subs. (common).—See quots.
1840. F. TROLLOPE, The Life and Adventures of Michael Armstrong, ch. xiv. ‘What is the BILLY-ROLLER?’… ‘It’s a long stout stick, ma’am, that’s used often and often to beat the little ones employed in the mills when their strength fails.’
1875. URE, Dict. Arts, III., 1166. This is the BILLY-ROLLER, so much talked of in the controversies between the operatives and masters in the cotton-factories, as an instrumeat of cruel punishment to children, though no such machine has been used in cotton-mills for half a century at least.
