subs. (athletic).—1. A sort of cricket-bat, roughly made from one piece of word, and shaped narrow in the blade.
3. (old).—In pl. = worthless bail: see STRAW BAIL.
1819. J. H. VAUX, A Vocabulary of the Flash Language. Queer-bail, Persons of no repute, hired to bail a prisoner in any bailable case; these men are to be had in London for a trifling sum, and are called BROOMSTICKS.
4. (colloquial).—An awkward, dull, impotent, or stupid person: also STICK, POOR STICK, etc.
1803. EDGEWORTH, Belinda, xx. ‘You … will go and marry, I know you will, some stick of a rival.’… ‘I hope I shall never marry a BROOMSTICK.’
1809. MALKIN, Gil Blas [ROUTLEDGE], 32. It is hard if you cannot turn the head of some rich widow, or handsome wife with a BROOMSTICK for her husband.
1814. AUSTEN, Mansfield Park, xiii. I was surprised to see Sir Henry such a STICK; luckily the strength of the piece did not depend upon him.
1847. C. BRONTË, Jane Eyre, xvii. The poor old STICK used to cry out, ‘Oh you villains childs!’ and then we sermonized her on the presumption of attempting to teach such clever blades as we were, when she was herself so ignorant.
1855. New York Tribune, 4 Sept. About the poorest STICK for a legislator ever elected.
1886. Daily Telegraph, 13 July. A great actor may not exhibit himself as a STICK for half-an-hour together, and claim to redeem his fame by a few magnificent moments.
1899. KERNAHAN, Scoundrels & Co., xxi. The ‘STICK’ will find himself as readily cold-shouldered, and the assumer of ‘side’ may think himself lucky if he be allowed to depart unbaited.
1900. PERCY WHITE, The West End, 126. ‘Elsenham’s a STICK.’ ‘He is—rather,’ said my aunt. ‘But he is heir to one of the oldest earldoms in the kingdom.’
TO JUMP THE BROOMSTICK (HOP THE BROOM, or JUMP THE BESOM), verb. phr. (common).—To live as man and wife without the legal tie: formerly a quasi marriage ceremony performed by both parties jumping over a broomstick.
1811. POOLE, Hamlet Travestie, ii., 3.
| JUMP O’ER A BROOMSTICK, but don’t make a farce on | |
| The marriage ceremonies of the parson. |
1837. R. H. BARHAM, The Ingoldsby Legends (‘A Lay of St. Romwold’).
| While young ladies had fain | |
| Single women remain, | |
| And unwedded dames to the last ‘crack of doom’ stick, | |
| Ere marry, by taking a JUMP O’ER A BROOMSTICK. |
1851. H. MAYHEW, London Labour and the London Poor, I., 336. The old woman (who kept the ken), when any female, old or young, who had no tin, came into the kitchen, made up a match for her with some men. Fellows half-drunk had the old women. There was always a BROOMSTICK wedding. Without that ceremony a couple weren’t looked on as man and wife.
1800. DICKENS, Great Expectations, xlviii., 227. They both led tramping lives, and this woman in Gerrard St. here, had been married very young, OVER THE BROOMSTICK (as we say), to a tramping man, and was a perfect fury in point of jealousy.
c. 18[79]. Broadside Ballad, David Dove that fell in love. By L. M. THORNTON.
| The girl that I had hoped to hear | |
| Pronounce my happy doom, sir, | |
| Had bolted with a carpenter, | |
| In fact HOPPED O’ER THE BROOM, sir. |
