[f. WALL sb.1 + -ER1.]
1. A wall-tree.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, II. 87/1. Wall-Trees, called Wallers, are such as are planted at Wall sides, and are pinned up to the Wall.
† 2. A ‘keeper of the walls.’ Hence Wallership. Obs.
1578. in Househ. Ord. (1790), 264. Keeper of the Walles, alias wallership; fee 2. 5. 4.
3. (See quots.)
1904. Daily Chron., 15 April, 8/2. ‘Wallers’ … are men who find casual employment as law-writers, and have been facetiously christened ‘wallers,’ because they are generally to be found lounging against a wall in Cursitor-street waiting on an engagement. Ibid. (1908), 3 July, 6/7. ‘Waller,’ as applied to a man who does law writing…. They were called ‘wallers,’ as a term of contempt, by the regular writers.
