U.S. [cf. straddle-bob, STRADDLE sb. 7.] A long-legged beetle, esp. Canthon lævis. Also attrib. (similative).
1824. Woodstock Observer, 21 Dec., 4/1. ‘Countryman has paches got legs?’ ‘No you fool’—‘Then by my shoul I have swallowed a straddlebug.’
1839. Longf., Hyperion, I. vi. (1852), 37. There is one [sketch] on the wall there, which is beautiful, save and except that straddle-bug figure among the bushes.
1862. R. H. Newell, Orpheus C. Kerr Papers, xx. (1866), 124. Now that I look at him, he reminds me of an old-fashioned straddle-bug.
