adv. (common).—1. Well-informed, KNOWING (q.v.), keen, alert, up to SNUFF (q.v.): also WIDE-AWAKE and WIDO: cf. NARROW.
1834. W. H. AINSWORTH, Rookwood, ‘The Double Cross.’
| Two milling coves, each VIDE AVAKE, | |
| Vere backed to fight for heavy stake. |
1836. The Thieves’ Chaunt [FARMER, Musa Pedestris (1896), 121].
| She’s WIDE-AWAKE, and her prating cheat, | |
| For humming a cove was never beat. |
1836. DICKENS, Sketches by Boz, ‘Passage in the Life of Mr. Watkins Tottle,’ ii. Our governor’s WIDE AWAKE, he is; I’ll never say nothin’ agin him, nor no man; but he knows what’s o’clock, he does, uncommon.
1841. CATLIN, North American Indians, I. 71. Bogard … was a Yankee and a WIDE-AWAKE fellow.
1854–5. THACKERAY, The Newcomes, xx. ‘Your aunt is a woman who is uncommon WIDE AWAKE, I can tell you.’ ‘I always knew, sir, that my aunt was perfectly aware of the time of day,’ says Barnes, with a low bow.
1856. H. B. STOWE, Dred, I. xvi. She [Miss Harriet] always had more clothes, and more money, and more everything, dan the rest of them, ’cause she was always WIDE AWAKE, and looking out for herself.
1874. MAHAFFY, Social Life in Greece, 48. The Homeric Greeks were too shrewd and WIDE-AWAKE a people to sow where they did not reap; and the increase of communication, and consequent frequency of visitors, were sure to close quickly the open door, and the unasked right of entry.
1887. J. W. HORSLEY, Jottings from Jail, i. I got in company with some of the WIDEST (cleverest) people in London.
1897. MARSHALL, Pomes, 8. But the knight of the pencil was WIDE-AWAKE, and was not to be had with ‘kid.’ Ibid., 49. WIDE, sir? I believe yer! Far too WIDE for Honest Bill. Ibid., 120. Although she was quite the lady In deportment and in dress, Were you asked, as a WIDE-’UN, ‘Shady?’ You would have to answer ‘Yes.’
2. (old).—Indifferent, wide of the mark, out of the running, adrift: hence generic for bad.
1612–5. JOSEPH HALL, Contemplations, ‘Aaron and Miriam.’ God eyther denyes or defers the grant of our requests for our good; it were WIDE for us if our suites should be euer heard.
