Also 8 Sc. spraul. [f. SPRAWL v.]
1. The, or an, act of sprawling; an awkward or clumsy spreading out of the limbs.
1719. Ozell, trans. Misson’s Mem., 25. When the Dog thinks he is sure of fixing his Teeth, a Turn of the [Bull’s] Horn … gives him a Sprawl thirty Foot high.
1820. Keats, Eve of St. Agnes, xli. To the iron porch they glide, Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl.
a. 1847. Eliza Cook, Old Mill-Stream, xiii. And the running,… the pull and the haul, Had a glorious end in the slip and the sprawl.
1857. Mrs. Mathews, Tea-Table T., I. 188. The triumphant shout which accompanies his awkward sprawl on the carpet.
b. A straggling array or display of something.
1827. Blackw. Mag., XXII. 474. Through one long wide sprawl of men, women, and children, we wheeled past the Gothic front.
1858. Hawthorne, Fr. & It. Jrnls., I. 217. The sprawl of nakedness with which Michael Angelo has filled his sky.
c. The sprawls, a disease affecting the legs of young ducks. dial.
1880–. in south-western glossaries.
2. A struggle. rare–1.
1795. A. Wilson, Hollander, Poet. Wks. (1846), 193. Jock and him has att a spraul Wha’ll bring the biggest dark [= day’s work] in.
3. dial. and U.S. Activity, energy, go.
1888–. in south-western glossaries and texts.
1894. Advance (Chicago), 25 Oct., 124/1. Fact of it is neither of them had sprawl enough to disagree.
1896. T. Hardy, Jude, I. ii. Poor or’nary child—there never was any sprawl on thy side of the family.
