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Clerk   Listen
noun
Clerk  n.  
1.
A clergyman or ecclesiastic. (Obs.) "All persons were styled clerks that served in the church of Christ."
2.
A man who could read; a scholar; a learned person; a man of letters. (Obs.) "Every one that could read... being accounted a clerk." "He was no great clerk, but he was perfectly well versed in the interests of Europe."
3.
A parish officer, being a layman who leads in reading the responses of the Episcopal church service, and otherwise assists in it. (Eng.) "And like unlettered clerk still cry "Amen"."
4.
One employed to keep records or accounts; a scribe; an accountant; as, the clerk of a court; a town clerk. "The clerk of the crown... withdrew the bill." Note: In some cases, clerk is synonymous with secretary. A clerk is always an officer subordinate to a higher officer, board, corporation, or person; whereas a secretary may be either a subordinate or the head of an office or department.
5.
An assistant in a shop or store. (U. S.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Clerk" Quotes from Famous Books



... history: back to England's Ernest Rutherford, who in 1919 proved that, occasionally, when an alpha particle from radium strikes a nitrogen atom, either a proton or a hydrogen nucleus is ejected; to the Dane Niels Bohr and his 1913 idea of electron orbits; to a once unknown Swiss patent clerk, Albert Einstein, and his now famous theories; to Poland's Marie Curie who, in 1898, with her French husband Pierre laboriously isolated polonium and radium; back to the French scientist H. A. Becquerel, who first discovered something he called a "spontaneous ...
— A Brief History of Element Discovery, Synthesis, and Analysis • Glen W. Watson

... room when Johnny again arrived at the store, and a clerk took his name up very dubiously. The clerk returned, smiling with extreme graciousness, and informed the caller that he was to walk straight back. Johnny found Ersten in spectacles and apron, with a tape-line round his neck ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester

... to draw out the entrails and eat them, from all persons whom he saw dressed in white. That happened toward Catanduanes; and it is not fable, since our Fray Juan de Merida buried a Spanish clerk in Calilaya to whom this misfortune had happened. The magtatangal is said to have been a man who left his body without head and intestines, and that the head wandered about hither and thither during ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin

... Dong! There's a shadow on the marn, Dong! Dong! Dong! The one larst bell du warn: "O fulish mun! O fulish mun! Life be no more than grass, It glitters in the shinin' zun— Until the Reaper pass! An', hark! I call 'ee up to prayer, Wi' passen, clerk, an' schule, Come up along, an' take thee seat Thou ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie

... made all the difference. Within two hours from his gaining the document so important, Philip, without any subtler exertion of intellect than the decision of a plain, bold sense, had already forestalled both the peer and the lawyer. He had sent down Mr. Barlow's head clerk to his master in Wales with the document, and a short account of the manner in which it had been discovered. And fortunate, indeed, was it that the copy had been found; for all the inquiries of Mr. Barlow at A—— had failed, and probably would have failed, without such a clue, ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... only time to see Dandy one moment, to pet and fondle him and praise his beautiful condition (to Hogan's delight), and then, just as tattoo was sounding, there came into the room the quartermaster's clerk with some papers for ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... have rehearsed for more than a century, is as false as it is old, and it belonged to M. Chevalier, as an engineer, to rectify the economic tradition. The salary of a head clerk being ten francs per day, and the wages of a workingman four, if the income of each is increased five francs, the ratio of their fortunes, which was formerly as one hundred to forty, will be thereafter as one ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon

... black, with large shoes and black worsted stockings, I might certainly have passed very well for a Methodist missionary. However I disclaimed my title. What then may you be? A man of fortune? No!—A merchant? No!—A merchant's traveller? No!—A clerk? No!—Un Philosophe, perhaps? It was at that time in my life, in which of all possible names and characters I had the greatest disgust to that of "un Philosophe." But I was weary of being questioned, and rather than be nothing, or at best only the abstract idea of a man, ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... gate he was met in the same cautious manner by a dark-skinned human being, the character of whose garments was something between those of a sailor and a West India planter. This was Sambo, Thorwald's major-domo, clerk, overseer, and right-hand man. Sambo was not his proper name; but his master, regarding him as being the embodiment of all the excellent qualities that could by any possibility exist in the person of a South Sea islander, had bestowed upon ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne

... up his tall hat and his lemon-coloured gloves—and then a look of annoyance came over his weary face, for he heard the swinging of a door. Evidently his clerk was coming back to ask ...
— Studies in love and in terror • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... master, who was a skilful clerk, taught me a particular word, which, when I went on the tops of people's houses, I ...
— Mediaeval Tales • Various

... colored voter was soon, by coercion and fraud, practically deprived of his franchise. The plan of stuffing ballot-boxes with tissue ballots (printed often on tissue paper about an inch long and less in width) was in vogue in some districts. The judge or clerk of the election would, when the ballot-box was opened, shake from his sleeve into the box hundreds of these tickets. In these districts voters were encouraged to vote, but the tissue ballot was mainly counted to the number ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer

... Universalist minister; and, in 1834, he settled in Charlestown, Massachusetts. The son was preparing to enter Harvard University, when the death of his father devolved upon him the support of his mother, and his collegiate course had to be given up. He spent several years as clerk and teacher, improving meanwhile all possible opportunities for study. In 1846 he was settled over the church to which his father had preached in Charlestown. Two years later, he was called to the Hollis Street Unitarian Church in Boston. Here his eloquence and active public spirit ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey

