déjeûner
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Forms: form: déjeûners
Etymology: From French déjeûner.
Senses: examples: text: Placed on a richly chased gold stand was a déjeûner of Sevre china, the cups painted with medallions of the beauties of Louis the Fourteenth’s reign.
ref: [1832], L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “The Talisman”, in Heath’s Book of Beauty. M.DCCC.XXXIII. […], London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman, […] [for Charles Heath], →OCLC, page 74:
text: Each of those oxen is allowed, I should think, a bottle of wine and bread-and-butter at discretion, at their déjeûner and dinner: how else should they be so fat and well-liking?
ref: 1855 October 13, “A Dash through the Vines”, in Charles Dickens, editor, Household Words. […], volume XII, number 290, London: Office, […], published 1856, page 241, column 1:
text: Some persons have found it advantageous, when intending to prolong their stay, to take unfurnished apartments, and hire by the month or quarter from an upholsterer the furniture they require; this is perhaps the most economical plan, and where a cook is not kept, déjeûners and dinners may be ordered from a neighbouring restaurateur.
ref: 1859, Thomas Forester, editor, Paris and Its Environs. An Illustrated Handbook., London: Henry G[eorge] Bohn, […], page 368:
text: At all these Hotels, or nearly so, there is a table d’hôte at a stated hour for both the déjeûner and dinner, the other repasts being allowed in one’s own apartment.
ref: 1859, [Augustus Granville], The Mineral Springs of Vichy: A Sketch of Their Chemical and Physical Characters, and of Their Efficacy in the Treatment of Various Diseases. […], London: John Churchill, […], page 224:
text: But, chiefly, he is delighted with the orchards which abound in Normandy, and sweeten the air with their healthy smell; for thousands of red apples are still on the trees, though thousands are lying in rich heaps underneath them, and though sixty wagons loaded with the same may be counted at the Bayeux railway station this fine October day. No wonder there is cider everywhere, universal as red wine in the south, and drunk at every table d’hôte both for déjeûner and dinner.
ref: 1859 December 10, “Cherbourg”, in Charles Dickens, editor, All the Year Round. […], volume II, number 33, London: […], published 1860, page 149, column 2:
text: I am not a marrying man, and the great Emporium of good matches is of no use to me; so, after concerts and crushes, déjeûners and dinners, the coulisses and the Commons, I was thankful enough when, after having eaten my customary whitebait, I was free to turn my thoughts to the bracken and the mist, the corries and the glens of the dear far-away Western Highlands.
ref: 1860, Ouida [pseudonym; Maria Louise Ramé], “Belles and Blackcock; or, How a Little Candle on the Moors Lighted Dyneley to His Destiny”, in Bentley’s Miscellany, volume XLVII, London: Richard Bentley, […], page 179:
text: At twelve we have déjeûner, consisting of boiled eggs or omelette, cutlets, and potatoes; […]
ref: 1869 October 21, K., “French Peasant Life”, in The Pall Mall Gazette: An Evening Newspaper and Review, volume X, number 1464, London, page 11, column 1:
text: No news of Emile or Blanchard—our young men gone from us; Clémence gone; even the bonne absent; how solitary the house felt! for M. Brunel had shut himself into his apartments, only descending to join us at déjeûner and dinner, and when he went to receive his newspaper.
ref: 1872, Mrs. A[lexander] S[mith] Orr [i.e., Mary Orr], “New Arrivals in Paris”, in The Twins of Saint-Marcel: A Tale of Paris Incendié, Edinburgh: William P[hilip] Nimmo, page 166:
text: The formal hotel pension takes the place of the genial household, with its elaborate regulation dietary compressed in two meals, déjeûner and dinner, irrespective of individual necessities.
ref: 1872, Alexander M[enzies] Brown, Wintering at Menton on the Riviera: A Compagnon de Voyage, with Hints to Invalids, London: J[ohn] and A[ugustus] Churchill, […], page 165:
text: Those who come to stay over a month or two invariably abandon the hotels and take to the boarding-houses, where they can live much more comfortably and fare better for half the expense. The charge at these houses ranges from eight to twelve francs per day, including finely-furnished chambers and the use of the parlors, pianos, etc., wine at déjeûner and dinner.
ref: 1874, Charles Carroll Fulton, Europe Viewed through American Spectacles, Philadelphia, Pa.: J[oshua] B[allinger] Lippincott & Co., page 153, column 1:
text: At home, and abroad; when they lie down, and before they rise; with chocolate, and at déjeûner, and dinner; on the street, and the Paseo; in the studio, bureau, counting-house, and café; on horseback, or in a carriage; whether idle or busy; it might—without being wide of the truth—be said, whether asleep or awake; tobacco smoke, duly mixed with the required proportion of phosphoretted and sulphuretted gases from matches, is the breath and being of Spanish life, of both sexes.
ref: 1875, H[enry] Willis Baxley, Spain. Art-Remains and Art-Realities, Painters, Priests, and Princes. Being Notes of Things Seen, and of Opinions Formed, During Nearly Three Years’ Residence and Travels in That Country., volume I, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton and Co., pages 121–122:
text: The charges at the Inns along the road are generally, bed 2 f. [francs], café au lait 1 f., déjeûner and dinner 3 to 4 f. each.
ref: 1878, R[obert] L[ambert] Playfair, Handbook for Travellers in Algeria and Tunis: Algiers, Oran, Constantine, Carthage, etc., 2nd edition, London: John Murray, […], pages 209–210:
text: (t.) 1 fr. [franc] on déjeûner and dinner coupons.
ref: 1897, “Appendix. Hotel Accommodation Coupons.”, in Cook’s Tourists’ Handbook for Egypt, the Nile and the Desert, London: Thomas Cook & Son, […]; Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co., Ltd, page 20:
text: We arrived, in short, at the “Great White City,” as it is called; and when the expressions of her delight at the beauty of its cupolas and domes, its dazzling pinnacles and spires against the blue sky beyond, had subsided, my father suggested that, to begin with, as she was bent on British ways, she should come and lunch with us on the terrace of the Grand Restaurant. “Hors d’œuvres! But the menu is French! Oh, you English!” and Mademoiselle, as she plied her knife and fork vigorously in true French fashion, elbows in the air, gave us her mind volubly on the characteristics of our nation. “Humbugs” we were, treating her to an English lunch when here she was partaking of an excellent French déjeûner and dinner in one.
ref: 1908, The Lady’s Realm: An Illustrated Monthly Magazine, volume XXIV, page 357, column 2:
text: Daily, too, she would collect all the bits of bread left after déjeûner and dinner, and put these carefully in her bag, as she said she was often hungry in the night and it was a pity to waste them.
ref: 1916, A[nna] M[arie] W[ilhelmina] Stirling, A Painter of Dreams and Other Biographical Studies, London: John Lane[,] The Bodley Head; New York, N.Y.: John Lane Company, page 196:
text: For our meals we joined the French officers in the station buffet, where we were excellently fed for 5 francs, which included déjeûner and dinner.
ref: 1916, Herbert A[rthur] Stewart, From Mons to Loos: Being the Diary of a Supply Officer, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, page 12:
glosses: Alternative form of déjeuner.