shauchle

English

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium. Particularly: “Perhaps connected with Icelandic skjálgr: wry, squinting.”)

Verb

shauchle (third-person singular simple present shauchles, present participle shauchling, simple past and past participle shauchled)

1. (Scotland, intransitive) To shamble.
   • 1856, Debate on the Forbes Mackenzie Act, between the Rev. Dr. Ritchie, of Edinburgh and James H. McGuire, Esq., of Glasgow:

     Dr Ritchie says that he has seen a man shauchling through the shop when he scarcely knew a plane from a handsaw.

   • 1917, Frederick Watson, Children of Passage, page 120:

     The vision of the Colonel shauchling down the glen (being paralysed upon his right side) an ancient tweed cap pulled over his eyes, a cheroot in the side of his mouth, leaning heavily upon a great silver-mounted walking-stick would not have satisfied a Moffat lady.

   • 2010, Rebecca West, The Judge, →ISBN:

     Besides, I'm not going shauchling down to the Dean Bridge in wet shoes either.”“

2. (Scotland, transitive) To distort or deform.