do duty

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Having reached Safeway with no fatalities, Stassin and I ordered our respective Loomos to trail us, so that they could do duty as shopping carts.

From The New Yorker • Nov. 19, 2018

Can Chang do duty on The Times' editorial pages?

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 29, 2017

Jones' Ospreys back-up Craig Mitchell, James and John Yapp are candidates to do duty on the tight-head of the scrum during the tournament.

From BBC • Jan. 20, 2011

There the voyagers were sorely attacked with scurvy which thinned their numbers to such an extent, that, of the whole, only six were able to do duty.

From Mexico, Aztec, Spanish and Republican Vol. 1 of 2 A Historical, Geographical, Political, Statistical and Social Account of That Country From the Period of the Invasion by the Spaniards to the Present Time; With a View of the Ancient Aztec Empire and Civilization; A Historical Sketch of the Late War; And Notices of New Mexico and California by Mayer, Brantz

After all, any phase of Art does but express the mind of its day, and it cannot do duty for the mind of another time.

From Garden-Craft Old and New by Sedding, John D.