APAD: Hold with the hare and run with the hounds

Meaning:

    To deceitfully purport to remain on good terms with both sides in a conflict.

 

Background:

   The proverbial saying `hold with the hare...' is first found in John

   Heywood's 1546 glossary ``A Dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the

   Prouerbes in the Englishe tongue'':

 

     There is no mo [more] suche tytifils [scoundrels] in Englands grounde,

     To holde with the hare, and run with the hounde.

 

   When Heywood coined (or more probably, heard and then wrote down) `hold with

   the hare and run with the hounds' hare coursing was a commonplace form of

   hunting for food. In more recent years it was undertaken for the

   entertainment of the onlookers. It is now illegal in the UK, although it

   still takes place. The `holding' refers to the hare's tactic of pressing

   itself low to the ground to avoid being seen, only bolting at the last

   moment.

 

   The notion that one can't legitimately support both sides of an argument is

   graphically illustrated by the hare/hounds imagery as there is no grey area -

   either the hare gets away or it is killed.

 

- www.phrases.org.uk [edited]

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Some Kuomintang officials held with the hare and ran with the hounds by working

for the party on the sides. They did not follow Mr. Chiang to Taiwan and stayed

to suffer and, indeed, few survived the endless political campaigns on the

mainland after 1949.