pewful

plural pewfuls · plural pewsful

1. An amount sufficient to fill a pew.

   The scanty congregation, who had been sitting, stolidly immobile in their stiff, Sunday clothes, shuffled to their feet, and the pewful of school-children, in clamorous chorus, intoned the final hymn.

   1896 July, Hubert Crackanthorpe, “Anthony Garstin's Courtship”, in The Savoy

   2 more examples

   (On these two pewsful you will not wonder at me refraining from looking a second time.) Around and beneath sat many an aged, many an experienced saint, to give edification to whom seemed less becoming than to receive it from them; many a friend in whose converse I had delighted; many a companion of my youth; many an erring fellow man, to all of whom I in my weaknesss was now to speak—and on what subject?

   1850, Thomas P[orteous] Callender, Memoir of the Late Rev. Thomas P. Callender, Missionary to Jamaica. With a Selection from His Pulpit Discourses., Edinburgh: William Oliphant and Sons; London: Hamilton, Adams and Co.; Glasgow: David Robertson, page 9

   At St. Ann’s, Soho, Canon Gregory was preaching for the schools, and I saw no decorations; but the fact was I had lost my bearings, and furtively opened a door which brought me suddenly face to face with whole pewsful of people; so I beat a quicker retreat than even from a suspicious pew-opener or supercilious beadle.

   1871 December 25, “Christmastide at the Churches”, in The Daily Telegraph, number 5,159, London, page 2