or hand-’em downs, subs. (common).—Second-hand clothes. HAND-ME-DOWN-SHOP, or NEVER-TOO-LATE-TO-MEND-SHOP = a repairing tailors. Fr., un décrochez-moi-ça.
1878. Notes and Queries, 5, S. ix., 6 April, p. 263. HAND-’EM-DOWN—A second-hand garment (Northamptonshire).
1888. New York World, 5 March. Russell Sage, it is said, walked into a Broadway clothing store the other day and tried on and purchased a twelve-dollar suit of HAND-ME-DOWNS.
1889. The Sporting Times, 29 June. Trousers which fit him nowhere in particular, and which all over proclaim themselves entitled to the epithet of HAND-ME-DOWN.
ENGLISH SYNONYMS.—Reach-me-downs; translations; wallflowers.
FRENCH SYNONYMS.—La musique (popular); la mise-bas (servants’: especially ‘perks’).
