Part I
. At five a.m. the publication of the Times newspaper is, to use a north-country mining expression, in ‘full blast.’
1884. Daily News, Feb. 9, p. 5, col. 2. If he visit New York in that most pleasant season, the autumn, he will find that the ‘fall’ trade is ‘in full blast.’
1888. Daily Telegraph, 17 Nov. By half-past ten o’clock the smoking-room was in full swing.
In full dig, adv. phr. (common).—On full pay.
In full feather, see Feather.
In full fig.—1. See Fig (to which may be added the following illustrative quotations).
1836. M. Scott, Cruise of the Midge, p. 178. In front of this shed—full fig, in regular Highland costume, philabeg, short hose, green coatee, bonnet and feather, marched the bagpiper.
1836. M. Scott, Cringle’s Log, ch. xi. Captain Transom, the other lieutenant, and myself in full puff, leading the van, followed by about fourteen seamen.
1838. Haliburton, Clockmaker, (2nd ed.), ch. viii. ‘Lookin’ as pleased as a peacock when it’s in full fig with its head and tail up.’
1841. Punch, i., p. 26, col. 1. Dressed in full fig—sword very troublesome—getting continually between my legs.
1874. Mrs. H. Wood, Johnny Ludlow (1st ed.), No. IV., p. 62. When our church bells were going for service, Major Parrifer’s carriage turned out with the ladies all in full fig.
2. adv. phr. (venery).—Said of an erection of the penis; prick-proud (q.v.). For synonyms, see Horn.
Like a straw-yard bull: full of fuck and half starved, phr. (venery). A friendly retort to the question, ‘How goes it?’ i.e., How are you?
Full of it, phr. (common).—With child.
Full of guts, phr. (colloquial).—Full of vigour; excellently inspired and done: as a picture, a novel, and so forth. See Guts.
Full of beans, see Beans.
Full of bread, see Bread.
Fuller’s Earth, subs. phr. (old).—Gin. For synonyms, see Satin.
1821. Real Life in London, i., 394. The swell covies and out-and-outers find nothing so refreshing, after a night’s spree, when the victualling office is out of order, as a little fuller’s earth, or dose of Daffy’s.
1823. Moncrieff, Tom and Jerry, iii., 3. Bring me de kwarten of de fuller’s earth.
Fullied. To be fullied, verb. phr. (thieves’).—To be committed for trial. [From the newspaper expression, ‘Fully committed.’] Fr., être mis sur la planche au pain.
1851–61. H. Mayhew, London Lab. and Lon. Poor, Vol. iii., p. 397. He got acquitted for that there note after he had me ‘pinched’ (arrested). I got fullied (fully committed).
1879. Horsley, ‘Autobiography of a Thief,’ in Macmillan’s Magazine, xl., 506. I ... was then fullied and got this stretch and a half.
1889. Answers, 13 April, p. 313. At the House of Detention I often noticed such announcements as ‘Jack from Bradford fullied for smashing, and expects seven stretch,’ i.e., fully committed for trial for passing bad money, and expects seven years’ penal servitude.
Fulness. There’s not fulness enough in the sleeve top. phr. (tailors’).—A derisive answer to a threat.
Fumbler, subs. (old).—An impotent man.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. Fumbler, c., an unperforming husband; one that is insufficient; a weak Brother.
1719. Durfey, Pills, etc., vi., 312. The old fumbler (title).
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
c. 1790. Burns, ‘David and Bathsheba,’ p. 40. ‘By Jove,’ says she, ‘what’s this I see, my Lord the King’s a fumbler.’
Fumbler’s Hall, subs. phr. (venery).—The female pudendum. See, however, quot. 1690. For synonyms, see Monosyllable.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. Fumbler’s hall, the place where such (fumblers, q.v.) are to be put for their non-performance.
Free of Fumbler’s hall, phr.—Said of an impotent man.
Fumbles, subs. (thieves’).—Gloves.
1825. Kent, Modern Flash Dict., s.v.
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum, or Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v.
1881. New York Slang Dict., s.v.
Fun, subs. (old).—1. A cheat; a trick.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew, s.v.
2. (old).—The posteriors, or Western End (Marvell). Probably an abbreviation of fundament. For synonyms, see Blind Cheeks and Monocular Eye-glass.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. I’ll kick your fun, c., I’ll kick your arse.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
Verb. (old).—1. To cheat; to trick. Also to put the fun on.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. What do you fun me? Do you think to Sharp or Trick me? Ibid. He put the fun upon the cull, c., he sharp’d the Fellow. Ibid. I funn’d him, c., I was too hard for him; I outwitted or rook’d him.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1859 Matsell, Vocabulum, or Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v.
To poke fun at, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To joke; to ridicule; to make a butt.
1837. Barham, Ingoldsby Legends, i., p. 280. O fie! Mister Noakes,—for shame, Mr. Noakes! To be poking your fun at us plain-dealing folks.
1855. Haliburton (‘Sam Slick’) Human Nature, p. 124. I thought you was pokin’ fun at me; for I am a poor ignorant farmer, and these people are always making game of me.
1865. Neal, Charcoal Sketches (in Bartlett). Jeames, if you don’t be quit poking fun at me, I’ll break your mouth, as sure as you sit there.
To have been making fun, verb. phr. (common).—Intoxicated. For synonyms, see Drinks and Screwed.
To have (or do) a bit of fun, verb. phr. (venery).—To procure or enjoy the sexual favour. For synonyms, see Greens.
Functior or Functure, subs. (Winchester College).—An iron bracket candlestick, used for the nightlight in college chambers. [The word, says Winchester Notions, looks like fulctura, an earlier form of fulture, meaning a prop or stay with phonetic change of l into n.]
1870. Mansfield, School Life at Winchester, p. 68. Beside the window yawned the great fireplace, with its dogs, on which rested the faggots and bars for the reception of the array of boilers. Above it was a rushlight, fixed in a circular iron pan fastened to a staple in the wall; it was called the functior.
Fundamental Features, subs. phr. (common).—The posteriors. For synonyms, see Blind Cheeks and Monocular Eye-glass.
1818. Moore, Fudge Family, ix., Aug. 21. O can we wonder, best of speechers, When Louis seated thus we see, That France’s ‘fundamental features’ Are much the same they used to be?
Funds, subs. (colloquial).—Finances; e.g. ‘my funds are very low.’
Funeral. It’s not my (or your) funeral, verb. phr. (American).—i.e., It is no business of mine, or yours. Fr., nib dans mes blots (= that is not my affair). Also used affirmatively.
1867. Mrs. Whitney, A Summer in Leslie Goldthwaite’s Life, p. 183. ‘It’s none of my funeral, I know, Sin Saxon,’ said Miss Craydocke. ‘I’m only an eleventh-hour helper; but I’ll come in for the holiday business ... that’s more in my line.’
1871. De Vere, Americanisms, p. 239. This is none of your funeral is heard quite frequently as an indirect rebuke for intermeddling, with the ludicrous undercurrent of thought, that the troublesome meddler has no right to be crying at a strange man’s funeral.
1877. Hartford Times, 17 Oct. Senators Blaine and Barnum passed down to New York, en route to Washington, on Wednesday last, when Barnum asked Blaine how he liked the news from Ohio. ‘Oh, that isn’t my funeral, I want you to understand,’ replied the plucky Maine Senator.
1888. Missouri Republican, 8 Apr. After a lot of slides had been exhibited the audience howled for Miss Debar. It got so noisy that Mr. Marsh reluctantly exclaimed—‘Well, is this your funeral or mine?’
Fungus, subs. (old).—An old man.
Funk, subs. (old).—1. Tobacco smoke; also a powerful stink. Cf., Ger., funke; Walloon funki.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. What a funk here is! What a thick smoke. Smoak of Tobacco is here! Ibid. Here’s a damn’d funk, here’s a great stink.
2. (vulgar).—A state of fear; trepidation, nervousness, or cowardice; a stew (q.v.). Generally, with an intensitive, e.g., a ‘mortal,’ ‘awful,’ ‘bloody,’ ‘blue,’ or ‘pissing’ funk. Fr., la guenette; le flubart (thieves’); la frousse (also = diarrhœa). It., filo = thread.
1796. Wolcott, Pindarina, p. 59. If they find no brandy to get drunk, Their souls are in a miserable funk.
1819. Moore, Tom Crib’s Memorial, p. 21. Up he rose in a funk.
1821. P. Egan, Tom and Jerry (1890), p. 91. I was in a complete funk.
1837. Barham, I. L., Look at the Clock, ed. 1862, p. 39. Pryce, usually brimful of valour when drunk, Now experienced what schoolboys denominate funk.
1848. Ruxton, Life in the Far West, p. 9. The mules, which was a-snorting with funk and running before the Injuns ... followed her right into the corral, and thar they was safe.
1850. Literary World (New York), 30 Nov. So my friend’s fault is timidity.... I grant, then, that the funk is sublime, which is a true and friendly admission.
1856. Thomas Hughes, Tom Brown’s School-days, p. 196. If I was going to be flogged next minute, I should be in a blue funk.
1859. Whitty, Political Portraits, p. 30. Lord Clarendon did not get through the business without these failures, which result from the intellectual process termed freely funk.
1861. Macmillan’s Magazine, p. 211. I was in a real blue funk.
1861. Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxvi. I was in a real blue funk and no mistake.
1870. London Figaro, 19 Oct. After the Fire. He was in a mortal funk, no doubt.
1871. Maxwell, in Life (1882), xvi., 382. Certainly χλωρὸν θéος is the Homeric for a blue funk.
1888. Cassell’s Saturday Journal, 29 Dec., p. 305. You’re always in a funk about nothing at all.
3. (schoolboys’).—A coward.
1882. F. Anstey, Vice Versâ, ch. v. Bosher said, ‘Let’s cut it,’ and he and Peebles bolted. (They were neither of them funks, of course, but they lost their heads.)
Verb. (common).—1. To smoke out. See Funk the cobbler.
