here's the very devil to pay
Preserved but no longer current.
Meaning · English
Here's a pretty kettle of fish. I'm in a pretty mess; this is confusion worse confounded. Cp. THE DEVIL TO PAY below.
Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)
Sources & notes
Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.
Common questions
What does “here's the very devil to pay” mean?
Here's a pretty kettle of fish. I'm in a pretty mess; this is confusion worse confounded. Cp. THE DEVIL TO PAY below.
Is “here's the very devil to pay” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.