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7U
I
SUPPLEMENTARY
ENGLISH GLOSSABY.
BY
IT LEWIS O^AVIES, M.A.,
VICAR OF S. MABT EXTHA, SOUTHAMPTON;
AUTHOR OF "BJBLB ENGLISH."
LONDON :
GEORGE BELL AND SONS, YORK STREET,
COVENT GARDEN.
1881.
[All Rights reserved.]
CLAT AMU TAYLOH, PRINTERS.
PEEFACE.
I have been for some time in the habit of marking in an inter-
leaved copy of Halliwell's Dictionary references to any of the words
noted therein that I may have come across in my reading. I found,
however, that even a Dictionary so copious as that had left many
terms unrecorded, and about four years ago the idea occurred to
me of compiling a Supplementary Glossary.
I determined then not to confine myself to archaic and provincial
words, which were what Mr. Halliwell undertook to register, but to
insert any expressions, whether old or modern, which were not in
the best existing Dictionaries. I chose four as those which I would
desire to supplement ; that is to say, I decided to exclude from my
book (subject to certain exceptions which I shall name immediately)
words that were in Richardson's, or HalliwelFs, or Latham's Dic-
tionaries, or in Nares's Glossary as edited by Halliwell and Wright.
I further resolved not to go back earlier than the 16th century for
my materials.
The exceptional circumstances under which I have thought it
expedient to insert words that were already in one or more of the
four works that I have mentioned are principally these : —
1. When the word is given, but with no example.
2. When I could adduce a much earlier or later illustration than
any supplied in those other Dictionaries. See, e. g.9 cut = to ' run/
' crope/ ' fisc/ ' lope/ c officious/ ' partlet/ ' scry/ ' volve/ c weeds/
&c, &c.
3. When I have been able to furnish an extract, unnoticed by
previous lexicographers, which bears on the history of a word, show-
ing at about what time or under what circumstances it found its
way into the language. Thus Latham has the verb to ' storm ' (a
town) with quotations from Dryden and Pope ; Richardson only
cites the latter; it seemed therefore well worth while to adduce a
iv PREFACE.
passage from Howell in which he says that this expression, together
with ' plunder ' and the familiar use of " that once abominable word,
excise," came in at the time of the Great Rebellion. Similar in-
stances will be found under ' geography/ € granadier/ € huzza,'
' loyalty/ ' ministry/ ' prudery/ ' yacht/ &c.
4. When I met with a quotation which marked some sense of a
word, differing from that now current, or from the meaning given in
the Dictionaries. Thus 'pelf is explained by both Richardson and
Latham as " money, riches/' and the former adds, " perhaps applied
originally to wealth or riches acquired by 'pilfering, by petty scrap-
ings, or hoardings." But Puttenham {Arte of Eng. Poesie, 1589)
tells us the particular kind of scraps that the word in the first place
meant : " Pelfe is properly the scrappes or shreds of taylors and
skinners." We may observe a similar connection between tailors'
odds and ends and pilfering in the word ' cabbage/
Again, ' Bmart/ as applied to dress, is, among educated people at
all events, a modern usage. Richardson has no example of it, and
the earliest in Latham is from Dickens. But this would be only
negative evidence; it is confirmed, however, by the following direct
testimony from The Gentleman Instructed, which was published very
early in the 18th century :
" ' Sirrah ! ' says the youngster, € make me a smart wig, a smart
one, ye dog/ The fellow blest himself; he had heard of a smart
nag, a smart man, &c, but a smart wig was Chinese to the trades-
man. However, nothing would please his worship but smart shoes,
smart hats, and smart cravats : within two days he had a smart wig
with a smart price in the box. The truth is, he had been bred
up with the groom, and transplanted the stable-dialect into the
dressing-room."
I have, of course, been glad also to put down anything that
threw light, however little, on any passage in our best authors.
Thus under the words ' capon-justice/ ' crants/ and ' equipage ' may
be found something bearing on certain expressions in Shakespeare.
I may take this opportunity of adding another illustration of the last
of these terms, which I met with after that sheet had been printed
off: " Master Watson . . . whose Amintas and translated Antigone
may march in equipage of honour with any of our ancient Poets."
(Nashe, Introduction to Greene's Menaplion, p. 14).
I have not meddled with etymology on my own account. My
PREFACE. v
Glossary does not pretend to be more than a bare catalogue of words
with their meanings (where I knew or could ascertain them) and with
illustrative examples. I desire to lay stress on this, because while I
shall try to receive with proper' equanimity strictures on the way in
which I have performed even the modest task that I have under-
taken, I do not wish to be blamed for not having accomplished
objects which it was never in my mind to attempt.
But while, in the matter of etymology, I have refrained from any
original effort, I have always been forward to cite extracts which
treat of or refer to the derivation of the word for which the passage
is quoted. In several cases the etymology may be wrong, or even
ridiculous ; as when Ascham tells us that " there is nothing worse
[waur ?] than war, whereof it taketh his name," or when S. Richard-
son, in the person of Lovelace, says that familiar letter- writing is
" writing from the heart (without the fetters prescribed by method
or study) as the very word cor-respondence implied." These ety-
mologies, if not useful, are at least entertaining and noteworthy;
and indeed in a few instances (e. g. Job, Redshanks, Salic) I have
cited derivations that were intended to be jocular.
As regards the quotations generally, I have endeavoured to make
the references as exact as possible. In some cases I was only able
to give the volume and page of the edition used, but I hope that the
plan which I have adopted in the appended List of Authorities will
render the verification of the extract possible, while the year of birth
and death which I have added to the name of each author will
give to the general reader information as to (about) the date of the
quotation.
When I first contemplated this Glossary, I did not know that
there was any immediate prospect of the Dictionary of the Philo-
logical Society being issued. Happily, since then, that scheme has
started into new life, and we are led to expect its completion in
about eight or ten years time. If there is anything in my book that
may be found useful to that important undertaking, I willingly offer
it ; while there will still remain a large number of words and phrases
which, suitable enough in a miscellaneous Glossary like this, would
find no place in a regular Dictionary.
