Definition of "smutch" [smutch]

• To soil or stain. (verb-transitive)
• A stain or spot of dirt. (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.

• "Strether felt HIS character receive for the instant a smutch from all the wrong things he had suspected or believed."
• "Item, in another he had a little leather bottle full of old oil, wherewith, when he saw any man or woman in a rich new handsome suit, he would grease, smutch, and spoil all the best parts of it under colour and pretence of touching them, saying, This is good cloth; this is good satin; good taffeties!"
• "Against this grisly, dark smutch the whites of the man's eyes stood out like sculpted marbles."