a. [SOFT a. 29.]

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  1.  Having a soft shell. Chiefly in specific names of animals.

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1611.  Cotgr., Harde, a soft-sheld egge.

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1771.  Phil. Trans., LXI. 267. We call it the soft shelled Turtle.

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c. 1880.  Cassell’s Nat. Hist., IV. 256. The other Soft-shelled Tortoise (Trionyx ferox) … is a voracious animal.

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1883.  Goode, in Fisheries Exhib. Lit. (1884), V. 15. Soft-shelled clam, Mya arenaria. Ibid. (1884), Nat. Hist. Aquat. Anim., 152. The species of Soft-shelled Tortoises, Trionychidæ. Ibid., 776. The common edible Crab or Blue Crab—Callinectes hastatus.… These ‘soft-shelled Crabs’ are much esteemed by many.

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  2.  transf. (Cf. SOFT-SHELL 2.)

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1890.  Daily News, 4 Feb., 5/3. Dissentient Liberals of the soft-shelled species.

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