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Yeoman   Listen
noun
Yeoman  n.  (pl. yeomen)  
1.
A common man, or one of the commonly of the first or most respectable class; a freeholder; a man free born. Note: A yeoman in England is considered as next in order to the gentry. The word is little used in the United States, unless as a title in law proceedings and instruments, designating occupation, and this only in particular States.
2.
A servant; a retainer. (Obs.) "A yeman hadde he and servants no mo."
3.
A yeoman of the guard; also, a member of the yeomanry cavalry. (Eng.)
4.
(Naut.) An interior officer under the boatswain, gunner, or carpenters, charged with the stowage, account, and distribution of the stores.
Yeoman of the guard, one of the bodyguard of the English sovereign, consisting of the hundred yeomen, armed with partisans, and habited in the costume of the sixteenth century. They are members of the royal household.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Yeoman" Quotes from Famous Books



... visit have more of a private and friendly character than the visits of sovereigns to subjects were wont to have. However, the country did not lose its gala. Arches of winter evergreens instead of summer flowers, festive banners, loyal inscriptions, yeoman corps, holiday faces, met her on all sides. At Swallowfield—a name which Mary Russell Mitford has made pleasant to English ears—"no less a person than the Speaker of the House of Commons," the representative of an old Huguenot refugee, ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler

... of which there were large brass buttons. She had catskin gloves upon her hands; the gloves were white inside and lined with fur. When she entered, all of the folk felt it to be their duty to offer her becoming greetings. She received the salutations of each individual according as he pleased her. Yeoman Thorkel took the sibyl by the hand, and led her to the seat which had been made ready for her. Thorkel bade her run her eyes over man and beast and home. She had little to say concerning all these. The tables were brought forth in the evening, and it remains to be told what manner ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang

... that he set the pott on his head and hied him up the hatch, While all the shipwrights ran below to find what they might snatch; All except Bob Brygandyne and he was a yeoman good, He caught Slingawai round the waist and threw him on ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling

... stars. His earliest recorded use of the telescope was to verify Herschel's conclusion as to the revolving movement of Castor, and he never varied from the predilection which this first observation at once indicated and determined. He was born at Altona, of a respectable yeoman family, April 15, 1793, and in 1811 took a degree in philology at the new Russian University of Dorpat. He then turned to science, was appointed in 1813 to a professorship of astronomy and mathematics, and began regular work ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke

... his work in Washington, and his later position as bank examiner in the eastern part of New York State, that he seemed to come into his own. Business life, he had long known, could never be congenial to him; literary pursuits alone were insufficient; the long line of yeoman ancestry back of him cried out for recognition; he felt the need of closer contact with the soil; of having land to till and cultivate. This need, an ancestral one, was as imperative as his need of literary expression, an individual one. Hear what ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus

... through the multitude when Sir Walter had ceased to live, and many groaned aloud at the horrible sight. One stout yeoman cried out angrily, "We have not had such another head to be ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston

... the idiom of the professionals, he "raised his plant," and the burglar's kit manufactured in the Connecticut State Prison did what Stoneman considered yeoman service. With all his art and cunning, justice would not be cajoled by him, but weighed him in her balance, to a good purpose too. His success in his particular line was great, but he paid dearly for it all. Many ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell

... you live alone?" "Yes," said he; "with the exception of the bees and the donkey, I live quite alone." "And have you always lived alone?" The old man emptied his cup, and his heart being warmed with the mead, he told me his history, which was simplicity itself. His father was a small yeoman, who, at his death, had left him, his only child, the cottage, with a small piece of ground behind it, and on this little property he had lived ever since. About the age of twenty- five he had married an industrious young woman, by whom he had one daughter, who died before reaching years ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... olden time—long ago, when boards smoked and groaned under a load of good things in every man's house; when the rich took care of the poor, and the poor took care of themselves; when husband and wife married for love, and lived happily (though that must have been very long ago indeed); the athletic yeoman proceeded to his daily toil, enveloped in garments instinct with pockets. The ponderous watch—the plethoric purse—the massive snuff-box—the dainty tooth-pick—the grotesque handkerchief; all were accommodated and cherished in the more ample ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... guilty of murder; but I am glad they found means to convict him.' The gentleman-farmer said, 'A poor man has as much honour as a rich man; and Campbell had that to defend.' Johnson exclaimed, 'A poor man has no honour.' The English yeoman, not dismayed, proceeded: 'Lord Eglintoune was a damned fool to run on upon Campbell, after being warned that Campbell would shoot him if he did.' Johnson, who could not bear any thing like swearing[539], angrily ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell

... a yeoman that has a gentleman to his son; for he's a mad yeoman that sees his son a gentleman ...
— The Tragedy of King Lear • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... home was Christmas-eve. There were great preparations in the cottage for spending Christmas worthily, for if there was one thing more than another that John Longe believed in, it was the proper keeping of Christmas. It was a part of the worthy yeoman's faith. He was a humble and thorough believer in all the tenets of Christianity, he worshipped the Saviour and adored His Nativity, but his faith was a cheerful one, and he thought he best honoured his Master by enjoying the good gifts which He sent. Hence it was a part of his ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... young yeoman; What use to rise and rise? Rise man a thousand mornings Yet down at last he lies, And ...
— A Shropshire Lad • A. E. Housman

... of good yeoman extraction, and Guy himself had had a public school education, but the fact of their position was an obstacle which the squire had found insuperable. Only his love for his daughter had restrained him from violent measures. But Sylvia had somehow managed to hold him, how no one ever knew, ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell

