subs. (colloquial).—1. In pl. = breeches: spec. the close-fitting knee-breeches of the 18th and early 19th centuries: also SMALL-CLOTHES [GROSE: ‘A gird at the affected delicacy of the present age; a suit being called coat, waistcoat, and—articles or SMALL CLOTHES’].
1812. COMBE, Dr. Syntax, i. 20.
| His SMALL-CLOTHES sat so close and tight, | |
| His boots, like jet, were black and bright. |
1813. STEPHENS [Anti-Jacobin Review of Life of Horne Took, quoted by SOUTHEY, Doctor, Interchap. xx.]. His breeches he [STEPHENS] calls SMALL CLOTHES; the first time we have seen this bastard term, the offspring of gross ideas and disgusting affectation, in print, in anything like a book.
1818. BYRON, Beppo, iv.
| You’d better walk about begirt with briars, | |
| Instead of coat and SMALLCLOTHES. |
1836. DICKENS, Sketches by Boz, ‘The Last Cabdriver.’ His boots were of the Wellington form, pulled up to meet his corduroy knee-SMALLS.
1840. HOOD, Miss Kilmansegg and Her Precious Leg. Wears a negative coat, and positive SMALLS.
1869. H. B. STOWE, Oldtown Folks, v. His well-brushed Sunday coat and SMALL-CLOTHES.
2. (university Oxon).—In pl., see quots. LITTLE-GO is the Cambridge equivalent. Properly ‘Responsions.’
c. 1840. E. A. FREEMAN [1823–92], The Contemporary Review, li. 821. ‘Greats,’ so far as the name existed in my time, meant the Public Examination, as distinguished from Responsions, Little-go, or SMALLS.
1853. REV. E. BRADLEY (‘Cuthbert Bede’), The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green, an Oxford Freshman, II. xi. The little gentleman was going in for his degree, alias Great-go, alias Greats; and our hero for his first examination in literis humanioribus, alias Responsions, alias Little-go, alias SMALLS.
1861. T. HUGHES, Tom Brown at Oxford, x. In our second term we are no longer freshmen, and begin to feel ourselves at home, while both SMALLS and greats are sufficiently distant to be altogether ignored if we feel that way inclined.
1863. C. READE, Hard Cash, Prologue. Julia … reminded her that ‘SMALLS’ was the new word for ‘little go.’
1878. Scribner’s Magazine, xvii. Dec., 283. Looking forward with annoyance to the rather childish first examination, in Oxford language known as ‘SMALLS.’
3. (theatrical).—A one-night performance in a small town or village by a minor company carrying its own ‘fit-up.’
Adv. (colloquial).—Timidly; humbly: e.g., to SING (or SPEAK) SMALL (q.v.).
