old-maids

A subtle and profound instinct warns him, that with the increased intelligence and economic freedom of woman, he, and such as he, might ultimately be left sexually companionless; the undesirable, the residuary, male old-maids of the human race.

Woman and Labour 2003

While the old-maids 'pinks were nodding groups of gossips, here and there,

Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse Joseph Crosby Lincoln 1907

Are ye goin 'to let me stand here -- me that has seen your grands'rs pump -- and have it said that old Niag'ry was licked by a passul of knittin'-work old-maids, led by an elephant and a peep-show man?

The Skipper and the Skipped Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul Holman Day 1900

And when the children came along I was permitted to bring them up according to my own ideas, thanks to the entire absence from the country of inspired old-maids, and omniscient editors, ceaselessly endeavoring to reduce a natural maternal function to an arbitrary science.

The Autobiography of Methuselah John Kendrick Bangs 1892

A subtle and profound instinct warns him, that with the increased intelligence and economic freedom of woman, he, and such as he, might ultimately be left sexually companionless; the undesirable, the residuary, male old-maids of the human race.

Woman and Labour Olive Schreiner 1887

Her godmother had twice written to her, and this year she was expected to visit Interlachen with her two daughters; "but they are old-maids," added Babette, who was only eighteen: "they are nearly thirty."

Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen 1840

For a long time I sat by the window and talked to Billy in my mind and told him what I thought of men old-maids and prissy places and gossipy spinsters and flirtatious widows, and of people who didn't have anything to talk of but one another; and then, as the moon came out clearer, I seemed to see myself clearer also, and after a while it came over me that maybe I had been a little nicer to

Kitty Canary Kate Langley Bosher 1898