Crossword clues for on the sly
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Sly \Sly\, a. [Compar. Slieror Slyer; superl. Sliest or Slyest.] [OE. sli, slegh, sleih, Icel. sl?gr, for sl?gr; akin to Sw. slug, Dan. slu, LG. slou, G. schlau; probably to E. slay, v.t.; cf. G. verschlagen sly. See Slay, v. t., and cf. Sleight.]
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Dexterous in performing an action, so as to escape notice; nimble; skillful; cautious; shrewd; knowing; -- in a good sense.
Be ye sly as serpents, and simple as doves.
--Wyclif (Matt. x. 16).Whom graver age And long experience hath made wise and sly.
--Fairfax. -
Artfully cunning; secretly mischievous; wily.
For my sly wiles and subtle craftiness, The litle of the kingdom I possess.
--Spenser. -
Done with, and marked by, artful and dexterous secrecy; subtle; as, a sly trick.
Envy works in a sly and imperceptible manner.
--I. Watts. -
Light or delicate; slight; thin. [Obs.]
By the sly, or On the sly, in a sly or secret manner. [Colloq.] ``Gazed on Hetty's charms by the sly.''
--G. Eliot.Sly goose (Zo["o]l.), the common sheldrake; -- so named from its craftiness.
Syn: Cunning; crafty; subtile; wily. See Cunning.
Wiktionary
adv. (context idiomatic English) slyly, in an inconspicuous manner, so as not to be seen; secretly; stealthily.
WordNet
adv. in a furtive manner; "the soldiers were furtively crawling through the night" [syn: furtively]
Usage examples of "on the sly".
Unfortunately for Flanders, Tyger was way more certain it had to be him pulling jobs on the sly and making an outlaw laying low more famous than he'd ever mean to be.
Next day being the last representation of a celebrated piece at the theatre of the County Town, by a first-rate London company, papa expressed a wish that we should all go in the evening, but Annie and Sophie, giving me a knowing look on the sly, declared they had already seen it once and did not care to go again.
She handed us a loaf of bread on the sly and immediately shut the door.
Watt, the head groundsman, who makes a fortune every year, stealing from the Mansion, selling jobs, and filling up the Center Market with all the truck he grows on the sly in the park.
Bettie Duvall crossed to the vestibule, where David stood, shivering slightly despite a heavy, brand-new, only slightly adapted Union army overcoat, bought on the sly at half price from an army quartermaster.
She'd been brave and brash asking the doctor please not to sedate her, please no thanks but maybe with her anxious husband's complicity he'd dosed her anyway on the sly?