1. gen. a. lit. or in physical sense.
1435. Misyn, Fire of Love, I. xxv. 54. Qwhils þe hart of þe toucher in dyuers desires is takyn.
1495. Trevisa’s Barth. De P. R., VII. lxvi. (W. de W.), S iij. Yf he [torpedo] be touchyd with a spere, the towcher shall fele the vyolence of the venym.
1548. Udall, etc., Erasm. Par. Matt. ix. 59. [Jesus] loked about hym as seking for the priuy toucher.
1680. C. Nesse, Church Hist., 340. Touch a great man upon the sore … he fumes and casts the toucher into prison.
1763. Life Swift, in Wks., XI. 265. A thistle is the Scotish arms Which to the Toucher threatens harms.
1904. Times, Lit. Suppl., 1 April, 97/2. That high sort … means death to the profane toucher.
b. fig.
1601. Deacon & Walker, Spirits & Divels, 121. This argument … is a toucher.
1709. Mrs. Manley, Secret Mem. (1720), III. 323. A Heart truly touch’d, values nothing in comparison with the Toucher.
1846. Haydon, in Gullick & Timbs, Paint. (1859), 235. The touchers … are the great men who had discovered the optical principles of imitating nature to convey thought.
c. With adv., as toucher-up.
1908. Westm. Gaz., 28 Jan., 4/1. Taken … advantage of by the wily dealer and his ally, the ‘toucher-up.’
2. Bowls. A bowl that touches the jack.
1600. Nashe, Summer’s Last Will, 1178. Ho, wel shot, a tutcher, a tutcher!
1659. Fuller, App. Inj. Innoc. (1840), 552. I expected when the Animadvertor had knocked away my bowl, he would have laid a toucher in the room thereof.
1868. ‘S. Daryl,’ Quoits & Bowls, 51. A bowl which touches the Jack at any time during its course … is called a ‘toucher.’
3. An instrument for touching: see quot.
1885. C. G. W. Lock, Workshop Receipts, Ser. IV. 327/2. By means of a little strip of brass—called a ‘toucher’—the crossings are found [in examining a watch].
4. colloq. or slang. a. A case of close contact, an exact fit. b. A very near approach, a ‘near go’; in phr. as near as a toucher, very nearly, all but.
1828. Craven Gloss., s.v., An exact fit. ‘It hits to a toucher,’ i.e. so exactly that the joints touch each other.
1841. J. T. J. Hewlett, Peter Priggins, II. ix. 62. ‘So Dick and Tripes were nearly being rusticated this morning.’…
‘As near as a toucher.’
1860. Sala, Baddington Peerage, I. xvii. 298. It was a near toucher, though!
1894. Sir J. Astley, 50 Years Life, II. 199. I was as near as a toucher turning too short, through mistaking the post.
