buy the rabbit
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English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]According to Hotten: from an old story about a man selling a cat to a foreigner as a rabbit.
Verb
[edit]buy the rabbit (third-person singular simple present buys the rabbit, present participle buying the rabbit, simple past and past participle bought the rabbit)
- (UK, slang, archaic) To get the worst of a bargain.
- 1895, Horace White, Money and Banking, page 253:
- This is ruffian-like, by superiority of numbers to endeavor to make honest people buy the rabbit.
References
[edit]- John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary