cock-fighter

Freeland was one of the real chivalry of the South; besides being himself a slaveholder, he was a horse-racer, cock-fighter, gambler, and, to crown the whole, an inveterate drunkard.

Clotel; or, The President's Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States. By William Wells Brown, A Fugitive Slave, Author of "Three Years in Europe." With a Sketch of the Author's Life 1953

He was formerly from Virginia, and was a horse-racer, cock-fighter, gambler, and withal an inveterate drunkard.

The Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave William Wells Brown

The late Lord Derby was an enthusiastic cock-fighter, and kept a complete set of trainers and attendants.

Recollections of Old Liverpool A Nonagenarian

It has been said that “the reader of old newspaper files and pamphlet collections of the Adamsite persuasion, in the absence of other knowledge, would gather that Jackson was a usurper, an adulterer, a gambler, a cock-fighter, a brawler, a drunkard, and withal a murderer of the most cruel and blood-thirsty description.”

The Reign of Andrew Jackson Ogg, Frederick A 1919

When William Wells Brown (how he came by this name we shall see further on) had answered the purpose of his master, he was hired out by a Major Freeland, who was a public-house keeper, also a horse-racer, cock-fighter, gambler, and to crown the whole, an inveterate drunkard.

Uncle Tom's Companions: Or, Facts Stranger Than Fiction. A Supplement to Uncle Tom's Cabin: Being Startling Incidents in the Lives of Celebrated Fugitive Slaves. 1911

Sexual selection, by always allowing the victor to breed, might surely give indomitable courage, length to the spur, and strength to the wing to strike in the spurred leg, in nearly the same manner as does the brutal cock-fighter by the careful selection of his best cocks.

The World's Greatest Books — Volume 15 — Science Various 1909

At last time is called, and the cock-fighter, who is in charge of the blinded bird, after examining it carefully, asks for a needle and thread, and the swollen lower lid of the still uninjured eye-ball is sewn to the piece of membrane on the bird's cheek, and its sight is thus once more partially restored.

In Court and Kampong Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula Hugh Charles Clifford 1903

At the word, each cock-fighter seizes his bird, drenches it with water, cleans out with a feather the phlegm which has collected in its throat, and shampoos its legs and body.

In Court and Kampong Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula Hugh Charles Clifford 1903

He was considered among his more peaceable neighbours, pretty much as a gambler, cock-fighter, or horse-jockey would be regarded at the present day; a person, of course, whose habits were to be condemned, and his society, in general, avoided, yet who could not be considered as marked with the indelible infamy attached to his profession where laws have been habitually observed.

The Black Dwarf 1898

Sexual selection by always allowing the victor to breed might surely give indomitable courage, length to the spur, and strength to the wing to strike in the spurred leg, as well as the brutal cock-fighter, who knows well that he can improve his breed by careful selection of the best cocks.

On the Origin of Species~ Chapter 04 (historical) Charles Darwin 1859