touch-me-not-ishness
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From touch-me-not-ish + -ness.
Noun
[edit]touch-me-not-ishness (uncountable)
- The quality of being touch-me-not-ish.
- Synonyms: aloofness, standoffishness
- 1836, Charles Dickens, chapter VIII, in The Pickwick Papers:
- The young ladies were pretty, their manners winning, their dispositions unexceptionable; but there was a dignity in the air, a touch-me-not-ish-ness in the walk, a majesty in the eye of the spinster aunt, to which, at their time of life they could lay no claim, which distinguished her from any female on whom Mr. Tupman had ever gazed.
- 1893 February, Frank S. Rice, “The Medical Expert as a Witness”, in Columbia Law Times, volume VI, number 5, New York: The Columbia Law Times Publishing Company, page 128:
- The consequence of this training persisted in for a series of years without the least deviation enables the serene olympian to mount the witness stand with the perfect composure and touch-me-not-ish-ness that belongs to the elect.