verbal phr. (American).—TO CATCH A TARTAR (q.v.); to meet with one’s superior.
1887. STUART CUMBERLAND, The Queen’s Highway. In rough Western parlance a man who falls in with such a player (a man, who, bearing a high reputation for all-round godliness, is a crack ‘poker’ player) ‘CATCHES ON A SNAG,’ and it is said that every one who visits the North-West comes across sooner or later the SNAG on which he is TO CATCH.
