Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. UK but usu. US) excellent, first rate.

1595		Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream III i: What sayst thou bully Bottom?
1608		Middleton Mad World (1640) II iv: Here, bully-Captaine.
1613		Beaumont & Fletcher Captain IV ii: Adieu, sweet bully Captain.
1678		Dryden Kind Keeper V i: How now, Bully Brainsick!
1681		J. Chetham Angler’s Vade Mecum (1689) Preface: From such bully fishers this book expects no other reception [F&H].
1686–88		‘The Invincible Pride of Women’ in Ebsworth Roxburghe Ballads (1893) VII:1 21: And when she home returns again, conducted by a bully park, / If that I in the least complain, she does my words and actions mark.
1840		Comic Almanack Nov. 242: It is a bully month, whose vapouring flies / Wherever man is found.
1853		N.Y. Clipper 24 Sept. 4/4: She has beaten the crack vessels of their club, even the ‘bully sloop’ the Una.
1866		Border Watch (Mt Gambier, SA) 31 Oct. 3/2: THE LATEST SLANG CREATION IN NEW YORK [...] His friends are ‘gay ducks,’ ‘no slouches’ ‘bullydogs’.
1867		‘Johnny Cross’ ‘Who’ll Have Me Now?’ in Orig. Pontoon Songster 19: No doctor’s bills do trouble me for bully is my health.
1870		B. Harte Luck of Roaring Camp (1873) 130: Must have been asleep, sir. Hope you had a pleasant nap. Bully place for a nice quiet snooze – empty stage, sir!
1880		H.L. Williams Darkey Sleep-Walker 8: He is in a doze – dat’s bully.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 14 Mar. 7/4: This is the bulliest man Genoa ever raised since the days of Kit Columbus.
1889		Eve, Capital Jrnl (Salem, OR) 21 Aug. 4/4: A Bully Story. A man [...] wanted to inspect more closely a three-year-old bull [etc].
1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 23 Aug. 3/1: Tag Rag. You are always a bully boy, and we appreciate your good wishes.
1895		Opelousas Courier (LA) 10 Aug.2/4: You have got the natural stuff and materials in you for the makin of a bully good farmer.
1899		A. Binstead Houndsditch Day by Day 69: It was a bully drive.
1900		T.J. Carey Hebrew Yarns and Dialect Humor 81/1: To praise you they say ‘you are bully,’ / For honest they nickname you ‘square’.
1908		D. Stewart Wild Tribes of London in Illus. Police News 11 Jan. 12/3: You’re late, my bully rum-cull’.
1910		O. Johnson Varmint 287: And Tough McCarty, what a bully chap – bully! We’re going to be friends – pals – what a bully fellow! Everything is bully – everything!
1920		Marvel 22 May 14: Oh, it was a bully little scrap. I was sorry when it was almost over.
1930		(con. 1900s–10s) Dos Passos 42nd Parallel in USA (1966) 63: I know a dump where we could get a bully breakfast.
1937		J.T. Farrell ‘Can All This Grandeur Perish’ in Fellow Countrymen 141: That’s what I call a bully idea, Mr. Gregory.
1940		O. Strange Sudden Takes the Trail 123: ‘That was bully,’ he complimented.
1954		in Randolph & Legman Ozark Folksongs and Folklore (1992) II 592: Rio, Rio, son-of-a-bitch! / World’s biggest bastard, / Bully I feel!
c.1960		in E. Cray Erotic Muse (1992) 342: Jesus Christ, how bully I feel.
1972		(con. 1916) G. Swarthout Tin Lizzie Troop (1978) 19: We thought it might be bully to have them here.
1982		S. King Different Seasons (1995) 203: The grin of a man who knew that God was in His heaven and everything was bully.
1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 23/1: bully first rate; Meade’s New Zealand, 1870, refers to a ‘bully blaze’ while English used the word only to refer to people.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].

2. (US) very popular.

1850

Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 7 Sept. n.p.: [He] swells around with the ballet girls and is ‘bully’ in all the brothels and drinking shops.