That clings; cleaving.
a. 1763. Shenstone, Poems, Wks. 1764, I. 106. The defenceless train Of clinging infants.
1810. Southey, Kehama, III. x. A clinging curse.
b. said of garments fitting close to the body.
1883. G. H. Boughton, in Harper’s Mag., Feb., 403/1. The garments of the women were the reverse of ‘clinging.’
1884. E. P. Roe, Ibid., June, 97/1. Dressed in some light clinging fabric.
Hence Clingingly adv.; Clingingness.
1865. Ellen C. Clayton, Cruel Fortune, I. 118. Val … nestled clingingly by his side.
1869. ‘H. A. Page,’ in Contemp. Rev., XII. 126. The domestic clingingness and tender dependency.
