(archaic) Someone who travels with a pack, especially a travelling salesman.
1912, Thomas Hardy, The Return of the Native Chapter , Wildeve was standing with his back to the fireplace smoking a cigar; and the promoter of the raffle, a packman from a distant town, was expatiating upon the value of the fabric as material for a summer dress.
1900, Various, Japanese Literature Chapter , L Beneath love's heavy weight my falt'ring soul Plods, like the packman, o'er life's dusty road.
1828, David Macbeth Moir, The Life of Mansie Wauch Chapter , Magneezhy was in an awful case; if he had been already shot, he could not have looked more clay and corpse-like; so I took up a douce earnest confabulation, while the stramash was drawing to a bloody conclusion, with Mr Harry Molasses, the fourth in the spree, who was standing behind Bloatsheet with a large mahogany box under his arm, something in shape like that of a licensed packman, ganging about from house to house, through the country-side, selling toys and trinkets; or niffering plaited ear-rings, and suchlike, with young lasses, for old silver coins or cracked teaspoons.
