Forms: 4–6 spowte, 6–7 (9) spowt (6 Sc. spowtt-, spowit); 5–7 spoute (5 spute), 6–7 Sc. spoutt-, 6– spout. [ME. spowte, spoute, of doubtful origin, corresponding to older Flem. spuyte (also spoyte, spoeyte), Du. (and WFris.) spuit, NFris. spütj, spout, squirt, fire-engine; cf. MSw. eldsputa a fire-throwing war-engine, Norw. dial. sputa cuttle-fish. See SPOUT v.]
I. 1. A pipe by which rain-water is carried off or discharged from a roof.
1392. Mem. Ripon (Surtees), III. 113. In salario Ricardi de Bettes facientis guturas cum spowtis super quamdam novam cameram … cum plumbo de stauro ecclesiæ.
1412–20. Lydg., Chron. Troy, II. 697. Gargoyl & many hidous hed, With spoutis þoruȝ, & pipes.
c. 1475. Pict. Voc., in Wr.-Wülcker, 800. Hoc stillicidium, a spowte.
1538. in Lett. Suppress. Monast. (Camden), 198. Dyverse gutteres, spowtes, and condytes.
a. 1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. VIII., 166. In the fyrst worke were gargylles of golde fiersly faced with spoutes runnyng.
1600. Surflet, Countrie Farme, I. iv. 7. The cesterne shall be set in such a place, as that it may receiue all that commeth from such spouts as are belonging to roofes or lower lofts of the house.
c. 1720. Prior, Fatal Love, 1. Poor Hal caught his death standing under a spout,… And curs’d was the weather that quench’d the man’s flame.
1788. Gibbon, Decl. & F., V. 191. A spout (now of gold) discharges the rain-water, and the well Zemzem is protected by a dome.
1823. Act 4 Geo. IV., c. 3 § 42. A Spout … from the Roof down to the Ground, to carry off … the Water.
1845. Alb. Smith, Fort. Scattergood Fam., xxxii. The splashing cataracts from the eaves and spouts of the dwellings.
b. A pipe or similar conduit through which water or other liquid flows and is discharged; that part of a fountain, pump, etc., from which the water issues.
1408. in Eng. Hist. Rev. (1899), XIV. 517. Les spowtes lignea ducentia aquam a dicto Watergate usque dictam rotam.
1474–5. Durham Acc. Rolls (Surtees), 95. Factura unius le Spowte inter pandoxatorium et ortum porcorum.
1548. Extr. Aberdeen Reg. (1844), I. 259. Certane wther varklummes, sic as spowttis, spowcheouris, and cruikis, worth xxx s.
1594. T. B., La Primaud. Fr. Acad., II. 122. The nose is giuen to man that it might serue the braine in stead of a pipe and spowt to purge it of flegmatike humours.
1601. Shaks., Jul. C., II. ii. 77. She dreampt … she saw my Statue, Which like a Fountaine with an hundred spouts Did run pure blood.
1632. Lithgow, Trav., VII. 316. Betweene the Riuer and this pond, there are sixe passages or spouts digged through the Banke.
1705. Addison, Italy, 142. A beautiful Marble Fountain, where the Water runs continually thro’ several little Spouts.
1747. Wesley, Jrnl., Feb. (1849), I. 444. They brought an hand-engine;… the constable came, seized upon the spout of the engine, and carried it off.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1824), I. xx. 144. A hollow copper ball, with a long pipe;… through this spout it is to be filled with water.
1815. J. Smith, Panorama Sci. & Art, II. 117. The spout of the pump should be opposite the horizontal part of the pipe.
1833. Loudon, Encycl. Archit., § 1020. The situation of the spout or trunk of wood … for supplying water to the cisterns.
1858. Lardner, Hand-bk. Nat. Phil., 113. G 1 is a short tube proceeding from the side of the barrel…. K is the spout of discharge.
fig. 1592. Timme, Ten Eng. Lepers, B iij. Some rashe heades being Conchæ, before they be Canales, that is to say, Spoutes, before they have filled their Cesterne.
