a. [SNAIL sb.1]
1. Slow, sluggish or tardy in pace, progress or motion; slothful, slow-moving. Also fig.
1594. Shaks., Rich. III., IV. iii. 53. Delay leds impotent and Snaile-pac’d Beggery. Ibid. (1606), Tr. & Cr., V. v. 18. Goe … bid the snaile-pac’d Aiax arme for shame.
1646. W. Jenkyn, Remora, 9. Doth that winged speed … deserve a snail-paced Reformation?
1770. Armstrong, Misc., I. 154. Thus they lash on The snail-pac’d Hyperborean nights.
1862. Christina Rossetti, Goblin Market, etc. 6. The whisk-tailed merchant bade her taste In tones as smooth as honey,… and the snail-paced even was heard.
1874. J. Robertson, in Gordon, Life, xv. (1908), 117. We left here … with a snail-paced horse.
2. Marked or characterized by tardiness, slowness or sluggishness.
1601. Chester, Love’s Martyr, etc. (1878), 123. Snaile-paced gate.
1818. Keats, Endym., IV. 25. In very scorn Of our dull, uninspired, snail-paced lives.
