subs. (common).—1. A frog.
2. (university).—One of Todhunter’s series of mathematical text-books. (Because bound in green cloth. Cf., BLUE-RUIN.)
3. (American).—The paper issue of the Treasury of the United States; first sent out in 1862 during the Civil War. [From the backs being printed in green.] Hence GREEN-BACKER = an advocate for an unlimited issue of paper money.
1873. Echo, 8 May. This was accomplished by the issue of legal tender notes, popularly known as GREENBACKS.
1877. S. L. CLEMENS (‘Mark Twain’), Life on the Mississippi, ch. lvii., p. 499. Anything in the semblance of a town lot, no matter how situated, was saleable, and at a figure which would still have been high if the ground had been sodded with GREENBACKS.
1890. A. C. GUNTER, Miss Nobody of Nowhere, p. 228. Gussie can hear the crinkle of the GREENBACKS as he folds them up.
