a jocular imitation of a hesitating or deliberately emphatic pronunciation of LITTLE.
1687. Phillips, Don Quixote, 496. The Taylour … held up five leetle Cloaks.
1755. Johnson, Grammar, in Dict., c j. There is another form of diminution among the English, by lessening the sound itself, especially of vowels; as there is a form of augmenting them [sic] by enlarging, or even lengthening it;… as … little pronounced long, lee-tle.
1835. B. Hofland, in L’Estrange, Friendships Miss Mitford (1882), I. xi. 280. A gentleman, somewhat a leetle too much dressed.
1838. Dickens, O. Twist, ii. Just a leetle drop, with a little cold water, and a lump of sugar.
1894. G. W. Appleton, Co-respondent, I. 45, I am sure he went just a leetle wrong.
