adj. (colloquial).—Neat; tidy; spruce. Hence NATTILY, nattiness.
1557. TUSSER, Five Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie, ch. 68, st. i., p. 159 (E.D.S.).
| Concerning how prettie, | |
| how fine and how NETTIE, | |
| Good huswife should iettie, | |
| from morning to night. |
1789. G. PARKER, Life’s Painter, p. 149. A kind of fellow who dresses smart, or what they term NATTY.
1819. T. MOORE, Tom Crib’s Memorial to Congress, 10. From NATTY barouche down to buggy precarious.
1823. BADCOCK (‘Jon Bee’), Dictionary of the Turf, etc., s.v.
1849. C. BRONTË, Shirley, xv. Sweeting alone received the posy like a smart, sensible, little man, as he was: putting it gallantly and NATTILY into his button-hole.
1860. G. ELIOT, The Mill on the Floss, ii., 7. A connoisseur might have seen ‘point’ in her which had a higher promise for maturity than Lucy’s NATTY completeness. Ibid. (1861), Silas Marner, xi. Everything belonging to Miss Nancy was of delicate purity and NATTINESS … as for her own person it gave the same idea of perfect unvarying neatness as the body of a little bird.
1867. LATHAM, Dictionary, s.v., NATTY, Smart, spruce [colloq.].
1872. Figaro, 22 June. A NATTIER rig you’ll hardly twig.
1875. OUIDA, Signa, III., x., p. 221. It seems a nice easy trade, said Nita, tempted; and lying must be handy in it; that would suit him. No one lies so NATTILY as Toto.
1889. Harper’s Magazine, LXXIX., 819. A very NATTY little officer, whose handsome uniform was a source of great pride and a matter of great pride to him.
1892. MILLIKEN, ’Arry Ballads, p. 24. NATTY cove.
