Robert Christy, comp. Proverbs, Maxims and Phrases of All Ages. 1887.
Cow
A cow from afar gives plenty of milk.French.
A cow is not called dappled unless she has a spot.Danish.
A cow may catch a hare.
A cursed cow has short horns.
All is not butter that comes from a cow.
An ill cow may have a good calf.
Barley straw’s good fodder when the cow gives water.
Every cow licks her own calf.Servian.
He that owns the cow goes nearest her tail.Scotch.
He who recovers but the tail of his cow does not lose all.French.
If you buy the cow take the tail into the bargain.
If you sell the cow you sell her milk too.
It is by the head the cow gi’es milk. (By good feeding.)
It is not for the good of the cow when she is driven in a carriage.Danish.
It is not until the cow has lost her tail that she discovers its value.German.
It is the old cow’s notion that she never was a calf.French.
Let him who owns the cow take her by the tail.
Like the cow that gives a good pail of milk and then kicks it over.
Like Mrs. Peabody’s cow that drank all the swill and gave no milk.Gen. Jo. Geiger.
Loud in the loan was never a good milch cow.
Many a cow stands in the meadow and looks wistfully at the common.Danish.
Many a good cow has a bad calf.German.
Milk the cow but don’t pull off the udder.Dutch.
Of what use is it that the cow gives plenty of milk if she upset the pail.German.
The beadle’s cow may graze in the churchyard.German, Dutch.
The cow gives good milk but kicks over the pail.
The cow gives milk through her mouth. (As she is fed.)German.
The cow is milked, not the ox; the sheep is shorn, not the horse.Danish.
The cow licks no strange calf.
The cow that does not eat with the oxen, either eats before or after them.Gallician.
The cows that low most give the least milk.German.
The cow that’s first up gets the first o’ the dew.
The day is sure to come when the cow will want her tail.Danish.
The laggard cow gets the sour grass.Danish.
’Tis well that wicked cows have short horns.Dutch.
To come home like the parson’s cow with a calf at her foot.