beat into fits
English
[edit]Verb
[edit]beat into fits (third-person singular simple present beats into fits, present participle beating into fits, simple past beat into fits, past participle beaten into fits)
- (transitive, slang) To surpass or defeat utterly.
- 1845, Sporting Magazine, volume 5, page 378:
- I do not mean to say Sir Hercules could in a walk carry as much flour as a miller's horse; but he would beat him into fits, and bring him to a stand still, with 17st. on each of their backs in a gallop […]
- 1886, Elizabeth Lynn Linton, Paston Carew, Millionaire and Miser, page 175:
- We shall be beaten into fits, for the child plays like an angel, as she does everything, and I am only a clumsy little imp, as you know.
References
[edit]- John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary