after-clap

after-clap

See also: afterclap

English

Noun

after-clap (plural after-claps)

1. Alternative form of afterclap
   • 1630–1680 (date of composition), 1759 (date of publication), Samuel Butler, Characters:

     What he loses by Venus he thinks to recover by Mercury, but catches his cure as an after-clap, that commonly proves the worse disease of the two.

   • 1782, letter from Benjamin Franklin to Robert Morris, 9 January, 1782, published in The Complete Works of Benjamin Franklin: volume VII (John Bigelow, editor; →ISBN in 2008:

     Sir:—I have long feared that by our continually worrying the ministry here with successive after-clap demands for more and more money, we should at length tire out their patience.

References

• [Francis] Grose [et al.] (1811), “After-clap”, in Lexicon Balatronicum. A Dictionary of Buckish Slang, University Wit, and Pickpocket Eloquence. […], London: Printed for C. Chappell, […], OCLC 23927885.