See also CUSPADORE.
1840. A well-dressed gentleman picked up a China spittoon.—Daily Pennant, St. Louis, July 11.
1841. With their clean, checked, home-made pocket-handkerchiefs spread in their laps, and their spit-boxes standing in a row between them, they [the Shakers] converse about raising sheep and kine, &c.—‘Lowell Offering,’ i. 339.
1843. A fine porcelain spit-box, purchased for the particular convenience of Phlogiston, he stamped into a thousand fragments; and its principal patron—who had often opened his mouth wide and filled it—was well repaid for his liberality by a bountiful sprinkling of its jet de juice.—Yale Lit. Mag., viii. 141.
1845. Mouth as usual, full of tobacco, and, horror of horrors! found the pew elegantly carpeted with white and green, two or three mahogany crickets, and a hat-stand, but no spitbox.… I thought of using my hat for a spitbox, then of turning one of the crickets over, but I could do nothing unperceived.—‘The Cincinnati Miscellany,’ ii. 102.
1857. They would sit together, for hours at a time, under the wardroom-windsail, with a spittoon between them, discussing the various topics of the day.—Knick. Mag., l. 119 (Aug.).
