half-seas-over

And she looked back at them with a benevolent compassion because they were obviously not half-seas-over with happiness.

Maid in Waiting 2004

When they understood he was safely housed at the George, they rode up to the door in a body, and expressed their satisfaction in three cheers; which were returned by the company within, as soon as they were instructed in the nature of the salute by Trunnion, who, by this time, had entered into all the jollity of his new friends, and was indeed more than half-seas-over.

The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle 2004

'T wa'n't none o 'yer sober perfumes nuther, but kind o' half-seas-over all the time, an 'pooty consid'able in the wind.

The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 Various

A pleasant young fellow, about half-seas-over, passing through the Strand at a late hour, was accosted by a watchman, who began with all the insolence of office to file a string of interrogatories, in the hope of being handsomly paid for his trouble.

The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 19, No. 530, January 21, 1832 Various

Always sort of half-seas-over, if you see what I mean.

Death of a Harbormaster Simenon, Georges 1942

She left at two in the morning, having cut her moorings, and it was none of her crew's pleasure that the engines should strike up a thundering half-seas-over chanty that echoed among the hills.

The Day's Work - Volume 1 Rudyard Kipling 1900

They can be all half-seas-over when they get ashore, blind drunk by dark, and cruising out of the Golden Gate in different deep-sea ships by the next morning.

The Wrecker 1898

He was half-seas-over now: not foundered -- he'd ever a cautious hand with a bottle -- but well smothered.

Harbor Tales Down North With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. Norman Duncan 1893

When they came up to Mr Rush he was found to be more than half-seas-over, and commenced grinding out odds and ends of profanity about the shabby trick that had been played on the port watch on the occasion when the captain's grog was purloined and some people had to be sent to bed.

The Shellback's Progress In the Nineteenth Century Walter Runciman 1892

Booth had been drunk when he chased a super from the stage; Webster made his best speeches when he was half-seas-over -- was making them at that very moment.

Kennedy Square Francis Hopkinson Smith 1876