adj. and adv. (colloquial).—A general intensive: cf. TALL. Thus a STEEP (= high) price; STEEP (= excessive) damages; a STEEP (= a difficult or forlorn) undertaking; a STEEP (= heavy) tax, &c. TOO STEEP = too absurd (bad, idiotic, or impudent) for acceptance. Hence, in the same sense PRECIPITOUS (q.v.). Fr. raide.
1841. EMERSON, Essays, 1 S., 302, ‘Intellect.’ Perhaps, if we should meet Shakspeare we should not be conscious of any STEEP inferiority; no, but of a great equality.
1857. Chicago Tribune, 17 Oct. At the election in Minnesota, one hundred and ten Winnebago Indians … voted the Democratic ticket; but the agent thought this was rather STEEP, so he afterwards crossed that number from the list.
1858. Baltimore Sun, 23 Aug. The verdict by twelve of seventeen of a jury giving $150,000 as damages to a Land and Water-Power Company, at the Great Falls of the Potomac … is regarded as decidedly STEEP.
1882–3. FROUDE, Historical and Other Sketches, 164. Neither priest nor squire was able to establish any STEEP difference in outward advantages between himself and the commons among whom he lived.
