[f. as prec.]
1. Emitting or ejecting saliva or spittle. Also in comb. venom-sputtering.
1598. Marston, Sco. Villanie, III. xi. 229. Avaunt lewd curre, presume not speake Or with thy venome-sputtering chaps to barke Gainst well-pend poems.
1602. Dekker, Satiro-m., Wks. 1873, I. 244. Thy sputtering chappes yelpe, that Arrogance, and Impudence,… are the essentiall parts of a Courtier.
2. Characterized by, burning with, making or giving out, a succession of explosive sounds accompanied by the emission of small particles, sparks, or bursts of flame.
1649. G. Daniel, Trinarch., Hen. V., cxx. The Despaireing flame Resigns its Sputtering light, ere the Time came.
1697. Dryden, Æneid, XII. 762. The laurels crackle in the sputt’ring fire.
1743. Davidson, Æneid, VIII. 251. Others dip the sputtering Metals in the Trough.
1794. Schmeisser, Syst. Min., I. 219. The so called sprudel stone or sputtering stone, from Carlsbad.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., III. V. vi. The wheels of Langres scream, amid their sputtering fire-halo.
1848. Thackeray, Van. Fair, lxi. A sputtering tallow candle.
1880. Grant, Hist. India, vi. 33/2. A sputtering fire of musketry was kept up for two hours.
b. Of sound, etc.
1825. Jamieson, Suppl., Sotter,… the bubbling, crackling, or sputtering noise made by any thing in boiling or cooking.
1860. Tyndall, Glac., I. xxv. 189. My lamp … carried on a sputtering combustion.
1874. L. Stephen, Hours in Library (1892), I. iii. 94. His writings resemble those fireworks which … suddenly break out again into sputtering explosions.
3. Of speech, etc., or of persons with reference to this: (see SPUTTER v. 4).
1691. [De Foe], New Disc. Old Intreague, xxxiii. 33. Sir W—m W—ms first the Cause espous’d, And all his sputtering Eloquence he rous’d.
1756. Mrs. Delany, Life & Corr. (1861), III. 411. To make out sputtering Hampden’s observation.
1812. Combe, Tour Picturesque, XXIII. Then … his shrill and sputt’ring speeches.
c. 1825. Ld. Cockburn, Mem., iii. (1874), 135. His voice … got sputtering and screechy when he became excited.
1835. T. Mitchell, Aristoph. Acharn., 1041, note. It would have afforded the angry chorus a very appropriate quotation against their parsimonious and sputtering provider.
Hence Sputteringly adv., in a sputtering manner; with a sputter or sputters.
1833. Lamb, Elia, II. Barbara S—. When she crammed a portion of it into her mouth, she was obliged sputteringly to reject it.
1861. Temple Bar, III. 359. ‘But—but’—I exclaimed sputteringly.
