? Obs. Also 8 ’versal. [Illiterate or colloq. abbrev. of UNIVERSAL a. Cf. the later VARSAL a.]
1. Universal; whole. Usu. coupled with world.
1592. Shaks., Rom. & Jul., II. iv. 219. Shee lookes as pale as any clout in the versall world.
1664. Butler, Hud., II. iii. 930. Some, for brevity, Have cast the Versal World’s Nativity.
1777. Sheridan, Trip to Scarborough, IV. i. That which they call pin-money, is to buy everything in the ’versal world.
2. Single; individual.
1709. Mrs. Manley, Secret Mem., I. 151. She … had provided no versal Thing for the Child.
1717. Susanna Wesley, in Southey, Wesley (1820), I. 444. We are secluded from sight, or hearing, of any versal thing except Jeffrey.
