jail-bird, gaol-bird
(ˈdʒeɪlbəd)
Forms: see jail n.
[With allusion to a caged bird.]
A prisoner in jail; esp. one who has been long, or is often, in jail, a habitual criminal; also, as a term of reproach, an incorrigible rogue.
| α 1618–61 B. Holyday Juvenal 24 Servitia and Ergastala, in Florus, signify Slaves and Gaol-Birds. 1692 Washington tr. Milton's Def. Pop. vi. M.'s Wks. (1851) 169 Thou Goal-bird of a Knight,..thou everlasting scandal to thy Native Countrey! 1701 De Foe True-born Eng., Fine Speech 124 In Print my Panegyricks fill the Street, And hired Goal-Birds their Huzza's Repeat. 1860 H. Gouger Imprisonment Burmah xx. 226 We had now become old gaol-birds. |
| β 1603 J. Davies Microcosmos, etc. Sonn. to Lady Rich (1878) 99/1 It made thee subiect to a Iaile's controule. But, such a Iaile-bird heauenly Nightingale. 1685 Mischief of Cabals 21 The bare oaths of a pack of Jayl-birds. 1751 Smollett Per. Pic. IV. ciii, She bestowed on him the epithets of spendthrift, jailbird and unnatural ruffian. 1883 Contemp. Rev. Aug. 172 The one thing most dreaded by the old jail-bird is work requiring bodily exertion. |