1720. Durfey, Wit and Mirth, vi., 303. With a sober dose Of coffee funks his nose.
1578. Grose, Vulg. Tongue. funk, to smoke, figuratively to smoke or stink through fear.
1823. Moncrieff, Tom and Jerry, ii., 2. Tom. But, I say, only see how confoundedly the dustman’s getting hold of Logic—we’ll funk him. (Tom and Jerry smoke Logic), Log. Oh, hang your cigars, I don’t like it; let’s have no funking.
1841. Punch, I., p. 172. Look here ... isn’t it considerable clear they’re a all funking like burnt cayenne in a clay pipe, or couldn’t they have made a raise somehow to get a ship of their own, or borrow one to send after that caged-up coon of a Macleod.
2. (common).—To terrify; to shrink or quail through nervousness or cowardice.
1858. A. Mayhew, Paved with Gold, Bk. III., ch. vi., p. 294. Perhaps we’re only funking ourselves useless, and it mayn’t be the farm chaps at all.
3. (colloquial).—To fear; to hesitate; to shirk; and (among pugilists) to come it (q.v.).
1836. Smith, The Individual, ‘The Thieves’ Chaunt.’ But dearer to me Sue’s kisses far Than grunting peck or other grub are, And I never funk the lambskin men When I sits with her in the boozing ken.
1846. Punch, X., p. 163. But as yet no nose is bleeding, As yet no man is down; For the gownsmen funk the townsmen, And the townsmen funk the gown.
1848. J. R. Lowell, Biglow Papers. To funk right out o’ p’lit’cal strife ain’t thought to be the thing.
1873. M. Collins, Squire Silchester’s Whim, ch. xvii. Come along! don’t funk it, old fellow.
English Synonyms.—To come it; to lose one’s guts; to shit one’s breeches; to get the needle (athletic).
French Synonyms.—Paniquer (thieves’: Panique = sudden fright); blaguer (familiar: = to swagger: Il avait l’air de blaguer mais il n’était pas à la noce = he put on a lot of side, but he didn’t like it); avec la cœur en gargousse (sailors’ = with sinking heart); avoir une fluxion (popular: fluxion = inflammation); avoir la flemme (popular: also = to be idle); avoir le trac or trak (general); foirer (popular: foire = excrement); léziner (popular: also = to cheat).
Spanish Synonym.—Pajarear.
Italian Synonym.—Filare (= to run: Fr., filer).
4. (colloquial).—To be nervous; to lose heart.
1827. ‘Advice to Tommy,’ Every Night Book (by the author of ‘The Cigar’). Do not go out of your depth, unless you have available assistance at hand, in case you should funk.
1856. Hughes, Tom Brown’s School Days, ii., p. 5. He’s funking; go in Williams!
1857. Moncrieff, The Bashful Man, ii., 4. Ah! Gyp, hope I sha’n’t get plucked; funk confoundedly: no matter, I must put a bold face on it.
1857. Hood, Pen and Pencil Pictures, p. 144. I have seen him out with the governor’s hounds: he funked at the first hedge, and I never saw him again!
1863. Reade, Hard Cash, ii., p. 135. I told him I hadn’t a notion of what he meant! ‘O yes I did,’ he said, ‘Captain Dodd’s fourteen thousand pounds! It had passed through my hands.’ Then I began to funk again at his knowing that.... I was flustered, ye see.
1865. H. Kingsley, The Hillyars and the Burtons, ch. xxxiii. The sound of the table falling was the signal for a rush of four men from the inner room, who had to use a vulgar expression, funked following the valiant scoundrel Sykes, but who now tried to make their escape, and found themselves hand to hand with the policemen.
1871. Morning Advertiser, 11 Sept. ‘Holy Abr’ham!’ mused he vauntingly, ‘shall British sailors funk, While tracts refresh their spirits, tea washes down their junk?’
1890. Pall Mall Gazette, 17 Oct. p. 2, col. 1. They wanted badly to get one steamer loaded and sent to New Zealand. The non-union men funked loading her on account of the union men.
1891. Licensed Vict. Gazette, 13 Feb. Smith’s friends thought he was funking, and shouted to Tom to go in and punch him.
5. (schoolboys’).—To move the hand forward unfairly in playing marbles; to fudge (q.v.).
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum. Funk, to use an unfair motion of the hand in plumping at taw.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, i., p. 144. I’ve noticed them, too, playing at ring-taw, and one of their exclamations is ‘Knuckle down fair, and no funking.’
To funk the cobbler, verb. phr. (schoolboys’).—To smoke out a schoolmate: a trick performed with asafœtida and cotton stuffed into a hollow tube or cow’s horn; the cotton being lighted, the smoke is blown through the keyhole.
1698–1700. Ward, London Spy, Pt. IX., p. 197. We smoak’d the Beans almost as bad as unlucky schoolboys us’d to do the coblers, till they sneak’d off one by one, and left behind ’em more agreeable Company.
1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
See also Peter Funk.
Funker, subs. (old).—1. A pipe; a cigar; a fire. [From funk = to smoke + er.]
2. (thieves’).—A low thief.
1848. Duncombe, Sinks of London, etc., s.v.
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum, or Rogue’s Lexicon. Funkers, the very lowest order of thieves.
3. (colloquial).—A coward.
4. (prostitutes’).—A girl that shirks her trade in bad weather.
Funking-room, subs. (medical).—The room at the Royal College of Surgeons where the students collect on the last evening of their final during the addition of their marks, and whence each is summoned by an official announcing failure or success.
1841. Punch, I., p. 225, col. 2. On the top of a staircase he enters a room, wherein the partners of his misery are collected. It is a long, narrow apartment, commonly known as the funking-room.
Funkster, subs. (Winchester College).—A coward; one that funks (q.v.).
Funky, adj. (colloquial).—Nervous; frightened; timid.
1845. Naylor, Reynard the Fox, 46. I do seem somewhat funky.
1863. C. Reade, Hard Cash, I., 143. On his retiring with twenty-five, scored in eight minutes, the remaining Barkingtonians were less funky, and made some fair scores.
1876. Hindley, Life and Adventures of a Cheapjack, p. 237. The second round commences with a little cautious sparring on both sides, the bouncing Elias looking very funky.
1891. Hume Nisbet, Bail Up! p. 51. ‘I’ll noy funky,’ returned the Chinaman impressively.
Funnel, subs. (common).—The throat. For synonyms, see Gutter Alley.
1712. Blackmore, Creation, Bk. VI. Some the long funnel’s curious mouth extend, Through which the ingested meats with ease descend.
Funniment, subs. (colloquial).—1. A joke, either practical or verbal.
2. (venery).—The female pudendum. For synonyms, see Monosyllable.
Funny, subs. (nautical).—A clinker-built, narrow boat for sculls.
1837. Barham, I. L., Sir Rupert the Fearless. Sprang up through the waves, popped him into his funny, Which some others already had half-filled with money.
1882. Field, 28 Jan. The only obtainable craft, besides funnies, pair-oars, and randans, were a couple of six-oars.
To feel funny, verb. phr. (common).—To be overtaken with (1) emotion, or (2) drink: e.g., to wax amorous, or get the flavour (q.v.); to begin to be the worse for liquor.
Funny Bit, subs. phr. (venery).—The female pudendum.
Funny Bone, subs. (popular).—The elbow, with the passage of the ulnar nerve connecting the two bones: the extremity of the humerus.
1837. Barham, I. L. (Blondie Jacke). They have pull’d you down flat on your back! And they smack, and they thwack, Till your funny bones crack, As if you were stretch’d on the rack.
1853. Thackeray, ‘Shabby Genteel Story,’ ch. ix. He had merely received a blow on that part which anatomists call the funny bone.
1870. Lowell Courier. Thanks for your kind condolence; I would write A merry rhyme in answer if I might; But then—confound the fall!—the very stone That broke my humerus hurt my funny bone!
Funny-man, subs. (common).—A circus clown. Also a joker in private life.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor., III., p. 129. What I’ve earned as clown, or the funny man.
Fur, subs. (venery).—The pubic hair. For synonyms, see Fleece.
To make the fur fly.—See Fly.
To have one’s fur out, verb. phr. (Winchester College).—To be angry. For synonyms, see Nab the rust.
Fur and Feathers, subs. phr. (sporting).—Generic for game.
Fur-below, subs. (venery).—The female pubic hair. For synonyms, see Fleece.
16(?). Old Catch. Adam caught Eve by the fur-below, And that’s the oldest catch I know.
Furioso, subs. (old).—A blusterer; Ital., furioso = raving.
1692. Hacket. Life of Archbishop Williams, ii., p. 218. A violent man and a furioso was deaf to all this.
English Synonyms.—Barker; blower; bobadil; bouncer; bulldozer (American); cacafogo; Captain Bounce; Captain Bluff; Captain Grand; Captain Hackam; cutter; fire-eater; hector; huff-cap; humguffin; gasser; gasman; mouth; mouth-almighty; pissfire; pump-thunder; ramper; roarer; ruffler; shitefire; slangwhanger; spitfire; swashbuckler; swasher; teazer; Timothy Tearcat.
French Synonyms.—Un avale-tout-cru (popular: = an eat-all-he-kills); un fendart or fendart (popular: = a cutter); un avaleur de charrettes fereés (popular); un mata (printers’: from matador = a bull-fighter); un bousineur (popular: bousin = uproar, shindy); un bourreau de crânes (military): = a scull-destroyer; un bœufier (popular: = an ugly customer); un mauvais gas (familiar: from garçon); un homme qui a l’air de vouloir tout avaler (familiar: a man who looks as though he’d swallow the world); un croquet (popular).
Spanish Synonyms.—Perdonavidas; fierabras (fiera = a wild beast); botarate; macareno cacafuoco (= a shitfire).
Furk, Ferk, Firk, verb. (Winchester College).—To expel; to send (as on a message); to drive away. Also to furk up and furk down. [Old English fercian, High German ferken, Middle English to lead or send away.]
Furmen, subs. (old).—Aldermen. From their fur-trimmed robes.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew, s.v.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
Furmity-faced, adj. phr. (old).—White-faced (furmity is described by Grose as ‘wheat boiled to a jelly’). To simper like a furmity kitten (Grose), see Simper.
Furnish, verb. (common).—To fill out; to improve in strength and appearance.