... the other side were the rebels, headed by the Guiol. With her the bishop treated, in hopes of getting her to enter into relations with the Carmelite, and bring her friends over to him. He sent her his own clerk, and then a solicitor, an old lover of Guiol's. All this failing of any effect, the bishop came to his last resource, determined to summon them all to his palace. Here they mostly denied those trances and mystic marks of which they had made such boast. One of them, Guiol, ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet

... first rate. Perhaps she plagiarized so largely owing to the haste with which her play was written and staged, but yet everything she touched has been invested with an irresistible humour. A glaring example of her hurry remains in the fact that the 'precise clerk' of Sir Patient has a double nomenclature. In Act III he appears as Abel; in Act IV, iii, he is referred to as Bartholomew, and under this last name has an exit marked in Act V. This character is only on the stage twice and is given but some three or four lines to speak. Obviously, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn

... such a question. But by mine host, Bro. Graves, I was treated with the most frank and manly courtesy, albeit that he was brother to the man that shot a brother congressman in a duel with rifles. He seemed to feel like the town clerk at Ephesus: "What man is there that knoweth not that the city of the Ephesians is a worshiper of the great goddess Diana, and of the image that fell down from Jupiter? Seeing then that these things can not be spoken against, ye ought to be quiet and ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler

... bar-room, lighted by a vilely smelling kerosene lamp, the clerk, hitherto a shadow and a voice, came to light as a middle-aged man with a sullen face slightly belied by a sly twinkle ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland

... soon after the special," the booking-clerk assured him. "Plenty of time to see your friends before she sails. Why, she's not due to sail till twelve o'clock. There'll be a deal of luggage to ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan

... to be slack that afternoon, and at the early hour of four o'clock Mr. Walkingshaw resumed his overcoat and muffler. As Mr. Thomieson, his confidential clerk, decorously tucked the scarf beneath the velvet collar, he offered a word or ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston

... when the clock of the old parish church in Scarnham Market-Place struck eight, Wallington Neale asked himself why on earth he had chosen to be a bank clerk. On all the other mornings of the week this question never occurred to him: on Sunday he never allowed a thought of the bank to cross his mind: from Sunday to Saturday he was firmly settled in the usual rut, and never dreamed of tearing ...
— The Chestermarke Instinct • J. S. Fletcher

... the room clerk, please. Hello? This is Mr. Fallon. I'm expecting two gentlemen at five o'clock. Send them right up. And, not now, but when they come, send me up a box of your best cigars and some rye and seltzer. ...
— Writing for Vaudeville • Brett Page

... interred here; and, desirous of paying my homage to his grave, I inquired for the spot. As is usual in regard to this class of people, they could give me no information; yet one of them fancied she had heard such a name before. I was therefore obliged to wait while the sexton or clerk was fetched, and in the interim I walked into the chapel. I was, in truth, well re-paid for the time it cost me; for I never saw any thing prettier, except Lord Le Despencer's exquisite structure at West Wycombe. As the royal family usually attend here when they ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips

... Goupil, was head clerk to Monsieur Cremiere-Dionis, the Nemours notary. Notwithstanding a past conduct that was almost debauched, Dionis had taken Goupil into his office when a career in Paris—where the clerk had wasted all the money he ...
— Ursula • Honore de Balzac

... with Madam Pauline and Alice, was preparing to go to church when he arrived, and by his uncle's desire he accompanied them. When they reached the church-door, however, except Master Holden and the clerk, with half a dozen poor women, no one was there. Notwithstanding, Master Holden performed the service, but it was evident that he was puzzled what to preach about, as it would have been useless to such a congregation to warn them against rebellion, ...
— Roger Willoughby - A Story of the Times of Benbow • William H. G. Kingston

... his most powerful stories deal with the tragedies—only too life-like—of the shop and the farm. He describes the temptations which lead the small tradesman to adulterate his goods, or the parish clerk to embezzle the money subscribed in the village church, and the evil influence of dissenting families in fostering a spiritual pride which leads to more unctuous hypocrisy; for, though he says of ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen

... approach the office, for ladies—especially young and pretty ladies—were few in comparison to the men in North Queensland in those days, and a murmured whisper of admiration was quite audible to her as she made her inquiry of the clerk. ...
— Chinkie's Flat and Other Stories - 1904 • Louis Becke

... which the whole congregation joined in it, "singing praises lustily with a good courage," instead of deputing this branch of religious duty to half a dozen yawning and jangling charity children, assisted by the clerk and parish tailor. I believe it is an observation of Dr. Burney, in his History of Handel's Commemoration, that no sound proceeding from a great multitude can be discordant. In the present instance, certainly, the separate voices qualified ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes

... to hesitate if one were attached to this court. Fouquier had a clerk named Paris-Fabricius. Now Paris had been a friend of Danton and took his condemnation to heart. He even declined to sign the judgment, which it was his duty to do. The next day, when he presented himself to Fouquier, Fouquier looked at him sourly, and observed, "We don't want men who ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams

