A hassock stuffed with straw; a bed—properly, a straw bed; whence the cant word for a lodging-house is a dossingken. Dossel is an old word for a bundle of hay or straw, and dosser for a straw basket. These words were common in Elizabeth’s reign. The French dossier means a “bundle.”
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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.
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