... Alwyn's stronghold was as a bar against the strong-thieves of the forest and thereabout. But the others went forward toward Brookside, nor is there much to tell of their journey; for the most part they guested at the houses of the husbandmen, or whiles at a franklin's or yeoman's house, and none begrudged them the harbour and victual; but the poor folk Sir Mark paid ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris

... yeoman of France, who in the midst of the most pleasing circumstances, never forgets his own interests, has also found it desirable for the advancement of his worldly prosperity, to establish fairs, at which he can sell his hemp and beasts, his wine and ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle

... (B.C. 234-149), born at Tusculum, of a yeoman stock, was one of the most prominent figures of his time. For the best account of his military and political career, including his advancement to the Consulship (B.C. 195) and Censorship (B.C. 184), and his economic and social reforms, the ...
— The Student's Companion to Latin Authors • George Middleton

... order, which brought his men to an attentive halt, then swaggered forward, his gloved hand bearing down the pummel of his sword, his spurs jingling musically as he moved. He announced his authority to the yeoman. ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini

... more words. Where he learns 'em all is a mystery, for he'd much rather talk than study. He's infatuated young Jefferson, who's yeoman on his father's side, but who's as smart as he is conceited. What do you suppose that young scamp is trying to accomplish? Nothing less than the ruin of the old families of this Dominion, sir. He would so change our laws that, instead ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane

... rain. I'm off again. She's got somebody else in her eye!' And the yeoman went out, slamming ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy

... Table is to be served, as at the first Course, in every respect, which performed, the Servitors and Musicians are to resort to the place assigned them to dine at; which is the Valect's, or Yeoman's Table, beneath the Skreen. Dinner ended, the Musicians prepare to sing a Song, at the highest Table; which ceremony accomplished, then the Officers are to address themselves, every one in his office, to avoid the Tables ...
— A Righte Merrie Christmasse - The Story of Christ-Tide • John Ashton

... in Essex, son of a yeoman; became Speaker of the House of Commons and Lord Chancellor of England; the selfish, unscrupulous ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... no more of this mysterious little being, and the family soon returned from Church. The father was a fine, old-fashioned yeoman, the son had the style of a modern farmer, and the wife was so quiet, sensible, and matronly as to be almost ladylike. Her two little girls were dressed as well as Essie and Ellie, but all were essentially commonplace. ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge

... following morning, shortly after daybreak, Rebolledo Williams began his preparations for a further bombardment of Iquique; but, just as he was on the point of opening fire, the Blanco Encalada's yeoman of signals presented himself with a report that the Chilian gunboat Magellanes—a vessel of 772 tons displacement and of eleven knots speed—had just made her appearance in the bay, coming up from the southward, and flying the signal, "Have important news to ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood

... earnest and eloquent advocates of Liberty in the Nation's youth-time, and a sturdy and noble defender of its cause at the critical era of England's injustice and oppression. No man of the period, it may be hazarded, did more yeoman service than Otis did in the cause of American Freedom, or was more sensible of the rights of the Colonists and of the injustice done them by the Motherland in her assaults on their civil and political status in the years preceding the ...
— James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist • John Clark Ridpath

... evident from the Canon's Yeoman's Tale in Chaucer, that many of those who professed to turn the base metals into gold were held in bad repute as early as the 14th century. The "false chanoun" persuaded the priest, who was his dupe, to send his servant for quicksilver, ...
— The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry • M. M. Pattison Muir

... was that had gained so many laurels, yet had refused, even at the command of Prince John, to lift his visor or to name his name. But their officious inquisitiveness was not gratified. The Disinherited Knight refused all other assistance save that of his own squire, or rather yeoman—a clownish-looking man, who, wrapped in a cloak of dark-colored felt, and having his head and face half buried in a Norman bonnet made of black fur, seemed to affect the incognito as much as his master. All others being excluded from the tent, this attendant relieved his master ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester

... in Canada, taken at the house of some substantial yeoman, is a very different affair from a dinner in the town. The table literally groans with good cheer; and you cannot offer a greater affront to your hostess, than to eat sparingly of ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... sent by the committee to Mrs. Johnson, wife of the Governor, and violets to Mrs. Wallace for their helpful cooperation. Cordial appreciation was expressed to the wives of Senators and Assemblymen who did yeoman service, among them Mrs. Bell, Mrs. Gates, Mrs. Henry Ward Beecher Brown, Mrs. Miguel Estidillo ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various

... of RHYME (invented by the monks to enslave the people) I have a rooted objection. I have therefore written an address for your Theatre in plain, homespun, yeoman's prose; in the doing whereof I hope I am swayed by nothing but an INDEPENDENT wish to open the eyes of this gulled people, to prevent a repetition of the dramatic BAMBOOZLING they have hitherto ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith

... believe to be a haughty Princess. How can you, a grown man, waste money on a seat to witness such tomfoolery! What we saw was something very different. A young and beautiful girl—true, not a lady by birth, being merely the daughter of an honest yeoman, but one equal in all the essentials of womanhood to the noblest in the land—suffered before our very eyes an amount of misfortune that, had one not seen it for oneself, one would never have believed Fate could have accumulated upon the head of any ...
— Paul Kelver • Jerome Klapka, AKA Jerome K. Jerome

