Also 8 -kie, -kee. [Short for WHISKYBAE, etc. (Gael. uisgebeatha lit. ‘water of life’), though this is not actually evidenced so early (but Ramsay has usque for USQUEBAUGH, q.v., in 1728). In modern trade usage, Scotch whisky and Irish whiskey are thus distinguished in spelling.] A spirituous liquor distilled originally in Ireland and Scotland, and in the British Islands still chiefly, from malted barley (with or without unmalted barley or other cereals), in U.S. chiefly from maize or rye. With a and pl., a drink of whisky.
Also in whisky-and-milk, -soda, -water (often so hyphened), denoting mixed or diluted drinks.
1715. in Maidment, Bk. Scot. Pasquils (1868), 404. Whiskie shall put our brains in rage.
1746. M. Hughes, Jrnl. Late Rebell. (1747), 44. A double Portion of Oatmeal and Whisky. note, Whisky is a hot Malt Spirit.
1753. Gray’s Inn Jrnl., No. 48. Whiskee—Po!—Give me a Glass of that Rhenish.
1753. Gentl. Mag., Aug., 391/2. In one dram shop only in this town [sc. Dublin], there are 120 gallons of that accursed spirit, whiskey, sold.
1827. Whitehall, II. iii. 132. The Major then mixed himself a glass of whiskey and water in equal portions.
1835. Dickens, Sk. Boz, Parl. Sk. He … went home … for his whiskey-and-water.
1884. G. Moore, Mummer’s Wife, xvi. ‘I think I’ll have a whisky.’ ‘Scotch or Irish?’ asked the barman.
1894. K. Grahame, Pagan Papers, 76. Those of us who were left being assembled to drink a parting whisky-and-milk.
1903. Times, 31 July, 13/6. In less than an hour he sold 22 whiskies.
b. attrib. and Comb., as whisky-brose (cf. BROSE b), -can, -cocktail, -drinker, -drinking sb. and adj., -gill, -peg (PEG sb.1 6), -punch, -shop, -still, -toddy; whisky-sodden adj.; whisky insurrection or rebellion U.S. Hist., an outbreak in Pennsylvania in 1794 against an excise duty on spirits imposed by Congress in 1791; whisky-poker (see quot.); whisky ring U.S. Hist., a combination of distillers and revenue officers formed in 1872 to defraud the government of part of the tax on spirits; whisky-straight U.S. slang, whisky without water.
1822. A. Cunningham, Trad. Tales, Allan-a-Maut (1887), 136. *Whisky-brose shall be my breakfast, and my supper shall be the untaken-down spirit.
1845. Eliza Cook, Poems, Fisher Boat, 12. Jolly mates, a *whiskey-can, and trusty nets for me!
1862. Jerry Thomas, How to mix Drinks, Contents, 10/1. *Whiskey Cobbler, Cocktail.
1771. Wesley, Jrnl., 18 June (1827), III. 424. The house … was filled with *whisky drinkers.
1905. Rolleston, Dis. Liver, 178. Hobnailed, Gin, or Whiskey-drinker’s liver.
1891. C. Roberts, Adrift Amer., 34. The row was the outcome of *whiskey drinking.
1785. Burns, Holy Fair, xix. Be’t *whisky gill, or penny wheep, Or ony stronger potion.
1824. Mass. Spy, 28 July (Thornton, Amer. Gloss.). Tinctured with the duelling or *whiskey-insurrection mania.
1889. Conan Doyle, Sign of Four, xii. There he sat … drinking *whisky-pegs and smoking cheroots.
1878. J. S. Campion, On Frontier (ed. 2), 25–6. Whisky-poker, a harmless non-gambling game, in which the winner gets a drink and the losers a smell at the cork of the bottle.
1785. Burns, Scotch Drink, xvii. A glass o’ *Whisky-punch.
1850. Thackeray, Pendennis, xlii[i]. His … utterance began to fail him, over his sixth tumbler of whisky-punch.
1863. in Thornton, Amer. Gloss., s.v., The whisky rebellion of Pennsylvania.
1884. Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 25 Sept. The candidate of the *whisky ring.
1868. A. K. H. Boyd, Less. Middle Age, 29. The sight of a *whisky-shop or a gin-palace is to such an overwhelming temptation.
1891. E. Kinglake, Australian at H., 102. You *whisky-sodden old miscreant.
1785. Burns, Scotch Drink, xx. Thae curst horse-leeches o’ th’ Excise, Wha mak the *Whisky Stells their prize!
1872. ‘Mark Twain,’ Innoc. Abr., xv. 106. We will take a *whisky-straight.
1812. Col. Hawker, Diary (1893), I. 59. I sat down with some *whisky toddy.
Hence Whisky v., trans. to supply with whisky, to give a drink of whisky to.
1862. B. Taylor, Home & Abr., Ser. II. 120. The horses were changed, and the passengers whiskied.
1882. [Lees & Clutterbuck], Three in Norway, ix. (1888), 65. We ‘whisky’ every one who turns up at camp.
