Pelf. n.s. [In low Latin, pelfra, not known whence derived; peuffe, in Norman, is frippery.] Money; riches.
The thought of this doth pass all worldly pelf. Sidney.
Hardy elf,
Thou darest view my direful countenance,
I read thee rash and heedless of thyself,
To trouble my still seat and heaps of precious pelf. Fairy Queen.
Immortal gods, I crave no pelf;
I pray for no man by myself. Shakespeare.
He call'd his money in;
But the prevailing love of pelf
Soon split him on the former shelf:
He put it out again. Dryden's Horace.
To the poor if he refus'd his pelf,
He us'd them full as kindly as himself. Swift.
