1673. Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque (1770), 260. And every Goddess lay her Tail As bare and naked as my Nail.
1678. Cotton, Virgil Travestie, i. (1770), 9. He was, in fine, the loud'st of Farters, Yet could . . . Correct his Tail, and only blow If there Occasion were, or so.
1695. Congreve, Love for Love, i. 1. Without a whole tatter to her tail.
d.1704. Brown, Works, i. 164. Several tails turned up at Paul's School, Merchant Taylors, etc., for their Repetitions.
c.1709. Ward, Terræfilius, ii. 28. Let your Servants do their Business without your Watching at their Tails.
1771. Smollett, Humph. Clinker (1900), 105-9. An't you ashamed, fellow, to ride postillion without a shirt to cover your backside from the view of the ladies? . . . Try if you cans't make peace with my sister. Thou hast given her much offence by showing her thy naked tail.
1774. Bridges, Burlesque Homer, 53. Upstarts the king, and with his nail Scratch'd both his head, and ears, and tail.
1872. Black, Phaeton, xxii. The tail-end of a shower caught us.
1874. Siliad, 15. A general Hubbub all the force misled, And one, a Highland Chief, turned tail and fled.
2. (venery).—(a) The penis: see Prick; (b) the female pudendum: see Monosyllable; (c) a harlot: see Tart (Grose). Also (penis or pudendum) tail-gap, tail-gate, tail-hole, tail-pike, tail-pin, tail-pipe, tail-trimmer, tail-tree or tail-tackle (penis and testes). Hence tail-feathers = the pubic hair: see Fleece; tail-flowers = the menses; tail-fruit = children; tail-fence = the hymen; tail-juice = (a) the semen and (b) urine: also tail-water; tail-work (or tail-wagging) = copulation; to tail ('to make a settlement in tail,' 'to go tail-tickling' or twitching, 'to play at up-tails all,' 'to turn up one's tail,' or to 'get shot in the tail') = to copulate; tail-trading = prostitution; a tenant-in-tail = (1) a whore (a wag-tail), (2) a keeper (q.v.) and (3) the penis; light (hot, or warm) in the tail = wanton; hot-tailed (or with tail on fire) = infected. See Squirrel.
1363. Langland, Piers Plowman, 1619. For she is tikel of hire tail . . . As commune as a cartway.
1383. Chaucer, Cant. Tales, 6047-8. For al so siker as cold engendreth hayl, A likerous mouth most han a likerous tayl.
c.1400. Coventry Myst., 134. Of hire tayle oftetyme be lyght, And rygh tekyl undyr the too.
[?]. Commune Secretary and Jalowsye [Halliwell]. She that is fayre, lusty, and yonge . . . Thynke ye her tayle is not lyght of the seare.
d.1529. Skelton, Bouge of Court [Chalmers, Eng. Poets, ii. 253]. I lete her to hyre that men may on her ryde . . . She hath got me more money with her tayle Than hath some shyppe that into bordews sayle.
15[?]. MS. Poem [Dr. Bliss], quoted by Halliwell. Alyed was countess would be, For she would still be tenaunt in taile To any one she could be.
1599. Hall, Satires, iv. iv. The maidens mocke, and call him withered leeke, That with a greene tayle hath an hoary head.
1647-80. Rochester, Poems. Then pulling out the rector of the females, Nine times he bath'd him in their piping tails.
16[?]. Old Song, 'John Anderson, my Jo.' John Anderson, my Jo, John, When that ye first began, Ye hae as guid a tail-tree As ony ither man.
1694. Motteux, Rabelais, v. xxi. They were pulling and hauling the man like mad, telling him that it is the most grievous . . . thing in nature for the tail to be on fire. Ibid. xxx. I saw some . . . more diligent in tailwagging than any water-wagtail. Ibid. (1694), Pant. Prog. Hedgewhores, wagtails, cockatrices.