... reached them early the next morning, a messenger having been despatched from Crocker's ranch before eleven at night, but all his skill could not save "Burnham," now known to be Pierce, the ex-sutler clerk of the early Fifties. He had prospered and made money ever since the close of the war, and Zoe had been thoroughly well educated in the East before the poor child was summoned to share her mother's ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... hedgerow—anywhere, so long as he had breath and the music of the hounds allured him onward in his impetuous career. The sun glanced between the trees as they passed the cottage door. Then came the Magistrate's Clerk, faultlessly attired, with florid face and glittering eyeglass, who, in an ambitious youth, finding his name too suggestive of plebeian blood, changed a vowel in it, and thereby gave an aristocratic flavour ...
— Creatures of the Night - A Book of Wild Life in Western Britain • Alfred W. Rees

... eagerly sorting the mail. His eagerness at that task had not been abated by the repeated, the daily disappointments which it had caused him. During the whole summer month for which he had now been in attendance as Mr. Beasley's clerk, the arrival of the mail had constituted his chief interest. And because that for which he had been hoping had failed to come, his thin face had grown more worried, and the brooding look was ...
— The Jester of St. Timothy's • Arthur Stanwood Pier

... The clerk at the hotel desk, directing him, thought that the Admiral was not in his house on Main Street. He was apt at this season to ...
— The Trumpeter Swan • Temple Bailey

... be able to read, because Harold thinks much of it, but except for that I see not that it would do me much good. If the king makes me any further grant of land it will be doubtless properly made out, and I can get a clerk or a monk to read it to me. My steward will keep the tallies of the tenants' payments. I can learn the history of our forefathers as well from the songs and tales of the ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty

... them eighty piastres per month for any period exceeding the five months for which they are paid. His men receive their advance partly in cash and partly in cotton stuffs for clothes at an exorbitant price. Every man has a strip of paper, upon which is written, by the clerk of the expedition, the amount he has received both in goods and money, and this paper he must produce at the ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker

... from the company in the way of working parties, the services of the company artificer or company clerk, the use of ordnance stores or quartermaster articles, he should always speak to ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss

... my Lord Faulkland most commonly brought me my instructions in so fine a dress, that I did not alwaies own them. Which put me in mind to tell him a story of my Lord Burleigh and his son Cecil: for Burleigh being at Councill, and Lord Treasurer, reading an order penn'd by a new Clerk of the Councill, who was a Wit and Scholar, he flung it downward to the lower end of the Table to his son, the Secretary, saying, Mr. Secretary, you bring in Clerks of the Councill, who will corrupt the gravity and dignity of the style of the Board: to which ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various

... place to which they go, within the said month. That given by the said alcalde-mayor shall not carry fees in excess of one-half real. If the alcalde-mayor of the Parian grant such permission, he shall collect no fee, since the said Chinese pay ten pesos to him, and the same amount to the clerk of the salary fund. Having examined the matter in my royal Council of the Indias, I have considered it advisable to refer the matter herein contained to you, so that you may provide that the said Chinese be not annoyed or molested, in order that there may ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XXII, 1625-29 • Various

... you, for that I see you lose your soul at this game; but, to do you service, I will well to take the pains of putting up my special orisons to God in your name, the which maybe shall profit you, and I will send you bytimes a little clerk of mine, to whom you shall say if they have profited you or not; and if they have profited you, we will proceed farther.' 'Sir,' answered the lady, 'whatever you do, send none to me at home, for, should my husband come to know of it, he is so terribly ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... anything yet." This assurance of mine—I have given it scores of times personally—never gives the comfort that it ought; for these timid souls, bullied by long dealings with the Office—tormented, as Mr Carlyle would say, with much First Clerk—grow to be easily panic-stricken, and have gloomy nightmares of a time when there shall be no more life-certificates ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever

... effected. In the old times the civil and criminal tribunals had been hotbeds of bribery and corruption to such an extent that a satirical author had once ventured to write a comedy with the significant title, "An Unheard-of Wonder; or, The Honest Clerk of Court!" Now they were thoroughly cleansed, and during some half a dozen years, when I traveled about the country in search of information, I never heard of a Judge suspected of taking bribes. The lawsuits, which were previously liable to be prolonged for a ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various

... up the House to the Clerk's table and took the oath and then walked down again, felt himself to be almost taken aback by the little notice which was accorded to him. It was not that he had expected to create a sensation, or that he had for a moment thought on the subject, but the thing which he was doing was so great to ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope

... judicial officer Branting, gave the young Esaias a home in his house. The lad soon wrote a good hand and was given a desk and a high, three-legged chair in the office. Branting took a fancy to the young clerk and soon fell into the habit of inviting him to accompany the master upon the many official journeys that had to be made through the bailiwick. Thus Esaias came to see the glories of nature in his native province, and deep and lasting impressions ...
— Fritiofs Saga • Esaias Tegner

... The clerk's eyebrows remained in a raised position for a few moments, until he remembered that Captain Roy, being owner of his ship and cargo, was entitled to do what he pleased with his own and himself. Then they descended, and he went on with his work, amusing himself with the thought that the most curious ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne

... table filled me with surprise. I very seldom saw any beverage but pure iced-water. There are conveniences of all descriptions for the use of the guests. The wires of the electric telegraph, constantly attended by a clerk, run into the hotel; porters are ever ready to take your messages into the town; pens, paper, and ink await you in recesses in the lobbies; a man is ever at hand to clean and brush soiled boots—in short, there is every contrivance ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird

... credo in that we went via the P.R.R., but we were compensated by a man who was just behind us at the ticket window. He asked for a ticket to Asbury Park. "Single, or return?" asked the clerk. "I don't believe I'll ever come back," he said, but with so unconsciously droll an accent that the ticket seller ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley

