ETYMOLOGY
from French tardigrade (slow-paced) or from Latin tardigradus (walking slowly); from Latin tardus (slow) + -gradus (stepping, going)
EXAMPLE (for adj. 1)
“… Once more a cruelly long passage fell to my lot. The Deborah proved a marine hackney-coach of the most tardigrade order. But it could not be helped; so, like Diogenes, I resolved to be satisfied with my tub, and as for sunshine, I found it within and without! …”
From: Our Antipodes:
Or, Residence and Rambles in the Australasian Colonies.
By Lt. Colonel Godfrey Charles Mundy, 1852
Lexicophilia 