Used with a negative to express the extreme of impossibility.
1842. Money is too scarce. Not one of the three theatres [announced as to be built in New York] will begin to go up.—Phila. Spirit of the Times, April 11.
1843. Certain gentlemen must be made to know that they do not begin to be the party, “by a long slipe.”—Missouri Reporter, May 19.
1847. The trees and vines, and prognostics of all sorts, ar sorter nit together like a sock, and you couldent begin to get through ’em.—T. B. Thorpe, ‘The Big Bear of Arkansas: A Swim for a Deer,’ p. 124 (Phila.).
1852. “But, bust my buckskins!” chucked the Scout, slapping his leather pants sufficiently hard to show the strength of his oath, and at the same time laughing at the very idea, “if them ’ar kind of tactics would begin to do with the redskins.”—James Weir, ‘Simon Kenton,’ p. 13 (Phila.).
1855.
| No “breathing-ships” e’er will begin to supplant | |
| The ships rushed along by omnipotent steam. | |
Wm. Boyd on Steam v. Hot Air, Boston Traveller, May 23 (Bartlett). |
1856. I am satisfied that $8,000 will not begin to put up a stable suitable for the accommodation of from sixty to eighty horses.—Mr. Dick of Pa., House of Repr., April 2: Cong. Globe, p. 798.
