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<font size=3>My British lab member sent me a great explanation, check the
link below for a great write up of
</font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=3>soup and
fish</font>:<br><br>
<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite><font face="arial" size=2 color="#000080">Heres
the answer:<br>
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</font><font face="arial" size=2 color="#000080"> <br>
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</font><font face="arial" size=2 color="#000080"><a href="http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-sou2.htm">http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-sou2.htm</a><br>
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</font><font face="arial" size=2 color="#000080"> <br>
</font><font size=3><br>
</font><font face="wingdings" size=2 color="#000080">J<br>
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</font><font face="arial" size=2 color="#000080"> </blockquote><br>
Test of the link:<br><br>
</font><font size=3>[Q] <i>From Lee-Ann Nelson</i>: I am baffled by an
expression from P G Wodehouse. Bertie puts on his <i>soup and fish</i>.
Can you explain this?<br><br>
[A] I can. The <i>soup and fish</i> is a mans evening dress, dinner suit,
or dress suit, though I should really instead refer to it as a tuxedo,
since despite Bertie Woosters mainly London milieu the phrase seems to be
natively American.<br><br>
Until I went delving in old US newspapers, I thought that Wodehouse had
invented it. Indeed, the OED gives him the credit for its first use, in
<i>Piccadilly Jim</i> in 1918: He took me to supper at some swell joint
where they all had the soup-and-fish on but me. I felt like a dirty deuce
in a clean deck.But there are earlier examples, such as this from <i>The
Atlanta Constitution</i> of November 1914, in a report about local kids
being given a slap-up meal by the Rotary Club: Theres going to be no fess
upbusiness; no soup and fishoutfits. Itll be just a good
dinner.<br><br>
But why <i>soup and fish</i>? Well, one dons these duds for a special
occasion such as a formal meal. This is likely to be a heavyweight event,
with many courses, starting with soup and followed by fish before one
gets to the main event of the meat course. So the soup-and-fish is what
one wears to consume the soup and fish.<br><br>
Incidentally, one of the more delightful aspects of hunting down this
kind of language is that sometimes you get more than you were expecting.
The <i>Grand Rapids Tribune</i> in February 1915 included this: After
donning the complete Soup and Fish known in swozzey circles as Thirteen
and the Odd, he didnt look as much like a waiter as one might have
supposed.<i>Thirteen and the Odd</i>? There are other examples to be
found, though only a few. Jonathon Green notes in the <i>Cassells
Dictionary of Slang</i> that it is long-obsolete slang for a tail-coat,
as worn with the full fig of white tie and tails, but says that its
origin is unknown. Well, did you ever?<br>
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