"bottle in front of me" (close, but no cigar)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Tue, Oct 7, 2008 at 5:54 PM, George Thompson <george.thompson at nyu.edu> wrote:
>
> Here is the idea of the champagne/sham pain quibble, but they somehow piss it:
>
>        A good natured looking little black fellow named Charles Odell, with
his
> hair braided into as many tails as a Bashaw. . . .  [a clerk; is arrested for
> stealing a bottle of champagne from his boss, and so suffers] the real pain of
> imprisonment.  New-York Daily Advertiser, November 18, 1834, p. 2, col. 3

>From the same year, under the heading "Volunteer Toasts":

1834 _Hagers-Town (Md.) Free Press_ 9 July 2/6 Champaigne to our real friends,
and real pain to our sham friends.


--Ben Zimmer

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