Prepare to cut recitations, cut prayers, cut lectures,—ay, to cut even the President himself.—Oration before H.L. of I.O. of O.F. 1848.
Next morn he cuts his maiden prayer, to his last night's text abiding.—Poem before Y.H. of Harv. Coll., 1849.
As soon as we were Seniors,
We cut the morning prayers,
We showed the Freshmen to the door,
And helped them down the stairs.
Presentation Day Songs, June 15, 1854.
We speak not of individuals but of majorities, not of him whose ambition is to "cut" prayers and recitations so far as possible. —Williams Quarterly, Vol. II. p. 15.
The two rudimentary lectures which he was at first forced to attend, are now pressed less earnestly upon his notice. In fact, he can almost entirely "cut" them, if he likes, and does cut them accordingly, as a waste of time,—Household Words, Vol. II. p. 160.
To cut dead, in student use, to neglect entirely.
I cut the Algebra and Trigonometry papers dead my first year, and came out seventh.—Bristed's Five Years in an Eng. Univ., Ed. 2d, p. 51.
This word is much used in the University of Cambridge, England, as appears from the following extract from a letter in the Gentleman's Magazine, written with reference to some of the customs there observed:—"I remarked, also, that they frequently used the words to cut, and to sport, in senses to me totally unintelligible. A man had been cut in chapel, cut at afternoon lectures, cut in his tutor's rooms, cut at a concert, cut at a ball, &c. Soon, however, I was told of men, vice versa, who cut a figure, cut chapel, cut gates, cut lectures, cut hall, cut examinations, cut particular connections; nay, more, I was informed of some who cut their tutors!"—Gent. Mag., 1794, p. 1085.
The instances in which the verb to cut is used in the above extract without Italics, are now very common both in England and America.
To cut Gates. To enter college after ten o'clock,—the hour of shutting them.—Gradus ad Cantab., p. 40.