The Only Use of
degenerate
in
Ethan Frome
- Yet I had come in the degenerate day of trolley, bicycle and rural delivery, when communication was easy between the scattered mountain villages, and the bigger towns in the valleys, such as Bettsbridge and Shadd's Falls, had libraries, theatres and Y. M. C. A. halls to which the youth of the hills could descend for recreation.†
Chpt Open
Definition:
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(degenerate) to grow worse; or describing a person or situation that is worse in the sense of deviating from what is socially acceptable