quisby

English edit

Uncertain; perhaps quiz +‎ -by, or from queer or Queer Street (“difficult circumstances”).

quisby (plural quisbies)

quisby (comparative more quisby, superlative most quisby)

(UK, slang, archaic) Mean; destitute; strange. [from 19th c.]
(UK, slang, archaic) In difficult circumstances; in trouble.
- 1874, Arthur Sketchley, Mrs. Brown and Disraeli, page 151:
  [S]he told me as things was a-goin' werry quisby with 'em Wilkses. I says, "I'm sorry for 'er, but he's a party I don't 'old with, as in my opinion deserves to want, only but for others as would want with 'im."
  She says, "He's been and got 'isself in a 'ole with them books as he've been lewanted with, and will get two years over it, they say," and so he did, […]
(UK, slang, archaic) Drunk; tipsy.
- 1889, Belgravia, volume 70, page 15:
  " […] Did you know that my husband came home intoxicated?"
  Mrs. Brown laughed.
  "Oh, not so bad as that, surely! Only a little 'screwed.' George was 'quisby,' too. But then its Christmas, you know."