subs. (colloquial).—Energetic and continuous manual labour: e.g., ‘ELBOW-GREASE is the best furniture oil.’ Fr., huile de bras or de poignet; du foulage.
1823. GALT, The Entail, iii. 84. He has scartit and dintit my guid mahogany past a’ the power o’ bees-wax and ELBOW GREASE to smooth.
1785. GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v.
1859. G. ELIOT, Adam Bede, bk. I., ch. vi. Surely nowhere else could an oak clock-case and an oak-table have got to such a polish by the hand: genuine ‘ELBOW POLISH,’ as Mrs Poyser called it, for she thanked God she never had any of your varnished rubbish in her house.
1870. London Figaro, 31 Oct. Often have I been … frequently admonished to put some ELBOW-GREASE into my work.
1876. M. E. BRADDON, Joshua Haggard’s Daughter, ch. xi. There’s no such polish in Devonshire, I should think, as poor Phœbe’s ELBOW-GREASE.
