[f. FLIRT v. + -ING1.] The action of the vb. FLIRT in various senses; esp. trifling or coquetting with the opposite sex, flirtation.
1593. Nashe, Four Lett. Confut., Wks. (Grosart), II. 274. With none but clownish and roynish ieasts dost thou rush vppon vs, and keepst such a flurting and a flinging in euerie leafe, as if thou wert the onely reasty iade in a country.
1644. J. Bulwer, Chirologia, 54. The flirting out of the Back part of the Hand, or put-by of the turning palme, is their naturall expression who would refuse, deny, prohibit, repudiate, impute, or to lay to ones charge, reject or pretend to lay for an excuse.
1684. Jer. Taylor, Contempl. State of Man, I. iv. (1699), 44. A Life then of Eight hundred years being no more than the flirting up and down of a little Sparrow, the flight of an Arrow, or to say better, the passage of a Shadow.
1710. Steele, Tatler, No. 9, 28 April, ¶ 3. Miss with all her Flirting and Ogling.
1806–7. J. Beresford, Miseries Hum. Life (1826), IV. xxxiii. As you walk forth, freshly and sprucely dressed—receiving in full, at a sharp turning, the filthy flirtings of a well-twirled mop.
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., I. ix. You can have as much flirting as you like—at your Boffins.
attrib. 1644. Bulwer, Chiron., 81. The middle Finger strongly comprest by the Thumbe, and their collision producing a flurting sound, and the Hand so cast out, is an Action convenient to slight and undervalue, and to expresse the vanity of things.
