verbal phr. (common).—To join in suddenly and without ceremony; to intrude, or CHIP IN (q.v.). Also substantively.
1819. SCOTT, The Bride of Lammermoor, ch. xxi. He was afraid you would CUT IN and carry off the girl.
1843. DICKENS, Martin Chuzzlewit, ch. xxiv., p. 246. I advise you to keep your own counsel, and to avoid tittle-tattle, and not to CUT IN where you’re not wanted.
1849. THACKERAY, Pendennis, ch. vii. ‘Most injudicious,’ CUT IN the Major.
1864. G. A. LAWRENCE, Guy Livingstone, ch. vi. Keeping all her after-supper waltzes for him religiously, though half the men in town were trying to CUT IN.
1883. Referee, 17 June, p. 7, col. 4. I am anxious to have a CUT IN and get a big advertisement for nothing.
1884. W. C. RUSSELL, Jack’s Courtship, ch. v. ‘In short,’ CUT IN my uncle unceremoniously, ‘you have seen enough of Jack’s life to know something about it!’
