pusses

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of puss.

   Look at their sour pusses; they must have lost the game.

   The barn was full of half-wild pusses that kept the mice away.

   Note

   The plural adds -es after the double s, as kiss becomes kisses, and it keeps every meaning of the singular, from the colloquial word for cats to slang for faces and cruder uses. Context does the sorting: sour pusses are faces, a barn full of pusses is cats. Do not confuse it with the verb form of pus, which shares the spelling but not the word.

2. 2
   verbrare

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of pus.

   Note

   The single s of pus doubles before the ending, which is why this verb form looks like a different word altogether. It belongs to plain description of a sore or blister; in careful or clinical writing, a wound is more usually said to discharge pus.

Showing meanings only. Show all 2