Green’s Dictionary of Slang

pully-hawly n.

SE in slang uses

1. a wrestling bout.

1825		Pierce Egan’s Life in London 19 June 165/2: [A] kind of Lancashire pulleyhawley kicking up and down work, and not particular as to two or three upon one.
[1842		Bell’s Penny Dispatch 8 May 2/5: A pull and haul-away struggle; Bungaree down on his latter end, and Brush on his knees].
1907		E. Dyson ‘Two Battlers and a Bear’ in Lone Hand (Sydney) July 339/1: ‘S’pose yeh have a tough pully-haul ’ere once in a while?’.

2. (Aus.) a lover.

1850

Bell’s Life in Sydney 6 Apr. 3/3: O cruel, cruel Juley Morley / Thus, thus to treat your Pully Hawley.

In phrases

have a game at pully-hawly (v.) (also play at pully-hawly) [colloq. pully-hawly, a rough and tumble, ult. the pulling and hauling of sails]

to have sexual intercourse.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Pully hawly. To have a game at pully hawly; to romp with women.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1896		Farmer Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 235: Réverbération, f. The act of kind; ‘the game of pully-hauly’.