1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue

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PREFACE.


Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team


1811 DICTIONARY OF THE VULGAR TONGUE.

              A
          DICTIONARY
             OF
BUCKISH SLANG, UNIVERSITY WIT,
            AND
     PICKPOCKET ELOQUENCE.


UNABRIDGED FROM THE ORIGINAL 1811 EDITION WITH A FOREWORD BY
ROBERT CROMIE

COMPILED ORIGINALLY BY CAPTAIN GROSE.

AND NOW CONSIDERABLY ALTERED AND ENLARGED, WITH THE MODERN
CHANGES AND IMPROVEMENTS, BY A MEMBER OF THE WHIP CLUB.

ASSISTED BY HELL-FIRE DICK, AND JAMES GORDON, ESQRS. OF
CAMBRIDGE; AND WILLIAM
SOAMES, ESQ. OF THE HON. SOCIETY OF NEWMAN'S HOTEL.

PREFACE.

The merit of Captain Grose's Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue has been long and universally acknowledged. But its circulation was confined almost exclusively to the lower orders of society: he was not aware, at the time of its compilation, that our young men of fashion would at no very distant period be as distinguished for the vulgarity of their jargon as the inhabitants of Newgate; and he therefore conceived it superfluous to incorporate with his work the few examples of fashionable slang that might occur to his observation.

But our Jehus of rank have a phraseology not less peculiar to themselves, than the disciples of Barrington: for the uninitiated to understand their modes of expression, is as impossible as for a Buxton to construe the Greek Testament. To sport an Upper Benjamin, and to swear with a good grace, are qualifications easily attainable by their cockney imitators; but without the aid of our additional definitions, neither the cits of Fish-street, nor the boors of Brentford would be able to attain the language of whippism. We trust, therefore, that the whole tribe of second- rate Bang Ups, will feel grateful for our endeavour to render this part of the work as complete as possible. By an occasional reference to our pages, they may be initiated into all the peculiarities of language by which the man of spirit is distinguished from the man of worth. They may now talk bawdy before their papas, without the fear of detection, and abuse their less spirited companions, who prefer a good dinner at home to a glorious UP-SHOT in the highway, without the hazard of a cudgelling.

But we claim not merely the praise of gratifying curiosity, or affording assistance to the ambitious; we are very sure that the moral influence of the Lexicon Balatronicum will be more certain and extensive than that of any methodist sermon that has ever been delivered within the bills of mortality. We need not descant on the dangerous impressions that are made on the female mind, by the remarks that fall incidentally from the lips of the brothers or servants of a family; and we have before observed, that improper topics can with our assistance be discussed, even before the ladies, without raising a blush on the cheek of modesty. It is impossible that a female should understand the meaning of TWIDDLE DIDDLES, or rise from table at the mention of BUCKINGER'S BOOT. Besides, Pope assures us, that "VICE TO BE HATED NEEDS BUT TO BE SEEN;" in this volume it cannot be denied, that she is seen very plainly; and a love of virtue is, therefore, the necessary result of perusing it.

The propriety of introducing the UNIVERSITY SLANG will be readily admitted; it is not less curious than that of the College in the Old Bailey, and is less generally understood. When the number and accuracy of our additions are compared with the price of the volume, we have no doubt that its editors will meet with the encouragement that is due to learning, modesty, and virtue.

DICTIONARY OF THE VULGAR TONGUE.

A

ABBESS, or LADY ABBESS, A bawd, the mistress of a
brothel.

ABEL-WACKETS. Blows given on the palm of the hand
  with a twisted handkerchief, instead of a ferula; a jocular
  punishment among seamen, who sometimes play at cards
  for wackets, the loser suffering as many strokes as he has
  lost games.

ABIGAIL. A lady's waiting-maid.

ABRAM. Naked. CANT.

ABRAM COVE. A cant word among thieves, signifying a
naked or poor man; also a lusty, strong rogue.

ABRAM MEN. Pretended mad men.

TO SHAM ABRAM. To pretend sickness.

ACADEMY, or PUSHING SCHOOL. A brothel. The Floating
  Academy; the lighters on board of which those persons
  are confined, who by a late regulation are condemned to
  hard labour, instead of transportation.—Campbell's
  Academy; the same, from a gentleman of that name, who had
  the contract for victualling the hulks or lighters.

ACE OF SPADES. A widow.

ACCOUNTS. To cast up one's accounts; to vomit.

ACORN. You will ride a horse foaled by an acorn, i.e. the
gallows, called also the Wooden and Three-legged Mare.
You will be hanged.—See THREE-LEGGED MARE.

ACT OF PARLIAMENT. A military term for small beer, five
pints of which, by an act of parliament, a landlord was
formerly obliged to give to each soldier gratis.

ACTEON. A cuckold, from the horns planted on the head
of Acteon by Diana.

ACTIVE CITIZEN. A louse.

ADAM'S ALE. Water.

ADAM TILER. A pickpocket's associate, who receives the
stolen goods, and runs off with them. CANT.

ADDLE PATE. An inconsiderate foolish fellow.

ADDLE PLOT. A spoil-sport, a mar-all.

ADMIRAL OF THE BLUE, who carries his flag on the main-mast.
A landlord or publican wearing a blue apron, as
was formerly the custom among gentlemen of that vocation.

ADMIRAL OF THE NARROW SEAS. One who from drunkenness
vomits into the lap of the person sitting opposite to
him. SEA PHRASE.

ADRIFT. Loose, turned adrift, discharged. SEA PHRASE.

AEGROTAT, (CAMBRIDGE), A certificate from the apothecary
  that you are INDISPOSED, (i. e.) to go to chapel. He
  sports an Aegrotat, he is sick, and unable to attend Chapel.
  or Hall. It does not follow, however, but that he can STRUM
  A PIECE, or sport a pair of oars.

AFFIDAVIT MEN. Knights of the post, or false witnesses,
said to attend Westminster Hall, and other courts of
justice, ready to swear any thing for hire.

AFTER-CLAP. A demand after the first given in has been
  discharged; a charge for pretended omissions; in short,
  any thing disagreeable happening after all consequences of
  the cause have been thought at an end.

AGAINST THE GRAIN. Unwilling. It went much against
the grain with him, i.e. it was much against his
inclination, or against his pluck.

AGOG, ALL-A-GOG. Anxious, eager, impatient: from the
Italian AGOGARE, to desire eagerly.

AGROUND. Stuck fast, stopped, at a loss, ruined; like a
boat or vessel aground.

AIR AND EXERCISE. He has had air and exercise, i.e. he
has been whipped at the cart's tail; or, as it is generally,
though more vulgarly, expressed, at the cart's a-se.

ALDERMAN. A roasted turkey garnished with sausages;
the latter are supposed to represent the gold chain worn
by those magistrates.

ALDGATE. A draught on the pump at Aldgate; a bad bill
of exchange, drawn on persons who have no effects of the
drawer.

ALE DRAPER. An alehouse keeper.

ALE POST. A may-pole.

ALL-A-MORT. Struck dumb, confounded. What, sweet
one, all-a-mort? SHAKESPEARE.

ALL HOLIDAY. It is all holiday at Peckham, or it is all holiday
with him; a saying signifying that it is all over
with the business or person spoken of or alluded to.

ALL HOLLOW. He was beat all hollow, i.e. he had no
chance of conquering: it was all hollow, or a hollow thing,
it was a decided thing from the beginning. See HOLLOW.

ALL NATIONS. A composition of all the different spirits
sold in a dram-shop, collected in a vessel into which
the drainings of the bottles and quartern pots are emptied.

ALLS. The five alls is a country sign, representing five human
  figures, each having a motto under him. The first
  is a king in his regalia; his motto, I govern all: the second,
  a bishop in pontificals; motto, I pray for all: third,
  a lawyer in his gown; motto, I plead for all: fourth: a
  soldier in his regimentals, fully accoutred; motto, I
  fight for all: fifth, a poor countryman with his scythe
  and rake; motto, I pay for all.

ALTAMEL. A verbal or lump account, without particulars,
such as is commonly produced at bawdy-houses,
spunging-houses, Vide DUTCH RECKONING.

ALTITUDES. The man is in his altitudes, i.e. he is drunk.

AMBASSADOR. A trick to duck some ignorant fellow or
  landsman, frequently played on board ships in the warm
  latitudes. It is thus managed: A large tub is filled with
  water, and two stools placed on each side of it. Over
  the whole is thrown a tarpaulin, or old sail: this is
  kept tight by two persons, who are to represent the king
  and queen of a foreign country, and are seated on the
  stools. The person intended to be ducked plays the Ambassador,
  and after repeating a ridiculous speech dictated
  to him, is led in great form up to the throne, and seated
  between the king and queen, who rising suddenly as soon
  as he is seated, he falls backwards into the tub of water.

AMBASSADOR OF MOROCCO. A Shoemaker. (See Mrs.
Clarke's Examination.)

AMBIDEXTER. A lawyer who takes fees from both plaintiff
and defendant, or that goes snacks with both parties
in gaming.

AMEN CURLER. A parish clerk.

AMEN. He said Yes and Amen to every thing; he agreed to
every thing.

AMINADAB. A jeering name for a Quaker.

AMES ACE. Within ames ace; nearly, very near.

TO AMUSE. To fling dust or snuff in the eyes of the person
  intended to be robbed; also to invent some plausible tale,
  to delude shop-keepers and others, thereby to put them
  off their guard. CANT.

AMUSERS. Rogues who carried snuff or dust in their pockets,
  which they threw into the eyes of any person they
  intended to rob; and running away, their accomplices
  (pretending to assist and pity the half-blinded person)
  took that opportunity of plundering him.

ANABAPTIST. A pickpocket caught in the fact, and punished
with the discipline of the pump or horse-pond.

ANCHOR. Bring your a-se to an anchor, i.e. sit down. To let
go an anchor to the windward of the law; to keep within
the letter of the law. SEA WIT.

ANGLERS. Pilferers, or petty thieves, who, with a stick
  having a hook at the end, steal goods out of shop-windows,
  grates, also those who draw in or entice unwary persons
  to prick at the belt, or such like devices.

ANGLING FOR FARTHINGS. Begging out of a prison window
with a cap, or box, let down at the end of a long
string.

ANKLE. A girl who is got with child, is said to have sprained
her ankle.

ANODYNE NECKLACE. A halter.

ANTHONY or TANTONY PIG. The favourite or smallest pig
  in the litter.—To follow like a tantony pig, i.e. St.
  Anthony's pig; to follow close at one's heels. St. Anthony
  the hermit was a swineherd, and is always represented
  with a swine's bell and a pig. Some derive this saying
  from a privilege enjoyed by the friars of certain convents
  in England and France (sons of St. Anthony), whose swine
  were permitted to feed in the streets. These swine would
  follow any one having greens or other provisions, till they
  obtained some of them; and it was in those days considered
  an act of charity and religion to feed them.

TO KNOCK ANTHONY. Said of an in-kneed person, or one
whose knees knock together; to cuff Jonas. See JONAS.

APE LEADER. An old maid; their punishment after
death, for neglecting increase and multiply, will be, it is
said, leading apes in hell.

APOSTLES. To manoeuvre the apostles, i.e. rob Peter to
pay Paul; that is, to borrow money of one man to pay
another.

APOSTLES. (CAMBRIDGE.) Men who are plucked, refused
their degree.

APOTHECARY. To talk like an apothecary; to use hard or
  gallipot words: from the assumed gravity and affectation
  of knowledge generally put on by the gentlemen of this
  profession, who are commonly as superficial in their
  learning as they are pedantic in their language.

APOTHECARY'S BILL. A long bill.

APOTHECARY'S, or LAW LATIN. Barbarous Latin, vulgarly
called Dog Latin, in Ireland Bog Latin.

APPLE CART. Down with his apple-cart; knock or throw
him down.

APPLE DUMPLIN SHOP. A woman's bosom.

APPLE-PYE BED. A bed made apple-pye fashion, like what
  is called a turnover apple-pye, where the sheets are so
  doubled as to prevent any one from getting at his length
  between them: a common trick played by frolicsome
  country lasses on their sweethearts, male relations, or
  visitors.

APRIL FOOL. Any one imposed on, or sent on a bootless
  errand, on the first of April; which day it is the custom
  among the lower people, children, and servants, by dropping
  empty papers carefully doubled up, sending persons
  on absurd messages, and such like contrivances, to impose
  on every one they can, and then to salute them with
  the title of April Fool. This is also practised in
  Scotland under the title of Hunting the Gowke.

