[f. as prec.]
1. The state, condition, or quality of being snug or comfortable; cosiness. Also personif.
1766. Goldsm., Vicar W., iv. My house … was covered with thatch, which gave it an air of great snugness.
1766. Cowper, Wks. (1837), XV. 11. I rejoice with you in the snugness of your situation.
c. 1790. Warton, Phaeton & One-horse Chair, 70. O’er me soft Snugness spreads her wings.
1809. Pinkney, Trav. France, 179. The fields … are so small as to give them a peculiar air of snugness.
1850. Hawthorne, Scarlet Letter, Introd. 4. Her bosom has all the softness and snugness of an eider-down pillow.
1873. Hamerton, Intell. Life, XII. iii. 447. There is a well-known objection to extensive views as wanting in snugness and comfort.
† 2. Secrecy, reticence. Obs.
1778. Mme. D’Arblay, Diary, Sept. Had I been allowed to preserve the snugness I had planned, I need not have concerned myself at all about its fate.
3. Neatness, trimness; compactness, closeness.
1799. [A. Young], Agric. Linc., 325. Though the Lincoln had the thicker pelt, and more wool, the thickness and snugness of frame of the Leicester made amends.
1802. Naval Chron., VII. 178. She … has all the snugness on the water of a large frigate.
