is to attain a solid basis or foundation; bedrock facts are the 'chiels that winna ding'—the incontestible and uncontrovertible truth.
1870. Bret Harte, Poems and Prose, p. 113. 'No! no!' continued T. hastily. 'I play this yer hand alone. to come down to the bedrock it's just this,' etc.
1875. Scribner's Magazine, p. 277. Getting to the real character of a man is coming to the bedrock.
1888. Louisiana Press, March 31. Thomas J. Whiteman, of Carrol county, is a Republican candidate for Governor of Missouri. You can bet your bedrock dollar that the next governor of Missouri will be a white man, although his first name isn't apt to be Thomas.
Bee. To have a bee in the head
or bonnet, phr. (familiar).—To
be possessed of queer ideas;
'half-cracked'; flighty. This
phrase is of considerable antiquity,
being traced back to a
Scotch writer, Gawin Douglas
by name [1474-1521], Bishop of
Dunkeld, who used it in a translation
of Virgil's Æneid.
1512-3 (translated: published in 1553). Gawin Douglas, Æneis, VIII., Prol. 120. Quhat bern be thou in bed with heid full of beis.
1657. Samuel Colvil, Whigg's Supplication, or Scotch Hudibras [1710]. Which comes from brains which have a bee.
1825. Scott, St. Ronan's, ch. xvii. 'Maybe ye think the puir lassie has a bee in her bonnet; but ye ken yoursell if naebody but wise folk were to marry, the warld wad be ill peopled.'
1853. Bulwer Lytton, My Novel, III., 307. It is not an uncommon crochet amongst benevolent men to maintain that wickedness in necessarily a sort of insanity, and that nobody would make a violent start out of a straight path unless stung to such disorder by a bee in his bonnet.
For synonyms, see Apartments to let.
1868. Dr. Brewer, Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, p. 77, col. 2. You have a bee in your bonnet or your head is full of bees; [i.e.] full of devices, crotchets, fancies, inventions, and dreamy theories. The connection between bees and the soul was once generally maintained . . . . the moon was called a bee by the priestesses of Cerës, and the word lunatic or moon-struck still means one with 'bees in his head.'
Beef, subs. (common).—1. Human
flesh (a transferred sense); i.e.,
obese; stolid; or fleshy like
an ox.
1862. Cork Examiner, March 28. Chelmsford stood higher in the leg, and showed less beef about him. [m.]
2. (nautical.)—By a further transition beef has also come to signify men; strength; or 'hands'; 'More beef!' a bo'sun's exhortation to extra exertion.
1863. Cornhill Magazine. Feb., 'Life on Board a Man of War.' Useful at the heavy hauling of braces, etc., where plenty of beef is required. [m.]
3. (common.)—The penis. For synonyms, see Cream stick.
To be in beef, phr. (old)—Said only of women. It means to have carnal knowledge.
To be in a man's beef, phr. (old).—To wound with a sword.—Grose.
To cry of give beef, or hot beef, phr. (thieves').—To give an alarm; to pursue; to set up a hue and cry. It has been suggested that beef in this case is a rhyming synonym to 'thief.' For synonyms, see To guy.
To be dressed like Christmas beef, phr. (common).—To be decked out in one's best raiment; in allusion to the
