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bristling

   Also found in: Medical, Legal, Idioms, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia 0.03 sec.
bris·tle  (brsl)
n.
1. A stiff hair.
2. A stiff hairlike structure: the bristles of a wire brush.
v. bris·tled, bris·tling, bris·tles
v.intr.
1. To stand stiffly on end like bristles: The hair on the dog's neck bristled.
2. To raise the bristles: The cat bristled at the sight of the large dog.
3. To react in an angry or offended manner: The author bristled at the suggestion of plagiarism.
4. To be covered or thick with or as if with bristles: The path bristled with thorns.
v.tr.
1. To cause to stand erect like bristles; stiffen.
2. To furnish or supply with bristles.
3. To make bristly; ruffle.

[Middle English bristel, probably from Old English *byrstel, from byrst, bristle.]
Translations
bristling [ˈbrɪslɪŋ] adj
[moustache, beard, eyebrows] → broussailleux/euse
(= energetic) → énergique


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? Mentioned in ? References in classic literature
 
This he resented, and when she stood shoulder to shoulder with him, bristling and showing her teeth, the aspiring solitary ones would back off, turn-tail, and continue on their lonely way.
And saw it also, with hair bristling, its head upwards, trembling in the stillest midnight, when even dogs believe in ghosts:
No -- better still, he would join the Indians, and hunt buffaloes and go on the warpath in the mountain ranges and the trackless great plains of the Far West, and away in the future come back a great chief, bristling with feathers, hideous with paint, and prance into Sunday- school, some drowsy summer morning, with a blood- curdling war-whoop, and sear the eyeballs of all his companions with unappeasable envy.
 
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