APRON STRING HOLD. An estate held by a man during
his wife's life.

AQUA PUMPAGINIS. Pump water. APOTHECARIES LATIN.

ARBOR VITAE. A man's penis.

ARCH DUKE. A comical or eccentric fellow.

ARCH ROGUE, DIMBER DAMBER UPRIGHT MAN. The
chief of a gang of thieves or gypsies.

ARCH DELL, or ARCH DOXY, signifies the same in rank
among the female canters or gypsies.

ARD. Hot. CANT.

ARMOUR. In his armour, pot valiant: to fight in armour;
to make use of Mrs. Philips's ware. See C—D—M.

ARK. A boat or wherry. Let us take an ark and winns, let
us take a sculler. CANT.

ARK RUFFIANS. Rogues who, in conjunction with watermen,
  robbed, and sometimes murdered, on the water, by
  picking a quarrel with the passengers in a boat, boarding
  it, plundering, stripping, and throwing them overboard,   A species of badger. CANT.

ARRAH NOW. An unmeaning expletive, frequently used by
the vulgar Irish.

ARS MUSICA. A bum fiddlle.

ARSE. To hang an arse; to hang back, to be afraid to
  advance. He would lend his a-e and sh-te through his ribs;
  a saying of any one who lends his money inconsiderately.
  He would lose his a-e if it was loose; said of a careless
  person. A-e about; turn round.

ARSY YARSEY. To fall arsy varsey, i.e. head over heels.

ARTHUR, KING ARTHUR, A game used at sea, when near
  the line, or in a hot latitude. It is performed thus: A man
  who is to represent king Arthur, ridiculously dressed,
  having a large wig made out of oakum, or some old swabs, is
  seated on the side, or over a large vessel of water. Every
  person in his turn is to be ceremoniously introduced to
  him, and to pour a bucket of water over him, crying,
  hail, king Arthur! if during this ceremony the person
  introduced laughs or smiles (to which his majesty endeavours
  to excite him, by all sorts of ridiculous gesticulations), he
  changes place with, and then becomes, king Arthur, till
  relieved by some brother tar, who has as little command
  over his muscles as himself.

ARTICLES. Breeches; coat, waistcoat, and articles.

ARTICLE. A wench. A prime article. A handsome girl.
She's a prime article (WHIP SLANG), she's a devilish good
piece, a hell of a GOER.

ASK, or AX MY A-E. A common reply to any question;
still deemed wit at sea, and formerly at court, under the
denomination of selling bargains. See BARGAIN.

ASSIG. An assignation.

ATHANASIAN WENCH, or QUICUNQUE VULT. A forward
girl, ready to oblige every man that shall ask her.

AUNT. Mine aunt; a bawd or procuress: a title of eminence
for the senior dells, who serve for instructresses, midwives,
for the dells. CANT. See DELLS.

AVOIR DU POIS LAY. Stealing brass weights off the counters
of shops. CANT.

AUTEM. A church.

AUTEM BAWLER. A parson. CANT.

AUTEM CACKLERS, AUTEM PRICKEARS. Dissenters of every
denomination. CANT.

AUTEM CACKLETUB. A conventicle or meeting-house for
dissenters. CANT.

AUTEM DIPPERS. Anabaptists. CANT.

AUTEM DIVERS. Pickpockets who practice in churches;
also churchwardens and overseers of the poor. CANT.

AUTEM GOGLERS. Pretended French prophets. CANT.

AUTEM MORT. A married woman; also a female beggar
with several children hired or borrowed to excite charity.
CANT.

AUTEM QUAVERS. Quakers.

AUTEM QUAVER TUB. A Quakers' meeting-house. CANT.

AWAKE. Acquainted with, knowing the business. Stow the
books, the culls are awake; hide the cards, the fellows
know what we intended to do.

B

BABES IN THE WOOD. Criminals in the stocks, or pillory.

BABBLE. Confused, unintelligible talk, such as was used at
the building the tower of Babel.

BACK BITER. One who slanders another behind his back,
i.e. in his absence. His bosom friends are become his back
biters, said of a lousy man.

BACKED. Dead. He wishes to have the senior, or old
square-toes, backed; he longs to have his father on six
men's shoulders; that is, carrying to the grave.

BACK UP. His back is up, i.e. he is offended or angry; an
  expression or idea taken from a cat; that animal, when
  angry, always raising its back. An allusion also sometimes
  used to jeer a crooked man; as, So, Sir, I see somebody
  has offended you, for your back is up.

BACON. He has saved his bacon; he has escaped. He has a
good voice to beg bacon; a saying in ridicule of a bad voice.

BACON-FACED. Full-faced.

BACON FED. Fat, greasy.

BACK GAMMON PLAYER. A sodomite.

BACK DOOR (USHER, or GENTLEMAN OF THE). The same.

BAD BARGAIN. One of his majesty's bad bargains; a
worthless soldier, a malingeror. See MALINGEROR.

BADGE. A term used for one burned in the hand. He has got
his badge, and piked; he was burned in the hand, and is
at liberty. Cant.

BADGE-COVES. Parish Pensioners. Cant.

BADGERS. A crew of desperate villains who robbed near
rivers, into which they threw the bodies of those they
murdered. Cant.

BAG. He gave them the bag, i.e. left them.

BAG OF NAILS. He squints like a bag of nails; i. e.
  his eyes are directed as many ways as the points of a bag
  of nails. The old BAG OF NAILS at Pimlico; originally
  the BACCHANALS.

BAGGAGE. Heavy baggage; women and children. Also a
familiar epithet for a woman; as, cunning baggage,
wanton baggage,

BAKERS DOZEN. Fourteen; that number of rolls being allowed
to the purchasers of a dozen.

BAKER-KNEE'D. One whose knees knock together in
walking, as if kneading dough.

BALDERDASH. Adulterated wine.

BALLOCKS. The testicles of a man or beast; also a vulgar
nick name for a parson. His brains are in his ballocks,
a cant saying to designate a fool.

BALUM RANCUM. A hop or dance, where the women are
all prostitutes. N. B. The company dance in their
birthday suits.

BALSAM. Money.

BAM. A jocular imposition, the same as a humbug. See
HUMBUG.

TO BAM. To impose on any one by a falsity; also to
jeer or make fun of any one.

TO BAMBOOZLE. To make a fool of any one, to humbug or
impose on him.

BANAGHAN. He beats Banaghan; an Irish saying of one
who tells wonderful stories. Perhaps Banaghan was a
minstrel famous for dealing in the marvellous.

BANDBOX. Mine a-se on a bandbox; an answer to the
offer of any thing inadequate to the purpose for which
it is proffered, like offering a bandbox for a seat.

BANBURY STORY OF A COCK AND A BULL. A roundabout,
nonsensical story.

BANDOG. A bailiff or his follower; also a very fierce
mastiff: likewise, a bandbox. CANT.

BANG UP. (WHIP.) Quite the thing, hellish fine. Well
  done. Compleat. Dashing. In a handsome stile.
  A bang up cove; a dashing fellow who spends his money
  freely. To bang up prime: to bring your horses up in a
  dashing or fine style: as the swell's rattler and prads are
  bang up prime; the gentleman sports an elegant carriage
  and fine horses.

TO BANG. To beat.

BANGING. Great; a fine banging boy.

BANG STRAW. A nick name for a thresher, but applied
to all the servants of a farmer.

BANKRUPT CART. A one-horse chaise, said to be so
  called by a Lord Chief Justice, from their being so
  frequently used on Sunday jaunts by extravagant
  shop-keepers and tradesmen.

BANKS'S HORSE. A horse famous for playing tricks, the
  property of one Banks. It is mentioned in Sir Walter
  Raleigh's Hist. of the World, p. 178; also by Sir
  Kenelm Digby and Ben Jonson.

BANTLING. A young child.

BANYAN DAY. A sea term for those days on which no
  meat is allowed to the sailors: the term is borrowed
  from the Banyans in the East Indies, a cast that eat
  nothing that had life.

BAPTIZED, OR CHRISTENED. Rum, brandy, or any other
spirits, that have been lowered with water.

BARBER'S CHAIR. She is as common as a barber's chair, in
which a whole parish sit to be trimmed; said of a prostitute.

BARBER'S SIGN. A standing pole and two wash balls.

BARGAIN. To sell a bargain; a species of wit, much in
  vogue about the latter end of the reign of Queen Anne,
  and frequently alluded to by Dean Swift, who says the
  maids of honour often amused themselves with it. It
  consisted in the seller naming his or her hinder parts, in
  answer to the question, What? which the buyer was
  artfully led to ask. As a specimen, take the following
  instance: A lady would come into a room full of company,
  apparently in a fright, crying out, It is white, and follows
  me! On any of the company asking, What? she sold
  him the bargain, by saying, Mine a-e.

BARGEES. (CAMBRIDGE.) Barge-men on the river.

BARKER. The shopman of a bow-wow shop, or dealer in
  second hand clothes, particularly about Monmouth-Street,
  who walks before his master's door, and deafens every
  passenger with his cries of—Clothes, coats, or gowns—what
  d'ye want, gemmen?—what d'ye buy? See BOW-WOW SHOP.

BARKSHIRE. A member or candidate for Barkshire, said of
one troubled with a cough, vulgarly styled barking.

BARKING IRONS. Pistols, from their explosion resembling
the bow-wow or barking of a dog. IRISH.

BARN. A parson's barn; never so full but there is still room,
for more. Bit by a barn mouse, tipsey, probably from an
allusion to barley.

BARNABY. An old dance to a quick movement. See Cotton,
in his Virgil Travesti; where, speaking of Eolus he has
these lines,

Bounce cry the port-holes, out they fly,
And make the world dance Barnaby.

BARNACLE. A good job, or snack easily got: also shellfish
  growing at the bottoms of ships; a bird of the goose
  kind; an instrument like a pair of pincers, to fix on the
  noses of vicious horses whilst shoeing; a nick name for
  spectacles, and also for the gratuity given to grooms by the
  buyers and sellers of horses.

BARREL FEVER. He died of the barrel fever; he killed
himself by drinking.

BARROW MAN. A man under sentence of transportation;
alluding to the convicts at Woolwich, who are principally
employed in wheeling barrows full of brick or dirt.

BARTHOLOMEW BABY. A person dressed up in a tawdry
manner, like the dolls or babies sold at Bartholomew fair.

BASKET. An exclamation frequently made use of in cock-pits,
  at cock-fightings, where persons refusing or unable
  to pay their losings, are adjudged by that respectable
  assembly to be put into a basket suspended over the pit, there
  to remain during that day's diversion: on the least demur
  to pay a bet, Basket is vociferated in terrorem. He grins
  like a basket of chips: a saying of one who is on the broad
  grin.

BASKET-MAKING. The good old trade of basket-making;
copulation, or making feet for children's stockings.

BASTARD. The child of an unmarried woman.

BASTARDLY GULLION. A bastard's bastard.

TO BASTE. To beat. I'll give him his bastings, I'll beat
him heartily.

BASTING. A beating.

BASTONADING. Beating any one with a stick; from baton,
a stick, formerly spelt baston.

BAT. A low whore: so called from moving out like bats in
the dusk of the evening.

BATCH. We had a pretty batch of it last night; we had a
hearty dose of liquor. Batch originally means the whole
quantity of bread baked at one time in an oven.

BATTNER. An ox: beef being apt to batten or fatten those
that eat it. The cove has hushed the battner; i.e. has
killed the ox.

BATCHELOR'S FARE. Bread and cheese and kisses.

BATCHELOR'S SON. A bastard.

BATTLE-ROYAL. A battle or bout at cudgels or fisty-cuffs,
  wherein more than two persons are engaged: perhaps from
  its resemblance, in that particular, to more serious
  engagements fought to settle royal disputes.

BAWBEE. A halfpenny. Scotch.

BAWBELS, or BAWBLES. Trinkets; a man's testicles.

BAWD. A female procuress.

BAWDY BASKET. The twenty-third rank of canters, who
carry pins, tape, ballads, and obscene books to sell, but live
mostly by stealing. Cant.

BAWDY-HOUSE BOTTLE. A very small bottle; short measure
  being among the many means used by the keepers of those
  houses, to gain what they call an honest livelihood: indeed
  this is one of the least reprehensible; the less they give a
  man of their infernal beverages for his money, the kinder
  they behave to him.

