wet nurse, wet-nurse, n.
A woman who is hired to suckle and nurse another woman's child. Cf. dry-nurse.
| 1620 Middleton Chaste Maid ii. ii, I call the Wet Nurse hither. a 1633 Austin Medit. (1635) 45 Shee was both wet-Nurse, and dry-Nurse herselfe. And yet this his handmaid was his Mother. 1689 Full Answ. Depos. Birth Pr. Wales 7 Query, Whether she did not use to provide a Wet-Nurse, at her other Deliveries. 1776 Pennsylvania Even. Post 8 Feb. 70/2 Wants a place, as Wet Nurse, a young woman with a good breast of milk. 1888 M. E. Braddon Fatal Three i. iii, A wet-nurse being wanted at the great house. |
| transf. and fig. 1826 Hood Irish Schoolm. xxi, How Romulus was bred in savage wood, By wet-nurse wolf, devoid of wolfish rage. 1884 Gilmour Mongols xxxii. 375 China has acted the wet-nurse to Mongolia, and discharged her duty well. |