snap up

snap up (third-person singular simple present snaps up, present participle snapping up, simple past and past participle snapped up)

1. (transitive, colloquial) To buy quickly, usually because the item is a bargain or in short supply or something one has been searching for.

   When I saw the penny black missing from my collection in the shop window, I just went in and snapped it up.

2. (transitive, colloquial, archaic) To snap at (a person); to speak harshly to.
   • 1840, Henry Fielding, The History of the Life of Jonathan Wild, the Great, page xlviii:

     [H]e saw Jonathan a horse-back, and, asking him how he did, Jonathan d—d him, and bid him not trouble him with impertinent questions; therefore the tradesman desired to know the reason why Jonathan snapped him up in that rude angry manner, when he had spoken to him so civilly.

   • 1846 October 1 – 1848 April 1, Charles Dickens, Dombey and Son, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1848, →OCLC:

     'Sir, I know what to do,' retorted Mrs Pipchin, 'and of course shall do it. Susan Nipper,' snapping her up particularly short, 'a month's warning from this hour.'
     'Oh indeed!' cried Susan, loftily.
     'Yes,' returned Mrs Pipchin, 'and don't smile at me, you minx, or I'll know the reason why! Go along with you this minute!'

• snap it up