subs. (American).—An anonymous letter.
Verb. (common).—1. To ride hard; not to spare one’s beast.
1856. WHYTE-MELVILLE, Kate Coventry, xi. ‘I had rather give Brilliant a good BUCKETING’ [Aunt Horsingham shuddered—I knew she would, and used the word on purpose] ‘over an even heath or a line of grass, than go bodkin in a chariot.’
1864. YATES, Broken to Harness, II., 218. There’s room in the Row to give him [the horse] a very good BUCKETING.
1868. G. L. TOTTENHAM, Charlie Villars at Cambridge, I., 243. BUCKETING his wretched horse home to Cambridge.
1884. HAWLEY SMART, From Post to Finish, 342. Ten thousand pardons, Dollie, dearest; but I only got your message an hour or so ago, and am so busy I couldn’t get here before. As it is I have had to BUCKET my hack unmercifully.
2. (old).—To cheat; to ruin; to deceive: see BUCKET-SHOP.
1819. J. H. VAUX, A Vocabulary of the Flash Language, s.v. TO BUCKET a person is synonymous with putting him in the well.
3. (rowing).—To take the water unfairly—with a scoop at the beginning of the stroke instead of a steady even pull throughout.
1828. SCOTT, Diary, in Lockhart (1839), ix., 253. Thurtell … must in slang phrase have BUCKETED his palls.
1876. BESANT and RICE, The Golden Butterfly, xv., 130. He was not so straight in the back as an Oxford stroke; and he BUCKETED about a good deal, but he got along.
1891. LEHMANN, Harry Fludyer at Cambridge, 62. He kept muttering something about three (that’s me) BUCKETING.
TO GIVE THE BUCKET, verb. phr. (old).—To dismiss; to send a person about his business: cf. BAG, and SACK.
1860. GASKELL, Sylvia’s Lovers, xxi. He were sore put about because Hester had GI’EN HIM THE BUCKET.
TO KICK THE BUCKET, verb. phr. (common).—To die: see HOP THE TWIG. [The bucket here is thought to refer to a Norfolk term for a pulley.] When pigs are killed they are hung by their hind legs on a BUCKET.
1785. GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue. BUCKET, TO KICK THE BUCKET; to die.
1796. WOLCOT (‘Peter Pindar’), Tristia, Wks. (1812) V., 242. Pitt has KICKED THE BUCKET.
1812. COLMAN, Poetical Vagaries, p. 55.
| Near thee doth a BUCKET dangle. | |
| Chieftain! leave me not to drown; | |
| Save a Maid without a smicket! | |
| If the BUCKET come not down, | |
| Soon shall I be doom’d to KICK IT. |
1840. MARRYAT, Poor Jack, xxx. He drained it dry … and KICKED THE BUCKET.
1849. C. KINGSLEY, Alton Locke, ii. ‘Fine him a pot’ roared one, ‘for talking about KICKING THE BUCKET. He’s a nice young man to keep a cove’s spirits up, and talk about a short life and a merry one.’
1876 (?). Broadside Ballad, Ten Little Niggers.
| Eight little niggers never heard of heav’n, | |
| One KICKED THE BUCKET, and then there were seven. |
1889. Answers, July 27, 141, 3. The high-school girl explained to her particular friend yesterday that he KICKED THE BUCKET was slang, and that the polite expression was, ‘He propelled his pedal extremities with violence against a familiar utensil used for the transportation of water and other fluids.’
