"I see it now," Alice remarked thoughtfully: "and what are toves?

"well, `toves' are something like badgers -- they're something like lizards -- and they're something like corkscrews."

"They must be very curious creatures."

"They are that," said Humpty Dumpty: "also they make their nests under sun-dials -- also they live on cheese."

By Lewis Carroll
from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872

TOVE. A species of BADGER. They had smooth white hair, long hind legs, and short horns like a stag; lived chiefly on cheese.


Carroll's definition, printed in 1855, cited by The Annotated Alice

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