cro'jack-eyed

[Jonathan Lighter]

OED defines "cross-jack-eyed" (s.v. "cross-jack") as nautical slang for "cross-eyed."  Oddly, though, it does not offer a citation for what, I feel sure, is a long obsolete term.  Well, here's one:

  1828 [W. S. Witham?]The Night Watch; or, Tales of the Sea  (London: Henry Colburn) II 89: Besides being crosjack [sic]-eyed, he was nicknamed Eighteenpence, from one eye being as large again as the other.

  JL




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