a. Having a light hand. a. Having a light touch; handling objects deftly and quickly. Said of persons and their actions. lit. and fig. b. Having the hand lightly laden; carrying little. c. Of a vessel or factory = SHORT-HANDED.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 304/1. Lyghte handyd, manulevis.
1562–3. Sir W. Cecil, in Abp. Parker’s Corr. (Parker Soc.), 173. I beseech your Grace be not too light-handed in licences to every person.
1798. Ld. Clare, in Ld. Auckland’s Corr. (1862), III. 396. The town … was disarmed … by a body of light-handed rebels.
1830. Galt, Lawrie T., II. i. (1849), 82. It was agreed … that … we should set out as light-handed as possible.
1846. Young, Naut. Dict., Light-handed, a term implying that a vessel is short of her complement of men.
1876. T. Hardy, Ethelberta (1890), 211. She was one of the cleverest and lightest-handed women we ever had about us.
1891. Spectator, 21 March, 412/1. That light-handed treatment of the trifles of life in which feminine correspondents are so incontestably superior to the generality of men.
Hence Light-handedness.
1613. R. Cawdrey, Table Alph. (ed. 3), Legeirdemaine, light-handednesse, craftie slights, and conueiance.
1879. Black, Macleod of D., I. 152. What you want is … the dexterous light-handedness of a woman.
