1864. G. W. Reynolds, Pickwick Abroad, ch. xxvi. Let Davy’s dust
and a well-faked claw, For fancy coves be the only law.
Dawb or Daub, verb (old).—To bribe.
1785. Grose, Dict. Vulg. Tongue, s.v. The cull was scragged because
he could not dawb.
Daylight, subs. (University).—A glass that is not a bumper; also
Skylight (q.v.). Obsolete.
To burn daylight, verbal phr. (colloquial).—To use artificial light
before it is really dark; to waste time.
1595. Shakspeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act i., 4. Mercutio. Come, we
burn daylight.
To let or knock daylight into one, into the victualling department, or
into the luncheon reservoir, phr. (common).—To stab in the stomach (or
breadbasket); in the bread-room, potato-store, or giblet-pie, etc., and
by implication to kill. Fr., bayafer. For synonyms, see Cook one’s
goose.
1841. Punch, vol. I., p. 101, col. 2. A gentleman in a blue uniform
has thrown himself into an attitude à la Crib, with the facetious
intention of letting daylight into the wittling department.
Daylights, subs. (common).—1. The eyes. Cf., quots. under Darken the
Daylights. For synonyms, see Glims.
1785. Grose, Dict. Vul. Tongue, s.v.
1823. Bee, Sl. Dict. [quoted in]. The hero (Achilles) in his tent
they found, His day-lights fixed upon the cold, cold ground.
2. (general).—The space in a glass between liquor and brim:
inadmissible in bumpers at toasts: the toast-master cries ‘no daylights
nor heeltaps!’
To darken one’s daylights, verbal phr. (pugilistic).—1. To give a
black-eye; ‘to sew up one’s sees.’
1752. Fielding, Amelia, bk. I., ch. x. If the lady says such
another word to me, d—n me, I will darken her daylights.
1786. The Microcosm, No. 2. The nobility and gentry were taught
theoretically as well as practically, to bruise the bodies, and (to
use a technical term) darken the daylights of each other, with the
vigour of a Hercules, tempered with the grace of an Apollo.
1819. T. Moore, Tom Crib’s Memorial, p. 3. If the Fine Arts Of
fibbing and boring be dear to your hearts; If to level, to punish,
to ruffian mankind, And to darken their daylights, be pleasures
refin’d.
1822. David Carey, Life in Paris, p. 200. So here’s at darkening
his daylights for the advantage of his mummer.
Deacon, verb (American).—To pack fruit, vegetables, etc., the finest on
the top. [Either derived by inversion, or in allusion to the Yankee
proverb—‘All deacons are good, but there is odds in deacons.’]
1868. Miss Alcott, Little Women, ch. xi. The blanc-mange was lumpy,
and the strawberries not as ripe as they looked, having been
skilfully deaconed.
To deacon a calf, verbal phr. (American).—To kill.
To deacon land, verbal phr. (American).—To filch land by removing one’s
fences into the highway or other common property.
To deacon off, verbal phr. (American).—To give the cue; to lead in
debate. [From a custom, once universal but now almost extinct, in the
New England Congregational churches. An important function of the
deacon’s office was to read aloud the hymns given out by the minister
one line at a time, the congregation singing each line as soon as read.
This was called deaconing off.]
1848. J. R. Lowell, Biglow Papers. To funk right out o’ p’lit’cal
strife ain’t thought to be the thing, Without you deacon off the
tune you want your folks should sing.
1890. H. D. Traill, Saturday Songs, p. 7. We grieve, too, that of
all men you, Your own great Union’s stout defender Should deacon
off the craven crew, Who here are clamouring for surrender.
Deacon-Seat, subs. (American lumberers’).—In log cabins the sleeping
apartment is partitioned off by poles. The bed is mother earth, the
pillow is a log, the foot-board a long pole six feet from the fire and
in the centre of the cabin. The deacon seat is a plank fixed over and
running parallel with the footboard so as to form a kind of settee in
front of the fire. [Probably in allusion to the seats round a pulpit,
facing the congregation, reserved for deacons.]
Deacon’s Hiding Place, subs. phr. (American).—A private compartment in
oyster saloons and cafés; the Fr. cabinet particulier.
Dead, subs. (turf).—An abbreviation of ‘dead certainty.’—See Cert.
1889. Bailey’s Magazine [quoted in S. J. & C.]. ‘Dealers in the
dead’ did well then.
Adj. (various).—Stagnant; ‘quiet’ (of trade); ‘flat’ (as of beer or
aërated waters after exposure); cold (Am., see quot., 1888); good;
thorough; complete (Cf., subs., sense). Also as an adv. as in dead
beat, dead best, dead drunk, dead rolled (or flummoxed), dead nuts,
dead bitched, etc.
