ppl. a. [f. TOUSLE v. + -ED1.] Disarranged, disheveled, tumbled; also shaggy, matted.
1848. Dickens, Dombey, xxv. Rob the Grinder … stood then, panting at the captain, with a flushed and touzled air of bed about him.
1852. Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom’s C., ix. A very heavy mat of sandy hair, in a decidedly tousled condition.
1861. Crt. Life at Naples, II. 1. Prudent mammas carried off reluctant daughters, whose touzled dresses, disordered hair, and heavy eyelids bore witness … to the wisdom of the measure.
1890. W. Booth, Darkest Eng., 104. A grimy footsore tramp … with filthy shirt and towselled hair.
b. Comb., as tousled-headed, -looking adjs.
1860. Dickens, Uncomm. Trav., xiii. The touzled-headed man … hadn’t got his coat on yet.
1883. Cleland, Inchbracken, xiii. 105. A damp and touselled-looking youth, who grasped his dripping ‘Tam o’ Shanter’ tightly in both hands.
1883. Carolina Mountaineer, 18 Aug., 1/3. The most remarkable thing we saw was a bear den, and out came something supposed to be a bear, but which turned out to be a tousled-headed young man of our own party.
