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devil's coach-horse

noun

  1. a large black rove beetle, Ocypus olens, with large jaws and ferocious habits
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged†2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


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Example Sentences

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Once she endured agonies through a mad desire to sneeze, and once her lips opened to scream as something suspiciously like the antennæ of a huge beetle, and which she subsequently discovered was a "devil's coach-horse," tickled the calf of her leg.

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As this atrocious tale of lies turned up joint by joint before her, like a "devil's coach-horse,"* mother was too much amazed to do any more than look at him, as if the earth must open.

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Now, as a matter of fact, the devil's coach-horse is quite harmless, but I have often seen, not only little boys and girls, but also chickens, small birds, and shrew-mice, evidently alarmed at his minatory attitude.

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The Archdeacon motioned to the clerk to remove the oak cover, and the old man, with the air of an officious waiter, lifted it with a flourish, disclosing, inside the cracked font, a white pudding-basin, inside which, again, reposed a species of beetle known as a "devil's coach-horse."

From

As this atrocious tale of lies turned up joint by joint before her, like a 'devil's coach-horse,'* mother was too much amazed to do any more than look at him, as if the earth must open.

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