touching the hem of someone's garment

Verb

touch the hem of someone's garment (third-person singular simple present touches the hem of someone's garment, present participle touching the hem of someone's garment, simple past and past participle touched the hem of someone's garment)

1. (idiomatic) To give respect or reverence to someone; to express servitude to someone; to draw strength or comfort from someone who is superior.
   • Thus, at peace with God and the world, the farmer of Grand-Pré
     Lived on his sunny farm, and Evangeline governed his household.
     Many a youth, as he knelt in the church and opened his missal,
     Fixed his eyes upon her, as the saint of his deepest devotion;
     Happy was he who might touch her hand or the...1847 November 1, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, chapter 1, in Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie, Boston, Mass.: William D. Ticknor & Company, →OCLC, part I