| 释义 |
half horse2 U.S.
[half adv. 2.]
Formerly used in the phr. half horse and half alligator (see quots.). Usu. attrib.
[1809‘D. Knickerbocker’ Hist. N.Y. (1820) iv. ii. 360 The backwood-men of Kentucky are styled half man, half horse, and half alligator, by the settlers on the Mississippi.] 1828J. Hall Lett. fr. West 47 Eight or ten of those ‘half-horse and half-alligator’ gentry, commonly called Ohio boatmen. 1847T. B. Thorpe Big Bear of Arkansas 14 The half horse and half alligator species of men, who are peculiar to ‘Old Mississippi’. 1860Oregon Argus 13 Oct. (Th.), These half horse and half alligator sort of politicians are becoming a stench in the nostrils of the American people. 1948E. N. Dick Dixie Frontier 241 More than once a ‘half-horse and half-alligator’ possessed accurate information on politics and government. |