Colloquialism: to see a man about a dog (antedating 1865 November)

[Laurence Horn]

I remember it as "see a man about a horse", which I see is included
as an alterant at the wikipedia site.  Isogloss, anyone?  (Although I
admit that in my native NYC, it would have been more of a challenge
to find a horse than a dog to see a man about.)

LH



At 4:04 AM -0400 6/15/11, Garson O'Toole wrote:
>Michael Quinion has an excellent webpage about the expression "see a
>man about a dog." Here is a link.
>http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-see1.htm
>
>OED has "to see a man about a dog" listed as a colloquialism under the
>headword "dog."
>
>The Historical Dictionary of American Slang has "have to see a man
>about a dog" (page 617) listed under "dog."
>
>Wikipedia has an entry for "See a man about a dog":
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/See_a_man_about_a_dog
>
>All of these sources list the same citation as the earliest: a play
>titled "The Flying Scud" by an Irish-born playwright named Dion
>Boucicault. The date is either 1866 according to Michael Quinion and
>Wikipedia; or c1867 according to OED and HDAS.
>
>I cannot tell if anyone has actually seen the text of this play. It is
>possible that these citations are based on evidence in a 1940 book
>called America's Lost Plays.
>
>Here is a citation in a London periodical dated November 1865:
>
>Cite: 1865 November 15, The Anti-Teapot Review: A Magazine of
>Politics, Literature and Art Of Falling In and Out of Love, Page 135,
>Houlston and Wright, London. (Google Books full view)
>
>The husband will meekly excuse himself from offering an explanation;
>feel himself henpecked; and twice a week, at least, will find that he
>has to absent himself by going to London, to "see a man about a dog,"
>or on some other important business.
>
>http://books.google.com/books?id=GmgEAAAAQAAJ&q=dog#v=snippet&
>
>I was prompted to explore this expression by a commenter at the
>Freakonomics blog who was interested in the phrase "I got to see a man
>about a horse."
>http://www.freakonomics.com/2011/06/09/a-grain-of-salt/
>
>Garson
>
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