... capital I have sometimes been unable to procure stamps, and "Dypore" (We have none) has been the civil answer of the clerk. When they had stamps they were not provided with mucilage, but a brush and pot of paste were handed the buyer. If you ask for a one cent stamp the clerk will cut a two cent stamp and give you a half. ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray

... of the greatest and most daring jewel robberies in France. For several years the police had tried to bring their crimes home to them, but without avail, until the great robbery at Louis Verrier's, in the Rue des Petit-Champs, when a clerk in the employ of the well-known diamond dealer was shot dead by Paul Bonnemain. The latter was arrested, tried for murder, and executed, the gang ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux

... LeFleur. From the balcony, running along the ell, onto which each room opened, one could look down into the courtyard. It was on this balcony that the lawyer met them with outstretched hands after they had given their names to his dark, languid young clerk. ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton

... been privileged to attend. There were men there of every class, every position, every calling, every condition of life. The peasant had left his plow, the workman had left his lathe and his loom, the clerk had left his desk, the trader and the business man had left their counting houses, the shepherd had left his sunlit hills, and the miner the darkness of the earth, the rich proprietor had left his palace, and the man earning his daily bread had quitted his ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... pad of paper toward him and hastily wrote a few lines upon it. Then, tearing off the sheet, he rang a bell and gave the written message into the hand of a clerk. ...
— The Last Woman • Ross Beeckman

... one of the most powerful and distinguished of our septs, was a blacksmith, I have often seen a mechanic, named James Dungan, who was said to be a descendant of James Dungan, Earl of Limerick; and 'the Chevers' (Lord Mount Leinster) was the clerk of Mrs. Byrnes, who carried on ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... half-past nine. On Sunday morning about four or half-past, was awoke by the noise of firing. Got up soon after, and walked about twenty yards, when some trooper rode up to me. The foremost one was a young man whom I knew as the Clerk of the Peace. He was of a light, fair complexion, with reddish hair. He told me to "stand in the Queen's name! You are my prisoner." I said "Very good, Sir." Up came more troopers. I cannot say how many. Believe about twenty or thirty. I said, ...
— The Eureka Stockade • Carboni Raffaello

... followed their impulses to go to him after the service, or from strangers who had chanced to drop into the church. Some were autobiographical, such as those of a trained nurse, a stenographer, a hardware clerk who had sat up late Sunday night to summarize what that sermon had meant to him, how a gray and hopeless existence had taken on a new colour. Next Sunday he would bring a friend who lived in the same boarding house . . . . Hodder read every word of ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... in the same number of the paper, a first-rate clerk, a carver, and a lackey are offered for sale, and the reason assigned is a superabundance of the articles in question (za izlishestvom). In some instances it seems as if the serfs and the cattle were intentionally ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace

... from the house to the church, a few paces distant. The village priest came, preceded by three chorister-boys and the venerable singing-clerk of the parish, to perform the ceremony. A portion of the little churchyard, railed off from the rest and planted with evergreen-trees, contains the graves of her grandmother, her father, and the two little grandchildren she had lost. A plain granite ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas

... he claims as author, in conformity with an act of Congress, entitled "An act to amend the several acts respecting copyrights." W.H. BROWN, Clerk of the District ...
— Autobiography of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Hawk • Black Hawk

... charge of the fees for clerk, verger, bell-ringers, and every person, connected with the church, who could possibly have a tip pressed ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay

... thin, cold, and tireless and he moved among the Watchers of this World of Trade. In the rich Wall Street offices of Grey and Easterly, Brokers, Mr. Taylor, as chief and confidential clerk surveyed the world's nakedness and the supply of cotton to clothe it. The object of his watching was frankly stated to himself and to his world. He purposed going into business neither for his own health nor for the healing or clothing of the peoples but to apply his knowledge of ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois

... an occupation. This is not one. Banking is an occupation, and architecture is a career, but what we call affairs in Rome are neither one nor the other. If you want to be a banker you must go into a bank and do clerk's work for years. If you mean to follow architecture as a profession you must spend four or five years in study at the ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford

... the clerk, withdrawing his glance, continued his writing. 'No admission without an order, and no admission with an ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli

... satchel in my hand: no, sir! I'll wait till I'm safe inside. In there I'll feel all right. They'll know me in there. They'll remember right away my visit in the fall of '86. They won't easily have forgotten that big dinner I gave—nine people at a dollar fifty a plate, with the cigars extra. The clerk will remember ...
— Frenzied Fiction • Stephen Leacock

... "professionally," and with the kindest intention. In fact, he and Bunce became great friends. Bunce had entirely accepted the story he told about himself to the effect that he had once been "in an office in the city," and looked upon him as a superannuated bank clerk, too old to be kept on in his former line of business. Questions that were put to him respecting his "late friend, James Deane," he answered with apparent good faith by saying that it was a long time since he had seen him, and that it was only as a "last forlorn hope" that ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli

... use wasting time trying to conceal our identity now," remarked Kennedy finally, drawing a card from his case. "Besides, we came here to see them, anyhow." He handed the card to the clerk. "Senora de Moche, please," ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve

... was near the Capitol. It was near to the one o'clock dinner hour when the appropriation had been passed by the Senate. The hotel clerk told Lonny that a famous artist from New York had arrived in town that day and was in the hotel. He was on his way westward to New Mexico to study the effect of sunlight upon the ancient walls of the Zunis. Modern stones reflect light. ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry

