The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue dates from 1811 and this is probably the only full, uncensored and searchable version of this dictionary on the internet. All the original crudities have been restored and it offers an interesting perspective on Common English from the time of the Regency and Jane Austen.

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Entries releated to ARD

 

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.
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.
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.
ANCHOR		Bring your arse 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.
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.
ARD		Hot.
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, etc. A species of badger.
ATHANASIAN WENCH, or QUICUNQUE VULT		A forward girl, ready to oblige every man that shall ask her.
AUTEM DIVERS		Pickpockets who practice in churches; also churchwardens and overseers of the poor.
AWAKE		Acquainted with, knowing the business. Stow the books, the culls are awake; hide the cards, the fellows know what we intended to do.
BASTARD		The child of an unmarried woman.
BASTARDLY GULLION		A bastard's bastard.
BATCHELOR'S SON		A bastard.
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.
BEAR-GARDEN JAW or DISCOURSE		Rude, vulgar language, such as was used at the bear-gardens.
BEARD SPLITTER		A man much given to wenching.
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."
BEDIZENED		Dressed out, over-dressed, or awkwardly ornamented.
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.
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.
BLOOD MONEY		The reward given by the legislature on the conviction of highwaymen, burglars, etc.
BOARDING SCHOOL		Bridewell, Newgate, or any other prison, or house of correction.
BOB STAY		A rope which holds the bowsprit to the stem or cutwater. Figuratively, the frenum of a man's yard.
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.
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.
BOOKS		Cards to play with. To plant the books; to place the cards in the pack in an unfair manner.
BORACHIO		A skin for holding wine, commonly a goat's; also a nick name for a drunkard.
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.
BRACKET-FACED		Ugly, hard-featured.
BREAK-TEETH WORDS		Hard words, difficult to pronounce.
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.
BUGGER		A blackguard, a rascal, a term of reproach. Mill the bloody bugger; beat the damned rascal.
BULLY		A cowardly fellow, who gives himself airs of great bravery. A bully huff cap; a hector. See HECTOR.
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 arses. Blackstone says, it is a corruption of bound bailiff, from their being obliged to give bond for their good behaviour.
BUNG UPWARDS		Said of a person lying on his face.
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.
BUZZARD		A simple fellow. A blind buzzard: a pur-blind man or woman.
BYE BLOW		A bastard.
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.
CARDINAL		A cloak in fashion about the year 1760.
CATAMARAN		An old scraggy woman; from a kind of float made of spars and yards lashed together, for saving ship-wrecked persons.
CAW-HANDED, or CAW-PAWED		Awkward, not dextrous, ready, or nimble.
CHICKEN-HAMMED		Persons whose legs and thighs are bent or archward outwards.
CHICKEN-HEARTED		Fearful, cowardly.
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 chin. See GREASY CHIN.
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.
CHURCH WARDEN		A Sussex name fora shag, or cormorant, probably from its voracity.
CHURCHYARD COUGH		A cough that is likely to terminate in death.
CIVILITY MONEY		A reward claimed by bailiffs for executing their office with civility.
CLANK		A silver tankard.
CLANK NAPPER		A silver tankard stealer. See RUM BUBBER.
CLEAVER		One that will cleave; used of a forward or wanton woman.
CLUNCH		An awkward clownish fellow.
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.
COCKISH		Wanton, forward. A cockish wench; a forward coming girl.
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, etc. See DUGDALE'S ORIGINES JURIDICIALES, p. 247. - Ray says, the interpretation of the word Cockney, is, a young person coaxed or conquered, made wanton; or a nestle cock, delicately bred and brought up, so as, when arrived a man's estate, to be unable to bear the least hardship. Whatever may be the origin of this appellation, we learn from the following verses, attributed to Hugh Bigot, Earl of Norfolk, that it was in use. in the time of king Henry II. Was I in my castle at Bungay, Fast by the river Waveney, I would not care for the king of Cockney; ie: the king of London.
CODDERS		Persons employed by the gardeners to gather peas.
COLD PIG		To give cold pig is a punishment inflicted on sluggards who lie too long in bed: it consists in pulling off all the bed clothes from them, and throwing cold water upon them.
COME		To come; to lend. Has he come it; has he lent it? To come over any one; to cheat or over reach him. Coming wench; a forward wench, also a breeding woman.
COOL TANKARD		Wine and water, with lemon, sugar, and burrage.
COSTARD		The head. I'll smite your costard; I'll give you a knock on the head.
COSTARD MONGER		A dealer in fruit, particularly apples.
COURT CARD		A gay fluttering coxcomb.
COVENT GARDEN ABBESS		A bawd.
COVENT GARDEN AGUE		The venereal disease. He broke his shins against Covent Garden rails; he caught the venereal disorder.
COVENT GARDEN NUN		A prostitute.
COVENT, or CONVENT GARDEN, vulgarly called COMMON		Anciently, the garden belonging to a dissolved monastery; now famous for being the chief market in London for fruit, flowers, and herbs. The theatres are situated near it. In its environs are many brothels, and not long ago, the lodgings of the second order of ladies of easy virtue were either there, or in the purlieus of Drury Lane.
COW		To sleep like a cow, with a cunt at one's arse; said of a married man; married men being supposed to sleep with their backs towards their wives, according to the following proclamation: All you that in your beds do lie, Turn to your wives, and occupy: And when that you have done your best, Turn arse to arse, and take your rest.
