a varnish for wood consisting of shellac dissolved in alcohol
the gloss finish produced by repeated applications of this polish
First recorded in 1810–20
First recorded in 1830–40
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Dr. Walter Damrosch started the idea, after running a wartime school in which U. S. bandmasters took a high French polish.
From Time Magazine Archive
That fellow, with all his smoothness and French polish, may turn out, now he is thwarted, a perfect demon.
From One Maid's Mischief by Fenn, George Manville
French polish can be tinted a light-red with alkanet-root, and a dark-red with dragon's blood.
From French Polishing and Enamelling A Practical Work of Instruction by Bitmead, Richard
Another good black polish is obtained by gas-black being applied to the rubber after wetting with French polish, the cover being then put on and worked in the usual manner.
From French Polishing and Enamelling A Practical Work of Instruction by Bitmead, Richard
The young, patient, retreating wife was changed at once into an irritated lioness, and, amid the refinements of the French polish, with all its gilded accompaniments, uprose the glowing, impassioned, threatening creole.
From Empress Josephine An historical sketch of the days of Napoleon by Mühlbach, L. (Luise)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
