Of an object, reflecting light as if giving off tiny sparks or flashes of light.
"Methinks 't were sweet once more to see Our native forest shade, And the wild streamlet leaping free Along the sparkling glade,...1827, Lydia Sigourney, Poems, Carloman and Merovee, page 78:
2
Of a beverage, especially an alcoholic beverage, containing dissolved carbon dioxide (either naturally or that has been added) that comes out of solution in the form of many tiny bubbles.
The outstanding train on the L.M.S. route was the 6.20 p.m. from Birmingham, which reached Euston in two hours after intermediate stops at Coventry, Rugby and Watford Junction, and evoked some sparkling performances from "Patriot" and "Jubilee" 4-6-0s.1960 February, R. C. Riley, “The London-Birmingham services - Past, Present and Future”, in Trains Illustrated, page 98:
While we know – because the script tells us so – that the people we are watching are in love and in pain and in trouble, they never come across as more than dispensers of sparkling aperçus.2014 October 30, Ben Brantley, “When the head leads the heart: 'The Real Thing,' With Ewan McGregor and Maggie Gyllenhaal, opens on Broadway [print version: When the witty head is far ahead of the heart: Maggie Gyllenhaal and Ewan McGregor star in revival of 'Real Thing', International New York Times, 4 November 2014, p. 9]”, in The New York Times:
Act or appearance of something that sparkles; a sparkle; a gleam.
Bright are the sparklings that beam from the dew.1820, Nathaniel John Hollingsworth, “Song”, in The Renegade and Other Poems:
2
A sparkling wine.
Wines like this struggle to stand out on the show circuit, where the judges are more likely to be searching for sparklings designed in the classic Champagne mould.2011, Michael Cooper, 100 Must-try New Zealand Wines, page 208:
3
Abbreviation, Ellipsis Ellipsis of sparkling water (“fizzy drinking water”).