Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Anaquatic amphibian with four legs and a tail, as a mud-puppy, water-dog, or hellbender. See triton, newt, and cuts under hellbender, Menobranchus, axolotl, and newt.
  • noun A water-monitor or varan. See cut under Hydrosaurus.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Here was done the fierce secret and russet rite in detestation of Bokrug, the water-lizard, and here declaimed the altar of chrysolite which enhance the Doom-scrawl of Taran-Ish.

    Think Progress » Inaugural Investments 2005

  • Here was done the lucrative secret and supportive rite in detestation of Bokrug, the water-lizard, and here roped the altar of chrysolite which obtaine the Doom-scrawl of Taran-Ish.

    Think Progress » Inaugural Fundraising Fiasco 2005

  • In short, it is not a frog or a toad, but a salamander or water-lizard, which lays eggs similar to those of the frog, and whose young upon first hatching look very much like young tadpoles.

    The Renewal of Life; How and When to Tell the Story to the Young Margaret Warner Morley 1890

  • The hideous large water-lizard (_Amblyrhynchus_), swimming with perfect ease, and capable of an hour's immersion in sea-water; and the land lizard of the same genus, so numerous that at James Island it was hardly possible to find a spot free from their burrows, the roofs of which constantly give way under the pedestrian, were equally strange denizens of this group of islands, where reptiles replace herbivorous mammals.

    Life of Charles Darwin 1870

  • "It was not a crocodile, Jack, but a large water-lizard," said Mr

    Off to the Wilds Being the Adventures of Two Brothers George Manville Fenn 1870

  • Other amphibious creatures I perceived at times -- a large water-lizard that almost rivalled the crocodiles in bulk -- and I once had

    Ran Away to Sea Mayne Reid 1850

  • It seizes the anolis, a kind of water-lizard, in the same way.

    The Western World Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North and South America William Henry Giles Kingston 1847

  • If the wind blew with violence, it was because the water-lizard, which makes the wind, had crawled out of his pool; if the lightning was sharp and frequent, it was because the young of the thunder-bird were restless in their nest; if a blight fell upon the corn, it was because the Corn Spirit was angry; and if the beavers were shy and difficult to catch, it was because they had taken offence at seeing the bones of one of their race thrown to a dog.

    The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century Francis Parkman 1858

  • "They are varanians, a species of water-lizard, very similar to the iguanas of the

    In the Wilds of Africa William Henry Giles Kingston 1847

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