COW-HANDED		Awkward.
CRAB		To catch a crab; to fall backwards by missing one's stroke in rowing.
CRABS		A losing throw to the main at hazard.
CRACKMANS		Hedges. The cull thought to have loped by breaking through the crackmans, but we fetched him back by a nope on the costard, which stopped his jaw; the man thought to have escaped by breaking through the hedge, but we brought him back by a great blow on the head, which laid him speechless.
CREW		A knot or gang; also a boat or ship's company. The canting crew are thus divided into twenty-three orders, which see under the different words: MEN. 1 Rufflers 2 Upright Men 3 Hookers or Anglers 4 Rogues 5 Wild Rogues 6 Priggers of Prancers 7 Palliardes 8 Fraters 9 Jarkmen, or Patricoes 10 Fresh Water Mariners, or Whip Jackets 11 Drummerers 12 Drunken Tinkers 13 Swadders, or Pedlars 14 Abrams. WOMEN. 1 Demanders for Glimmer or Fire 2 Bawdy Baskets 3 Morts 4 Autem Morts 5 Walking Morts 6 Doxies 7 Delles 8 Kinching Morts 9 Kinching Coes
CRIBBAGE-FACED		Marked with the small pox, the pits bearing a kind of resemblance to the holes in a cribbage-board.
CROPPING DRUMS		Drummers of the foot guards, or Chelsea hospital, who find out weddings, and beat a point of war to serenade the new married couple, and thereby obtain money.
CROWN OFFICE		The head. I fired into her keel upwards; my eyes and limbs Jack, the crown office was full; I fucked a woman with her arse upwards, she was so drunk, that her head lay on the ground.
CUNDUM		The dried gut of a sheep, worn by men in the act of coition, to prevent venereal infection; said to have been invented by one colonel Cundum. These machines were long prepared and sold by a matron of the name of Philips, at the Green Canister, in Half-moon-street, in the Strand. That good lady having acquired a fortune, retired from business; but learning that the town was not well served by her successors, she, out of a patriotic zeal for the public welfare, returned to her occupation; of which she gave notice by divers hand-bills, in circulation in the year 1776. Also a false scabbard over a sword, and the oil-skin case for holding the colours of a regiment.
CUNNY-THUMBED		To double one's fist with the thumb inwards, like a woman.
CUPBOARD LOVE		Pretended love to the cook, or any other person, for the sake of a meal. My guts cry cupboard; i.e. I am hungry
CUSTARD CAP		The cap worn by the sword-bearer of the city of London, made hollow at the top like a custard.
DAMNED SOUL		A clerk in a counting house, whose sole business it is to clear or swear off merchandise at the custom-house; and who, it is said, guards against the crime of perjury, by taking a previous oath, never to swear truly on those occasions.
DEVIL		The gizzard of a turkey or fowl, scored, peppered, salted and broiled: it derives its appellation from being hot in the mouth.
DEVIL'S BOOKS		Cards.
DICE		The names of false dice: A bale of bard cinque deuces A bale of flat cinque deuces A bale of flat sice aces A bale of bard cater traes A bale of flat cater traes A bale of fulhams A bale of light graniers A bale of langrets contrary to the ventage A bale of gordes, with as many highmen as lowmen, for passage A bale of demies A bale of long dice for even and odd A bale of bristles A bale of direct contraries.
DIE HARD, or GAME		To die hard, is to shew no signs of fear or contrition at the gallows; not to whiddle or squeak. This advice is frequently given to felons going to suffer the law, by their old comrades, anxious for the honour of the gang.
DILDO		From the Italian DILETTO, a woman's delight; or from our word DALLY, a thing to play withal. Penis-succedaneus, called in Lombardy Passo Tempo. Bailey.
DOWN		Aware of a thing. Knowing it. There is NO DOWN. A cant phrase used by house-breakers to signify that the persons belonging to any house are not on their guard, or that they are fast asleep, and have not heard any noise to alarm them.
DROPPING MEMBER		A man's yard with a gonorrhoea.
DUCK FUCKER		The man who has the care of the poultry on board a ship of war.
DUKE OF LIMBS		A tall, awkward, ill-made fellow.
DUNGHILL		A coward: a cockpit phrase, all but gamecocks being styled dunghills. To die dunghill; to repent, or shew any signs of contrition at the gallows. Moving dunghill; a dirty, filthy man or woman. Dung, an abbreviation of dunghill, also means a journeyman taylor who submits to the law for regulating journeymen taylors' wages, therefore deemed by the flints a coward. See FLINTS.
DURHAM MAN		Knocker kneed, he grinds mustard with his knees: Durham is famous for its mustard.
FACE-MAKING		Begetting children. To face it out; to persist in a falsity. No face but his own: a saying of one who has no money in his pocket or no court cards in his hand.
FICE, or FOYSE		A small windy escape backwards, more obvious to the nose than ears; frequently by old ladies charged on their lap-dogs. See FIZZLE.
FIGHT A CRIB		To make a sham fight. BEAR GARDEN TERM.
FINISH		The finish; a small coffee-house in Coven Garden, market, opposite Russel-street, open very early in the morning, and therefore resorted to by debauchees shut out of every other house: it is also called Carpenter's coffee-house.
