subs. (common).—1. Silk.
1887. J. W. HORSLEY, Jottings from Jail. Me and another screwed a place at Stoke Newington, and we got some SQUEEZE dresses, and two sealskin jackets, and some other things.
2. (common).—A crowd; a PUSH (q.v.); crowding.
1862. THACKERAY, The Adventures of Philip, xxvi. Four and twenty hours of SQUEEZE in the diligence.
3. See SQUEEZER.
Verb. (B. E.).—‘To gripe, or skrew hard.’ Also (colloquial) = to extort, to coerce, TO BEST (q.v.). As subs. = (1) a hard bargain; (2) HOBSON’S CHOICE (q.v.); and (3) a RISE (q.v.). Whence SQUEEZABLE, SQUEEZABILITY, &c.
1670. MILTON, The History of Britain, vi. He [Canute] SQUEEZED out of the English, though now his subjects, not his enemies, seventy-two, some say, eighty-two thousand pounds.
1743–5. R. POCOCKE, A Description of the East, i. 171, The little officers oppress the people; the great officers SQUEEZE them.
1809. MALKIN, Gil Blas [ROUTLEDGE], 378. You shall go snacks in all that we can SQUEEZE OUT of the old fellow.
1852. M. W. SAVAGE, Reuben Medlicott (1864), i. 9. You are too versatile and too SQUEEZABLE … you take impressions too readily.
1892. C. LOWE, Prince Bismarck, II. 230. The peace-of-mind-at-any-price disposition of that Cabinet had rendered it ‘SQUEEZABLE’ to any extent.
1900. FLYNT, Tramping with Tramps, 308. And then there is a celebration over having ‘SQUEEZED’ another railroad company.
