Puce Puce Puce is a dark red or purple brown color, a brownish purple or a "dark reddish brown." "Puce" is the French word for "flea". The color is said to be the color of bloodstains on linen or bedsheets, even after being laundered, from a flea's droppings, or after a flea has been crushed. The "Oxford English Dictionary" ("OED") dates the first English use of "puce" as a color to 1778. The name comes from the French word "puce", or flea, which comes from the Latin words for flea, "pulicem" or "pulex". According to the "Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology",
The Tale of Cross-eyed Lefty from Tula and the Steel Flea The Tale of Cross-eyed Lefty from Tula and the Steel Flea "The Tale of Cross-eyed Lefty from Tula and the Steel Flea" (, Skaz o Tulskom kosom Levshe i o stalnoy Blokhe), "The Tale of the Crosseyed Lefthander from Tula and the Steel Flea" or simply "Levsha" (, "left-handed"), sometimes called "The Lefthander", "Lefty", "The Steel Flea" or "The Left-handed Craftsman" is a well-known 1881 skaz (story) by Nikolai Leskov. Styled as a folk tale, it tells a story of a left-handed arms craftsman from Tula (traditionally a center of the Russian armaments industry) who outperformed his English colleagues by