TO PLAY A GOOD KNIFE AND fork, verb. phr. (common).—To eat with appetite.
1837. Knowles, Love Chase, i. 3. Why shouldn't I marry? Knife and fork I play Better than many a boy of twenty-five.
1846-8. Thackeray, Vanity Fair, ii. viii. The Colonel plays a good knife and fork at tiffin, and resumes those weapons with great success at dinner.
Before one can say 'knife'! phr. (common).—Instanter; in THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE (q.v.). Cf. Jack Robinson.
1892. Rolf Boldrewood, Robbery Under Arms, xxiv. She'd be off and out to sea BEFORE ANY ONE COULD SAY 'KNIFE.'
Knife-board, subs. (common).—A
seat for passengers running lengthwise
on the roof of an omnibus:
now mostly superseded by 'garden
seats' Fr. l'impératrice.
1853. Diogenes, ii. 21. A 'Correspondent' calls the top of an omnibus 'the eyrie of the knife-board.'
1856. Punch, xxxi. 203. And then the knifeboard cramps you so.
1859. Punch, xxxvi. 51, 2. Perhaps Mum'll ride on the knifeboard.
1860. Arthur Smith, Thames Angler, ii. 'On 'busses' knifeboards, stretch'd, The City clerks all tongue-protruded lay.'
1882. Daily News, 7 Oct., p. 5, col. 7. The box, or still better the knife-*board, of an omnibus facing the docks is the real shifting point from which to view the most superb range of docks in existence on any river but the Thames.
1889. Daily Telegraph, 5 Jan. The 'insides' were terrified, and clamoured loudly, so the driver left his seat, staggered up on the knifeboard, and fell asleep.
Knifer, subs. (common).—A sharking
sponge.
Knifish, adj. (tailors').—Spiteful.
Knight, subs. (common).—An ironical
prefix of profession or calling:
generic.
[Combinations are Knight of the Blade = a bully (B. E. 1690); Knight of the Brush = an artist or painter; Knight of the Collar = a gallows-bird; Knight of the Cleaver = a butcher; Knight of the Cue = a billiard-marker; Knight of the Green Cloth = a gamester; Knight of Hornsey (or of the Forked Order) = a cuckold; Knight of Industry = a thief; Knight of the Knife = a cut-purse; Knight of Labor = (in America) a workingman; Knight of the Lapstone = a cobbler; Knight of the Napkin = a waiter; Knight of the Needle = a tailor; Knight of the Quill = an author or journalist; Knight of the Pencil = a book-maker; Knight of the Pestle = an apothecary; Knight of the Pit = a cocker; Knight of the Petticoat = a bawdy-house bully; Knight of the Piss-pot = a physician, an apothecary; Knight of the Post = a knight dubbed at the whipping post or pillory, also a rogue who got his living by giving false witness or false bail; Knight of the Rainbow = a footman (Grose, 1785); Knight of the Road—a footpad or highwayman: also Knight of the Rumpad; Knight of the Shears or Thimble = a tailor (Grose, 1785); Knight of the Spigot = a tapster, a publican; Knight of the Sun = an adventurer, a knight-errant; Knight of the Wheel = a cyclist; Knight of the Whip = a coachman; Knight of the Yard = a shopman or counter-jumper].
c.1554. Youth [Dodsley, Old Plays (1847), ii. 15]. God's fate! thou didst enough there For to be made knight OF THE COLLAR.
1592. Nashe, Pierce Penilesse, in Works, ii. 19. A knight of the post, quoth he, for so I am tearmed; a fellowe that will sweare you anything for twelue pence.
1606. Sir Gyles Goosecappe, 1, iii. [in Bullen's Old Plays, iii. 19]. O good Knight a' the post, heele sweare.
1614. Jonson, Bartholomew Fayre, ii. 1. 'Is this goodly person before us here . . . a knight of the knife?' 'What mean you by that?' 'I mean a child of the horn thumb . . . a cut purse.'