FIZZLE		An escape backward,
FLY SLICERS		Life-guard men, from their sitting on horseback, under an arch, where they are frequently observed to drive away flies with their swords.
FREEZE		A thin, small, hard cider, much used by vintners and coopers in parting their wines, to lower the price of them, and to advance their gain. A freezing vintner; a vintner who balderdashes his wine.
FUDDLE		Drunk. This is rum fuddle; this is excellent tipple, or drink. Fuddle; drunk. Fuddle cap; a drunkard.
FUMBLER		An old or impotent man. To fumble, also means to go awkwardly about any work, or manual operation.
FUZZ		To shuffle cards minutely: also, to change the pack.
GALIMAUFREY		A hodgepodge made up of the remnants and scraps of the larder.
GAME		Any mode of robbing. The toby is now a queer game; to rob on the highway is now a bad mode of acting. This observation is frequently made by thieves; the roads being now so well guarded by the horse patrole; and gentlemen travel with little cash in their pockets.
GAME		Bubbles or pigeons drawn in to be cheated. Also, at bawdy-houses, lewd women. Mother have you any game; mother, have you any girls? To die game; to suffer at the gallows without shewing any signs of fear or repentance. Game pullet; a young whore, or forward girl in the way of becoming one.
GAWKEY		A tall, thin, awkward young man or woman.
GILLY GAUPUS		A Scotch term for a tall awkward fellow.
GINGERBREAD WORK		Gilding and carving: these terms are particularly applied by seamen on board Newcastle colliers, to the decorations of the sterns and quarters of West-Indiamen, which they have the greatest joy in defacing.
GIZZARD		To grumble in the gizzard; to be secretly displeased.
GO SHOP		The Queen's Head in Duke's court, Bow street, Covent Garden; frequented by the under players: where gin and water was sold in three-halfpenny bowls, called Goes; the gin was called Arrack. The go, the fashion; as, large hats are all the go.
GOLD DROPPERS		Sharpers who drop a piece of gold, which they pick up in the presence of some unexperienced person, for whom the trap is laid, this they pretend to have found, and, as he saw them pick it up, they invite him to a public house to partake of it: when there, two or three of their comrades drop in, as if by accident, and propose cards, or some other game, when they seldom fail of stripping their prey.
GOOD MAN		A word of various imports, according to the place where it is spoken: in the city it means a rich man; at Hockley in the Hole, or St. Giles's, an expert boxer; at a bagnio in Covent Garden, a vigorous fornicator; at an alehouse or tavern, one who loves his pot or bottle; and sometimes, though but rarely, a virtuous man
GRANNUM'S GOLD		Hoarded money: supposed to have belonged to the grandmother of the possessor.
GREASE		To bribe. To grease a man in the fist; to bribe him. To grease a fat sow in the arse; to give to a rich man. Greasy chin; a treat given to parish officers in part of commutation for a bastard: called also, Eating a child.
GREEN		Young, inexperienced, unacquainted; ignorant. How green the cull was not to stag how the old file planted the books. How ignorant the booby was not to perceive how the old sharper placed the cards in such a manner as to insure the game.
GREY BEARD		Earthen jugs formerly used in public house for drawing ale: they had the figure of a man with a large beard stamped on them; whence probably they took the name: see BEN JONSON'S PLAYS, BARTHOLOMEW FAIR, etc. etc. Dutch earthen jugs, used for smuggling gin on the coasts of Essex and Suffolk, are at this time called grey beards.
GRUMBLE		To grumble in the gizzard; to murmur or repine. He grumbled like a bear with a sore head.
GUNNER'S DAUGHTER		To kiss the gunner's daughter; to be tied to a gun and flogged on the posteriors; a mode of punishing boys on board a ship of war.
GUTS AND GARBAGE		A very fat man or woman. More guts than brains; a silly fellow. He has plenty of guts, but no bowels: said of a hard, merciless, unfeeling person.
HAIR SPLITTER		A man's yard.
HANDSOME REWARD		This, in advertisements, means a horse-whipping.
HARD		Stale beer, nearly sour, is said to be hard. Hard also means severe: as, hard fate, a hard master.
HARD AT HIS arse		Close after him.
HECTOR		bully, a swaggering coward. To hector; to bully, probably from such persons affecting the valour of Hector, the Trojan hero.
HEN HOUSE		A house where the woman rules; called also a SHE HOUSE, and HEN FRIGATE: the latter a sea phrase, originally applied to a ship, the captain of which had his wife on board, supposed to command him.
HEN-HEARTED		Cowardly.
HIDEBOUND		Stingy, hard of delivery; a poet poor in invention, is said to have a hidebound muse.
HISTORY OF THE FOUR KINGS, or CHILD'S BEST GUIDE T		A pack of cards. He studies the history of the four kings assiduously; he plays much at cards.
HOG		A shilling. To drive one's hogs; to snore: the noise made by some persons in snoring, being not much unlike the notes of that animal. He has brought his hogs to a fine market; a saying of any one who has been remarkably successful in his affairs, and is spoken ironically to signify the contrary. A hog in armour; an awkward or mean looking man or woman, finely dressed, is said to look like a hog in armour. To hog a horse's mane; to cut it short, so that the ends of the hair stick up like hog's bristles. Jonian hogs; an appellation given to the members of St. John's College, Cambridge.
