1861. Whyte Melville, Good for Nothing, ch. xxvii. I worked on my own hook, after that, and I rather think I paid my expenses.
1869. Greenwood, Seven Curses of London, p. 409. To steal on your own hook as a bookmaker.
1889. Answers, p. 52, c. 3. Finally Edison went to work on his own hook.
1893. Emerson, Signor Lippo, ch. viii. We used to have to part company and go in twos and threes then on our own hook. [[343]]
By hook or by crook, phr. (colloquial).—By some means or other; by fair means or foul; at all hazards. [Probably of forestal origin.]
d. 1298. Thomas the Rhymer, On Parliaments. Their work was by hook or crook to rap and bring all under the emperor’s power.
1525. Bodmin Register. Dynmure Wood was ever open and common to the … inhabitants of Bodmin … to bear away upon their backs a burden of lop, crop, hook, crook, and bag wood.
d. 1529. Skelton, Collyn Cloute. Nor wyll suffer this boke By hooke ne by crooke Prynted for to be.
1550. Bacon, Fortress of the Faithful. Whatsoever is pleasant or profitable must be theirs by hook or by crook.
1557. Tusser, Good Husbandrie, 30 Mar. Watch therefore in Lent, to thy sheepe go and look, For dogs will have vittels by hooke and by crooke.