[TML] an interesting story somewhat related to this thing we do

[Richard Aiken]

On 9/29/07, Tom Naro <tomnaro at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The phrase used by highwaymen was "stand and deliver your purse!" (or variants) meaning "Stop and give me your valuables".  Alexander Smith's book The history of the lives of the most noted highwaymen marked it as a common phrase by 1740.  The robbers either picked up a very clever play on words or misunderstand the military use of the initial portion of the phrase.
>
> However since the phrase is heavily use in romantic literature, it might just have sounded better than "Give me your money!" to the writers of the time.

I must admit that my google foo is not great, because I couldn't find
reference to my version of what the phrase means.  Lot's of hits on
the Edward James Olmos movie, though.  So I'm thinking my definition
if out there somewhere, as I doubt the movie - given it's subject
matter (teaching kids to excel far past anyone's expectations) -
derives from the highwaymans line.

BTW, the Stand & Deliver website (the one about the highwaymen) has a
rather big typo on it's front page: "Literature and media both about
the light-fingered gentry . . . "  There seems to be a verb missing.
Maybe "rave?"

-- 
Richard Aiken

"Never insult anyone by accident."  Robert A. Heinlein