vegetable wool

American  

noun

1. wool5

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Etymology

Origin of vegetable wool

First recorded in 1880–85

Example Sentences

He then showed her the vegetable wool and vegetable hair he had collected, and told her where they grew.

From Foul Play by Reade, Charles

Grain, fruit and vegetable, wool, silk and cotton, gold, silver and iron, steam and electricity,—were not all, like the spark, within arm's reach of savage man?

From Heart of Man by Woodberry, George Edward

The war between the States caused hardly more suffering than the blockade which cut off the spinners of Manchester from the vegetable wool which supplied them the means of living.

From The Fabric of Civilization A Short Survey of the Cotton Industry in the United States by Guaranty Trust Company of New York

This was the vegetable wool of the ancients, which many learned authorities have identified with the byssus, in bandages of cloth made from which the old Egyptians wrapped their mummies.

From The Romance of Industry and Invention by Cochrane, Robert

The best operatives of Lancashire were attracted sooner or later to assist the triumphs of art over the vegetable wool.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 7, Slice 5 "Cosway" to "Coucy" by Various