quill-driver

English

Noun

quill-driver (plural quill-drivers)

1. (colloquial) A clerk or hack writer; a pen-pusher.
   • 1791, Charlotte Smith, Celestina, Broadview, published 2004, page 263:

     His brother, enraged at this insult, spoke to him very freely, which he returned no otherwise than by calling him quill-driver, and maccaroni of Mincing-lane.

   • 1803, John Davis, Travels of Four Years and a Half in the United States of America: During 1798, 1799, 1800, 1801, and 1802, page 439:

     Passenger.—What o'clock is it?
     Mr. Adams.—That's not proper language for a ship. It becomes only a quill-driver, a grass-comber, or a sugar-baker.

   • 1900, Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim, page v. 36:

     He wouldn't be terrified with a pack of lies by a cocky half-bred little quill-driver.

References

• John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary