tail between one's legs

From the body posture of a dog that is worried or frightened.

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tail between one's legs

1. Defeated; in a cowardly or miserable manner.

   He came back home, tail between his legs.

   • 1919, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, chapter XV, in The Moon and Sixpence, [New York, N.Y.]: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers […], →OCLC:

     "I wouldn't do that," said Mrs. MacAndrew. "I'd give him all the rope he wants. He'll come back with his tail between his legs and settle down again quite comfortably."

   • 1973, Henri Guillemin, translated by Harold J. Salemson, “Recertification”, in Joan, Maid of Orléans, New York, N.Y.: Saturday Review Press, →ISBN, page 223:

     He [John du Lys] told the city fathers that Charles VII had promised him a hundred livres but the Royal Treasurer, either misinformed or dishonest, had given him only twenty; so he was requesting the balance of eighty from the municipality. He got only twelve, and went off with his tail between his legs.

   • 2023 February 27, Elle Hunt, quoting Kelsey Grammer, “‘Don’t make Frasier best friends with Elon Musk!’ Writers and comics offer their reboot tips”, in The Guardian‎^[1], →ISSN:

     After 11 seasons set in Seattle […] Frasier is returning to Boston, to reconquer his old Cheers-era stomping ground. “He left with his tail between his legs a little bit,” Grammer said in a recent interview.

2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see tail,‎ between,‎ one's,‎ legs.
   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], page 144:

     Oft haue I ſeene a hot ore-weening Curre / Run backe and bite, becauſe he was with-held, / Who being ſuffer'd with the Beares fell paw, / Hath clapt his taile, between his legges and cride,

• Usually with one’s tail between one’s legs.

• “with your tail between your legs” (US) / “with your tail between your legs” (UK) in Macmillan English Dictionary.
• “tail between one’s legs”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “with one’s tail between one’s legs”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “*tail between*legs”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.