E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Figs.
I shan’t buy my Attic figs in future, but grow them. Don’t count your chickens before they are hatched. It was Xerxes who boasted that he did not intend any longer to buy his figs, because he meant to conquer Att’ica and add it to his own empire; but Xerxes met a signal defeat at Sal’amis, and “never loosed his sandal till he reached Abde’ra.”
1
“In the name of the Prophet, Figs!” A burlesque of the solemn language employed in eastern countries in the common business of life. The line occurs in the imitation of Dr. Johnson’s pompous style, in Rejected Addresses, by James and Horace Smith.
