subs. (common).—A woman; a wife. THE GREY MARE IS THE BETTER HORSE = the wife rules the husband.
TO WIN THE MARE OR LOSE THE HALTER, verb. phr. (old).—To play double or quits.
MONEY MAKES THE MARE GO, phr. (common).—Money does anything you will.
1605. BRETON, An Old Man’s Lesson [GROSART, ii. l, 7, 2, line 32]. Money is a matter of more moment than you make account of; why MONEY MAKES the medicine for the sick, pleads the client’s cause, maintains the merchant’s trade, makes the soldier fight, and the craftsman work, and the traveller tread lightly, and THE OLD MARE TROT, and the young tit amble.
1662. Rump Songs, i. 232. ‘The Power of Money.’
| Furr’d Aldermen too, and Mayors also; | |
| This makes the old Wife trot, and MAKES THE MARE TO GO. |
1728. BAILEY, English Dictionary, s.v. MONEY.
1857. C. KINGSLEY, Two Years Ago, Introduction. I’m MAKING THE MARE GO here in Whitford, without the money too, sometimes.
1886. J. GREGO, A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering in the Old Days, 9. The proverb still remains, a relic of the days in which it had its origin, ‘MONEY MAKES THE MAYOR TO GO.’
SHANKS’S MARE. See SHANKS.
TO GO BEFORE THE MARE TO MARKET, verb. phr. (old).—To do preposterous things.—RAY (1767).
