1604. Shakspeare, Winter’s Tale, i., 2. My wife’s a hobby-horse; deserves a name As rank as any flax-wench. [[18]]
Flea. To send away with a flea in the ear. verb. phr. (common).—To dismiss with vigour and acerbity.
1854. Notes and Queries, 8 Apl., p. 322, col. 2. The luckless applicant is peremptorily dismissed with an imperative ‘flee!’ … or, facetiously, with a flee in his ear.
To have a flea in the ear = (1) to fail in an enterprise; and (2) to receive a scolding, or annoying suggestion.
To sit on a bag of fleas, verb. phr. (common).—To sit uncomfortably; on a bag of hen fleas = very uncomfortably indeed.
To catch fleas for, verb. phr. (venery).—To be on terms of extreme intimacy: e.g., ‘I catch her fleas for her’ = She has nothing to refuse me. Cf., Shakspeare (Tempest, III., 2.), ‘Yet a tailor might scratch her wheree’er she did itch.’
In a flea’s leap, adv. phr. (old).—In next to no time; instanter (q.v.).
Flea-and-louse, subs. (rhyming slang). A house. For synonyms, see Ken.
Flea-bag, subs. (common).—A bed; Fr. un pucier. For synonyms, see Kip.
1839. Lever, Harry Lorrequer, ch. xl. ‘Troth, and I think the gentleman would be better if he went off to his flea-bag himself.’