led captain

led captain (plural led captains)

1. (obsolete) An obsequious sidekick
   • January 8 1733, Jonathan Swift, letter to Lady Betty Germain

     Mr. Pope (with whom I lived) and Mr. Gay were then great favourites of Mrs. Howard, especially the latter, who was then one of her led-captains.

   • 1777, The Laughing Philosopher:

     We hardly ſee a poor Peer, or a debilitated Knight, without his Toad-eater and Led-Captain; a Thing devoted to ſmile when he ſmiles, laugh loud when he does, and entertain his gueſts by ſubmitting himself to be the butt and jeſt of his keeper.

• “led”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• pedantical