Also thread-the-needle; thread the (my) needle-eye, my grandmother’s, the tailor’s needle; dial. grandy needles. [f. THREAD v. + NEEDLE.]
1. A children’s game, in which, all joining hands, the player at one end of the string passes between the last two at the other end, the rest following.
1751. Advent. G. Edwards, 140 (Halliwell). Eight people … joining hands like children at thread-needle.
1797–1805. S. & Ht. Lee, Canterb. T., III. 450. Children … playing thread my grandmother’s needle.
1825–7. Hone, Every-day Bk., I. 692. The prettiest sight … was a game at ‘Thread my needle,’ played by about a dozen lasses.
1856. Miss Mulock, J. Halifax, xxv. From top to bottom, the young men and women were running in a long ‘Thread-the-needle.’
2. Thread the needle, as verb phrase: (a) in dancing, denoting the movement in which the lady passes under her partner’s arm, their hands being joined; (b) to pass in and out in a winding course; (c) in shooting: see quot. 18952.
1844. Dickens, Christmas Carol, li. Advance and retire, both hands to your partner, bow and curtsey, corkscrew, thread-the-needle, and back again to your place.
1895. Daily News, 12 June, 7/2. The toiling oarsman … might then have to ‘thread the needle’ (inshore for the boat, outside for the punt, close astern).
1895. Funk’s Standard Dict., s.v., To thread the needle (Western U.S.), to fire a rifle-ball through an auger-hole barely large enough to allow the ball to pass without enlarging the hole.
