Frequently used in combination for oaths: among semi-veiled imprecations are:—BY CRACKY; BY GEORGE; BY GOLDAM; BY GOLLY; BY GORRAM; BY GOSH; BY GUM; BY HOOKY; BY THE EVER-LIVING JUMPING MOSES; BY THE LIVING JINGO, etc.
1731. FIELDING, The Grub-Street Opera, iii., 7. By GEORGE I’ll make an example of him.
1737. Bacchus and Venus, 117, ’Fore GEORGE, I’d knock him down.
1743. W. WARREN, Five Arguments against Tythes. The first person consulted a gentleman-farmer, and declared that he never read anything so good in his life. ‘BY GOLLY,’ says he, ‘he ’as mauled the parsons.’
1772. BRIDGES, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, 256. I will, BY GEORGE; so there’s an end on’t.
1804. C. K. SHARPE, in Correspondence (1888), I., 210. I promise, BY GOSH (which is the most elegant and classical oath imaginable].
1851–61. H. MAYHEW, London Labour and the London Poor, III. 204. Then I turn round to him and say, ‘BY GOLLY, if you don’t leave off, I’ll broke you over de jaw.’
1852. DICKENS, Bleak House, xxxviii. I—er—a little subject to this sort of thing—er—BY GEORGE!
1860. HALIBURTON (‘Sam Slick’), The Season Ticket, ix. BY GUM, Squire Shegog, we have had the greatest bobbery of a shindy in our carriage you ever knowed in all our born days.
1877. W. BLACK, Green Pastures and Piccadilly, xxxv. ‘If this goes on,’ said he suddenly, ‘BY GOSH, I’ll heave!’
1882. PAYN, For Cash Only, xxii. ‘Pay me what you owe me,’ says I, ‘or, BY HOOKY, I’ll tell your father.’
1887. F. FRANCIS, Jun., Saddle and Moccasin, viii. 145. He’s a high roller, BY GUM!—when he’s got it.
1888. American Humorist. ‘Bill, are you hurt?’ ‘Yes, BY GUM; I’ve broke my goldarned neck.’
1888. Superior Inter Ocean. Say, haint Tubbs a Methodist? BY CRACKY! here’s where it is, and in we walked.
1900. KIPLING, Stalky & Co., 18. Loco parentis, BY GUM! But what’s the odds, as long as you’re ‘appy.’ We’re all right.
BY THE WIND, phr. (nautical).—Hard up; in difficulties.
