Naut. [app. a. obs. F. busquer ‘to shift, filch; prowle, catch by hook or crook; busquer fortune to go seek his fortune’ (Cotgr.), ad. It. buscare ‘to filch, to prowl, to shift for’ (Florio), or Sp. buscar, OSp. boscar to seek; perh. orig. ‘to hunt,’ or ‘to beat a wood,’ f. bosco wood.]
1. intr. Of a ship: To beat or cruise about; to beat to windward, tack: with adv. about, to and again. Also to busk it out: to weather a storm by tacking about.
1665. Lond. Gaz., No. 9/2. A Ship from Longsound, who hath been busking too and again this Fortnight.
1678. Wycherley, Pl.-Dealer, III. i. 33. Go, busk about, and run thyself into the next great Man’s Lobby.
1713. C. Johnson, Successf. Pyrate, I. i. 6 (D.). Of India, the Ship was found busking on the Seas, without a Mast or Rudder.
a. 1734. North, Lives, II. 316. Sometimes a-try and sometimes a-hull we busked it out.
b. ‘To cruise as a pirate.’ [Perh. the original sense: cf. It. buscare, F. busquer (above).]
1867. Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., Busking, piratical cruising.
c. trans. To busk the seas: ? = to scour the seas.
1747. J. Lind, Lett. Navy, i. (1757), 29. As three deck’d ships are too large and unweildy to busk the seas, as they call it, they must be as much at anchor, as the servive they are upon will admit.
2. fig. To go about seeking for, to seek after.
a. 1734. North, Exam., I. iii. ¶ 123. 203. The Parties would be less industrious to busk about for any other [defence]. Ibid., Lives, II. 122. My Lord Rochester … was inclined … to busk for some other way to raise the supply. Ibid., III. 54. Running up and down and through the city … perpetually busking after one thing or other.
3. slang. See quots. (But perhaps this is a distinct word. Hence Busking vbl. sb. and ppl. a.
1851. Mayhew, Lond. Labour, I. 215. Obtain a livelihood by ‘busking,’ as it is technically termed, or, in other words, by offering their goods for sale only at the bars and in the taprooms and parlours of taverns. Ibid. (ed. 2), III. 216. Busking is going into public houses and playing and singing and dancing. Ibid., 222. Busking, that is going into public houses and cutting likenesses of the company.
1860. Cornh. Mag., II. 334. Thieves’ words and phrases … selling obscene songs—busking.
1874. Sunday Mag., Xmas No. 1. Chair-caners, ‘busking vocalists,’ musicians and acrobats.
