"chicken-livered" antedatings, and "turn chicken"

[victor steinbok]

Another "yellow"--and this one is not even listed for the birds! Well, not
quite... This one is actually listed in its dual capacity

yellow bellied:

1. Applied to birds or animals having yellow underparts. Also in extended
> use (in quot. 1909 of an airship).
> 2. fig. Cowardly, craven. Cf. yellow adj. 2b, yellow-belly n. 5 slang
> (orig. U.S.).
> 1924    P. Marks Plastic Age ix. 75   Yellow-bellied quiters.
> 1930    J. Dos Passos 42nd Parallel iv. 313   You know what we'd do if we
> had a man in the White House instead of a yellow-bellied potatomouthed
> reformer‥? We'd‥clean this place up.


Of course, I'm only looking at 2.

 http://goo.gl/pz5NU
The free range. By Elwell Lawrence [Francis William Sullivan]. New York:
1913
p. 256

> "There, you whelp!" bellowed Stelton. "That's a sample of what you'll get
> later on. All I ask is to see you kickin' at the end of a rope, you
> yellow-bellied traitor!" And Smithy, clutching at his throat, staggered,
> whimpering, away.



Back to "yellow-livered"


http://goo.gl/44TPX
United Service Journal and Naval and Military Magazine. London: November
1837
A Voyage on a Convict Ship. p. 352
http://goo.gl/eLJEX
The Museum of foreign literature, science, and art, Volume 34. Philadelphia:
September 1838
A Voyage on a Convict Ship. [From United Service Journal.] p. 138/2

> In a few weeks we reached Sidney, a large and populous town, in which is an
> hotel called the 'Palteney,' one that for magnificence, luxury, and comfort,
> might almost vie with its aristocratic namesake in Piccadilly. It is
> supported principally by the yellow-livered and affluent gentry of India,
> who resort thither in numbers, to cleanse the one and diffuse the other.


http://goo.gl/8760q
The Arethusa: A Naval Story. Volume 1. By Frederick Chamier. Philadelphia:
1837
p. 180

> Oliver started from him, and gathering all his energy, he screamed rather
> than said, " What do you mean, you yellow-livered scoundrel ? Speak! I say
> ; or by the devil, who is now near you, I will shake you into reason !"



http://goo.gl/2mnLl
Figaro in London. No. 173. March 28, 1835
The Interpreter. Affectionate Humbug. p. 51/2

> But mark the disgusting flattery of the courtly penny-a-liner:--'The two *lovely
> *infants, one of which is the present Earl of Munster,' --an ugly, sallow,
> yellow livered, fat fellow; with a beard like a blacking brush, and a head
> like a dumpling!


VS-)

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