<P> By the mid-18th century, the phrase "on tenterhooks" came to mean being in a state of tension, uneasiness, anxiety, or suspense, i.e. figuratively stretched like the cloth on the tenter . </P> <P> John Ford's 1633 play Broken Heart contains the lines: "There is no faith in woman . Passion, O, be contain'd! My very heart - strings Are on the tenters ." </P> <P> In 1690 the periodical The General History of Europe used the term in the modern sense: "The mischief is, they will not meet again these two years, so that all business must hang upon the tenterhooks till then ." </P> <P> In 1826, English periodical Monthly magazine or British register of literature, sciences, and the belles - lettres contained the line "I hope (though the wish is a cruel one) that my fair readers, if any such readers have deigned to follow me thus far, are on tenterhooks to know to whom the prize was adjudged ." In a letter to his wife the same year, American educator Francis Wayland (waiting for his promised appointment as President of Brown University) wrote "I was never so much on tenter hooks before ." </P>

Where does the saying on tenterhooks come from