? Obs. Also 7 solicitresse, 8 sollicitress. [Cf. next and -ESS.]
1. A female who solicits or prefers requests.
1631. Mabbe, Celestina, X. 117. I know not whether thou art now comming with that Solicitresse of my safety?
165466. Earl Orrery, Parthenissa (1676), 593. To disoblige his pretended Solicitress.
1788. Charlotte Smith, Emmeline (1816), III. 116. She prepared to become a solicitress for favours to a statesman.
fig. 1710. Shaftesbury, Charact. (1737), I. Adv. Author, III. 312. They are very powerful Sollicitresses. They never seem to importune us; tho they are ever in our eye.
2. A female who entices to immorality.
1634. W. Tirwhyt, trans. Balzacs Lett. (vol. I.), 270. Yet am I credibly informed, that she is turned Solicitresse to entice others to vice.
a. 1639. W. Whateley, Prototypes, III. xxxix. (1640), 9. If we consider the person of his solicitresse, how great a patterne is he of constant and invincible purity?