vegetable wool

American  

noun

1. wool5

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Etymology

Origin of vegetable wool

First recorded in 1880–85

Example Sentences

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

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

Alexander the Great introduced the "vegetable wool" into Europe.

From The Age of Invention : a chronicle of mechanical conquest by Thompson, Holland

Of this vegetable wool, or cotton, they fabricate various kinds of pure white cloth, some of which I have seen as fine as our best lawns, if not finer.

From A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 09 Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present Time by Kerr, Robert

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