civil servantn.

1767 Let. Proprietors East India Stock 25 The civil servants of the Company..have not only been treated with total neglect, but prosectuions, I am told, have been brought against them.

1800 Ld. Wellesley (title) Notes on the necessity of a special collegiate training of Civil Servants.

1861 Sat. Rev. 27 July 90 When a Civil Servant's mind has reached the stage of sub-acute discontent which has not quite strength enough to develope into resignation.

1864 E. Yates Broken to Harness II. x. 209 He had a set of ancestors on his walls in Harley Street dating from the warriors who fought at Ramillies and Malplaquet, down to the 'Civil Servant of the Company,' who shook the pagoda-tree in the East, and from whom, as Mr. Townshend said, his first start in life was derived.

1921 T. S. Eliot Let. 2 June (1988) I. 457 You have, from what I have heard, been making such a success as a civil servant, that you may find no time or strength left to serve the Muses.

1967 H. Arendt Origins Totalitarianism (new ed.) v. 130 The imperialist-minded businessmen were followed by civil servants who wanted ‘the African to be left an African’.

1997 A. Barnett This Time vii. 247 Civil servants..are the creatures of their Ministers and may not be singled out for blame, either.

2010 Guardian 15 Feb. 13/4 Britain's most senior civil servants and royal courtiers, known as the ‘golden triangle’, are preparing for a hung parliament, when the Queen would wield strong power over the formation of a government.