Definition of "lordly" []

• Of, relating to, or characteristic of a lord. (adjective)
• Very dignified and noble: a lordly and charitable enterprise. (adjective)
• Pretentiously arrogant and overbearing. (adjective)
• In a dignified, noble fashion befitting or characteristic of a lord. (adverb)
• In a pretentiously arrogant and overbearing manner. (adverb)

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.

• "Van Horn, smoking his cigar in lordly indifferent fashion, kept his apparently uninterested eyes glued to each boy who made his way aft, box on shoulder, and stepped out on the land."
• "Thus, the claim that "I've kept as yet from thieving pretty free" is undercut by a "stolen" form, or rather one that evokes a high-literate and aristocratic practice of satire, casting the lowly versifier as a clown in lordly clothing."
• "Horn, smoking his cigar in lordly indifferent fashion, kept his apparently uninterested eyes glued to each boy who made his way aft, box on shoulder, and stepped out on the land."