ride and tie

present singular third person rides and ties · participle present riding and tying · past rode and tied · participle past ridden and tied

1. To take turns with another in labour and rest.

   […] the music of the duet is flexible and sweet, and the bass and tenor progress with it not in the ride-and-tie fashion but marking time with the title-syllable.

   1906, Theron Brown, Hezekiah Butterworth, “Come”, in The Story of the Hymns and Tunes, New York: American Tract Society, page 453

   4 more examples

   Mr. Adams discharged the Bill, and they were both setting out, having agreed to ride and tie: a Method of travelling much used by Persons who have but one Horse between them […]

   1742, Henry Fielding, Joseph Andrews, 3rd edition, London: A. Millar, published 1743, Volume 1, Book 2, Chapter 2, p. 100

   If those who vote the supplies are the same persons who receive the supplies when voted, and are to account for the expenditure of those supplies to those who voted them, it is themselves accountable to themselves, and the Comedy of Errors concludes with the Pantomine of HUSH. Neither the ministerial party, nor the opposition, will touch upon this case. The national purse is the common hack which each mounts upon. It is like what the country people call, Ride and tie—You ride a little way, and then I.

   1791, Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, London: J.S. Jordan, page 64

   “I see you are main willing, your honour, to hear what daddy Dennison says,” cried Jonathan, who had returned into the chamber with Jerom—“and I,” exclaimed the latter, “will read it, were it as cramp and crooked as our own.” “Aye we’ll make him out I warrant,” answered Jerom, “an if it be long, why we can ride and tie you know, cousin. You a bit and I a bit.”

   1797, Samuel Jackson Pratt, chapter 33, in Family Secrets, volume 5, London: T.N. Longman, page 274

   1941, Mary Grayson, interviewed in A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves, Washington: Library of Congress, Volume 13, Oklahoma Narratives, p. 122, After three or four days of walking we came across some more Negroes who had a horse, and mammy paid them to let us children ride and tie with their children for a day or two.

2. To ride an animal and travel on foot alternately.