All 3 Uses

grovel
in
Notes from the Underground
(Auto-generated)

Either to be a hero or to grovel in the mud—there was nothing between.†
Chpt 2.2 *

grovel = show submission or fear
In spite of superficial, fantastic and sham notions of honour and dignity, all but very few of us positively grovelled before Zverkov, and the more so the more he swaggered.†
Chpt 2.3

grovelled = showed submission or fear

unconventional spelling: This is a British spelling. Americans use groveled.
And it was not from any interested motive that they grovelled, but simply because he had been favoured by the gifts of nature.†
Chpt 2.3

Definitions:

(1) (grovel)
to show submission or fear -- sometimes by crawling or lying face down
(2) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)