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I don't quite get you, Judy - Partridge says there is such an association in historical slang. So there was nothing very clever about referring to both the actual mangle & the metaphorical one in one phrase - but its use apparently diminished when the slang term lost its currency. There is no connection with "wet behind the ears", whatever Flatears may maintain. mj Creator - A comedian whose audience is afraid to laugh. H.L.Mencken ----- Original Message ----- From: Judy Prince To: [log in to unmask] Sent: Friday, May 08, 2009 4:01 PM Subject: Re: question (UK) You would turn all honest labour to naughty business, Martin. And everyone knows that the foundation of all knowledge, honesty, humility, and love is what Gustave Courbet painted so nicely, his "L'Origine du Monde". [His "Man with Pipe" self-portrait's his most sublime work, I think, tho.] Despite your preoccupation with all things pudend, you still cannot find a citation-connection between it and a mangle, huh? More's the pity. Surely there's a first step towards the phrase which's much more prosaic than that, I'm thinking. I only remember from girlhood that our mangle was a washer, part of which were rollers that when fed the clothing thru, wrang them of washwater. I understand that the mangle was, tho, by itself an earlier form of a washer. Your own connection between 'pudend' and 'mangle'; viz, that whoring paid more than laundering, sounds at least plausible. But somehow it seems too clever to've had common use. And how do we, in any event, link "Has your mother sold the mangle yet?" to "wet behind the ears"? Maybe not at all. Only my strange fierce notion of a relationship, p'raps. I do wish to be a liddle dormouse in London at that time and hearing them say these phrases, not as now, having to depend upon the scribblers of the phrases. The speakers of "Has your mother sold her mangle" would've known its meaning, for goodness' sakes! Only wish WE did. Best, and thanks for the enlightened help, Judy >