Meanings
adjectivestartlish (comparative more startlish, superlative most startlish)
comparative more startlish · superlative most startlish
- colloquialEasily startled; skittish.
He stirred up in a kind of a startlish way; but when he see it was only me he took a good gap and stretch, and then he says: “Hello, what's up? Don't cry, bub. What's the trouble?”
1884 December 10, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: (Tom Sawyer’s Comrade) […], London: Chatto & Windus, […], →OCLC
Origin
Cite this entry
APA
startlish. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/startlish
MLA
“startlish.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/startlish. Accessed November 3, 2026.
Chicago
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “startlish,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/startlish.
Source: startlish on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.