Eggcorn?

[Jonathan Lighter]

Probably not an eggcorn, though still a surprise.  "Cough" is an old slang term for "confess," but I haven't run into it in a long time.  It's evidently never lost currency in Britain.

Cf., from a uk e-address:

2002 The Drug Test on the Other Foot (Usenet :rec.arts.sf.fandom )(July 8) http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.fandom/browse_frm/thread/476185ae6d5df7d/6602e611535cbcfe?lnk=st&q=%22coughs+to%22&rnum=7#6602e611535cbcfe : You turn over his digs and find a load of stuff nicked from other houses. Joe X coughs to, say six burglaries.



HDAS has U.S. exx. from 1899-1921.



JL


Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Eggcorn?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Apple coughs to iPod Nano screen flaws"

Headline at



The URL itself - "apple_admits" - makes it clear that what is meant is
"cops to."

-Wilson Gray

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