Literary notes about scuttle (AI summary)
The word "scuttle" displays remarkable versatility in literature, functioning both as a noun and a verb with nautical, domestic, and metaphorical connotations. As a noun, it often denotes a container for coal or similar items—a mundane object that punctuates everyday life in works like those of Dickens and Thackeray ([1], [2], [3], [4]). In nautical contexts, it refers to a ship’s small opening or hatch that provides access, as seen in maritime adventures ([5], [6], [7], [8]). When used as a verb, it vividly conveys rapid, furtive movement, whether describing cockroaches in retreat or characters hastily exiting a room ([9], [10], [11]). Furthermore, the term is metaphorically extended to acts of sabotage, evoking deliberate destruction such as the scuttling of a ship ([12], [13], [14]). Through these varied uses, "scuttle" enriches narrative imagery and underscores actions both literal and symbolic.
- Then Mrs. Bunting scrutinised the waste-paper basket and Mr. Bunting opened the lid of the coal-scuttle.
— from The Invisible Man: A Grotesque Romance by H. G. Wells - Bob! Make up the fires, and buy another scuttle of coal before you dot another i, Bob Cratchit!"
— from The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book by Ontario. Department of Education - The big Irishwoman gave me a glance as kindly as it was shrewd, and took up her position beside me, her coal-scuttle bonnet on a level with my curls.
— from A Volunteer with Pike The True Narrative of One Dr. John Robinson and of His Love for the Fair Señorita Vallois by Robert Ames Bennet - Make up the fires, and buy another coal-scuttle before you dot another i, Bob Cratchit!” Scrooge was better than his word.
— from A Christmas Carol in Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas by Charles Dickens - We sprang up for our clothes, and were about halfway dressed, when the mate called out, down the scuttle, "Tumble up here, men!
— from Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana - The entrance to it is at the top, through a scuttle in the deck large enough to admit the lamp.
— from Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy.1866. Fourth edition. by United States. Navy Department. Bureau of Ordnance - Going forward to the forecastle, we found the slide of the scuttle open.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville - and looking up the scuttle, saw that it was just daylight.
— from Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana - Cockroaches usually scuttle away when they are disturbed and seem to have learnt that human beings have a just grievance against them.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - Then in the pause he heard his landlady scuttle upstairs, lock her door, and drag something heavy across the room and put against it.
— from The Country of the Blind, and Other Stories by H. G. Wells - Nic. came up to him with an insolent menacing air, so that the old fellow was forced to scuttle out of the room, and retire behind a dung-cart.
— from The History of John Bull by John Arbuthnot - He would at once have been suspected of trying to scuttle the ship of “benign civil government” if he had admitted that the regular army was needed.
— from The American Occupation of the Philippines 1898-1912 by James H. Blount - I was aware that their intention was to scuttle the ship and leave her, with us on board, to sink.
— from The Wreck of the Grosvenor, Volume 2 of 3 An account of the mutiny of the crew and the loss of the ship when trying to make the Bermudas by William Clark Russell - The dead were left on board, for it was decided to scuttle the ship.
— from The Japan-Russia War: An Illustrated History of the War in the Far East by Sydney Tyler
