Amy’s case came to be a proverb for procrastination.
1803. This Amy Dardin is a Virginian, and has unremittingly applied to every Congress for nine years past for compensation.—Mass. Spy, Dec. 7. See also Mass. Spy, Jan. 11, 1804. [She was administratrix of David Dardin’s estate.]
1817. He and Amy Dardin’s horse alike have run their race, and their claims have survived them.—J. K. Paulding, ‘Letters from the South,’ i. 190 (N.Y.).
1835. [It would be] better than hanging on like Amy Dardin for fifty years; and then after the seed, breed, and generation was most run out, get pay for a horse pressed during the revolution; and indeed this case of Amy Dardin shows much of the course of proceeding.—‘Col. Crockett’s Tour,’ p. 114 (Phila.).