... the counter in conference with a junior clerk, and the sunshine pouring through the windows—the only plate-glass windows in Garland Town—gilded the dome of Mr. Fossell's bald head. As the Commandant entered, Mr. Fossell looked up and nodded pleasantly, in a neighbourly ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... Leave it to me," said Amy, getting on her feet. "I'll speak to the clerk. He's nice looking and wears his hair slicked back like ...
— The Campfire Girls of Roselawn - A Strange Message from the Air • Margaret Penrose

... cried Mrs. Creddle, losing her temper. "And what does that lead to, I should like to know? No girl clerk earns enough to buy food and lodging such as you would get at Miss Wilson's. I don't understand where the charm comes in, I'm sure, unless you want to be considered a lady. But you aren't one—and you'll ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose

... against the home Government and that of these islands, they were fiercely chauvinistic toward foreigners, as are all nationals abroad where jingoism partakes of self-aggrandizement. The American consul, a new appointee, addressed the customs clerk in his only tongue, Iowan, and received no response. I spoke to him in French, and the prepose replied in mixed French and English, out of compliment to me. The consul was enraged, considering himself and the American eagle ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien

... making money, but of being something. Before a twelvemonth had passed, he had made himself master of every detail in his business; at the end of his second year, he was so invaluable that he was intrusted with duties which the firm had never before placed in the hands of any clerk; and, at the end of his third year, the period of which I now write, he had been told that on the retirement of the senior partner he would be taken ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, V. 5, April 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various

... a man's pleasures jumped with his duties mine did in the year 1744, when, as a clerk in the service of the Royal African Company of Adventurers, I was despatched to the remote islands of Scilly in search of certain information which, it was believed, Mr. Robert Lovyes alone could impart. For even ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason

... the duty which devolves upon every person, to labor for the increase of his knowledge and the general improvement of his mind. We have heard him say on the platform of his church, that it was disgraceful to any mechanic or clerk to let such a picture as the Heart of the Andes be exhibited for twenty-five cents, and not go and see it. Probably there is not one honest clergyman in the country who does not fairly earn his livelihood by the good he does, or ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton

... rally her weary powers. She asked the clerk next her if it had been a busy day, and she told the sewing-girl at her left about a lovely bouquet of flowers that one of the girls brought to school, and that she had meant to bring home to her, if it was presented. To be sure it was not. But the intention was ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden

... read Greek in the original: that she was beautiful: of a grave and sweet disposition: and raised far above the voice of calumny. She had, says Foxe, 'the innocency of childhood, the beauty of youth, the gravity of age: she had the birth of a princess, the learning of a clerk, the life of a saint, and the death of a malefactor for her ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant

... a wicker basket made with a cover to fasten it up with; also, an office in Chancery; the clerk or warden of the Hanaper receives all monies due to the king for seals of charters, &c.... and takes into his custody all sealed charters, patents, &c.,... which he now puts into bags, but anciently, it is supposed, into Hampers, which gave the ...
— Notes & Queries No. 29, Saturday, May 18, 1850 • Various

... the secretaries. "Read them the indictment," said he, and sank back in his chair, his dull glance upon the prisoners, whilst the clerk in a droning voice read from a document which he took up. It impeached Sir Rowland Blake and Mr. Richard Westmacott of holding treasonable communication with James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, and of plotting against His Majesty's life and throne and the peace of ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini

... wear a black satin gown the way Grandy's father had. Nor were there any scrolls of vellum with fat beribboned seals in this Judge's hands. Instead, alert slender fingers riffled their way rapidly through a mass of papers that a clerk put before him. Felicia watched the fingers until the close cropped head was lifted and keen gray eyes glanced straight ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke

... you?" she began. "A clerk in the chancellery, an upstart. And yet you dare to address a noblewoman with violence. You have too good an opinion of yourself, and have asked for your lesson, which you shall have from me once and ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov

... brightest form by Aristeides, while Cato seems to have forfeited all claim to this virtue by his unsuitable and unseasonable second marriage. It could not be to his honour, when he was of such a great age, to marry the daughter of his own servant, a man who acted as a public clerk, and to bring her into the house to act as mother-in-law to his son, who was now himself grown up and married. Whether he acted thus from natural inclination, or to spite his son for his behaviour about his mistress, the marriage and the motives which led to it are equally discreditable ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long

... the following letter, we know only that he was a "writer," or clerk. Hans Bontemantel, to whom the letter was addressed, was a director in the Amsterdam Chamber of the West India Company, and a schepen (magistrate) of Amsterdam from 1655 to 1672, in which last year he took a prominent part in bringing William III. The letter was first printed ...
— Narrative of New Netherland • Various

... They paid calls in every walk of life. His young companion was privileged to see the inside of London homes of almost every class, for he showed no partiality; he went to the homes of the poor and the rich alike. One day they visited the home of an old bookkeeper whom he had known in 1872 as a clerk in a large establishment, earning a salary of perhaps a pound a week, who now had risen mightily, for he had become head bookkeeper in that establishment on a salary of six pounds a week, and thought it great prosperity and fortune for ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... content! Souls in the Making (CHAPMAN AND HALL) is mainly an analysis of two love episodes in the life of a young man, the liberally educated son of an ambitious self-made soapmaker. The first—with Sue, the pretty waitress—is thwarted by a very persistent and unpleasant clerk; the second—with Virginia, a girl of birth and breeding—is threatened by the intrusion of the girl's cousin, a queerly morbid ne'er-do-well. There is no action to speak of, so one can't speak of it. I can only say that the interest of the shrewd analysis held me, and that if my ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 153, November 7, 1917 • Various

