Definition of "pall-mall" [pall•-mall]

• A 17th-century game in which a boxwood ball was struck with a mallet to drive it through an iron ring suspended at the end of an alley. (noun)
• The alley in which this game was played. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "So they go public with inside dope on the machine they previously had themselves helped to ram pall-mall into our bodies and our hearts."
• ""We can, perhaps, lay out a course of pall-mall here as well," Mary told her Marys, who were dutifully trotting along behind her."
• "The vast Sala della Palla, where the dukes and their courtiers indulged in their favourite pastime of "pall-mall," which Burckhardt calls the classic game of the Renaissance, was decorated with frescoes by the best artists of Pavia or Cremona, representing fishing and hunting scenes."