The Thirty-Nine Steps (39 page)

lighterman
NOUN
a lighterman is another word for sailor
in and out, hammers going in ship-builders’ yards, saws going at timber, clashing
engines going at things unknown, pumps going in leaky ships, capstans going, ships
going out to sea, and unintelligible sea creatures roaring curses over the bulwarks
at respondent lightermen
(
Great Expectations
by Charles Dickens)

livery
NOUN
servants often wore a uniform known as a livery
suddenly a footman in livery came running out of the wood
(
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
by Lewis Carroll)

livid
ADJ
livid means pale or ash coloured. Livid also means very angry
a dirty, livid white
(
Treasure Island
by Robert Louis Stevenson)

lottery-tickets
NOUN
a popular card game
and Mrs. Philips protested that they would have a nice comfortable noisy game of lottery
tickets
(
Pride and Prejudice
by Jane Austen)

lower and upper world
PHRASE
the earth and the heavens are the lower and upper worlds
the changes in the lower and upper world
(
Gulliver’s Travels
by Jonathan Swift)

lustres
NOUN
lustres are chandeliers. A chandelier is a large, decorative frame which holds light
bulbs or candles and hangs from the ceiling
the lustres, lights, the carving and the guilding
(
The Prelude
by William Wordsworth)

lynched
VERB
killed without a criminal trial by a crowd of people
He’ll never know how nigh he come to getting lynched
(
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
by Mark Twain)

malingering
VERB
if someone is malingering they are pretending to be ill to avoid working
And you stand there malingering
(
Treasure Island
by Robert Louis Stevenson)

managing
PHRASE
treating with consideration
to think the honour of my own kind not worth managing
(
Gulliver’s Travels
by Jonathan Swift)

manhood
PHRASE
manhood means human nature
concerning the nature of manhood
(
Gulliver’s Travels
by Jonathan Swift)

man-trap
NOUN
a man-trap is a set of steel jaws that snap shut when trodden on and trap a person’s
leg
“Don’t go to him,” I called out of the window, “he’s an assassin! A
man-trap!”
(
Oliver Twist
by Charles Dickens)

maps
NOUN
charts of the night sky
Let maps to others, worlds on worlds have shown
(
The Good-Morrow
by John Donne)