... Brown's descendants, known in public life, may be mentioned Rev. John W. Hanson, D.D., of Chicago, Ill.; Rev. Warren H. Cudworth, D.D., formerly of East Boston; Harriet H. Robinson, who married William S. Robinson, ("Warrington,") journalist, and clerk of the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1862 to 1873, and their ...
— Tea Leaves • Various

... sailor's pleasure; and you live with the steward, who is usually a go-between; and the crew never feel as though you were one of them. But if you live in the forecastle, you are "as independent as a wood-sawyer's clerk," (nautice',) and are a sailor. You hear sailor's talk, learn their ways, their peculiarities of feeling as well as speaking and acting; and moreover pick up a great deal of curious and useful information in seamanship, ship's customs, foreign ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... of the City of Canterbury, [Footnote: Probably this freedom was given, by the city or some board therein, as mark of respect. N. E. Gen. Hist. Reg., 63, 201.] he is named as James Chylton, tailor, "Freeman by Gift, 1583." Earlier Chiltons,—William, spicer, and Nicholas, clerk,—are classified as "Freemen by Redemption." Three children were baptized in St. Paul's Church, Canterbury,—Isabella, 1586; Jane, 1589; and Ingle, 1599. Isabella was married in Leyden to Roger Chandler five years before The Mayflower sailed. Evidently, Mary bore the same name ...
— The Women Who Came in the Mayflower • Annie Russell Marble

... said archbishop of the reasons which had influenced this royal Audiencia to issue the decrees. After [the publication of] the royal and canonical decrees, the archbishop had a right to command the clerk of the court to give him the said copy; but for the sake of the quiet and comfort of this community, he had commanded him first to request the acts from this royal Audiencia, making the proper and necessary requisitions therefor, and asking that the said secretary of the Audiencia ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various

... stained, soul damned with blasphemy. I ran into my room and seized a pistol To end my life. God willed it otherwise. I fainted and awoke upon the floor After some hours. To heap my suffering full A few days after this while in the village I went into a store. The friendly clerk— I knew him always—said 'What will you have? I wait first always on the little boys.' I laughed and went my way. But in an hour His saying rankled, I began to brood On ways of vengeance, till it seemed at last His life must pay. ...
— Toward the Gulf • Edgar Lee Masters

... I stepped off the car, Mr. Davis, quartermaster's clerk, appeared and took my satchel, assuring me that Faye was right there waiting for me. This was so very unlike Faye's way of doing things, that at once I suspected that the real truth was not being told. But I went with him quickly through the little crowd, ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe

... dint of diligent asking, she managed to find the quarters of one of the shipping companies that ran a line of steamers to South Africa, and after toiling up a long flight of stairs she boldly entered the office, and stated her business to an astonished clerk. He gave her one comprehensive glance, screwed up his mouth, and ...
— The Leader of the Lower School - A Tale of School Life • Angela Brazil

... Middle Ages. Culture was the humanizing and refining influence of the Renaissance. The problem for the present and the future is how, through education, to render culture accessible to all—to break down that barrier which in the Middle Ages was set between clerk and layman, and which in the intermediate period has arisen between the intelligent and ignorant classes. Whether the Utopia of a modern world in which all men shall enjoy the same social, political, and intellectual ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... JOHN, the Smith, to THOMAS the Jones—a contraction of joiner. "It is these combinations—co-operations, as Sir EVANS, the Clerk at the church over yonder hath it—that ruin trade." Before THOMAS the Jones or joiner could reply, there was a crash, and it was known that Sir BRIAN had been overcome by a ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 98, March 1, 1890 • Various

... The patient was bright and passed successfully through high school. For seven years prior to the psychosis she worked for the same company as clerk. She was described as efficient, conscientious, systematic, though sometimes upset by her work; as lively, talkative, cheerful, with somewhat of a temper and easily hurt, also as quite religious. She was more attached to her mother than to her father, but still more to her ...
— Benign Stupors - A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type • August Hoch

... he said; and even as I asked exchange to put me through to "D.A.," the brigade clerk came in with the telephoned warning that we had talked about, expected, or refused to believe in ever since the alarm order to move into the ...
— Pushed and the Return Push • George Herbert Fosdike Nichols, (AKA Quex)

... but English, you might fancy that the creature still lived in this labyrinth, to nip you between his toothless gums—for the beast grows old—at some darker corner. There is a story of the place, that once a raw clerk having been sent to rummage in the basement, his candle tipped off the shelf. He was left in so complete darkness that his fears overcame his judgment and for two hours he roamed and babbled among the barrels. Nor was his absence discovered until the end of ...
— There's Pippins And Cheese To Come • Charles S. Brooks

... of the city, however, he played a very important part. He was Town Clerk, treasurer of several societies, solicitor to the Abchester County and City Bank, legal adviser of the Cathedral Authorities, deacon of the principal Church, City Alderman, president of the Musical Society, treasurer of the Hospital, a director of the Gas ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty

... written for the specialist, but for that restless, seething multitude known as "the masses." It is written for busy people, for workers, such as the shop-girl, the factory-girl, the clerk, the mechanic, the farmer, the merchant, and the busy housewife; but ministers, lawyers, and doctors may find food for thought ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge

