bedraggled

Definition

Wet, limp, and unkempt; in disarray due to being doused with water, exposed to the elements, etc.

Etymology

From bedraggle + -ed.

Example Sentences

• "A low rumbling sound was heard; a subterraneous hum; and then all held their breaths; as bedraggled with trailing ropes, and harpoons, and lances, a vast form shot lengthwise, but obliquely from the sea."
• "She came at night, and in a storm, with only two attendants, and stood before a peasant’s hut, tired, bedraggled, soaked with rain, “the red print of her lost crown still girdling her brow,” and implored admittance—and was refused!"
• "No three tramps that one could have met in a Surrey lane could have looked more hopeless and bedraggled."

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