(a.) Colloq. abbreviation of YANKEE.

1

1778.  Conquerors, 14. Give me five hundred brave and chosen men, I’ll drive the Yanks from north to south again.

2

1834.  R. H. Froude, in Newman’s Lett. (1891), II. 77. The Yank edition of the Christian Year.’

3

1872.  Schele de Vere, Amer., 23. During the war the Yanks became the universal designation of Federal soldiers in the Confederacy, even as they were called Rebs—not Rebels—by Northern men.

4

1886.  All Year Round, 14 Aug., 35. As clever at a trick as a Yank.

5

  Comb. Yankland nonce-wd., the land of the Yankees, America.

6

1834.  R. H. Froude, in Newman’s Lett. (1891), II. 37. When I shall go to Yankland I do not know.

7