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Plum   /pləm/   Listen
noun
Plum  n.  
1.
(Bot.) The edible drupaceous fruit of the Prunus domestica, and of several other species of Prunus; also, the tree itself, usually called plum tree. "The bullace, the damson, and the numerous varieties of plum, of our gardens, although growing into thornless trees, are believed to be varieties of the blackthorn, produced by long cultivation." Note: Two or three hundred varieties of plums derived from the Prunus domestica are described; among them the greengage, the Orleans, the purple gage, or Reine Claude Violette, and the German prune, are some of the best known. Note: Among the true plums are; Beach plum, the Prunus maritima, and its crimson or purple globular drupes, Bullace plum. See Bullace. Chickasaw plum, the American Prunus Chicasa, and its round red drupes. Orleans plum, a dark reddish purple plum of medium size, much grown in England for sale in the markets. Wild plum of America, Prunus Americana, with red or yellow fruit, the original of the Iowa plum and several other varieties. Among plants called plum, but of other genera than Prunus, are; Australian plum, Cargillia arborea and Cargillia australis, of the same family with the persimmon. Blood plum, the West African Haematostaphes Barteri. Cocoa plum, the Spanish nectarine. See under Nectarine. Date plum. See under Date. Gingerbread plum, the West African Parinarium macrophyllum. Gopher plum, the Ogeechee lime. Gray plum, Guinea plum. See under Guinea. Indian plum, several species of Flacourtia.
2.
A grape dried in the sun; a raisin.
3.
A handsome fortune or property; formerly, in cant language, the sum of £100,000 sterling; also, the person possessing it.
4.
Something likened to a plum in desirableness; a good or choice thing of its kind, as among appointments, positions, parts of a book, etc.; as, the mayor rewarded his cronies with cushy plums, requiring little work for handsome pay
5.
A color resembling that of a plum; a slightly grayish deep purple, varying somewhat in its red or blue tint.
Plum bird, Plum budder (Zool.), the European bullfinch.
Plum gouger (Zool.), a weevil, or curculio (Coccotorus scutellaris), which destroys plums. It makes round holes in the pulp, for the reception of its eggs. The larva bores into the stone and eats the kernel.
Plum weevil (Zool.), an American weevil which is very destructive to plums, nectarines, cherries, and many other stone fruits. It lays its eggs in crescent-shaped incisions made with its jaws. The larva lives upon the pulp around the stone. Called also turk, and plum curculio.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Plum" Quotes from Famous Books



... locality. The Lancashire witches of 1633 were the direct outcome of the Lancashire witches of 1612. The story is a weird one. An eleven-year-old boy played truant one day to his cattle-herding, and, as he afterwards told the story, went plum-gathering. When he came back he had to find a plausible excuse to present to his parents. Now, the lad had been brought up in the Blackburn forest, close to Pendle Hill; he had overheard stories of Malking ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein

... there was for dinner?" inquired Mrs. Marx now. "I shouldn't like to make my dinner of boiled beef, if there was partridges comin'. And when there's plum-puddin' I always like to know ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner

... deserve it for my humility," he says plaintively. "I have stood in the background, humbly and afar off, and given you up to my betters. Surely, after all the bitter pills I have been swallowing, I deserve one sugar-plum." ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming

... and safety of the dishes, which she playfully shied at whoever came within reach, she was ejected, and Mathewson prepared his own meals. At The'venet's, however, everything went smoothly, and the sumptuous meal of baked whitefish, venison, with canned vegetables, plum pudding, cheese and coffee—delicacies held in reserve for the occasion—made us forget the bleak wilderness and ice-bound land in which ...
— The Long Labrador Trail • Dillon Wallace

... eyes of mine, I seek above the surf of hedgerow line Where peeping branches reach, and reaching twine Faint cherry or plum or eglantine. But with pretence of whisperings The year's young mischief-wind shall take By storm these shy striplings, And soon or later shake Their slender limbs, and make Free with their clinging may— Strip from them in a single boisterous day ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various


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