1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1889. Gentleman’s Mag., June, p. 593. Friday-face is a term still occasionally applied to a sour-visaged person; it was formerly in very common use.
Friday-faced, adj. (old).—Mortified; melancholy; ‘sour-featured’ (Scott).
1592. John Day, Blind Beggar, Act iii., Sc. 2, p. 57. Can. No, you Friday-fac’d frying-pan, it was to save us all from whipping or a worse shame.
1606. Wily Beguiled (Hawkins Eng. Dr., iii., 356). Marry, out upon him! What a Friday-fac’d slave it is! I think in my conscience his face never keeps holiday.
Friend (or Little Friend), subs.—The menstrual flux or domestic afflictions (q.v.), whose appearance is sometimes announced by the formula ‘My little friend has come.’ Conventionalisms are queer; poorly; changes (Irish); ‘the Captain’s at home’ (Grose). See Flag.
To go and see a sick friend, verb. phr. (venery).—To go on the loose. See Greens.
Friend Charles. See Charles his friend.
Friendly Lead, subs. phr. (thieves’).—An entertainment (as a sing-song) got up to assist a companion in trouble (q.v.), or to raise money for the wife and children of a ‘quodded pal.’
1871. Daily Telegraph, 4 Dec. This was the secret business, the tremendous conspiracy, to compass which it was deemed necessary to act with infinitely more caution than the friends of Bill Sikes feel called on to exercise when they distribute tickets for a friendly lead for the benefit of Bill, who is ‘just out of his trouble.’