by-wipe

English

Noun

by-wipe (plural by-wipes)

1. A secret or side stroke, as of raillery or sarcasm.
   • 1641, [John Milton], Animadversions upon the Remonstrants Defence against Smectymnuus, London: […] [Richard Oulton and Gregory Dexter] for Thomas Vnderhill, […], →OCLC, page 5:

     [W]herefore that conceit of Legion with a by-wipe? was it becauſe you would have men take notice how you eſteeme them, whom through all your booke ſo bountifully you call your brethren?

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “by-wipe”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)