BAY FEVER. A term of ridicule applied to convicts, who
sham illness, to avoid being sent to Botany Bay.

BAYARD OF TEN TOES. To ride bayard of ten toes, is to
walk on foot. Bayard was a horse famous in old romances,

BEAK. A justice of-peace, or magistrate. Also a judge or
  chairman who presides in court. I clapp'd my peepers
  full of tears, and so the old beak set me free; I began to
  weep, and the judge set me free.

BEAN. A guinea. Half bean; half a guinea.

BEAR. One who contracts to deliver a certain quantity of
  sum of stock in the public funds, on a future day, and at
  stated price; or, in other words, sells what he has not got,
  like the huntsman in the fable, who sold the bear's skin
  before the bear was killed. As the bear sells the stock he
  is not possessed of, so the bull purchases what he has not
  money to pay for; but in case of any alteration in the price
  agreed on, either party pays or receives the difference.
  Exchange Alley.

BEAR-GARDEN JAW or DISCOURSE. Rude, vulgar language,
such as was used at the bear-gardens.

BEAR LEADER. A travelling tutor.

BEARD SPLITTER. A man much given to wenching.

BEARINGS. I'll bring him to his bearings; I'll bring him to
reason. Sea term.

BEAST. To drink like a beast, i.e. only when thirsty.

BEAST WITH TWO BACKS. A man and woman in the act of
copulation. Shakespeare in Othello.

BEATER CASES. Boots. Cant.

BEAU-NASTY. A slovenly fop; one finely dressed, but dirty.

BEAU TRAP. A loose stone in a pavement, under which
  water lodges, and on being trod upon, squirts it up, to the
  great damage of white stockings; also a sharper neatly
  dressed, lying in wait for raw country squires, or ignorant
  fops.

BECALMED. A piece of sea wit, sported in hot weather. I
am becalmed, the sail sticks to the mast; that is, my shirt
sticks to my back. His prad is becalmed; his horse knocked up.

BECK. A beadle. See HERMANBECK.

BED. Put to bed with a mattock, and tucked up with a
  spade; said of one that is dead and buried. You will go up
  a ladder to bed, i.e. you will be hanged. In many country
  places, persons hanged are made to mount up a ladder,
  which is afterwards turned round or taken away, whence the
  term, "Turned off."

BEDFORDSHIRE. I am for Bedfordshire, i.e. for going to bed.

BEDIZENED. Dressed out, over-dressed, or awkwardly ornamented.

BED-MAKER. Women employed at Cambridge to attend
  on the Students, sweep his room, They will put their
  hands to any thing, and are generally blest with a pretty
  family of daughters: who unmake the beds, as fast as they
  are made by their mothers.

BEEF. To cry beef; to give the alarm. They have cried beef
  on us. Cant.—To be in a man's beef; to wound him with
  a sword. To be in a woman's beef; to have carnal
  knowledge of her. Say you bought your beef of me, a jocular
  request from a butcher to a fat man. implying that he
  credits the butcher who serves him.

BEEF EATER. A yeoman of the guards, instituted by Henry
  VII. Their office was to stand near the bouffet, or
  cupboard, thence called Bouffetiers, since corrupted to Beef
  Eaters. Others suppose they obtained this name from the
  size of their persons, and the easiness of their duty, as
  having scarce more to do than to eat the king's beef.

BEETLE-BROWED. One having thick projecting eyebrows.

BEETLE-HEADED. Dull, stupid.

BEGGAR MAKER. A publican, or ale-house keeper.

BEGGAR'S BULLETS. Stones. The beggar's bullets began
to fly, i.e. they began to throw stones.

BEILBY'S BALL. He will dance at Beilby's ball, where the
  sheriff pays the music; he will be hanged. Who Mr.
  Beilby was, or why that ceremony was so called, remains
  with the quadrature of the circle, the discovery of the
  philosopher's stone, and divers other desiderata yet
  undiscovered.

BELCH. All sorts of beer; that liquor being apt to cause
eructation.

BELCHER. A red silk handkerchief, intermixed with yellow
and a little black. The kiddey flashes his belcher; the
young fellow wears a silk handkerchief round his neck.

BELL, BOOK, AND CANDLE. They cursed him with bell,
  book, and candle; an allusion to the popish form of
  excommunicating and anathematizing persons who had
  offended the church.

TO BEAR THE BELL. To excel or surpass all competitors, to
  be the principal in a body or society; an allusion to the
  fore horse or leader of a team, whose harness is commonly
  ornamented with a bell or bells. Some suppose it a term
  borrowed from an ancient tournament, where the victorious
  knights bore away the BELLE or FAIR LADY. Others derive
  it from a horse-race, or other rural contentions, where bells
  were frequently given as prizes.

BELLOWS. The lungs.

BELLOWER. The town crier.

BELLOWSER. Transportation for life: i.e. as long.

BELLY. His eye was bigger than his belly; a saying of a
person at a table, who takes more on his plate than he
can eat.

BELLYFULL. A hearty beating, sufficient to make a man
yield or give out. A woman with child is also said to
have got her belly full.

BELLY CHEAT. An apron.

BELLY PLEA. The plea of pregnancy, generally adduced by
  female felons capitally convicted, which they take care to
  provide for, previous to their trials; every gaol having, as
  the Beggar's Opera informs us, one or more child getters,
  who qualify the ladies for that expedient to procure a respite.

BELLY TIMBER. Food of all sorts.

BELL SWAGGER. A noisy bullying fellow.

BELLWETHER. The chief or leader of a mob; an idea
taken from a flock of sheep, where the wether has a bell
about his neck.

BENE. Good—BENAR. Better. Cant.

BENE BOWSE. Good beer, or other strong liquor. Cant.

BENE COVE. A good fellow. Cant.

BENE DARKMANS. Goodnight. Cant.

BENE FEARERS. Counterfeiters of bills. Cant.

BENE FEAKERS OF GYBES. Counterfeiters of passes. Cant.

BENESHIPLY. Worshipfully. Cant.

BEN. A fool. Cant.

BENISH. Foolish.

BENISON. The beggar's benison: May your ***** and
purse never fail you.

BERMUDAS. A cant name for certain places in London,
privileged against arrests, like the Mint in Southwark,
Ben. Jonson. These privileges are abolished.

BESS, or BETTY. A small instrument used by house-breakers
  to force open doors. Bring bess and glym; bring the
  instrument to force the door, and the dark lantern. Small
  flasks, like those for Florence wine, are also called betties.

BESS. See BROWN BESS.

BEST. To the best in Christendom: i.e. the best **** in
Christendom; a health formerly much in vogue.

BET. A wager.—TO BET. To lay a wager.

BETTY MARTIN. That's my eye, Betty Martin; an answer
to any one that attempts to impose or humbug.

BETWATTLED. Surprised, confounded, out of one's senses;
also bewrayed.

BEVER. An afternoon's luncheon; also a fine hat; beaver's
fur making the best hats,

BEVERAGE. Garnish money, or money for drink, demanded
of any one having a new suit of clothes.

BIBLE. A boatswain's great axe. Sea term.

BIBLE OATH. Supposed by the vulgar to be more binding
  than an oath taken on the Testament only, as being the
  bigger book, and generally containing both the Old and New
  Testament.

BIDDY, or CHICK-A-BIDDY. A chicken, and figuratively
a young wench.

BIDET, commonly pronounced BIDDY. A kind of tub, contrived
  for ladies to wash themselves, for which purpose they
  bestride it like a French poney, or post-horse, called in
  French bidets.

BIENLY. Excellently. She wheedled so bienly; she coaxed
or flattered so cleverly. French.

BILL AT SIGHT. To pay a bill at sight; to be ready at all
times for the venereal act.

BILBOA. A sword. Bilboa in Spain was once famous for
  well-tempered blades: these are quoted by Falstaff, where
  he describes the manner in which he lay in the buck-basket.
  Bilboes, the stock; prison. Cant.

TO BILK. To cheat. Let us bilk the rattling cove; let us
  cheat the hackney coachman of his fare. Cant. Bilking a
  coachman, a box-keeper, and a poor whore, were formerly,
  among men of the town, thought gallant actions.

BILL OF SALE. A widow's weeds. See HOUSE TO LET.

BILLINGSGATE LANGUAGE. Foul language, or abuse. Billingsgate is
  the market where the fishwomen assemble to
  purchase fish; and where, in their dealings and disputes,
  they are somewhat apt to leave decency and good manners
  a little on the left hand.

BING. To go. Cant. Bing avast; get you gone. Binged
avast in a darkmans; stole away in the night. Bing we to
Rumeville: shall we go to London?

BINGO. Brandy or other spirituous liquor. Cant.

BINGO BOY. A dram drinker. Cant.

BINGO MORT. A female dram drinker. Cant.

BINNACLE WORD. A fine or affected word, which sailors
jeeringly offer to chalk up on the binnacle.

BIRD AND BABY. The sign of the eagle and child.

BIRD-WITTED. Inconsiderate, thoughtless, easily imposed
on.

BIRDS OF A FEATHER. Rogues of the same gang.

BIRTH-DAY SUIT. He was in his birth-day suit, that is,
stark naked.

BISHOP. A mixture of wine and water, into which is put a
roasted orange. Also one of the largest of Mrs. Philips's
purses, used to contain the others.

BISHOPED, or TO BISHOP. A term used among horse-dealers, for
  burning the mark into a horse's tooth, after he has
  lost it by age; by bishoping, a horse is made to appear
  younger than he is. It is a common saying of milk that is
  burnt too, that the bishop has set his foot in it. Formerly,
  when a bishop passed through a village, all the inhabitants
  ran out of their houses to solicit his blessing, even leaving
  their milk, on the fire, to take its chance: which, went
  burnt to, was said to be bishoped.

TO BISHOP the balls, a term used among printers, to water
them.

BIT. Money. He grappled the cull's bit; he seized the
man's money. A bit is also the smallest coin in Jamaica,
equal to about sixpence sterling.

BITCH. A she dog, or doggess; the most offensive appellation
  that can be given to an English woman, even more
  provoking than that of whore, as may he gathered from the
  regular Billinsgate or St. Giles's answer—"I may be a
  whore, but can't be a bitch."

TO BITCH. To yield, or give up an attempt through fear.
  To stand bitch; to make tea, or do the honours of the tea-
  table, performing a female part: bitch there standing for
  woman, species for genius.

BITCH BOOBY. A country wench. Military term.

BITE. A cheat; also a woman's privities. The cull wapt
the mort's bite; the fellow enjoyed the wench heartily.
Cant.

TO BITE. To over-reach, or impose; also to steal.—Cant.
  —Biting was once esteemed a kind of wit, similar to the
  humbug. An instance of it is given in the Spectator: A
  man under sentence of death having sold his body to a surgeon
  rather below the market price, on receiving the money, cried, A
  bite! I am to be hanged in chains.—To bite
  the roger; to steal a portmanteau. To bite the wiper, to
  steal a handkerchief. To bite on the bridle; to be pinched
  or reduced to difficulties. Hark ye, friend, whether do
  they bite in the collar or the cod-piece? Water wit to
  anglers.

BITER. A wench whose **** is ready to bite her a-se; a
lascivious, rampant wench.

BLAB. A tell-tale, or one incapable of keeping a secret

BLACK AND WHITE. In writing. I have it in black and
white; I have written evidence.

BLACK ART. The art of picking a lock. Cant.

BLACK A-SE. A copper or kettle. The pot calls the kettle
black a-se. Cant.

BLACK BOOK. He is down in the black book, i.e. has a
  stain in his character. A black book is keep in most regiments,
  wherein the names of all persons sentenced to punishment
  are recorded.

BLACK BOX. A lawyer. Cant.

BLACK EYE. We gave the bottle a black eye, i.e. drank it
almost up. He cannot say black is the white of my eye;
he cannot point out a blot in my character.

BLACK FLY. The greatest drawback on the farmer is the
black fly, i.e. the parson who takes tithe of the harvest.

BLACK GUARD. A shabby, mean fellow; a term said to be
  derived from a number of dirty, tattered roguish boys, who
  attended at the Horse Guards, and Parade in St. James's
  Park, to black the boots and shoes of the soldiers, or to do
  any other dirty offices. These, from their constant attendance
  about the time of guard mounting, were nick-named
  the black-guards.

BLACK JACK. A nick name given to the Recorder by the
Thieves.

