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Scrub   /skrəb/   Listen
noun
Scrub  n.  
1.
One who labors hard and lives meanly; a mean fellow. "A sorry scrub." "We should go there in as proper a manner as possible; nor altogether like the scrubs about us."
2.
Something small and mean.
3.
A worn-out brush.
4.
A thicket or jungle, often specified by the name of the prevailing plant; as, oak scrub, palmetto scrub, etc.
5.
(Stock Breeding) One of the common live stock of a region of no particular breed or not of pure breed, esp. when inferior in size, etc. (U.S.)
6.
Vegetation of inferior quality, though sometimes thick and impenetrable, growing in poor soil or in sand; also, brush; called also scrub brush. See Brush, above. (Australia & South Africa)
7.
(Forestry) A low, straggling tree of inferior quality.
Scrub bird (Zool.), an Australian passerine bird of the family Atrichornithidae, as Atrichia clamosa; called also brush bird.
Scrub oak (Bot.), the popular name of several dwarfish species of oak. The scrub oak of New England and the Middle States is Quercus ilicifolia, a scraggy shrub; that of the Southern States is a small tree (Quercus Catesbaei); that of the Rocky Mountain region is Quercus undulata, var. Gambelii.
Scrub robin (Zool.), an Australian singing bird of the genus Drymodes.



verb
Scrub  v. t.  (past & past part. scrubbed; pres. part. scrubbing)  To rub hard; to wash with rubbing; usually, to rub with a wet brush, or with something coarse or rough, for the purpose of cleaning or brightening; as, to scrub a floor, a doorplate.



Scrub  v. i.  To rub anything hard, especially with a wet brush; to scour; hence, to be diligent and penurious; as, to scrub hard for a living.



adjective
Scrub  adj.  Mean; dirty; contemptible; scrubby. "How solitary, how scrub, does this town look!" "No little scrub joint shall come on my board."
Scrub game, a game, as of ball, by unpracticed players.
Scrub race, a race between scrubs, or between untrained animals or contestants.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Scrub" Quotes from Famous Books



... fever, and cholera and other dread diseases, by being willing to do the dirty work and to wear the old hat. Why, just suppose everybody was a college president. Who would wash our clothes? Who would scrub our floors? Who would clean our streets? Who ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold

... region of the island, but further east, extended wide central tracts of pine and scrub-oak, (charcoal was largely made here,) monotonous and sterile. But many a good day or half-day did I have, wandering through those solitary crossroads, inhaling the peculiar and wild aroma. Here, and all along the island and its shores, I spent intervals many years, all seasons, sometimes riding, ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... wash dirty wool so's to cleanse it, so with a pitiless zeal we will scrub Through the whole city for all greasy fellows; burrs too, the parasites, off we will rub. That verminous plague of insensate place-seekers soon between thumb and forefinger we'll crack. All who inside Athens' walls have their dwelling into one great ...
— Lysistrata • Aristophanes

... the climbers, reappearing above, crawl like flies out on the face of the rock and, with craning necks and cautious steps, seek new advantage above. They discovered at length the remains of a scrub pine jutting out below the railroad track. The tree had been sawed off almost at the root, when the roadbed was levelled, and a few feet of the trunk was left hugging upward against the ...
— The Daughter of a Magnate • Frank H. Spearman

... afterward he came out of his reverie, and said: "I forgot to tell you that Swanson spoke to me yesterday about his sister's latest. I was awfully sorry for the poor chap, my dear. He seemed most anxious to see the child comfortably settled. His sister is a scrub-woman in the Metropolitan Life Building. It appears that she has been supplying families with children for the past ten or twelve years. Her husband is a most unfeeling brute. He says that the babies interfere with her work, and so she has to either give them up altogether or let ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon


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