HOLBORN HILL		To ride backwards up Holborn hill; to go to the gallows: the way to Tyburn, the place of execution for criminals condemned in London, was up that hill. Criminals going to suffer, always ride backwards, as some conceive to increase the ignominy, but more probably to prevent them being shocked with a distant view of the gallows; as, in amputations, surgeons conceal the instruments with which they are going to operate. The last execution at Tyburn, and consequently of this procession, was in the year 1784, since which the criminals have been executed near Newgate
HOLY FATHER		A butcher's boy of St. Patrick's Market, Dublin, or other Irish blackguard; among whom the exclamation, or oath, by the Holy Father (meaning the Pope), is common.
HONEST MAN		A term frequently used by superiors to inferiors. As honest a man as any in the cards when all the kings are out; i.e. a knave. I dare not call thee rogue for fear of the law, said a quaker to an attorney; but I wil give thee five pounds, if thou canst find any creditable person who wilt say thou art an honest man.
HULVER-HEADED		Having a hard impenetrable head; hulver, in the Norfolk dialect, signifying holly, a hard and solid wood.
IRISH APRICOTS		Potatoes. It is a common joke against the Irish vessels, to say they are loaded with fruit and timber, that is, potatoes and broomsticks. Irish assurance; a bold forward behaviour: as being dipt in the river Styx was formerly supposed to render persons invulnerable, so it is said that a dipping in the river Shannon totally annihilates bashfulness; whence arises the saying of an impudent Irishman, that he has been dipt in the Shannon.
IRISH LEGS		Thick legs, jocularly styled the Irish arms. It is said of the Irish women, that they have a dispensation from the pope to wear the thick end of their legs downwards.
JACK OF LEGS		A tall long-legged man; also a giant, said to be buried in Weston church, near Baldock, in Hertfordshire, where there are two stones fourteen feet distant, said to be the head and feet stones of his grave. This giant, says Salmon, as fame goes, lived in a wood here, and was a great robber, but a generous one; for he plundered the rich to feed the poor: he frequently took bread for this purpose from the Baldock bakers, who catching him at an advantage, put out his eyes, and afterwards hanged him upon a knoll in Baldock field.
JEW		An over-reaching dealer, or hard, sharp fellow; an extortioner: the brokers formerly behind St. Clement's church in the Strand were called Jews by their brethren the taylors.
JIBBER THE KIBBER		A method of deceiving seamen, by fixing a candle and lanthorn round the neck of a horse, one of whose fore feet is tied up; this at night has the appearance of a ship's light. Ships bearing towards it, run on shore, and being wrecked, are plundered by the inhabitants. This diabolical device is, it is said, practised by the inhabitants of our western coasts.
JOB'S DOCK		He is laid up in Job's dock; i.e. in a salivation. The apartments for the foul or venereal patients in St. Bartholomew's hospital, are called Job's ward.
KEELHAULING		A punishment in use among the Dutch seamen, in which, for certain offences, the delinquent is drawn once, or oftener, under the ship's keel: ludicrously defined, undergoing a great hard-ship.
KIDDER		A forestaller: see CROCKER. Kidders are also persons employed by the gardeners to gather peas.
KIDDY NIPPERS		Taylors out of work, who cut off the waistcoat pockets of their brethren, when cross-legged on their board, thereby grabbling their bit.
LAY		Enterprize, pursuit, or attempt: to be sick of the lay. It also means a hazard or chance: he stands a queer lay; i.e. he is in danger.
LEAF		To go off with the fall of the leaf; to be hanged: criminals in Dublin being turned off from the outside of the prison by the falling of a board, propped up, and moving on a hinge, like the leaf of a table. IRISH TERM.
LEERY		On one's guard. See PEERY.
LEG		To make a leg; to bow. To give leg-bail and land security; to run away. To fight at the leg; to take unfair advantages: it being held unfair by back-sword players to strike at the leg. To break a leg; a woman who has had a bastard, is said to have broken a leg.
LIMBS		Duke of limbs; a tall awkward fellow.
LIVE LUMBER		A term used by sailors, to signify all landsmen on board their ships.
LOBLOLLEY BOY		A nick name for the surgeon's servant on board a man of war, sometimes for the surgeon himself: from the water gruel prescribed to the sick, which is called loblolley.
LOMBARD FEVER		Sick of the lombard fever; i.e. of the idles.
LONG GALLERY		Throwing, or rather trundling, the dice the whole length of the board.
LOOBY		An awkward, ignorant fellow.
LOVE BEGOTTEN CHILD		A bastard.
LUBBER		An awkward fellow: a name given by sailors to landsmen.
LUMBER		Live lumber; soldiers or passengers on board a ship are so called by the sailors.
MALKIN, or MAULKIN		A general name for a cat; also a parcel of rags fastened to the end of a stick, to clean an oven; also a figure set up in a garden to scare the birds; likewise an awkward woman. The cove's so scaly, he'd spice a malkin of his jazey: the fellow is so mean, that he would rob a scare-crow of his old wig.
MARRIED		Persons chained or handcuffed together, in order to be conveyed to gaol, or on board the lighters for transportation, are in the cant language said to be married together.