I am fully conscious that what I now present to the Public is as
a drop in the ocean, but I am not afraid of criticism on the score of
my omissions, because all must know that any one man's contri-
vi PREFACE.
bution towards a catalogue of English words must be very imper-
fect. I am, however, more apprehensive of adverse remark on some
of the terms that I have admitted. No one would accuse a man of
moroseness or exclusiveness because a very large number of respect-
able persons might be pointed out of whom he had never taken any
notice. It would be well understood that he could not be expected
to know everybody, and that probably he would have been well
pleased if circumstances had allowed him to make Buch valuable
additions to his acquaintance. If, however, he admitted to his
intimacy people of bad or doubtful character, he would justly incur
blame. Opinions may differ as to whether I am in this last position.
Several slang expressions will be found in my Glossary. I have
not gone out of my way to seek these, but I have not rejected them
when they have presented themselves in the pages of books that have
an assured place in English literature, as, for example, the novels of
Fielding, Dickens, or Thackeray. A great deal of slang is ephemeral,
neither preserved nor worth preserving, but when an eminent writer
employs it, he bestows on it a species of immortality : indeed it often
happens that a slang word in course of years loses its slanginess
and becomes a recognised part of the language. It is not the aim
of a work like this to form a collection of pure and standard English,
but to register and explain any words good or bad, legitimate or
illegitimate, which are used in our literature. The compiler is like
a census enumerator ; his business is to note the names of every one
in his district, and to state certain particulars in each case, and this
he is bound to do quite irrespective of his private opinion as to the
personal qualities of the various individuals with whom he is in this
way concerned. The above remarks will also apply, in great mea-
sure, to a more respectable class than the preceding — the provincial-
isms, as to which my practice has been the same.
Several foreign words will be found in the following pages, and
exception may be taken to their presence in an English Glossary.
My rule has been to include these when they appear to have become
naturalised or semi-naturalised, e. g. ' chiffoniere/ ' esclandre/ ' non-
chalance/ 'penchant'; or when the writer has seemed to m6 to use
the term with a wish to naturalise it, though his introduction may
not have availed to give the stranger any permanent footing among
us; e.g. ' calino' (Nashe; Dekker) ; 'inti-ado* (Fuller; Heylin) ;
' orage ' (B. North), &c, &c.
PREFACE. vii
Another class of words I may notice ; — those which have appar-
ently been coined for the occasion. I have not excluded such
expressions ; they are often amusing or interesting, and it would be
rash in any one case to say that the word is peculiar to the author in
whom we first find it. ' Betweenity/ for instance, might be taken
for one of Southey's numerous inventions, but Walpole, another
great manufacturer of verbal eccentricities, had used it before him.
Even when a writer expressly announces a word as coined by him-
self, we cannot be certain of more than that he was unaware of its
having been in circulation. (See c agreeability/ ' naturalness/ ' regi-
mented,' € triftlity,' &c.) Thus then, though many of these issues of
the word-mint may be ugly, debased, or intrinsically worthless, they
ought yet, I think, to have a place as objects of curiosity in the
cabinet of the collector.
I have also had to consider what should be done with words
which in their simple form are in the Dictionaries, but which I have
found compounded with some prefix as be-, fore-, un-, or some suffix
as -able, -less, -ship. I could not discover that the works which I
propose to supplement went on any fixed principle in this matter ;
some of these compounds were inserted; others, equally common,
were left out. My general rule has been to admit them.
In addition to isolated words I have, following the example of
Nares, Halliwell, and Latham, taken cognizance also of phrases, and
even, in some instances, of proverbial sentences. It ib of course
difficult to draw the line as to what should be included under this
head ; each case has had to be decided on its own merits and to the
best of my judgment.
It only remains to express my cordial thanks to those who have
assisted me in my task. My acknowledgments are especially due
to Edward Peacock, Esq., author of the Manley and Corringham
Glossary, &c., for large contributions of words ; to the Rev. W. C.
Flenderleath, Sector of Cherhill, Wilts, who carefully read and
marked for me three somewhat voluminous works; to Edgar
MacCulloch, Esq., of Guernsey, who has often taken much trouble in
clearing up points on which I needed information ; to the Hon. J.
Leicester Warren, who sent me several words, principally from
books that are rather out of the ordinary course of reading ; and to
F. Francois De Chaumont, Esq., M.D., F.R.S., Professor of Hygiene
at Netley Hospital, who added to the kindnesses shown me during a
x LIST OF A UTHORS QUOTED.
Brand, J. (1743 ?-1806), Popular Antiquities, published posthumously , edited by
Sir H. Ellis, 1813 [Bonn's Antiq. Lib., 1853^55].
Breton, Nicholas (1542?-1626?), Work? [ed. Grosart, Chertsey Worthies' Lib.,
1879].
Britten, J. and Holland, R., Diet, of Eng. Plant Names, E. D. S., 1878-80.
BrontA, Charlotte (1816-55), Jane Eyre, 1847 ; Villette, 1853.
BrontA, Emily (1818-48), Wuthering Heights, 1847.
Brooke, Henry (1706-83), The Fool of Quality, 1766-70 [ed. Kingsley, 1859].
Brooks, Thomas (1608-80), Works [Nicbol's Puritan Divines, 1866-7].
Broome, Richard (d. 1632), A Jovial Crew, a Comedy.
Brown, Thomas (1663-1704), Works Serious and Comical [ed. 1760].
Browne, Sir Thomas (1605-82), Works [ed. 1686].
Browning, Robert, Poems.
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett (1809-61), Poems.
Bullinger, Henry (1504-75), translated by H. J., 1577 [Parker Soc, 1849-52].
Bunyan, John (1628-88), Pilgrim's Progress, Part I. 1678 ; II. 1684 [Facsimile of
1st ed., 1875].
Burgoyne, Sir John (d. 1792), Dramatic Works.
Burke, Edmund (1730-97), Reflections on the French Revolution, 1790 [new ed.,
1852].
Burton, Robert (1576-1640), Anatomy of Melancholy, 1621 [ed. 1638].
Butler, Samuel (1612-80), Hudibras, 1663-78.
By*on, Lord (1788-1824), Poems.
