sb. (a.) colloq. [The verbal phrase take in used as sb. or adj.] An act of taking in (TAKE v. 82 o); a cheat, swindle, deception; a thing or person that takes one in, a fraud.
1778. Miss Burney, Evelina (1791), I. xxi. 105. I find it’s as arrant a take-in as ever I met with.
1814. Jane Austen, Mansf. Park, v. What is this but a take in?
1818. Blackw. Mag., II. 398. There are at least twenty take-ins (as they are called) for one true heiress.
1819. Hermit in London, II. 233. What a take-in it is to be told that persons are at home when you have not the least desire to see them.
1858. Lytton, What will he do, I. xii. Comedians are such takes in.
1884. Miss Mulock, Miss Tommy, III. 185. What a take-in it was!
b. attrib. or adj. That takes in; deceptive.
1819. Metropolis, III. 119. Tales of a take-in match and a vicious mother-in-law.
