stoke-hole
[Partly an adoption, partly a transl., of Du. stookgat, f. stoken to stoke + gat hole.]
1. The space in front of a furnace where the stokers stand to tend the fires; the aperture through which the fire is fed and tended; also Naut., a hole in the deck through which the fuel is passed for storage.
| 1660 J. Okie's Lament. xiv, I'le Cunningly retreat again into my warm Stoke Hole [of a brewery]. 1683 Moxon Mech. Exerc., Printing xviii. 163 The Stoke-Hole four Inches wide, and six Inches long. 1840 Civil Engin. & Arch. Jrnl. III. 349/2 The space between the engines and the boilers [of a steamship], usually called the stoke-hole. 1846 A. Young Naut. Dict. 322 Stoke-hole, a scuttle in a steamer's deck, to admit fuel for the engine. 1892 E. Reeves Homeward Bound 147 Lascars are employed on the decks and Zanzibar men in the stoke-hole. |
| attrib. 1660 J. Okie's Lament. vii, They say I am indited,..Would the Inditement was rak't in my Stoake hole Embers. |
2. (See
quot.)
| 1785 Specif. of Phillips' Patent No. 1477, That species of..fireplaces commonly called copper holes or stoke holes. |
† 3. fig. Obs.| 1768 [W. Donaldson] Life Sir B. Sapskull I. iv. 32 They scower the inside of their flower-pots, at the same time they make a stoke-hole of their throats. |