Definition of "roustabouts" [roustabouts]

• Plural form of roustabout. (noun)

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• "After journeying a day and a night, working my way on a river steamer among the "roustabouts," I reached the frontier-like scene of a railroad"
• "After a time a negro passed near the cotton-shed — one of the kind called "roustabouts" in that part of the country - people who live in a happy-go-lucky sort of way, dependent from day to day on stray jobs or stray thefts, never losing flesh or vivacity, never appearing otherwise than supremely content with life and their lot."
• "This army of "roustabouts" is an ebony-breasted, tough-fisted, bullet-headed, toiling, awkward mass; but it does wonders at work."