E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Rascal.
Originally applied in the chase to a lean, worthless deer, then a collective term for the commonalty, the mob; and popularly to a base fellow. Shakespeare says, “Horns! the noblest deer hath them as huge as the rascal” [deer]. Palsgrave calls a starveling animal, like the lean kine of Pharaoh, “a rascall refus beest” (1530). The French have racaille (riff-raff).
1
“Come, you thin thing; come, you rascal.”—Shakespeare: 2 Henry IV., v. 4.
