Green’s Dictionary of Slang

to be disgraced, thus comb-cutting n.

1593		G. Harvey Pierce’s Supererogation in Grosart Works II 283: Can... loue quench, [...] or supererogation combe-cutt itselfe?
1607		Middleton A Trick to Catch the Old One IV iv: To see ten men ride after me in watchet liveries, with orange-tawny-caps, – ’twill cut his comb, i’faith.
1663		S. Butler Hudibras pt 2 41: I wonder you should Cackel thus: / Has the Hen trod you? Is your Comb / Cut, and no Cock at dunghil-home?
1684		R. Allestree The vanity of the creature 26: [B]y and by is his Comb cut, all his Glory worm-eaten, and none able to endure him for the filthiness of his smell.
1845		W.T. Thompson Chronicles of Pineville 141: Now’s the time to cut his comb, major.
1856		Taunton Courier 12 Nov. 7/3: The champion [...] however, had his ‘comb-cut’, and though on ‘his own dung-hill’ [...] he was obliged to succumb to his juniors .
1890		Kipling ‘The God from the Machine’ Soldiers Three (1907) 8: I was death [...] on the comb-cuttin’.