money after bad; of one who gives certa pro incertis. The allusion is to the well-known fable.
"Illudit species, ac den′tibus aëra mordit."
(Down sank the meat in the stream for the fishes to hoard it.)
Love me love my dog. "Qui m’aime aime mon chien," or "Qui aime Bertrand aime son chien."
Old dogs will not learn new tricks. People in old age do not readily conform to new ways.
To call off the dogs. To break up a disagreeable conversation. In the chase, if the dogs are on the wrong track, the huntsman calls them off. (French, rompre les chiens.)
Throw it to the dogs. Throw it away, it is useless and worthless.
What! keep a dog and bark myself! Must I keep servants and myself do their work?
You are like Neville's dog, which runs away when it is called. (See Chien.)
(9) Dog, Dogs, in Superstitions:
Dogs howl at death. A wide-spread superstition.
"In the rabbinical book it saith
The dogs howl when, with icy breath,
Great Sammaël, the angel of death,
Takes thro' the town his flight."
Longfellow: Golden Legend, iii.
The hair of the dog that bit you. When a man has had a debauch, he is advised to take next morning "a hair of the same dog," in allusion to an ancient notion that the burnt hair of a dog is an antidote to its bite.
(10) Dog, to express the male of animals, as dog-ape, dog-fox, dog-otter.
(11) Dog, applied to inferior plants: dog-brier, dog-berry, dog-cabbage, dog-daisy, dog-fennel, dog-leek, dog-lichen, dog-mercury, dog-parsley, dog-violets (which have no perfume), dog-wheat. (See below, Dog-grass, Dog-rose.
Dog and Duck. A public-house sign, to announce that ducks were hunted by dogs within. The sport was to see the duck dive, and the dog after it. At Lambeth there was a famous pleasure-resort so called, on the spot where Bethlehem Hospital now stands.
Dog-cheap. A perversion of the old English god-chepe (a good bargain). French, bon marché (good-cheap or bargain).
"The sack . . . would have bought me lights as good-cheap at the dearest chandler's in Europe."—Shakespeare: 1 Henry IV., iii. 3.
Dog-days. Days of great heat. The Romans called the six or eight hottest weeks of the summer canicula′rēs diēs. According to their theory, the dog-star or Sirius, rising with the sun, added to its heat, and the dog-days bore the combined heat of the dog-star and the sun. (July 3rd to August 11th.)
Dog-fall (in wrestling), when both wrestlers fall together.
Dog-grass (triticum repens). Grass eaten by dogs when they have lost their appetite; it acts as an emetic and purgative.
Dog-head (in machinery). That which bites or holds the gun-flint.
Dog-headed Tribes of India. Mentioned in the Italian romance of Gueri′no Meschi′no.
Dog-Latin. Pretended or mongrel Latin. An excellent example is Stevens' definition of a kitchen:
As the law classically expresses it, a kitchen is "camera necessaria pro usus cookare; cum saucepannis, stewpannis, scullero, dressero, coalholo, stovis, smoak-jacko; pro roastandum, boilandum, fryandum, et plum-pudding-mixandum. . . ."—A Law Report (Daniel v. Dishclout).
Dog-leech (A). A dog-doctor. Formerly applied to a medical practitioner; it expresses great contempt.
Dog-rose. Botanical name, Cynorrhodos—i.e. Greek kuno-rodon, dog-rose; so called because it was supposed to cure the bite of a mad dog (Rosa Canina, wild brier).
"A morsu vero [i.e. of a mad dog] unicum remedium oraculo quodam nuper repertum, radix sylvestris rosæ, quæ cynorrhodos appellatur."—Pliny: Natural History, viii. 63; xxv. 6.
Dog-sick. Sick as a dog. We also say "Sick as a cat." The Bible speaks of dogs "returning to their vomit again" (Prov. xxvi. 11; 2 Pet. ii. 22).
Dog-sleep (A). A pretended sleep. Dogs seem to sleep with "one eye open."
Dog-star. The brightest star in the firmament. (See Dog-days.)
Dog-vane (A). A cockade.
"Dog-vane is a term familiarly applied to a cockade."—Smyth: Sailors' Word-book.
Dog-watch. A corruption of dodge-watch: two short watches, one from four to six, and the other from six to eight in the evening, introduced to dodge the routine, or prevent the same men always keeping watch at the same time. (See Watch.)
Dog-whipper (A). A beadle who whips all dogs from the precincts of a church. At one time there was a church officer so called. Even so recently as 1856 Mr. John Pickard was appointed
