a. [UN-1 7.]
1. Not enlivening or gladdening; cheerless.
c. 1449. Pecock, Repr., II. xvi. 244. Forto cleue to a thing as to his Souereyn Lord … and ȝit for to haue noon homelynes with the same thing were an vnchereful thing.
1586. Bright, Melanch., xvii. 103. The body thus possessed with the vnchearefull darknes of melancholie.
1593. Shaks., Lucr., 1024. In vaine I raile at oportunitie, At time, at Tarqvin, and vnchearfull night.
1648. Milton, Ps. lxxxviii. 11. My life at death’s uncherful dore Unto the grave draws nigh.
1656. Cowley, Davideis, IV. 536. ’Twas the last Morning whose unchearful Rise, Sad Jabes was to view with both their Eyes.
1798. Jane Austen, Northang. Abb., xxi. The furniture … was handsome and comfortable, and the air of the room altogether far from uncheerful.
1853. Ruskin, Stones Ven., II. iv. § 10. 63. The Cathedral square … laid out in rigid divisions of smooth grass and gravel walk, yet not uncheerful.
1856. Hawthorne, Eng. Note-bks. (1879), I. 256. It is an uncheerful old hotel.
2. Not exhibiting, or partaking of, cheerfulness.
c. 1550. Dice Play (Percy Soc.), 6. Stalking up and down … with such heavy and uncheerful countenance, as if he had some hammers working in his head.
1596. Spenser, F. Q., V. vii. 18. But by the change of her vnchearefull looke, They might perceiue she was not well in plight.
1712. Addison, Spect., No. 483, ¶ 1. People of gloomy unchearful Imaginations.
1753. Richardson, Grandison (1781), I. v. 24. I cannot bear an unchearful brow in a servant.
1882. C. E. Norton, Lett. (1913), II. x. 131. ‘Ah, Charles,’ he answered, with a not uncheerful smile, ‘there are no good days now.’
1892. G. Hake, Mem. 80 Yrs., lxviii. 293. A quiet, not uncheerful, but almost complaining way.
b. Not cheerfully performed.
a. 1684. Leighton, Comm. 1 Pet. iii. 1 (1849), II. 4. Now, if it be such obedience as ought to arise from a special kind of love, then the wife would remember this, that it must not be constrained, uncheerful obedience.
1858. Faber, Spir. Confer., 115. There is no vigour in uncheerful penance.
3. Of persons: Lacking in cheerfulness; melancholy, gloomy. Also transf.
1612. Bp. Hall, Contempl., O. T., IV. iv. Wheresoeuer meere Nature is, she is … niggardly in her grants, and vncheerfull.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., I. iii. I. i. 231. They be commonly leane, hirsute, vncheareful in countenance.
1680–1. Penn, in Wks. I. Pennington, I. p. viii. When be did Speak, he was Serious, yet sweet and not uncheerful.
1740. Cibber, Apol. (1756), I. 17. Let them call me any fool but an unchearful one.
1860. Bushnell, New Life, i. 7. There ought never to be a discouraged or uncheerful being in the world.
1862. Lytton, Str. Story, xlviii. She said that Lilian was quiet, not uncheerful.
Hence Uncheerfully adv.
a. 1628. Preston, New Covt. (1634), 104. Who comes not more uncheerfully before God, because of it?
1753. Richardson, Grandison (1781), VII. xvii. 98. We had hopes … she would be brought to give her hand, not unchearfully, to the Count of Belvedere.
1890. ‘R. Boldrewood,’ Col. Reformer (1891), 299. Save for the inevitable death-scene of the morrow, the evening would have passed not uncheerfully.