1611. Shaks., Wint. T., III. iii. 26. And (gasping to begin some speech) her eyes Became two spouts.
1885. Sat. Rev., 3 Jan., 2/1. Another type of Correspondent there is whose function is to serve as spout for this or that Continental statesman.
† c. A syringe. Obs.–1
1546. Phaër, Bk. Childr., X ij. Iuyce of purcelane:… dryue it in wyth a spoute called of the surgions a syrynge.
† d. = SPOUT-HOLE 1. Obs.
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., 197. They have … sharp and little teeth: great eyes. A spout betwixt the eyes.
1681. Grew, Musæum, I. 38. He squirts the water out at his Nostrils, in the same manner as the Dolphin doth at his Spout.
1747. Gentl. Mag., 174/2. His spouts are in his forehead, and not on the hinder part of his head, as in other whales.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1824), III. 27. The cachalot … with a spout in the neck; that with a spout in the snout.
e. Mining. A short passage connecting an air-head with a gate-road.
1839. Ure, Dict. Arts, 990. Lateral openings, named spouts, are led from the air-head gallery into the side of work. Ibid. (1853), (ed. 4), II. 225. A series of ‘spouts’ or openings are driven upwards from the gate-road.
1883. Gresley, Gloss. Coal-mining, Spout, a short underground passage in the Thick-coal workings connecting a main road with an air-head.
2. A tubular or lip-like addition to, or projection from, a vessel to facilitate the pouring out of liquid from it.
1444. Test. Ebor. (Surtees), II. 101. j laver cum ij spowtes deaurat. pond. vij unc. et dim.
1591. Sylvester, Du Bartas, I. iv. 278. Mean-while the Skinker, from his starry spout, After the Goat, a silver stream pours out.
1650. Bulwer, Anthropomet., 113. They of Goa … drink out of a Copper-Can with a Spout.
1664. Power, Exp. Philos., II. 125. We took a Glass-Cruet, with a small Spout, and fill’d it with Water.
1755. Johnson, Beak,… the spout of a cup.
1790. Act 30 Geo. III., c. 31 § 3. Spouts to China, Stone, or Earthenware Teapots.
1842. Loudon, Suburban Hort., 147. The larger rose, e, is used without the middle piece of the spout.
1846. Dickens, Cricket on Hearth, i. The kettle … carrying its handle with an air of defiance, and cocking its spout pertly.
1866. R. M. Ballantyne, Shifting Winds, i. He … willed to screw off the spout of the family tea-pot,… and … he did it.
b. In pigeons: (see quots.).
1879. L. Wright, Pigeon Keeper, 85. Carriers … are … peculiarly subject to ‘spouts.’ Ibid., 231. Spouts … consist of a folded corner in the lower eyelid, through which there is a constant gradual drain of fluid.
3. A contrivance having the form of a trough or box with open ends, by which flour, grain, coals, etc., are discharged from, or conveyed to, a receptacle; a shoot.
1557. in Hazl., E. P. P., III. 110. The one clarke stode at the spoute Thereas the meale shoulde come out.
1629. Reg. Privy Council Scot., III. 15. [They] hewed doun to the ground the spouttes of the compleaners said mylne.
1677. Yarranton, Eng. Improv., 136. There must be in each side of the Granaries, Three or Four long Troughs or Spouts fixt in the uppermost Loft.
1793. [Earl Dundonald], Descr. Estate Culross, 55. Shipping the Coal, from an elevated Coal Steath and Spout, instead of by Hand-barrows.
1821. Acc. Peculations in Coal Trade, 3. The Coals descending from a spout into the vessel.
1860. Mining Gloss., Newcastle Terms, 64. Spouts, boxes down which the coals are run from the waggons into the ships.
1884. Tyne Improv. Comm. Bye-Laws, 29. Pitch … shall not be boiled … within 40 feet of any staith, drop, spout, warehouse or other erection on or near to the dock.
4. A lift formerly in use in pawnbrokers’ shops, up which the articles pawned were taken for storage. Also transf., a pawnshop.
