pen-feathered, a.
(ˈpɛnˌfɛðəd)
[f. pen n.2 1 c + feathered, in the sense ‘feathered with {oqq}pens{cqq} only’. Cf. the synonymous pin-feathered.]
1. Having the feathers undeveloped, or showing the quills or barrels only, without vanes (see pen-feather 2), as a young bird; half-fledged; not fully fledged; also fig. immature, ‘callow’.
| 1628 Earle Microcosm., Aturney (Arb.) 65 His hatching [was] vnder a Lawer; whence though but pen-feather'd, hee hath now nested for himselfe. 1659 R. Wild Poems (1870) 36 Not a pen-feathered lark who ne'er tried wing. 1708 Prior Turtle & Sparrow 263 My children then were just pen-feather'd, Some little corn for them I gather'd. 1858 Gen. P. Thompson Audi Alt. I. liii. 208 The most extraordinary argument, worthy of being set down in any pen-feathered logician's list of fallacies. |
2. Said of a horse or his hair when rough and bristly.
| 1737 Bracken Farriery Impr. (1756) I. 346 So that the Hair stare, and is (what some term) pen-feather'd. 1828 Craven Gloss. (ed. 2), Pen-feathered, when the skin or hair of a horse is rough, he is said to be pen-feathered. His hair is so sticky that it resembles pens or feathers. 1874 W. Williams Princ. Veterinary Med. (1888) 389 The hair stands on end ‘pen-feathered’. |