Calfhill, James (d. 1570), Answer to Martiall, 1565 [Parker Soc., 1846].
Carlyle, Thomas (1795-1881), Sartor Resartus, 1833 ; Fr. Revolution, 1837 ; Life
of Sterling, 1851 ; Essays, v. d. [ed. 1857].
Cartwright, William (1611-43), The Ordinary, a Comedy.
Centlivre, Susanna (1667-1723), Dramatic Works [ed. 1872].
Chapman, Geo. (1557-1634), Dramatic Works [ed. 1873] ; Iliad, 1603.
Chaucer, Geoff. (1328?-1400), Poems.
Churchill, Charles (1731-64), Poems.
Cibber, Colley (1671-1757), Plays ; Apology, 1739 [ed. 1829].
Coleridge, Samuel (1772-1834), Poems.
Collier, Jeremy (1650-1726), View of the Eng. Stage, 1698 [2nd ed.].
Collins, Wilkie, The Woman in White, 1860 ; the Moonstone, 1868.
Colman, Geo., Senr. (1733-94), Dramatic Works.
Colman, Geo., Junr. (1762-1836), Poetical Vagaries [2nd ed. 1814].
Combe, William (1741-1823), Three Tours of Dr. Syntax, 1812-20-21.
Committee, The. See Howard.
Congreve, William (1670-1729), Dramatic Works.
Corbet, Bp. (1582-1635), Poems [ed. Gilchrist, 1807].
Cotton, Charles (1630-87), Poetical Works [5th ed. 1765] ; Scarronides or
Traveatie of jEneid II. [ed. 1692].
Coverdale, Bp. (1488-1569), Works [Parker Soc, 1846].
Cowley, Abraham (1618-67), Poems and Essays.
Cowper, William (1731-1800), Poems.
Cox, Sir G., Mythology of the Aryan Nations, 1870.
Crabbe, George (1754-1832), Poems.
Cranmer, Abp. (1489-1556), Works [Parker Soc, 1844-6].
LIST OF AUTHORS QUOTED, xi
Daniel, Samuel (1562-1619), Hist, of England, 1618.
D'Arblay, Frances (1752-1840), Cecilia, 1782; Camilla, 1796; Diary [ed. 1842].
Davies, John, of Hereford (1560 ?-1618), Works [ed. Grosart, Chertsey Worthies
Lib., 1876].
Defoe, Daniel (1663 ?-1731), Tour thro' G. Britain [4th ed., 1748] ; Select Works
[ed. Keltie, 1871].
Dekker, Thomas (1641 ?), Satiromastix, 1602 ; Seven Deadly Sins, 1606 [ed.
Arber, 1879].
Denham, Sir John (1615-68), Poems.
Dennys, John (d. before 1613), Secrets of Angling, 1613.
De Quincey, Thomas (1785-1859), Selections Grave and Gay, 1853-61 ; Conf. of
an Opium-eater [new ed., 1853].
Dickens, Charles (1812-70), Works, Pickwick, 1836; Chuzzlewit, 1843; Bleak
House, 1852 ; Great Expectations, 1858.
Digby, George, Earl of Bristol (1612-76), Elvira, a Comedy.
Disraeli, Benjamin, Earl of Beaconsfield (1804-81), Loth air, 1871.
Dodsley, Robert (1703-64), Collection of Old Plays [ed. 1744].
D'Oyly, George (d. 1846), Life of Abp. Sancroft [2nd ed. 1840].
Drayton, Michael (1563-1631), Poems.
Dryden, John (1631-1701), Works.
D'Urfry, Tom (d. 1723), Collin's Walk through London, 1690 ; New Operas, &c,
1721.
Dyaloge betwene a Gentillman and a husbandman, 1530? [ed. Arber, 1871].
Earle, Bp. (1601-65), Microcosmographie, 1628 [ed. Arber, 1868].
Edgeworth, Maria (1767-1849), Castle Rackrent, 1800; Helen.
Edward II., Hist of, by E. F., written 1627, published 1680.
Edwards, Richard (b. 1523), Damon and Pitheas, published 1582.
Eliot, George (Mrs. Cross), (1820-80).
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, English Traits, 1856.
English Dialect Society, Publications of, 1873-81.
English Garner, ed. by Arber, 1877-80.
Evelyn, John (1620-1706), Diary, ed. Bray, 1818 [Chandos Lib., n. d.J
Falconer, William (1730 ?-69), The Shipwreck, 1762.
Farquhar, George (1678-1707), Dramatic Works.
Ferrier, Susan (1782-1854), Marriage, 1818 ; Inheritance, 1824; Destiny, 1831.
Fielding, Henry (1707-54), J. Andrews, 1742; Jonathan Wild, 1743; Tom
Jones, 1749; Amelia, 1751.
Fish, Simon (d. 1530), Supplication for the Beggars, 1529 [ed. Arber, 1878],
Fisher, Bp. (1459-1535), Works [ed. Mayor, Early Eng. Text Soc, 1876],
Foote, Samuel (1720?- 77), Dramatic Works.
Foxe, John (1517-87), Acts and Monuments, 1562.
Fuller, Thomas (1608-61), David's Sin, &c, 1631 ; Holy War, 1639 : Holy State,
1642; Pisgah Sight, 1650; Ch. Hist., 1655; Worthies, 1662 [ed. Nichols, 1811].
Galt, John (1779-1839), Annals of the Parish, 1821.
Gammer Gurton's Needle, by Mr. S., M.A. (Bp. Still, 1543-1608).
Garrick, David (1716-79), Dramatic Works.
Gascoigne, George (1536-77), The Supposes, 1566; Steele Glas, &c, 1577 [ed.
Arber, 1858].
Gaskell, Elizabeth (1811-65), Ruth, 1853; North and South, 1854.
Gauden, Bp. (1605-62), Tears of the Church, 1659.
xii LIST OF A UTHORS Q VOTED.
Gay, John (1688-1732), Poems.
Gentleman Instructed; the author is more probably Father Darrell, S. J. Tlio
earliest edition in the Bodleian is the 2nd, 1704 ; it was afterwards enlarged
[10th ed., 1732].
Godwin, William (1756-1836), Mandeville, 1817.
