1898. Sat. Rev., 19 Nov., 657, 1. Whilst rival nations have been taking 'pot-*luck' and helping themselves freely to whatever happened to be going.
1899. Whiteing, John St., xxv. He leaves the meeting, and accepts an invitation to pot-luck for the remainder of the revel from one of the Bacchanalian floors.
Pot-of-wine, subs. phr. (old).—A
bribe. Fr. pot-de-vin.
Pot-shot. See Pot, subs. and
verb. 1.
Pottage. See Breath and Piss;
besides which there are proverbial
sayings:—'With cost one may
make pottage of a joint-stool';
'Scald not your lips in another
man's pottage'; 'Like a chip
in a pottage-pot, neither good
nor harm.'
Potted-fug, subs. phr. (Rugby).—Potted
meat.
Potter, verb. (colloquial).—1. To
walk aimlessly and listlessly; (2)
to make a pretence of work; and
(3) to dawdle: usually with about.
Hence as subs. = a saunter, a
slow pace: also potterer.
1854. Martin and Aytoun, Bon Gualtier Ballads, 'The Lay of the Lover's Friend.' He waxes strong upon his pangs, And potters o'er his grog.
1857. T. Hughes, Tom Brown's Schooldays, 1. 2. Past the old church and down the footpath, pottered the old man and the child, hand-in-hand.
1859. George Eliot, Adam Bede, xvii. His servants stayed with him till they were so old and pottering he had to hire other folk to do their work.
1868. Collins, Moonstone, 1. xxiii. I . . . was pottering about the grounds, when I heard my name called.
1870. Bell's Life, 29 July. It was a day of pottering about—no run worthy of the name, and no kill.
1878-80. McCarthy, Hist. Own Times, xvii. Lord John Russell's Government pottered with the difficulty rather than encountered it.
1884. H. James, Jr., Little Tour, 252. I . . . pottered about Beaune rather rather vaguely for the rest of my hour.
1886. Field, 27 Feb. The run . . . degenerated into a potter.
1898. Boldrewood, Robbery Under Arms, v. You haven't got to do with the old-fashioned mounted police as was pottering about.
Pottery, subs, (common).—Poetry.
Pot-walloper (-wabbler, -walloner,
or -waller), subs. phr.
(political: was obsolete).—1. See
quots. [The qualification was
abolished by the Reform Bill of
1832.] Hence pot-walloping,
and also subs. and adj.—Grose
(1785).
1724-7. De Foe, Tour thro' Great Britain, 11, 18. The election of members here [Taunton] is by those whom they call pot-walloners—that is to say, every inhabitant, whether housekeeper or lodger, who dresses his own victuals; to make out which, several inmates or lodgers will, some little time before the election, bring out their pots, and make fires in the street, and boil victuals in the sight of their neighbours, that their votes may not be called in question.
1787. Grose, Prov. Glossary, s.v. "Walling." Walling, i.e., boiling . . . Perhaps the same as wallopping; whence in some boroughs, persons who boil a pot there are called pot-walloppers, and entitled to vote for representatives in Parliament.
1807. Southey, Letters, iv. 39. A pot-walloping borough like Taunton.
1857. Trollope, Three Clerks, xxix. "I am once more a constituent part of the legislative wisdom of the United Kingdom, thanks to the patriotic discretion of the pot-wallopers, burgage-tenants, and ten-pound freeholders of these loyal towns."
2. (common).—A scullion; a kitchen-maid; and (nautical) a cook, esp. on board a whaler: also pot-wrestler.
