1848. Thackeray, Snobs; xxxvi. The bride must have a trousseau of laces, satins, jewel-boxes and tomfoolery, to make her fit to be a lieutenant's wife.
1851. Borrow, Lavengro, lxvii. The subjects . . . college education, priggism, church authority, tomfoolery, and the like.
1882. D. Teleg., 8 Nov. Guy Fawkes's Day would cease to be one of the recognised seasons for tomfoolery in England.
1886. Besant, Children of Gibeon, ii. xiv. Many young men . . . will stoop to tomfool tricks if they cannot get a show by any other way.
1888. Black, In Far Lochaber, xiv. He had resolved to treat these tom-fools with proper contempt, by paying no more heed to them.
1890. Broughton, Alas! xxix. 'And leave you to go tomfooling out there again?' asks Jim.
1899. Wyndham, Queen's Service, 228. Why the deuce don't you speak English then, without any of your dashed medical tomfoolery about it?
Tom Long, subs. phr. (old).—A
prosy talker; a bore (q.v.): a
windbag (q.v.). also to wait
for Tom Long the carrier =
to wait to no purpose (B. E.,
Ray and Grose); 'That's coming
by Tom Long the carrier
(of anything long expected).
Tommy, subs. (common).—1. Orig.
a penny roll; hence (2) =
bread, food: specifically a workman's
daily allowance carried
in a handkerchief; (3) = goods
supplied to a workman in lieu of
wages; (4) = the truck-system
(q.v.); (5) = a shop run on truck
lines: also tommy-shop (or
store); and (6) = a baker's shop.
Whence also soft (or white)
tommy (nautical) = (1) bread:
as distinguished from biscuit or
hard-tack (q.v.); and (2) soft
solder (jewellers'); brown-tommy
(Grose) = ammunition
bread for soldiers, or that given to
convicts on the hulks; tommy-bag
= a workman's scran-bag (or
handkerchief); and tommy
master = an employer who pays
in kind or by orders on tradesmen
with whom he shares profits. As
verb, tommy = to enforce (or
defraud by means of) the tommy-system.
1845. Disraeli, Sybil, iii. i. The fact is, we are tommied to death.
d. 1859. De Quincey, Casuistry Roman Meals [Works, iii. 254]. It is placed in antithesis to soft and new bread, what English sailors call soft tommy.
1866. Harland, Lancashire Lyrics, 292, There'll be plenty o' tommy an' wark for us a', When this 'Merica bother gets o'er.
1875. Hinton, Eng. Rad. Leaders, 145. The employers . . . supplied them [miners] with food in order that they might spend no money save in the truck-shops or tommy-shops.
18[?]. Macmillan's Mag. [Annandale]. Halliwell sets down the word tommy, meaning provisions, as belonging to various dialects. It is now current among the 'navvy' class. . . . Hence . . . the store belonging to an employer, where his workmen must take part of their earnings in kind, especially in tommy or food, whence the name of tommy-shop.
1884. Greenwood, Little Ragamuffin. Coffee wirrout tommy don't make much of a breakfast.
7. (provincial).—A simpleton: a Tom-fool (q.v.).
8. See Tommy Atkins.
9. (Dublin University).—A sham shirt-front; a dickey (q.v.). [Cf. Gr. [Greek: tomê] = a section.]
10. (common).—A tomato: usually in plural.
