(Seldom used in the English sense.) Obliging, kind, pleasant, amiable.
1768.
| Or else how does it come to pass | |
| That Wedlock Joys increase so fast? | |
| That Young and Old, the Cross and Clever, | |
| Join hands, and live so well together? | |
Boston Post-Boy, June 20. |
1773.
| Then come, put the jorum about, | |
| And let us be merry and clever. | |
‘She Stoops to Conquer.’ (N.E.D.) |
1793. The ladies vowed he was a clever fellow; the rakes called him a high buck, for he was spunky, and cut a dash.—Mass. Spy, Sept. 26: from the Eagle.
1804. Clever in New England means honest, conscientious.—W. Austin, ‘Lett. London,’ 68 n. (N.E.D.) This meaning is uncommon.
1805. The Yankee declares I am “a plaguy likely fellow,” and the Englishman is no less positive that I am “a right clever fellow.”—Balt. Ev. Post, May 30, p. 2/3: from the N.Y. Commercial Advertiser. [The editor adds, “This is not an Englishman’s phrase.”]
1815. I somehow did not feel quite clever, but hoped for the best.—Mass. Spy, June 14. [Here the meaning is “up to the mark.” This also is uncommon.]
1816. The Virginians use clever for intelligent; whereas we use it for a kind of negative character of weak intellect, but good disposition; the correct meaning is rather with them, than with us, as shrewd, cunning, dexterous.—Henry C. Knight (‘Arthur Singleton’), ‘Letters from the South and West,’ p. 82 (Boston, 1824).
1818. See BOSS.
1822. [Court of Oyer and Terminer, Philadelphia.] Question, Why, Sir, have you a prejudice against me? Ans. Because neither you nor the other counsel have acted clever towards the Jury.—Mass. Spy, June 5.
1826. [Lewis Cass] is what we call in New England a clever fellow, good-natured, kind-hearted, amiable, and obliging.—Daniel Webster to George Ticknor, March 1: ‘Life,’ i. 260 (1870).
1833. The word clever … has here no connexion with talent, and simply means pleasant or amiable. Thus a good-natured blockhead in the American vernacular is a clever man; and, having had this drilled into me, I foolishly imagined that all trouble, with regard to this word at least, was at an end. It was not long, however, before I heard of a gentleman having moved into a clever house, of another succeeding to a clever sum of money, of a third embarking in a clever ship, and making a clever voyage, with a clever cargo.—T. Hamilton, ‘Men and Manners in America,’ i. 233 (Blackwood).
*** The extended use of the word, illustrated in the latter sentence, is at least very uncommon now.
1835. I found him all sorts of a clever man.—‘Col. Crockett’s Tour,’ p. 142 (Phila.).
1836. Welden the Magician holds forth at the American Museum, and is really very clever in his way.—Phila. Public Ledger, Dec. 24.
1837. “Clever is hardly a name for you, Tippleton,” said Diggs, using the word in its cis-atlantic sense.—J. C. Neal, ‘Charcoal Sketches,’ p. 169.
1837. See DIG.
1839. Mrs. Guttridge was a clever woman, and it was a shame that she should be left to suffer so.—Knickerbocker Mag., xiii. 421 (May).
1846. “Its five mild to the next house,” he added, “and I reckon you’ll hardly find ’em up when you get there; but they’es right clever, and won’t make much account of gittin up if they can take you.”—E. W. Farnham, ‘Life in Prairie Land,’ p. 365.
1847. It makes me mad to hear clever scholars talk of the ‘Iliad’ as a book of ballads, as if ’t were a mere collection, like Percy’s Reliques, or my friend Longfellow’s ‘Estray.’—Knick. Mag., xxix. 473 (May).
1847. My only associates were wild, fashionable youths, “clever” enough, but thoughtless and fond of frivolous sport. (Note.) The word clever is here used in the American sense of amiable.—‘Life of Benjamin Lundy,’ p. 14–5 (Phila.).
1848. See YANKEE.
1850. He was what we call in Kentucky a “clever fellow”—which, my dear reader, means nothing more or less, in plain English, than a wild, frolicking, good-hearted, good-for-nothing chap, against whom there can be no positive charges of crime or meanness, but to whom it would not be advisable to loan money, or credit too largely, if you ever wish to be paid.—James Weir, ‘Lonz Powers,’ i. 34 (Phila.).
1852.
| ‘This child, who perished by the fire, | |
| Her christen-name it was Sophia; | |
| Also her sis’er, Mary Ann: | |
| Their father was a clever man!’ |
1853. [The steamer Die Vernon] is the mail-boat, with a clever set of officers in charge.—Daily Morning Herald (St. Louis), June 30.
1861. Brown is a clever man, but he can’t manage an hotel.—W. H. Russell, ‘My Diary, North and South,’ March 26 (1863).
1862. He was a very clever man, and used to do enything for his naybors for nothin.—‘Letters of Major Jack Downing,’ June 18.
1866. He said … he could as well carry a bushel as a half bushel, for it would only jest make a clever weight to balance him.—Seba Smith, ‘’Way Down East,’ p. 332.
1867. The next morning Adjutant Cheathamm, of the fifth Georgia, gave me from his wardrobe a shirt and pair of drawers, which I considered very clever in one who had so poor a supply himself.—W. L. Goss, ‘The Soldier’s Story,’ p. 251 (Boston).
1878. You’re as clever as a robin, Happy. I guess you’ve done me more good than the minister an’ meetin’ together, since you’ve lived here, and I’ve strove to tell ye on’t, frequent, but somehow I couldn’t fetch round to.—Rose T. Cooke, ‘Happy Dodd,’ chap. xxvii.