... members? No more than the proletariat. Who, then, controls the government? The Plutocracy, with its paltry quarter of a million of occupied members. But this quarter of a million does not control the government, though it renders yeoman service. It is the brain of the Plutocracy that controls the government, and this brain consists of seven* small and powerful groups of men. And do not forget that these groups are working ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London

... influence of certain families prominent in affairs for generations. Yet there were no distinct class-lines, and popular power, like popular education, was widely diffused. Practically Massachusetts was almost independent of the mother-country. Its people were purely English, of sound yeoman stock, with an abundant leaven drawn from the best of the Puritan gentry; but their original character had been somewhat modified by changed conditions of life. A harsh and exacting creed, with its stiff formalism and its prohibition of wholesome recreation; ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman

... that when she left Hinton she had not one of the servants who came thither in her family, which "evinces the impossibility of a confederacy". Her new, like her former servants, were satisfactory; Camis, her new coachman, was of a yeoman house of 400 years' standing. It will be observed that Mrs. Ricketts was a good deal annoyed even before 2nd April, 1771, the day when she dates the beginning of the worst disturbances. She believed that the agency was human—a robber or a practical joker—and but slowly and reluctantly ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang

... old shoes. Bauld, bold. Bees in their bonnet, eccentricities. Birling, whirling. Black-a-vised, dark-complexioned. Bonnet-laird, small landed proprietor, yeoman. Bool, ball. Brae, rising ground. Brig, bridge. Buff, play buff on, to make a fool of, to deceive. Burn, stream. Butt end, end ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson

... an uprising that made his position insupportable. Conscious that his mission had come to an end and certain that, unless he gave way, a collision with Bolivar was inevitable, San Martin resolved to sacrifice himself lest harm befall the common cause in which both had done such yeoman service. Accordingly he resigned his power into the hands of a constituent congress and left the country. But when he found that no happier fortune awaited him in Chile and in his own native land, San Martin decided to abandon Spanish America forever and go into selfimposed ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd

... found among the lowest of our respectable poor. And the biography of Beau Nash, who attempted to reform the manners of the gentry, in the times of Queen Anne, exhibits violations of the rules of decency among the aristocracy, which the commonest yeoman of this Land ...
— A Treatise on Domestic Economy - For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School • Catherine Esther Beecher

... and effective, and which has resulted in lowering the percentage of infantile blindness, and in arousing the public to a sense of its duty in this regard. Dr Glaser and the above-named organizations have also rendered yeoman service in securing the passage of laws prohibiting the use of a roller towel, and for the licensing and registering ...
— Five Lectures on Blindness • Kate M. Foley

... district Dickens came across the types of the oldfashioned and jovially comfortable home of the English yeoman, represented by his Manor Farm, Dingley Dell, and of the little country town, represented by the Muggleton of Pickwick, in which local enthusiasm for cricket was ardent, if the standard of skill was somewhat low. The most plausible identification of ...
— Dickens-Land • J. A. Nicklin

... yew, I may perhaps observe that I am hardly inclined now (though I once was so) to derive from it, as the author of the Etymological Compendium does, the name yeoman: I think that yeoman is not yew-man, "a man using the yew-bow," but yoke-man, a man owning as much land as a yoke of oxen could plough in a ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 206, October 8, 1853 • Various

... came to the old man amid comparative peace and serenity. He accepted a sinecure from the Whigs, and became a Yeoman Usher of the Exchequer, with a small stipend and chambers in New Palace Yard. It was a tribute as much to his harmlessness as to his merit. The work of his last years shows little decay in his intellectual powers. His ...
— Shelley, Godwin and Their Circle • H. N. Brailsford

... and I have spent our vacation handling cartridges," said Josiah grimly, for he was a tutor at Yale, and had done yeoman service in the defense of New Haven. "'Tis a sorry sight to see our beautiful city now laid waste; but that our faith is strong in the Continental Congress and General Washington, I know not how heart ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln

... Mr. James Grierson, General Manager of the Great Western, was the principal witness for the railway companies, and yeoman service he rendered. He presented the railway case with great ability, and his views were accepted on the important terminal question. In 1886 he published a book on Railway Rates, which was warmly welcomed ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow

... back a hundred and fifty years, say to 1735, and suppose a yeoman to have a son about that time. That son would be bred upon the hardest fare, but, though hard, it would be plentiful and of honest sort. The bread would be home-baked, the beef salted at home, the ale home-brewed. ...
— The Open Air • Richard Jefferies

... came by a stone gallery, where a stalwart scarlet sentinel, a yeoman of the guard, with a Tudor rose embroidered in gold upon his back, stood under a lamp set in the wall, with grounded pike ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini

... For the first time in my life I was grieved to the bone at the inadequacy of my wardrobe, and even when I had donned my Sunday best my appearance was undoubtedly villainous from the London point of view. I feathered myself as finely as my resources permitted, but it was a homely, uncouth yeoman that raced downstairs and awaited her coming. I drew the curtains, lit the candles, kicked the fire into a blaze, and built it ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough

... of the kind. The 'worsted stockings' at least are characteristic. Crabbe's son and biographer indicates some of the surroundings of his father's early life in a description of the uncle, a Mr. Tovell, with whom the poet's wife, the Mira of his Journal, passed her youth. He was a sturdy yeoman, living in an old house with a moat, a rookery, and fishponds. The hall was paved with black and white marble, and the staircase was of black oak, slippery as ice, with a chiming clock and a barrel-organ on the landing-places. The handsome drawing-room and dining-rooms were only ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen

