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Webster 1828 Edition

Noun.

[tortoise and shell.] The shell or rather scales of the tortoise, used in inlaying and in various manufactures.

See also: tortoiseshell and tortoise shell

tortoise-shell ‎(plural tortoise-shells)

tortoise-shell ‎(not comparable)

Alternative form of tortoiseshell
- 1891, Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray:
  The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife.