chowse

Verb (1)

chouse (third-person singular simple present chouses, present participle chousing, simple past and past participle choused)

1. (obsolete, transitive) To cheat, to trick.
   • This is some conspiracy, I suppose, to bam, to chouse me out of my money1774, Samuel Foote, The Cozeners

   Synonyms:

   cheat, trick

Verb (2)

chouse (third-person singular simple present chouses, present participle chousing, simple past and past participle choused)

1. (US) To handle roughly, as by chasing or scaring.
2. (US, regional) To handle, to take care of.
   • This gave the roundup the appearance of a cavalry charge, and a stranger observing the procedure for the first time might have thought we were a bunch of green, possibly drunken cowboys making sport out of chousing cattle. But we weren't chousing them, we were just trying to keep them in sight, and...1980, John R. Erickson, Panhandle Cowboy, page 79
3. (US, regional, transitive) To cause undesirable activity in livestock, such as running.
   • […] but the fact remains that my range cattle, because of the chousing which they received at the hands of the troops and the fright that they had, were caused to go into a period of considerable range deficiency without the flesh with which they should have entered this period.1940 April 9, John Owen, “[letter to] Paul J. Kilday”, in [Relief of] John Owen, quoted in United States congressional serial set, 76th Congress, 3rd session (January 3, 1940—January 3, 1941)...

See all 7 meanings of chouse