Furniture Picture, subs. phr. (artists’).—A ‘picture’ sold not as a piece of art but as a piece of upholstery, such things being turned out by the score, as pianos are, or three-legged stools; the worst and cheapest kind of potboiler (q.v.).
Furrow, subs. (venery). Also Cupid’s (or the One-ended) furrow, etc.—The female pudendum. For synonyms, see Monosyllable. To draw a straight furrow. See Draw.
to fall in the furrow, verb. phr. (venery).—To achieve emission.
To fail (or die) in the furrow, verb. phr. (venery).—To do a dry-bob (q.v.).
Furry Tail, subs. phr. (printers’).—A non-unionist; a rat (q.v.). Specifically, a workman accepting employment at less than ‘Society’ wages. Cf., Dung, Flint, etc.
Further. I’ll see you further first, phr. (colloquial).—A denial. I’ll sooner die first (q.v.).
1861–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, i., p. 29. I gave a country lad 2d. to mind him (the donkey) in a green lane there. I wanted my own boy to do so, but he said, I’ll see you further first. A London boy hates being by himself in a lone country part. He’s afraid of being burked.
Fur Trade, subs. phr. (old).—Barristers.
1839. Reynolds, Pickwick Abroad, ch. xxvi. Let nobs in the fur trade hold their jaw, And let the jug be free.
Furze-Bush, subs. phr. (venery).—The female pubic hair. For synonyms, see fleece.
Fussock, and Fussocks, subs. (old).—Opprobrious for a fat woman.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. Fussocks, a meer fussocks, a Lazy Fat-Arsed Wench, a fat fussocks, a Flusom, Fat, Strapping Woman.
1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
Fust (or Fust out), verb. (American).—To end in smoke; to go to waste; to end in nothing. Cf., fizzle.
Fustian, subs. and adj. (old).—1. Bombast; bad rhetoric; sound without sense: bombastic; ranting. Now accepted.
1598. Shakspeare, 2 Henry IV., II., 4. Thrust him downstairs; I cannot endure such a fustian rascal.
1602. Shakspeare, Twelfth Night II., 5. A fustian riddle.
1602. Shakspeare, Othello, II., 3. And discourse fustian with one’s own shadow.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. Fustian-verse, verse in words of lofty sound and humble sense.
1828–45. Hood, Poems, i., p. 105 (ed. 1846). The saints!—the bigots that in public spout, Spread phosphorous of zeal on scraps of fustian, And go like walking ‘Lucifers’ about These living bundles of combustion.
2. (common).—Wine; white fustian = champagne; red fustian = port.
1834. W. H. Ainsworth, Rookwood, p. 51 (ed. 1864). I’m as dry as a sandbed. Famous wine this—beautiful tipple—better than all your red fustian. Ah, how poor Sir Piers used to like it!
Fustilarian, subs. (old).—A low fellow; a common scoundrel.
1598. Shakspeare, 2 Henry IV., II., 1. Away, you scullion! you rampallian! you fustilarian! I’ll tickle your catastrophe.
Fustilug (or Fustilugs), subs. (old).—A piece of grossness, male or female; a coarse and dirty Blowzalinda; a foul slut; a fat stinkard.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. Fustiluggs, a Fulsom, Beastly, Nasty Woman.
1739. Junius (quoted in Encly. Dict.). You may daily see such fustilugs walking in the streets, like so many tuns.
1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
Futter, verb. (venery).—To copulate. Fr., foutre. [A coinage of Sir. R. Burton’s, who makes continual use of it in the Thousand Nights and a Night.] For synonyms, see Greens and Ride. Also to do a futter.
1885. Burton, Thousand Nights, II., 332. Eating and drinking and futtering for a year of full twelve months.
1890. Burton, Priapeia, Ep. xii. Thee, my girl, I shalt futter.
Future, to deal in futures, verb. phr. (Stock Exchange).—To speculate for a rise or fall.
1862. Globe, 1 Dec. He deals in futures, i.e., speculates in cotton with Stock Exchange folks, or speculates in securities.
Fuzz, verb. (old).—1. ‘To shuffle cards minutely; also to change the pack.’ [Grose.]
2. (old).—To be, or to make, drunk.
1685. Life of Amb. Wood, 14 July. Came home well fuzd.
Fuzziness, subs. (old).—The condition of being in drink. Hence blurredness; incoherence; bewilderment.
Fuzzy, adj. (common).—1. Drunk. For synonyms, see Drinks and Screwed. Hence blurred (as a picture); tangled; incoherent or inconsequent.
1876. Hindley, Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack, p. 324. Her husband or any other man might have drunk six glasses, with no more hurt than just making him a little fuzzy.
2. (popular).—Rough; as in a fuzzy head; a fuzzy cloth; a fuzzy bit (= a full-grown wench); a fuzzy carpet; etc.
Fuzzy-wuzzy, subs. (military). A Soudanese tribesman.
1890. Rudyard Kipling, National Observer, 8 Mar., p. 438, col. 1. So ’ere’s to you Fuzzy-wuzzy And your ’ome in the Soudan, You’re a pore benighted ’eathen but a first-class fighting man; And ’ere’s to you Fuzzy-wuzzy with your ’ay-rick ’ead of ’air, You big, black bouncing beggar, for you bruk a British square.
Fye-buck, subs. (old).—A sixpence. For synonyms, see Bender.
1781. G. Parker, View of Society, II., 56. You give a shilling to buy a comb, for which he gives sixpence, so works you for another fye-buck.
1885. Household Words, 20 June, p. 155. ‘Buck’ is most likely a corruption of fye-buck, a slang name for sixpence, which is now almost, if not altogether, obsolete.
Fylche.—See Filch.
Fyst.—See Foist.
G
Gab, subs. (vulgar).—1. The mouth; also Gob. For synonyms, see Potato-trap.
1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v.
1785. Burns, Jolly Beggars. And aye he gies the touzie drab The tither skelpin kiss, While she held up her greedy gab, Just like an aumos dish.
1820. Scott, The Abbot, ch. xiv. ‘And now, my mates,’ said the Abbot of Unreason, ‘once again digut your gabs and be hushed—let us see if the Cock of Kennaguhair will fight or flee the pit.’
1890. Rare Bits, 12 Apr., p. 347. ‘Clap a stopper on your gab and whack up, or I’ll let ’er speak!’
2. (vulgar).—Talk; idle babble. Also Gabb, Gabber, and Gabble.
1712. Spectator, No. 389. Having no language among them but a confused gabble, which is neither well understood by themselves or others.
1811. Poole, Hamlet Travestied, I., 3. Then hold your gab, and hear what I’ve to tell.
1863. C. Reade, Hard Cash, ch. xxxiv. ‘Hush your gab,’ said Mr. Green, roughly.
1887. Punch, 10 Sept., p. 111. Gladstone’s gab about ‘masses and classes’ is all tommy rot.
Verb. (vulgar: O. E., and now preserved in Gabble).—To talk fluently; to talk brilliantly; to lie.
1383. Chaucer, Canterbury Tales 1652. I gabbe nought, so have I joye or blis.
1402. [? T. Occleve], Letter of Cupid, in Arber’s Garner, vol. IV., p. 59. A foul vice it is, of tongue to be light, For whoso mochil clappeth, gabbeth oft.
1601. Shakspeare, Twelfth Night, Act II., Sc. iii. Mal. ... Have you no wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night.
1663. Butler, Hudibras, pt. I., ch. i., p. 5. Which made some think when he did gabble Th’ had heard three Labourers of Babel.
1786. Burns, Earnest Cry and Prayer, st. 10. But could I like Montgomeries fight, Or gab like Boswell.
1880. G. R. Sims, Zeph, ch. vii. An elderly clergyman ... gabbled the funeral service as though he were calling back an invoice at a draper’s entering desk.
1887. Punch, 10 Sept., p. 111. Gals do like a chap as can gab.
Gift of the Gab (or Gob), subs. phr. (colloquial).—The gift of conversation; the talent for speech. Fr., n’avoir pas sa langue dans sa poche.
d. 1653. Z. Boyd, Book of Job, quoted in Brewer’s Phrase and Fable, s.v., ‘gab. There was a good man named Job, Who lived in the land of Uz, He had a good gift of the gob.’
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Canting Crew. Gift of the gob, a wide, open Mouth; also a good Songster, or Singing-master.
1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v.
1820. Shelley, Œdipus Tyrannus, Act I. You, Purganax, who have the gift o’ the gab, Make them a solemn speech.
1837. Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xliii. And we’ll have a big-wig, Charley: one that’s got the greatest gift of the gab: to carry on his defence.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, I., 250. People reckon me one of the best patterers in the trade. I’m reckoned to have the gift—that is, the gift of the gab.
1869. Whyte-Melville, M. or N., p. 29. I’ve got the gift of the gab, I know, and I stick at nothing.
1870. Lond. Figaro, 18 Sept. ‘Of all gifts possessed by man,’ said George Stephenson, the engineer, to Sir William Follett, ‘there is none like the gift of the gab.’
1876. Hindley, Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack, p. 193. Others, although they have the gift of the gab when they are on the ground, as soon as they mount the cart are dumbfounded.
To blow the gab, verb. phr. (vulgar).—To inform; to peach (q.v.). Also to blow the gaff (q.v.).
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1834. Ainsworth, Rookwood, bk. III., ch. 5. Never blow the gab or squeak.
To flash the gab, verb. phr. (common).—To show off (q.v.) in talk; cf., Air one’s vocabulary.
1819. Moore, Tom Crib’s Memorial, p. 2. While his Lordship ... that very great dab At the flowers of rhet’ric is flashing his gab.
Gabble, subs. (colloquial).—1. A gossip. Also Gabbler, Gabble-grinder, Gabble-merchant, and Gabble-monger.
2. (colloquial).—A voluble talker.
Gabble-mill, subs. (American).—1. The United States Congress. Also Gabble-manufactory.
2. (common).—A pulpit. For synonyms, see Humbox.
3. (common).—The mouth. For synonyms, see Potato-trap.
Gable, subs. (common).—The head. Also Gable-end. For synonyms, see Crumpet.
Gabster, subs. (common).—A voluble talker, whether eloquent or vain; one having the gift of the gab (q.v.).
