pumps

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of pump.

   Industrial pumps moved thousands of gallons through the pipeline each hour.

   The boutique displayed a row of patent-leather pumps in the window.

   Note

   A regular plural that serves every countable sense of the noun: the devices that move liquid or gas, the fuel dispensers lined up at a filling station, and single strokes of a pump. The gym's word for muscle swelling after heavy lifting and the colloquial ride on a bicycle's handlebars take it too. The same spelling also serves as the present-tense verb, so context separates a row of pumps from a heart that pumps.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of pump.

   The heart pumps blood through the body without rest.

   A small motor pumps coolant around the engine block.

   Note

   Its constructions follow the verb's double nature. It can be used alone (she pumps at the well) or with an object (a mother pumps milk, a motor pumps coolant). With a person as the object it usually means persistent questioning, and it often takes for: he pumps the clerk for details. Take care with a person as the object in British contexts, because UK slang gives the verb a sexual sense.

   She pumps at the old well every morning.

   He pumps the clerk for every detail of the deal.

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