Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. an empty, meaningless statement.

1633		Jonson Tale of a Tub I i: tub: He will have the last word, though he talk bilk for’t. [...] hugh: Bilk! What’s that? tub: Why, nothing: a word signifying Nothing.
1670		T. Blount Glossographia 83: Bilk is said to be an Arabick word, and signifies nothing: Cribbidge-players understand it best.
1740		R. North Examen 213: Bedloe was questioned over and over, [...] still swore the same bilk.

2. a hoax; an act of cheating.

1664		S. Butler Hudibras Pt II canto 3 line 376: Spells, / Which over ev’ry month’s blank-page. / I’ th’ Almanack strange bilks presage.
1694		Congreve Double-Dealer III iii: There he’s secure from danger of a bilk, / His fare is paid.
1700		T. Brown Amusements Serious and Comical in Works (1744) III 70: I put the bilk upon a pick-pocket, who measured my estate by the length and bulkiness of my new wig (which God knows is not paid for).
1742–4		R. North Lives of the Norths (1826) I 260: After this bilk of a discovery was known, it was reported, and by many really expected or believed, that Bedloe’s wife was coming to town.
1792		New Cheats of London Exposed 14: Having [...] promised, on detection of the bilk, to give him immediate notice.
1844		New Sprees of London 19: [T]he singing is good —I wish as much could be said for the grog; this is most detrimental to many of these cribs; it is a bad policy, and a villanous bilk into the bargain.
1863		T. Taylor Ticket-Of-Leave Man Act I: A regular case of bilk—.
1877		Pioche Record (NV) 28 Apr. 3/2: Tell them I think it is a ‘bilk’ [...] probably some men will make money, whilst most will leave poorer.
1907		Sun. Times (Perth) 3 Feb. 1/1: The trail of bilk is over the late Government subsidised Exhibition [and] repudiation in this instance is simply a squalid and shrieking scandal.
1911		E. Dyson ‘At the Opera’ Benno and Some of the Push 94: ‘It’s a bilk,’ he said. ‘This ain’t no play. The cows ’re makin’ it up ez they go along.’.
1935		O.O. McIntyre New York Day by Day 5 June [synd. col.] All this on the street of slickers with a game that was a bilk when the 49-ers swarmed the Yukon.
1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks 8/1: Bilk [...] defrauding a prostitute of her pay.

3. (US Und.) a swindler or cheat.

c.1758		John F---g Epistle of a Reformed Rake 30: To prevent the Trade being distrest by Sharpers, or what are generally understood by the Technical-name of Bilks.
1766		Midnight Spy 124: Behold a gang of right honourable pickpockets. The venerable company is composed of the Duke of Odds, the Earl of Bilk, Lord Viscount Cogem, Baron Jockey, Sir Samuel Snatchall, [...] and Mr. Live-by-wit.
1790		Sheridan in Sheridaniana 109: Johnny W[i]lks, Johnny W[i]lks, Thou greatest of bilks [F&H].
1819		Beppo in London lxxiv: Tongues are fluent and expert, When Bilk or Dandy wounds their reputation.
1827		J. Wight More Mornings in Bow St. 168: Miss Elizabeth Ferrers called Mr Fitzgerald ‘a bilk!’ (a term well known among the ladies and gentlemen of the saloons — signifying a cheat).
1833		‘Poll Of Drury’ in Lummy Chaunter 60: No thought had I to be a bilk.
1833		Ely’s Hawk & Buzzard (NY) Aug. 31 n.p.: His first appearance was [...] in the chcracter of a dead bilk .
1836		Marryat Japhet 38: After a little delay, the waggoner drove off, cursing him for a bilk, and vowing that he’d never have anything more to do with a ‘larned man’.
1841		W.J. Neale Paul Periwinkle 400: ‘Bilk – Cheat – Runaway’ and other terms of endearment that seem especially to belong to the vocabulary of ’pike men.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 2 Apr. n.p.: Gob told [her] that Swab was a regular bilk.
1851		R.S. Surtees Young Tom Hall (1926) 127: Fourpence! [...] why don’t you pay your pike, you dirty bilks?
1865		‘Tricks of Tradesmen’ in Bob Smith’s Clown Song and Joke Bk 50: Taps you plenty of chalk in your score – what a bilk.
1869		A.K. McClure Three Thousand Miles through the Rocky Mountains 211: A ‘bilk’ is a man who never misses a meal and never pays a cent.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1878–9		A. Garcia Tough Trip Through Paradise (1977) 245: What did he take me for, a damn bilk.
1883		G.W. Peck Peck’s Bad Boy and His Pa (1887) 156: You are a high-toned, gentlemanly sort of a bilk.
1888–94		‘Walter’ My Secret Life (1966) III 435: ‘Oh!’ thought I, ‘she is a whore diseased, and a bilk.’.
1899		A. Binstead Houndsditch Day by Day 86: They knows what these young Yiddisher bilks is capable of.
1912		A.G. Field Watch Yourself Go By 393: The boss [...] swore he would not allow a cheap poker player to do him. ‘Fix the olly! I gave him broads to the show! He’s right as a guinea! Fix him! Have this cheap Greene County bilk pinched.’.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 404: You larn that go off of they there Frenchy bilks? Won’t wash here for nuts nohow.
1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks 8/1: Bilk, a cheat; swindler.

4. (US) a disappointment.

1869

F. Whymper Travel and Adventure in Alaska 310: If the thing has disappointed, it may be, ‘We got down to the “bed rock,” and found it a “bilk”’ – Californian for a humbug.

5. (US) a form of swindle worked on a brothel madam.

1940

D. Maurer Big Con 290: The bilk. A short-con swindle worked on a brothel-madam.