Gab-string.—See Gob-string.
Gaby (also Gabbey and Gabby), subs. (common).—A fool; a babbler; a boor. Icl. gapi = a foolish person, from gapa = to gape.
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v.
1856. T. Hughes, Tom Brown’s School Days, pt. 1, ch. iii. Two boys, who stopped close by him, and one of whom, a fat gaby of a fellow, pointed at him and called him young ‘mammy-sick.’
1859. H. Kingsley, Geoffrey Hamlyn, ch. ix. Don’t stand laughing there like a great gaby.
1875. Ouida, Signa, vol. I., ch. iv., p. 47. ‘You have never dried your clothes, Bruno,’ said his sister-in-law, ‘What a gaby a man is without a wife!’
Gad, subs. (common).—An idle slattern. An abbreviation of gad-about (q.v.).
Intj. (common).—An abbreviation of by Gad! Cf. Agad, Egad—themselves corruptions of by God, Lit.
On the gad, adv. phr. (old).—1. On the spur of the moment.
1605. Shakspeare, Lear, i., 2. All this is done upon the gad.
2. (colloquial).—On the move, on the gossip.
1818. Austen, Persuasion. I have no very good opinion of Mrs. Charles’ nursery maid.... She is always upon the gad.
3. (colloquial).—On the spree (especially of women); and, by implication, on the town.
To gad the hoof, verb. phr. (common).—To walk or go without shoes; to pad the hoof (q.v.). Also, more loosely, to walk or roam about.
1857. Snowden, Mag. Assistant, 3rd ed., p. 447. Going without shoes, gadding the hoof.
Gadabout, subs. (colloquial).—A trapesing gossip; as a housewife seldom seen at home, but very often at her neighbours’ doors. [From Gad = to wander, to stray (Cf., Lycidas: ‘the gadding vine’) + About.] Used also as an adjective; e.g., ‘a Gad-about hussey.’
Gadso, subs. (old)—The penis. Italian cazzo. For synonyms, see Creamstick and Prick.
Intj. (old: still literary and colloquial).—An interjection. [A relic of phallicism with which many popular oaths and exclamations have a direct connection, especially in Neo-Latin dialects. A Spaniard cries out, Carajo! (—the member), or Cojones! (—the testicles); an Italian says Cazzo (the penis); while a Frenchman exclaims by the act itself, Foutre! The female equivalent, (coño with the Spaniard, conno with the Italian, con with the Frenchman, and cunt with ourselves), was, and is, more generally used as an expression of contempt, which is also the case with the testicles. (Cf., ante, All Balls!) Germanic oaths are profane rather than obscene; except, perhaps, in Potz! and Potztaufend! and the English equivalent Pox! which last is obsolete. See Catso. In Florio (A Worlde of Wordes, 1598), Cazzo = ‘a man’s privie member,’ and cazzo di mare = a pintle fish; while cazzica = ‘an interjection of admiration and affirming. What? Gad’s me, Gad forfend, tush.’]
1697. Vanbrugh, Provoked Wife, iii., 1. Sir? Gadso! we are to consult about playing the devil to night.
1770. Foote, Lame Lover, i. Gadso! a little unlucky.
1838. Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. iv. ‘Gadso!’ said the undertaker ... ‘that’s just the very thing I wanted to speak to you about.’
Gadzooks! intj. (old and colloquial).—A corruption of Gadzo (q.v.).
Gaff, subs. (old).—1. A fair.
1754. Discoveries of John Poulter, p. 32. The first thing they do at a gaff is to look for a room clear of company.
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v. The drop coves maced the joskins at the gaff; the ring-droppers cheated the countryman at the fair.
1821. Haggart, Life, p. 22. We stopped at this place two days, waiting to attend the gaff.
1823. Jon. Bee, Dict. of the Turf, etc., s.v. A fair is a gaff as well as all the transactions enacted there.
2. (common).—A cheap, low music-hall or theatre; frequently penny-gaff, Cf., quot. 1823, sense 1. Also dookie. Fr., un beuglant (= a low music-hall; beugler = to bellow); un bouisbouis (boui = brothel); une guinche (popular). See also quot. 1889.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, I., p. 46. They court for a time, going to raffles and gaffs together, and then the affair is arranged.
1869. Greenwood, Seven Curses of London, p. 68. A gaff is a place where stage plays, according to the strict interpretation of the term, may not be represented. The actors of a drama may not correspond in colloquy, only in pantomime; but the pieces brought out at the gaff are seldom of an intricate character, and the not over-fastidious auditory are well content with an exhibition of dumb-show and gesture.
1870. Orchestra, 18 Feb. The absolute harm done by these gaffs does not consist in the subjects represented.
1889. Notes and Queries, 7 S. vii., p. 395. I have often heard the British soldier make use of the word when speaking of the entertainment got up for his benefit in barracks.
3. (prison).—A hoax; an imposture. Cf., Fr., gaffe = joke, deceit.
1877. Five Years’ Penal Servitude, ch. iv., p. 312. I also saw that Jemmy’s blowing up of me wos all gaff. He knew as well as I did the things left the shop all right.
1892. Hume Nisbet, Bushranger’s Sweetheart, p. 227. Can you put me up to this other gaff.
4. (old sharpers’).—A ring worn by the dealer. [From gaffe = a hook.]
5. (American cock-pit).—A steel spur.
6. (anglers’).—A landing spear, barbed in the iron.
Verb. (old).—1. To toss for liquor. See gaffing.
1823. Jon Bee, Dict. of the Turf, s.v.
2. (theatrical).—To play in a gaff (q.v. sense 2).
To blow the gaff, or gab (q.v.), verb. phr. (common). To give information; to let out a secret. For synonyms, see Peach.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue. To blow the gab (cant), to confess, or impeach a confederate.
1833. Marryat, Peter Simple, ch. xliii. One of the French officers, after he was taken prisoner, axed me how we had managed to get the gun up there; but I wasn’t going to blow the gaff.
1877. Five Years’ Penal Servitude, ch. ii., p. 122. The prisoner, burning for revenge, quietly bides his time till the chief warder comes round, then asks to speak to him, and blows the gaff.
1891. Referee, 8 Mar. Under sacred promise not to blow the gaff I was put up to the method.
Gaffer, subs. (old).—1. An old man; the masculine of Gammer (q.v.). Also a title of address: e.g., ‘Good day, gaffer!’ Cf., Uncle and Daddy. Also (see quot. 1710), a husband.
1710. Dame Hurdle’s Letter (quoted by Nares). My gaffer only said he would inform himself as well as he could against next election, and keep a good conscience.
1714. Gay, Shepherd’s Week. For Gaffer Treadwell told us, by-the-bye, Excessive sorrow is exceeding dry.
1842. Tennyson, The Goose. Ran Gaffer, stumbled Gammer.
2. (common).—A master; an employer; a boss (q.v.); (athletic) a pedestrian trainer and ‘farmer’; and (navvies’) a gang-master or ganger (q.v.).
1719. Durfey, Pills, etc., iv., 123. In comes our gaffer Underwood, And sits him on the bench.
1748. T. Dyche, Dict. (5th ed.) Gaffer (S.) a familiar word mostly used in the country for master.
1885. Daily News, 24 Jan., p. 3, c. 1. They go and work at fivepence, and some on ’em as low as threepence halfpenny, an hour; that’s just half what we get, and the gaffers keep ’em on and sack us.
1888. Sportsman, 20 Dec. Comic enough were some of the stories ‘Jemmy’ told of his relations with ‘the gaffer.’
1889. Broadside Ballad, ‘The Gaffers of the Gang.’ We are the boys that can do the excavations, We are the lads for the ’atin’ and the dhrinkin’, With the ladies we are so fascinatin’, Because we are the gaffers of the gang.
3. (old).—A toss-penny; a gambler with coins. From gaffing (q.v.).
1828. Jon Bee, Living Picture of London, p. 241. If the person calling for ‘man’ or ‘woman’ is not right or wrong at five guesses, neither of the gaffers win or lose, but go again.
Verb. (venery).—To copulate. For synonyms, see Greens and Ride.
Gaffing, subs. (old).—See quot.
1821. Pierce Egan, Life in London, p. 279. Gaffing was unfortunately for him introduced. Ibid. Note.—A mode of tossing for drinks, etc., in which three coins are placed in a hat, shaken up, and then thrown on the table. If the party to ‘call’ calls ‘heads’ (or ‘tails’) and all three coins are as he calls them, he wins; if not, he pays a settled amount towards drinks.
1839. Brandon, Poverty, Mendicity, and Crime, s.v.
Gag, subs. (common).—1. A joke; an invention; a hoax.
1823. Jon Bee, Dict. of the Turf, s.v. Gag—a grand imposition upon the public; as a mountebank’s professions, his cures, and his lottery-bags, are so many broad gags.
1871. All the Year Round, 18 Feb., p. 288. You won’t bear malice now, will you? All gag of mine, you know, about old Miss Ponsonby.
1885. Daily News, 16 May, p. 5, c. 2. ‘The Mahdi sends you lies from Khartoum, and laughs when you believe them,’ said a native, lately. We need not gratify the Mahdi by believing any bazaar-gag he may circulate.
2. (theatrical).—Expressions interpolated by an actor in his part: especially such as can be repeated again and again in the course of performance. Certain plays, as The Critic, are recognised ‘gag-pieces,’ and in these the practice is accounted legitimate. Cf., Hamlet, iii., 2: ‘And let those, that play your clowns, say no more than is set down for them.’ Cf., Wheeze. Fr., la cocotte (specifically additions to vocal scores). A typical example is the ‘I believe you, my boy!’ of the late Paul Bedford. In the quot. under 1851–61, it is probable that gag = patter (q.v.)
1841. Punch, i., p. 105. I shall do the liberal in the way of terms, and get up the gag properly.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, iii., p. 148. When I go out I always do my own gag, and I try to knock out something new.
1866. W. D. Howells, Venetian Life, ch. v.... I have heard some very passable gags at the Marionette, but the real commedia a braccio no longer exists.
1889. Globe, 12 Oct., p. 4, c. 4. In a high-class music hall it is a rule that no song must be sung till it is read and signed by the manager, and this applies even to the gag.
