coat-tail
The tail of a coat. to sit, etc., on one's own coat-tail: ‘to live, or to do any thing, at one's personal expense’ (Jam.). Sc. to drag his coat-tails, so that some one may tread on them (attributed to Irishmen at Donnybrook Fair): to put himself purposely in a position in which some one may intentionally or unintentionally afford a pretext for a quarrel; to provoke attack so as to get up a row. to climb on, hang (on) to, ride (on), etc., (a person's) coat-tails, to attach oneself to another, usually thereby gaining some undeserved benefit (orig. U.S.).
| a 1600 Poems 16th. Cent., Leg. Bp. St. Andrew's 329 (Jam.) Still on his owne cott tail he satt. 1679 Sc. Pasquils (1868) 248 From his coat-tail you'll claime, boys, Lippies of grace. 1818 Scott Rob Roy xiv, ‘To gang there on ane's ain coat⁓tail, is a waste o' precious time and hard-won siller.’ 1837 Dickens Pickw. i, The eloquent Pickwick, with one hand gracefully concealed behind his coat tails. 1848 Lincoln in Congr. Globe App. 1042 Has he no acquaintance with the ample military coat tail of General Jackson? Does he not know that his own party have run the last five Presidential races under that coat tail? 1852 Scott Battery 1 Nov. 2/4 Be sure and hang fast to John's coat tail. 1909 H. G. Wells Tono-Bungay i. 5, I was his nephew, his peculiar and intimate nephew. I was hanging on to his coat-tails all the way through. 1929 ‘E. Queen’ Roman Hat Myst. iii. xvii. 256 ‘Know anything about him?’ ‘Nothing except that he hung on to Field's coat-tails pretty closely. He's an ex-jailbird.’ 1949 Citizen-Jrnl. (Columbus, Ohio) 16 Dec., That straight-ticket voting has enabled many a mediocre candidate to ride into office on the coat-tails of an able, popular man at the top. 1953 Manch. Guardian Weekly 3 Dec. 4 The people whose coat-tails he is riding. 1962 Sat. Night 20 Jan. 19/1 And as soon as the 71-year-old Kikuyu leader was released last summer, Mboya climbed on his coattails. 1964 Economist 31 Oct. 482/2 Mr. Robert Kennedy cannot be sure of riding the coat-tails of Mr Johnson in New York. 1966 Listener 17 Mar. 375/1 May they not have tied themselves to the coat tails of a dangerous American policy in relation to China? |