1837. Dickens, Pickw., xlii. Spout—dear relation—uncle Tom.
1855. Gentl. Mag., Oct., 446. Mr. Hull, pawnbroker,… committed suicide … by hanging himself within his ‘spout.’
1859. Sala, Tw. round Clock (1861), 286. The half-pence rattle, shillings are tested, huge bundles rumble down the spout.
1866. Howells, Venetian Life, 108. Instead of many pawnbrokers’ shops there is one large municipal spout.
b. Hence to put (or shove) up the spout, to pawn. Up the spout, pawned, pledged; also fig., in a bad way, in a hopeless condition, out of the question.
1812. J. H. Vaux, Flash Dict., s.v., To pledge any property at a pawnbroker’s is termed … shoving it up the spout.
1848. Thackeray, Van. Fair, xxx. Please to put that up the spout, ma’am, with my pins, and rings, and watch and chain, and things.
1886. D. C. Murray, Cynic Fortune, vii. I haven’t a suit of clothes fit to go in; even my wig and gown are up the spout together.
fig. 1853. Dods, Early Lett. (1910), 35. The fact is, Germany is up the spout, and consequently a damper is thrown over my hopes for next summer.
1854. Miss Baker, Northampt. Gloss., ‘He’s up the spout.’ A phrase applied to a person in a state of bankruptcy.
1857. Trollope, Three Clerks, xviii. I shall be up the spout altogether if you don’t do something to help me. Ibid. (1864), Small Ho. at Allington, xxxvi. He was regularly up the spout with accommodation bills.
II. 5. Sc. A razor-fish.
1525. in Excerpta e Libr. Domicilii Jacobi Quinti (Bann. Cl.), 7. Bukes, spouttis, grenbans, podlokis.
1710. Sibbald, Hist. Fife, 55. The Sheath, or Razor Fish; our Fishers call them Spouts.
1742. Richardson, De Foe’s Tour Gt. Brit., IV. 9. Scollops, and Spouts, are cast up by the Tide in such Numbers on the Isles, that the People cannot consume them.
1793. Statist. Acc. Scot., VII. 543. Lobsters, partens, cockles, muscles, and spouts or razor fish.
1806. Neill, Tour, 93. Besides … rasor-fish or spouts, they have abundance of what are called culleocks and smurlins.
1837. R. Dunn, Ornith. Orkney & Shetl., 8. Razor-fish, commonly called spouts.
6. A waterspout.
Common in 17th and 18th cent.; now rare.
1555. Eden, Decades (Arb.), 386. They sawe certeyne stremes of water which they caule spoutes faulynge out of the ayer into the sea.
1570. Dee, Math. Pref., d iv b. He ought to haue expert coniecture of Stormes, Tempestes, and Spoutes.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., V. ii. 171. The dreadfull spout, Which Shipmen doe the Hurricano call.
1698. T. Froger, Voy., 90. There we saw two of those pillars of water that arise out of the Sea, and which are commonly call’d Spouts.
1719. Phil. Trans., XXX. 1097. A vast breach in the Ground, which was made by a Spout, which fell upon Emott-more.
1769. Falconer, Dict. Marine (1780), s.v. Water-spout, The whirlwinds and spouts are not always … in the day-time.
1819. Keats, Song of Four Fairies, 82. To the torrid spouts and fountains, Underneath earth-quaked mountains.
1842. Penny Cycl., XXII. 382/2. Some spouts disappear almost as soon as they are formed, and others have been known to continue nearly an hour.
b. A heavy downpour or pelt (of rain).
1648. B. Plantagenet, Descr. New Albion, Pref. 3. The storm grew far more tempestuous with … terrible gusts and spouts, that made the rivers rise, and my friends to hide.
1692. Ray, Disc., II. ii. (1693), 74. Of great Spouts of Rain … that set the whole Countrey in a Flood.
1851. Mayne Reid, Scalp Hunt., xli. 319. The rain fell, not in drops, but in ‘spouts.’
7. A discharge of water or other liquid, in some quantity and with some degree of force, from the mouth of a pipe or similar orifice.
1500–20. Dunbar, Poems, xxxiii. 104. He maid a hundreth nolt all hawkit Beneth him with a spowt.
