That which intoxicates. In the campaign of 1840, it was commonly said that “Tippecanoe” lived in a log cabin, and drank hard cider. See also COON and LOG CABIN.
1840. Mr. Proffit said he had heard, at every cross road in Indiana, the same arguments preached nine hundred and ninety nine times over a barrel of hard cider.—House of Repr., Feb. 13: Cong. Globe, p. 197.
1840. Mr. Duncan of Ohio said the Whig party were palming General Harrison off as the “log cabin and hard cider candidate.” He showed conclusively that he neither drank hard cider nor lived in a log cabin, but that he lived on a princely estate.—The same, April 10: id., p. 320.
1842. Gentlemen are continually accounting for their defeat in 1840. They say that people were made drunk upon hard cider, and were frightened out of their better judgment by the rattling of a coonskin.—Mr. Arnold of Tennessee, the same, July 2: id., p. 572, Appendix.
1848. They had charged [President Harrison] with drinking hard cider, which was then considered more dangerous than drinking soup in our day.—Mr. Clingman of North Carolina, the same, April 27: id., p. 688.
1879. [He was] before the court for selling hard liquor, when he had only a license for selling ale.—Boston Traveller, Sept. 30. (Century Dict.)
