subs. phr. (old).—1.  See quot.

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  1837.  R. H. BARHAM, The Ingoldsby Legends, 3 S. (Jerry Jarvis’s Wig). He looked disdainfully at the wig; it had once been a comely jasey enough, of the colour of over-baked gingerbread, one of the description commonly known during the latter half of the last century by the name of a ‘BROWN GEORGE.’

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  1882.  Globe, 24 July, 2, 1. The King [George III.] wore a brown wig … known popularly a century ago as BROWN GEORGE.

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  2.  (common).—A jug; a brown earthenware pitcher: cf. BLACK-JACK.

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  1861.  T. HUGHES, Tom Brown at Oxford, xxiv. He … stood behind his oak, holding his BROWN GEORGE, or huge earthenware receptacle, half full of dirty water, in which his bedmaker had been washing up his tea-things.

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  1881.  BESANT and RICE, The Chaplain of the Fleet, II., iii. His country brother might have been seen at the Crown, over a pipe and a BROWN GEORGE full of strong October.

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  3.  (old).—A coarse brown loaf; hard brown biscuit.

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  1653.  URQUHART, Rabelais, IV. Author’s Prologue. The devil of one musty crust of a BROWN GEORGE the poor dogs had to scour their grinders with.

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  1693.  DRYDEN, Perseus, V., 215.

        Cubb’d in a cabin, on a mattrass laid,
On a BROWN GEORGE, with lousy swabbers fed.

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  1694.  ECHARD, Plautus’s Comedies Made English. Faith, I’ve great designs i’ my head; but first and foremost; let me hide this portmantle.——After all, this monarch here, must dine to day with a BROWN GEORGE, and only salt and vineager sawce.

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