BLACK JACK. A jug to drink out of, made of jacked leather.

BLACK JOKE. A popular tune to a song, having for the
burden, "Her black joke and belly so white:" figuratively
the black joke signifies the monosyllable. See MONOSYLLABLE.

BLACK INDIES. Newcastle upon Tyne, whose rich coal
mines prove an Indies to the proprietors.

BLACKLEGS. A gambler or sharper on the turf or in the cockpit:
so called, perhaps, from their appearing generally in
boots; or else from game-cocks whose legs are always black.

BLACK MONDAY. The first Monday after the school-boys
holidays, or breaking up, when they are to go to school,
and produce or repeat the tasks set them.

BLACK PSALM. To sing the black psalm; to cry: a saying
used to children.

BLACK SPICE RACKET. To rob chimney sweepers of
their soot, bag and soot.

BLACK SPY. The Devil.

BLACK STRAP. Bene Carlo wine; also port. A task of
labour imposed on soldiers at Gibraltar, as a punishment
for small offences.

BLANK. To look blank; to appear disappointed or confounded.

BLANKET HORNPIPE. The amorous congress.

BLARNEY. He has licked the blarney stone; he deals in the
  wonderful, or tips us the traveller. The blarney stone is a
  triangular stone on the very top of an ancient castle of that
  name in the county of Cork in Ireland, extremely difficult
  of access; so that to have ascended to it, was considered
  as a proof of perseverance, courage, and agility, whereof
  many are supposed to claim the honour, who never atchieved
  the adventure: and to tip the blarney, is figuratively
  used telling a marvellous story, or falsity; and also
  sometimes to express flattery. Irish.

A BLASTED FELLOW or BRIMSTONE. An abandoned
rogue or prostitute. Cant.

To BLAST. To curse.

BLATER. A calf. Cant.

BLEACHED MORT. A fair-complexioned wench.

BLEATERS. Those cheated by Jack in a box. CANT.—See
JACK IN A BOX.

BLEATING CHEAT. A sheep. Cant.

BLEATING RIG. Sheep stealing. Cant.

BLEEDERS. Spurs. He clapped his bleeders to his prad;
be put spurs to his horse.

BLEEDING CULLY. One who parts easily with his money,
or bleeds freely.

BLEEDING NEW. A metaphor borrowed from fish, which
will not bleed when stale.

BLESSING. A small quantity over and above the measure,
usually given by hucksters dealing in peas, beans, and
other vegetables.

BLIND. A feint, pretence, or shift.

BLIND CHEEKS. The breech. Buss blind cheeks; kiss
mine a-se.

BLIND EXCUSE. A poor or insufficient excuse. A blind ale-house,
lane, or alley; an obscure, or little known or frequented
ale-house, lane, or alley.

BLIND HARPERS. Beggars counterfeiting blindness, playing
on fiddles,

BLINDMAN'S BUFF. A play used by children, where one
  being blinded by a handkerchief bound over his eyes,
  attempts to seize any one of the company, who all endeavour
  to avoid him; the person caught, must be blinded in
  his stead.

BLIND CUPID. The backside.

BLINDMAN'S HOLIDAY. Night, darkness.

BLOCK HOUSES. Prisons, houses of correction,

BLOCKED AT BOTH ENDS. Finished. The game is blocked
at both ends; the game is ended.

BLOOD. A riotous disorderly fellow.

BLOOD FOR BLOOD. A term used by tradesmen for bartering
  the different commodities in which they deal. Thus a
  hatter furnishing a hosier with a hat, and taking payment
  in stockings, is said to deal blood for blood.

BLOOD MONEY. The reward given by the legislature on the
conviction of highwaymen, burglars,

BLOODY BACK. A jeering appellation for a soldier, alluding
to his scarlet coat.

BLOODY. A favourite word used by the thieves in swearing,
as bloody eyes, bloody rascal.

BLOSS or BLOWEN. The pretended wife of a bully, or
shoplifter. Cant.

TO BLOT THE SKRIP AND JAR IT. To stand engaged or
bound for any one. Cant.

BLOW. He has bit the blow, i.e. he has stolen the goods.
Cant.

BLOWEN. A mistress or whore of a gentleman of the
  scamp. The blowen kidded the swell into a snoozing
  ken, and shook him of his dummee and thimble; the
  girl inveigled the gentleman into a brothel and robbed him
  of his pocket book and watch.

BLOWER. A pipe. How the swell funks his blower and
lushes red tape; what a smoke the gentleman makes
with his pipe, and drinks brandy.

TO BLOW THE GROUNSILS. To lie with a woman on the
floor. Cant.

TO BLOW THE GAB. To confess, or impeach a confederate.
Cant.

BLOW-UP. A discovery, or the confusion occasioned by one.

A BLOWSE, or BLOWSABELLA. A woman whose hair is
dishevelled, and hanging about her face; a slattern.

BLUBBER. The mouth.—I have stopped the cull's blubber;
I have stopped the fellow's mouth, meant either by gagging
or murdering him.

TO BLUBBER. To cry.

TO SPORT BLUBBER. Said of a large coarse woman, who
exposes her bosom.

BLUBBER CHEEKS. Large flaccid cheeks, hanging like
the fat or blubber of a whale.

BLUE, To look blue; to be confounded, terrified, or disappointed.
Blue as a razor; perhaps, blue as azure.

BLUE BOAR. A venereal bubo.

BLUE DEVILS. Low spirits.

BLUE FLAG. He has hoisted the blue flag; he has commenced
  publican, or taken a public house, an allusion to
  the blue aprons worn by publicans. See ADMIRAL OF
  THE BLUE.

BLUE PIGEONS. Thieves who steal lead off houses and
churches. Cant. To fly a blue pigeon; to steal lead
off houses or churches.

BLUE PLUMB. A bullet.—Surfeited with a blue plumb;
wounded with a bullet. A sortment of George R—'s
blue plumbs; a volley of ball, shot from soldiers' firelocks.

BLUE SKIN. A person begotten on a black woman by a
  white man. One of the blue squadron; any one having
  a cross of the black breed, or, as it is termed, a lick of
  the tar brush.

BLUE TAPE, or SKY BLUE. Gin.

BLUE RUIN. Gin. Blue ribband; gin.

BLUFF. Fierce, surly. He looked as bluff as bull beef.

BLUFFER. An inn-keeper. Cant.

BLUNDERBUSS. A short gun, with a wide bore, for carrying
slugs; also a stupid, blundering fellow.

BLUNT. Money. Cant.

TO BLUSTER. To talk big, to hector or bully.

BOARDING SCHOOL. Bridewell, Newgate, or any other
prison, or house of correction.

BOB. A shoplifter's assistant, or one that receives and carries
off stolen goods. All is bob; all is safe. Cant.

BOB. A shilling.

BOBBED. Cheated, tricked, disappointed.

BOBBISH. Smart, clever, spruce.

BOB STAY. A rope which holds the bowsprit to the stem or
cutwater. Figuratively, the frenum of a man's yard.

BOB TAIL. A lewd woman, or one that plays with her tail;
  also an impotent man, or an eunuch. Tag, rag, and bobtail;
  a mob of all sorts of low people. To shift one's bob;
  to move off, or go away. To bear a bob; to join in chorus
  with any singers. Also a term used by the sellers of game,
  for a partridge.

BODY SNATCHERS. Bum bailiffs.

BODY OF DIVINITY BOUND IN BLACK CALF. A parson.

BOG LANDER. An Irishman; Ireland being famous for its
large bogs, which furnish the chief fuel in many parts
of that kingdom.

BOG TROTTER. The same.

BOG HOUSE. The necessary house. To go to bog; to go to
stool.

BOG LATIN. Barbarous Latin. Irish.—See DOG LATIN,
and APOTHECARIES LATIN.

BOGY. Ask bogy, i.e. ask mine a-se. Sea wit.

BOH. Said to be the name of a Danish general, who so terrified
  his opponent Foh, that he caused him to bewray
  himself. Whence, when we smell a stink, it is custom
  to exclaim, Foh! i.e. I smell general Foh. He cannot say
  Boh to a goose; i.e. he is a cowardly or sheepish fellow.
  There is a story related of the celebrated Ben Jonson, who
  always dressed very plain; that being introduced to the
  presence of a nobleman, the peer, struck by his homely
  appearance and awkward manner, exclaimed, as if in doubt,
  "you Ben Johnson! why you look as if you could not say
  Boh to a goose!" "Boh!" replied the wit.

BOLD. Bold as a miller's shirt, which every day takes a
rogue by the collar.

BOLT. A blunt arrow.

BOLT UPRIGHT. As erect, or straight up, as an arrow
set on its end.

TO BOLT. To run suddenly out of one's house, or hiding
  place, through fear; a term borrowed from a rabbit-warren,
  where the rabbits are made to bolt, by sending
  ferrets into their burrows: we set the house on fire, and
  made him bolt. To bolt, also means to swallow meat
  without chewing: the farmer's servants in Kent are
  famous for bolting large quantities of pickled pork.

BONES. Dice.

BONE BOX. The mouth. Shut your bone box; shut your
mouth.

BONE PICKER. A footman.

BONED. Seized. apprehended, taken up by a constable. CANT.

BOLUS. A nick name for an apothecary.

BONESETTER. A hard-trotting horse.

BOOBY, or DOG BOOBY. An awkward lout, clodhopper, or
country fellow. See CLODHOPPER and LOUT. A bitch
booby; a country wench.

BOOBY HUTCH. A one-horse chaise, noddy, buggy, or
leathern bottle.

BOOKS. Cards to play with. To plant the books; to place
the cards in the pack in an unfair manner.

BOOK-KEEPER. One who never returns borrowed books.
Out of one's books; out of one's fevor. Out of his books;
out of debt.

BOOT CATCHER. The servant at an inn whose business
it is to clean the boots of the guest.

BOOTS. The youngest officer in a regimental mess, whose
  duty it is to skink, that is, to stir the fire, snuff the
  candles, and ring the bell. See SKINK.—To ride in any one's
  old boots; to marry or keep his cast-off mistress.

BOOTY. To play booty; cheating play, where the player
purposely avoids winning.

BO-PEEP. One who sometimes hides himself, and sometimes
appears publicly abroad, is said to-play at bo-peep.
Also one who lies perdue, or on the watch.

BORACHIO. A skin for holding wine, commonly a goat's;
also a nick name for a drunkard.

BORDE. A shilling. A half borde; a sixpence.

BORDELLO. A bawdy house.

BORE. A tedious, troublesome man or woman, one who
bores the ears of his hearers with an uninteresting tale;
a term much in fashion about the years 1780 and 1781.

BORN UNDER A THREEPENNY HALFPENNY PLANET, NEVER TO BE WORTH A GROAT.
Said of any person remarkably unsuccessful in his attempts or
profession.

BOTCH. A nick name for a taylor.

BOTHERED or BOTH-EARED. Talked to at both ears by different
persons at the same time, confounded, confused. IRISH
PHRASE.

BOTHERAMS. A convivial society.

BOTTLE-HEADED. Void of wit.

BOTTOM. A polite term for the posteriors. Also, in the
  sporting sense, strength and spirits to support fatigue; as
  a bottomed horse. Among bruisers it is used to express
  a hardy fellow, who will bear a good beating.

BOTTOMLESS PIT. The monosyllable.

BOUGHS. Wide in the boughs; with large hips and posteriors.

BOUGHS. He is up in the boughs; he is in a passion.

TO BOUNCE. To brag or hector; also to tell an improbable
  story. To bully a man out of any thing. The kiddey
  bounced the swell of the blowen; the lad bullied the
  gentleman out of the girl.

BOUNCER. A large man or woman; also a great lie.

BOUNCING CHEAT. A bottle; from the explosion in
drawing the cork. CANT.

BOUNG. A purse. CANT.

BOUNG NIPPER. A cut purse. CANT.—Formerly purses
were worn at the girdle, from whence they were cut.

BOOSE, or BOUSE. Drink.

BOOSEY. Drunk.

BOWSING KEN. An ale-house or gin-shop.

BOWSPRIT. The nose, from its being the most projecting
part of the human face, as the bowsprit is of a ship.

BOW-WOW. The childish name for a dog; also a jeering
appellation for a man born at Boston in America.

BOW-WOW MUTTON. Dog's flesh.

BOW-WOW SHOP. A salesman's shop in Monmouth-street;
so called because the servant barks, and the master bites.
See BARKER.

