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Handsel   Listen
verb
Handsel  v. t.  (past & past part. handseled or handselled; pres. part. handseling or handselling)  
1.
To give a handsel to.
2.
To use or do for the first time, esp. so as to make fortunate or unfortunate; to try experimentally. "No contrivance of our body, but some good man in Scripture hath handseled it with prayer."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Handsel" Quotes from Famous Books



... window, than business flowed in upon us in a perfect torrent. First one came in for his measure, and then another. A wife came in for a pair of red worsted boots for her bairn, but would not take them for they had not blue fringes. A bareheaded lassie, hoping to be handsel, threw down twopence, and asked tape at three yards for a halfpenny. The minister sent an old black coat beneath his maid's arm, pinned up in a towel, to get docked in the tails down into a jacket; which I trust I did to his entire satisfaction, making it fit to a hair. The Duke's butler himself ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - tailor in Dalkeith • D. M. Moir

... bear this flower Unto thy little Saviour; And tell Him, by that bud now blown, He is the Rose of Sharon known. When thou hast said so, stick it there Upon His bib or stomacher; And tell Him, for good handsel too, That thou hast brought a whistle new, Made of a clean strait oaten reed, To charm His cries at time of need. Tell Him, for coral, thou hast none, But if thou hadst, He should have one; But poor thou art, and known to be Even as moneyless as He. ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick

... Lady," linked together by a white handkerchief, of which each held an end. The Lady carried the purse, and when she received a donation the Lord doffed his cap and kissed her. They sang a doggerel rhyme, and the form in which money was asked was, "Please to handsel the Lord ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... know it exclusively as a child's play. But yet, within the memory of living men, it was the regular custom in country places nearly over all Scotland to wind up every dancing-ball with "Bab at the Bowster." No wedding dance, no Handsel Monday ball, would have been esteemed complete without it; and I have seen it performed at both, less than forty years ago. Performed by old or young, however, the mode is the same. The girls sit down on ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford

... Enough,—here's a Bill for 500 Crowns more upon my Merchant, you know him by a good token, I lost the last Sum you receiv'd for me, a pox of that Handsel; away, here's company. [Ex. Pet. Enter Octavio and Crapine.] Now will I disguise my self, according to the mode of the Roman Inamoratos; and deliver my self upon the place appointed. [Ex. ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn

... forgotten the day when thou first receivedst breeches, and thy long clothes became short? The village where thou livedst was all apprised of the fact; and neighbour after neighbour kissed thy pudding-cheek, and gave thee, as handsel, silver or copper coins, on that the first gala-day of thy existence. Again, wert not thou, at one period of life, a Buck, or Blood, or Macaroni, or Incroyable, or Dandy, or by whatever name, according to year and place, such phenomenon is distinguished? ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle

... Such handsel is not new unto mine ears; Therefore let Fortune turn her wheel around As it may please her, ...
— Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell • Dante Alighieri

... year—the period, by universal consent, dedicated to goodwill and rejoicing all over the world—the old "daft days" even of sober, austere Scotland. Jenny and Menie, in the kitchen, were looking forward to that Handsel Monday which is the Whit Monday of country servants, and the family gathering of the peasantry in Scotland. First footing and New Year's gifts were lighting up the servant girls' imaginations. The former may be safely looked upon ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler



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