crack hardy

present singular third person cracks hardy · participle present cracking hardy · participle past cracked hardy · past cracked hardy

1. AustraliaNew ZealandidiomaticslangTo keep a brave face, to suppress one's feelings, to grin and bear it.

   Daley's got a big family to keep, the old man said. And he's got his interest to pay. So he cracks hearty.

   1949, Frank Sargeson, I Saw in My Dream, page 169

   4 more examples

   He smiled gratefully to her for 'cracking hardy', pretending she was not tired when her back ached and her head swayed giddily on the long days, driving, and gazing through dust and blinding sunshine, over the ever-widening ever-distancing plains.

   1929, Katharine Susannah Prichard, Coonardo, page 139

   In diagnosis, he had to discriminate, besides the disease, the human element; to spot the man who was only "fed up," the man seriously ill but "cracking hardy," and the man nearing his limit but not quite there within the stern purpose of Gallipoli.

   1930, Arthur Graham Butler, The Australian Army Medical Services in the War of 1914-1918, Volume 1, page 364

   Two days earlier the Minister of Finance had cracked hardy and had said, "Do not criticise my tax. You will not get away with it."

   1972, New Zealand, Parliament, “Address in Reply”, in Parliamentary Debates, House of Representatives, volume 378, page 119

   "We can't bear what you're going through," I said. "We can't bear to lose you. We want to look after you. You're so dear to us. But you crack hardy. You hold us away. We can't get to you. You fight us off. And you make us feel silly for getting upset."

   2008, Helen Garner, The Spare Room, A Novel, page 126