a. A coat reaching to the ancles; also in pl. (= long-clothes) the garments of a baby in arms. Also attrib. b. One who wears a long coat.
1603. Dekker, Grissil, II. i. (Shaks. Soc.), 18. Yet he doth but as many of his brother knights do, keep an ordinary table for him and his long coat follower. That long coat makes the master a little king.
1614. R. Tailor, Hog hath lost his Pearl, III. E 2. Ile laugh shalt see enough, and thou shalt weepe Softly, good long coate, softly.
1614. B. Jonson, Barth. Fair, I. i. And where hee spi’d a Parrat, or a Monkey, there hee was pitch’d, with all the little-long-coats about him male and female. Ibid. (1625), Staple of News, III. i. A Cabal … set out by Archie, Or some such head, of whose long coat they haue heard, And, being black, desire it.
1667. Evelyn, Diary, 29 Jan. Not as yet 13 years old. He was newly out of long coates.
1840. Thackeray, Catherine, vii. Master Thomas Billings … was in his long-coats fearfully passionate.