MARROWBONES		The knees. To bring any one down on his marrow bones; to make him beg pardon on his knees: some derive this from Mary's bones, i.e. the bones bent in honour of the Virgin Mary; but this seems rather far- fetched. Marrow bones and cleavers; principal instruments in the band of rough music: these are generally performed on by butchers, on marriages, elections, riding skimmington, and other public or joyous occasions.
MASTER OF THE MINT		A gardener.
MASTER OF THE WARDROBE		One who pawns his clothes to purchase liquor.
MEALY-MOUTHED		Over-modest or backward in speech.
MERRY-BEGOTTEN		A bastard.
MORNING DROP		The gallows. He napped the king's pardon and escaped the morning drop; he was pardoned, and was not hanged.
MOSES		To stand Moses: a man is said to stand Moses when he has another man's bastard child fathered upon him, and he is obliged by the parish to maintain it.
MUMCHANCE		An ancient game like hazard, played with dice: probably so named from the silence observed in playing at it.
MUZZLE		A beard.
NATURAL		A mistress, a child; also an idiot. A natural son or daughter; a love or merry-begotten child, a bastard.
NAVY OFFICE		The Fleet prison. Commander of the Fleet; the warden of the Fleet prison.
NEWMAN'S TEA GARDENS		Newgate.
NIGGLING		Cutting awkwardly, trifling; also accompanying with a woman.
NOKES		A ninny, or fool. John-a-Nokes and Tom-a-Stiles; two honest peaceable gentlemen, repeatedly set together by the ears by lawyers of different denominations: two fictitious names formerly used in law proceedings, but now very seldom, having for several years past been supplanted by two other honest peaceable gentlemen, namely, John Doe and Richard Roe.
NOPE		A blow: as, I took him a nope on the costard.
NOSE		As plain as the nose on your face; evidently to be seen. He is led by the nose; he is governed. To follow one's nose; to go strait forward. To put one's nose out of joint; to rival one in the favour of any person. To make a bridge of any one's nose; to pass by him in drinking. To nose a stink; to smell it. He cut off his nose to be revenged of his face; said of one who, to be revenged on his neighbour, has materially injured himself.
OAK		A rich man, a man of good substance and credit. To sport oak; to shut the outward door of a student's room at college. An oaken towel; an oaken cudgel. To rub a man down with an oaken towel; to beat him.
PALLIARDS		Those whose fathers were clapperdogens, or beggars born, and who themselves follow the same trade: the female sort beg with a number of children, borrowing them, if they have not a sufficient number of their own, and making them cry by pinching in order to excite charity; the males make artificial sores on different parts of their bodies, to move compassion.
PEG		Old Peg; poor hard Suffolk or Yorkshire cheese. A peg is also a blow with a straightarm: a term used by the professors of gymnastic arts. A peg in the day-light, the victualling office, or the haltering-place; a blow in the eye, stomach, or under the ear.
PENANCE BOARD		The pillory.
PERSUADERS		Spurs. The kiddey clapped his persuaders to his prad but the traps boned him; the highwayman spurred his horse hard, but the officers seized him.
PHILISTINES		Bailiffs, or officers of justice; also drunkards.
PIGEONS		Sharpers, who, during the drawing of the lottery, wait ready mounted near Guildhall, and, as soon as the first two or three numbers are drawn, which they receive from a confederate on a card, ride with them full speed to some distant insurance office, before fixed on, where there is another of the gang, commonly a decent looking woman, who takes care to be at the office before the hour of drawing: to her he secretly gives the number, which she insures for a considerable sum: thus biting the biter.
PIN		In or to a merry pin; almost drunk: an allusion to a sort of tankard, formerly used in the north, having silver pegs or pins set at equal distances from the top to the bottom: by the rules of good fellowship, every person drinking out of one of these tankards, was to swallow the quantity contained between two pins; if he drank more or less, he was to continue drinking till he ended at a pin: by this means persons unaccustomed to measure their draughts were obliged to drink the whole tankard. Hence when a person was a little elevated with liquor, he was said to have drunk to a merry pin.
PITCHER		The miraculous pitcher, that holds water with the mouth downwards: a woman's commodity. She has crack'd her pitcher or pipkin; she has lost her maidenhead.
PLUCK		Courage. He wants pluck: he is a coward. Against the pluck; against the inclination. Pluck the Ribbon; ring the bell. To pluck a crow with one; to settle a dispute, to reprove one for some past transgression. To pluck a rose; an expression said to be used by women for going to the necessary house, which in the country usually stands in the garden. To pluck also signifies to deny a degree to a candidate at one of the universities, on account of insufficiency.
POINT		To stretch a point; to exceed some usual limit, to take a great stride. Breeches were usually tied up with points, a kind of short laces, formerly given away by the churchwardens at Whitsuntide, under the denomination of tags: by taking a great stride these were stretched.
POKER		A sword. Fore pokers; aces and kings at cards. To burn your poker; to catch the venereal disease.
PONTIUS PILATE		A pawnbroker. Pontius Pilate's guards, the first regiment of foot, or Royal Scots: so intitled from their supposed great antiquity. Pontius Pilate's counsellor; one who like him can say, Non invenio causam, I can find no cause. Also (Cambridge) a Mr. Shepherd of Trinity College; who disputing with a brother parson on the comparative rapidity with which they read the liturgy, offered to give him as far as Pontius Pilate in the Belief.
