Horse-milliner.

Properly, one who makes up and supplies decorations for horses.

A horse-soldier more fit for the toilet than the battle-field. The expression was first used by Rowley in his Ballads of Charitie, but Sir Walter Scott revived it.

“One comes in foreign trashery

Of tinkling chain and spur,

A walking haberdashery

Of feathers, lace, and fur;

In Rowley’s antiquated phrase,

Horse milliner of modern days.”

Bridal of Triermain, ii. 3.

· ·

Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.