[Belongs to LAG v.2; the origin and mutual relation of the words are obscure.
In some parts of England fog, seg, lag, or foggie, seggie, laggie, are used in children’s games as substitutes for ‘first, second, last’ (see Eng. Dial. Dict., s.v. Fog). This suggests the possibility that lag may have originated in the language of sports as an arbitrary distortion of last; but even in that case the word may have coalesced with a homophone of independent origin. The current hypothesis that the adj. is a. Welsh llag (earlier llac), Ir. and Gael. lag, slack, weak, is highly improbable. There is some affinity of sense between lag and LACK a. and v. (cf. to come lag and to come lack); the former might conceivably be an alteration of the latter under the influence of words like FLAG v.1, FAG sb.2 Cf. further MDa. lakke to go slowly (Kalkar).]
A. sb. 1. The last or hindmost person in a race, game, sequence of any kind). Now rare exc. in schoolboy use.
1514. Barclay, 1st Eclogue, in Cyt. & Uplondyshm. (Percy Soc.), p. xii. In the tavern remayne they last for lag.
1567. Drant, Horace’s Ep., B vj. Since eche man bragges, the lagge of vs A shendefull shame him take.
1611. Cotgr., s.v. Dernier, Le dernier le loup le mange … lags come to the lash.
1641. M. Frank, Serm., vii. (1672), 112. The novissimus virorum, the lag and fag of all a very scum of men.
1687. Miége, Gt. Fr. Dict., II. Lag, a School-Word that signifies the last, le dernier. As the Lag of a Form, le dernier d’une Classe.
1700. Dryden, Iliad, I. 337. In threats the foremost, but the lag in fight.
1776. T. Jefferson, Writ. (ed. Ford), II. 39. The omission of H— and B— and my being next to the lag [in the nomination of delegates] give me some alarm.
1777. Johnson, Lett. to Mrs. Thrale, 25 Oct. How long do you stay at Brighthelmstone? Now the company is gone, why should you be the lag?
1825. Sporting Mag., XVI. 310. Ward first mounted the stage and Cannon was no lag.
1859. Farrar, Julian Home, iv. 38. I say, Julian, I vote we both try for lag next trials. It’d save lots of grind.
1890. A. Lang, Sir S. Northcote, I. I. 15. Stafford Northcote occupied the undistinguished place of ‘lag’ in his form.
b. Comb.: lag-out (= ‘last out’), the name of a boys’ game.
1845. in Brasenose Ale, 76. No marble in circles on the hall-step rolls, We cannot play lag-out, nor yet three-holes.
† 2. pl. What remains in a vessel after the liquor is drawn off; dregs, lees. Obs.
15[?]. Regul. Househ. Earl Northumb. (1770), 57. That Vinacre be made of the brokyn Wynes … And that the Laggs be provide by the Clerks of the Hous and markid after thei be past drawing that thei can be set no more of broche.
1594. Plat, Jewell-ho., III. 65. Transmutations … of old lags of Sacks or Malmesies … into Muskadels.
1615. Markham, Eng. Housew., II. iv. (1668), 116. Laggs of Claret and Sack.
1703. Art & Myst. Vintners, 21. Muskadel is sophisticated with the Lags of Sack.
† 3. The lowest class. (Cf. lag-end.) Obs.–1
1607. Shaks., Timon, III. vi. 90. The Senators of Athens, together with the common legge [Rowe (1709) and later editors lag] of People.
4. [from the vb.] The condition of lagging.
1837. Fraser’s Mag., XVI. 114. When Spaniard meets Spaniard, then comes, not the tug, but the lag, of war.
b. Physics. The retardation in a current or movement of any kind; the amount of this retardation. Lag of the tide: the interval by which the tide-wave falls behind the mean time in the first and third quarters of the moon.
1855. Ogilvie, Suppl. s.v., The lag of the tide…. The lag of the steam-valve of a steam-engine.
1881. Chambers, in Nature, XXIII. 399. The remarkable lag which takes place in the occurrence of the critical barometric epochs at the more easterly stations.
1892. Electrical Engineer, 16 Sept., 287/1. It is obvious that at the point where B cuts the axis the induction is a maximum; hence if there were no ‘magnetic lag’ and no currents in the iron, this point should occur at the same time as that at which the current is a maximum.
B. adj.
1. † Last, hindmost (obs.); belated, lingering behind, lagging, tardy (now rare). (In early instances only absol. or predicative, and hence hardly distinguishable from the sb.) † (To come) lag of: short of, too late for, or in arrear of.
1552. Huloet, Lagge and last.
1568. Hist. Jacob & Esau, V. v. F iv b. Haue not we well hunted, of blessing to come lagge?
1589. R. Harvey, Pl. Perc., 22. Beshrow him that comes lagge in so good a course.
1594. Shaks., Rich. III., II. i. 90. Some tardie Cripple … That came too lagge to see him buried. Ibid. (1605), Lear, I. ii. 6. I am some twelue, or fourteene Moonshines Lag of a Brother.
1612. Two Noble K., V. iv. 8. Beguile The gout and rheum, that in lag hours attend For grey approachers.
1624. Sir C. Mountagu in Buccleuch MSS. (Hist. MSS. Comm.), I. 260. Your neighbour will struggle so long for place as he will be cast lagg.
a. 1639. T. Carew, To Mistresse in Absence, 31. There seated in those heavenly bowers, Wee’le cheat the lag and lingring hours.
1678–9. Dryden & Lee, Œdipus, III. i. Then hell has been among ye, And some lag fiend yet lingers in the grove.
1691. Wood, Ath. Oxon., I. 594. A fourth person, who comes lagg, as having lately appeared in print … tells us … he died.
1742. R. Blair, Grave, 731. Even the lag flesh Rests.
1785. Burns, Address Deil, iii. An’ faith! thou ’s neither lag nor lame.
1832–53. Whistle-Binkie (Scot. Songs), Ser. II. 100. Lauchie had looms, but was lag at the weaving.
b. as an exclamation at play (see quot. 1869).
1609. Armin, Maids of More-Cl., C 3. Boy. Now Iohn, i’le cry first. Ioh. And i’le cry lagge. I was in hoblies hole.
1869. Lonsdale Gloss., Lag or Lag last is said by boys when playing at pitch and toss, or other games, in order that they may bespeak the last pitch.
2. Special collocations (sometimes hyphened): lag-end, the hinder or latter part, the fag end (now rare); † lag-man, the last man, the one who brings up the rear; † lag-tooth, a wisdom tooth (from its late appearance). Also Comb.: lag-bellied a., ? slow-paced, tardy.
1596. Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., V. i. 24. I could be well content To entertaine the Lagge-end of my life With quiet hours.
1599. Nashe, Lenten Stuffe, 37. The Essex calfe or lagman, who had lost the calues of his legs by gnawing on the horslegs.
1611. Florio, Sophronisteri, the two teeth which grow last when a man is about twentie yeares ould, lag-teeth.
1624. Heywood, Gunaik., I. 17. In the lagge end of the same troope were driven a certaine number of faire and goodlie oxen.
1822. Hood, Lycus the Centaur, 62. From the lag-bellied toad To the mammoth.
1857. Mrs. Mathews, Tea-Table T., I. 204. A shelter … where they may … wear away the lag-end of their madness.
