SG Heritage Dictionary

Bitters [Noun] Webster's Dictionary 1828

A liquor in which bitter herbs or roots are steeped; generally a spirituous liquor, the bitter cause of intemperance, of disease, and of premature death!

Bitters [Noun plural] Webster's Dictionary 1913

A liquor, generally spirituous in which a bitter herb, leaf, or root is steeped.

Bitters Encyclopedia Britannica

BITTERS, an aromatized alcoholic beverage, so named originally in the United States, where it was first used on account of its flavour and tonic influence. The drink by itself, or as an addition to unflavoured spirits, is used with considerable frequency in Europe, and especially in France it has come to be be favourably regarded as a substitute for the insidious and deleterious absinthe. In the year 1867 the daily consumption of bitter3 in Paris alone had reached 4000 litres. The preparation of bitters in Europe was at first a spécialité of the Dutch, and Dutch bitters are the staple used in Great Britain. A considerable variety of recipes are in use for the preparation of Dutch bitters, but generally gentian root is the leading bitter ingredient in the beverages. The following is given as the composition of brandy bitters :—Gentian root, 4 oz.; orange peel, 5 oz.; cassia bark, 2 oz.; cardamoms, 1 oz.; and proof spirits, 1 gallon, coloured with ∣ oz. of cochineal. Bitters prepared in the great French cities—Bordeaux, Rouen, Havre, Paris, &c.—contain extracts of gentian root, bitter orange peel, and orange flowers, with a proportion of sugar, and possess an alcoholic strength of about 40°

9th ed. Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 3, p. 794
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Bittersweet [Adjective] Webster's Dictionary 1913

Sweet and then bitter or bitter and then sweet; esp. sweet with a bitter after taste; hence (Fig.), pleasant but painful.

Bittersweet [Noun] Webster's Dictionary 1913

1. Anything which is bittersweet.

2. A kind of apple so called.

3. A climbing shrub, with oval coral-red berries (Solanum dulcamara); woody nightshade. The whole plant is poisonous, and has a taste at first sweetish and then bitter. The branches are the officinal dulcamara.

4. An American woody climber (Celastrus scandens), whose yellow capsules open late in autumn, and disclose the red aril which covers the seeds; -- also called Roxbury waxwork.