subs. phr. (common).—A personification of respectability. See quots. 1849 and 1855. [From a character in Speed the Plough, see quot. 1798.]
1798. J. MORTON, Speed the Plough, i. 1. Be quiet woolye? always ding, dinging DAME GRUNDY into my ears—What will MRS. GRUNDY say? What will MRS. GRUNDY think?
1849. BULWER-LYTTON, The Caxtons, Pt. xv. ch. iii. I have hit upon a mode of satisfying the curiosity of our friend MRS. GRUNDY—that is, ‘the World’—without injury to any one.
1855. THACKERAY, The Newcomes, li. ‘What will Richmond, what will society, what will MRS. GRUNDY in general say to such atrocious behaviour?’
1891. Tales from Town Topics, ‘How a Shell Broke the Ice,’ p. 39. Come in; MRS. GRUNDY has run away from Paris long ago.
