Call-of-nature
a need to urinate or defecate.
Need to urinate or defecate, as in He left to answer the call of nature. This euphemism may be dying out. [ Mid-1800s ]
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- Call-number
a number, letter, symbol, or combination of these, indicating the specific location of a work in a library, especially the combination of the classification symbol and the designation for the author. Historical Examples Papers and Proceedings of the Thirty-fourth Annual Meeting of the American Library Association Held at Ottawa, Canada June 26-July 2, 1912 Various […]
- Call-of-duty
see under above and beyond
- Call-of-the-wild
a novel (1903) by Jack London.
- Call-off-the-dogs
call off the dogs
- Call-on-the-carpet
Summon for a scolding or rebuke, as in Suspecting a leak to the press, the governor called his press secretary on the carpet. This term began as on the carpet, which in the early 1700s referred to a cloth (carpet) covering a conference table and therefore came to mean “under consideration or discussion.” In 19th-century […]