subs. (colloquial).—The cost of anything; the sum total in the sense of recompense. ‘What’s the DAMAGE?’ ‘what’s to pay?’ also What’s the SWINDLE? (q.v.). [An allusion to damages at law.]
b. 1788, d. 1824. BYRON [quoted in Annandale]. Many thanks, but I must pay the DAMAGE and will thank you to tell me the amount of the engraving.
1852. H. B. STOWE, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, ch. xiv. Well, now, my good fellow, what ’s the DAMAGE, as they say in Kentucky; in short, what ’s to be paid out for this business?
1871. DE VERE, Americanisms, p. 576. When he wishes to know what he has to pay, he asks, What’s the DAMAGE? or not so charitably, What’s the swindle?
