E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Chalk.
I’ll chalk out your path for you—i.e. lay it down or plan it out as a carpenter or ship-builder plans out his work with a piece of chalk.
1
I can walk a chalk as well as you. I am no more drunk than you are. The allusion is to the ordeal on board ship of trying men suspected of drunkenness. They were required to walk along a line chalked on the deck, without deviating to the right or left.
2
The tapster is undone by chalk, i.e. credit. The allusion is to scoring up credit on a tally with chalk. This was common enough early in the nineteenth century, when milk scores, bread scores, as well as beer scores were general.
3
Chalk it up. Put it to his credit.
4
As good-humoured sarcasm, Chalk it up! is tantamount to saying, “What you have done so astonishes me that I must make some more or less permanent record of it.”
As good-humoured sarcasm, Chalk it up! is tantamount to saying, “What you have done so astonishes me that I must make some more or less permanent record of it.”
