ˈpoor-box
Also 7–9 poor's box.
A money-box (esp. in a church) for gifts towards the relief of the poor. Cf. poor man's box, poor man 5.
| 1621 B. Jonson Gipsies Metamorph. Wks. (Rtldg.) 624/2 On Sundays you rob the poor's box with your tabor. 1662 Pepys Diary 5 Mar., To the pewterer's, to buy a poore's box, to put my forfeits in, upon breach of my late vows. 1708 Diss. on Drunkenness 27 Overseers go to the Tavern and get drunk with the Poor's Box. 1738 Pope First Epistle of First Bk. of Horace Imitated 15 The rest, some farm the Poor-box, some the Pews. 1777 Sheridan Sch. Scand. ii. ii, She draws her mouth till it ..resembles the aperture of a poor's-box. 1851 Mayhew Lond. Labour II. 76/2 The magistrates..gave me 2s. out of the poor's-box. 1852 Hook Ch. Dict. (1871) 591 In Ireland the Poor Man's Box, or ‘poor-box’, as it is generally called, is still in use. It is an oval box, half-covered, of copper or wood, with a long handle. |