1602. Shakspeare, Othello, ii., 2. Why, he drinks you, with
facility, your Dane dead-drunk.
1819. Moore, Tom Crib’s Memorial to Congress p. 36. As dead hands
at a mill as they, and quite as ready after it.
1843. Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, ch. xvii., p. 187. ‘I wish you
would pull off my boots for me,’ said Martin, dropping into one of
the chairs, ‘I am quite knocked up. Dead beat, Mark.’
1845. Punch, vol. IX., p. 163. The general opinion is that the
Premier is dead beat.
1860. Punch, vol. XXXIX., p. 37. A dead take-in is swipes too thin.
1864. Punch. Veal is as dead as mutton.
1872. Derby Mercury, 1 May. ‘Freemasonry in New Zealand.’ He was
not dead, but only dead drunk.
1884. W. C. Russell, Jack’s Courtship, ch. vii. So surely do I
intend to try my dead best—all that I know—to win Florence’s love
and possess her as a wife.
1888. Puck’s Library, May, p. 27. Hungry Guest. Please bring me
some clam fritters. Count (in disguise). Live ’r dead? Hungry
Guest. Why, dead, of course! (And he got them stone-cold.)
Dead as a door-nail, mutton, a herring, a tent-peg, Julius Cæsar, etc.,
adv. phr. (common).—Utterly, completely dead. Dead as a door-nail is
found in Langland’s Piers Plowman [1362]; all other forms are modern.
[The door-nail is the striking-plate of the knocker. Herrings die
sooner after capture than most fish.]
1593. G. Harvey, Pierces Super., in wks. II., 71. If you will
needes strike it as dead as a dore naile.
1596. Nashe, Saffron Walden, in wks. III., 182. Wee’l strike it as
dead as a doore-naile.
1598. Shakspeare, II. King Henry IV., iii. Falstaff. What! is the
old king dead? Pistol. As nail in door.
1608. Armin, Nest of Ninnies. But now the thought of the new come
foole so much moved him, that he was as dead as a doore-nayle,
standing on tip-toe, looking toward the door to behold arivall.
1700. Farquhar, Constant Couple, Act iv., Sc. 1. He’s as dead as a
door-nail; for I gave him seven knocks on the head with a hammer.
1790. Rhodes, Bombastes Furioso, Ay, dead as herrings—herrings that
are red.
1843. C. Dickens, Christmas Carol, s.v.
1864. D. W. Thompson, Daydreams of a Schoolmaster, p. 230. The boat
of Charon will push a difficult furrow through innumerable bodies,
brick-bat laden, of purrless, soul-less dead-as-door-nail cats.
Poor pussies.
1878. Besant and Rice, By Celia’s Arbour, ch. xlviii. Quite dead he
was, dead as a door-nail.
In dead earnest, adv. phr. (colloquial).—Without doubt; in very truth.
1880. E. Bellamy, Dr. Heidenhoff’s Process, p. 11. I am sure that
you never had a more sincere, more dead-in-earnest convert than I
was.
Dead Against, adv. phr. (colloquial).—Decidedly opposed to.
1835. Haliburton, Clockmaker, 1 S., ch. vii. You know I was always
dead agin your tariff bill.
Dead-Alive or Dead-and-Alive, adj. (colloquial).—Dull; stupid; mopish;
formerly deadly-lively.
1884. H. D. Traill, in Eng. Ill. Mag., I., 541. The city has
greatly revived of late ... it has ceased to belong to the category
of the dead-alive, and has entered that of the lively.
Dead-Amiss, adv. phr. (turf).—Incapacitated through illness from
competing in a race; said of horses.
Dead-Beat, subs. (American).—1. A sponger; loafer; sharper. Cf.,
Dead-head and Beat, subs., sense 1.
1865. Glasgow Herald, 25 Dec. ‘Trial Swanborough v. Sotheran.’ I
returned the whole of the receipts, and about £4 16s. for dead
beats—free admissions who took advantage of the occasion and got
paid—which caused great discontent.
1884. S. L. Clemens (‘Mark Twain’), The Adventures of Huckleberry
Finn, p. 284. These uncles of your’n ain’t no uncles at all;
they’re a couple of frauds—regular dead-beats.
1888. Bulletin, 24 Nov. All the dead-beats and suspected
hen-snatchers plead when before the Bench that they were ‘only
mouching round to find out whether the family neglected its
religious dooties, yer washup.’