Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. drunk.

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Half Seas over, almost Drunk.
1700		M. Pix Beau Defeated IV ii: Ay fackins, had Master and I been at e’re Gentleman’s house [...] by this time we had been half Seas-over, Udsnigs.
1714		Spectator 5 Nov. n.p.: Our friend the alderman was half-seas over before the bonfire was out.
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1738		Swift Polite Conversation 9: O faith, Colonel, you must own you had a Drop in your Eye: when I left you, you were half Seas over.
1749		Smollett (trans.) Adventures of Gil Blas I 119: We drank hard, and went home in a state of elevation – that is, half seas over.
1751		Smollett Peregrine Pickle (1964) 196: Pickle [...] was escorted to his own lodgings, more than half seas over.
1762		Bridges Homer Travestie (1764) II 161: They eat a deal, and drank much more, / But stopp’d when they were half seas o’er.
1770		Gent.’s Mag. 559: To express the condition of an Honest Fellow, and no Flincher, under the Effects of good Fellowship, it is said that he is [...] Half seas over.
1780		A Treatise upon Publicans 13: When they are half seas over, as the saying is.
1793		Sporting Mag. Feb. I 256/1: [He] has passed the bottle pretty freely, and had got nearly half seas over.
1803		‘A Pembrochian’ Gradus ad Cantabrigiam 20: One would not suppose that they would be current among the Members of a learned University, except when the parties were half seas over.
1806–7		J. Beresford Miseries of Human Life (1826) 249: Not ‘half,’ (we discover), / But wholly ‘seas over’.
1815		T.L. Peacock Headlong Hall (1816) 210: All were drunk! [...] a few gentlemen not above half-seas-over.
1829		J.B. Buckstone Billy Taylor I i: The public-houses will not close till morn [...] we can all get nicely half seas over.
1838		T. Haliburton Clockmaker II 161: The whole on us were more than half-seas over; for my part the hot mulled wine actilly made me feel like a prince.
1838		Crim.-Con. Gaz. 15 Dec. 131/3: ‘You are drunk now.’ ‘No, your honour, only half seas over. I can see a hole through a grating’.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 19 Mar. n.p.: They kept up [...] pouring spirits down, at every tavern [so they] were rather flabberdegasted, hot, how-came-you-so, cornered, three-sheets-in-the-wind, half-seas-over.
1842		J. Labern ‘Christmas Capers’ Comic Songs 27: And being half Seas Over / They go Swimming Home to Bed.
1843		Bellew Memoirs of a Griffin II 143: The doctor, half-seas-over, was now completely in his element.
1850		Bell’s Life in Sydney 22 June 2/7: A nautical gentleman considerably more than half seas over.
1854		J.A. Hazen Five Years before the Mast 247: Some of the men, finding themselves, as yet, only ‘half seas over,’ inquired for liquor at the bar.
1854		Delhi Sketch Bk 1 Apr. 39/2: When being half seas over from my hand the trinkets fell.
1865		M. MacFie Vancouver Island and British Columbia 420: Neither shalt thou destroy thyself by getting [...] ‘high,’ nor ‘corned,’ nor ‘half-seas over,’ nor ‘three sheets in the wind’.
1873		W.H. Thomes Slaver’s Adventures 18: Captain Murphy came on board about eleven o’clock, as I thought, about half seas over; or, in other words, he had been paying close attention to his grog rations.
1885		A. Griffiths Fast and Loose III 82: It was a friend of his, who was half-seas over.
1889		Dead Bird (Sydney) 12 Oct. 4/4: ‘My father’s only son often gets doggy when he’s half seas over’.
1899		Boy’s Own Paper 15 Apr. 451: You knows I was never ’alf-seas over in my life since you knowed me.
1900		E.W. Rogers [perf. Marie Lloyd] The Red and The White and The Blue 🎵 And when he gets half seas over, he wont talk of anything / But the Red and the White and the Blue.
1907		W.M. Raine Bucky O’Connor (1910) 43: The bully, half seas over, leaned forward and gripped his knife.
1913		Truth (Sydney) 3 Aug. 12/4: Most of them was half seas over — / All were reckless, wild, and rude.
1917		B.E.F. Times 25 Dec. (2006) 256/2: Some half-remembered scene / From a show / That one went to half-seas-over.
1924		S. Scott Human Side of Crook and Convict Life 105: Billy was ‘half-seas-over,’ and not in his best form.
1931		W.N. Burns One-Way Ride 66: When half seas over he delighted in entertaining saloon crowds by recitations.
1944		P. Kendall Dict. Service Sl. n.p.: He might have been a little [...] half-seas-over [...] but he certainly wasn’t drunk.
1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 70: Are you feeling a bit half seas over shipmate?

2. thus intensely emotional, whether with joy, love etc.

1821		Egan Life in London (1869) 56: They dance till limbs no more can move, / Then, half-seas over, talk of love.
1825		‘The Ladies’ Universal Songster I 24: Half-seas over in love.