Googe, Barnaby (d. 1594), Eglogs, &c, 1563 [ed. Arber, 1871].
Gosson, Stephen (1555-1624), Schoole of Abuse, 1579 [ed. Arber, 1868].
Graves, Richard (1715-1804), Spiritual Quixote, 1773 [new ed., 1808].
Gray, Thomas (1716-71), Poems.
Greene, Robert (1550 ?-92), Dramatical and Poetical Works, ed. Dyce [Rout-
ledge's Old Dramatists, 1874] ; Menaphon, 1589 [ed. Arber, 1880].
Grim, the Collier of Croydon, printed as an old piece in 1662.
Grindal, Abp. (1519-83), Remains [Parker Society, 1843],
Grose, Francis (1731-91), Classical Diet, of the Vulgar Tongue, 1785 [3rd ed.>
1796].
Hall, Bp. (1574-1656), Satires, 1597 [Works, new ed., 1637-39].
Hall, Fitzedward, Exemplifications of False Philology, 1872 ; Modern English,
1873.
Halliwell, James O., Diet, of Archaic and Provincial Words [7th ed., 1872].
Harleian Miscellany, with notes by Park, 1808-12.
Hawkins, Thomas (1728-72), English Drama, 1773.
Heath (By an error this name is given as that of the author of the translation of
Horace : it should be Sir Thomas Hawkins). Translation of Odes of Horace,
1625 [4th ed., 1638].
Herbert, George (1593-1633), Poems.
Herrick, Robert (1591-1674), Poems, ed. Hazlitt [Smith's Lib. of Old Authors,
1869].
Heylin, Peter (1600-62), Hist, of Presbyterians, 1670; Life of Laud, 1671 ; Hist-
of Reformation, 1674 [Ecc. Hist. Soc, 1849].
Heywood, John (d. 1565 ?), Dramatic Works.
Holland, Philemon (1551-1636), Livy, 1600 [ed. 1659] : Pliny, 1601 [ed., 1634] ;
Camden, 1610 [revised and enlarged by Author, 1637].
Hood, Thomas (1798-1845), Poems.
Hook, Theodore (1788-1841), Sayings and Doings, 1824-5.
Hooper, Bp. (1495-1555), Works [Parker Soc, 1843-52].
Howard, Sir Robert (1626-98), The Committee ; a Comedy.
Howell, James (1596-1666), Forraine Travell, 1642 [ed. Arber, 1869] ; Dodona's
Grove, 1645; Letters, 1644-55 [9th ed., 1726] ; Parly of Beasts, 1660.
Hubert, Sir Francis (d. 1629), Life and Death of Edward IT., 1629.
Hudson, Thomas (temp. Eliz.), Hist, of Judith, translated from Du Bartas [od.
1613]. Hudson was a Scotchman, and dedicates his work to James VI. of
Scotland ; it must have appeared therefore before 1603.
Hughes, Thomas, Tom Brown's Schooldays, 1856 ; Tom Brown at Oxford, 1861.
Hunt, Leigh (1784-1859), Poems.
Hutchinson, Roger (d. 1555), Works [Parker Soc, 1842].
Imperial Dictionary, with Supplement, ed. J. Ogilvie, 1850-55.
Ingoldsby Legends. See Barham.
Irving, Washington (1783-1859), Salmagundi, 1807; Sketch Book, 1819.
Jarvis, Charles (d. 1743), Translation of Don Quixote, 1742.
Jewel, Bp. (1522-71), Works [Parker Soc, 1845-50].
Johnston, Charles (d. 1800 ?), Chrysal, 1760 [Cooke's ed., n. d.].
-a? — ■■: — • iLjktr
LIST OF A UTHORS QUOTED. xiii
Jonson, Ben (1574-1637), Works.
Keats, John (1796-1821), Endymion, 1818; Lamia, 1820.
Ken, Bp. (1637-1711), Life of, by a Layman, 1851 [2nd ed., 1854].
Kennet, Bp. (1660-1728), Parochial Antiquities, 1695; Translation of Erasmus's
Praise of Folly [8th ed., n. d.].
Killigrew, Thomas (1611-82), The Parson's Wedding; a Comedy.
Kingsley, Charles (1819-75), Saint's Tragedy, 1848 ; Alton Locke, 1850 ; West-
ward Ho ! 1855 ; Two Years Ago, 1857. Letters, &c, edited by his wife [3rd
abridged ed., 1879].
Kingsley, Henry (1830-76), Geoff ry Hamlyn, 1859; Ravenshoe, 1861.
Kirby, William (1759-1850), and Spence, William (1780-1860), Entomology,
1815-26 [ed. 1826].
Lackington, James (1746-1816), Memoirs, 1791 [new ed., 1803].
Lamb, Charles (1775-1834), Works, with Life by Talfourd [new ed., 1852].
Latham, Robert G., Diet, of the Eng. Language, founded on Todd's Johnson,
1876.
Latimer, Bp. (1472-1555), Sermons and Remains [Parker Soc, 1844-5].
Lawes, Henry (1600-62), Ayres and Dialogues, 1653.
Lennox, Charlotte (1720-1804), Female Quixote, 1752 [Cook's ed., n. d.] ; Hen-
rietta [Ibid.].
L'Estrange, Roger (1616-1704), Trans, of Seneca's Morals [11th ed., 1710].
Lewis, Sir George C. (1806-63), Letters, 1870.
Lytton, Lord (1806-73), Pelhara, 1827 ; Caxtons, 1849 ; My Novel, 1853 ; What
will he do with it ? 1858.
Macaulay, Lord (1800-59), Hist of Eng., 1849-61.
Machin, Lewis (temp. Charles I.), The Dumb Knight, a Comedy, 1633.
Maine, Jasper (1604-72), The City Match, a Comedy.
Maitland, Samuel (1795-1866), Essays on the Reformation, 1849.
Markham, Gervase (1566 ?-1655 ?), Tragedie of Sir Richard Grinuile, 1595 [ed.
Arber, 1871].
Marlowe, Christopher (1564-93), Dramatic Works.
Marmion, Shakerley (1602-39), The Antiquary.
