1616-25. Court and Times Jas. I. Oliphant, New Eng., ii. 71. Amongst Romance words are save his skin, refreshed with money. . . .]
1664. Cotton, Virgil Travestie (1st ed.), 72. Æneas, was so glad on's kin, He ready was t'leap out on's skin.
d.1704. L'Estrange, Works [Century], Dangerous civilities, wherein 'tis hard for a man to save both his skin and his credit.
1708. Centlivre, Busy-Body, v. 1. Confirm it! Make me leap out of my skin.
1708-10. Swift, Polite Conversation, i. Col. Pray, Miss, where is your old Acquaintance, Mrs. Wayward. Miss. Why, where should she be? You must needs know; she's in her Skin.
1798. G. Colman (the younger), Blue Devils, i. 1. Made me jump out of my skin with joy.
1809. Malkin, Gil Blas [Routledge], 26. At these words I was ready to jump out of my skin for joy.
1836. Scott, Tom Cringle's Log, i. Who says that eels can not be made used to skinning? The poor girls continued their preparations with an alacrity and presence of mind that truly surprised me. There was neither screaming nor fainting.
1841. Thackeray, Snobs, xii. I should be ready to jump out of my skin if two Dukes would walk down Pall Mall with me.
1877. Besant and Rice, Golden Butterfly, xxxiii. You jest gather up your traps and skin out of this.
1882. Grant, Bush Life, 1. 206. These clean skins . . . are supposed to belong to the cattle owner, on whose run they emerge from their shelter.
1888. Phil. Ev. Bulletin, 23 Feb. Another Presidential candidate who is abroad, it will be remembered, utilized a pole daily for skinning the cat.
1888. Boldrewood, Robbery Under Arms, xx. Brought out a horse—the same I'd ridden from Gippsland, saddled and bridled, and ready to jump out of his skin.
1891. Gould, Double Event, 101. The horse was regularly worked, and he looked in splendid health and condition, fit to jump out of his skin, to use a racing term.
1896. Sala, London up to Date, 66. At the election I had no less than seventeen black balls; but . . . I got in by the skin of my teeth.
Skin-coat, subs. phr. (venery).—The
female pudendum: see
Monosyllable. Hence shaking
a skin-coax = copulating.
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, ii. xvii. And by God, I will have their skincoat shaken once yet before they die.
To curry one's skincoat, verb. phr. (old).—To thrash.
Skin-disease, subs, phr. (common).—Fourpenny
ale.
Skinflint (or Skin), subs. (old).—'A
griping, sharping, close-fisted
Fellow' (B. E., c.1696,
and Grose). As verb. (or to
skin, or flay, a flint, fly,
stone, &c.) = to pinch, to screw,
to starve: cf. (proverbial) 'to
skin a flea, and bleed a cabbage';
skinny = mean, stingy; the
skinflinteries = The Museum
of Economic [now Practical] Geology,
Jermyn St., W. See File,
Flay, Flea, and Flint for
additional quots.
1761. Murphy, Citizen, ii. An old miserly good-for-nothing skin-flint.
1789. Parker, Life's Painter, 'The Masqueraders.' The miser, that skin-*flint old elf.
1809. Malkin, Gil Blas [Routledge], 212. The skinflint would not trust me for six ells of cloth.
1816. Scott, Antiquary, xi. It would have been long . . . ere my womankind could have made such a reasonable bargain with that old skinflint. Ibid. Fortunes of Nigel, xxxi. 'Plague on ye,' he muttered, 'for a cunning auld skinflint!'
1833. Marryat, Peter Simple (1846), ii. 194. Report says she would skin a flint if she could.
