tardigrade

comparative more tardigrade · superlative most tardigrade

1. Sluggish; moving slowly.

   In sorrow, its voice is tardigrade but loud, dragging time at a snail's pace before our eyes.

   2001, Richard S. Conde, “The Metronome”, in Century One, →ISBN, page 92

   2 more examples

   Each tendril ending in a perfect claw, / Obeys the whole routine of Nature's law; / Transforms each sinus to a sylvan shade, / Though p'rhaps its force is rather tardigrade.

   1850, Joses Badcock, “Botany; or, Phytology”, in Poems, volume 1, page 67

   He ran on into the piazza, but he quickly heard the tramp of feet behind him, for the other two prisoners had been released, and the soldiers were struggling and fighting their way after them, in such tardigrade fashion as their hoof-shaped shoes would allow—impeded, but not very resolutely attacked, by the people.

   1863, George Eliot, Romola

plural tardigrades

1. biologyA member of the animal phylum Tardigrada.

   Synonyms: water bear

2. obsoleteA sloth, a neotropical mammal of suborder Folivora (syn. Tardigrada).