Marryat, Frederick (1792-1848), Frank Mildmay, 1829 ; Peter Simple, 1834.
Marston, John (1575, d. after 1633), The Malcontent, a Comedy, 1604.
Massinger, Philip (1584-1640), Dramatic Works.
May, Thomas (1594 ?-1650), The Heir ; The Old Couple— Comedies.
Merry Drolleries, 1661-70-91 ; ed. Ebsworth, 1875.
Middleton, Thomas (1570-1627), Comedies.
Milton, John (1608-74), Paradise Lost, 1667 ; Paradise Regained, 1671 ; Prose
Works [Bonn's Standard Lib., 1872-75].
Misson, Francois (d. 1722), Travels in Eng., 1698, translated by J. Ozell (d. 1743),
1719.
Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley (1689-1762), Letters, written 1716-18 [ed. J. St.
John, 1838].
More, Henry (1614-87), Works [ed. Grosart, Chertsey Worthies' Lib., 1876-8].
Nares, Edward (1762-1841), Thinks-I-to-Myself, 1811 [9th ed., 1816].
Nares, Robert (1753-1829), Glossary, 1822 [new ed. with additions by J. Halli-
well and T. Wright, 1876].
Nashe, Thomas (L567-1600), Lenten Stuffe, 1599.
Nomenclator of Junius, translated by J. Higins, 1585.
xiv LIST OF A UTHORS QUOTED.
North, Roger (1650-1734), Examen, 1740; Life of Lord Guilford [2nd ed.,
1608].
Notes and Queries, Five Series, 1849-79.
Oliphant, Margaret, Salem Chapel, 1863.
Parish, W. D., Dictionary of the Sussex Dialect, 1875.
Parker Society, Publications of, 1841-53.
Peacock, Edward, Manley and Corringham Glossary (E. D. S.), 1877.
Peele, George (1553 ?-97?), Works, ed. Dyce [Routledge's Old Dramatists, 1874]-
Pepys, Samuel (1632-1703), Diary, ed. Lord Braybrooke [Bonn's Hist. Lib., 1858>
Phillips, Samuel (1815-54), Essays from the Times, 1854.
Philpot, John (1511-55), Examinations and Writings [Parker Soc, 1842].
Pilkington, Bp. (1520-75), Works [Parker Soc., 1842].
Poe, Edgar Allen (1811-49), Works [ed. 1853].
Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), Poems.
Preston, Thomas (1537-98), King Cambises, a Tragedy.
Prior, Matthew (1664-1721), Poems.
Puttenham, George (b. 1532 ?), Arte of English Poesie, 1589 [ed. Arber, 1869].
Quarles, Francis (1592-1644), Emblems, 1635.
Randolph, Thomas (1605-34), Muses* Looking Glass, a Comedy.
Reade, Charles, Never too late to Mend, 1857 ; Cloister and Hearth, 1861.
Richardson, Charles (1775-1865), English Dictionary, with Supplement, 1836-7].
Richardson, Samuel (1689-1761), Pamela, 1741 [ed. Mangin, 1811] ; CI. Hariowe,
1748 [lb.] ; Grandison, 1754 [ed. 1812].
Robberd8, W. See Taylor.
Rogers, Thomas (b. 1550), Exposition of Thirty-nine Articles, 1586 [Parker Soc,
1854].
Rowlet, William (temp. James and Charles I.), Match at Midnight, a Comedy.
Roxburgh Ballads, ed. Hindley, 1873.
Roy, William, and Barlow, Jerome, Rede me and be nott wroth, 1528 [ed.
Arber, 1871].
Sackville, Thomas, Lord Buckhurst (1536-1608), Works [ed. Sackville-WeRt],
[Smith's Lib. of Old Authors, 1859].
Sanderson, Bp. (1587-1663), Works [ed. Jacobson, 1854].
Sandys, Abp. (1519-88), Sermons [Parker Soc, 1841].
Savage, M. W., Reuben Medlicott, 1852 [ed. 1864].
Scott, Sir Walter (1771-1832), Lay of the Last Minstrel, 1805 ; Waverley Novels,
1814-31 [48 vols. 1829-33].
Selden, John (1584-1654), Table Talk, published 1699 [Smith's Lib. of Old
Authors, I860].
Shakespeare, William : (1564-1 616), Works.
Shenstone, William (1714-63), Poems.
Sheridan, Richard Brinsley (1751-1816), Dramatic Works.
Shirley, James (1594-1666), The Bird in a Cage, 1633 ; The Gamester, 1637.
Sibbes, Richard (1577-1635), Works [Nicholas Puritan Divines, 1862-4].
Sidney, Sir Philip (1554-86), Arcadia, published 1590; Astrophel and Stella,
1591 ; Wanstead Play. [All these works quoted from 13th ed., 1674].
Skelton, John (1460?-1529), Elynour Rummin, the famous Ale-wife of England.
Smith, Henry (1550-91), Works [Nicholas Puritan Divines, 1866-7].
Smith, James (1775-1839), and Horace (1779-1849), Rejected Addresses, 1812
[new ed., 1869].
LIST OF A UTHORS Q UOTED. xv
Smith, Sidnet (1771-1845), Works [2nd ed., 1840] ; Letters, with Memoir by Lady
Holland, 1855 [new ed., 1869].
Smollett, Tobias (1721-71), Roderick Random, 1748 ; Peregrine Pickle, 1751 ;
Sir L. Greaves, 1762 ; Humphrey Clinker, 1771.
South, Robebt (1633-1716), Sermons, 1697 [ed. 1737].
Southet, Robebt (1774-1843), Joan of Arc, 1796 ; Thalaba, 1801 ; Eehama,
1810; The Doctor, 1834-47; Letters, ed. Waiter, 1856.
Speed, John (1552-1629), Hist, of Great Britain, 1611 [2nd ed., 1623].
Spenser, Edmund (1552-99), Shepherd's Calendar, 1579 ; Faerie Queene, 1590-96 ;
Colin Clout, 1595.
Stanyhubst, Richard (1548-1618), Translation of JEneid I. -IV., 1582 ; Conceites,
&c. [ed. Arber, 1880].
