ill treatment, ill-treatment
[ill a. 2, treatment 1. Cf. ill-treat v.]
Bad or unfavourable treatment; rough handling; harsh or unsympathetic dealings.
| 1667 Sprat Hist. R. Soc. 401 A just occasion of lamenting the ill Treatment which has bin most commonly given to Inventors. 1676 Locke Jrnl. 23 Aug. in Ess. Law Nature (1954) 275 Making yourself an enemy to all by ill-treatment. 1677 ― tr. Nicole's Ess. (1828) 112 Ill treatment and persecutions would certainly fall to their lot. 1713 Steele Guard. No. 47 ¶9 The ill treatment which the protestants have met with. 1811 A. Graydon Mem. 292 In revenge for some real or supposed ill-treatment. 1818 Public Ledger 8 Apr. 3/2 Alledged ill-treatment during a short confinement in that prison. 1864 E. B. Pusey Daniel i. 21 Who revenge on man their illtreatment at the hand of man. 1879 G. Meredith Egoist II. v. 94 He contemplated her with an air of stiff-backed ill-treatment. 1905 Chesterton Heretics 79 A permanent possibility of selfishness arises from the mere fact of having a self, and not from any accidents of education or ill-treatment. |