... the enterprising agriculturist with special favor. On his return to head-quarters he expressed the pleasure his inspection had afforded; and noticed in a public order Mr. Gatenby, of the Isis, as a "good old English yeoman," and an example of enterprise and skill. Well assured that his Majesty was desirous that the character of a plain, upright farmer, should meet with encouragement and reward, he added to this settler's grant 1,000 acres.[159] The "Gatenby farmers" were henceforth noted as a favored class; ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West

... over 8 feet in height. In his "Chronicles of Holland" in 1557 Hadrianus Barlandus said that in the time of John, Earl of Holland, the giant Nicholas was so large that men could stand under his arms, and his shoe held 3 ordinary feet. Among the yeoman of the guard of John Frederick, Duke of Hanover, there was one Christopher Munster, 8 1/2 feet high, who died in 1676 in his forty-fifth year. The giant porter of the Duke of Wurtemberg was 7 1/2 feet high. "Big Sam," the ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... before you, holden with the point upwards; your barrons in the third degree sitting beside you, and your beneficed men and your Deemsters before you sitting; and your Clarke, Knights, Esquires, and Yeomen, and yeoman about you in the third degree; and the worthiest man in your Land (these are the twenty-four Keys) to be called in before your Deemsters, if you will ask any Thing of them, and to hear the Government of your Land and your will; and the Commons to stand without the circle of the Hill ...
— A Girl's Ride in Iceland • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie

... allies, in a way. Though sometimes he is against us. He's doing yeoman work in this reform mayoralty campaign. If we elect Robert Laird, as I think we shall, it will be chiefly due to The ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... Bury, I was inuited to the house of a very bountifull widdow, whose husband during his life was a Yeoman of that Countrie; dying rich no doubt, as might well appeare, by the riches and plentie that abounded in euery corner of the house. She is called ...
— Kemps Nine Daies Wonder - Performed in a Daunce from London to Norwich • William Kemp

... yeoman is said to have made his appearance in the fifteenth century, but the small freeholders of the manor before that date were to all intents and purposes yeomen. No doubt, as trade grew in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries successful tradesmen ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler

... business to the Earl, who was seated near the Queen. Lord Shrewsbury took the petition from him, glanced it over, and asked, "Who knew the Guy Norman who sent it?" Frank Talbot answered for him, that he was a yeoman pricker, and the Earl permitted the paper to be carried to Mary, watching her carefully as she read it, when Antony had presented it ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge

... the country was in a state of great turbulency on account of the Plug Drawing and the Chartist Riots. Soldiers were stationed at Keighley, where the late Captain Ferrand had a troop of yeoman cavalry under his charge. One day, I recollect, the Keighley soldiers had a rare outing. This is just how it came about. An old inhabitant, with the baptismal name, James Mitchell, but the locally-accepted ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End

... a particular pleasure to acknowledge the major contributions of Mark Brader to the final manuscript; he read and reread many drafts, checked facts, caught typos, submitted an amazing number of thoughtful comments, and did yeoman service in catching typos and minor usage bobbles. Mr. Brader's rare combination of enthusiasm, persistence, wide-ranging technical knowledge, and precisionism in matters of language made his help invaluable, and the sustained volume and quality ...
— THE JARGON FILE, VERSION 2.9.10

... ornament of the pigskin would on certain occasions (race meetings) take his place at the card-table with some who were very literally his betters, while others who had more self-respect contented themselves with backing him. The other example I have in my mind was an ancient Cumberland yeoman, who, having lost the use of his limbs in middle life from having been tossed by a bull, pursued the science under considerable difficulties. A sort of card-rack (such as Psycho uses at the Egyptian Hall) was placed in front of him, and behind him stood his little granddaughter ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn

... the Charterhouse became a nobleman's palace, and passed through several changes of ownership. After the suppression of the monastery the buildings were used as a storehouse for the King's hales (that is, nets) and tents. John Brydges, yeoman, and Thomas Hales were placed in charge of the King's property. This arrangement, however, was of short duration, for in 1545 the King presented the site to Sir Edward North, Brydges and Hales receiving L10 per annum by way of compensation. According ...
— Memorials of Old London - Volume I • Various

... connection, of the blush that rises to the innocent girl's cheek; but why should even those who are supposed to be past the age of blushing not also enjoy humour unspiced by even a suggestion of lubricity? The "Mikado" and "Pinafore" have done yeoman's service in displacing the meretricious delights of Offenbach and Lecocq; and Howells' little pieces yield an exquisite, though innocent, enjoyment to those whose taste in farces has not been fashioned and spoiled by clumsy English adaptations or imitations of intriguing ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead

... a distinctive and professional vocabulary, which it was necessary for every one who joined in hawking to understand, unless he wished to be looked upon as an ignorant yeoman. "Flying the hawk is a royal pastime," says the Jesuit Claude Binet, "and it is to talk royally to talk of the flight of birds. Every one speaks of it, but few speak well. Many speak so ignorantly as to excite pity among their hearers. Sometimes one says the hand of the bird instead ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix

... this condition) by the emblem reared on the roadside over against the house, which, if not of those goodly proportions that Maypoles were wont to present in olden times, was a fair young ash, thirty feet in height, and straight as any arrow that ever English yeoman drew. ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens

... 2ND YEOMAN This the autumn of our life, This the evening of our day; Weary we of battle strife, Weary we of mortal fray. But our year is not so spent, And our days are not so faded, But that we with one consent, Were our ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan

