The devil a barrel the better herring, phr. (old).—All bad alike.—Lex. Bal. In modern American, all alike; indistinguishable. Cf., Sardine.
Herring-gutted, adj. (old).—Lanky; thin.—Grose.
Herring-pond, subs. (common).—The sea; specifically, the North Atlantic Ocean. See Briny and Puddle. To be sent across the herring-pond = to be transported.
1722. England’s Path to Wealth. ’Tis odds but a finer country, cheaper and better food and raiment, wholesomer air, easier rents and taxes, will tempt many of your countrymen to cross the herring-pond.
1729. Gay, Polly, i., 1. Bless us all! how little are our customs known on this side the herring pond! [[306]]
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1823. Bee, Dict. Turf, etc., s.v. Herring-pond—the sea, the Atlantic; and he who is gone across it is said to be lagged, or gone a Botanizing.
1830. Lytton, Paul Clifford, p. 256, ed. 1854. You’re too old a hand for the herring-pond.
1864. M. E. Braddon, Henry Dunbar, ch. xxv. You’re not going to run away? You’re not going to renounce the pomps and vanities of this wicked world, and make an early expedition across the herring-pond—eh?
1884. Phillipps-Woolley, Trottings of a Tenderfoot. Everyone nowadays has read as much as he or she cares to about the voyage across the herring-pond.