a. [f. LAUGH v. + -ABLE.] That may be laughed at; to be laughed at.
1596. Shaks., Merch. V., I. i. 56. They’ll not shew their teeth in way of smile, Though Nestor sweare the iest be laughable.
1693. Dryden, Juvenal, Ded. (1697), 52. He [Persius] was not a laughable Writer.
1840. Carlyle, Heroes, iv. (1858), 293. Puritanism was only despicable, laughable then; but nobody can manage to laugh at it now.
1853. Reade, Chr. Johnstone, 258. [He] had fallen in love with her in a manner that was half pathetic, half laughable.
1870. ‘Ouida,’ Held in Bondage, 78. She could not see that she had said anything laughable.
¶ Similarly laugh-at-able. (nonce-wd.)
1844. J. T. Hewlett, Parsons & W., iv. His being deemed so laugh-at-able a character.
Hence Laughably adv., Laughableness.
1815. Lady Granville, Lett., 1 Aug. (1894), I. 68. She follows and watches him quite laughably.
1853. Kane, Grinnell Exp., xxx. (1856), 259. All our eatables became laughably consolidated, and after different fashions.
1864. Webster, Laughableness.
1872. ‘Mark Twain,’ Innoc. Abr., 194. The dress of the men is laughably grotesque.