1890. Pall Mall Gazette, 5 Mar., p. 4, c. 3. Mr. Augustus Harris pointed out that if the clause were carried the penalty would, in many cases, be incurred twenty times in one scene, for actors and singers were continually introducing gag into their business.
3. (American).—A commonwealth of players in which the profits are shared round. Cf., Conscience.
1847. Darley, Drama in Pokerville, p. 124. The artist ... merely remarking that he had thought of a gag which would bring them through, mounted a ladder, and disappeared.
4. (American).—A fool; i.e., a thing to laugh at. For synonyms, see Cabbage- and Buffle-head and Sammy Soft.
1838–40. Haliburton, The Clockmaker, p. 46. ‘Sam,’ says he, ‘they tell me you broke down the other day in the House of Representatives and made a proper gag of yourself.’
5. (Christ’s Hospital).—Boiled fat beef. Gag-eater = a term of reproach.
1813. Lamb, Christ’s Hospital, in wks., p. 324 (ed. 1852). L. has recorded the repugnance of the school to gags, or the fat of fresh beef boiled; and sets it down to some superstition.... A gag-eater in our time was equivalent to a ghoul ... and held in equal estimation.
6. (Winchester College).—An exercise (said to have been invented by Dr. Gabell) which consists in writing Latin criticisms on some celebrated piece, in a book sent in about once a month. In the Parts below Sixth Book and Senior Part, the gags consisted in historical analysis. [An abbreviation of ‘gathering.’]
1870. Mansfield, School-life at Winchester College, p. 108. From time to time, also, they had to write ... an analysis of some historical work; these productions were called gatherings (or gags).
Verb, trs. and intrs. (theatrical).—1. To speak gags (q.v.), sense 2. Fr., cascader.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, III., 149. He has to gag, that is, to make up words.
1852. Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xxxix. The same vocalist gags in the regular business like a man inspired.
1883. Referee, 15 April, p. 3, c. 1. Toole ... cannot repress a tendency to gag and to introduce more than is set down for him by the author.
2. (old).—To hoax; to puff.
1781. G. Parker, View of Society, II., 154. Having discovered the weak side of him he means to gag.
1823. Jon Bee, Dict. of the Turf, etc., s.v. A showman cries ‘Walk in, ladies and gentlemen, they’re all alive,’ but the spectators soon perceive ’tis all stuff, reproach Mr. Merryman, and he, in excuse, swears he said ‘they were’ and not ‘are alive’ He thus gags the public.
1876. Hindley, Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack, p. 325. Then they gag the thing up, and send their bills out about the immense cost of scenery and dresses, and other expenses they are at, etc.
3. (thieves’).—To inform; to round on (q.v.); also to blow the gag. Cf., Gaff, Gab, etc. For synonyms, see Peach.
1891. Morning Advertiser, 28 Mar. She ... besought them with (crocodile) tears not to gag on them, in other words not to give information to the police.
On the high gag. adv. phr. (old).—On the whisper; telling secrets; cf., verb, sense 3.
1823. Kent, The Modern Flash Dict., s.v.
1848. Duncombe, Sinks of London, etc., s.v.
On the low gag, adv. phr. (old).—On the last rungs of beggary, ill-luck, or despair.
1823. Kent, The Modern Flash Dict., s.v.
1848. Duncombe, The Sinks of London, etc., s.v.
To strike the gag, verb. phr. (old).—To cease from chaffing.
1839. Ainsworth, Jack Sheppard (ed. 1889), p. 43. ‘A clever device,’ replied Jonathan; ‘but it won’t serve your turn. Let us pass, sir. Strike the gag, Blueskin.’
Gage (Gauge or Gag), subs. (old).—1. A quart pot (i.e., a measure). Also a drink or go (q.v.).
1567. Harman, Caveat (1814), p. 65. A gage, a quart pot.
1610. Rowlands, Martin Mark-all, p. 38 (H. Club’s Rept., 1874). Gage, a quart pot.
1622. J. Fletcher, Beggar’s Bush. I crown thy nab with a gage of benbouse.
1656. Broome, Jovial Crew, Act ii., I bowse no lage, but a whole gage Of this I bowse to you.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Cant. Crew. Gage, c. A pot or pipe. Tip me a gage, c. give me a pot, or pipe.
1714. Memoirs of John Hall (4th ed.), p. 12. Gage, a pot.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue. Gage, a quart pot, also a pint (cant).
1821. Haggart, Life, p. 40. We drank our gauge and parted good friends.
2. (18th century).—A chamber-pot.
3. (old).—A pipe.
1690. B. E., New Dict. of the Cant. Crew (See quot. 1690 under sense 1).
1796. Grose, Vulg. Tongue (3rd Ed.), s.v.
1834. H. Ainsworth, Rookwood, Bk. III., ch. v. In the mean time, tip me a gage of fogus, Jerry.
4. (American).—A man. For synonyms, see Cove.
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum, or Rogues Lexicon. Deck the gage, see the man.
Gagers, subs. (American).—The eyes. For synonyms, see Glims.
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum, s.v.
Gagga, subs. (old).—See quot.
1796. Grose, Vulg. Tongue (3rd Ed). Cheats who by sham pretences and wonderful stories of their sufferings impose on the credulity of good people.
Gagger, subs. (theatrical).—A player who deals in gags (q.v.), sense 2. Also Gaggist, Gagmaster, and Gagster.
1841. Punch, Vol. I., p. 169. Men with ‘swallows’ like Thames tunnels, in fact accomplished gaggers and unrivalled ‘wiry watchers.’
1887. Burnand and a’Beckett in Fortn. Review, April, p. 548. Robson ... was an inveterate gagger.
1890. Globe, 3 March, p. 1, c. 4. The low comedy was much toned down.... In other words, the gaggers were gagged.
Gaggery, subs. (theatrical).—The practice of Gagging (q.v.), sense 3.
Gagging, subs. (old).—1. Bluff (q.v.); specifically, bunco-steering (q.v.), the art of talking over and persuading a stranger that he is an old acquaintance. Cf., Gag, verb, sense 2.
1828. G. Smeaton, Doings in London, p. 28. One of the modes of raising money, well known in town by the flash name of gagging, has been practised of late to a considerable extent on simple countrymen, who are strangers to the ‘ways of town.’
2. (cabmen’s).—Loitering about for ‘fares’; ‘crawling.’
1851–61. H. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, Vol. III., p. 366. The means used are gagging, that is to say, driving about and loitering in the thoroughfares for jobs.
3. (theatrical).—Dealing in gags (q.v.), sense 1. Also as ppl. adj.
1883. The Echo, 5 Jan., p. 2, c. 3. A protest, by no means unneeded, against the insolence or ignorance of some playwrights, and gagging actors.
1889. Answers, 27 July, p. 143, c. 2. Gagging is a thing about which the public know little.
Gaggler’s Coach, subs. phr. (old).—A hurdle.
1823. Kent, Modern Flash Dict., s.v.
1848. Duncombe, Sinks of London, s.v.
Gail, subs. (old).—A horse. For synonyms, see Prad.
Gaily-like, adj. (American).—Showy; expensive: bang-up (q.v.).
1872. Clemens (Mark Twain), Undertaker’s Chat. Now, you know how difficult it is to roust out such a gaily-like thing as that in a little one-horse town like this.
Gain-pain, subs. (old).—A sword; specifically, in the Middle Ages, that of a hired soldier. [From Fr., gagner = to gain + pain = bread. Cf., Breadwinner (prostitutes’) and Potboiler (artists’).] For synonyms, see Cheese-toaster and Poker.
Gait, subs. (colloquial).—Walk in life; profession; mode of making a living; game (q.v.).
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum. ‘I say, Tim, what’s your gait now?’ ‘Why, you see, I’m on the crack’ (burglary).
Gaiters, subs. (American colloquial).—Half boots; shoes.
Gal, subs. (common).—1. A girl; a servant-maid; a sweetheart. Best girl = favourite flame.
2. (common).—A prostitute. For synonyms, see Barrack-hack and Tart.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, I., p. 535. Upon the most trivial offence in this respect, or on the suspicion of an offence, the gals are sure to be beaten cruelly and savagely by their ‘chaps.’
3. (American).—A female rough.
Galaney. See Galeny.
Galanty (Gallanty or Galantee) Show, subs. phr. (common).—A shadow pantomime: silhouettes shown on a transparency or thrown on a white sheet by a magic lantern. Specifically, the former. See Punch and Judy.
1851–61. H. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, Vol. III., p. 81. The galantee show don’t answer, because magic lanterns are so cheap in the shops.
1884. Cassell’s Technical Educator, pt. 10, p. 244. That reminiscence of the nursery, the galanty show.
1888. Notes and Queries, 7 S. v., p. 265. A flourish on the panpipes and a rumble on the drum was followed by the cry, galanty-show!
Gal-boy, subs. (American).—A romp; a tom-boy (q.v.).
Galen, subs. (common).—An apothecary. For synonyms, see Gallipot.
Galena, subs. (American).—Salt pork. [From Galen, Ill., a chief hog-raising and pork-packing centre].
Galeny (or Galany), subs. (old).—The domestic hen; now (West of England) a Guinea fowl. [Latin, gallina]. For synonyms, see Cackling-cheat.
1887. Temple Bar, Mar., p. 333 It’s a sin to think of the money you’d be spending on girls and things as don’t know a hen’s egg from a galeeny’s.
Galimaufrey, subs. (old).—1. A medley; a jumble; a chaos of differences. [Fr., gallimaufrée = a hash].
1592. Nashe, Pierce Penilesse, in wks., ii., 93. Coblers, Tinkers, Fencers, none escapt them, but they mingled them all on one gallimafrey of glory.
1592. John Day, Blind Beggar, Act iv., Sc. 1, p. 75. Can. Let me be torn into mammocks with wilde Bears if I make not a gallemaufry of thy heart and keep thy Skull for my quaffing bowl.
1604. Shakspeare, Winter’s Tale, Act iv., Sc. 4. And they have a dance which the wenches say is a gallimaufry of gambols, because they are not in’t.
