garreter

plural garreters

1. alternativeAlternative form of garreteer (“poor writer; literary hack”).

   Not that the existence of Grub street is to be doubted: it was, indeed, a grim actuality, and many a garreter realised by experience How unhappy's the fate To live by one's pate And to be forced to write hackney for bread.

   1972, Pat Rogers, Grub Street: Studies in a Subculture, page 384

2. obsoleteA thief who used housetops to enter by garret windows.

   [A]bout 40 were burglars, "dancers," "garreters," and other adepts with the skeleton keys.

   1889, Charles Tempest Clarkson, J. Hall Richardson, Police!, page 260

   Synonyms: dancer