(adj) hesitant to state facts or opinions simply and directly as from e.g. timidity or hypocrisy, Syn.mealy-mouthed, Example: a mealymouthed politician
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English (GCIDE) v.0.53
a. [ Compar. Mealier superl. Mealiest. ]1. Having the qualities of meal; resembling meal; soft, dry, and friable; easily reduced to a condition resembling meal; as, a mealy potato. [ 1913 Webster ]
2. Overspread with something that resembles meal; as, the mealy wings of an insect. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]
n. (Zool.), Any of several homopteran scale insects (as, Coccus adonidum, and related species of the families Pseudococcidae and Eriococcidae), that cover themselves with a white powderlike or cottony wax secretion. They are common plant-eating pests in hothouses and are also destructive of fruit trees. [ 1913 Webster + WordNet 1.5 ]
a. Using soft words; not straightforward; plausible; affectedly or timidly delicate of speech; speaking deviously; unwilling to tell the truth in plain language. Opposite of frank or blunt. “Mealy-mouthed philanthropies.” Tennyson. [ 1913 Webster ]
She was a fool to be mealy-mouthed where nature speaks so plain. L'Estrange. [ 1913 Webster ]
แสดงได้ทั้งความหมายของคำเดี่ยว และคำผสม ได้อย่างถูกต้อง
เช่น Secretary of State=รัฐมนตรีต่างประเทศของสหรัฐฯ (ในภาพตัวอย่าง),
High school=โรงเรียนมัธยมปลาย
