STALKING-HORSE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Stalking-horse

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

Listen

noun

Stalking-horse n.

A horse, or a figure resembling a horse, behind which a hunter conceals himself from the game he is aiming to kill.

Fig.: Something used to cover up a secret project; a mask; a pretense. "Hypocrisy is the devil's stalking-horse under an affectation of simplicity and religion." "How much more abominable is it to make of him (Christ) and religion a stalking-horse, to get and enjoy the world!"

See images of 'Stalking-horse'

Etymology of 'Stalking-horse'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Stalking-horse" Quotes from Famous Books

... of snowy ice, and laying his gun behind it, approached the flock as near as possible, under cover of the hummocks. About three hundred yards of level ice still intervened, and lying down behind his snow-screen, he slowly moved his ingenious stalking-horse towards the flock. Had he understood the nature of the birds thoroughly, it is probable that his device would have succeeded splendidly; but when he was still about a hundred yards distant, the wary leader became suspicious, and gave ...

— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall

Words linked to "Stalking-horse" : cover, horse, pretence, pretense, covert, concealment, dissembling, putoff, screen, pretext