Dictionary

neat-handed en · ADJ

Etymology

From neat + handed.

Meanings

1. Dextrous; having the skill and discipline to do precision work neatly.
   • Hard by a cottage chimney smokes, From betwixt two aged oaks, Where Corydon and Thyrsis met, Are at their savory dinner set Of herbs and other country messes, Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses; 1752, Christopher Smart, “L’Allegro”, in Poems on Several Occasions, London: for the author, page 186:
   • Lastly, you must learn to be diligent to perform whatsoever your Mistress commands you, to be neat in your habit, modest in your carriage, silent when she is angry, willing to please, quick and neat handed about what you have to do. 1677, Hannah Woolley, The Compleat Servant-Maid, London: T. Passinger, page 63:
   • c. 1928, Rudyard Kipling, article published in The Morning Post, in Andrew Lycett (ed.), Kipling Abroad: Traffics and Discoveries from Burma to Brazil, London: I.B. Tauris, 2010, p. 221, For one thing, they were racially neat-handed, as those are who deal in strong sunlight with wood, fibres, cane and rattan; and their fight against fever in the past had most practically taught them tidiness.
   • […] if I bid you do what you thought wrong, there would be no light-footed running, no neat-handed alacrity, no lively glance and animated complexion. 1847, Charlotte Brontë, chapter 20, in Jane Eyre:

Forms

Deriveds

neat-handedly · neat-handedness