by-and-by, noun
- Forms:
- Show more Also bai-nbai, bay and bay, by-and-bye.
- Origin:
- EnglishShow more From mbayimbayi (adaptation of English by and by, see quotation 1913), in the Nguni languages ‘cannon’, ‘field gun’, with spelling remodelled to the English root.
obs. except in historical contexts
Among some Nguni peoples: a field gun, or its shell.
1857 J. Shooter Kafirs of Natal 112They have had experience of warfare with Europeans, and retain a lively recollection of the guns and horses of the boers...They believe that the fearful by-and-bye eats up everything — grass, stones, rocks — and why not ama-doda?
1994 M. Roberts tr. of J.A. Wahlberg’s Trav. Jrnls 1838–56 44The Kaffers call a cannon ‘bay and bay’; the name is said to be derived from the English expression ‘by and by’, and the story is that once during a commando the Kaffers came quite near to the English troops, at which the officers, shewing the canon, used this expression by way of saying that they would soon make them clear off.
a field gun, or its shell.
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