Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also snips) a tailor; also used as a generic proper name, e.g. Master Snip, Snip the Tailor, McSnip.

1599		Jonson Every Man Out of his Humour IV v: Master Snip, pray let me reduct some two or three shillings for points and ribands.
1630		T. Randolph Muses’ Looking Glass IV iii: Sir, here’s Snip the Taylor Charg’d with a riot.
1674		Hogan-Moganides 29: The rest were Taylors, All famous Snips, for Clipping, Coyning, For filching Cabbage, and Purloyning.
1696		Motteux (trans.) Gargantua and Pantagruel (1927) II Bk IV 423: Snip thinking to cut a hood, would cut you out a cod-piece, instead of a cassock, he would make you a high-crowned hat [...] Snip was condemned to make good the stuffs to all his customers; and to this day poor cabbage’s hair grows through his hood.
1740		Garrick Lethe Act I: Come along, Neighbor Snip. Come along Tailor.
1756		W. Toldervy Hist. of the Two Orphans III 94: I am arrested by that damn’d taylor Snip.
1767		‘Andrew Barton’ Disappointment I i: As for McSnip, he intends to knock off business.
1772		Bridges Burlesque Homer (3rd edn) 529: Like snip the taylor with his suit.
1786		‘Peter Pindar’ ‘Epistle to Boswell’ Works (1794) I 315: And Snip, the taylor, from the Isle of Muck.
1793		Sporting Mag. Oct. III 8/1: Our Heroine [...] gave her hand to the Prime Minister of the Forge, to the great mortification of Crispin and Snip.
1805		‘Jeremy Swell, Gent.’ Tailors’ Revolt 5: snip, a member of the Tailor weal, / Resolv’d to take a walk to Pentonville.
1815		‘Some push along with Four in Hand’ in A Garland of New Songs (21) 2: Mrs. Snip the tailor’s wife, can teach her spouse to drive.
1822		Egan Life and Adventures of Samuel Hayward 9: The appellations of snip, the ninth part of a man, young cabbage, &c. added to the idea of spoiling his well-turned limbs by sitting cross-legged.
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 162: Snip, Sniplouse a tailor’s shears work with a clicketting snip; this explains the first word.
1838		J. Grant Sketches in London 55: I could not help compassionating poor Snip [...] patching the tattered corduroy unmentionables of the poor mechanics of the Bench.
1842		Leeds Times 5 Nov. 6/2: ‘Ye clambering, cockle-hearted snips, be off!’.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 2 July n.p.: the whip wants to know Who is that young snip that carries a cane .
1843		Satirist & Sporting Chron. (Sydney) 11 Mar. 2/3: My pen made a trip, / I meant to say ‘Snip,’ / That title for Tailors reserved.
1845		Bell’s Life in Sydney 27 Sept. 3/1: Ginger again nailed him one [...] The tailor down. [Round] 9. Snip more cautious and quiet at first.
1849		Thackeray Pendennis I 329: He might pay poor Snip, the tailor, the twenty pounds which the poor devil wants for his landlord.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1854		Bell’s Life in Sydney 14 Oct. 3/3: The snip stated that he saw two gentlemen near the toll-bar.
1859		G.F. Atkinson Curry & Rice (3 edn) n.p.: Scraps came to India as a recruit, and being originally a tailor, got a snip to purchase his discharge.
1863		G.A. Sala Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous 178: Those who are so ready to sneer at a Snip, and to cast Cabbage in his teeth.
1864		Leavitt & White Lost Will 3: old snip: Well, well, well! what in the world is going to become of us? People ain’t buying clothes any more.
1879		H. Hartigan Stray Leaves (2nd ser.) 152: [H]e never would wear that cap again—a cap which had been sullied by the head of a snip!
1879		‘’Arry on Crutches’ in Punch 3 May 201/1: The Snips cut it [i.e. cloth] finer and finer.
1886		M.E. Braddon Mohawks III 149: Your West End snip is generally a money-lender in disguise.
1889		Dead Bird (Sydney) 26 Oct. 2/1: Charlie Brown, the well-known comedian, plays the part of a fashionable tailor [...] ‘Bravo, old fellow, you played the snip grand last night’.
1890		Bird o’ Freedom 15 Jan. 1/4: The other day the Jerker waltzed bang into the arms of his tame tailer. [...] ‘Excuse me mentioning the fact, Mr. J.,’ said the snip.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 77: Snip, a tailor.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 22 Dec. 12/4: Melbourne johnniedom is sad at heart because of the barbarity of local tailors, who are combining for mutual protection against the masher who dresses ‘on the nod.’ A gorgeously-apparelled swell, who lately went through the local court after going through the local tailors, owed money to 15 different Snips.
1901		Regiment 27 July 5/2: The budding Wellington immediately sent the following somewhat unsatisfactory (to the tailor) answer:— ‘Dear Mr. Snip,—Yours of the 11th inst. to hand with bill. Enclosed please find cheque for amount due ( [...] for I am hanged if I can’.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 23 Oct. 4/8: A week later Snip sang at a smoke social.
1910		Sun. Times (Perth) 26 June 2nd sect. 9/7: They Say [...] That a dashing dentist got home on a confiding tailor last week. That having told the latter he was ‘Right O’ with two panto girls he ordered and got a swagger suit. That Mr. Snip was introduced [...] and made welcome.
1927		(con. 1835–40) P. Herring Bold Bendigo 26: Bill Atkinson, the fighting snip, and his rival, Sam Merriman were shining lights of the first magnitude.
1930		Eve. Teleg. 12 Feb. 6/4: Mr ‘Snip’ the tailor.
1940		D. Burley N.Y. Amsterdam News 27 July 20: ‘You’d better see your snipper, ’Cause it [i.e. a jacket] looks like the China Clipper’.
1947		N. Marsh Final Curtain (1958) 152: Would you be good enough [...] to oblige me with Mrs Snips the Tailor’s Wife?

