one-horse

comparative more one-horse · superlative most one-horse

1. Drawn or worked by a single horse.

   Oh what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh!

   1857, James Lord Pierpont, One Horse Open Sleigh (Jingle Bells)

   2 more examples

   He constructed a one-horse plough for me about two years ago, which only weighs 581b., for planting potatoes.

   1839, British Farmer's Magazine - Volume 3, page 84

   Come to the wagon business I may have a pole put in front of that one-horse wagon and hitch em both to it.

   2013, Theodore Rosengarten, All God's Dangers

2. Having no competitor.
3. broadlySmall, insignificant.

   The Great Powers never think of us as a one-horse state.

   2014, James A. Michener, A. Grove Day, Rascals in Paradise, page 132

   3 more examples

   Let us have no one-horse candidate for the Presidency. General Grant is the man.

   1871, The Catholic Record - Volumes 1-2, page 47

   A Nestor may reappear as an elderly pedagogue, a Circe as the "Madam" of a one-horse brothel.

   1922, James Joyce, Ulysses

   Going from its one-horse hotel, to the model hotel of Philadelphia, was almost too sudden a change even for my excellent constitution.

   2016, Fanny Fern, Folly as It Flies, page 112