subs. (old cant: now recognised).—A prisoner; a CRACK-HALTER (q.v.). [Cf. CAGE and CANARY.]
1603. DAVIES, Microcosmus, in Works [GROSART], i. 99. ‘To the Right Noble Lady, the Lady Rich.’ But such a JAILE-BIRD heauenly Nightingale.
c. 1696. B. E., A New Dictionary of the Canting Crew, s.v. JAYL-BIRDS.
1785. GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v.
1819. T. MOORE, Tom Crib’s Memorial to Congress, 77.
| Thus a new set of darbies, when first they are worn, | |
| Makes the JAIL-BIRD uneasy. |
1849. F. S. MAHONY (‘Father Prout’), Reliques, (Bohn) p. 233. The fellow must be what Terry calls ‘a bad mimber intirely,’ what we English call a JAIL-BIRD; what the French denominate a ‘vrai gibier de grève’; termed in Latin ‘corvus patibularius’; and by the Greeks, κακου κορακος κακον ωον.