1690. Durfey, Collin’s Walk, ch. ii., p. 58. But, like thy Tribe of canting Widgeons, A gallimaufry of Religions.
1781. G. Parker, View of Society, i., 207. A compound of Player, Soldier, Stroller, Sailor, and Tinker! An odd gallimaufry!
1860. Haliburton (Sam Slick), The Season Ticket, No. 7. This portion of my journal, which includes a variety of topics and anecdotes, some substantial like solid meat, some savoury as spicy vegetable ingredients, and some fragments to swell the bulk, which, though not valuable as materials, help to compound the gallimaufry.
2. (old).—A hodge-podge of scraps and leavings.
1724. Coles, Eng. Dict.; 1728. Bailey, Eng. Dict.; 1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue; 1811. Lexicon Balatronicum.
3. A mistress.
1596. Shakspeare, Merry Wives, ii., 1. He loves thy gallymawfry; Ford, perpend.
4. (venery).—The female pudendum. For synonyms, see Monosyllable.
Gall, subs. (common).—Effrontery; cheek (q.v.); brass (q.v.); e.g., ‘Ain’t he got a gall on him?’
1789. Grose, Vulg. Tongue (3rd Ed.), s.v. His gall is not yet broken, a saying used in prisons of a man just brought in who appears melancholy and dejected, [i.e., ‘He is not yet embittered enough to care for nothing, and meet everything with a front of brass.’]
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v.
a 1891. New York Sun (quoted in Slang, Jargon, and Cant, s.v.). ‘What do you think he had the gall to do to-day?’ Brown: ‘He has the gall to do anything.’ Dumley: ‘He asked me to drink with him; but he’ll never repeat the impudence.’
Gallant, subs. (old).—A dandy (q.v.); a ladies’ man; a lover; a cuckold-maker, whether in posse or in esse (Shakspeare).
1596. Shakspeare, Merry Wives, ii. One that is well-nigh worn to pieces with age to show himself a young gallant!
1598. Shakspeare, 1 Henry IV., ii., 4. Gallants, lads, boys, hearts of gold, all the titles of good fellowship come to you.
1663. Dryden, The Wild Gallant [Title.]
1690. B. E., A New Dict. Gallant a very fine man; also a Man of Metal, or a brave Fellow; also one that Courts, or keeps, or is Kept by, a Mistress.
1719. Durfey, Pills, etc., iv., 110 There’s never a gallant but sat at her hand.
1751–4. Jortin, Eccles. Hist. (quoted in Encyclopædic Dict.). As to Theodora, they who had been her gallants when she was an actress, related that dæmons, or nocturnal spirits, had often driven them away to lie with her themselves.
Adj. (old).—(1). Valiant (2) showy; (3) amorous.
1719. Durfey, Pills, etc., i., 40. O London is a fine town, and a gallant city.
Verb. (old).—To sweetheart; to squire; to escort; to pursue or to enjoy.
To Gallant a Fan. verb. phr. (old).—To break with design, to afford an opportunity of presenting a better.—B. E. (1690).
Gallant Fiftieth, subs. phr. (military).—The Fiftieth Foot. [For its share in Vimiera, 1808.] Also, blind half hundred (q.v.); and dirty half hundred (q.v.).
Gallantry, subs. (1). Sparkishness (q.v.); dandyism; (2) the habit, or pursuit, of the sexual favour. A life of gallantry = a life devoted to the other sex.
Gallery, subs. (Winchester College).—A commoner bedroom. [From a tradition of galleries in Commoners.] See gallery-nymphs.
To play to the Gallery, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To act so as to win the applause of the vulgar: i.e., to abandon distinction and art for coarseness of means and cheapness of effect. Said indifferently of anyone in any profession who exerts himself to win the suffrages of the mob; as a political demagogue, a ‘popular’ preacher, a ‘fashionable’ painter, and so on.
1872. Standard, 23 Oct. ‘New York Correspondence.’ His dispatches were, indeed, too long and too swelling in phrase; for herein he was always playing to the galleries.
Hence, Gallery-hit, shot, stroke, etc. = a touch designed for, and exclusively addressed to, the non-critical.
To play the Gallery, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To make an audience; to applaud.
1870. Echo, 23 July, p. 5, c. 4. He seemed altogether a jovial, amusing sort of fellow, and as we were close by him, and constantly called in to play the gallery to his witty remarks, we asked him, when his friends left him, to join our party.
Gallery Nymph, subs. phr. (Winchester College).—A housemaid. See Gallery.
Galley—put a brass galley down your back, verb. phr. (printers’).—An admonition to appear before a principal; implying that the galley will serve as a screen.
Galley-foist, subs. (old).—The state barge, used by the Lord Mayor when he was sworn in at Westminster.
1609. Ben Jonson, Silent Woman, iv., 2. Out of my doores, you sons of noise and tumult, begot on an ill May day, or when the galleyfoist is afloate to Westminster.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v.
Galley-growler or -stoker, subs. (nautical).—A loafer; a malingerer (q.v.); a grumble-guts (q.v.).
Galley-halfpenny, subs. (old).—A base coin, tempus Henry IV. [So called because it was commonly imported in the Genoese galleys. See Leake, English Money, p. 129; Ruding, Annals of Coinage, i., 250; and Stow, Survey (ed. 1842) p. 50.]
Galley-Slave, subs. (printers’).—A compositor. [From the oblong tray whereon the matter from the composing stick is arranged in column or page.] For synonyms, see Donkey.
1683. Moxon, s.v.
Galleywest, adj. or adv. (American).—An indefinite superlative. Cf., About-east.
1884. Clemens, (M. Twain) Huck. Finn, xxxvii., 382. Then she grabbed up the basket and slammed it across the house, and knocked the cat galleywest.
1887. Francis, Saddle and Mocassin (quoted in Slang, Jargon, and Cant). I’ll be darned if this establishment of yours, Hunse, don’t knock any one of them galley-west!—galleywest, sir, that’s what it does.
Galley-yarn (or news), subs. phr. (nautical).—A lying story; a swindle or take-in (q.v.). Frequently abbreviated to ‘G.Y.’
1884. Henley and Stevenson, Admiral Guinea, iii., 4. What? lantern and cutlass yours; you the one that knew the house; you the one that saw; you the one overtaken and denounced; and you spin me a galley-yarn like that.
Gallied, ppl. adj. (old).—‘Harried; vexed; over-fatigued; perhaps like a galley-slave’ (Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.). In Australia, frightened.
Gallinipper, subs. (West Indian).—A large mosquito.
1847. Porter, Big Bear, etc., p. 119. In the summer time the lakes and snakes ... musketoes and gallinippers, buffalo gnats and sandflies ... prevented the Injins from gwine through the country.
1888. Lippincott’s Magazine. I thought the gallinippers would fly away with me before the seed ticks had sucked all my blood.
Gallipot, subs. (common).—An apothecary.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1836. M. Scott, Cringle’s Log, ch. xiv. In truth, sir, I thought our surgeon would be of more use than any outlandish gallipot that you could carry back.
1848. Thackeray, Book of Snobs, ch. xxvii. ‘Half a-dozen little gallipots,’ interposed Miss Wirt.
English Synonyms.—Bolus; bum-tender; clyster-giver; clyster-pipe; croaker; crocus; drugs; Ollapod (from a creation of the Younger Coleman’s); gage-monger; Galen (from the great physician); jakes-provider; pill-box; pill-merchant; pills; squirt; salts-and-senna; squire of the pot.
French Synonyms.—Un mirancu (obsolete: a play on mire en cul, respecting which cf., Béralde, in Molière, Malade Imaginaire: ‘On voit bien que vous n’avez pas accoutumé de parler à des visages’); un limonadier de postérieurs (popular: cf., ‘bum-tender’); un flûtencul (common); un insinuant (popular: one who ‘insinuates’ the clyster-pipe).
German Synonyms.—Rokeach, Raukeach, or Raukack (from the Hebrew).
Gallivant, verb. (colloquial).—1. To gad about with, or after, one of the other sex; to play the gallant; to ‘do the agreeable.’
1838. Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. lxiv. You were out all day yesterday, and gallivanting somewhere, I know.
1862. H. Beecher Stowe, in The Independent, 27 Feb. What business had he to flirt and gallivant all summer with Sally Kittridge?
1886. Hawley Smart, Struck Down, xi. The ramparts is a great place for gallivanting.
1863. H. Kingsley, Austin Elliot, i., 112. It’s them gals, Mr. Austin. Come in afore she sees you, else she’ll not be at home. She is gallivanting in the paddock with Captain Hertford.
2. (colloquial).—To trapes (q.v.); to fuss; to bustle about.
1859. Boston Post, 10 Dec. Senator Seward is gallivanting gaily about Europe. Now at Compiègne, saying soft things to the Empress and studying despotism, now treading the battle-field of Waterloo, then back at Paris, and so on.
1871. C. D. Warner, My Summer in a Garden. More than half the Lima beans, though on the most attractive sort of poles, which budded like Aaron’s rod, went gallivanting off to the neighboring grape trellis.
1848. Ruxton, Far West, p. 145. The three remaining brothers were absent from the Mission ... Fray Jose, gallivanting at Pueblo de los Angeles.
1863. Norton, Lost and Saved, p. 255. A pretty story, if, when her services were most wanted by the person who paid for them, she was to be gadding and gallivanting after friends of her own.
1865. M. E. Braddon, Henry Dunbar, ch. x. A pretty thing it would have been if your pa had come all the way from India to find his only daughter gallivanting at a theaytre.
1870. London Figaro, 6 Dec. You’re never content but when you’re galavanting about somewhere or other.
Gallivate, verb (American).—To frisk; to ‘figure about’; cf., Gallivant.
Gallon. What’s a gallon of rum among one? phr. (American).—The retort sarcastic; applied, e.g., to those with ‘eyes too big for their stomach’; to disproportionate ideas of the fitness of things, and so forth.
Gallon Distemper, subs. phr. (common).—1. Delirium tremens; (2.) the lighter after-effects of drinking.
