> as lemmas

1929 P. Sturges Strictly Dishonorable ii. 123 Isabelle. Willie's got the jitters—. Judge. Jitters? Isabelle. You know, he makes faces all the time.

1930 N.Y. Press 2 Apr. 6/4 The game is played only after the mugs and wenches have taken on too much gin and they arrive at the state of jitters, a disease known among the common herd as heebie jeebies.

1931 Charlottesville (Va.) Progress 23 Mar. 12/8 Swift moving elevators and roller coasters also give her the jitters.

1931 Harper's Mag. Mar. 420/2 How much of a price did we pay next day for a not very good party? How many kinds of hangovers are there? How much do you have to drink to get ‘jitters’? I know my hostess called me up to say she had the jitters and her husband an awful hangover.

1932 E. Wilson (title) The American jitters.

1933 Passing Show 15 July 14/1 Oh Heck, tell some photographer I can't be photographed. The very sight of a camera nowadays gives me the jitters.

1934 Redbook Mag. June 38/2 You begin to have the ‘jitters’. Your placid disposition has given way to irritability, sarcasm and dissatisfaction.

1936 ‘P. Quentin’ Puzzle for Fools vi. 44 My old jitters had returned and I had started to shake.

1937 Daily Herald 12 Jan. 15/5 All this chatter about rough play has been to give players..the jitters.

1939 F. M. Ford Let. 23 May (1965) 324 All the publishers here have the jitters so badly that they won't look at anything new at all.

1945 Univ. of Colorado Stud. Ser. B. II. iv. 42 The cures of General Semantics are not limited, fortunately, to those suffering from platform jitters.

1957 Economist 7 Sept. 759/1 The recession jitters now afflicting significant numbers of economists..seem to be better founded on economic evidence than did the others.

1971 B. W. Aldiss Soldier Erect 229 The signal came, the machine-gun fire stopped... Geordie was next to me, not showing a sign of his earlier jitters.