Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a beggar’s female companion.

1719		A. Smith Lives of Most Notorious Highway-men, etc. (1926) 202: Bloss [...] a bully’s pretended wife or mistress whom he guards, and who by her trading supports him.
1725		New Canting Dict.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict.
1770		‘Jolly Gypsies’ Rural Lover’s Delight (first part) 31: We are honest, we are boozey, / Fairly with out blosses dear; / We are courting, we are sporting, / Yet we never want good cheer.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: bloss (cant.) the pretended wife of a bully, or shop lifter.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1859		‘Scene in a London Flash-Panny’ Matsell Vocabulum 98: I only piked into Deuceaville with a dimber-damber, who couldn’t pad the hoof for a single darkman’s without his bloss to keep him from getting pogy.
1881		Trumble ‘On the Trail’ in Sl. Dict. (1890) 42: I only piked into Grassville with a dimber-damber, who couldn’t pad the hoof for a single darkman’s without his bloss to keep him from getting poggy.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 9: Bloss, a mistress.

2. (UK Und.) a thief.

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bloss c. a Thief or Shop-lift.
1719		A. Smith Lives of Most Notorious Highway-men, etc. (1926) 202: Bloss, a thief or shoplift.
1785		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.

3. (UK Und.) a prostitute [note Scots/Irish dial. bloss, a buxom young woman].

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bloss c. [...] a Bullies pretended Wife, or Mistress, whom he guards, and who by her Trading supports him, also a Whore.
1719		A. Smith Lives of Most Notorious Highway-men, etc. (1926) 202: Bloss [...] also a whore.
1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: The Cull has tipt his Tackle Rum-rigging, c. or, has Tipt his Bloss Rum-tackle, c. the keeping Coxcomb has given his Mistress very fine Cloths.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict.
1741		Canting Academy, or the Pedlar’s-French Dict. 114: Whore A Bloss or Wapping Mort.
1747		Life and Character of Moll King 12: My Blos has nailed me of mine [handkerchief]; but I shall catch her at Maddox’s Gin-Ken [...] and if she has morric’d it, Knocks and Socks, Thumps and Pumps, shall attend the Froe-File Buttocking B---h.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: brush to your froe, or bloss, and wheedle for crop, run to your mistress, and sooth and coax her out of some money.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc.
1867		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 14 Sept. n.p.: She is without doubt the ‘rustiest zuke’ in Washington. Some idea of the powers of this ‘bloss’ can be formed from the fact that it required three of our best coppers [...] to ‘run her in’.

4. (Aus.) an ostentatious show [? fig. use of sense 3].

1914

Sport (Adelaide) 4/4: Frank, the German, ought not put on such a bloss when he goes out with the Moonta Mines tabby, as he is only playing second fiddle.