arch. Forms: 5 tussch, tysche, 6 tusche, tusshe, tushe, tuch, 6– tush. [A natural utterance: cf. TWISH.] An exclamation of impatient contempt or disparagement.
c. 1440. York Myst., xxxiii. 121. Ȝa, tussch! for youre tales, þai touche not entente.
c. 1450. Mankind, 783, in Macro Plays, 39. Tysche! a flyes weynge!
c. 1520. Skelton, Magnyf., 591. Tushe! holde your pece.
1535. Coverdale, Jer. v. 11. Tush, there shall no miszfortune come vpon vs.
1602. Shaks., Ham., I. i. 29. Tush, tush, ’twill not appeare.
1678. Bunyan, Pilgr., I. 251. Tush, said Obstinate, away with your book.
1791. Cowper, Iliad, II. 290. But tush,—Achilles lacks Himself the spirit of a man.
1837. Hawthorne, Twice-told T. (1851), II. i. 16. Tush! we have nothing to fear.
1891. Farrar, Darkn. & Dawn, xlv. Tush, Cæsar! be a man. Sweep aside these flies. Poison them both.
B. sb. as a name for this utterance: esp. in phr. † to make a tush at (or of), to scoff at, to pooh-pooh (obs.).
1600. Holland, Livy, VI. xxxviii. 244. When the Tribunes … made but a tush therat.
1628. Earle, Microcosm., Worlds wise Man (Arb.), 6. His tush is greatest at Religion.
1632. Lithgow, Trav. (1906), p. xxii. A tush for that snarling Crew.
a. 1643. J. Shute, Judgement & Mercy (1645), 128. People … that make a tush of the Devills power.
1883. R. L. Stevenson, Lett. (1901), I. vi. 272. These tushes Are wearisome.
Hence Tush v., intr. to say ‘tush!,’ to scoff or express impatience at: also trans. to dismiss with ‘tush!’ (nonce-use); whence Tushing vbl. sb.; also Tusher, one who ‘tushes’; Tushery, used by R. L. Stevenson for a conventional style of romance characterized by excessive use of affected archaisms such as ‘tush!’
1548. Udall, Erasm. Par. Luke vi. 78. Thou makest muche tushyng, and many exceptions.
1555. Harpsfield, in Bonner, Homilies, 30 b. [He] doth thou hym or tushe at hym.
1597. J. Payne, Royal Exch., 11. To make men laughe at there tushinge and scoffinge of religiouse matters.
1679. J. Brown, Life of Faith (1824), II. xxii. 428. People become hardened in their sins … tushing at all threatenings.
1819. Scott, Ivanhoe, xl[i]v. Cedric tushed and pshawed more than once at the message.
1883. R. L. Stevenson, Lett. (1901), I. vi. 270. Every tusher tushes me so free that may I be tushed if the whole thing be worth a tush. Ibid. (1883), Lett. to Colvin, Oct. (1899), I. 285. It’s great sport to write tushery.
1907. Academy, 26 Jan., 96/1. This is what R. L. S. called ‘tushery.’ Luckily … for those who write tushery there is an enormous reading public that does not care a fig for Life.
1908. Times, 9 Dec., 14/4. We overheard … an occasional pishing and tushing.
