Checking saved dictionary data and trusted language sources. This will stop automatically if a source does not respond.
Pronunciation varies by accent · noun
Children’s toy consisting of a small box from which a male figure pops out unexpectedly after some turnings of a crank..
"Did you venture to call me a liar?" ("No, sir, no!" shouted the accused, and disappeared like a Jack-in-the-box.)
“There’s this terrible business to start with. Scotland Yard men in and out of the house like a jack-in-the-box! Never know where they won’t turn up next.”
Normally, you ring a bell and you have at least a half-minute wait before the door opens. But this person was like a jack-in-the-box. He pressed the bell—and out she popped! It made him jump.
It was possible, from underneath, to use the old jack-in-the-box safe-breaker's tool which lay in his gasman's bag.
Use jack-in-the-box when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.
Jack-in-the-box means Children’s toy consisting of a small box from which a male figure pops out unexpectedly after some turnings of a crank..
The closest synonym depends on the sentence and intended sense.
The opposite depends on the specific sense.
"Did you venture to call me a liar?" ("No, sir, no!" shouted the accused, and disappeared like a Jack-in-the-box.)
FreeDictionaryAPI.com / Wiktionary · Original source · CC BY-SA 4.0
Dictionary data is provided by FreeDictionaryAPI.com and sourced from Wiktionary under its stated license.