adv. phr. (adj., sb.) arch. In (or into) the house: = INDOORS.
1581. Mulcaster, Positions, viii. (1888), 53. One to be vsed within dores, and the other abroade.
a. 1690. in Somers, Tracts (1748), I. 264. It seems … odd … that [he] should … make his final Appeal to the People, before he had tried the Force of one of his Reasons within-doors.
1789. S. Shaw, Tour W. Eng., 459. Rain confined us within doors several hours.
1842. Dickens, Amer. Notes, iii. All within-doors is very plain and simple.
1858. Hawthorne, Fr. & It. Jrnls. (1871), II. 266. An English coal-fire, if we could see its honest face within doors, would compensate for all the unamiableness of the outside atmosphere.
1884. Black, Jud. Shakespeare, vi. Judith’s father would have no serving-men … come within-doors.
1895. Hardy, Jude the Obscure, I. ii. An animated conversation in progress within-doors.
b. (with hyphen) † attrib. or as adj. = INDOOR 1; also as sb. that which is, or those who are, indoors.
1612. [see prec., quot. 1625].
1630. R. Johnson’s Kingd. & Commw., 29. That there be more addicted to arts manly, than unto sedentary and within-doores occupations.
1858. Hawthorne, Fr. & It. Note-bks., II. 286. All the within-doors of the village empties itself there.
