of bacon as signifying the body will suffice to explain its origin.
To pull bacon, popular).—An operation described by the immortal Ingoldsby in the line—
He put his thumb unto his nose and spread his fingers out.
In other words to take a sight (q.v.), Or to make Queen Anne's fan (q.v.).
1886. Household Words, Oct. 2, p. 453. [This] peculiar action has, I believe, almost invariably been described as 'taking a sight.' A solicitor, however, in a recent police case at Manchester, described it as pulling bacon.
1887. Leeds Evening News, Sept. 15. 'Pulling bacon' at Leeds policemen.—Before Mr. Goodman and Mr. Farrar Smith, at the Leeds Police Court to-day, George Evans (50), coachman to the Earl of Mexborough, Mexborough Hall, near Methley, was summoned under the Hackney Carriage Bye-laws for having driven on the wrong side of the road. Police-constables Moody and Lockwood were on duty in Boar Lane on the 6th inst., when they saw the defendant driving a pair of horses attached to a carriage on the wrong side of the road for a distance of one hundred yards. The officers spoke to him, when he put his fingers to his nose and pulled bacon at them. He had been previously cautioned, but had not taken the slightest notice. Defendant said he had been a driver in London for eighteen years, and knew they had policemen in the road there, but he did not understand the law of driving in Yorkshire. He was fined 20s.
Bacon-Faced, adj. (colloquial).—With
sleek, fat face; full faced.
Otway in the Atheist [1684]
speaks of one with a 'bacon
face like a cherubim.'
Bacon-Fed, adj. (colloquial).—Fat
or greasy. The expression
occurs in Shakspeare's King
Henry IV.—See Bacon.
Bacon-Slicer, subs. (old).—A
rustic.—See Chawbacon.
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, bk. I., ch. xv. (Bohn), I., 149. If he have not a better judgment, a better discourse, and that expressed in better terms than your son, with a complete carriage and civility to all manner of persons, account me for ever hereafter a very clounch, and bacon-slicer of Brene.
Bad, adj. (popular).—Hard; difficult.
Used as in quotation.
1884. Hawley Smart, Post to Finish, ch. xi. 'I have heard you say over and over again that, when they are in the mood, their very temper makes them bad to beat.'
To go to the bad, phr. (colloquial).—To be ruined; to become depraved. Virgil has a similar phrase in pejus ruere, 'to go to the worse.'
1864. M. E. Braddon, Aurora Floyd, ch. xi. 'A reckless man, ready to go to the bad by any road that can take me there; worthless alike to myself and to others.'
1880. G. R. Sims, Ballads of Babylon (Beauty and Beast). Let him go to the bad at his own mad pace.
To the bad, i.e., on the wrong side of the account; in deficit.
1816. 'Quiz,' Grand Master, viii., 25. I've really to the bad some thousand of rupees to add. [m.]
1884. Pall Mall G., 6 Feb., 4. He was between £70 and £80 to the bad. [m.]
Want 'em or him bad, phr. (American).—A humorous manner of expressing strong desire.
1888. Daily Inter-Ocean, March 9. Myers' absence is seriously annoying to the defense, and does not appear quite as funny as it did when the prosecution called for him on Saturday last. It is not probable that the Court will very long suspend the trial if Myers does not appear. As the case now stands, the defense want Myers, and want him bad.
Bad 'Apenny.—See Bad halfpenny.