Staptlton, Sib Robert (d. 1669), Translation of Juvenal, 1647.
Steele, Sib Richard (1671-1729), Conscious Lovers, 1722.
Stebnb, Laubence (1713-68), Tristram Shandy, 1758-67 [8th ed., 1770], Sentimental
Journey, 1768.
Strangford, Lord (1825-69), Life and Letters.
Stbype, John (1643-1737), Memorials of Cranmer, 1694 [Ecc. Hist. Soc., 1848-54].
Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745), Tale of a Tub, 1704 ; Gulliver, 1726 ; Polite Con-
versation, written about 1706, published long after.
Sylvesteb, Joshua (1563-1618), Works [ed. Grosart, Chertsey Worthies' Lib.,
1877-80].
Taylob, Sib Henbt, 1843 ; Comnenus, 1827 ; Ph. van Artevelde, 1834 ; Edwin
1842; St Clement's Eve, 1862 [Works, new ed., 1877-8].
Taylob, William (1765-1836), Survey of German Poetry, 1828-30 ; Letters, with
Memoirs by W. Robberds, 1843.
Tennyson, Alfbed, Poems, 1832; Princess, 1847-50; Maud, 1855; Idylls, 1859-72-
Queen Mary, 1875 ; Harold, 1877 ; Ballads, &c, 1880. '
Thackebay, William M. (1811-63), Paris Sketch Book, 1840 ; Vanity Pair, 1847 ;
Esmond, 1852 ; Newcomes, 1855 ; Virginians, 1857 ; Miscellanies [ed. 1855-57].
Touchstone of Complexions, 1575.
Trollops, Anthony, Barchester Towers, 1857 ; Orley Farm, 1862.
Tbollope, Fbances (1779-1863), Michael Armstrong, 1839.
Tdsseb, Thomas (1525 ?-80), Husbandry, 1573 [ed. Payne and Herrtage, E. D. S.,
1878].
Two Noble Kinsmen, first printed 1634 ; ascribed to Fletcher and Shakespeare.
Tyndale, William (1477-1536), Works [Parker Soc, 1848-50].
Udal, Nicholas (1504-56), Roister Doister [ed. Arber, 1869] ; Translation of
Erasmus's Apophthegmes, 1542 [Reprint, 1877 of ed. of 1562].
Ubquhabt, Sib Thomas (d. 1642), Translation of Rabelais [Bonn's extra vols.,
1848].
Vanbbugh, Sib John (1666?-1726), Dramatic Works.
Walpole, Hobace, Eabl of Obfobd (1717-97); Private Correspondence [4 vols.,
1820], Letters to Mann, ed. Lord Dover [2nd ed., 1833].
Wabd, Samuel (1577-1639), Sermons [Nichol's Puritan Divines, 1862].
Wabd, Thomas (1652-1708), England's Reformation, a Poem, published 1710
[ed. 1716].
Wabton, Thomas (1728-90), Poems.
Webbe, William (d.. after 1591), Discourse of English Poetrie, 1586 [ed. Arber,
1870].
Whitqift, Abp. (1530-1604), Works [Parker Soc., 1851-3).
x vi LIST OF A UTHORS Q UO TED,
Wily Beguiled, a Comedy, temp. James I.
Wolcot, John (1738-1819), Peter Pindar [ed. 1830].
Wood, Anthony (1632-95), Life of, by himself [Ecc. Hist. Soc, 1848].
Wordsworth, William (1770-1850), Poems.
Wycherley, William (1640-1715), Dramatic Works.
ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THIS GLOSSARY.
El D. 8., English Dialect Society. N., Nares's Glossary, ed. by Halliwcll
H., Hall i well's Dictionary. and Wright.
L., Latham's Dictionary. N. & Q., Notes and Queries.
R., Richardson's Dictionary.
When a word is said not to be in the Dictionaries, the statement only refers to
the four which this book proposes to supplement.
SUPPLEMENTARY ENGLISH GLOSSARY.
A 1, the best ; in the first rank. In
Lloyds1 Register there are five classes
of ships: A, A in red, M, E, and I.
The first A is the highest. See N. and
Q., III. iii. 431, 478.
I want to be A 1 at cricket, and football,
and all the other games. — Hughes, Tom
Brown's Schooldays, Pt. II. ch. vi.
44 I never heard such a word before from
the lips of a young lady." " Not as A 1 ? I
thought it simply meant very good. . . . A 1
is a ship— a ship that is very good." — Trollope,
Phineas Finn, ch. xlii.
A B anne, to curse.
How durst the Bishops in this present
council of Trident so solemnly to abanne and
accurse all them that dare to find fault with
the same ? — Jewel, ii.
Abbatt, abbacy.
Dunstan . . . was the first' Abbot of Eng-
land, not in time, but in honour, Glassenbury
being the Froto- A bbaty, then and many years
after. — Fuller, Worthies, Somerset, ii. 260.
Abbreviatly, shortly.
The sweete smaoke that Yarmouth findes
in it . . . abbreviatly axA meetely according to
my old Sarum plainesong I have harpt upon.
—Noshe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 162).
Abcedaries, rudiments. R. has it
= teacher of rudiments.
It was lawful to begin of such rudiments
or abcedaries, but so that it behooved the
learned, grave, and godly ministers of Christ
to enterprise further. — Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
Vni. iii. 2.
Abecedarian, rudimentary. The
Dicta, have it as a subst. = teacher
of rudiments.
There is an Abecedarian ignorance that
precedes knowledge, and a Doctoral ignor-
ance that comes after it. — Cotton's Montaigne,
ch. xli.
Abear, to bear or comport oneself,
The Faerie Queene is the latest author-
ity for this word given in the Diets.,
but it was used by Bp. Lloyd a century
later. It occurs bIbo in Hist, of Edward
77. , p. 67, and in Hacked Life of Abp.
WUliamSi ii. 65. In the sense of "to
tolerate," as in the second quotation, it
is a vulgarism still in use.
The giving of a recognisance for the good
abearing or quiett peaceable liveing, is a point
that deserves to be well weighed. — Lloyd to
Sancroft, 1689 (Life of Ken, p. 554).