... grant of his pension Chaucer is called "dilectus vallectus noster," our beloved yeoman; before the end of 1368 he had risen to be one of the king's esquires. In September of the following year John of Gaunt's wife, the duchess Blanche, died at the age of twenty-nine, and Chaucer wrote in her honour The Book of the Duchesse, a poem of 1334 lines ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various

... believe that their struggle to wrest a living from the rocky hills while they built up a state was as worthy of honour as any knightly deed of the Round Table. She was prouder of those early ancestors who delved and spun and toiled with their hands at yeoman tasks, than the later ones, who were ministers and ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston

... frolique; but these gallants continued thus a great while, and I wondered to see how the ladies did tipple. At last I sent my wife and her bedfellow to bed, and Mr. Hunt and I went in with Mr. Thornbury (who did give the company all their wine, he being yeoman of the wine-cellar to the King) to his house; and there, with his wife and two of his sisters, and some gallant sparks that were there, we drank the King's health, and nothing else, till one of the gentlemen fell down stark drunk, and there lay spewing; and I went ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... never a wise man in the realm to be a comptroller of the mint? I speak it to your shame. I speak it to your shame. If there be never a wise man, make a water-bearer, a tinker, a cobbler, a slave, a page, comptroller of the mint: make a mean gentleman, a groom, a yeoman, or a ...
— Sermons on the Card and Other Discourses • Hugh Latimer

... mercer, St. Michael. Owen Robert, tiler and plasterer, St. Paul (fr. St. Paul.) Pymm Thomas, currier, Christchurch. Phelps James, gardener, St Philip. Perry James, jun. Cooper, St. Peter. Parker William, yeoman, St. Paul. Primm Jacob, cordwainer, St. Michael. Prescott William, carpenter, St. Philip. Palmer William, hat-maker, St. Philip. Pymm William, tailor, Christchurch. Parfitt Thomas, cabinet-maker, St. Thomas. Perry Charles, labourer, Frenebay. ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt

... the English yeoman averse to live upon public charity is highly advantageous to the industry and virtue of the nation. Even where it is instilled early into families as a prejudice, it is useful, and ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth

... cattle-dealer in the neighbourhood, who would willingly aid an old and faithful servant. Of Farmer Oakley, accordingly, she asked, not money, but something much more in his own way—a cow! And, amused and interested by the child's earnestness, the wealthy yeoman gave her a very ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various

... frenchified name, who would only think that she graced Ullathorne too highly by entering its portals? Was it likely that an honourable John, the son of the Earl de Courcy, should ride at a quintain in company with a Saxon yeoman? And why should she expect her brother to do that which her brother's guests ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope

... living in a world partly furnished with such; and that there are now almost no 'gentlemen' (not quite none): this is one great head of my reflexions, to which there is no visible tail or finish. I have also a Horse (borrowed from my fat Yeoman friend, who is at sea bathing in Sussex); and I go riding, at great lengths daily, over hill and dale: this I believe is really the main good I am doing,—if in this either there be much good. But it is a strange way of life to me, for the ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald

... upon the crowded street, In motley groups what maskers meet! 560 Banner and pageant, pipe and drum, And merry morris dancers come. I guess, by all this quaint array, The burghers hold their sports today. James will be there; he loves such show, 565 Where the good yeoman bends his bow, And the tough wrestler foils his foe, As well as where, in proud career, The high-born tilter shivers spear. I'll follow to the Castle-park, 570 And play my prize—King James shall mark If age has tamed these sinews stark, Whose force so oft, in happier days, His boyish wonder loved ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott

... represents Bacon is continually apparent to the instructed reader. Note especially Act II., Scene 3, where Puntarvolo addresses his wife, who appears at a window, in a parody of the address of Romeo to Juliet. Again in Act II., Scene 3, Carlo Buffone calls Puntarvolo "A yeoman pheuterer." Pheuter or feuter means a rest or ...
— Bacon is Shake-Speare • Sir Edwin Durning-Lawrence

... his father died he came into a very good thing, for his only brother was drowned when the Magna Charta foundered, so he inherited the whole estate. It was but a few hundred acres, but it was good arable land, and those were the great days of farming. Besides, it was freehold, and a yeoman farmer without a mortgage was a warmish man before the great fall in wheat came. Foreign wheat and barbed wire—those are the two curses of this country, for the one spoils the farmer's work and ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle

... appearance of the country is less pleasing. You meet there with few or none of those detached farm-houses, with their little dependencies of cottages, which everywhere greet the eye in England, bespeaking the honest and well-conditioned yeoman, and presenting a picture of prosperity and contentment,—the villages through which you pass, mostly wear a decayed and squalid appearance—the magnificent country-seats, with their parks and other appurtenances, ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... told Yeoman Lacey to haul down the Spanish flag, which was done, and then they raised the first United States flag to ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis

... called Mungo, was a substantial yeoman of Ettrick Forest, and was distinguished for his unremitting attention to the education of his children, the greater number of whom he saw respectably settled in life. The young Mungo, after receiving with his brothers a course of education at home under a private tutor, was sent ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston

... not, he might take it back again. She even hoped to pay for it by and by, by instalments, but that she would not promise!' and, partly amused, partly interested by the child's earnestness, the wealthy yeoman gave her, not as a purchase, but as a present, a very fine young Alderney. She then went to the lord of the manor, and, with equal knowledge of character, begged his permission to keep her cow on the Shaw common. 'Farmer Oakley had given her a fine Alderney, and ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford

