Also 7 sneeking. [f. SNEAK v.]
1. That sneaks; moving, walking, acting, etc., in a furtive or slinking manner. Also transf.
1590. Greene, Never too late (1600), 98. Hee is such a sneaking fellowe, that … touch him and he will scrike.
1594. Nashe, Unfort. Trav., C 1 b. They will … call him a sneaking [pr. sweating; corr. in To Rdr.] eauesdropper.
1659. in Burton’s Diary (1828), IV. 71. Where is then the anarchy, the sneaking oligarchy?
1673. A. Walker, Leez Lachrymans, 26. He had a great mans mind, not a little sneeking, servile, narrow, soul.
1710. Hearne, Collect. (O.H.S.), III. 34. Authoriz’d to be printed by our sneaking Vicechanc[ellor].
1726. Dyer, Country Walk, 75. The sneaking tribe of Flattery.
1824. W. Irving, T. Trav., I. 227. Lurking footpads and sneaking pickpockets.
1839. Dickens, Nickleby, xiii. A nasty, ungrateful, pig-headed, brutish, obstinate, sneaking dog.
1891. C. Roberts, Adrift Amer., 99. Several of these sneaking beasts [coyotes] were prowling round.
Comb. 1828. Lights & Shades, I. 292. A toad-eater … is the same sneaking-looking animal, whether you meet with it in a palace or a jail.
† b. Sneaking-budge, one who steals or robs alone; also erron. (quots. 1743–51), stealing, pilfering. Obs.
a. 1700. B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew.
1743. Fielding, J. Wild, I. viii. Wild … looked upon borrowing to be as good a way of taking as any, and, as he called it, the genteelest kind of Sneaking-budge. Ibid. (1751), Amelia, I. iii. I find you are some sneaking-budge rascal.
† c. Niggardly, mean, near. Obs.
1696. W. Mountagu, Holland, Pref. 2. We were not Sneaking … but thriftily Liberal.
1749. Fielding, Tom Jones, X. iii. He had some few blemishes…, yet being a sneaking or a niggardly fellow, was not one of them.
1773. Foote, Bankrupt, III. No gentleman can accuse me of being sneaking. Dingey, give him six pence.
transf. 1697. Tryon, Way to Health, vi. 116. How many stingy sneaking Names will they call us?
2. Marked or characterized by, partaking or suggestive of, sneaking; hence, mean, contemptible.
1582. Stanyhurst, Æneis, III. (Arb.), 84. But Scylla in cabbans with sneaking treacherye lurcketh.
1648. J. Beaumont, Psyche, XIII. xxiii. No Conventicle’s sneaking Cloisters hid Those Doctrines.
1658. Verney Mem. (1907), II. 73. He has an extraordinary sneaking countenance and way with him.
1724. Welton, Chr. Faith & Pract., 223. It was, methinks, as sneaking a submission … as it was a false assertion.
1770. Foote, Lame Lover, I. An absolute monarch to sink into the sneaking state of being a slave to one of his subjects.
1845. Ld. Campbell, Chancellors, lxxiii. (1857), III. 402. They, in a sneaking and paltry manner, pretended that they were not prepared.
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., I. i. It’s worthy of the sneaking spirit that robs a live man.
† 3. Mean in appearance or amount; petty, paltry, contemptibly poor or small. Obs.
1703. R. Neve, City & C. Purchaser, 87. Sometimes little sneaking ill-contrived Stair-cases are built in a good comely large Structure.
1733. Fielding, Quix. Eng., II. i. For a sneaking fee he pleads the villain’s cause.
1779. Mme. D’Arblay, Diary, 20 Oct. A meaner, more sneaking and pitiful wig … did I never see.
4. Of feelings, affection, etc.: Unavowedly cherished or entertained; not openly declared or shown; undemonstrative. Freq. in a sneaking kindness.
1748. Richardson, Clarissa (1811), III. 303. I believe I have a sneaking kindness for the sneaking fellow. Ibid. (1753–4), Grandison (1812), I. 290 (D.). You … shall reveal to me your sneaking passion, if you have one.
1784. Cowper, Tiroc., 244. Some sneaking virtue lurks in him, no doubt.
1842. Thackeray, Miss Tickletoby’s Lect., vii. I can’t help having a sneaking regard for him.
1871. L. Stephen, Playgr. Eur., ix. (1894), 204. I have a sneaking … belief in the virtues of the scrambling Briton.
1897. Miss Kingsley, W. Africa, 676. I have a sneaking sympathy with these good people.
