Cough
A cough ( pronunciation Latin: tussis), is a sudden and often repetitively occurring reflex which helps to clear the large breathing passages from secretions, irritants, foreign particles and microbes. The cough reflex consists of three phases: an inhalation, a forced exhalation against a closed glottis, and a violent release of air from the lungs following opening of the glottis, usually accompanied by a distinctive sound. Coughing can happen voluntarily as well as involuntarily.
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Famous quotes containing the word cough:
“Thou didst drink
The stale of horses and the gilded puddle
That beasts would cough at.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“I doused the fatal instrument with lightning promptitude, but it was a good seven minutes before the last indignant handkerchief had folded its wings and gone back to its reticule and the last manufactured cough died protestingly away.”
—Margaret Halsey (b. 1910)
“He sits, strong and blunt as a Celtic cross,
Clearly used to silence and an armchair:
Tonight the wife and children will be quiet
At slammed door and smoker’s cough in the hall.”
—Seamus Heaney (b. 1939)