... importance for the trial." On another day a humbler witness still, Massieu, one of the officers of the court, who had the charge of taking Jeanne daily from her prison to the hall, and back again, met in the courtyard an Englishman, who seems to have been a singing man or lay clerk "of the King's chapel in England," probably attached to Winchester's ecclesiastical retinue. This man asked him: "What do you think of her answers? Will she be burned? What will happen?" "Up to this time," said Massieu, "I have heard nothing from her that was not honourable ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant

... answer. 'I feel it as much as you possibly could, Mr. Harrington. Hear the facts,' Jack turned round again. 'Why did I consent to this absurdity? Because of my ambition. That old fellow, whom I took to be a clerk of Messrs. Grist, said: "You want to cut a figure in the world—you're armed now." A sort of Fortunatus's joke. It was his way of launching me. But did he think I intended this for more than a lift? I his puppet? He, sir, was ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... were to be offered for the person recollected, were to be secured by the fee of a shilling to the warden on each occasion, sixpence to each fellow and chaplain, and likewise to the schoolmaster, twopence to each lay clerk, sixpence to the sacrist for wax candles, and a mark or thirteen and fourpence to be spent in a "pittance" extra course in the college hall. The indenture by which Colpoys hoped to secure perpetual masses in remembrance of his relations and himself is in perfect preservation, ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge

... outward seeming, but in a frenzy within, he went down to the station one night, and, stooping to the pigeon-hole, he asked the ticket-clerk, in the suavest voice, whether he could tell him how far it was to London. The official put forward his face to reply when Cullingworth drove his fist through the little hole with the force of a piston. The clerk ...
— The Stark Munro Letters • J. Stark Munro

... a young man now, and has outgrown his gloomy, brooding disposition. He is a clerk in the office of a rich corn merchant in Oxbridge, the nearest market to Wynne, and shows every tendency to become a successful and ...
— Our Young Folks at Home and Abroad • Various

... cobbles of the midnight streets, he ran, pulling up at moments to take his breath, then running on again. Panting, sweating, he lumbered up the steps of the telegraph office and thrust the message through the grille to the sleepy clerk. ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon

... scarcely permits of being rolled up, so that the man of the East can return to his primitive use of his fingers in place of the fork, and for this he rejects the coat for the flowing pelisse, or he goes to his meal in his shirt-sleeves. It is amusing to see the homme de bureau, or the humble clerk, endeavoring to sit on his sofa cross-legged, with his writing paraphernalia before him as formerly, or to examine the broad chair which he has had to invent, so as to suit himself to his new transitory state. It may even be doubted whether he has gained any thing by the change, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... He is not allowed to marry on his official income, unless he or his wife has an income of L125 in addition to his pay, as even in Germany an army man can hardly keep up appearances and support a wife and family on less than L190 a year. It is quite common to hear of a clerk living on L40 or L50, or of a doctor who knows his work and yet can only make L150. The official posts so eagerly sought after are poorly paid; so are servants, agricultural labourers, and artisans. When you are in Germany, if you are interested in questions of income and expenditure, ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick

... Quaker lady's picture, gruesome as it was. "Henry was too ill to return to Chinon, and so passed the night at Azay-le-Rideau, or at the Commanderie of the Templars at Ballan. It was there or at Chinon that his clerk, at his request, read to him the list of the rebellious barons. 'Sire,' said the man, 'may Jesus Christ help me! The first name that is written here is the name of Count John, your son.' Then Henry turned his face to the wall, caring no more for ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton

... little inn, in the little hamlet of East Woodyates and parish of Pentridge, nine miles south-west of Salisbury on the road to Exeter." Robert, born in 1749, the son of this Thomas, and grandfather of the poet, became a clerk in the Bank of England, and rose to be principal in the Bank Stock Office. At the age of twenty-nine he married Margaret Tittle, a lady born in the West Indies and possessed of West Indian property. He is described by Mrs Orr as an able, energetic, and worldly man. He lived until his grandson ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden

... upon the Bridge of his Nose as he was drinking the King's Health, and spoiled his Tip. The Mob were very loyal 'till about Midnight, when they grew a little mutinous for more Liquor. They had like to have dumfounded the Justice; but his Clerk came in to his Assistance, and took them all down in Black ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... made him see that to win through he must fight and not fiddle. For eight years he had worked tremendously hard at half a dozen jobs across half a dozen states; and there had been plenty of fighting. But what had he won?—a job as a hardware clerk ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby

... the means of using a friend's interest—interest of no ordinary kind—with a great Mercantile Firm in the City; and he had at once exerted this influence in favor of Mr. Clare's eldest boy. Frank would be received in the office on a very different footing from the footing of an ordinary clerk; he would be "pushed on" at every available opportunity; and the first "good thing" the House had to offer, either at home or abroad, would be placed at his disposal. If he possessed fair abilities and showed ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins

... but did my father come up here?" questioned Randy innocently. And then, as the clerk looked puzzled, he added: "I am Randy Rover. My father is Thomas Rover ...
— The Rover Boys Under Canvas - or The Mystery of the Wrecked Submarine • Arthur M. Winfield

