droil, a drudge, a menial. Beaumont and Fl., Wit at Several Weapons, ii. 1. 19; Brome, New Acad. ii, p. 40 (Nares). See Prompt. EETS. (note no. 588).
droil, to drudge. Spelt droyle, Spenser, Mother Hubberd, 157. Hence droil, drudgery, Shirley, Gentlemen of Venice, i. 2.
drollery, a puppet-show; a puppet; a caricature. Tempest, iii. 3. 21; Fletcher, Valentinian, ii. 2 (Claudia); Wildgoose Chase, i. 2. 21; 2 Hen. IV, ii. 1. 156. F. drôlerie, ‘waggery; a merry prank’; dróle, ‘a good fellow, boon companion, merry grig, pleasant wag; one that cares not which end goes forward or how the world goes’ (Cotgr.).
dromound, a large ship, propelled by many oars. Morte Arthur, leaf 82, back, 30; bk. v, c. 3 (end). Anglo-F. dromund (Rough List), OF. dromon, Med. L. dromō (Ducange), Byzant. Gk. δρόμων, a large ship; cogn. with Gk. δρόμος, a racing, a course.
drone, to smoke (a pipe); ‘Droning a tobacco-pipe’, B. Jonson, Sil. Woman, iv. 1; Ev. Man out of Humour, iv. 3.
dronel, dronet, a drone; ‘That dronel’, Appius and Virginia, in Hazlitt’s Dodsley, iv. 151; ‘Like vnto dronets’, Stubbes, Anat. Abuses, To Reader (ed. Furnivall, p. xi).
dropshot: phr. at dropshot; ‘I’ll do no more at dropshot’ (i.e. I’ll do no more in the character of an eaves-dropper, or where one can be shot with drops), Beaumont and Fl., Mad Lover, iii. 6 (end).
drossel, a slattern, a slut. Warner, Albion’s England, bk. ix, ch. 47, st. 12. A north Yorkshire word (EDD.). See [drazel].
drouson; ‘Boiling oatemeale . . . with barme or the dregges and hinder ends of your beere barrels makes an excellent pottage . . . of great vse in all the parts of the West Countrie . . . called by the name of drouson potage’, Markham, Farewell, 133 (EDD.); ‘Drowsen broath’, London Prodigal, ii. 1. 42. OE. drōsna, lees, dregs.
droye, a servant, a drudge. Spelt droie; Tusser, Husbandry, § 81. 3; Stubbes, Anat. Abuses (ed. Furnivall, 78).