From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishquicksilverquick‧sil‧ver /ˈkwɪkˌsɪlvə $ -ər/ noun [uncountable] 1 HCE old use the metal mercury2 literary something that is like quicksilver changes or moves quickly in a way that you do not expect His mood changed like quicksilver. —quicksilver adjective his quicksilver temperament
Examples from the Corpus
quicksilver• Beckett's playing is all quicksilver and lyricism with an often sardonic edge.• The essential Gielgud was all quicksilver intelligence.• The old man was a cracked leather bottle trying to contain quicksilver.• Under that flippant attitude he liked to show at Park Crescent was a mind like quicksilver.• It wriggled and squirmed like quicksilver and, apart from that, the box was only just long enough to take it.• The tar on the roads glistened like liquid quicksilver.• Hunt, the team's quicksilver guard, slipped in and made the basket.• the quicksilver beauty of Khan's singing• His eyes had lost their quicksilver fear.• In fact, its core is crystal, shining night and day, veined with quicksilver and gold. 