Australia, 1900: rabbit meat—later also: rabbits—‘mutton’, denoting a choice meat, was derisively substituted for ‘rabbit’, denoting the inferior meat that had to be eaten when butcher’s meat was too costly
USA, 1939 in The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck—a piece of homespun philosophy meaning that a man must do what he feels needs to be done, even if it is dangerous or undesirable
UK, 1909: expresses the speaker’s good faith—literally, in Scouting for Boys (1908), by Robert Baden-Powell: the honour on which a Scout promises to obey the Scout Law
Australia, 1930—describes a person who is reluctant, or very slow, to pay for something—the image is of a snake biting the person when they put their hand in their pocket to get at their money
According to superstition, if on waking on the first morning of a month one mutters to oneself ‘(white) rabbit(s)’ three times before speaking to anyone, then one will have good luck during the whole month.
UK, 1823 as ‘calf’s head is best hot’, defined by John Badcock as “the apology for one of those who made no bones of dining with his topper on” in Slang. A Dictionary of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, the Pit, of Bon-ton, and the Varieties of Life
refers to “All right, have it your own way—you heard a seal bark”, the caption to a drawing by James Thurber, originally published in The New Yorker of 30th January 1932
to be extremely tight with money—USA, 1926—refers to the five-cent coin, struck from 1913 to 1938, featuring a Native American on one side and a bison on the other