Definition of "frolic"

The frolick wind that breathes the Spring,Zephyr with Aurora playing,As he met her once a MayingThere on Beds of Violets blew,

1645, John Milton, “L’Allegro”, in Poems‎, London: Humphrey Moseley, page 31

For women, born to be controul’d,Stoop to the forward and the bold,Affect the haughty and the proud,The gay, the frollick, and the loud.

1682, Edmund Waller, “Of Love”, in Poems, &c. written upon several occasions, and to several persons‎, 5th edition, London: H. Herringman, published 1686, page 73

You meet him at the tables and conversations of the wise, the impertinent, the grave, the frolic, and the witty; [...]

1766, Joseph Addison, The Spectator - Volume 5 - Page 304

Beale, under this frolic menace, took nothing back at all; he was indeed apparently on the point of repeating his extravagence, but Miss Overmore instructed her little charge that she was not to listen to his bad jokes [...].

1897, Henry James, What Maisie Knew

the annual jubilee […] filled the souls of old and young with visions of splendour, frolic and fun.

1876, Louisa May Alcott, “The King of Clubs and the Queen of Hearts”, in Hallberger's Illustrated Magazine: 1876

By the old-fashioned magnificence of this procession, it might worthily have included his Holiness in person, with a suite of attendant Cardinals, if those sacred dignitaries would kindly have lent their aid to heighten the frolic of the Carnival.

2012 (original 1860), Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Marble Faun - Page 276

He would be at his frolic once again.

1680, James Dillon, 3rd Earl of Roscommon, Art of Poetry

He came clattering up to the school door with an invitation to Ichabod to attend a merry-making or “quilting frolic,” to be held that evening at Mynheer Van Tassel’s

1820, Washington Irving, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow