1. The scullions and lower menials of a court, or of a nobleman's household, who, in a removal from
one residence to another, had charge of the kitchen utensils, and being smutted by them, were jocularly
called the "black guard"; also, the servants and hangers-on of an army. [Obs.]
A lousy slave, that . . . rode with the black guard in the duke's carriage, 'mongst spits and dripping
pans.
Webster
2. The criminals and vagrants or vagabonds of a town or community, collectively. [Obs.]
3. A person of stained or low character, esp. one who uses scurrilous language, or treats others with
foul abuse; a scoundrel; a rough.
A man whose manners and sentiments are decidedly below those of his class deserves to be called a
blackguard.
Macaulay.
4. A vagrant; a bootblack; a gamin. [Obs.]
Blackguard
(Black"guard`), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Blackguarded; p. pr. & vb. n. Blackguarding.] To
revile or abuse in scurrilous language. Southey.
Blackguard
(Black"guard), a. Scurrilous; abusive; low; worthless; vicious; as, blackguard language.
Blackguardism
(Black"guard*ism) n. The conduct or language of a blackguard; ruffianism.
Blackguardly
(Black"guard*ly), adv. & a. In the manner of or resembling a blackguard; abusive; scurrilous; ruffianly.
Blackhead
(Black"head`) n. (Zoöl.) The scaup duck.
Blackheart
(Black"heart`) n. A heart-shaped cherry with a very dark-colored skin.
Black-hearted
(Black"-heart`ed), a. Having a wicked, malignant disposition; morally bad.
Black hole
(Black" hole`) A dungeon or dark cell in a prison; a military lock-up or guardroom; — now commonly
with allusion to the cell (the Black Hole) in a fort at Calcutta, into which 146 English prisoners were thrust
by the nabob Suraja Dowla on the night of June 20, 17656, and in which 123 of the prisoners died before
morning from lack of air.
A discipline of unlimited autocracy, upheld by rods, and ferules, and the black hole.
H. Spencer.