... the daughter of a king, he said: "Frithiof, my dear foster-son, in vain are your hopes. Ingeborg is a king's daughter. Your reason should tell you that you cannot marry her. Proud is King Bele of his family descended from the great god Odin. He will have his daughter marry a prince, not a yeoman. Well do I love you; brave and handsome are you and strong as any prince, but you must forget ...
— Northland Heroes • Florence Holbrook

... you. Moreover, in taking vengeance on those whom you know in some cases to be your enemies, because you championed the cause of my recall, in others to be jealous of the splendid position and renown which that measure brought you, I should have done you yeoman's service as your associate. However, that perpetual enemy of his own friends, who, in spite of having been honoured with the highest compliments on your part, has selected you of all people for the object of his impotent and enfeebled violence, ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... heart, was as much present in the most ethereal things of Christendom as it was absent from the most practical things of Islam. England would derive a thing from France, France from Italy, Italy from Greece, Greece from Palestine, Palestine from Paradise. It was not merely that a yeoman of Kent would have his house hallowed by the priest of the parish church, which was confirmed by Canterbury, which was confirmed by Rome. Rome herself did not worship herself, as in the pagan age. Rome herself looked eastward to the mysterious cradle of her creed, to a land of which the very earth ...
— A Short History of England • G. K. Chesterton

... It is a characteristic circumstance that his name is not his own, except in the sense that it was assumed by himself. The name of his father, who was a butcher in the parish of St. Giles, Cripplegate, was Foe. His grandfather was a Northamptonshire yeoman. In his True Born Englishman, Defoe spoke very contemptuously of families that professed to have come over with "the Norman bastard," defying them to prove whether their ancestors were drummers or colonels; but apparently ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto

... nothing of this when I first made application to the landlord, a solid yeoman inhabiting a farm at the foot of the coombe, on a cliff overlooking the beach. To him I presented myself fearlessly as a spinster of decent family and small but assured income, intending a rural life of combined seemliness and economy. He met my advances ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... the Jew pursued his point, and jostled the Norman Christian, without respect either to his descent, quality, or religion. The complaints of the old man, however, excited the indignation of the bystanders. One of these, a stout well-set yeoman, arrayed in Lincoln green, having twelve arrows stuck in his belt, with a baldric and badge of silver, and a bow of six feet length in his hand, turned short round, and while his countenance, which his constant ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott

... of them are, their fears once raised, will not easily be controlled. Napoleon had most politically excited alarm among them, and they are favourably inclined towards him. This powerful body have no leaders to direct them: The respectable and wealthy farmer, possessing great landed property; the yeoman, the country gentleman,—all these ranks are abolished. Where the views of the Sovereign are inimical to the peasantry, as was imagined under Louis XVIII. that body will powerfully resist him; where they were in concert, as under Napoleon, ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison

... prowess. This was a fellow of mighty limb and boastful tongue, vast in strength and terrible in war, as his own tale ran. Hereward fought him, and the giant ceased to boast. Cornwall had a giant the less. Next he sought Ireland, and did yeoman service in the wars of that unquiet island. Taking ship thence, he made his way to Flanders, where legend credits him with wonderful deeds. Battle and bread were the nutriment of his existence, the one as necessary to him as the other, and a journey of ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... People in THEIR position, who could do this and that, whose name stood so high for this and that, who knew themselves well bred, who had one relation an admiral, another a general, and a marriage-connection with some of the oldest families in the country—that one little better than a yeoman, a man who held the plough with his own big hands, should enquire into THEIR social standing! Was not Mr. Peregrine Palmer prepared to buy him up the moment he required to sell! Was he not rich enough to purchase an earl's daughter for his son, and ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... hardly note the change. Three generations are born and die, and no villager living has seen the older greater oak; the younger, slighter tree succeeds to its glories. Tilford's oak to-day is called by all Tilford the King's Oak. On the old estate maps it is Novel's Oak; Novel, perhaps, was a yeoman farmer. ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker

... Lincoln paid a visit to the college city to speak at the old City Hall. He was introduced as one who had "done yeoman service for the young party (the Republican)." The word yeoman was under stood in the old English sense of the small independent farmers. Old Tom Lincoln's boy came into this class. He assented to it and even lowered the level by presenting himself as a hard worker in the cause—"a dirty shirt" ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams

... YEOMAN. An experienced hand placed in charge of a store-room, who should be able to keep the accounts of supply ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... she can when her country calls, and so Miss Loretta Walsh became a member of the United States navy—the first woman enlisted in that branch of the service, with the exception of the nurses' corps. Her title was chief yeoman. ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller

... time, this was only by fits and starts, and on the whole she served them well. Therefore, to most of them she was always the good Queen Bess. What mattered it to the ditcher and yeoman, far from the court, that the queen was said to dance in her nightdress and to swear like ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr

... the festival. The old avenue was thronged with bright and beaming faces, rustic maidens decked out in ribbons of many-colored splendor, and stout youths in their best holiday trim; nor was the lusty yeoman and his buxom spouse—nor yet the patriarch of the village, nor prattling child, wanting. Even the ancestral rooks seemed to participate in the universal merriment, and returned, from their eyries, a hoarse greeting, like a lusty chorus of laughter, to the frolic ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth

