toadess
nounEtymology From toad + -ess.
1
Rare A female toad.
- Taking a hoe this morning, (could find no spade but the ace,) I exhumed a toadess, perhaps a widow, living all by herself, in underground lodgings, as widows have done, and will do, again and again, till there is no such thing as widowdom in the world.1854, Benj[amin] F[ranklin] Taylor, “Digging for a Subject”, in January and June: Being Out-Door Thinkings, and Fire-Side Musings. […], New York, N.Y.: Samuel Hueston, […], →OCLC, pages 50–51:
- The toad likes cool, moist earth, neither muddy nor dusty, and just after a shower, when the roads are just properly moistened, the little toads and toadesses go forth to promenade and enlarge their acquaintance with the world beyond the cabbage-leaf of their nativity.1858 October 23, Ecuyer Tranchant [pseudonym], “The Democrat of the Dinner Table”, in Boston Evening Transcript, volume XXIX, number 8740, Boston, Mass., supplement, column 4:
4 more examples
- They [toads] lead a very retired and pensive life during the day, behind stun walls, but when twilight begins tew dress for the night, then the toads and toadesses begin to reconnoiter round.1868 July 24, Josh Billings [pseudonym; Henry Wheeler Shaw], “The Josh Billings Papers. Josh Does Up his Back Correspondence.”, in The Missouri Democrat, volume 16, number 289, St. Louis, Mo., page [3], column 4:
- I do know that all the respectable toads and toadesses of my acquaintance always went down in family parties into the water and there brought forth a respectable and legitimate family of tadpoles.1899 July 27, H. M. Doak, “Doak on Frog and Toad Music”, in The Nashville American, volume XXIII, number 8263, Nashville, Tenn., page 4, column 6:
- “A toad’s highest idea of beauty is a toadess;” says another [proverb].1915, M. V. Srinivasa Aiyangar, An Open Letter to Mrs. Annie Besant: Being a Reply to Her Attacks on Hinduism, Madras: M. C. Narasimhacharya, →OCLC, page 57:
- [T]hey […] stuffed their faces into the grass, shaking uncontrollably, silently. What could they see? […] Some animal? ‘And from his queer abode came forth giant toad, a toadess in a bodice.’1969, Jonathan Gathorne-Hardy, “The Picnic”, in The Centre of the Universe is 18 Baedekerstrasse, London: Hamish Hamilton, published 1985, →ISBN, page 52: