3 uses
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Definition
smart — especially in negotiating with people (may infer underhanded dealings)
- Whether the witch had read the minister's thoughts or no, she came to a full stop, looked shrewdly into his face, smiled craftily, and—though little given to converse with clergymen—began a conversation.Chapter 20 -- The Minister in a Maze (64% in)
- Would it be beyond a philosopher's research, think ye, gentlemen, to analyse that child's nature, and, from it make a mould, to give a shrewd guess at the father?"Chapter 8 -- The Elf-child and the Minister (90% in)
- There were men, too, of a sturdier texture of mind than his, and endowed with a far greater share of shrewd, hard iron, or granite understanding; which, duly mingled with a fair proportion of doctrinal ingredient, constitutes a highly respectable, efficacious, and unamiable variety of the clerical species.Chapter 11 -- The Interior of a Heart (33% in)
There are no more uses of "shrewd" in The Scarlet Letter.
Typical Usage
(best examples)