ppl. a. and sb. Also 7–8 unim-. [UN-1 8.]
1. Not put to use; not applied to some end or purpose.
1600. Surflet, Countrie Farme, II. iii. 205. Wherefore it behooueth that the vnimploied or fallow ground … be first well cleansed from stones.
1665. in De Foe, Plague (1754), 53. Till their Coaches … have stood unemploy’d by the Space of five or six Days after such Service.
1748. Chesterf., Lett., 16 Feb. Every moment may be put to some use, and that with much more pleasure than if unemployed.
1826. Kirby & Sp., Entomol., III. 363. The real instrument of suction, which when unemployed is retracted within the tubulet.
1882. Child, Ballads, Advt. p. vii. No becoming means has been left unemployed.
2. Not engaged in any work or occupation; idle; spec. temporarily out of work.
1667. Milton, P. L., IV. 617. Other Creatures all day long Rove idle unimploid, and less need rest.
1677. Yarranton, Eng. Improv., 61. Admit there be in England and Wales a hundred thousand poor people unimployed.
1740. Cibber, Apol. (1756), I. 167. I remember him three times for some years unemploy’d in any theatre.
1824. Miss L. M. Hawkins, Annaline, I. 40. Being unemployed they amused themselves and others with conjectures.
1860. Ruskin, Unto this Last, ii. § 54. The vexed question of the destinies of the unemployed workmen.
1887. [see UNEMPLOYABLE].
b. absol. or as sb.
1882. Pall Mall G., 10 May, 3/2. The genuine total abstainers among the unemployed.
1900. H. Lawson, On Track, 108. Here I’ve been mooning round like an unemployed for three weeks.
c. Pertaining to, connected with, unemployed persons.
1844. Stocqueler, Handbk. Brit. India, 49. During this interval he draws the unemployed salary of three hundred rupees per mensem.
1895. Daily News, 19 Aug., 5/2. Twenty-four per cent. of its 10,000 members received unemployed benefits.
