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Rip (A)

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He’s a regular rip. A rip of a fellow. A precious rip. Applied to children, means one who rips or tears his clothes by boisterous play, carelessness, or indifference. Anglo-Saxon ryp[an], to spoil, to tear, to break in pieces.

He is a sad rip. A sad rake or debauchee; seems to be a perversion of rep, as in demirep, meaning rep, i.e. rep-robate.

“Some forlorn, worn-out old rips, broken-kneed and broken-winded.”—Du Maurier: Peter Ibbetson, part vi. p. 376.

 

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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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Ring a Ding-ding
Ring in the Ear
Ring of Invisibility (The)
Ring One’s Own Bell (To)
Rings Noted in Fable
Ringing Changes
Ringing the Changes
Ringing Island
Ringleader
Riot
Rip (A)
Rip
Rip Van Winkle
Ripaille
Riphean or Rhiphæan Rocks
Ripon
Riquet with a Tuft
Rise
Rising in the Air
Rivals
River Demon or River Horse