plain dealer

plural plain dealers

1. Someone who interacts or does business straightforwardly and honestly.First known use 16th c.

   ‘If plain speakers are scarce in this part of the world, I fancy that plain dealers are still scarcer.’

   1840 April – 1841 November, Charles Dickens, “(please specify the chapter number or name)”, in The Old Curiosity Shop. A Tale. […], London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1841, →OCLC

   2 more examples

   Ant. Why thou didst conclude hairy men plain dealers without wit. S. Dro. The plainer dealer, the sooner lost; yet he looseth it in a kind of iollitie.

   c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]

   She as often acted the Plain-Dealer with him, and fairly told him [...] that, in Truth, she had nothign but a very Small Spot to which she had any Hereditary Right [...].

   1723, Charles Walker, Memoirs of Sally Salisbury, section VI