[f. prec. sb.]
1. intr. To use finesse, artifice, or stratagem.
1778. Conquerors, 61. The flights finesse.
1803. Edin. Rev., II. April, 103. But our author can hector as well as finesse.
1867. Miss Braddon, Aur. Floyd, i. 15. Instead of telling them at once in a candid and Christian-like manner that they were all ditry, degraded, ungrateful, and irreligious, she diplomatized and finessed with them as if she had been canvassing the county.
b. trans. To conduct by artifice; to bring or modify by finesse or delicate handling into (a specified state). Also with away.
1814. Jane Austen, Watsons, Concl. (1879), 290. Till such time as Reginald de Courcy could be talked, flattered and finessed into an affection for her.
1851. Ruskin, Stones Ven., I. xiv. § 16. A battlement is in its origin a piece of wall large enough to cover a man’s body, and however it may be decorated, or pierced, or finessed away into traceries, as long as much of its outline is retained as to suggest its origin, so long its size must remain undiminished.
1885. L. Wingfield, Barbara Philpot, II. iii. 75. Although the Bill had been finessed through the first stage, it could never become law.
2. a. Whist. intr. To attempt to take a trick by finesse; also trans. To play (a particular card) for the purpose of finessing.
1746. Hoyle, Whist (ed. 6), 4. He finesses upon your Partner. Ibid., 40. Your Adversary finesses the Knave.
1752. A. Murphy, Gray’s-Inn Journal, No. 7, ¶ 4. I can now return my Partner’s Suit, lead through the Honour, Finesse [tie], and sometimes contrive to bring about an agreeable see-saw.
1837. Dickens, Pickw., xxxv. Why Mr. Pickwick had not returned that diamond, or led the club, or roughed the spade, or finessed the heart, or led through the honour, or brought out the ace, or played up to the king, or some such thing.
1885. Proctor, Whist, vii. 86. You may finesse more deeply in trumps than in plain suits.
b. Croquet. intr. To play one’s ball out of the adversary’s way.
1875. J. D. Heath, Croquet Player, 65. Blue’s best game would be to finesse to the corner near him.
Hence Finessed ppl. a.; Finessing vbl. sb. Also Finesser, a schemer, strategist.
1746. Hoyle, Whist (ed. 6), 68. Finessing, means the endeavouring to gain an Advantage by Art and Skill.
1774. Goldsm., Retaliation, 105.
| Though secure of our hearts, yet confoundedly sick | |
| If they were not his own by finessing and trick. |
1835. Miss Sedgwick, Linwoods (1873), I. 211–2. Like the false priest, she was contriving to steal the gift from the altar; or rather, like an expert finesser, she seemed to leave the game to others while she held, or fancied she held, the controlling card in her own hand.
1851. Ruskin, Stones Ven., I. xxi. § 11. Educated imbecility and finessed foolishness are the worst of all imbecilities and foolishnesses.
1861. Macm. Mag., V. Dec., 134/2. Finessing is scarcely ever admissible in quadrille, the number of cards being too limited.
