Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A vagrant; a swindler.
  • To practise begging, especially under the pretense of being a wounded or disbanded soldier; play the swindler; live by begging. Also skilder.
  • To swindle, especially by assuming to be a worn-out soldier; hence, in general, to cheat; trick; defraud.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • verb obsolete To deceive; to cheat; to trick.
  • noun obsolete A vagrant; a cheat.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun obsolete A vagrant; a cheat.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • “I swear to you,” continued the scrivener “they are in no way at my disposal — they have been delivered to me by tale — I am to pay them over to Lord Dalgarno, whose boy waits for them, and I could not skelder one piece out of them, without risk of hue and cry.”

    The Fortunes of Nigel 2004

  • "I swear to you," continued the scrivener "they are in no way at my disposal -- they have been delivered to me by tale -- I am to pay them over to Lord Dalgarno, whose boy waits for them, and I could not skelder one piece out of them, without risk of hue and cry."

    The Fortunes of Nigel Walter Scott 1801

  • 'an honest, decayed commander cannot skelder, cheat, nor be seen in a bawdy house, but he shall be straight in one of their wormwood comedies.'

    Shakspere and Montaigne Jacob Feis

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