1617. Moryson, Itin., I. 153. With the turning of a cocke, spoutes of water rise up in great force.
1718. Lady M. W. Montagu, Lett. to Mrs. Thistlethwayte, 1 April. Marble fountains in the lower part of the room, which throw up several spouts of water.
1793. Smeaton, Edystone L., § 317, note. This momentary Spout of the Edystone may perhaps be best compared with the momentary jet of boiling water … from the Fountain Geisser in Iceland!
1825. Hone, Every-day Bk., I. 1044. The most usual form is a simple opening to throw the jet or spout upright.
1851. Mayne Reid, Scalp Hunt., xxxii. 250. The red spout [of blood] gushed forth, and the victim fell forward.
1877. Black, Green Past., xxxviii. These spouts and jets increased to a shower.
transf. 1771. Encycl. Brit., II. 124/2. The volatile phosphorus continues two hours; after which the little spout of light contracts to the length of a line or two.
b. Spouting power or force. rare.
a. 1774. Goldsm., Surv. Exp. Philos. (1776), I. 405. Thus at b, the water had no spout for want of height to drive it; at c, the water hath no spout for want of room to descend.
c. Agric. A spring of water forcing its way up through the soil.
1791. Statist. Acc. Scotl., I. 442. The land abounds with boggs and springs, or what husbandmen call spouts.
1801. Farmer’s Mag., Nov., 414. The benefit arising from draining, whether by carrying away surface-water, or freeing the land from spouts, occasioned by water bursting out from higher grounds.
1840. J. Buel, Farmer’s Companion, 96. When wetness is caused by spouts or springs, rising from below, the object is to prevent the water rising to or saturating the soil.
1844. H. Stephens, Bk. Farm, I. 505. 4-feet drains have completely removed the spouts.
d. The column of spray thrown into the air by a whale in the act of respiration.
1824. J. F. Cooper, Pilot, xvii. ’Tis a right whale,… I saw his spout.
1839. T. Beale, Nat. Hist. Sperm Whale, 42. From the extremity of the nose the spout is thrown up.
1850. Scoresby, Cheever’s Whaleman’s Adv., vi. (1858), 78. Its spout … flashes up from the ocean just like smoke.
1898. F. T. Bullen, Cruise ‘Cachalot,’ xviii. 217. We flew after a retreating spout to leeward.
8. An outpour or rush of water falling from a higher to a lower level, esp. in a detached stream; a waterfall or cascade of this kind.
a. 1700. Evelyn, Diary, 27 Feb. 1644. Before this grotto is a long poole into which ran divers spouts of water.
1775. A. Burnaby, Trav., 29. Coming to a ledge of rocks, which runs … cross the river, it divides into two spouts…. The spout on the Virginian side makes three falls.
1806. Forsyth, Beauties Scotl., III. 388. The river rushes over the Auchinlilie Lin or Spout, a tremendous cataract.
1836. G. Back, Arctic Land Exped., x. 334. The river, from an imposing width, now gradually contracted to about fifty yards…. In the language of voyageurs, this form is denominated a spout.
1879. Stevenson, Trav. Cevennes (1886), 126. A streamlet made a little spout over some stones to serve me for a water-tap.
b. A similar fall of earth or rock.
1883. Stevenson, Silverado Sq., 234. The great spout of broken mineral, which had damned the canyon up. Ibid. (1883), Treas. Isl., xv. From the side of the hill … a spout of gravel was dislodged.
9. a. slang. (See quot.)
1787. Grose, Prov. Gloss., s.v., He is in great spout, he is in high spirits.
1888. in Berkshire Gloss., 153.
b. A recitation or declamation. rare–1.
1832. Hood, Stage-Struck Hero, 59. If one should just break out, Perchance, into a little spout, A stick about the skull is.
10. A spurt; a sudden dart.
1787. Burns, Petit. Bruar Water, ii. If, in their random, wanton spouts, They near the margin stray;… They’re left … In gasping death to wallow.
