(See also CESSATION, COMPLETION, CULMINATION, THWARTING.)

bitter end A difficult or disagreeable conclusion; the last or ultimate extremity; death; often in the phrase to thebitter end. According to Captain John Smith’s A Sea Grammar (1627):

William Henry Smyth in The Sailor’s Word-book (1867) elaborates further:

A variation of the phrase bitter end appears in the Bible (Proverbs 5:4) and some conjecture this usage, rather than the nautical, to be its origin.

The phrase gave rise to the term bitter-ender ‘a diehard,’ in use since 1850.

curtains The end, usually a disastrous or unfortunate one; most often, death itself. This slang term, of obvious theatrical derivation, is often used to indicate the end of some illegitimate enterprise, and as such is similar to expressions such as the jig is up.

[one’s] days are numbered See ILL HEALTH.

in the homestretch In the final stages; nearing the completion of a project, ordeal, activity, or other matter; the denouement. In racing terminology, the homestretch is the last leg of a race, i.e., the straight part of a racecourse from the last turn to the finish line. Figurative use of this Americanism was recorded as early as the mid-19th century. It usually suggests some degree of relief because in the homestretch, the end is in sight.

the jig is up This is it, it’s all over, this is the end of the line; usually used in reference to being caught or discovered in some wrongdoing. This slang or dialectal expression, which dates from the late 1700s, derives from the obsolete ‘prank, joke, trick’ meaning of jig.

lower the boom See PUNISHMENT.

nip in the bud To terminate a project, plan, or other matter in its early stages; to prevent or stop something before it has had a chance to develop. A bud is an undeveloped part of a plant which, if nipped by frost, pests, or a zealous gardener, does not grow to fruition; hence the expression.

quit cold turkey To stop abruptly and completely the habitual use of alcohol, tobacco, or drugs without substituting nonaddicting alternatives; to terminate any habit suddenly. Although both the origin of this phrase and the rationale for turkey are uncertain, quit cold turkey clearly implies an abrupt cessation as opposed to a gradual tapering off as a means of ridding one-self of an unwanted behavior or addiction. One theory as to the origin of the phrase holds that when a drug addict stops taking drugs, among the (often severe) withdrawal symptoms is horripilation of the skin (goose bumps) accompanied by a cold, blanched complexion. The similarity of appearance to the skin of a turkey prepared for cooking is obvious. Variations are stop cold turkey and go cold turkey.

Cold turkey itself is sometimes used to describe any action or performance undertaken in impromptu fashion, without “warming up,”so to speak. In this usage, however, the phrase is now usually truncated to the simpler cold.

ring down the curtain To terminate or bring to an end. In the theater, the person responsible for raising or lowering the stage curtain once received his cue from the stage manager who would ring a bell at the appropriate moment.

While still used in the theater, ring down the curtain on is applied figuratively in other contexts as well. A variation is the shortened ring down.

stem the tide To stop, terminate, end; to squash, quell, check; to block or stifle; to nip in the bud. The most plausible conjecture is that stem in this expression is derived from the Icelandic stemma ‘to stop the flow of’; attempts to relate it to the stem of an ocean-going vessel defy logic. Tide implies a flow of events.