Also 8–9 cannister. [ad. L. canistr-um bread basket, basket for fruit or flowers, ad. Gr. κάναστρον wicker basket (app. f. κάννα reed).]

1

  1.  A small case or box, usually of metal, for holding tea, coffee, shot, etc.

2

1711.  Lond. Gaz., No. 4915/4. A silver Canister for Tea.

3

1769.  Falconer, Dict. Marine (1789), C cc b. A case … or cannister, filled with case-shot.

4

1778.  Johnson, in Boswell (1887), III. 320. This authour, when mankind are hunting him with a cannister at his tail.

5

1828.  J. W. Croker, in Cr. Papers (1884), I. xiii. 404. A dog with a canister tied to his tail.

6

  b.  R. C. Ch. A metal vessel used to hold the wafers before consecration.

7

  † 2.  An instrument used in racking off wine. Obs.

8

1678.  Phillips, Cannister, a certain Instrument which Coopers use in the racking of [1696 off] the Wine. Hence in Bailey, etc.

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  † 3.  A quantity of tea from 75 to 100 lbs. weight.

10

1704.  Worlidge, Dict. Rust. et Urb., s.v., Canister; of Tea, 75 to 1 c. weight.

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1715.  in Kersey.

12

1721.  in Bailey.

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  4.  A basket for bread, flowers, etc. [transl. or imitation of the Lat. or Gr.]

14

1697.  Potter, Antiq. Greece, IV. viii. (1715), 233. Full Canisters of fragrant Lillies.

15

1697.  Dryden, Virg. Æneid, I. 981.

        Then Canisters with Bread are heap’d on high;
Th’ Attendants Water for their Hands supply.

16

1718.  Pope, Odyss., I. 184. They heap the glittering canisters with bread.

17

1847.  Emerson, Poems, Monadnoc, Wks. (Bohn), I. 435. Weave wood to canisters and mats.

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  5.  Short for canister-shot (see 6).

19

1801.  Naval Chron., VI. 237. A brisk discharge of cannister and grape.

20

1833.  Marryat, P. Simple (1863), 331. ‘Put another dose of canister in.’ We did so, and then discharged the gun.

21

1863.  Kinglake, Crimea (1877), III. i. 121. The storm of … grape and canister came in blasts.

22

  6.  Comb., as canisterful; canister-shot, a kind of case-shot consisting of ‘a number of small iron balls … packed in a cylindrical tin case fitting the bore of the gun from which it is to be fired’ (Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., s.v. Case-shot).

23

1809.  Naval Chron., XXI. 25. Repeated broadsides of grape and cannister shot.

24

1810.  Wellington, in Gurw., Disp., VI. 376. 1000 rounds of canister shot.

25

1865.  Dickens, Mut. Fr., vi. 309. A canister-full of treasure.

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