Hole-and-corner

I love words. I love the English language. I used to just randomly open the dictionary. Today, for reasons I don't even remember, I checked Merriam-Webster's thesaurus for secret. This was one of the synonyms:

hole-and-corner

as in clandestine

undertaken or done so as to escape being observed or known by others

They give a recent example of its usage:

"a hole-and-corner antiterrorist operation whose very existence has been steadfastly denied by the government"

I had NEVER fucking heard of hole-and-corner. M-W doesn't give the etymology, noting only that it came into existence in 1833. I assume like hiding in a hole and behind a corner, clandestine-like.

And then of course there is the possibility (?) probability (?) that it owes its existence to the cornhole, "anus (in the context of anal sex)". A hole-and-corner cornholer? Yeah, that's just coincidence.🙄