TO SEND ONE TO BIRCHIN LANE, phr. (old).—To castigate; to flog: cf. STRAP OIL, etc.

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  1544.  ASCHAM, The Scholemaster, 69. A common proverb of BIRCHING-LANE.

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  [?].  Royal King [Ancient Drama], vi. 235. It had not been amiss if we had gone to BURCHEN-LANE first to have suited us; and yet it is a credit for a man of the sword to go thread-bare.

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  1614.  OVERBURY, Characters, 17, ‘Of a fine gent.’ His discourse makes not his behaviour, but he buyes it at court, as countreymen their clothes in BIRCHIN-LANE. Ibid. If all men were of his mind, all honesty would be out of fashion; he withers his cloaths on the stage, as a salesman is forced to do his suits in BIRCHIN-LANE, and when the play is done, if you mark his rising, ’tis with a kind of walking epilogue between the two candles.

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  1654.  Witt’s Recreations.

        ’Tis like apparell made in BIRCHEN-LANE,
If any please to suit themselves and wear it,
The blame’s not mine, but theirs that needs will bear it.

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