She couldn't abear the men, they were
such deceivers. — Sketches by Boz (Mr. John
Bounce).
Abele, a white poplar. The first
extract is from Britten and Holland'*
Eng. Plant Names (E. D. S.).
It is called ... in low Dutch abeel, of his
horie or aged colour, and also abeelboome ;
. . . in French, aubel, obel, or aubeau; in
English, abeell, after the Dutch name. — Ge-
rard, Herball (1597).
Six abeles i' the churchyard grow on the
north side in a row. — Mrs. browning (Duchess
Mary).
Abigail, a waiting - woman. L.
says, " The direct etymology of this
word is uncertain: it goes back to
Abigail of Carmel (1 Sam. xxv.) ; but
it is probable that its present use is
referable to Abigail Hill, the famous
Mrs. Masham." Mrs. Masham's position
towards Q. Anne may have made the
expression more common, but the sub-
joined extract was written four years
before Mrs. Masham entered her Majes-
ty's service, and several years before
she could have become of sufficient im-
portance to give rise to the name. I
B
ABJECTION
( 2 )
ACADEMICALS
think it may be questioned whether
there is any reference to the wife of
Nabal ; she was not a servant, but the
wife of a wealthy man. She calls her-
self, with Oriental humility, a hand-
maid, but so do Ruth and others. It
has been pointed out that in Beaumont
and Fletcher's Scornful Lady the wait-
ing-woman is called Abigail ; and this
play was long popular. Pepys records
seven occasions on which he went to
see it, and on one of these he says,
" Doll Common [i. e. Mrs. Corey], doing
Abigail most excellently." Perhaps
this was the real origin of the term,
just as we call an inn-keeper Boniface
from Farquhar's Beaux Stratagem.
Whereas they [the chaplains] petition to
be freed from any obligation to marry the
chamber-maid, we can by no means assent
to it ; the Abigail, by immemorial custom,
being a deodand, and belonging to holy
Church. — Reply to Ladies and Bachelors
Petition, 1604 (Karl. Misc., iv. 440).
Abjection, casting away.
Calvin understands by Christ's descending
into hell, that he suffered in his soul ... all
the torments of hell, even to abjection from
God' 8 presence. — Heylin, Hist, of the Pres-
byterians, p. 350.
Able most, most efficient.
For, quick despatching (hourely) Post on
Post
To all the Coverts of the Able-most
For Pate, Pro wesse^Purse; commands, prayes,
presses them
To come with speed unto Jerusalem.
Sylvester, Bethulia's Rescue, i. 108.
Ablesse, power, ablenesse, which
is the reading in the second folio ed. of
Chapman.
This did with anger sting
The blood of Diomed, to see his friend that
chid the king
Before the fight, and then preferred his
ablesse and his mind
To all his ancestors in fight, now come so
far behind. — Chapman, Iliad, v. 248.
Abortive, to perish, or cause to
perish untimely.
Thus one of your bold thunders may abortive.
And cause that birth miscarry that might
have provM
An instrument of wonders greater and rarer
Than Apollonius the magician wrought.
Alhumazar, i. 3.
He wrought to abortive the bill before it
came to the birth. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
i. 37.
When peace came so near to the birth,
how it abortived, and by whose fault, comes
now to be remembred. — Ibid. ii. 147.
Abound, to expatiate. To abound
in or with one's own sense = to be free
to express or keep one's own opinion.
Adams (ii. 300) says, "I will not
abound in this discovery," t. e. I will
not enlarge upon it.
Some of them [opinions] are such as are
fit only for schools, and to be left at more
liberty for learned men to abound in their own
sense, so they keep themselves peaceable, and
distract not the Church. — Letter from Laud,
1625 (Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 137).
Every one is said to afjound with his owns
sense, and that, among the race of mankind,
opinions and fancies are found to be as various
as the severall faces and voyces. — Howell,
Forreine Travell, sect. 1.
I meddle not with Mr. Boss, but leave him
to abound in his own sense. — Bran^hall, ii.
632.
Abbaid, to upbraid. The word is
still in use in the neighbourhood of
Whitby (see Robinson's Glossary). In
Willaris West Riding Yorkshire Glos-
sary (a.d. 1811) it is given as meaning,
to rise on the stomach with some degree
of nausea, a sense in which " upbraid "
and '* reprove " are still sometimes
used.
How now, base brat! what, are thy wits
thine own,
That thou dar'st thus abraid me in my land ?
Greene, Alphonsus, Act II.
Abramide, descendant of Abraham ;
a Jew: also called Abramite.
Alas how many a guiltlesse Abramide
Dyes in three daies, through the too-curious
Pride. — Sylvester, Trophtes, 1244.
O Jacob's Lanthorn, Load-star pure which
lights
On these rough Seas the rest of Abramites.
Ibid. The Captaines, 601.
Abscession, departure.
Neither justly excommunicated out of that
particular Church to which he was orderly
joyned, nor excommunicating himself by
voluntary Schisme, declared abscession, separ-
ation, or apostasie. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 37.
Absolution, a sweeping away.
But grant it true [that the Liturgy ordered
too many ceremonies], not a total absolution,
but a reformation tnereof may hence be
inferred. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. x. 8.
Academicals, cap and gown.
At first he caught up his cap and gown, as
though he were going out. . . On second
thoughts, however, he threw his academicals
ACCESSIVE
( 3 )
ACORN-BALL
back on to the sof a.— Hughes, Tom Brawn at
Oxford, ch. xix.
Accessive, contributory. .
God " opened the eyes of one that was
born blind," and had increased this csecity by
his own accessive and excessive wickedness. —
Adams, ii. 379.
Accipitbal, pertaining to a hawk or
falcon.
My learned friends ! most swift, sharp are
you; of temper most aecipitral, hawkish,
aquiline, not to say vulturish.— Carlyle, Misc.,
Aoclamator, shouter ; cheerer.
He went almost the whole wav with his
hat in his hand, saluting the fadys and
accfamators who had filled the windows with
their beauty, and the aire with Vive le Boy.—
Evelyn, Diary, Sept. 7, 1651.
Accleabment, vindication.
The acclearment is fair, and the proof
nothing.— Racket, Life of Williams, i. 148.
