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Wassail   Listen
noun
Wassail  n.  
1.
An ancient expression of good wishes on a festive occasion, especially in drinking to some one. "Geoffrey of Monmouth relates, on the authority of Walter Calenius, that this lady (Rowena), the daughter of Hengist, knelt down on the approach of the king, and, presenting him with a cup of wine, exclaimed, Lord king waes heil, that is, literally, Health be to you."
2.
An occasion on which such good wishes are expressed in drinking; a drinking bout; a carouse. "In merry wassail he... peals his loud song." "The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse, Keeps wassail." "The victors abandoned themselves to feasting and wassail."
3.
The liquor used for a wassail; esp., a beverage formerly much used in England at Christmas and other festivals, made of ale (or wine) flavored with spices, sugar, toast, roasted apples, etc.; called also lamb's wool. "A jolly wassail bowl, A wassail of good ale."
4.
A festive or drinking song or glee. (Obs.) "Have you done your wassail! 'T is a handsome, drowsy ditty, I'll assure you."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Wassail" Quotes from Famous Books



... loud, And impatient of control, Boisterous in the market crowd, Boisterous at the wassail-bowl, Everywhere Would drink and swear, Swaggering ...
— Tales of a Wayside Inn • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... second act Wallfried arrives with two friends at the Count's castle. All three are in pilgrim's garb and bring a beautiful wassail-horn to the Count in token of friendship from the Sire of Rodenstein. The sentry and the Count consider these pious guests harmless, and the Count, being a great amateur of good wine, drinks and sings with them and soon gets drunk. ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley

... his friends, vociferous though they were, and heated with anticipated triumphs, wine and wassail, heard the glorious din, learned its cause, and came reeling forth to embrace their puissant ally. Quitting as they did the fumes of buttocks and sirloins, gammons and hams, turkies and geese, wines, ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... with our geese), and great cheering when the puddings and flapdragons came in all aflame, and all as merry as grigs—flinging of lighted plums at each other, but most mannerly not to fling any at Moll or us. Then more shouting for joy when the bowls of wassail and posset come in, and all standing to give three times three for their new mistress and her husband. Hearing of which, the beggars without (now tired of dancing about the embers) troop up to the door and give three times three as well, and end with crying joy and long life to ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett

... always seemed to him as if any movement would destroy the sacred act he witnessed, and when, in the pauses, he looked at the canvas and saw how swiftly and steadily the work progressed, he felt as if before his own eyes, he was being born again to a nobler existence. In the wassail-hall hung the portrait of a young Prince of Navarre, whose life had been saved in the chase by a Rappoltstein. Ulrich, attired in the count's clothes, looked exactly like him. The jester had been the first to perceive this strange circumstance. Every one, even Moor, agreed with him, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... exultant with success, encamped that night in the woods not far from Marlborough, and kept the forest awake with the uproar of their barbarian wassail. The colonists immediately assembled a small band of brave men, fell upon them by surprise in the midst of their carousals, shot ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott

... it seemed, around. "Farewell!" she sighed, sinking; then from afar Flowed the pealing laughter and wassail's sound (For the dead ...
— Along the Shore • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop

... said young Chitterlings wildly. "Every moment is precious. Is this an hour to give to wine and wassail? Ha, we want action—action! We must strike the blow for freedom to-night—ay, this very night. The scow is already anchored in the mill-dam, freighted with provisions for a three months' voyage. I have a black flag in my pocket. ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... west and east And other foreign parts, Come share the rapture of our feast, The love of loyal hearts; And in the wassail that suspends All matters burthensome, We'll drink a health to good old friends And good friends yet to come. Clink, clink, clink! To fellowship we drink! And from the bowl No genial soul In such an hour will shrink. Clink, clink, clink! Merrily let us drink! There's ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field

... underground pipes from flower-beds. They had baths, and libraries, and dining-halls, fountains of quicksilver and water. City and country were full of conviviality, and of dancing to the lute and mandolin. Instead of the drunken and gluttonous wassail orgies of their Northern neighbors, the feasts of the Saracens were marked by sobriety. Wine was prohibited. The enchanting moonlight evenings of Andalusia were spent by the Moors in sequestered, fairy-like gardens or in orange-groves, listening to the romances ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper

... sets the beakers For the guests at the wassail feast; Nor fills a flask from the oldest cask For ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various

... handsome face, with its fair hue and its gentle languor on which there was not a single trace of the outrecuidance attributed to him. Both he and the Seraph could lead the wildest life of any men in Europe without looking one shadow more worn than the brightest beauty of the season, and could hold wassail in riotous rivalry till the sun rose, and then throw themselves into saddle as fresh as if they had been sound asleep all night; to keep up with the pack the whole day in a fast burst or on a cold scent, or in whatever sport Fortune ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... night, with its wassail and its mirth, its toasts and its loud-voiced bragging, might be called "the great night of Morristown," this, the girl promised herself, should more truly and more fitly be styled "the great day of Ireland." ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... A teetotaller! Well! He is the true Heautontimorumenos, the self-punisher, with a jug of toast-and-water for his Christmas wassail. So far his folly is merely pitiable, but his intolerance makes it offensive. He cannot enjoy his own tipple unless he can deprive me of mine. A fox that has lost his tail. There is no tyrant like a thoroughpaced reformer. I drink to ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock

... With some strange tale bewitch'd my mind, Of forayers who, with headlong force, Down from that strength had spurr'd their horse, Their southern rapine to renew, Far in the distant Cheviots blue, And home returning, fill'd the hall With revel, wassail-rout, and brawl. Methought that still with trump and clang The gateway's broken arches rang; Methought grim features, seam'd with scars, Glared through the windows' rusty bars; And ever, by the winter hearth, Old tales ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart

... matter of interest to them. As they came through the village, they perceived that Farmer Huet was holding his apple feast; for he was carrying from his house into his orchard a great bowl of spiced ale, and was followed by a merry company, singing wassail as they poured a little at ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... thee," he said "men say thou art a prompt fellow in thy service, but too much given to brawling and to wassail to be ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... thou that crown'st my glittering hearth With guiltless mirth, And giv'st me wassail bowls to drink, Spiced to the brink. Lord, 'tis thy plenty-dropping hand That soils my land, And giv'st me for my bushel sown Twice ...
— Eighth Reader • James Baldwin



Words linked to "Wassail" :   make whoopie, whoop it up, reward, roister, booze, make happy, honor, revel, toast, pledge, riot, racket, make merry, punch, give, fuddle, fete



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