a. slang. Also toll-loll. [f. the first syllable of TOLERABLE, with rhyming extension.] Tolerable, pretty good, pretty well, passable, ‘middling.’ Hence Tol-lol-ish a.
1797. Mrs. A. M. Bennett, Beggar Girl (1813), V. 137. Our lady did nothing … but stare at you all supper time; and he says you looked very toll-loll.
1809. Sporting Mag., XXXIII. 278. Lounged to the theatre … Kemble toll-loll.
1835. Marryat, Olla Podr., iii. ‘And how does … Maria find herself?’… At last there was a reply. ‘Oh! tol, lol!’
1846. The Era, 27 Dec., 3/4. We are counted tol-lol-ish judges of horse flesh.
1866. T. Miller, in Routledge’s Every Boy’s Ann., 296. He came in at night with one or two friends, who seemed rather tol-lol-ish.
1909. ‘Q’ (Quilier-Couch), True Tilda, ix. 115. How do my bantlings find themselves this morning? Tol-tollish, I trust?
