scairt-to-death

Updated: May 12, 2025

"You c'n estimate, I reckon," he began, "what kind of a bringin'-up I had, an' what a poor, mis'able, God-fersaken, scairt-to-death little forlorn critter I was; put upon, an' snubbed, an' jawed at till I'd come to believe myself what was rubbed into me the hull time that I was the most all-'round no-account animul that was ever made out o' dust, an' wa'n't ever likely to be no diff'rent.

Edward Noyes Westcott - David Harum: A Story of American Life