BOWYER. One that draws a long bow, a dealer in the marvellous,
a teller of improbable stories, a liar: perhaps from
the wonderful shots frequently boasted of by archers.

TO BOX THE COMPASS. To say or repeat the mariner's
  compass, not only backwards or forwards, but also to
  be able to answer any and all questions respecting its
  divisions. SEA TERM.

TO BOX THE JESUIT, AND GET COCK ROACHES. A sea
term for masturbation; a crime, it is said, much practised
by the reverend fathers of that society.

BRACE. The Brace tavern; a room in the S.E. corner of the
  King's Bench, where, for the convenience of prisoners
  residing thereabouts, beer purchased at the tap-house was
  retailed at a halfpenny per pot advance. It was kept by
  two brothers of the name of Partridge, and thence called
  the Brace.

BRACKET-FACED. Ugly, hard-featured.

BRAGGET. Mead and ale sweetened with honey.

BRAGGADOCIA. vain-glorious fellow, a boaster.

BRAINS. If you had as much brains as guts, what a clever
fellow you would be! a saying to a stupid fat fellow. To
have some guts in his brains; to know something.

BRAN-FACED. Freckled. He was christened by a baker,
he carries the bran in his face.

BRANDY-FACED. Red-faced, as if from drinking brandy.

BRANDY. Brandy is Latin for a goose; a memento to
prevent the animal from rising in the stomach by a
glass of the good creature.

BRAT. A child or infant.

BRAY. A vicar of Bray; one who frequently changes his
  principles, always siding with the strongest party: an
  allusion to a vicar of Bray, in Berkshire, commemorated
  in a well-known ballad for the pliability of his conscience.

BRAZEN-FACED. Bold-faced, shameless, impudent.

BREAD AND BUTTER FASHION. One slice upon the
  other. John and his maid were caught lying bread and
  butter fashion.—To quarrel with one's bread and butter;
  to act contrary to one's interest. To know on which
  side one's bread is buttered; to know one's interest, or
  what is best for one. It is no bread and butter of mine;
  I have no business with it; or rather, I won't intermeddle,
  because I shall get nothing by it.

BREAK-TEETH WORDS. Hard words, difficult to pronounce.

BREAKING SHINS. Borrowing money; perhaps from the
figurative operation being, like the real one, extremely
disagreeable to the patient.

BREAD. Employment. Out of bread; out of employment.
In bad bread; in a disagreeable scrape, or situation.

BREAD BASKET. The stomach; a term used by boxers.
I took him a punch in his bread basket; i.e. I gave him
a blow in the stomach.

BREAST FLEET. He or she belongs to the breast fleet; i.e. is
a Roman catholic; an appellation derived from their custom
of beating their breasts in the confession of their sins.

BREECHED. Money in the pocket: the swell is well
breeched, let's draw him; the gentleman has plenty of
money in his pocket, let us rob him.

BREECHES. To wear the breeches; a woman who governs
her husband is said to wear the breeches.

BREECHES BIBLE. An edition of the Bible printed in
1598, wherein it is said that Adam and Eve sewed figleaves
together, and made themselves breeches.

BREEZE. To raise a breeze; to kick up a dust or breed a
disturbance.

BRIDGE. To make a bridge of any one's nose; to push the
  bottle past him, so as to deprive him of his turn of filling
  his glass; to pass one over. Also to play booty, or
  purposely to avoid winning.

BRIM. (Abbreviation of Brimstone.) An abandoned woman;
perhaps originally only a passionate or irascible
woman, compared to brimstone for its inflammability.

BRISKET BEATER. A Roman catholic. SEE BREAST
FLEET, and CRAW THUMPER.

BRISTOL MILK. A Spanish wine called sherry, much
drunk at that place, particularly in the morning.

BRISTOL MAN. The son of an Irish thief and a Welch
whore.

BRITISH CHAMPAIGNE. Porter.

BROGANIER. One who has a strong Irish pronunciation or
accent.

BROGUE. A particular kind of shoe without a heel,
worn in Ireland, and figuratively used to signify the
Irish accent.

BROTHER OF THE BLADE. A soldier
          BUSKIN. A player.
          BUNG. A brewer
          QUILL. An author.
          STRING. A fiddler.
          WHIP. A coachman.

BROTHER STARLING. One who lies with the same woman,
that is, builds in the same nest.

BROUGHTONIAN. A boxer: a disciple of Broughton,
who was a beef-eater, and once the best boxer of his day.

BROWN BESS. A soldier's firelock. To hug brown Bess; to
carry a firelock, or serve as a private soldier.

BROWN GEORGE. An ammunition loaf, A wig without
powder; similar to the undress wig worn by his majesty.

BROWN MADAM, or MISS BROWN. The monosyllable.

BROWN STUDY. Said of one absent, in a reverie, or
thoughtful.

BRUISER. A boxer; one skilled in the ar of boxing also
an inferior workman among chasers.

BREWES, or BROWES. The fat scum from the pot in
which salted beef is boiled.

TO BRUSH. To run away. Let us buy a brush and lope;
  let us go away or off. To have a brush with a woman; to
  lie with her. To have a brush with a man; to fight with
  him. The cove cracked the peter and bought a brush;
  the fellow broke open the trunk, and then ran away.

BRUSHER. A bumper, a full glass. See BUMPER.

BUB. Strong beer.

BUBBER. A drinking bowl; also a great drinker; a
thief that steals plate from public houses. CANT.

THE BUBBLE. The party cheated, perhaps from his
being like an air bubble, filled with words, which are
only wind, instead of real property.

TO BUBBLE. To cheat.

TO BAR THE BUBBLE. To except against the general
rule, that he who lays the odds must always be adjudged
the loser: this is restricted to betts laid for liquor.

BUBBLY JOCK. A turkey cock. SCOTCH.

BUBBLE AND SQUEAK. Beef and cabbage fried together.
It is so called from its bubbling up and squeaking whilst
over the fire.

BUBE. The venereal disease.

BUCK. A blind horse; also a gay debauchee.

TO RUN A BUCK. To poll a bad vote at an election.—IRISH
TERM.

BUCK BAIL. Bail given by a sharper for one of the gang.

A BUCK OF THE FIRST HEAD. One who in debauchery
  surpasses the rest of his companions, a blood or choice
  spirit. There are in London divers lodges or societies of
  Bucks, formed in imitation of the Free Masons: one was
  held at the Rose, in Monkwell-street, about the year
  1705. The president is styled the Grand Buck. A buck
  sometimes signifies a cuckold.

BUCK'S FACE. A cuckold.

BUCK FITCH. A lecherous old fellow.

BUCKEEN. A bully. IRISH.

BUCKET. To kick the bucket; to die.

BUCKINGER'S BOOT. The monosyllable. Matthew
  Buckinger was born without hands and legs; notwithstanding
  which he drew coats of arms very neatly, and
  could write the Lord's Prayer within the compass of a
  shilling; he was married to a tall handsome woman,
  and traversed the country, shewing himself for money.

BUCKLES. Fetters.

BUDGE, or SNEAKING BUDGE. One that slips into houses
  in the dark, to steal cloaks or other clothes. Also
  lambs' fur formerly used for doctors' robes, whence they
  were called budge doctors. Standing budge; a thief's
  scout or spy.

TO BUDGE. To move, or quit one's station. Don't budge
from hence; i.e. don't move from hence, stay here.

BUDGET. A wallet. To open the budget; a term used
  to signify the notification of the taxes required by the
  minister for the expences of the ensuing year; as To-morrow
  the minister will go to the house, and open the
  budget.

BUFE. A dog. Bufe's nob; a dog's head. CANT.

BUFE NABBER. A dog stealer. CANT.

BUFF. All in buff; stript to the skin, stark naked.

BUFF. To stand buff; to stand the brunt. To swear as a
witness. He buffed it home; and I was served; he
swore hard against me, and I was found guilty.

BUFFER. One that steals and kills horses and dogs for
their skins; also an inn-keeper: in Ireland it signifies a
boxer.

BUFFER. A man who takes an oath: generally applied to
Jew bail.

BUFFLE-HEADED. Confused, stupid.

BUG. A nick name given by the Irish to Englishmen;
bugs having, as it is said, been introduced into Ireland by
the English.

TO BUG. A cant word among journeymen hatters, signifying
  the exchanging some of the dearest materials of
  which a hat is made for others of less value. Hats are
  composed of the furs and wool of divers animals among
  which is a small portion of beavers' fur. Bugging, is
  stealing the beaver, and substituting in lieu thereof an equal
  weight of some cheaper ingredient.—Bailiffs who take
  money to postpone or refrain the serving of a writ, are
  said to bug the writ.

BUG-HUNTER. An upholsterer.

BUGABOE. A scare-babe, or bully-beggar.

BUGAROCH. Comely, handsome. IRISH.

BUGGY. A one-horse chaise.

BUGGER. A blackguard, a rascal, a term of reproach. Mill
the bloody bugger; beat the damned rascal.

BULK AND FILE. Two pickpockets; the bulk jostles the
party to be robbed, and the file does the business.

BULKER. One who lodges all night on a bulk or projection
before old-fashioned shop windows.

BULL. An Exchange Alley term for one who buys stock
  on speculation for time, i.e. agrees with the seller, called
  a Bear, to take a certain sum of stock at a future day, at a
  stated price: if at that day stock fetches more than the
  price agreed on, he receives the difference; if it falls or is
  cheaper, he either pays it, or becomes a lame duck, and
  waddles out of the Alley. See LAME DUCK and BEAR.

BULL. A blunder; from one Obadiah Bull, a blundering
  lawyer of London, who lived in the reign of Henery VII.
  by a bull is now always meant a blunder made by an Irishman.
  A bull was also the name of false hair formerly
  much worn by women. To look like bull beef, or as bluff
  as bull beef; to look fierce or surly. Town bull, a great
  whore-master.

BULL. A crown piece. A half bull; half a crown.

BULL BEGGAR, or BULLY BEGGAR. An imaginary
being with which children are threatened by servants
and nurses, like raw head and bloody bones.

BULL CALF. A great hulkey or clumsy fellow. See
HULKEY.

BULL CHIN. A fat chubby child.

BULL DOGS. Pistols.

BULL HANKERS. Persons who over-drive bulls, or
frequent bull baits.

BULL'S EYE. A crown-piece.

BULL'S FEATHER. A horn: he wears the bull's feather; he
is a cuckold.

TO BULLOCK. To hector, bounce, or bully.

BULLY. A cowardly fellow, who gives himself airs of
great bravery. A bully huff cap; a hector. See HECTOR.

BULLY BACK. A bully to a bawdy-house; one who is
  kept in pay, to oblige the frequenters of the house to submit
  to the impositions of the mother abbess, or bawd; and
  who also sometimes pretends to be the husband of one of
  the ladies, and under that pretence extorts money from
  greenhorns, or ignorant young men, whom he finds with her.
  See GREENHORN.

BULLY COCK. One who foments quarrels in order to rob
the persons quarrelling.

BULLY RUFFIANS. Highwaymen who attack passengers
with paths and imprecations.

BULLY TRAP. A brave man with a mild or effeminate
appearance, by whom bullies are frequently taken in.

BUM. the breech, or backside.

TO BUM. To arrest a debtor. The gill bummed the
swell for a thimble; the tradesman arrested the
gentleman for a watch.

BUM TRAP. A sheriff's officer who arrests debtors.
  Ware hawke! the bum traps are fly to our panney; keep a
  good look out, the bailiffs know where our house is
  situated.

BUM BAILIFF. A sheriff's officer, who arrests debtors; so
  called perhaps from following his prey, and being at their
  bums, or, as the vulgar phrase is, hard at their a-ses.
  Blackstone says, it is a corruption of bound bailiff, from
  their being obliged to give bond for their good behaviour.

BUM BRUSHER. A schoolmaster.

BUM BOAT. A boat attending ships to retail greens,
drams, commonly rowed by a woman; a kind of
floating chandler's shop,

BUM FODDER. Soft paper for the necessary house or
torchecul.

BUMFIDDLE. The backside, the breech. See ARS MUSICA.

BUMBO. Brandy, water, and sugar; also the negro name for
the private parts of a woman.

BUMKIN. A raw country fellow.

BUMMED. Arrested.

BUMPER. A full glass; in all likelihood from its convexity
or bump at the top: some derive it from a full glass
formerly drunk to the health of the pope—AU BON PERE.