PORRIDGE ISLAND		An alley leading from St. Martin's church-yard to Round-court, chiefly inhabited by cooks, who cut off ready-dressed meat of all sorts, and also sell soup.
POSEY, or POESY		A nosegay. I shall see you ride backwards up Holborn-hill, with a book in one hand, and a posey in t'other; i.e. I shall see you go to be hanged. Malefactors who piqued themselves on being properly equipped for that occasion, had always a nosegay to smell to, and a prayer book, although they could not read.
POST NOINTER		A house painter, who occasionally paints or anoints posts. Knight of the post; a false evidence, one ready to swear any thing for hire. From post to pillar; backwards and forwards.
POWDER MONKEY		A boy on board a ship of war, whose business is to fetch powder from the magazine.
PPC		An inscription on the visiting cards of our modern fine gentleman, signifying that they have called POUR PRENDRE CONGE, i.e. 'to take leave,' This has of late been ridiculed by cards inscribed D.I.O. i.e. 'Damme, I'm off.'
PRAY		She prays with her knees upwards; said of a woman much given to gallantry and intrigue. At her last prayers; saying of an old maid.
PRINCOX		A pert, lively, forward fellow.
PRINKING		Dressing over nicely: prinked up as if he came out of a bandbox, or fit to sit upon a cupboard's head.
PUT		A country put; an ignorant awkward clown. To put upon any one; to attempt to impose on him, or to make him the but of the company.
QUEER PLUNGERS		Cheats who throw themselves into the water, in order that they may be taken up by their accomplices, who carry them to one of the houses appointed by the Humane Society for the recovery of drowned persons, where they are rewarded by the society with a guinea each; and the supposed drowned persons, pretending he was driven to that extremity by great necessity, also frequently sent away with a contribution in his pocket.
QUEER PRANCER		A bad, worn-out, foundered horse; also a cowardly or faint-hearted horse-stealer.
RANDLE		A set of nonsensical verses, repeated in Ireland by schoolboys, and young people, who have been guilty of breaking wind backwards before any of their compa- nions; if they neglect this apology, they are liable to certain kicks, pinches, and fillips, which are accompanied with divers admonitory couplets.
RANK		Stinking, rammish, ill-flavoured; also strong, great. A rank knave; a rank coward: perhaps the latter may allude to an ill savour caused by fear.
RAREE SHEW MEN		Poor Savoyards, who subsist by shewing the magic lantern and marmots about London.
RED SAIL-YARD DOCKERS		Buyers of stores stolen out of the royal yards and docks.
RESURRECTION MEN		Persons employed by the students in anatomy to steal dead bodies out of church-yards.
REVERENCE		An ancient custom, which obliges any person easing himself near the highway or foot-path, on the word REVERENCE being given him by a passenger, to take off his hat with his teeth, and without moving from his station to throw it over his head, by which it frequently falls into the excrement; this was considered as a punishment for the breach of delicacy, A person refusing to obey this law, might be pushed backwards. Hence, perhaps, the term, SIR-REVERENCE.
REVERSED		A man set by bullies on his head, that his money may fall out of his breeches, which they afterwards by accident pick up. See HOISTING.
RIBALDRY		Vulgar abusive language, such as was spoken by ribalds. Ribalds were originally mercenary soldiers who travelled about, serving any master far pay, but afterwards degenerated into a mere banditti.
RICHAUD SNARY		A dictionary. A country lad, having been reproved for calling persons by their christian names, being sent by his master to borrow a dictionary, thought to shew his breeding by asking for a Richard Snary.
RIDING SKIMMINGTON		A ludicrous cavalcade, in ridicule of a man beaten by his wife. It consists of a man riding behind a woman, with his face to the horse's tail, holding a distaff in his hand, at which he seems to work, the woman all the while beating him with a ladle; a smock displayed on a staff is carried before them as an emblematical standard, denoting female superiority: they are accompanied by what is called the ROUGH MUSIC, that is, frying-pans, bulls horns, marrow-bones and cleavers, etc. A procession of this kind is admirably described by Butler in his Hudibras. He rode private, i.e. was a private trooper.
ROAST AND BOILED		A nick name for the Life Guards, who are mostly substantial house-keepers; and eat daily of roast and boiled.
ROGER		A portmanteau; also a man's yard.
ROGUM POGUM, or DRAGRUM POGRAM		Goat's beard, eaten for asparagus; so called by the ladies who gather cresses, etc. who also deal in this plant.
ROMBOYLES		Watch and ward. Romboyled; sought after with a warrant.
ROMP		A forward wanton girl, a tomrig. Grey, in his notes to Shakespeare, derives it from arompo, an animal found in South Guinea, that is a man eater. See HOYDEN.
ROOM		She lets out her fore room and lies backwards: saying of a woman suspected of prostitution.
ROUND ROBIN		A mode of signing remonstrances practised by sailors on board the king's ships, wherein their names are written in a circle, so that it cannot be discovered who first signed it, or was, in other words, the ringleader.
ROUT		A modern card meeting at a private house; also an order from the Secretary at War, directing the march and quartering of soldiers.
RUM BUBBER		A dexterous fellow at stealing silver tankards from inns and taverns.