English Synonyms.—(1) For the former, barrel-fever; black-dog; blue-devils; blue Johnnies (Australian); B. J’s. (idem.); blues; bottle-ache; D. T.; horrors; jim-jams; jumps; pink-spiders; quart-mania; rams; rats; shakes; snakes in the boots; trembles; triangles; uglies.
2. For the latter: a head; hot-coppers; a mouth; a touch of the brewer; a sore head (Scots).
French Synonyms.—Avoir mal aux cheveux (familiar = the hair-ache); les papillons noirs (Cf., pink spiders; also = hypochondria); avoir fumé dans une pipe neuve (= sick of a new clay).
Galloper, subs. (old).—1. A blood horse; a hunter.
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v. The toby gill clapped his bleeders to his galloper and tipped the straps the double.
2. (military).—An aide-de-camp.
Gallow-grass, subs. phr. (old).—Hemp. [i.e., halters in the rough.]
1578. Lyte, Trans. of Dodoens History of Plantes, fol. 72. Hempe is called in ... English, Neckweede, and gallowgrass.
Gallows, subs. (old).—1. A rascal; a wretch deserving the rope.
1594. Shakspeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost, v., 2. A shrewd unhappy gallows too.
1754. B. Martin, Eng. Dict. (2nd ed.). s.v. = a wicked rascal.
1837. Dickens, Oliver Twist. (To Oliver). Now young gallows.
1838. Jas. Grant, Sketches in London, ch. ii., p. 58. Blow me tight, young gallows, if I don’t pound your ribs to powder!
2. (common: generally in. pl. = Gallowses).—A pair of braces.
1835. Haliburton, Clockmaker, 1 S., ch. xv. Chock-full of spring, like the wire end of a bran new pair of trouser galluses.
1848. Durivage, Stray Subjects, p. 168. If I wouldn’t spile his picter bust my boots and gallowses.
1851–61. H. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, vol. I., p. 431. The braces, which in some parts of the country are called ‘gallowses.’
c. 1852. Traits of American Humor, p. 58. Hole on, dod drot you, wait till I unbutton my gallowses.
1864. James, etc., Italian-English Dict. Gallowses, batilla.
1883. G. A. S[ala], in Ill. Lond. News, Sept. 22, p. 275, c. i. Braces (which, when I was young, used, in the north of England, to be known by the expressive name of gallowses.)
Adv. (old).—Excessively; same as bloody, bleeding, (q.v.), etc. (As adj.) great; uncommon; real.
c. 1551. L. Shepherd. John Bon in Arber’s Garner, Vol. IV., p. 109. Ye, are much bound to God for such a spittle holiness. A gallows gift!
1789. Parker, Life’s Painter, p. 120. Some they pattered flash with gallows fun and joking.
1827. Egan, Anecdotes of the Turf, etc., p. 44. Then your blowen will wax gallows haughty! [Also quoted in notes to Don Juan.]
1830. Lytton, Paul Clifford, p. 293. (ed. 1854). Ah, Dame Lobkin, if so be as our little Paul vas a vith you, it would be a gallows comfort to you in your latter hend!
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, III., 90. I’ll be smothered if I’m going to look down that gallows long chimney.
1861. H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xli. And the pleece come in, and got gallus well kicked about the head.
1869. Greenwood, Seven Curses of London, p. 244. Put it on your face so gallus thick that the devil himself won’t see through it.
Gallows-bird (also Newgate-bird), subs. (common).—1. A son of the rope; an habitual criminal; a vagabond or scoundrel, old or young; a crack-rope or wag-halter (Cotgrave); a gallows-clapper (Florio). Fr., gibier de Cayenne, or de potence.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v. One that deserves hanging.
1822. Scott, Fortunes of Nigel, ch. xi. That very gallows-bird were enough to corrupt a whole ante-chamber of pages.
2. (common).—A corpse on, or from, the gallows.
1861. Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxviii. I ne’er minced (dissected) ape nor gallows-bird.
Gallows-faced, adj. (old).—Evil-looking; hang-dog. Also gallows-looking.
1766. H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 16. Art thou there, thou rogue, thou hang-dog, thou gallows-faced vagabond?
1768. Goldsmith, Good-natured Man, Act v. Hold him fast, he has the gallows in his face.
1837. Barham, I. L. (Misadv. at Margate). A little gallows-looking chap—dear me! what could he mean?
Gallows-minded, adj. (colloquial).—Criminal in habit and idea; also, evil-hearted.
Gallowsness, subs. (old).—Rascality; recklessness; mischievousness.
1859. G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. vi. I never knew your equal for gallowsness.
Gallows-ripe, adj. (old).—Ripe for the rope.
1837. Carlyle, French Revolution, Pt. II., bk. v., ch. iii. Loose again, as one not yet gallows-ripe.
Gallus.—See Gallows.
Gally-foist.—See Galley-foist.
Gallyslopes, subs. (Old Cant).—Breeches. For synonyms, see Kicks.
Galoot (also galloot and geeloot), subs. (general).—A man (sometimes in contempt); also (in America) a worthless fellow (or thing, see quot. 1888); a rowdy; a cad (q.v.).
1835. Marryat, Jacob Faithful, ch. xxxiv. Four greater galloots were never picked up, but never mind that.
1869. S. L. Clemens (Mark Twain) Innocents at Home, p. 22. He could lam any galoot of his inches in America.
1871. John Hay, Jim Bludso. I’ll hold her nozzle agin the bank Till the last galoot’s ashore.
1885. Saturday Review, Feb. 7, p. 167. ‘I’ll never draw a revolver on a man again as long as I live.’... ‘Guess I’ll go for the galoot with a two-scatter shoot-gun.’
1888. New York Tribune, May 16. It is better to have a Carrot for a President than a dead beat for a son-in-law. In this way we again score a live beat on the galoot.
1892. R. L. Stevenson and L. Osbourne, The Wrecker, p. 137. ‘My dear boy, I may be a galoot about literature, but you’ll always be an outsider in business.’
On the gay galoot, adv. phr. (common).—On the spree.
1892. Milliken, ’Arry Ballads, p. 3. I’m off on the gay galoot somewheres.
Galoptious or Galuptious, adj. (popular).—Delightful; a general superlative.
1887. Judy, 21 Sept., p. 140. Four young ladies represented the galopshus sum of 20,000,000 dollars.
Galore (also gallore and golore), adv. (old; now recognised).—In abundance; plenty. [Irish and Gaelic go leor = in plenty.]
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1848. Ruxton, Life in the Far West, p 14. Galore of alcohol to ratify the trade.
1856. C. Reade, Never Too Late, ch. lx. He found rogues galore, and envious spirits that wished the friends ill.
1891. Licensed Vic. Mirror, 30 Jan., p. 1, c. 1. Of chit-chat this week we have galore, and the difficulty is how to sift the wheat from the chaff.
Galumph, verb. (American).—To bump along (Onomatopœia).
1888. New York World, 13 May. The young man tackled the driver of a green bobtail car that galumphed through Lewis Street at a high rate of speed.
Galvanised Yankee, subs. phr. (American Civil War).—A Grey-back (q.v.) who took the oath to the North and served in its armies.
Gam, subs. (thieves’).—1. Pluck; gameness.
1888. Cassell’s Saturday Journal, 8 Dec., p. 260. I’m not so sure about his lack of cunnin’, speed, or gam.
2. (American thieves’).—Stealing (Matsell, 1859).
Verb. (American thieves’).—1. To steal.
2. (American).—To engage in social intercourse; to make a call; to have a chat. See Gamming.
Gamaliel, subs. (colloquial).—A pedant; a person curious of the letter and the form: e.g., ‘these Gamaliels of the theory’ = these ultra-puritans, to whom the spirit is nothing.
Gamaruche, subs. (venery).—See Cunnilingist and Cock-Teaser. Verb (venery).—To irrumate; to Bag-pipe (q.v.). Also to cunnilinge (q.v.). Fr., gamahucher.
Gamb (or Gam), subs. (old).—A leg. In use also in this sense as an heraldic term. [It., gambe; Fr., jambe; probably through Lingua Franca.] For synonyms, see Drumsticks and Pins.
1789. Geo. Parker, Life’s Painter, p. 143. If a man has bow legs, he has queer gams, gams being cant for legs.
1796. Grose, Vulg. Tongue (3rd ed.), s.v.
1819. Moore, Memorial, p. 61. Back to his home, with tottering gams.
1887. Henley, Villon’s Good Night. At you I merely lift my gam.
[To flutter a gam = to dance; to lift a gam = to break wind; to gam it = to walk; to run away; to leg it (q.v.)].
Gamble, subs. (colloquial).—A venture: a flutter (q.v.).
1892. R. L. Stevenson and L. Osbourne, The Wrecker, p. 250. And you know the Flying Scud was the biggest gamble of the crowd.
Gambler, subs. (old, now recognised). See quots.
1778. Bailey, Eng. Dict. Gambler, a guinea-dropper; one class of sharpers.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue. Gambler, a sharper; a tricking gamester.
1816. Johnson, Eng. Dict. (11th ed.). Gambler, a cant word, I suppose. A knave whose practice it is to invite the unwary to game and cheat them.
1890. Cassell’s Enc. Dict. Gambler, one given to playing for a stake.
Gambol, subs. (booking clerks’).—A railway ticket.
1882. Daily News, 6 Sept., p. 2, c. 5. ... Mr. Chance [the magistrate] asked what gambols meant. The inspector said doubtless the railway tickets.
Gam-cases, subs. (old). Stockings (Parker, Life’s Painter). [From gam = leg + case.]
Game, subs. (old).—1. The proceeds of a robbery; swag (q.v.).
1676. Warning for Housekeepers. Song. When that we have bit the bloe, we carry away the game.
2. (old).—A company of whores. A game-pullet = a young prostitute, or a girl inclined to lechery; cf., adj., sense 8.
1690. B. E., New Dictionary, s.v. ... also a Bawdy house, lewd women.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v. game ... Mother, have you any game, Mother, have you any girls?
3. (old).—A gull; a simpleton. For synonyms, see Buffle and Cabbage-head.
