FRAIL • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Frail

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/freɪl/ Listen

adjective

frail adj. (compar. frailer; superl. frailest)

Easily broken; fragile; not firm or durable; liable to fail and perish; easily destroyed; not tenacious of life; weak; infirm. "That I may know how frail I am." "An old bent man, worn and frail."

Tender. (Obs.) "Deep indignation and compassion frail."

Liable to fall from virtue or be led into sin; not strong against temptation; weak in resolution; also, unchaste; often applied to fallen women. "Man is frail, and prone to evil."

noun

frail n.

A basket made of rushes, used chiefly for containing figs and raisins.

The quantity of raisins about thirty-two, fifty-six, or seventy-five pounds, contained in a frail.

A rush for weaving baskets.

See images of 'Frail'

Etymology of 'Frail'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Frail" Quotes from Famous Books

... the stucco and paint is falling or peeling everywhere; there are fissures in the walls, crumbling faades, tumbling roofs. The first stories, built with solidity worthy of an earthquake region, seem extravagantly heavy by contrast with the frail wooden superstructures. One reason may be that the city was burned and sacked during a negro revolt in 1878;—the Spanish basements resisted the fire well, and it was found necessary to rebuild only the second stories of the buildings; but the work was done cheaply and flimsily, ...

— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn

... and do a number of things that were done in life, without the body. Nor can he be said to believe in the immortality of the soul. That term describes a free and unfettered existence after death, but to the savage the spirit after death has but a troubled and frail existence; it is tethered to certain spots on the earth, known to it formerly; it cannot do much, it lives under many limitations and constraints. Nor, again, can it be said that retribution after death is a true designation of ...

— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies

... with his hands behind him and an atmosphere of mystery that enshrouded him like a cloak. Jimmy, having had a good night and having taken the morning's medicine without argument, had been allowed up in a roller chair. It struck Peter with a pang that the boy looked more frail day by day, ...

— The Street of Seven Stars • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... of the roads was such, and the bridge at Brown's so frail, that it was not until the 23d that we got three of my divisions behind the hills near the point indicated above Chattanooga for crossing the river. It was determined to begin the battle with these three divisions, aided by a division of Thomas's army, commanded ...

— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... clapped their hands, and she escorted them up to the Baby Walk and back again, one at a time, putting an arm or a finger round the very frail, setting their leg right when it got too ridiculous, and treating the foreign ones quite as courteously as the English, though she could not understand ...

— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie

More quotes...