1861. Macmillan’s Magazine, p. 211. I was in a real blue funk.
1861. Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxvi. I was in a real blue funk and no mistake.
1870. London Figaro, 19 Oct. After the Fire. He was in a mortal funk, no doubt.
1871. Maxwell, in Life (1882), xvi., 382. Certainly χλωρὸν θéος is the Homeric for a blue funk.
1888. Cassell’s Saturday Journal, 29 Dec., p. 305. You’re always in a funk about nothing at all.
3. (schoolboys’).—A coward.
1882. F. Anstey, Vice Versâ, ch. v. Bosher said, ‘Let’s cut it,’ and he and Peebles bolted. (They were neither of them funks, of course, but they lost their heads.)
Verb. (common).—1. To smoke out. See Funk the cobbler. [[88]]
1720. Durfey, Wit and Mirth, vi., 303. With a sober dose Of coffee funks his nose.
1578. Grose, Vulg. Tongue. funk, to smoke, figuratively to smoke or stink through fear.