... literature. She had several conversations with Petrarch, which increased her admiration of him. After the example of her grandfather, she made him her chaplain and household clerk, both of which offices must be supposed to have been sinecures. Her letters appointing him to them are dated the 25th of November, 1343, the very day before that nocturnal storm of which I shall ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... he found himself in a narrow hall. On his right was the jury-room, and on his left the county clerk's office, stuffy little holes, each lighted by a single window. Beyond, and occupying the full width of the building, was the court-room, with its hard, wooden benches and its staring white walls. Advancing to the door, which stood open, the judge surveyed the room with the ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester

... we went out together. The narrow street of business was deserted. The heavy iron shutters were gloomily closed over the windows. From one or two offices struggled the dim gleam of an early candle, by whose light some perplexed accountant sat belated, and hunting for his error. A careless clerk passed, whistling. But the great tide of life had ebbed. We heard its roar far away, and the sound stole into that silent street like the murmur of the ocean into ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various

... steadily at work from eight in the morning till eight at night. His department is to take care of the day-book and ledger; Madame Moutonnet manages the correspondence and makes the bargains. The business of the shop and the accounts are confided to an old clerk and Mademoiselle Eugenie Moutonnet, with whom we shall ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various

... say, that from the moment I was witness to your generous concern in the cause of your servant, I conceived a particular esteem and veneration for your person; and yet what I say is true. I should think myself happy, if I could be admitted into your protection and service, as house-steward, clerk, butler, or bailiff, for either of which places I think myself tolerably well qualified; and, sure I am, I should not be found deficient in gratitude and fidelity — At the same time, I am very sensible how much you must deviate ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett

... matter of instinct. To begin with, she had been peculiarly unexposed. An only child, with an invalid mother upon whom she attended, she had not joined in the street games and frolics of the children of the neighbourhood. Her father, a mild-tempered, narrow-chested, anaemic little clerk, domestic because of his inherent disability to mix with men, had done his full share toward giving the home an atmosphere ...
— The Game • Jack London

... brothers! How tall and distinguished they had grown meanwhile. One of them studied philology, and the other had entered a big bank as clerk. In spite of their good aunt, both wanted money, much money—far, far more than their father could send them. Paul hoped that for them also, as a result of his beginning farming, a better time would ...
— Dame Care • Hermann Sudermann

... of Lincoln, and soon after he became Provost of Eton and Dean of Carlisle. Towards the end of February 1547, Smith was summoned to court, and 'mutata clericali veste, modoque, ac vivendi forma,'[15] he was made Clerk of the Privy Council, and Master of the Court of Requests of the Duke of Somerset, then Lord Protector. On the 14th of April 1548 he was sworn one of the King's Secretaries, and knighted in the beginning ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher

... foresee what facts may be useful, and what may be useless to us, otherwise the cultivation of the memory might be conducted by unerring rules. In the common business of life, people regulate their memories by the circumstances in which they happen to be placed. A clerk in a counting-house, by practice, learns to remember the circumstances, affairs, and names of numerous merchants, of his master's customers, the places of their abode, and, perhaps, something of their peculiar humours and manners. A fine lady ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth

... beg to move, Sir, that the letter addressed to you by Lord Charles Russell, the late Serjeant-at-Arms, be read by the Clerk at the Table. ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell

... inscriptions. But there were no separate shrines, no images, no display of chalice or crucifix on the altar. It was, therefore, a Protestant church upon the Continent. A clergyman, dressed in the Geneva gown and band, stood by the communion-table, and, with the Bible opened before him, and his clerk awaiting in the background, seemed prepared to perform some service of the ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... represented by one each: upholster, elevator conductor, stonemason, piano tuner, sleeping car porter, dairyman, dentist, bricklayer, restaurant proprietor, photographer, ice cream maker, insurance agent, coal dealer, baker, jewelry clerk, bridge builder, packer, hackman, editor and postmaster (of South Atlanta). May they not say, as Paul: "These hands ministered unto ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 52, No. 1, March, 1898 • Various

... Railroad in Philadelphia was sorely puzzled to know what to charge for a BOAT. He had loaded thousands of cars for Pittsburgh, but could find only one precedent to guide him. "We took a boat once to Pittsburgh," he said, "for twenty-five dollars, and yours should be charged the same." The shipping-clerk of a mercantile house, who had overheard the conversation, interrupted the agent with a loud laugh. "A charge of twenty-five dollars freight on a little thing like that! WHY, MAN, THAT SUM IS NEARLY HALF ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop

... place, they found it empty except for a native salesman, but as the Galavian paused to make a trivial purchase his listening ear caught a sound above. Without hesitation, he wheeled and mounted the stairs with Benton close at his heels. Behind him the shop-clerk stood irresolute—taken aback, with a vague consciousness that he should have devised a way to stop this gigantic Infidel. Assuredly the master would be angry. Orders had been explicitly given to allow no one to climb those steps to-day ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck

... his beauty, and the mother for a happy woman. In brief, christened he was, at the which all this good cheer was doubled, which made most of the women so wise, that they forgot to make themselves unready, and so lay in their clothes; and none of them next day could remember the child's name but the clerk, and he may thank his book for it, or else it had been utterly lost. So much for the ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick



Words linked to "Clerk" :   plotter, postal clerk, sorter, file clerk, hotel desk clerk, pencil pusher, room clerk, shop girl, town clerk, mail clerk, employee, bank clerk, shop clerk, clerking, clerkship, filer, penpusher, desk clerk, booking clerk, James Clerk Maxwell, shop assistant, clerical, work, filing clerk, tallyman, salesperson



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