[f. LUMBER sb.1] A room for the reception of lumber or disused chattels.
1741. Richardson, Pamela (1824), I. 132. My own little chapel, which has not been used for any thing but a lumber-room.
1812. H. & J. Smith, Rej. Addr., Baby’s Debut. The chaise … Stood in the lumber room.
1884. J. Hatton, H. Irving’s Impress. Amer. (ed. 2), I. 4. The apartments were lumber-rooms until lately.
b. fig.
1748. Chesterf., Lett., clx. (1792), II. 72. Many great readers … make lumber-rooms of their heads.
1827. Hare, Guesses, Ser. II. (1873), 446. The memory ought to be a store-room. Many turn theirs rather into a lumber-room.
1879. J. A. H. Murray, Address to Philol. Soc., 33. They are included by Lepsius in his provisional lumber-room of ‘Isolated Languages.’
