minute-jack

English

Noun

minute-jack (plural minute-jacks)

1. A figure which strikes the hour on the bell of some fanciful clocks; Jack o' the clock.
2. (obsolete) A timeserver; an inconstant person.
   • c. 1605–1608, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene vi]:

     Cap-and-knee slaves, vapours, and minute-jacks!

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 The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.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 “minute-jack”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)