- rail
- [[t]re͟ɪl[/t]]
♦♦♦rails, railing, railed1) N-COUNT: oft supp N A rail is a horizontal bar attached to posts or fixed round the edge of something as a fence or support.
They had to walk across an emergency footbridge, holding onto a rope that served as a rail...
She gripped the hand rail in the lift.
2) N-COUNT A rail is a horizontal bar that you hang things on....frocks hanging from a rail...
This pair of curtains will fit a rail up to 7ft 6in wide.
3) N-COUNT: usu pl Rails are the steel bars which trains run on.The train left the rails but somehow forced its way back onto the line.
Syn:The president traveled by rail to his home town.
...the electric rail link between Manchester and Sheffield.
5) VERB If you rail against something, you criticize it loudly and angrily. [WRITTEN][V against/at n] He railed against hypocrisy and greed...
[V against/at n] I'd cursed him and railed at him.
6) → See also railing7) PHRASE If something is back on the rails, it is beginning to be successful again after a period when it almost failed. [JOURNALISM]They are keen to get the negotiating process back on the rails...
Her career is back on the rails.
8) PHRASE: V inflects If someone goes off the rails, they start to behave in a way that other people think is unacceptable or very strange, for example they start taking drugs or breaking the law.They've got to do something about these children because clearly they've gone off the rails.
English dictionary. 2008.