cough
/kɔf/ verb B1- Sometimes followed by up: to force (something) out of the lungs or throat by pushing air from the lungs through the glottis (causing a short, explosive sound), and out through the mouth. · Sometimes she coughed up blood.
- To cause (oneself or something) to be in a certain condition in the manner described in etymology 1 sense 1.1. · He almost coughed himself into a fit.
- To express (words, etc.) in the manner described in etymology 1 sense 1.1.
- To surrender (information); to confess.
- Chiefly followed by up: to give up or hand over (something); especially, to pay up (money).
- To push air from the lungs through the glottis (causing a short, explosive sound) and out through the mouth, usually to expel something blocking or irritating the airway. · I breathed in a lungful of smoke by mistake, and started to cough.
- To make a noise like a cough. · The engine coughed and sputtered.
- To surrender information; to confess, to spill the beans.
Plural cough · He/she/it coughs · Past coughed · Past participle coughed · -ing form coughing
Verb forms
- Base form
- cough
- He/she/it
- coughs
- Past
- coughed
- Past participle
- coughed
- -ing form
- coughing
Phrasal verbs and expressions
From the library
About this time the nurse’s cough was heard on the stairs and the woman entered the room with a cup in her hand.
I gave her every drop of ipecac in that bottle and when the last dose went down I said to myself--not to Diana or Young Mary Joe, because I didn’t want to worry them any more than they were worried, but I had to say it to myself just to relieve my feelings--‘This is the last lingering hope and I fear, tis a vain one.’ But in about three minutes she coughed up the phlegm and began to get better right away.
His escort would rush him up a tree till he felt the thinnest topmost branches crackle and bend under them, and then with a cough and a whoop would fling themselves into the air outward and downward, and bring up, hanging by their hands or their feet to the lower limbs of the next tree.
Mowgli picked up some creepers and began to work them in and out, and the monkeys tried to imitate; but in a very few minutes they lost interest and began to pull their friends’ tails or jump up and down on all fours, coughing.
Other matches
- cough A sudden, often involuntary expulsion of air fr... B2
- cough Used to represent the sound of a cough C2
- cough down To drown out
- cough out To remove by coughing, especially figuratively,...
- cough over To give money or other valuables, usually reluc...
- cough up To expel from the lungs, throat, stomach, etc. ...
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