swallows

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of swallow.

   Dozens of swallows wheeled and dove above the meadow at dusk.

   He finished the cup in three long swallows.

   Note

   One spelling covers several quite different plurals. There are the birds wheeling over a meadow and the gulps that empty a cup. In Nigerian usage, swallows are starchy dishes that are swallowed without much chewing and eaten with soup. Riggers have swallows too: the openings in pulley blocks where the rope runs through. The same spelling also serves as the present-tense verb, as in "it swallows."

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of swallow.

   The snake swallows its prey whole, hours after the strike.

   She swallows hard and forces herself to keep reading the verdict aloud.

   Note

   Every use of the verb passes through this form, with or without an object. The snake swallows its prey, but a nervous witness simply swallows hard. In the figurative uses, someone who swallows a story believes it without question. Something that swallows up a smaller thing absorbs it, and up is the usual partner in that use. A speaker can even swallow a claim, taking it back.

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