rat-tail file
Americannoun
Etymology
Origin of rat-tail file
First recorded in 1840–50
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
You can bend a rat-tail file or ice pick in a vise to fashion a tool.
From Time Magazine Archive
I once knew a woman with no more music in her soul than a rat-tail file, who spent three laborious years learning to play the piano, then closed the instrument and never touched it again.
From Brann the Iconoclast — Volume 12 by William Cowper Brann
There was a good two-handed saw in the shed and Hiram found a good rat-tail file.
From Hiram the Young Farmer by Burbank L. Todd
Mac Tavish narrowed his eyes; he whittled his tone to a fine point to correspond, and the general effect was like impaling a puffball on a rat-tail file.
From All-Wool Morrison by Holman Day
It was laconic, but it sounded like a rat-tail file on steel.
From The Skipper and the Skipped Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul by Holman Day
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
