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What is the meaning of the term "feather merchant." Is it derisive? Is it from Shakespeare?
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stranger
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stranger
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 I don't know the etymology of feather merchant, but  the meaning is, (slang) a person who avoids responsibility and effort; loafer; slacker.
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Carpal Tunnel
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The first time I ever saw "feather merchant" in was in a comic strip in the early forties. Maybe Snuffy Smith, I'm not sure. It was a derisive term, and began to be used for people advocating dumb ideas, and also to refer to corrupt defence contractors.
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Carpal Tunnel
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I've never heard "to feather one's cap". I have heard "to feather one's nest" and (in WW's sense) "a feather in his cap".
Perhaps the last relates to a period when ostrich feathers were the fashion craze among well-dressed ladies? But why "cap"?
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addict
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addict
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Was there a time that the more feathers one had sticking out of one's hat meant one was self-promoting?
Many cultures have used the presence of feathers or other materials attached to one's headpiece to signify importance and/or seniority. The traditional inhabitants of the Americas would be the most famous for their feathers, and seniority in the Roman armies was demonstrated by the length of a soldier's reed(s, which were attached to the front of the helmet).
Placing feathers on one's own head, or adding longer reeds would be a definite no-no, and I doubt it ever happened. The saying is metaphorical and probably derived from this ancient practice.
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Welcome Longwell, re:(slang) a person who avoids responsibility and effort; loafer; slacker.
there is also the feather term, used in UK, and someone there will have to get it right for me..
"Wearing a white feather" or "taking a white feather"-- i have heard the idiom, and i know it is used to describe young men who failed to enlist in the armed services (at a time of war) fast enough to suit some people. the meaning at it mildest was slacker, at it worst, coward.
i don' t think is was ever used this side of the pond.
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Welcome Longwell, re:(slang) a person who avoids responsibility and effort; loafer; slacker.
there is also the feather term, used in UK, and someone there will have to get it right for me..
"Wearing a white feather" or "taking a white feather"-- i have heard the idiom, and i know it is used to describe young men who failed to enlist in the armed services (at a time of war) fast enough to suit some people. the meaning at it mildest was slacker, at it worst, coward.
i don' t think is was ever used this side of the pond.
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I think Longwell's, well, long gone, Helen Yes, the white feather was used by kindly and caring females as a badge of cowardice: to denigrate anyone of killable age of the other gender who was failing in their obvious duty to be killed or maimed in the Flanders swamp of the First World War. I am just reading Pat Barker's wonderful trilogy about these times - review to follow!
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