[f. STAG sb.1]
1. slang. a. trans. To observe; to take particular notice of; to watch; also, to find out or discover by observation, to detect. Also absol. or intr.
1796. Grose’s Dict. Vulgar T. (ed. 3), To Stag, to find, discover, observe.
1806. Surr, Winter in Lond. (ed. 3), II. 120. I shall soon stag who they are.
1823. ‘Jon Bee,’ Dict. Turf, s.v., To ‘stag’ a thief, to look on, and spoil his sport: ‘What’s that cove a stagging there for? Down him, Billy.’
1854. Miss Baker, Northampt. Gloss., s.v., When workmen are taking beer clandestinely, one of them keeps on the look out, to watch or ‘stag the master.’
1859. H. Kingsley, Geoffrey Hamlyn, v. So you’ve been stagging this gentleman and me, and listening, have you?
1897. G. Bartram, People of Clopton, v. 130. Who set ye on to watch me?… And at last … he admitted that Master John had told him to keep an eye on me and Jenny—to ‘stag’ us if he saw us out together—and to get a witness to what went on between us.
b. (See quots.)
1812. Sporting Mag., XXXVII. 11. ‘I stagged him my Lord.’—‘Stagged him, what do you mean by stagged him?’—‘Why, my Lord, I mean I was down upon him.’
1870. Daily News, 13 July. In the event of a man refusing or sloping, as it was termed, his line was what was called ‘stagged,’ and when he went for an advance it was resolutely refused.
c. intr. To turn informer; to inform against.
1839. W. Carleton, Fardorougha, xi. (1848). 101. But to stag against his companion and accomplice—this was looked upon as a crime.
1846. J. Keegan, Leg. & Poems (1907), 380. She imagines that I played foul at New Ross,—that I stagged and betrayed as well as deserted.
d. (See quot.)
1860. Hotten’s Slang Dict., Stag, to demand money, to ‘cadge.’… Also, to dun, or demand payment.
2. Comm. slang. To deal in shares as a stag (see STAG sb.1 7).
1845. Thackeray, in Punch, IX. 191. What! are ladies stagging it? Ibid. (1845) [Implied in the vbl. sb. and ppl. a.].
3. dial. (See quot. Cf. STAG-HEADED a.)
1854. Miss Baker, Northampt. Gloss., Stag, to take off the top of a hedge without laying it down.
Hence Stagging vbl. sb. and ppl. a.
1845. Thackeray, in Punch, IX. 191. Her appearance created quite a sensation among the stagging gents.
1851. Kingsley, Yeast, ii. The Stock-Exchange and railway stagging … and the frantic Mammon-hunting.
1905. A. I. Shand, Days of Past, ix. 162. Everything went automatically to a premium, and systematic stagging was a profitable business.
1905. Daily Chron., 13 July, 5/6. A peculiarity of the applications is the enormous number of them for £100. A great many of these are obviously of the ‘stagging’ order.