1690. B. E., New Dictionary. Game, c. Bubbles drawn in to be cheated.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
4. (thieves’).—Specifically, the game = thieving; also (nautical), slave trading; and (venery), the practice of copulation (e.g., good at the game = an expert and vigorous bedfellow. Cf., Shakspeare, Troilus, iv., 5, ‘Spoils of opportunity, daughters of the game’). In quot. (1639) it would seem that hen of the game = a shrew, a fighting woman.
1639–61. Rump, ii., 185. ‘Free Parliament Litany.’ From a dunghill Cock and a Hen of the Game.
1640. Ladies’ Parliament. Stamford she is for the game, She saies her husband is to blame, For her part she loves a foole, If he hath a good toole.
1668. Etheredge, She Would if She Could, i., 1. A gentleman should not have gone out of his chambers but some civil officer of the game or other would have ... given him notice where he might have had a course or two in the afternoon.
17(?). Burns, Merry Muses, ‘Jenny Macraw’ (old song). Jenny Macraw was a bird of the game.
1839. Brandon, Poverty, Mendicity, and Crime, Glossary. On the game—thieving.
1851–61. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, i., 263. Whether the game got stale, or Peter became honest, is beyond the purport of my communication to settle.
1857. Snowden, Mag. Assist. (3rd ed.), p. 444, s.v.
1859. Matsell, Vocabulum, or Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v. The particular line of rascality the rogue is engaged in; thieving; cheating.
1860. Chambers’ Journal, Vol. 13, p. 281. I asked him if he meant by a trading voyage, the game.
5. (colloquial).—A source of amusement; a lark (q.v.); a barney (q.v.); as, e.g., It was such a game!
6. (colloquial).—A design; trick; object; line of conduct: e.g., What’s your little game = What are you after? Also, None of your little games! = None of your tricks! See High Old Game.
1854. Whyte Melville, General Bounce, ch. ix. Honesty, indeed! if honesty’s the game, you’ve a right to your share, what Mrs. Kettering intended you should have.
1857. Ducange Anglicus, The Vulg. Tongue, p. 9. Game n. Intention. ‘What’s your game?’ or, ‘What are you up to?’ (very generally used).
1870. Standard, 27 Sept. If we accept the meaner game which the Times indicates for us, it can only be by deliberate choice.
1879. Justin McCarthy, Donna Quixote, ch. xiii. Come, what’s your little game?
1883. Edw. E. Morris, in Longman’s Mag., June, p. 176. A youth, who left England, and then carried on the same game in Australia.
1889. Standard, 1 May, p. 5, c. 1. The ‘game of law and order’ is not up, in Paris.
1890. Punch, 30 Aug., p. 97. Mug’s game! They’ll soon find as the Marsters ain’t going to be worried and welched.
1891. J. Newman, Scamping Tricks, p. 46. She knew how to work the game of fascination right.
1892. R. L. Stevenson and L. Osbourne, The Wrecker, p. 349, ‘It was the thing in your times, that’s right enough; but you’re old now, and the game’s up.’
Adj. (old).—1. Plucky; enduring; full of spirit and bottom (q.v.). [Cock-pit and pugilists’. The word may be said to have passed into the language with the rise to renown of Harry Pearce, surnamed the Game Chicken.]
1747. Capt. Godfrey, Science of Defence, p. 64. Smallwood (a boxer) is thorough game, with judgment equal to any, and superior to most.
1819. Moore, Tom Crib’s Memorial, p. 57. Pitying raised from earth the game old man.
1821. P. Egan, Tom and Jerry (ed. 1891), p. 38. Tom, however, was too game to acknowledge any sort of alarm at this slight visitation.
1823. E. Kent, Mod. Flash Dict. Game, s.v. Sturdy, hardy, hardened.
1827. Reynolds, Peter Corcoran, The Fancy. ‘The Field of Tothill.’ The highest in the fancy—all the game ones, Who are not very much beneath her weight.
1855. A. Trollope, The Warden, ch. viii. He was a most courageous lad, game to the backbone.
1891. Licensed Vict. Gaz., 19 June, p. 395. The round had lasted sixteen minutes, and no one present had ever seen gamer or more determined fighting.
2. (common).—Ready; willing; prepared. [Also from cock-fighting. See sense 1].
1836. Dickens, Pickwick, p. 99, (ed. 1857). ‘All alive to-day, I suppose?’ ‘Regular game, sir.’
1856. Reade, Never Too Late, ch. xxi. I’m game to try.
1865. Bentley, p. 182, ‘The Excursion Train.’ Again to London back we came The day the excursion ticket said, And really both of us felt game To travel round the world instead.
1880. Punch’s Almanack. Got three quid; have cried a go with Fan, Game to spend my money like a man.
1891. Farjeon, The Mystery of M. Felix, p. 103. ‘I’m game,’ said Sophy, to whom any task of this kind was especially inviting.
1891. Hume Nisbet, Bail Up! p. 51. ‘Yes, I am gamey, you bet!’ exclaimed the Chinaman, softly.
1891. J. Newman, Scamping Tricks, p. 121. It is nearly midnight. I am game for another hour, are you?
3. (old).—Lame; crooked; disabled: as in Game Leg.
1787. Grose, Prov. Glossary. Game-leg, a lame leg.
1825. Scott, St. Ronan’s Well, ch. i. Catching hold of the devil’s game leg with his episcopal crook.
1851. G. Borrow, Lavengro, ch. lxvii., p. 204 (1888). Mr. Platitude, having what is vulgarly called a game leg, came shambling into the room.
1875. Jas. Payn, Walter’s Word, ch. i. Well, you see, old fellow, with a game-arm (his left arm is in a sling), and a game-leg (he has limped across the platform with the aid of his friend, and also of a crutch), one feels a little helpless.
4. (thieves’).—Knowing; wide-awake; and (of women) Flash (q.v.), or inclined to venery. E.g., Game-cove = an associate of thieves; Game-woman = a prostitute: i.e., a woman who is game (sense 2); Game-pullet (Grose) = a girl that will show sport, a female game-cock; game-ship (old) = a ship whose commander and officers could be corrupted by bribes to allow the cargo to be stolen (Clark Russell).
1676. Etheredge, Man of Mode, ii. Go on, be the game mistress of the town and entice all our young fops as fast as they come from travel.
Cock of the Game, subs. phr. (old).—A champion; an undoubted blood; a star of magnitude (cock-pit).
1719. Durfey, Pills, iii., 329. Now all you tame gallants, you that have the name, And would accounted be cocks of the game.
1822. Scott, Nigel, xiv. I have seen a dung-hill chicken that you meant to have picked clean enough; it will be long ere his lordship ruffles a feather with a cock of the game.
To make game of, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To turn into ridicule; to delude; to humbug.
1671. Milton, Samson, 1331. Do they not seek occasion of new quarrels, On my refusal, to distress me more; Or ake a game of my calamities?
1690. B. E., New Dictionary. What you game me? c. do you jeer me, or pretend to expose me to make a May-game of me?
1745. Hist. of Coldstream Guards, 25 Oct. If the militia are reviewed to-morrow by his Majesty, the soldiers of the third regiment of Guards are to behave civilly and not to laugh or to make any game of them.
To die game, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To maintain a resolute attitude to the last; to show no contrition.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue. To die game, to suffer at the gallows without showing any signs of fear or repentance.
1815. Scott, Guy Mannering, ch. liv. The ruffian lay perfectly still and silent. ‘He’s gaun to die game ony how,’ said Dinmont.
1836. Dickens, Pickwick (ed. 1857), p. 363. I say that the coachman did not run away; but that he died game—game as pheasants; and I won’t hear nothin’ said to the contrary.
1869. Spencer, Study of Sociology, ch. viii., p. 183 (9th ed.). Nor should we forget the game-cock, supplying, as it does, a word of eulogy to the mob of roughs who witness the hanging of a murderer, and who half condone his crime if he dies game.
1871. Times, 30 Jan. Critique on London, etc. The principal was acquitted, and though his accomplices were hung in Pall Mall at the scene of their act, they died game.
To get against the game, verb. phr. (American).—To take a risk; to chance it. [From the game of poker].
To play the game, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To do a thing properly; to do what is right and proper.
1889. Geoffrey Drage, Cyril, ch. vii. I really think he is ... not playing the game.
The first game ever played, subs. phr. (venery).—Copulation. For synonyms, see Greens and Ride.
Gamecock, adj. (old).—Hectoring; angry; valiant out of place.
1838. Lever, Handy Andy. Smoke and fire is my desire, So blaze away my gamecock squire.
Gameness, subs. (colloquial).—Pluck; endurance; the mixture of spirit and bottom.
1861. Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxiv. There was no doubt about his gameness.
1884. Referee, 23 March, p. 1, c. 4. Carter fought with great gameness, but he never had a look in.
Gamester, subs. (old).—1. A prostitute. For synonyms, see Barrack-hack and Tart.
1598. Shakspeare, All’s Well, v. 3. She’s impudent, my lord, and was a common gamester to the camp.
1614. Jonson, Bartholomew Fair, ii. 1. Ay, ay, gamesters, mocke a plain soft wench of the suburbs, do.
1620. Percy, Folio MSS., p. 404. Be not att ffirst to nice nor coye when gamsters you are courtinge.
2. (old).—A ruffler; a gallant; a wencher; a man fit and ready for anything; also a player.
1639–61. Rump, i., 253, ‘A Medley.’ Room for a gamester that flies at all he sees.
1676. Etheredge, Man of Mode, v., 1. Live it also like a frank gamester, on the square.
Gamey, adj. (colloquial).—1. High-smelling; offensive to the nose; half-rotten.
2. (colloquial).—Frisky; plucky.
1843. Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, ch. xi. There’s something gamey in it, young ladies, ain’t there.
1869. S. Bowles, Our New West, p. 275. Horses are fresh and fat and gamey.
Gaminess, subs. (colloquial).—The malodorousness proceeding from decay and—by implication—filthiness.
Gaming-house, subs. (old).—A house of ill-repute—hell, tavern, or stews.
1611. Cotgrave, Dictionarie, Berlan, a common tippling house, a house of gaming, or of any other disorder.
Gammer, subs. (old).—An old wife; a familiar address; the correlative of gaffer (q.v.).
1551. Gammer Gurton’s Needle (Title).
1706. Hudibras Redivivus,