English

Verb

play up Old Gooseberry ‎(third-person singular simple present plays up Old Gooseberry, present participle playing up Old Gooseberry, simple past and past participle played up Old Gooseberry)

1. Alternative form of play Old Gooseberry
   • 1819 March 1, Moore, Thomas, Tom Crib's Memorial to Congress, page 22:

     Sandy's the boy, if once to it they fall, / That will play up old gooseberry soon with them all.

References

• Grose, Francis (1788) A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, 2nd edition, London: S. Hooper
• Farmer, John Stephen (1893) Slang and Its Analogues, volume 3, page 183
• Eric Partridge, The Routledge Dictionary of Historical Slang. Routledge, 1973. ISBN 9780710077615.