"Bob's your uncle"

[Gerald Cohen]

    Maybe "Bob's your uncle" came into being due to two different
Uncle Bobs, one being a fictional character in an 1887 novel and the
other being the already recognized Robert Cecil, who appointed his
nephew Alfred Balfour to be chief secretary of Ireland in 1888.

     A few weeks ago Barry Popik drew attention to a British novel
_Uncle Bob's Niece_, (in 3 vols.) by Leslie Keith (London: Ward and
Downey),1888.

    I've skimmed through a microfilm copy of this novel, which seems
to center around a young woman named Tilly, whose Uncle Bob looks
after her like a loving parent would. And it seems he takes very good
care of her. For example, vol. 2, p.232:
        '"Look here," he said; "you never come to me for any money now."
        "Because you supplied me so liberally. See," she drew out a
little open-work purse from her pocket and showed him the glitter of
gold between the meshes.'

      Clearly, every young person would do well to have a guardian
angel like Uncle Bob. We now see two developments occurring within
about a year:
1) 1887 -- Balfour was appointed as chief secretary of Ireland by his
uncle, Prime Minister Robert Cecil, in a move which stunned political
circles and seemed to be a clear case of nepotism.
2) 1888 -- The novel _Uncle Bob's Niece_ was published. Surely the
British who read this novel and also followed politics must have made
the connection between the novel's Uncle Bob and Alfred Balfour's
Uncle Bob. In either case, if you're a young person and Bob's your
uncle, you're in good shape.

     BTW, it's true, as Fred Shapiro points out, that the first
attestation of "Bob's your uncle" is in Eric Partridge's 1937
dictionary. But that may possibly be due to "Bob's your uncle" being
an offhand, very slang remark. Slang items can sometimes go for a
long time without making their way into print. Meanwhile, of course,
the search for early attestations should continue.

---Gerald Cohen