| 词源 |
back and fill. Hardly any progress is made when you back and fill a sailing ship; that is, when you are tacking the craft while the tide is running with her and the wind is against her. The sails are alternately backed and filled and the ship seems to remain in roughly the same place, going back and then for- ward. The term was a natural for sailors, and then landlubbers, to apply to any vacillating or irresolute action—to hem and haw. |