COLLOQUIAL PHRASES, etc.—TO TALK ONE DOWN = to silence; TO TALK ONE OUT OF = to dissuade; TO TALK OVER = (1) to persuade: also TO TALK INTO; and (2) to review; TO TALK ROUND = to review a subject; TO TALK UP = (1) to speak plainly (or defiantly); and (2) = to discuss with a view to promotion; TO TALK ONE UP = to urge; TO TALK OUT = to exhaust patience, time, etc.; TO TALK TO = to chide: hence TALKING-TO = a reprimand; TO TALK AT = to gird or chide covertly: talking of a person who is present to another; TO TALK THE HIND LEG OFF A JACKASS (COW, HORSE, etc.) = to seduce, to wheedle, to charm: also TO TALK ONE MAD, TO DEATH, INTO A THING, FEVER, etc.; TO TALK GREEK, DUTCH (or DOUBLE DUTCH) = to talk nonsense; TO TALK THROUGH ONE’S NECK (American) = to talk foolishly; TO TALK TURKEY = to say pleasant things. Also ‘TALK of the Angels (or the Devil) and you’ll hear the rustling of their wings’ (or see his horns). See BIG; DUTCH-UNCLE; SHOP; TALL-TALK.
1600. SHAKESPEARE, Much Ado about Nothing, ii. 1. 369. If they were but a week married they would TALK THEMSELVES MAD.
1693. VANBRUGH, The Old Bachelor, v. 5. Set. TALK of the devil—see where he comes! Ibid. (1706), The Mistake. [We will] TALK HIM INTO [it].
d. 1704. T. BROWN, Letter to George Moult, in Works, i. 233. I was within an Ace of being TALKED TO DEATH by a parcel of Huguenots.
1704. SWIFT, A Tale of a Tub, ‘Author’s Preface.’ He may ring the Changes as far as it will go, and vary his phrase till he has TALKED ROUND.
1717. PRIOR [MANLEY, Lucius, Epil.]. We’ll … TALK YOU all TO DEATH.
1777. SHERIDAN, The School for Scandal, iv. 3. And now … we will TALK OVER the situation of your affairs with Maria.
1816. AUSTEN, Emma, xxii. She had talked her into love; but, alas! she was not so easily to be TALKED OUT OF IT.
1838. WILLIAM WATTS (‘Lucian Redivivus’), Paradise Lost, 84.
| Prithee, good woman, leave your mag off; | |
| By George, you’d TALK A DOG’S HIND LEG OFF. |
1841. CAPT. MCCLINTOCK, John Beedle’s Sleigh Ride, Courtship, and Marriage, 24. Polly Bean was not the first [girl] that I run against by a long shot… And I was plaguy apt to TALK TURKEY always when I got sociable, if it was only out of politeness.
1847. TENNYSON, The Princess, v. Her that TALK’D DOWN the fifty wisest men.
1859. BARTLETT, Dictionary of Americanisms, s.v. TALK … The story is an old one,—that an Indian and a white man, after a day’s hunting, had only a turkey and a partridge to show for game. The white man proposed to divide them, and said to the Indian, “Take your choice. You can have the partridge, and I’ll take the turkey; or I’ll take the turkey, and you may have the partridge.” “Ugh!” said the Indian, “you DON’T TALK TURKEY TO ME any.”
1864. New Haven Register [BARTLETT]. They are not the only ones who TALK TURKEY, and rob the soldiers of what is contributed for their benefit.
