wild goose
(Also with hyphen.) Forms: see wild a. and goose; also 7 wilgosse.
[Cf. (M)HG. wildgans, Sw. vildgås, Da. vildgaas.]
1. Any wild bird of the goose kind; an undomesticated goose; in Britain usually the greylag (Anser ferus or cinereus), in N. America the Canada goose (Bernicla canadensis).
| c 1050 Voc. in Wr.-Wülcker 364/1 Cente, wilde gos. c 1325 Gloss. W. de Bibbesw. in Wright Voc. 165 Jo voy là une owe rossée [gloss a wilde-gos]. c 1440 Lydg. Hors, Shepe & G. 171 Whan wilde gees hihe in the ayer vp fleen. 1513 Bradshaw St. Werburge i. 2619 A great multytude somtyme of wylde gees, Comunely called Gauntes. 1597 Shakes. 2 Hen. IV, v. i. 79 They flocke together in consent, like so many Wilde-Geese. 1600 ― A.Y.L. ii. vii. 86 If he be free, Why then my taxing like a wild-goose flies Vnclaim'd of any man. 1752 Hill Hist. Anim. 421 We have the wild goose flying over our heads, in the fens of Lincolnshire, in vast flocks. 1845 Whittier Lumbermen ii, O'er us, to the southland heading, Screams the gray wild-goose. |
2. fig. a. Used of or in reference to a flighty or foolish person:
cf. goose n. 1
f. b. Eng. Hist. (
pl.) A nickname for the Irish Jacobites who went over to the Continent on the abdication of James II and later.
| 1592 [see wild goose chase 2]. 1843 M. J. Barry in Spirit of the Nation (Dublin 1845) 230 The wild geese—the wild geese,—'tis long since they flew, O'er the billowy ocean's bright bosom of blue. 1845 Ibid. 231 note, The recruits for the Irish Brigade..were entered on the ship's books as ‘wild geese’. 1845 M. O'Conor Milit. Hist. Irish Nation 367 note, Clare, it may be added, was a great recruiting county for the Brigade. On its stern coast the French used to land smuggled claret, brandy, &c., and take away wool, and, what was more precious, ‘Wild Geese,’ for such was the name usually given to the recruits for ‘The bold Brigade.’ 1872 Tennyson Gareth & Lynette 36 Thou art but a wild-goose to question it. 1881 Froude Eng. in Irel. ii. iii. I. 405 In 1715..Tens of thousands of young Irishmen were in the French service, and thousands more were continually recruited under the name of Wild Geese. 1902 in Emily Lawless With the Wild Geese Pref. p. viii, The ‘Wild Geese’ was the name given..to the exiles who, like the wild birds..migrated to the Continent before and after the Battle of Aughrim, and the Surrender of Limerick in 1691. |
3. attrib. a. [after
wild goose chase 2, as apprehended in later use.] Wild, fantastic, very foolish or risky.
| 1770 Cumberland West Indian ii. xi, To fit him out upon some wild-goose expedition to the coast of Africa. 1781 Cowper Anti-Thelyphthora 53 She tutor'd some in Dædalus's art, And promis'd they would act his wildgoose part. 1833 T. Hook Parson's Dau. iii. vi, ‘All mad, wild-goose nonsense,’ said MacGopus. 1841 Dickens Barn. Rudge iv, He'll..have gone away upon some wild-goose errand, seeking his fortune. |
b. wild-goose plum,
rye, names for N. American varieties of those plants raised from seeds found in the crops of wild geese;
wild-goose race = next.
| 1909 Month Dec. 599 A well-known American plum is called the ‘*wild-goose’ plum, because a plum-stone from which the whole race has been raised was found in the stomach of such a bird. |
| 1594 Willobie Avisa (1880) 83 As weary of this *wild-goose race That led askance, I know not where. 1624 Gataker Transubst. 145 As one running the wild goose race, he windeth backe to a passage in the former argument. |
| 1884 Lisbon (Dakota) Star 15 Aug., The introduction of *wild goose rye into Dakota. |