cudgeling , also: cudgelling

Now there was frantic whispering and a cudgeling of wits among the spectators, trying to compute the odds for this decisive event.

He that can reconcile blows and reverence, may, for aught I know, desire for his pains, a civil, respectful cudgeling where-ever he can meet with it.

All the behaviors punishable by the fustuarium-desertion, stealing, false witness, sexual misconduct and repeat offenses-thus violate trust (fides) among fellow soldiers, and the cudgeling was administered communally.

Forget fairness to the Governor, whose public cudgeling of his brain was a matter for political commentary; in linguistic affairs, as we equate the compound comparative Hamlet-like with indecision, usually synonymous with "pigeon-livered," we must consider fairness to Shakespeare's most famous character.