BUMPING. A ceremony performed on boys perambulating
  the bounds of the parish on Whit-monday, when they
  have their posteriors bumped against the stones marking
  the boundaries, in order to fix them in their memory.

BUN. A common name for a rabbit, also for the monosyllable.
To touch bun for luck; a practice observed among
sailors going on a cruize.

BUNDLING. A man and woman sleeping in the same bed, he
  with his small clothes, and she with her petticoats on; an
  expedient practised in America on a scarcity of beds, where,
  on such an occasion, husbands and parents frequently
  permitted travellers to bundle with their wives and daughters.
  This custom is now abolished. See Duke of Rochefoucalt's
  Travels in America,

BUNG UPWARDS. Said of a person lying on his face.

BUNG YOUR EYE. Drink a dram; strictly speaking, to
drink till one's eye is bunged up or closed.

BUNT. An apron.

BUNTER. A low dirty prostitute, half whore and half beggar.

BUNTLINGS. Petticoats. CANT.

BURN CRUST. A jocular name for a baker.

BURN THE KEN. Strollers living in an alehouse without paying
their quarters, are said to burn the ken. CANT.

BURNING SHAME. A lighted candle stuck into the parts of a
woman, certainly not intended by nature for a candlestick.

BURNER. A clap. The blowen tipped the swell a burner;
the girl gave the gentleman a clap.

BURNER. He is no burner of navigable rivers; i.e. he is no
conjuror, or man of extraordinary abilities; or rather,
he is, but a simple fellow. See THAMES.

BURNT. Poxed or clapped. He was sent out a sacrifice, and
  came home a burnt offering; a saying of seamen who have
  caught the venereal disease abroad. He has burnt his
  fingers; he has suffered by meddling.

BURR. A hanger on, or dependant; an allusion to the field
  burrs, which are not easily got rid of. Also the Northumbrian
  pronunciation: the people of that country, but
  chiefly about Newcastle and Morpeth, are said to have a
  burr in their throats, particularly called the Newcastle
  burr.

BUSHEL BUBBY. A full breasted woman.

BUSK. A piece of whalebone or ivory, formerly worn by
women, to stiffen the forepart of their stays: hence the
toast—Both ends of the busk.

BUSS BEGGAR. An old superannuated fumbler, whom none
but beggars will suffer to kiss them.

BUS-NAPPER. A constable. CANT.

BUS-NAPPER'S KENCHIN. A watchman. CANT.

BUSY. As busy is the devil in a high wind; as busy as a hen
with one chick.

BUTCHER'S DOG. To be like a butcher's dog, i.e. lie by the
beef without touching it; a simile often applicable to
married men.

BUTCHER'S HORSE. That must have been a butcher's
horse, by his carrying a calf so well; a vulgar joke on an
awkward rider.

BUTT. A dependant, poor relation, or simpleton, on whom
all kinds of practical jokes are played off; and who serves
as a butt for all the shafts of wit and ridicule.

BUTTER BOX. A Dutchman, from the great quantity of
butter eaten by the people of that country.

BUTTERED BUN. One lying with a woman that has just lain
with another man, is said to have a buttered bun.

BUTTER AND EGGS TROT. A kind of short jogg trot, such
  as is used by women going to market, with butter and
  eggs.—he looks as if butter would not melt in her mouth,
  yet I warrant you cheese would not choak her; a saying
  of a demure looking woman, of suspected character. Don't
  make butter dear; a gird at the patient angler.

BUTTOCK. A whore. CANT.

BUTTOCK BROKER. A bawd, or match-maker. CANT.

BUTTOCK BALL. The amorous congress. CANT.

BUTTOCK AND FILE. A common whore and a pick-pocket.
Cant.

BUTTOCK AND TWANG, or DOWN BUTTOCK AND SHAM
FILE. A common whore, but no pickpocket.

BUTTOCK AND TONGUE. A scolding wife.

BUTTOCKING SHOP. A brothel.

BUTTON. A bad shilling, among coiners. His a-se makes
buttons; he is ready to bewray himself through fear. CANT.

BUZMAN. A pickpocket. CANT.

BUZZARD. A simple fellow. A blind buzzard: a
pur-blind man or woman.

BYE BLOW. A bastard.

C

CABBAGE. Cloth, stuff, or silkpurloined by laylors from
  their employers, which they deposit in a place called
  HELL, or their EYE: from the first, when taxed, with their
  knavery, they equivocally swear, that if they have taken
  any, they wish they may find it in HELL; or, alluding to the
  second, protest, that what they have over and above is
  not more than they could put in their EYE.—When the scrotum
  is relaxed or whiffled, it is said they will not cabbage.

CAB. A brothel. Mother: how many tails have you in
your cab? how many girls have you in your bawdy house?

CACAFEOGO. A sh-te-fire, a furious braggadocio or bully
huff.

CACKLE. To blab, or discover secrets. The cull is leaky,
and cackles; the rogue tells all. CANT. See LEAKY.

CACKLER. A hen.

CACKLER'S KEN. A hen roost. CANT.

CACKLING CHEATS. Fowls. CANT.

CACKLING FARTS. Eggs. CANT.

CADDEE. A helper. An under-strapper.

CADGE. To beg. Cadge the swells; beg of the gentlemen.

CAFFAN. Cheese. CANT.

CAGG. To cagg; a military term used by the private soldiers,
  signifying a solemn vow or resolution not to get
  drunk for a certain time; or, as the term is, till their cagg
  is out: which vow is commonly observed with the strictest
  exactness. Ex. I have cagg'd myself for six months.
  Excuse me this time, and I will cagg myself for
  a year. This term is also used in the same sense among
  the common people of Scotland, where it is performed
  with divers ceremonies.

CAG. To be cagged. To be sulky or out of humour. The
cove carries the cag; the man is vexed or sullen.

CAG MAGG. Bits and scraps of provisions. Bad meat.

CAGG MAGGS. Old Lincolnshire geese, which having been
plucked ten or twelve years, are sent up to London to
feast the cockneys.

CAKE, or CAKEY. A foolish fellow.

CALF-SKIN FIDDLE. A drum. To smack calf's skin; to
  kiss the book in taking an oath. It is held by the St.
  Giles's casuists, that by kissing one's thumb instead of
  smacking calf's skin, the guilt of taking a false oath is
  avoided.

CALVES. His calves are gone to grass; a saying of a man
with slender legs without calves. Veal will be cheap,
calves fall; said of a man whose calves fall away.

CALVES HEAD CLUB. A club instituted by the Independents
  and Presbyterians, to commemorate the decapitation
  of King Charles I. Their chief fare was calves heads; and
  they drank their wine and ale out of calves skulls.

CALIBOGUS. Rum and spruce beer, American beverage.

CALLE. A cloak or gown. CANT.

CAMBRIDGE FORTUNE. A wind-mill and a water-mill,
used to signify a woman without any but personal endowments.

CAMBRIDGE OAK. A willow.

CAMBRADE. A chamber fellow; a Spanish military term.
  Soldiers were in that country divided into chambers, five
  men making a chamber, whence it was generally used to
  signify companion.

CAMESA. A shirt or shift. CANT. SPANISH.

CAMP CANDLESTICK. A bottle, or soldier's bayonet.

CAMPBELL'S ACADEMY. The hulks or lighters, on
  board of which felons are condemned to hard labour.
  Mr. Campbell was the first director of them. See
  ACADEMY and FLOATING ACADEMY.

CANARY BIRD. A jail bird, a person used to be kept in
a cage; also, in the canting sense, guineas.

CANDLESTICKS. Bad, small, or untunable bells. Hark!
how the candlesticks rattle.

CANDY. Drunk. IRISH.

CANE. To lay Cane upon Abel; to beat any one with a
cane or stick.

CANK. Dumb.

CANNISTER. The head. To mill his cannister; to break
his head.

CANNIKIN. A small can: also, in the canting sense,
the plague.

CANT. An hypocrite, a double-tongue palavering fellow.
See PALAVER.

CANT. To cant; to toss or throw: as, Cant a slug into
your bread room; drink a dram. SEA WIT.

CANTICLE. A parish clerk.

CANTING. Preaching with a whining, affected tone, perhaps
  a corruption of chaunting; some derive it from Andrew
  Cant, a famous Scotch preacher, who used that whining
  manner of expression. Also a kind of gibberish used by
  thieves and gypsies, called likewise pedlar's French, the
  slang,

CANTERS, or THE CANTING CREW. Thieves, beggars, and
gypsies, or any others using the canting lingo. See LINGO.

CANTERBURY STORY. A long roundabout tale.

TO CAP. To take one's oath. I will cap downright; I will
swear home. CANT.

TO CAP. To take off one's hat or cap. To cap the quadrangle;
  a lesson of humility, or rather servility, taught
  undergraduates at the university, where they are obliged to
  cross the area of the college cap in hand, in reverence to
  the fellows who sometimes walk there. The same ceremony
  is observed on coming on the quarter deck of ships of
  war, although no officer should be on it.

TO CAP. To support another's assertion or tale. To assist
  a man in cheating. The file kidded the joskin with sham
  books, and his pall capped; the deep one cheated the
  countryman with false cards, and his confederate assisted
  in the fraud.

CAP ACQUAINTANCE. Persons slightly acquainted, or only
  so far as mutually to salute with the hat on meeting. A
  woman who endeavours to attract the notice of any particular
  man, is said to set her cap at him.

CAPER MERCHANT. A dancing master, or hop mercbant;
marchand des capriolles. FRENCH TERM.—To cut papers; to
leap or jump in dancing. See HOP MERCHANT.

CAPPING VERSES. Repeating Latin Verses in turn, beginning
with the letter with which the last speaker left off.

CAPON. A castrated cock, also an eunuch.

CAPRICORNIFIED. Cuckolded, hornified.

CAPSIZE. To overturn or reverse. He took his broth till
he capsized; he drank till he fell out of his chair. SEA
TERM.

CAPTAIN. Led captain; an humble dependant in a great
  family, who for a precarious subsistence, and distant hopes
  of preferment, suffers every kind of indignity, and is the
  butt of every species of joke or ill-humour. The small
  provision made for officers of the army and navy in time of
  peace, obliges many in both services to occupy this wretched
  station. The idea of the appellation is taken from a led horse,
  many of which for magnificence appear in the retinues
  of great personages on solemn occasions, such as processions,

CAPTAIN COPPERTHORNE'S CREW. All officers; a saying
of a company where everyone strives to rule.

CAPTAIN LIEUTENANT. Meat between veal and beef, the
  flesh of an old calf; a military simile, drawn from the
  officer of that denomination, who has only the pay of a
  lieutenant, with the rank of captain; and so is not entirely
  one or the other, but between both.

CAPTAIN PODD. A celebrated master of a puppet-shew, in
Ben Johnson's time, whose name became a common one
to signify any of that fraternity.

CAPTAIN QUEERNABS. A shabby ill-dressed fellow.

CAPTAIN SHARP. A cheating bully, or one in a set of
gamblers, whose office is to bully any pigeon, who, suspecting
roguery, refuses to pay what he has lost. CANT.

CAPTAIN TOM. The leader of a mob; also the mob itself.

CARAVAN. A large sum of money; also, a person cheated
of such sum. CANT.

CARBUNCLE FACE. A red face, full of pimples.

CARDINAL. A cloak in fashion about the year 1760.

To CAROUSE. To drink freely or deep: from the German
word expressing ALL OUT.

CARRIERS. A set of rogues who are employed to look out
  and watch upon the roads, at inns, in order to carry
  information to their respective gangs, of a booty in
  prospect.

CARRIERS. Pigeons which carry expresses.

CARRION HUNTER. An undertaker; called also a cold
cook, and death hunter. See COLD COOK and DEATH
HUNTER.

CARROTS. Red hair.

CARROTTY-PATED. Ginger-hackled, red-haired. See
GINGER-HACKLED.

CARRY WITCHET. A sort of conundrum, puzzlewit, or
riddle.

CART. To put the cart before the horse; to mention the
  last part of a story first. To be flogged at the cart's a-se or
  tail; persons guilty of petty larceny are frequently
  sentenced to be tied to the tail of a cart, and whipped by the
  common executioner, for a certain distance: the degree
  of severity in the execution is left to the discretion of the
  executioner, who, it is said, has cats of nine tails of all
  prices.

