A bill discounter, a usurer.
1810. More satisfaction will result to ourselves than money ever administered to the bosom of a shaver.—Tho. Jefferson to James Madison, May 13.
1813. [This resource] the States have unfortunately fooled away, nay, corruptly alienated to swindlers and shavers, under the cover of private banks.—The same to John W. Eppes, June 24.
1816. We have too many note-shavers; too many gentlemen; &c.—Mass. Spy, Sept. 4.
1817. [He] put himself under the tuition of one of the most experienced shavers of the city, to learn all the wretched debasing arts of the trade.—J. K. Paulding, ‘Letters from the South,’ i. 54. (Italics in the original.)
1818. They should curtail their discounts, by making the shaver and speculator pay up entirely.—Mass. Spy, Dec. 30.
1819. They seized the poor president, shaved his head, and trundled him in a wheel-barrow through the streets of Louisville; meaning thereby, as Mr. Ormsby had been an old shaver, he should be shaved in his turn.—Id., May 12.
1819. [The operation of discounting] affords fine sport to shavers.—H. C. McMurtrie, ‘Sketches of Louisville,’ p. 124.
1838. The sub-Treasury Bill ought to be called “A Bill to encourage shavers and shaving.”—Letter of Hugh S. Legare, The Jeffersonian (Albany), June 16, p. 141.
1840. The poor market woman, with one of their notes, was liable to be shaved to the tune of from five to ten per cent.—Mr. Vanderpoel of N.Y., House of Repr., July 1: Cong. Globe, p. 497.
1850. Respectable people, as lawyers, note-shavers, fops, and women.—D. G. Mitchell, ‘The Lorgnette,’ i. 90 (1852).
1851. The wrinkled note-shaver will have taken his railroad trip in vain.—‘House of the Seven Gables,’ xviii. (N.E.D.)
1856. I can produce Elders here who can shave their smartest shavers, and take their money from them.—Brigham Young, Nov. 9: ‘Journal of Discourses,’ iv. 77.
