rare. [Allusive use of the proper name: see LAZAR.] A leper; a beggar. (In the first quot. the allusion may be to the Lazarus who was raised from the dead: see John xi.)
1508. Dunbar, Flyting w. Kennedie, 161. Thow Lazarus, thow laithly lene tramort.
1634–5. Brereton, Trav. (Chetham Soc.), 9. Only Lazaruses … are permitted to beg their victuals.
1850. S. G. Osborne, Gleanings, 15. Lazari, to whom the hated workhouse had come to be as the palace of a Dives.
1879. Farrar, St. Paul (1883), 491. The poor, hungry-eyed Lazaruses—half-starved slaves … sat famishing and unrelieved.
b. attrib.: † lazarus-clapper, a clapper or rattle with which a leper gave notice of his approach; † lazarus-house = LAZAR-HOUSE.
1560. Daus, trans. Sleidane’s Comm., 350. By the waye they set on fyre the poore Lazarus house, cleane contrary to the lawe of armes.
1593. Hollyband, Dict., Le Cliquet de l’huis, the hammer or ring of a doore, also a lazarous clapper.
1634–5. Brereton, Trav. (Chetham Soc.), 10. About half a mile from this town is this alms-house, this Lazarus house.