2. (UK Und.) a cheat.

1725		New Canting Dict.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict.
1832		S. Warren Diary of a Late Physician in Works (1854) III 122: He heard his own name mentioned [...] as one of the ‘served-out snips’ whom he intended to ‘do’.
1850		E.V. Kenealy Goethe: a New Pantomime in Poetical Works 2 (1878) 334: Bubble, Addlepate, Snip, Bumpkin, / Dog-heart, is it thus you bark?
1929		‘Ellery Queen’ Roman Hat Mystery 102: Wait till I get my hands on her, the little snip!

3. a certainty.

1890		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘Otherwise Engaged’ Sporting Times 22 Mar. 1/3: ’Twas his hobby, now and then, to lay points of nine or ten / When a gee-gee was apparently a snip.
1898		Binstead & Wells Pink ’Un and Pelican 225: There were some dead snips at Manchester that week, and most of the scribblers brought money home with them.
1908		G.R. Bacchus Pleasure Bound ‘Afloat’ (1969) 138: I may tell you, gentle, and otherwise readers, that a salt-water douche is a dead snip preventative.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘The Cost Of Living’ Sporting Times 25 June 1/3: He backed paddock snips occasionally, tipped by other Jays, / But he found that backing stiff ’uns was the very worst of ways / To net oof.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 170: He has some bloody horse up his sleeve for the Gold cup. A dead snip.
1935		G. Blake Shipbuilders (1954) 24: The accumulator was a dead snip.
1958		Willans & Searle Complete Molesworth (1985) 273: Do not miss this unique ocasion. A snip!!!!!
1971		Wodehouse Much Obliged, Jeeves 90: He said it would make my victory in the election certain. It would, as he phrased it, ‘be a snip’.

4. (Aus.) as snips, a lengthy bill of accounts.

1895

Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 77: Snips, a long bill of accounts.

5. (Aus.) as snips, a lawyer.

1895

Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 77: Snips, [...] an attorney.

6. anything simple, an easy task; thus as adj., easy.

1921		N&Q 12 Ser. IX 503: Snip. Easy.
1936		J. Curtis Gilt Kid 153–4: This won’t be a tumble. It seems as if it should be a snip.
1971		Wodehouse Much Obliged, Jeeves 33: Holding the strong Conservative views he does, it ought to be a snip to get him to vote for Ginger.

7. a bargain.

1923–4		F. Anthony ‘Wood-Splitting with Gus’ in Me And Gus (1977) 21: It didn’t seem such a wonderful snip to me, after I had worked it out on paper.
1936		M. Harrison All the Trees were Green 172: It’s a snip!
1958		Willans & Searle Complete Molesworth (1985) 306: Snip! Snip! Snip!!!!!!!!!!!!!! At speshul sacrifice!!! HEADMASTER FOR SALE.
1970		Sun. Times 4 Jan. 27: Every property man you talk to says that London County Freehold was a snip.
1981		J. Sullivan ‘A Slow Bus to Chingford’ Only Fools and Horses [TV script] That’s a snip that is at a fiver a go.
1998		P. McCabe Breakfast on Pluto 36: A belted sweater in yummy plum to match your crushed velvet hot pants could be purchased for a snip.
2000		Guardian Rev. 18 Mar. 12: Tickets should be a snip.
2012		D. O’Donnell Locked Ward (2013) 218: There’s a very nice detached villa [...] going for a song. A snip.

8. (Aus.) a loan.

1927

Western Mail (Perth) 3 June 6/2: Your father is awfully bucked about that snip of money.

9. (US) used as a term of affection.

1931

Hammett Glass Key 459: He did not take her hand. He slapped the back of it lightly, said ‘’Lo, snip,’ and sat on the foot of her bed.

10. a swindle, a deception.

1937		R. Westerby Wide Boys Never Work (1938) 74: He was a wide man, with an eye for a snip and a mug to take it that amounted almost to genius.
1953		K. Tennant Joyful Condemned 45: [of illegal two-up gambling] He was long past the stage when he did more than own a share in any snip that might be going.

11. (Aus.) a bite.

1968

J. Alard He who Shoots Last 126: Wot’s da matter Ragged. Da 2GB’s* givin’ ya a snip? (*2GB’s Sydney radio station slang for fleas).

12. an insignificant person.

1967–8		C. Bukowski Notes of a Dirty Old Man (1973) 39: What a sickening little snip.
1957		(con. WWII) ‘Weldon Hill’ Onionhead (1958) 29: ‘Little snips [...] trying to make somebody think they are better at home’.