Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word dismal. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word dismal, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say dismal in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word dismal you have here. The definition of the word dismal will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition ofdismal, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
So, after a spell, he decided to make the best of it and shoved us into the front parlor. 'Twas a dismal sort of place, with hair wreaths, and wax fruit, and tin lambrekins, and land knows what all. It looked like a tomb and smelt pretty nigh as musty and dead-and-gone.
1908, Charles Lee Coon, The Beginnings of Public Education in North Carolina: A Documentary History, 1790-1840, page 949:
. the proprietors of all the great unimproved tracts of Swamp lands will form themselves into Drainage Companies, by which method alone can we ever hope to witness the complete reclamation of the dismals of the seaboard. No reasonable doubt can be entertained that the clearing and draining of the lands will produce their usual effects in ameliorating the climate and that the tidal portions of No. Caro- lina may thus
2020 May 1, Hudson, Berman, Our Good Earth: A Natural History of Soil, Algora Publishing, →ISBN, page 167:
The term "Dismal" requires some clarification. At one time, all large swamps in eastern North Carolina were commonly referred to as "dismals," probably because they were so gloomy, dreary, and dark, and there are a lot of swamps or "dismals" in eastern North Carolina.