Colt (A)

A piece of knotted rope eighteen inches long for the special benefit of ship boys; a cat-oʹ-nine-tails.

“Look alive there, lads, or as sure as my name is Sam Weston Iʹll give the colt to the last man off the deck.”—J. Grant: Dick Rodney, chap. vii.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.