CARTING. The punishment formerly inflicted on bawds,
who were placed in a tumbrel or cart, and led through
a town, that their persons might be known.

CARVEL'S RING. The private parts of a woman. Ham
  Carvel, a jealous old doctor, being in bed with his wife,
  dreamed that the Devil gave him a ring, which, so long as
  he had it on his finger, would prevent his being made a
  cuckold: waking he found he had got his finger the Lord
  knows where. See Rabelais, and Prior's versification of
  the story.

TO CASCADE. To vomit.

CASE. A house; perhaps from the Italian CASA. In the canting
  lingo it meant store or ware house, as well as a dwelling
  house. Tout that case; mark or observe that house.
  It is all bob, now let's dub the gig of the case; now the
  coast is clear, let us break open the door of the house.

CASE VROW. A prostitute attached to a particular bawdy
house.

CASH, or CAFFAN. Cheese; CANT. See CAFFAN.

CASTER. A cloak. CANT.

CASTOR. A hat. To prig a castor; to steal a hat.

CASTING UP ONE'S ACCOUNTS. Vomiting.

CAT. A common prostitute. An old cat; a cross old woman.

CAT-HEADS. A Woman's breasts. SEA PHRASE.

TO CAT, or SHOOT THE CAT. To vomit from drunkenness.

CAT AND BAGPIPEAN SOCIETY. A society which met at
  their office in the great western road: in their summons,
  published in the daily papers, it was added, that the kittens
  might come with the old cats without being scratched.

CAT CALL. A kind of whistle, chiefly used at theatres, to
  interrupt the actors, and damn a new piece. It derives
  its name from one of its sounds, which greatly resembles
  the modulation of an intriguing boar cat.

CAT HARPING FASHION. Drinking cross-ways, and not, as
usual, over the left thumb. SEA TERM.

CAT IN PAN. To turn cat in pan, to change sides or
parties; supposed originally to have been to turn CATE or CAKE
in pan.

CAT'S FOOT. To live under the cat's foot; to be under the
  dominion of a wife hen-pecked. To live like dog and cat;
  spoken of married persons who live unhappily together.
  As many lives as a cat; cats, according to vulgar
  naturalists, have nine lives, that is one less than a woman.
  No more chance than a cat in hell without claws; said of
  one who enters into a dispute or quarrel with one greatly
  above his match.

CAT LAP. Tea, called also scandal broth. See SCANDAL
BROTH.

CAT MATCH. When a rook or cully is engaged amongst
bad bowlers.

CAT OF NINE TAILS. A scourge composed of nine strings
of whip-cord, each string having nine knots.

CAT'S PAW. To be made a cat's paw of; to be made a tool
  or instrument to accomplish the purpose of another: an
  allusion to the story of a monkey, who made use of a cat's
  paw to scratch a roasted chesnut out of the fire.

CAT'S SLEEP. Counterfeit sleep: cats often counterfeiting
sleep, to decoy their prey near them, and then suddenly
spring on them.

CAT STICKS. Thin legs, compared to sticks with which
boys play at cat. See TRAPSTICKS.

CAT WHIPPING, or WHIPPING THE CAT. A trick often
  practised on ignorant country fellows, vain of their strength,
  by laying a wager with them that they may be pulled
  through a pond by a cat. The bet being made, a rope is
  fixed round the waist of the party to be catted, and the
  end thrown across the pond, to which the cat is also
  fastened by a packthread, and three or four sturdy fellows
  are appointed to lead and whip the cat; these on a signal
  given, seize the end of the cord, and pretending to whip
  the cat, haul the astonished booby through the water.
  —To whip the cat, is also a term among tailors for working
  jobs at private houses, as practised in the country.

CATAMARAN. An old scraggy woman; from a kind of float
made of spars and yards lashed together, for saving
ship-wrecked persons.

CATCH CLUB. A member of the patch club; a bum bailiff.

CATCH FART. A footboy; so called from such servants
commonly following close behind their master or mistress.

CATCH PENNY. Any temporary contrivance to raise a
contribution on the public.

CATCH POLE. A bum bailiff, or sheriff's officer.

CATCHING HARVEST. A dangerous time for a robbery,
when many persons are on the road, on account of a
horse-race, fair, or some other public meeting.

CATER COUSINS. Good friends. He and I are not cater
  cousins, i.e. we are not even cousins in the fourth degree,
  or four times removed; that is, we have not the least
  friendly connexion.

CATERPILLAR. A nick name for a soldier. In the year
  1745, a soldier quartered at a house near Derby, was desired
  by his landlord to call upon him, whenever he came
  that way; for, added he, soldiers are the pillars of the
  nation. The rebellion being finished, it happened the same
  regiment was quartered in Derbyshire, when the soldier
  resolved to accept of his landlord's invitation, and
  accordingly obtained leave to go to him: but, on his arrival,
  he was greatly surprised to find a very cold reception;
  whereupon expostulating with his landlord, he reminded him of
  his invitation, and the circumstance of his having said,
  soldiers were the pillars of the nation. If I did, answered the
  host, I meant CATERpiliars.

CATERWAULING. Going out in the night in search of
intrigues, like a cat in the gutters.

CATHEDRAL. Old-fashioned. An old cathedral-bedstead,
chair,

CATTLE. Sad cattle: whores or gypsies. Black cattle,
bugs. CANT.

CAVAULTING SCHOOL. A Bawdy-house.

CAUDGE-PAWED. Left-handed.

CAULIFLOWER. A large white wig, such as is commonly
  worn by the dignified clergy, and was formerly by physicians.
  Also the private parts of a woman; the reason for
  which appellation is given in the following story: A
  woman, who was giving evidence in a cause wherein it was
  necessary to express those parts, made use of the term
  cauliflower; for which the judge on the bench, a peevish
  old fellow, reproved her, saying she might as well call it
  artichoke. Not so, my lord, replied she; for an artichoke
  has a bottom, but a **** and a cauliflower have none.

CAUTIONS. The four cautions: I. Beware of a woman
before.—II. Beware of a horse behind.—III. Beware of a cart
side-ways.—IV. Beware of a priest every way.

CAW-HANDED, or CAW-PAWED. Awkward, not dextrous,
ready, or nimble.

CAXON. An old weather-beaten wig.

CENT PER CENT. An usurer.

CHAFED. Well beaten; from CHAUFFE, warmed.

CHALKERS. Men of wit, in Ireland, who in the night amuse
  themselves with cutting inoffensive passengers across the
  face with a knife. They are somewhat like those facetious
  gentlemen some time ago known in England by the title
  of Sweaters and Mohocks.

CHALKING. The amusement above described.

CHAP. A fellow; An odd chap; A strange fellow.

CHAPERON. The cicisbeo, or gentleman usher to a lady;
from the French.

CHAPT. Dry or thirsty.

CHARACTERED, or LETTERED. Burnt in the hand. They
have palmed the character upon him; they have burned
him in the hand, CANT.—See LETTERED.

CHARM. A picklock. CANT.

CHARREN. The smoke of Charren.—His eyes water from
  the smoke of Charren; a man of that place coming out
  of his house weeping, because his wife had beat him, told
  his neighbours the smoke had made his eyes water.

CHATTER BOX. One whose tongue runs twelve score to the
dozen, a chattering man or woman.

CHATTER BROTH. Tea. See CAT LAP and SCANDAL BROTH.

CHATTS. Lice: perhaps an abbreviation of chattels, lice
  being the chief live stock of chattels of beggars, gypsies,
  and the rest of the canting crew. CANT.—Also, according
  to the canting academy, the gallows.

CHATES. The gallows. CANT.

CHAUNTER CULLS. Grub-street writers, who compose
songs, carrols, for ballad-singers. CANT.

CHAUNT. A song.

TO CHAUNT. To sing. To publish an account in the newspapers.
  The kiddey was chaunted for a toby; his examination
  concerning a highway robbery was published in
  the papers.

CHAW BACON. A countryman. A stupid fellow.

CHEAPSIDE. He came at it by way of Cheapside; he gave
little or nothing for it, he bought it cheap.

CHEATS. Sham sleeves to put over a dirty shift or shirt.
See SHAMS.

CHEEK BY JOWL. Side by side, hand to fist.

CHEEKS. Ask cheeks near cunnyborough; the repartee of a
  St. Gilse's fair one, who bids you ask her backside, anglice
  her a-se. A like answer is current in France: any one
  asking the road or distance to Macon, a city near Lyons,
  would be answered by a French lady of easy virtue,
  'Mettez votre nez dans mon cul, vous serrez dans les
  Fauxbourgs.'

CHEESE-TOASTER. A sword.

CHEESE IT; Be silent, be quiet, don't do it. Cheese it, the
coves are fly; be silent, the people understand our discourse.

CHEESER. A strong smelling fart.

CHELSEA. A village near London, famous for the military
  hospital. To get Chelsea; to obtain the benefit of that
  hospital. Dead Chelsea, by G-d! an exclamation uttered by
  a grenadier at Fontenoy, on having his leg carried away by
  a cannon-ball.

CHEST OF TOOLS. A shoe-black's brush and wig, Irish.

CHERRY-COLOURED CAT. A black cat, there being black
cherries as well as red.

CHERUBIMS. Peevish children, becausecherubimsand seraphims
continually do cry.

CHESHIRE CAT. He grins like a Cheshire cat; said of anyone
who shews his teeth and gums in laughing.

CHICK-A-BIDDY. A chicken, so called to and by little children.

CHICKEN-BREASTED. Said of a woman with scarce any breasts.

CHICKEN BUTCHER. A poulterer.

CHICKEN-HAMMED. Persons whose legs and thighs are bent
or archward outwards.

CHICKEN-HEARTED. Fearful, cowardly.

CHICKEN NABOB. One returned from the East Indies with but
a moderate fortune of fifty or sixty thousand pounds, a
diminutive nabob: a term borrowed from the chicken turtle.

CHILD. To eat a child; to partake of a treat given to the
  parish officers, in part of commutation for a bastard child
  the common price was formerly ten pounds and a greasy
  chiu. See GREASY CHIN.

CHIMNEY CHOPS. An abusive appellation for a negro.

CHINK. Money.

CHIP. A child. A chip of the old block; a child who either
in person or sentiments resembles its father or mother.

CHIP. A brother chip; a person of the same trade or calling.

CHIPS, A nick name for a carpenter.

CHIMPING MERRY. Exhilarated with liquor. Chirping glass,
a cheerful glass, that makes the company chirp like birds
in spring.

CHIT. An infant or baby.

CHITTERLINS. The bowels. There is a rumpus among my
bowels, i.e. I have the colic. The frill of a shirt.

CHITTY-FACED. Baby-faced; said of one who has a childish
look.

CHIVE, or CHIFF. A knife, file: or saw. To chive the
darbies; to file off the irons or fetters. To chive the bouhgs
of the frows; to cut off women's pockets.

CHIVEY. I gave him a good chivey; I gave him, a hearty Scolding.

CHIVING LAY. Cutting the braces of coaches behind, on
  which the coachman quitting the box, an accomplice robs
  the boot; also, formerly, cutting the back of the coach to
  steal the fine large wigs then worn.

CHOAK. Choak away, the churchyard's near; a jocular saying
  to a person taken with a violent fit of coughing, or who
  has swallowed any thing, as it is called the wrong way;
  Choak, chicken, more are hatching: a like consolation.

CHOAK PEAR. Figuratively, an unanswerable objection: also
  a machine formerly used in Holland by robbers; it was of
  iron, shaped like a pear; this they forced into the mouths
  of persons from whom they intended to extort money; and
  on turning a key, certain interior springs thrust forth a
  number of points, in all directions, which so enlarged it,
  that it could not be taken out of the mouth: and the iron,
  being case-hardened, could not be filed: the only methods
  of getting rid of it, were either by cutting the mouth, or
  advertizing a reward for the key, These pears were also
  called pears of agony.

CHOAKING PYE, or COLD PYE, A punishment inflicted
  on any person sleeping in company: it consists in wrapping
  up cotton in a case or tube of paper, setting it on
  fire, and directing the smoke up the nostrils of the sleeper.
  See HOWELL'S COTGRAVE.

CHOCOLATE. To give chocolate without sugar; to reprove.
MILITARY TERM.

CHOICE SPIRIT. A thoughtless, laughing, singing, drunken fellow.

CHOP. A blow. Boxing term.

TO CHOP AND CHANGE. To exchange backwards and forwards.
  To chop, in the canting sense, means making
  dispatch, or hurrying over any business: ex. The AUTEM
  BAWLER will soon quit the HUMS, for he CHOPS UP the WHINERS;
  the parson will soon quit the pulpit, for he hurries over
  the prayers. See AUTEM BAWLER, HUMS, and WHINERS,

CHOP CHURCHES. Simoniacal dealers in livings, or other
ecclesiastical preferments.

CHOPPING, LUSTY. A chopping boy or girl; a lusty
child.

CHOPS. The mouth. I gave him a wherrit, or a souse,
across the chops; I gave him a blow over the mouth,
See WHERRIT.

CHOP-STICK. A fork.

CHOUDER. A sea-dish, composed of fresh fish, salt pork,
herbs, and sea-biscuits, laid in different layers, and stewed
together.

TO CHOUSE. To cheat or trick: he choused me out of it.
Chouse is also the term for a game like chuck-farthing.

CHRIST-CROSS ROW. The alphabet in a horn-book: called
  Christ-cross Row, from having, as an Irishman observed,
  Christ's cross PREFIXED before and AFTER the twenty-four
  letters.

CHRISTENING. Erasing the name of the true maker from
a stolen watch, and engraving a fictitious one in its place.

CHRISTIAN PONEY. A chairman.

CHRISTIAN. A tradesman who has faith, i.e. will give credit.

CHRISTMAS COMPLIMENTS. A cough, kibed heels, and a snotty nose.

CHUB. He is a young chub, or a mere chub; i.e. a foolish
fellow, easily imposed on: an illusion to a fish of that
name, easily taken.

CHUBBY. Round-faced, plump.

CHUCK. My chuck; a term of endearment.

CHUCK FARTHING. A parish clerk.

CHUCKLE-HEADED. Stupid, thick-headed.

CHUFFY. Round-faced, chubby.

CHUM. A chamber-fellow, particularly at the universities
and in prison.

CHUMMAGE. Money paid by the richer sort of prisoners
  in the Fleet and King's Bench, to the poorer, for their
  share of a room. When prisons are very full, which is
  too often the case, particularly on the eve of an insolvent
  act, two or three persons are obliged to sleep in a room. A
  prisoner who can pay for being alone, chuses two poor
  chums, who for a stipulated price, called chummage,
  give up their share of the room, and sleep on the stairs,
  or, as the term is, ruff it.

CHUNK. Among printers, a journeyman who refuses to
work for legal wages; the same as the flint among taylors.
See FLINT.

CHURCH WARDEN. A Sussex name fora shag, or cormorant, probably
from its voracity.

CHURCH WORK. Said of any work that advances slowly.

CHURCHYARD COUGH. A cough that is likely to terminate
in death.

CHURK. The udder.

CHURL. Originally, a labourer or husbandman: figuratively
a rude, surly, boorish fellow. To put a churl upon a gentleman;
to drink malt liquor immediately after having drunk wine.

CINDER GARBLER. A servant maid, from her business of
sifting the ashes from the cinders. CUSTOM-HOUSE WIT.

CIRCUMBENDIBUS. A roundabout way, or story. He
took such a circumbendibus; he took such a circuit.

CIT. A citizen of London.

CITY COLLEGE. Newgate.

CIVILITY MONEY. A reward claimed by bailiffs for executing
their office with civility.

CIVIL RECEPTION. A house of civil reception; a bawdy-house,
or nanny-house. See NANNY-HOUSE.

CLACK. A tongue, chiefly applied to women; a simile drawn
from the clack of a water-mill.

CLACK-LOFT. A pulpit, so called by orator Henley.

CLAMMED. Starved.

CLAN. A family's tribe or brotherhood; a word much used
  in Scotland. The head of the clan; the chief: an allusion
  to a story of a Scotchman, who, when a very large
  louse crept down his arm, put him back again, saying he
  was the head of the clan, and that, if injured, all the rest
  would resent it.

CLANK. A silver tankard. CANT.

CLANK NAPPER. A silver tankard stealer. See RUM BUBBER.

CLANKER. A great lie.

CLAP. A venereal taint. He went out by Had'em, and came
round by Clapham home; i.e. he went out a wenching,
and got a clap.

CLAP ON THE SHOULDER. An arrest for debt; whence a
bum bailiff is called a shoulder-clapper.

CLAPPER. The tongue of a bell, and figuratively of a man
or woman.

CLAPPER CLAW. To scold, to abuse, or claw off with the
tongue.

CLAPPERDOGEON. A beggar born. CANT.

CLARET. French red wine; figuratively, blood. I tapped
his claret; I broke his head, and made the blood run.
Claret-faced; red-faced.

CLAWED OFF. Severely beaten or whipped; also smartly
poxed or clapped.

CLEAR. Very drunk. The cull is clear, let's bite him; the
fellow is very drunk, let's cheat him. CANT.

CLEAVER. One that will cleave; used of a forward or
wanton woman.

CLEAN. Expert; clever. Amongst the knuckling coves he
is reckoned very clean; he is considered very expert as
a pickpocket.

CLERKED. Soothed, funned, imposed on. The cull will
not be clerked; i.e. the fellow will not be imposed on by
fair words.

CLEYMES. Artificial sores, made by beggars to excite
charity.

CLICK. A blow. A click in the muns; a blow or knock
in the face. CANT.

TO CLICK. To snatch. To click a nab; to snatch a hat.
CANT.

CLICKER. A salesman's servant; also, one who proportions
out the different shares of the booty among thieves.

CLICKET. Copulation of foxes; and thence used, in a
  canting sense, for that of men and women: as, The cull
  and the mort are at clicket in the dyke; the man and
  woman are copulating in the ditch.

CLIMB. To climb the three trees with a ladder; to ascend
the gallows.

CLINCH. A pun or quibble. To clinch, or to clinch the
  nail; to confirm an improbable story by another: as, A
  man swore he drove a tenpenny nail through the moon;
  a bystander said it was true, for he was on the other side
  and clinched it.

CLINK. A place in the Borough of Southwark, formerly
  privileged from arrests; and inhabited by lawless vagabonds
  of every denomination, called, from the place of
  their residence, clinkers. Also a gaol, from the clinking
  of the prisoners' chains or fetters: he is gone to clink.

CLINKERS. A kind of small Dutch bricks; also irons worn
by prisoners; a crafty fellow.

TO CLIP. To hug or embrace: to clip and cling. To clip
the coin; to diminish the current coin. To clip the king's
English; to be unable to speak plain through drunkenness.

CLOAK TWITCHERS. Rogues who lurk about the entrances
into dark alleys, and bye-lanes, to snatch cloaks from the
shoulders of passengers.

CLOD HOPPER. A country farmer, or ploughman.

CLOD PATE. A dull, heavy booby.

CLOD POLE. The same.

CLOSE. As close as God's curse to a whore's a-se: close as
shirt and shitten a-se.

CLOSE-FISTED. Covetous or stingy.

CLOSH. A general name given by the mobility to Dutch
  seamen, being a corruption of CLAUS, the abbreviation of
  Nicholas, a name very common among the men of that
  nation.

CLOTH MARKET. He is just come from the cloth market,
i.e. from between the sheets, he is just risen from bed.

CLOUD. Tobacco. Under a cloud; in adversity.

CLOVEN, CLEAVE, or CLEFT. A term used for a woman
who passes for a maid, but is not one.

CLOVEN FOOT. To spy the cloven foot in any business; to
  discover some roguery or something bad in it: a saying
  that alludes to a piece of vulgar superstition, which is,
  that, let the Devil transform himself into what shape he
  will, he cannot hide his cloven foot

TO CHUCK. To shew a propensity for a man. The mors
chucks; the wench wants to be doing.

CLOUT. A blow. I'll give you a clout on your jolly nob;
  I'll give you a blow on your head. It also means a
  handkerchief. CANT. Any pocket handkerchief except
  a silk one.

CLOUTED SHOON. Shoes tipped with iron.

CLOUTING LAY. Picking pockets of handkerchiefs.

CLOVER. To be, or live, in clover; to live luxuriously.
Clover is the most desirable food for cattle.

CLOWES. Rogues.

CLOY. To steal. To cloy the clout; to steal the handkerchief.
To cloy the lour; to steal money. CANT.

CLOVES. Thieves, robbers,

CLUB. A meeting or association, where each man is to spend
an equal and stated sum, called his club.

CLUB LAW. Argumentum bacculinum, in which an oaken
stick is a better plea than an act of parliament.

CLUMP. A lump. Clumpish; lumpish, stupid.

CLUNCH. An awkward clownish fellow.

TO CLUTCH THE FIST. To clench or shut the hand. Clutch
fisted; covetous, stingy. See CLOSE-FISTED.

CLUTCHES. Hands, gripe, power.

CLUTTER. A stir, noise, or racket: what a confounded
clutter here is!

CLY. Money; also a pocket. He has filed the cly; he
has picked a pocket. CANT.

CLY THE JERK: To be whipped. CANT.

CLYSTER PIPE. A nick name for an apothecary.

COACH WHEEL. A half crown piece is a fore coach wheel,
and a crown piece a hind coach wheel; the fore wheels of
a coach being less than the hind ones.

TO COAX. To fondle, or wheedle. To coax a pair of stockings;
  to pull down the part soiled into the shoes, so as to
  give a dirty pair of stockings the appearance of clean ones.
  Coaxing is also used, instead of darning, to hide the holes
  about the ancles.

COB. A Spanish dollar.

COB, or COBBING. A punishment used by the seamen for
  petty offences, or irregularities, among themselves: it
  consists in bastonadoing the offender on the posteriors with
  a cobbing stick, or pipe staff; the number usually inflicted
  is a dozen. At the first stroke the executioner repeats
  the word WATCH, on which all persons present are to take
  off their hats, on pain of like punishment: the last stroke
  is always given as hard as possible, and is called THE PURSE.
  Ashore, among soldiers, where this punishment is sometimes
  adopted, WATCH and THE PURSE are not included in the
  number, but given over and above, or, in the vulgar phrase,
  free gratis for nothing. This piece of discipline is also
  inflicted in Ireland, by the school-boys, on persons coming
  into the school without taking off their hats; it is there
  called school butter.

COBBLE. A kind of boat.

TO COBBLE. To mend, or patch; likewise to do a thing in
a bungling manner.

COBBLE COLTER. A turkey.

COBBLER. A mender of shoes, an improver of the understandings of
his customers; a translator.

COBBLERS PUNCH. Treacle, vinegar, gin, and water.

COCK, or CHIEF COCK OF THE WALK. The leading man
in any society or body; the best boxer in a village or
district.

COCK ALE. A provocative drink.

COCK ALLEY or COCK LANE. The private parts of a woman.

COCK AND A BULL STORY. A roundabout story, without
head or tail, i.e. beginning or ending.

COCK OF THE COMPANY. A weak man, who from the desire of being the
head of the company associates with low
people, and pays all the reckoning.

COCK-A-WHOOP. Elevated, in high-spirits, transported with joy.

COCK BAWD. A male keeper of a bawdy-house.

COCK HOIST. A cross buttock.

COCKISH. Wanton, forward. A cockish wench; a forward
coming girl.

COCKLES. To cry cockles; to be hanged: perhaps from the
  noise made whilst strangling. CANT.—This will rejoice
  the cockles of one's heart; a saying in praise of wine, ale,
  or spirituous liquors.

COCK PIMP. The supposed husband of a bawd.

COCK ROBIN. A soft, easy fellow.

COCK-SURE. Certain: a metaphor borrowed front the cock
of a firelock, as being much more certain to fire than the
match.

COCK YOUR EYE. Shut one eye: thus translated into apothecaries
Latin.—Gallus tuus ego.

COCKER. One fond of the diversion of cock-fighting.

COCKNEY: A nick name given to the citizens of London,
  or persons born within the sound of Bow bell, derived
  from the following story: A citizen of London, being in
  the country, and hearing a horse neigh, exclaimed,
  Lord! how that horse laughs! A by-stander telling him
  that noise was called NEIGHING, the next morning, when
  the cock crowed, the citizen to shew he had not forgot
  what was told him, cried out, Do you hear how the COCK
  NEIGHS? The king of the cockneys is mentioned among
  the regulations for the sports and shows formerly held in
  the Middle Temple on Childermas Day, where he had
  his officers, a marshal, constable, butler, See DUGDALE'S
  O

1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue

Captain Grose et al.

PREFACE.

A

B

C