that a woman has been bitten by a bat, and afterwards died of lockjaw.' Mrs. P. (tartily): 'If she had been bitten by the kind of bat you went on when I was away last Saturday week, she would probably have died of delirium tremens.'
3. (athletic.)—Pace; speed (in walking, rowing, etc.). Partly also dialectical, especially Scotch, Craven, and Lincolnshire.
1887. Daily News, 18 August, p. 6, col. 3. Here they come, a mixed flock of birds full bat overhead.
To bat one's eyes, phr. (American).—1. A South-western term which is explained by quotation.
1846. Overland Monthly, p. 79. The ox whip has both parts as long as they can be managed. I have seen a poor fellow from Ohio, totally unused to this enormous affair, swing it round his head in many an awkward twist, while the Texans stood by and laughed to see him knock off his hat and bat his eyes at every twitch, to avoid cutting them out.
Cf., Italian batter d'occhio, twinkling of an eye.
2. (American gaming.)—To look on but not to play. Cf., Bet.
Off or on one's own bat, phr. (popular).—On one's own account; by one's own exertions. A figurative usage of a cricketing term; 'off one's own bat,' is said of a score made by a player individually.
1845. Sydney Smith, Fragm. Irish Ch., wks. II., 340, 1. He had no revenues but what he got off his own vat. [m.]
1855. Lord Lonsdale, in Croker Papers (1884), vol. III., p. 325. Derby . . . would not make a Ministry from his own friends or his own bat.
1880. Hawley Smart, Social Sinners, ch. xxiii. 'You have a weakness for the great world? Good. Score off your own bat, and it is the great world comes to you.'
1884. Sat. Review, March 8, p. 308, col, 2, He has in the most workmanlike manner, and off his own bat, lost for the Government an important seat by a crushing majority.
To carry out one's bat, phr. (popular).—This also is derived from a cricketing expression. In the game it means to be not out, i.e., the last man in. Figuratively, therefore, to carry out one's bat is to persevere and carry through an undertaking; to outlast all other opponents; and thus to secure the result aimed at.
1874. M. Collins, Frances, ch. xxviii. The General defended his stumps as he would have defended a fortress, and carried his bat out with a score of a hundred and seven.
Batchelor's Son, subs. (old).—A bastard.
Bates' Farm or Garden, subs. (thieves').—Coldbath Fields prison. [From a warder of that name + a certain appropriateness in the initials, C.B.F., the prison initials, and used as a stamp = Charley Bates' Farm.] When, formerly, the convicts were put to the treadmill in this prison, they were said to be 'feeding the chickens on Charley Bates' Farm.' Newgate was also called Akerman's Hotel, from a former governor, and a similar reason has caused the Melbourne gaol to be nicknamed Castilan's Hotel by Australian thieves.
[Circa 1850, but date uncertain.] Bates' Farm.
Good evening pals, how do you do, I thought I'd give a call, And introduce myself to you, For I'm glad to see you all. I'm up to every little fake, But in me there's no harm, For it was this blooming morning That I left Old Bates' Farm.