RUM DUKE		A jolly handsome fellow; also an odd eccentric fellow; likewise the boldest and stoutest fellows lately among the Alsatians, Minters, Savoyards, and other inhabitants of privileged districts, sent to remove and guard the goods of such bankrupts as intended to take sanctuary in those places.
RUMBOYLE		A ward or watch.
RUSSIAN COFFEE-HOUSE		The Brown Bear in Bow-street, Covent Garden, a house of call for thief-takers and runners of the Bow street justices.
SAUCE BOX		A term of familiar raillery, signifying a bold or forward person.
SHAMBLE		To walk awkwardly. Shamble-legged: one that walks wide, and shuffles about his feet.
SHIFTING BALLAST		A term used by sailors, to signify soldiers, passengers, or any landsmen on board.
SHIT SACK		A dastardly fellow: also a non-conformist. This appellation is said to have originated from the following story: - After the restoration, the laws against the non-conformists were extremely severe. They sometimes met in very obscure places: and there is a tradition that one of their congregations were assembled in a barn, the rendezvous of beggars and other vagrants, where the preacher, for want of a ladder or tub, was suspended in a sack fixed to the beam. His discourse that day being on the last judgment, he particularly attempted to describe the terrors of the wicked at the sounding of the trumpet, on which a trumpeter to a puppet-show, who had taken refuge in that barn, and lay hid under the straw, sounded a charge. The congregation, struck with the utmost consternation, fled in an instant from the place, leaving their affrighted teacher to shift for himself. The effects of his terror are said to have appeared at the bottom of the sack, and to have occasioned that opprobrious appellation by which the non-conformists were vulgarly distinguished.
SIMPLES		Physical herbs; also follies. He must go to Battersea, to be cut for the simples - Battersea is a place famous for its garden grounds, some of which were formerly appropriated to the growing of simples for apothecaries, who at a certain season used to go down to select their stock for the ensuing year, at which time the gardeners were said to cut their simples; whence it became a popular joke to advise young people to go to Battersea, at that time, to have their simples cut, or to be cut for the simples.
SLIPSLOPPING		Misnaming and misapplying any hard word; from the character of Mrs. Slipslop, in Fielding's Joseph Andrews.
SMELLING CHEAT		An orchard, or garden; also a nosegay.
SOAK		To drink. An old soaker; a drunkard, one that moistens his clay to make it stick together.
SPANISH WORM		A nail: so called by carpenters when they meet with one in a board they are sawing.
SPATCH COCK		Abbreviation of DISPATCH COCK. A hen just killed from the roost, or yard, and immediately skinned, split, and broiled: an Irish dish upon any sudden occasion.
SPILT		A small reward or gift.
SPOONEY		Thin, haggard, like the shank of a spoon; also delicate, craving for something, longing for sweets. Avaricious. That tit is damned spooney. She's a spooney piece of goods. He's a spooney old fellow.
SQUEAKER		A bar-boy; also a bastard or any other child. To stifle the squeaker; to murder a bastard, or throw It into the necessary house. - Organ pipes are likewise called squeakers. The squeakers are meltable; the small pipes are silver.
SQUELCH		A fall. Formerly a bailiff caught in a barrack- yard in Ireland, was liable by custom to have three tosses in a blanket, and a squelch; the squelch was given by letting go the corners of the blanket, and suffering him to fall to the ground. Squelch-gutted; fat, having a prominent belly.
STALL WHIMPER		A bastard.
STINGRUM		A niggard.
STRETCH		A yard. The cove was lagged for prigging a peter with several stretch of dobbin from a drag; the fellow was transported for stealing a trunk, containing several yards of ribband, from a waggon.
SWILL TUB		A drunkard, a sot.
SWIMMER		A ship. I shall have a swimmer; a cant phrase used by thieves to signify that they will be sent on board the tender.
SWIPES		Purser's swipes; small beer: so termed on board the king's ships, where it is furnished by the purser.
TARRING AND FEATHERING		A punishment lately infliced by the good people of Boston on any person convicted, or suspected, of loyalty: such delinquents being "stripped naked", were daubed all over wilh tar, and afterwards put into a hogshead of feathers.
TARTAR		To catch a Tartar; to attack one of superior strength or abilities. This saying originated from a story of an Irish-soldier in the Imperial service, who, in a battle against the Turks, called out to his comrade that he had caught a Tartar. 'Bring him along then,' said he. 'He won't come,' answered Paddy. 'Then come along yourself,' replied his comrade. 'Arrah,' cried he, 'but he won't let me.' - A Tartar is also an adept at any feat, or game: he is quite a Tartar at cricket, or billiards.
TEARS OF THE TANKARD		The drippings of liquor on a man's waistcoat.
TEN TOES		See BAYARD OF TEN TOES.
THIEF TAKERS		Fellows who associate with all kinds of villains, in order to betray them, when they have committed any of those crimes which entitle the persons taking them to a handsome reward, called blood money. It is the business of these thief takers to furnish subjects for a handsome execution, at the end of every sessions.
THOROUGH COUGH		Coughing and breaking wind backwards at the same time.
TODDY		Originally the juice of the cocoa tree, and afterwards rum, water, sugar, and nutmeg.
TOFSY-TURVY		The top side the other way; i.e. the wrong side upwards; some explain it, the top side turf ways, turf being always laid the wrong side upwards.
TOSS POT		A drunkard.
