Milord

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In the nineteenth century, milord (also milor) was well-known as a word which continental Europeans (especially French) whose jobs often brought them into contact with travellers (innkeepers, guides, etc.) commonly used to address Englishmen or male English-speakers who seemed to be upper-class (or whom they wished to flatter) — even though the English-language phrase "my lord" (the source of "milord") played a somewhat minor role in the British system of honorific forms of address, and most of those addressed as "milord" were not in fact proper "lords" (members of the nobility) at all. The word "milord" was occasionally borrowed back into the English language in order to be used as a sarcastic or jocular reference to British travellers abroad.

[edit] Milord, the Chanson

Milord or Ombre de la Rue is a 1959 song (lyrics by Georges Moustaki, music by Marguerite Monnot), famously sung by Édith Piaf. It recounts the feelings of a lower-class "girl of the port" (perhaps a prostitute) who develops a crush on an elegantly attired apparent upper-class British traveller (or "milord"), whom she has seen walking the streets of the town several times (with a beautiful young woman on his arm), but who hasn't even noticed her. The singer feels that she is nothing more than a "shadow of the street" (ombre de la rue).