Let Thy pity curb Thy justice; be unjust, forgive me; receive Thy poor bedesman for communion, the poor in spirit!"
"En Route"
J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
Stow had died in great poverty, and indeed had been for many years a licensed beggar or bedesman; but in his youth he had been enabled by Parker's protection to make a good collection out of the spoils of the Abbeys; during the Elizabethan persecution he was nearly convicted of treason for being in possession of remnants of Popery, and found it very hard to convince the stern inquisitor that he was only a harmless antiquary.
"The Great Book-Collectors"
Charles Isaac Elton and Mary Augusta Elton
You shall go into old Dobson's house at once, as a kind of probationary bedesman.
"Sylvia's Lovers -- Complete"
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell