blue devil
1. A baleful demon (cf. blue a. 3, 8).
| 1616 R. C. Times' Whistle vii. 3443 Alston, whose life hath been accounted evill, And therfore calde by many the blew devill. 1870 Lowell Among my Bks. Ser. i. (1873) 364 He..keeps a pet sorrow, a blue-devil familiar, that goes with him everywhere. |
2. fig. in pl. blue devils: a. Despondency, depression of spirits, hypochondriac melancholy.
| 1781 F. Burney Diary 2 July (1904) II. 17 Thinking..that generous wine will destroy even the blue devils. 1787 [see blue devilism below]. 1798 G. Colman (title) Blue Devils, a Farce. 1800 W. B. Rhodes Bom. Fur. i. (1836) 8 Do the blue devils your repose annoy? 1810 T. Jefferson Writ. (1830) IV. 144 We have something of the blue devils at times. 1823 Byron Juan x. xxxviii, Though six days smoothly run, The seventh will bring blue devils or a dun. 1880 Weekly Dispatch 8 Feb. 12/2 He got discontented and had fits of blue devils. |
b. The apparitions seen in delirium tremens.
| 1822 Cobbett Resid. U.S. 42 Just the weather to give drunkards the ‘blue devils’. 1830 Scott Demonol. i. 18 They, by a continued series of intoxication, become subject to what is popularly called the Blue Devils. |
Hence blue-ˈdevil v. trans., to affect with the ‘blue devils’; blue-ˈdevilage, blue-ˈdevilism; blue-ˈdevilled ppl. a.; blue-ˈdevilish, blue-ˈdevilly adjs.
| 1787 Burns Lett. lxviii. Wks. (1875) 355 In my bitter hours of blue-devilism. 1816 Elphinstone in Edin. Rev. (1884) July, He styles Childe Harold exquisite blue-devilage. 1817 T. L. Peacock Melincourt I. iii. 32 When Mr. Hippy was blue-devilled, old Harry was vapourish. 1824 New Monthly Mag. XI. 427 Our blue-devilish and hypochondriacal countrymen. 1832 Whewell Let. 1 July in Todhunter W.W. (1876) II. 143 Do not wait till I become blue-devilled with hard work. 1836 in Jrnl. Southern Hist. (1935) I. 364 To be hemmed up in a strange place without..anything to interest you,..is enough to Blue Devil one. 1871 L. W. M. Lockhart Fair to See I. viii. 208 The pine-trees loomed through stagnant mists with a dejected, blue-devilly aspect. |