beetles

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of beetle.

   The biologist counted three species of beetles on a single fallen branch.

   Iridescent beetles glittered in the museum's display case.

   Note

   One spelling, several nouns behind it. Beetles are usually the hard-winged insects, but the same plural serves for the heavy wooden mallets used to drive wedges and beat pavements, and for the machines that hammer cloth in cotton mills. The dice game is the exception: it takes no plural, so players play beetle, not beetles. The spelling is also the verb for scurrying; after a number or article, it is the noun.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of beetle.

   The little terrier beetles down the hallway whenever the doorbell rings.

   Whenever the lecture ends, she beetles across campus to her next class.

   Note

   A single -s form carries four quite different verbs. Someone beetles off or away when they scurry. A cliff beetles over a cove when it juts above it, with or without an object. A workman beetles a pavement with a heavy mallet, and a mill beetles cloth by hammering it on rollers. After a singular subject it is the verb, not the plural noun.

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