Trick or Treat

[Towse]

Laurence Horn wrote:
>
> At 7:01 PM -0400 6/29/03, sagehen wrote:
> >Whether the expression "trick or treat" does I don't know, but certainly
> >the custom goes back farther than '39 or '37.  Both the door-to-door
> >begging and the pranks were regularly practiced in the Lincoln NE of my
> >childhood.  Perhaps without the /or/, since the pranks occurred whether the
> >begging yielded results or not!  Soaping windows was the most common
> >practice, but the occasional small fire was set, and, where available,
> >privies were overturned.
> >A. Murie
>
> What's especially odd here is the order, which if memory serves is
> attributed by Cooper & Ross ("World Order", 1975) to a priority of
> the phonology over the semantics.  The problem with the latter is
> that it suggests "If I don't perform some mischief on you, you will
> give me (have given me?) a treat", when of course the idea is the
> other way around--so "Treat or trick" would make more sense.

I always assumed the underlying message was a threat:

    So what's your choice, Mrs. Cleaver? Trick? or Treat?

... and have I mentioned that I think that apron is very fetching
on you?

Sal
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