Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also chowze) to trick, to defraud; often as chouse someone out of v.

1653		Urquhart Rabelais II 426: One part of the world shall disguise itself to gull and chouse the other.
1659		J. Shirley Honoria and Mammon II i: We are in a fair way to be ridiculous, what think you? Chiaus’d by a Scholar!
1663		Pepys Diary (1866) 15 May 146: The Portugals have choused us, it seems, in the Island of Bombay, in the East Indies.
1672		‘The German Princess’ in Ebsworth Roxburghe Ballads (1893) VII:1 65: And thus he was chous’d by the wit of the Girl.
1683		Whores Rhetorick 143: This then must needs be a fit time to chouse the old Cully out of a Summ.
1699		N. Ward ‘A Hue and Cry after a Man-Midwife’ in Writings (1704) 139: And you that are Chous’d, for your Money may mourn.
1701		Cibber Love Makes a Man II i : I won’t be chous’d of my Daughter.
1709		S. Centlivre Busy Body Act III: You and my most conscionable Guardian here [...] plotted and agreed, to chouse a very civil, honest, honourable gentleman, out of a Hundred Pound.
1714		T. Lucas Lives of the Gamesters (1930) 166: Once having chous’d Mr. Levingstone [...] out of 50 guineas at Locket’s Ordinary.
1726		A. Smith Memoirs of... Jonathan Wild 6: He was entituled [sic] to the said Reward [...] but was chous’d ourt of it by Jonathan Wild.
1733		Cibber Harlot’s Progress 10: Then take yourself away, / Since I have chous’d you well, you Cull.
1749		Fielding Tom Jones (1959) 535: Lokee, Sophy [...] I am not to be choused in this way.
1752		‘tit for tat’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 305: While some are chous’d, and cheated.
1774		Foote Cozeners in Works (1799) II 171: I’d endeavour to get her for nothing: chouse her, chouse her!
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1790		W. Perry Only Sure Guide 158: Chouse, v. to cheat.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1825		C.M. Westmacott Eng. Spy I 81: Rum college slang he patters o’er, / With cads who chouse the guilder.
1828		[C. D’Oyly] Tom Raw, The Griffin 316: When the foe gave way. / They were pursued and puckerlow’d, and Cossim / Ordered his long resisted debt to pay / With interest twelve per cent. New horrors cross him, / And, seeing all was lost, and we resolved to chouse him.
1833		‘Jerry Abershaw’s Will’ in Fal-Lal Songster in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) III 17: Said he, in coat of mail I chooses for to ride, / Just to chouse the flaying covies of their fee.
1845		J. Lindridge Sixteen-String Jack 184: He’s choused us, by all that’s damnable—he’s not here.
1847		Bell’s Life in Sydney 20 Nov. 2/2: Our downey friend, the sporting Joe Mathewsof Wellington, was also choused out of a finniff by my nab.
1848		Bartlett Dict. Americanisms 78: to chouse. [...] A messenger, or chiaous, from the Grand Senior, in 1609, committed a gross fraud upon the Turkish and Persian merchants resident in England, by cheating them out of £4,000. Hence from the notoriety of the circumstance, to chiaous, chause, or chouse, was to do as this man did, i.e. to cheat, or defraud.
c.1850		Peeping Tom (London) 33 130/1: [He was] choused into rapturous fathering of successive babies.
1853		Delhi Sketch Bk 1 Oct. 62/1: I feel so choused — so done.
1855		letter in Bendigo Advertiser Vic. 1 Sept. 4/6: What guarantee have I that some of those Local Court gentlemen [...] will not rush round my claim before I secure my license and chice me out of the benefit of my discovery?
1856		Mons. Merlin 18 Oct. 6/2: The fast man [...] is never cheated, but sometimes ‘choused’.
1859		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor IV 223/1: They [i.e. bunters] was mostly Christ-killers, and chousing a Jew was no sin.
1874		J. Greenwood Wilds of London (1881) 3: They’ve choused the flats of ever rap they’ve got about ’em.
1875		M. Thompson Hoosier Mosaics 27: He’s a thief and a dog! – he’s chowzed me out’n my last cent!
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 2 May 6/2: The readiness of the English ‘swells’ to spend £500 in a desperate endeavour to chouse one of the vulgar herd out of a ‘fiver’ is a beautiful illustration of the ‘hereditary courage’ which fashionable papers so dearly love to dwell on.
1895		J. Greenwood Behind A Bus 63: In a rage at being ‘choused’ he gave poor Winkle a violent shove.
1895		Truth (Sydney) 13 Jan. 1/5: The beery Tar, the ‘tecks’ to chouse, / [...] / Yawed in a handy, open house .
1908		[Donald Shaw] (con. 1860s) London in the Sixties 59: Smiling as if he had been awarded the victory he was undoubtedly choused out of.
1912		Bulletin (Sydney) 12 Sept. 51/1: Not that there’s much straight-out renting in the wheat country. The share system has choused the other clean out of the premises.
1950		N. Lindsay Dust or Polish? 122: Mrs Dibble spent most of next day deciphering her copy of the partnership agreement with deep suspicion, and seeking for evidence that it was designed to chouse her out of her just share of the profits.

2. to leave (in order to hide oneself).

1938

C.M. Martin ‘Powdersmoke Showdown’ in Real Western Nov. 🌐 Old Gabriel always takes a last look around before he chouses off to his hideout.