TOUCH		To touch; to get money from any one; also to arrest. Touched in the wind; broken winded. Touched in the head; insane, crazy. To touch up a woman; to have carnal knowledge of her. Touch bone and whistle; any one having broken wind backwards, according to the vulgar law, may be pinched by any of the company till he has touched bone (i.e. his teeth) and whistled.
TRAVELLING PIQUET		A mode of amusing themselves, practised by two persons riding in a carriage, each reckoning towards his game the persons or animals that pass by on the side next them, according to the following estimation: A parson riding a grey horse, witholue furniture; game. An old woman under a hedge; ditto. A cat looking out of a window; 60. A man, woman, and child, in a buggy; 40. A man with a woman behind him; 30. A flock of sheep; 20. A flock of geese; 10. A post chaise; 5. A horseman; 2. A man or woman walking; 1.
TRIP		A short voyage or journey, a false step or stumble, an error in the tongue, a bastard. She has made a trip; she has had a bastard.
TRUMPS		To be put to one's trumps: to be in difficulties, or put to one's shifts. Something may turn up trumps; something lucky may happen. All his cards are trumps: he is extremely fortunate.
TURD		There were four turds for dinner: stir turd, hold turd, tread turd, and mus-turd: to wit, a hog's face, feet and chitterlings, with mustard. He will never shite a seaman's turd; i.e. he will never make a good seaman.
TURK		A cruel, hard-hearted man. Turkish treatment; barbarous usage. Turkish shore; Lambeth, Southwark, and Rotherhithe side of the Thames.
TWISS		(IRISH) A Jordan, or pot de chambre. A Mr. Richard Twiss having in his "Travels" given a very unfavourable description of the Irish character, the inhabitants of Dublin, byway of revenge, thought proper to christen this utensil by his name - suffice it to say that the baptismal rites were not wanting at the ceremony. On a nephew of this gentleman the following epigram was made by a friend of ouis: Perish the country, yet my name Shall ne'er in STORY be forgot, But still the more increase in fame, The more the country GOES TO POT.
TYBURN TIPPET		A halter; see Latimer's sermon before. Edward VI. A. D. 1549.
UNFORTUNATE GENTLEMEN		The horse guards, who thus named themselves in Germany, where a general officer seeing them very awkward in bundling up their forage, asked what the devil they were; to which some of them answered, unfortunate gentlemen.
UNTRUSS		To untruss a point; to let down one's breeches in order to ease one's self. Breeches were formerly tied with points, which till lately were distributed to the boys every Whit Monday by the churchwardens of most of the parishes in London, under the denomination of tags: these tags were worsteds of different colours twisted up to a size somewhat thicker than packthread, and tagged at both ends with tin. Laces were at the same given to the girls.
UPRIGHT MAN		An upright man signifies the chief or principal of a crew. The vilest, stoutest rogue in the pack is generally chosen to this post, and has the sole right to the first night's lodging with the dells, who afterwards are used in common among the whole fraternity. He carries a short truncheon in his hand, which he calls his filchman, and has a larger share than ordinary in whatsoever is gotten in the society. He often travels in company with thirty or forty males and females, abram men, and others, over whom he presides arbitrarily. Sometimes the women and children who are unable to travel, or fatigued, are by turns carried in panniers by an ass, or two, or by some poor jades procured for that purpose.
VARDY		To give one's vardy; i.e. verdict or opinion.
VINCENT'S LAW		The art of cheating at cards, composed of the following associates: bankers, those who play booty; the gripe, he that betteth; and the person cheated, who is styled the vincent; the gains acquired, termage.
WALKING THE PLANK		A mode of destroying devoted persons or officers in a mutiny or ship-board, by blindfolding them, and obliging them to walk on a plank laid over the ship's side; by this means, as the mutineers suppose, avoiding the penalty of murder.
WARREN		One that is security for goods taken up on credit by extravagant young gentlemen. Cunny warren; a girl's boarding-school, also a bawdy-house.
WHINYARD		A sword.
WHIP OFF		To run away, to drink off greedily, to snatch. He whipped away from home, went to the alehouse, where he whipped off a full tankard, and coming back whipped off a fellow's hat from his head.
WHITE FEATHER		He has a white feather; he is a coward; an allusion to a game cock, where having a white leather is a proof he is not of the true game breed.
WHITE-LIVERED		Cowardly, malicious.
WHORE'S KITLING, or WHORE'S SON		A bastard.
WIBLING'S WITCH		The four of clubs: from one James Wibling, who in the reign of King James I. grew rich by private gaming, and was commonly observed to have that card, and never to lose a game but when he had it not.
WIDOW'S WEEDS		Mourning clothes of a peculiar fashion, denoting her state. A grass widow; a discarded mistress. a widow bewitched; a woman whose husband is abroad, and said, but not certainly known, to be dead.
WINDWARD PASSAGE		One who uses or navigates the windward passage; a sodomite.
WORD GRUBBERS		Verbal critics, and also persons who use hard words in common discourse.
WRINKLE		A wrinkle-bellied whore; one who has had a number of bastards: child-bearing leaves wrinkles in a woman's belly. To take the wrinkles out of any one's belly; to fill it out by a hearty meal. You have one wrinkle more in your arse; i.e. you have one piece of knowledge more than you had, every fresh piece of knowledge being supposed by the vulgar naturalists to add a wrinkle to that part.