... his special principle that poetry should speak the language of Nature, and therefore, as he inferred, of the ordinary peasant and uneducated man. The hills did not speak to him of legend or history but of the sentiment of the unsophisticated yeoman or 'statesman.' He sympathised enthusiastically with the French Revolution so long as he took it to utter the simple republican sentiment congenial to a small society of farmers and shepherds. He abandoned it when he came to think that it really ...
— English Literature and Society in the Eighteenth Century • Leslie Stephen

... table's massy frame Bestride the kitchen floor! the careful dame And gen'rous host invite their friends around, While all that clear'd the crop, or till'd the ground, Are guests by right of custom:... old and young; And many a neighbouring yeoman join the throng, With artizans that lent their dext'rous aid, When o'er each field the flaming ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield

... "The man to whom the place belongs, a worthy yeoman of the old school, says that this wider part of the channel must have been the fish-pond, and that the portly monks stood on this stone and fished in ...
— The Seaboard Parish Vol. 2 • George MacDonald

... take your rest!" said the boy: "we have done yeoman's service to-day, and shown ourselves fit to earn our own livelihood! We are outlaws now, my lion of the Pyrenees; and you at least lead a merrier life than in the castle halls, when we hunted for sport, and not for sustenance! Well-a-day, ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge

... until early in June that, by an express from Ashburton in Devon, we heard that our brother's fortune was still rising, he having succeeded to the command of his company made vacant by the wounding of Captain Sir Harry Welcome. "And this is no mean achievement for a poor yeoman's son," he wrote, "in an army where promotion goes as a rule to them that have estates to pawn. But I hope in these days some few may serve his Majesty and yet prosper, and that my dear Margery may yet have her wish and be mistress in Lantine." ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... great estimation and possessions,—with no small number of the tallest yeomen that he could get in all his realm; in so much that well was that nobleman and gentleman that might prefer any tall and comely yeoman unto his service." ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various

... on certain occasions and by proper persons, and I hope when the time comes I shall take it as well as another. But that doesn't include turning out to be potted at like a woodcock on your confounded Berkshire wilds by a turnip-headed yeoman. It isn't to be done at ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes

... the amenities of the occasion. It was the only heaviness. To the other contest between them he brought an amazing sureness, a suppleness, power, and audacity beyond praise. He directed his battle, and at his elbow Tom Mocket, sandy-haired and ferret-eyed, did him yeoman service. ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston

... together, and when that comes about, from some member (if the session stretches to any length at all) is sure to come a story of particular interest to the guild; and perhaps it ought to be explained that a yeoman's story is never mistaken in the Navy for a stoker's, a gunner's, a quartermaster's; never for anybody's but ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly

... Bear and Ragged Staff, which has been the cognizance of the Warwick earldom from time immemorial. The soldiers were sturdy young men, with the simple, stolid, yet kindly, faces of English rustics, looking exceedingly well in a body, but slouching into a yeoman-like carriage and appearance, the moment they were dismissed from drill. Squads of them were distributed everywhere about the streets, and sentinels were posted at various points; and I saw a sergeant, with a great key in his hand, (big enough to have been the key of the castle's ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... aloud: Ah, fair knight, abide and suffer me to do thankings unto thee, for much have ye done for me. But ever Sir Galahad rode so fast that at the last he passed out of his sight. And as fast as Sir Percivale might he went after him on foot, crying. And then he met with a yeoman riding upon an hackney, the which led in his hand a great steed blacker than any bear. Ah, fair friend, said Sir Percivale, as ever I may do for you, and to be your true knight in the first place ye will require me, that ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed

... all the maidens who dwelt in those parts there was one who was so superior in beauty and in charm that she seemed to be very specially marked out for me. Her name was Marie Ravon, and her people, the Ravons, were of yeoman stock who had farmed their own land in those parts since the days when Duke William went to England. If I close my eyes now, I see her as she then was, her cheeks, dusky like moss roses; her hazel eyes, ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle

... to get on board in the confusion that attends a vessel's departure; and in one of the dark corners of Steerage No. 1, flat in a bunk and with an empty stomach, Alick made the voyage from the Broomielaw to Greenock. That night, the ship's yeoman pulled him out by the heels and had him before the mate. Two other stowaways had already been found and sent ashore; but by this time darkness had fallen, they were out in the middle of the estuary, and the last steamer had left them ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Captain of the Yeoman Gold Stick of the Captain of the Band of the Guard, Life Guards in of Gentlemen Pensioners, wearing his coronet. waiting, wearing wearing his his ...
— Coronation Anecdotes • Giles Gossip

... broken in the contest. The boy rode along, rejoicing in his youth and strength, singing as he went, till he drew near the appointed place, and then he suddenly heard a man's voice lamenting aloud and crying, "Wellaway! Alas!" and saw a venerable yeoman wringing his hands. "Good man," said Gamelyn, "why art thou in such distress? Can no ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt

... playing a piece called Partners. Not a good play. And the Yeoman of the Guard had just been produced at the Savoy. That makes it seem a long time ago, doesn't it? Well, I mustn't take up all your time. Good-bye, Mr. Bevan. I am glad to have had the opportunity of this little talk. ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... be one of astonishment, my Lord Count, but speaking for the Emperor, I am certain that he would never lay hands on the usurper, or treat him like a sack of corn in a yeoman's barn." ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr

... to Teufelsdrockh. For instance, that of the incessant use of a sort of odd superfluous qualification of his assertions; which seems to give the character of deliberateness and caution to the style, but in time sounds like mere trick or involuntary habit. 'Almost' does more than yeoman's, almost slave's service in this way. Something similar may be remarked of the use of the double negative by ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle

... to the north of west, if it makes any difference, and during the intervals there was always a comparative calm or slackening of the wind. I was once taken by one of these storm-clouds about Nether Libberton, on the Dalkeith road. I used the spur a little; and, having been a yeoman for many years, I was unconsciously holding a small rattan cane somewhat after the mode of "carry swords." Roused by the velocity of the wind, and the darkness of the passing cloud, I naturally turned my ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 554, Saturday, June 30, 1832 • Various

... bed-room adjoining, both indifferently furnished, and a few books on his table; no pen and ink or newspaper has been yet allowed him, but he has a pencil and a memorandum book, in which he occasionally notes things. The warden of the Tower, and a yeoman of the guard are constantly at his elbow, though they never attempt to stop his conversation. Mr Manning and his child being the first visitors he has had, perhaps Mr Laurens was led to say everything he could of the severity of his ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various

... alive. It was Thorbiorg's custom in the winters, to go to entertainments, and she was especially sought after at the homes of those who were curious to know their fate, or what manner of season might be in store for them; and inasmuch as Thorkel was the chief yeoman in the neighborhood, it was thought to devolve upon him to find out when the evil time, which was upon them, would cease. Thorkel invited the prophetess to his home, and careful preparations were made for her ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various

... intellectual: and I notice this now with the more emphasis, because I am coming rapidly upon ground where it will be seen that this one qualification was of more summary importance to us—did us more 'yeoman's service' at a crisis the most awful—than other qualities of greater name and pretension. Hannah was this woman's Christian name; and her name and her memory are to me amongst the most hallowed of ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey

... should feel obliged by any particulars respecting Richard Haley, or Hales, of Idlestreete, otherwise Ilstreyd, in com. Hertford, yeoman; my object being to ascertain the nature of some transaction he had with Milton, in July 1674, referred to in a bond which the former executed, dated the 27th of that month, for performance of the covenants contained in an ...
— Notes and Queries 1850.04.06 • Various

... the country. There has, therefore, since the middle of the century, been a widespread agitation in favor of the creation of smaller farms, of giving assistance in their purchase, and of thus introducing a more mixed system of rural land occupancy, and bringing back something of the earlier English yeoman farming. ...
— An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England • Edward Potts Cheyney

... desire, but no place to lay their heads; and few if any of them can afford to buy land and build houses at the same time. This, I am satisfied, is the main difficulty in the way of the speedy filling up of Virginia with the best class of yeoman settlers." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various

... (mentioned elsewhere) dance his Morris jig to the tune of "Rodney," had our other old friend Tabourot been present in the spirit—maybe he was—he need have altered nothing in the description we have quoted but to substitute for the boy with his face blackened a sturdy English yeoman, and to note some differences in the get-up of the dancer. The solo dance has been performed also at Bampton, between tobacco-pipes laid crosswise on the ground—to the tune of the "Bacca Pipes" jig, or "Green Sleeves"—suggesting the ...
— The Morris Book • Cecil J. Sharp

... feelings of the people of Carolina, simply through his own resources, at a period most adverse to their fortunes, and when the cause of their liberties, everywhere endangered, was almost everywhere considered hopeless. His name was the great rallying cry of the yeoman in battle—the word that promised hope—that cheered the desponding patriot—that startled, and made to pause in his career of recklessness and blood, the cruel and sanguinary tory. Unprovided with the means of warfare, no less than of comfort—wanting ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms

... and both dull, are engaged. The musician, visiting his fiancee, now well off and installed in a comfortable village farm-house, lets the strong air of the place get into his head and falls deep in love with a yeoman's daughter, who in turn, stimulated by this experience, straightway succumbs (at her first dance in real society, into which the great lady of the village, her patron, has introduced her) to the suggestion that she shall ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, February 4, 1920 • Various

... discipline. In England, on the contrary, under kings with more control over the feudal aristocracy, and from the combination of lords and common people in resistance to kings, the English armies had acquired union and discipline. The bow in the hands of the English yeoman was a most effective weapon. The English infantry were more than a match for the brave and impetuous cavaliers of France. At Crecy the entire English force fought on foot. Cannon were just beginning to come into use. This brought a new advantage to the foot-soldier. But it seems probable that ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher

... himself. Here reclined a glorious company of sixteenth century knights, with their honourable ladies at their sides, unyielding marble bolsters at their heads, and grotesque dogs at their feet. Later, when their peerage was conferred, they lost a little of their yeoman simplicity, and became peruked and robed and breeched; one, indeed, in the age of George III., who was blessed with poetical aspirations, appeared in bare feet and a Roman toga with a scroll of manuscript in his hand; while later ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson

... have studied thee, I have read thee as a scholar would read a book. I know thee proud; I know thee aspiring; I know thou art vain of thy gentle blood, and distasteful of my yeoman's birth. There, I am not blind to thy faults, but I love thee despite them; and to please those faults I have toiled, schemed, dreamed, risen. I offer to thee the future with the certainty of a man who can command it. Wouldst thou wealth?—be patient (as ambition ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... at a spot called Rocky Shallow, Where the Froom stream curves amid the moorland, washed aground, And they searched about for him, the yeoman, who had darkly known her, But he could not ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy



Words linked to "Yeoman" :   escort, bodyguard, freeholder



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