Heading
lendeth unto the Lord.' His treatment of the subject consisted of the words: 'If you approve the security, down with your dust!'
To dust one's jacket, cassock, or coat, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To thrash; metaphorically, to criticise severely.—See quot., 1557, and cf., Baste.
1557. Tusser, Husbandrie, ch. 49, st. b., p. 107 (E.D.S.). What fault deserves a brushed cote.
1612. Passenger of Benvenuto. Observe, my English gentleman, that blowes have a wonderfull prerogative in the feminine sex; for if shee be a bad woman, there is no more proper plaister to mend her, then this: but if (which is a rare chance) she be good, to dust her often hath in it a singular, unknowne, and as it were an inscrutable vertue to make her much better, and to reduce her, if possible, to perfection.
1698. Farquhar, Love and a Bottle, Act v., Sc. ii. Tell me presently where your master is, sirrah, or I'll dust the secret out of your jacket.
1771. Smollett, Humphry Clinker, l. 26. Prankley, shaking his cane, bid him hold his tongue, otherwise he would dust his cassock for him.
1837. Barham, I. L. (M. of Venice). Old Shylock was making a racket, and threatening how well he'd dust every man's jacket, Who'd help'd her in getting aboard of the packet.
1865. Saturday Review, Ap. If he will turn to Theocritus, v., 119, he will learn that there is a good and respectable Greek ancestry for the cant phrase, to dust one's jacket:—[Greek: o(/ka ma/npoka tei=de/tuda/sas Eu)ma/ridas e)ka)thêre], where [Greek: e)ka)thêre] means, 'purgavit te,' 'dressed you,' 'gave you a dressing,' dusted your jacket. So great is the similarity of ideas in all nations and languages, of which, indeed, there is abundant illustration in other passages of Theocritus.
1872. Fun, Sept. The difference is I dusts his [coat] off his back, and he dusts mine on my back.
To get up and dust, or To dust out of, verb. phr. (American).—To move quickly; to leave hurriedly. For synonyms, see Absquatulate.
To have dust in the eyes, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To be sleepy; to draw straws (q.v.). Said mainly of children: e.g., 'The dustman is coming.'
To kick up, or raise a dust, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To make a disturbance, or much ado.
1759. Smollett, Letter to Wilkes, quoted in D. Hannay's Smollett (1887), p. 132. If the affair cannot be compromised, we intend to kick up a dust, and die hard.
1766. H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii., 41. Our lay and ecclesiastical champions for arbitrary power . . . have raised such a dust, and kept such a coil about the divine, hereditary, and indefeasible right of kings.
1815. Scott, Guy Mannering, ch. xxxiii. 'Is there not a strong room up yonder in the old castle?' 'Ay, is there, sir; my uncle the constable once kept a man there for three days in Auld Ellangowan's time. But there was an unco-dust about it—it was tried in the Inner-*house afore the feifteen.'
To throw dust in the eyes, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To mislead; to dupe.—See Bamboozle.
To bite the dust, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To knock under; to be mortified, or shamed.
Dust-bin, subs. (common).—A
grave.
Dusted, ppl. adj. (colloquial).—Drubbed;
severely criticised.—See
Dust one's jacket and Tanning.
Duster, subs. (tailors')—A sweetheart.
For synonyms, see Jomer.
Dust-hole, subs. (theatrical).—1.
The late Prince of Wales' Theatre
in Tottenham Court Road. [From
the fact that, fifty years ago, under
the management of Mr. Glossop,
the sweepings of the house were
deposited and suffered to accumulate
under the pit.]
