snip-snap

present singular third person snip-snaps · participle present snip-snapping · participle past snip-snapped · past snip-snapped

1. To shut, close, bite, etc., with a brisk snap.

   He had picked a small section of scrub behind his shanty which the lagoon below cut into paintable patterns, and with easel snip-snapped up and palette set, was going through the essential preliminary of peering at it[.]

   1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 40

   1 more example

   No doubt of it, Edmund was at grips with that bumptious little hairy dog. They were going it at the very top note of sadistic fury, screaming and snip-snapping in such a lightning mixture of black and white murder that the eye could not follow it.

   1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 140

plural snip-snaps

1. A sharp snapping sound.
2. idiomaticA tart dialogue with quick replies.

   snip-snap short, and interruption smart

   1728, [Alexander Pope], “(please specify the page)”, in The Dunciad. An Heroic Poem. […], Dublin; London: […] A. Dodd, →OCLC

   1 more example

   The daily snip-snaps and hubbubs between the cross-purposed couple accentuated that tendency in her. After each altercation Mrs. Coley was seized with an hysterical attack, and my services were needed.

   1933, American Medicine, volume 39, page 73