Green’s Dictionary of Slang

the loss of one’s nose through syphilis; ad hoc vars. occur.

1619		J.T. Hinting of the Pox A4v: A plaine French Coulstaffe you haue got.
1639		J. Taylor Juniper Lecture 218: He got a pocky blow with a French Cowle-staffe and gave up the Ghost.
1640		R. Brathwait Ar’t Asleepe Husband? 291: [They have] unhappily got a blow on the shins with a French faggot, or fed too freely on a Neapolitan Rabbit.
1648		Mercurius Melancholicus 20 22–29 Jan. 129: Weaver ... hath got such a blowe on his nose with a Pox, that now he snivells treason with a grace.
1652		Mercurius Democritus 3 13–21 Apr. 19: A P- blow over the Nose ... with a French-cowl-staff.
1653		Mercurius Democritus 21-28 Sept. 388: The third [Justice] was Mr. Faggot-stick, a worm-eaten Wood-monger, who some said with P—y’s nose did fire his Maide.
1684		The tongue combatants 5: Some little Town Baggage, who picks your Pocket, and sends you home with a Clap of a French faggot-stick.
1664		Jordan ‘Canting Rogue’ in Collier Illustrations III 72: And if his Mort with a French Coltstaff strike, ’Tis ten to one they snuffle both alike.
1668		‘P.R.’ Whores Dialogue 7: It was her fortune to die of an outlandish Disease, which she got by a Clap of a French coultstaff.
1678		J. Ray Proverbs (2nd edn) 88: He has got a blow over the nose with a French cowlstaff.
1684		Tongue Combatants 5: Some little Town Baggage, who picks your Pocket, and sends you home with a Clap of a French faggot-stick.
1696		Motteux (trans.) Gargantua and Pantagruel (1927) II Bk V 623: May the devil’s dam suck my teat, if he does not look as if he had got a blow over the nose with a Naples cowl-staff.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: A blow with a French Faggot-Stick, when the Nose is fallen by the Pox.
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1727		M. Davys Accomplished Rake in McBurney 362: You look as if you had got a flap over the nose with a French faggot-stick.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: He suffered by a blow over the snout with a French faggot-stick; i.e. he lost his nose by the pox.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.