1883. Daily News, May 15, p. 7, col. 2. 'When you are coming out into the yard ask the next bloke to change numbers with you.'
In each case the 'face value' of the word appears to be simply 'a man,' and in spite of Barrère's assertion that 'in the police newspapers twenty-five years ago a bloke was a victim of sharps, a stupid person, a greenhorn,' the evidence is all the other way; in one instance, indeed, the individual in question is reported to be 'a gentleman.' As regards derivation, its origin is uncertain. Hotten and Ogilvie compare it with the Hindustanee loke, a man; while Leland traces it to 'the Dutch blok, a log, a fool.' For synonyms, see Cove.
Blood, subs. (old).—1. A fop; dandy; buck; or 'fast' man. Originally in common use, but now obsolete. [From that legitimate sense of the word which attributes the seat of the passions and emotions to the blood. Hence, a man of spirit; one who is worth mention, and, in an inferior sense, he who makes himself notorious, whether by dress or rowdyism.] In the last century, especially during the regency of George IV., the term was largely in vogue to denote a young man of good birth or social standing about town; subsequently, it came to mean a riotous, disorderly fellow.
1562. Bulleyn, Sicke Men, etc., 73a. A lustie blood, or a pleasaunte brave young roister. [m.]
1606. John Day, Ile of Gulls, Act i., p. 9. Basil. Welcome gallants, welcome honord bloods. Ibid. To which effect we have sent a generall challenge to all the youthfull bloods of Africa.
1752. Adventurer, No. 15. Our heroes of liberty, whether Bucks or Bloods, or of whatever other denomination, when by some creditor of slavish principles they have been locked up in a prison, never yet petitioned to be hanged.
1839. Harrison Ainsworth, Jack Sheppard [1889], p. 21. 'Trenchard!' he muttered—'Aliva Trenchard. They were right, then, as to the name. Well, if she survives the accident—as the blood who styles himself Sir Cecil fancies she may do—this ring will make my fortune by leading to the discovery of the chief parties concerned in this strange affair.'
1846. Thackeray, V. Fair, ch. x. A perfect and celebrated blood, or dandy about town, was this young officer.
1853. Thackeray, Barry Lyndon, ch. ii., p. 36. The modern bloods have given up the respectful ceremonies which distinguished a gentleman in my time.
2. (old.)—Money. [A comparison of blood, as the vital principle, to money, as that upon which the sustenance of life depends—the 'sinews of war,' the 'needful,' etc.] For all synonyms, see Actual.
1748. Dodsley, Collection of Poems, III., 199. He sticks to gaming, as the surer trade; Turns downright sharper, lives by sucking blood.
1872. M. E. Braddon, Dead Sea Fruit, ch. iv. 'A man who ought to consider himself uncommonly fortunate never to have known what it was to be hard up, or to have a pack of extravagant sons sucking his blood, like so many modern vampires.'
Verb (familiar).—To deplete of money; to victimise; a figurative usage of 'to bleed'; i.e., surgically, to let or draw blood by opening a vein. Cf., subs., sense 2, and Bleed.
1884. Hawley Smart, From Post to Finish, p. 187. 'He is very likely to want a thousand pounds at any moment. There's a leaven of the old squire in his composition, and I recollect hearing that he was blooded over the Phaeton Leger.' 'You surely can't mean that he
