wood-child

plural wood-children

1. literaryA child that lives in the woods.

   Months passed on, and the years, circling in varied costume over the path of the wood-child, led forward her opening life.

   1848 February 29, The Columbian Magazine, New York, page 73, column 2

   2 more examples

   Rob not the Primrose! - for her pallid bloom Long by the wayside tarries, And the wood-child homeward through the deep'ning gloom In its lap, rejoicing, carries.

   1841 June 18, The Albion, New York, page 1, column 1

   We each, dear readers, have our house, our cottage, or our room in the world. Shall we not seek to adorn it as the wood-children did their lonely house in the forest?

   1869, Golden Hours, New York, page 79, column 2

2. literaryobsoleteoffensiveA Native American or Amerindian.

   And all the elements of earth Obeyed their high behest. And the wood-child trembled as he said, "Alabama" - here we rest.

   1855, W. W. Fosdick, Ariel, and Other Poems, New York: Bunce and Brother, page 67

   1 more example

   Waiting the true pioneers, strong of heart, to succeed them. When from the east comes the vanguard of civilization, Vanish the wood children, perish and disappear slowly Off from the face of earth, even as of old did the glacier.

   1902, Year Book of the Old Setters' Association, Johnson County, Iowa City, page 19

3. artsA fairy or elf that inhabits the woods.

   A woman who good-naturedly gave her breast to a crying Wood-child, was rewarded by its mother by a gift of the bark on which it was lying.

   1850, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, London: H.G. Bohn, page 230