III. 11. attrib. and Comb., as spout-kind, -like adj.; spout-coals, coals loaded from a spout; spout-cup, † (a) a cup with a spout; (b) the upper end of a rain-spout; spout-fish, a mollusk that spouts or squirts out water, esp. a razor-fish; spout-head, (a) a rose on a watering-can; (b) a spring or fountain; spout-mouth, (a) a mouth resembling the spout of a vessel; (b) Mining (see quot.); spout-mouthed a., having a mouth shaped like a spout; † spout-pen (see quot.); † spout-pitcher, a pitcher with a spout; spout-plane (see quot.); † spout-pot, a pot with a spout; spout-road, Mining (see quot.); spout-shell, Zool. (see quots.); spout-vessel, a coal-boat loaded by means of a spout; spout-well, a well from which the water issues by a spout; spout-whale [cf. older Flem. spuyt-wal], a spouting whale.
1821. Acc. Peculations in Coal Trade, 5. Certificates … whereby he may see which are *spout or keel coals.
1702. Lond. Gaz., No. 3806/8. An old fashioned *Spout Cup mark’d E.L.
1864. Atkinson, Stanton Grange, 11. A starling built its nest in one of the spout-cups to the eaves-gutters of our house.
1805. Barry, Orkney, 287. The Razor,… or, as we name it, the *spout-fish, is also found in sandy places.
1895. Stand. Dict., Spout-fish, a bivalve that squirts water from its siphons, as the soft clam.
1904. Edith Rickert, Reaper, 269. The Spanish treasure-ship, a hundred years ago, poured her silver among the tang and spout-fish.
1733. W. Ellis, Chiltern & Vale Farm., 359. Pouring it through the streaming Holes of the *spout Head.
1818. Keats, Endym., II. 89. As if, athirst with So much toil, ’twould sip The crystal spout-head.
1699. Evelyn, Diary, 26 March. A larger [whale] of the *Spout kind, was killed there 40 years ago.
1829. Hood, in The Gem, 182. That damsel thrusting out a pair of pouting lips, still more *spout-like, at a rusty ribbon.
1875. Huxley & Martin, Pract. Biol., xi. 199. A short open spout-like tube.
1838. Carlyle, in Froude, Life in Lond. (1884), I. 135. Radical Grote…, a man with strait upper lip, large chin, and open mouth (*spout mouth).
1886. J. Barrowman, Sc. Mining Terms, 63. Spout-mouth, a place on a level road where the material from a spout road is filled into the hutches.
c. 1711. Petiver, Gazophyl., VII. lxi. *Spout-mouth’d Condore Button-shell.
1891. Meredith, One of our Conq., xiv. We have … our spout-mouthed young man, our eminently silly woman.
1713. Petiver, Aquat. Anim. Amboinæ, Tab. xiii. Strombus tuberosus … Knobbed *Spout-pen.
1648. Hexham, II. Een Bespruytkruycke, a Sprinkling, or a *Spout-picher for gardens.
1875. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2288/2. *Spout-plane, a round-soled plane used in hollowing out stuff for spouting and troughs.
1608. Willet, Hexapla in Exod., 590. Vessels to powre in wine with, like vnto our *spout pots.
1631. in Wills Doctors’ Comm. (Camden), 93. The deepe silver bason, the spout pott and maudlyn cupp of silver.
1879. Miss Jackson, Shropsh. Word-bk., 404. *Spout-road, same as Cungit [= ‘a road in a mine driven out of the main road for the convenience of drawing the coals’].
1886. J. Barrowman, Sc. Mining Terms, 63. Spout-road,… a road so steep that the mineral slides down of itself to a level.
1861. P. P. Carpenter, in Rep. Smithsonian Instit., 1860, 198. Family Aporrhaïdæ. (*Spout Shells.)
1881. Cassell’s Nat. Hist., V. 209. The genus Aporrhais, or the ‘Spout-shell,’ is a shell with an elongated spire.
1821. Acc. Peculations in Coal Trade, 3. This is the reason why a *spout vessel is preferred to a keel ship.
1875. W. M‘Ilwraith, Guide to Wigtownshire, 118. The spring of water … has been diverted into tiles, and forms a *spout-well.
1701. Brand, Descr. Orkney, etc. iv. (1703), 48. There are likewise a great number of little Whales,… which they call *spout-Whales or Pellacks.