Accompanyist, one who plays the
musical accompaniment to a song.
A young lady proceeded to entertain the
company with a ballad in four verses, be-
tween each of which the accompanyist played
the melody all through, as loud as he could.
—Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xxvi.
Aocompass, to bring about; to ac-
quire.
The remotion of two such impediments is
not commonly accompass7d by one head-
piece.— Racket, Life of Williams, i. 42.
[He] had accompassed such knowledge in a
quarter of a year that he gave satisfaction. —
Ibid. ii. 42.
Accomplish, to render accomplished.
His lady is open, chatty, fond of her chil-
dren, and anxious to accomplish them. — Mad.
DArblay, Diary, vi. 202.
Accost, sb. address.
By his aid
(Not gifted with that affable accost,
And personal grace which bids my cousin
trust
In his own prowess — conquering and to con-
quer)
I hoped to triumph in affairs of love.
Taylor, St. Clement's Eve, i. 3.
Acctjrtation, shortening.
Albert E bee thee last letter, that must
not salve M. from accurtation. — Stany hurst,
Virgil (To the Header).
ACCUSE, to indicate; show signs of
(cf. Karriyoptiv, accuser).
The princes, who were to part from the
greatest fortunes, did in their countenances
(weuse no point of fear, but . . . taught them
at one instant to promise themselves the
best, and yet to despise the worst. — Sidney,
Arcadia, p. 124.
Amphialus answered in honourable sort,
but with such excusing himself, that more
and more accused his love to Fhiloclea. —
Ibid. p. 144.
Accustomed, frequented.
A weU-accustom'd house, a handsome bar-
keeper, with clean, obliging drawers, soon get
the master an>state. — Centli vre, Bold Stroke
for a Wife, I. i.
WUdgoose, seeing a number of people
drinking under a tree at the door, observed to
my landlord that his seemed to be a well-
accustomed house. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. IX. ch. vi.
Accustomedly, usually.
For certain hours it accustomedly for-
beareth to flame. — Sandys, Travels, p. 248.
Acedy (d Ktjdoc), carelessness.
Though the mind be sufficiently convinced
of the necessity or profit of a good act, yet
for the tediousnes8 annexed to it, in a dan-
gerous spiritual acedy, it slips away from it. —
Dp. Hall, Works, v. 140.
Acerb, bitter.
The dark, acerb, and caustic little professor.
— Charlotte Bronte, Villette, ch. xix.
Acheloian horn. Hercules in a
contest with Achelous, who had changed
himself into an ox, broke one of his
adversary's horns.
Repair the Acheloian horn of your dilemma
how you can against the next push. — Milton,
Animadv. on Remonst. Defence, sect. ii.
Acholithite, acolyte.
To see a lazy, dumb Acholithite
Armed against a devout fly's despight.
Hall, Satires, IV. vii. 53.
Acidify, to sour.
Such are the plaints of Louvet; his thin
existence all acidified with rage, and preter-
natural insight of suspicion. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. iii.
Acorn. A horse foaled of an acorn =
an oak : so applied to the gallows.
I believe as how 'tis no horse, but a devil
incarnate ; and yet I've been worse mounted,
that I have— I'a like to have rid a horse that
was foaled of an acorn fi. e. he had nearly
met with the fate of Absalom]. — Smollett,
Sir L. Greaves, ch. viii.
Acorn-ball, the acorn.
And when my marriage morn may fall
She, Dryad-like, shall wear
Alternate leaf and acorn-ball,
In wreath about her hair.
Tennyson, Talking Oak.
B2
AC0UST1C0N
( 4 )
ADAM'S ALE
Aoousticon, belonging to hearing.
Ther's no creture hears more perfectly
then a goat, for lie hath not onely ears, but
an acousticon organ also in the throat. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 123.
Acquaint, to become acquainted, or
to seek acquaintance.
Though the Choiseuls will not acquaint
with you, I hope their abbe Barthelemi is
not put under the same quarantine. — Wal-
pole, Letters, iii. 604 (1774).
Acquiescate to, to acquiesce in.
Do you but acquiescate to my exhortation,
and you shall extinguish him. — Sidney,
Wanstead Play, p. 623.
Acquiesce, to rest (of things).
Which atoms are still hovering up and
down, and never rest till they meet with
some pores proportionable and cognate to
their figures, where they acquiesce.— Howell,
Letters, iv. 50.
Acquiesce to, for the more usual
construction, " acquiesce in."
Neander sent his man with a letter to
Theomachus, who acquiesced to the proposal.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 123.
A man that will acquiesce to nothing but
strict demonstrations would do well to dis-
band from society. — Ibid. p. 354.
Presqming on the unshaken submission of
Hippolita, he flattered himself that she would
. . . acquiesce with patience to a divorce. —
Walpofe, Castle of Otranto, ch. i.
Acquiesce with, acquiesce in.
Wisdom does ever acquiesce with the
present, and is never dissatisfied with its
immediate condition. — Cotton's Montaigne,
ch. iii.
I, as well as my nephew, must acquiesce
•with your pleasure. — Richardson, Grandison,
i. 134.
The two ladies . . . acquiesced with all he
proposed. — Ibid. ii. 222.
Acre-staff, plough-staff.
Where the Husbandman's Acre-staff and
the Shepheard's-hook are, as in this County,
in State, there they engross all to them-
selves.— Fuller, Worthies, Leicester (i. 561).
Actable, practically possible.
E Is naked truth actable in true life? —
Tennyson, Harold, iii. 1.
Action, to bring an action against.
If you please to action me, take your
course. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 525.
Activeable, capable of activity.
do many activeable wits
That might contend with proudest birds of
Po,
Sits now immur'd within their private cells.
Return from Parnassus, iv. 3 (1606).
Adamical, after the manner of Adam,
and so in a nude stute. C£. Adamitical.
In the first extract it = carnal, un-
regenerate.
Though the divel trapan
The Adamical man
The saint stands uninfected.
Merry Drollerie, p. 59.
Halbert standing on the plunging-stage
Adamically, without a rag upon him. — H.
Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xlvi.
Adamites, a sect in the early Church
who professed to endeavour after the
innocence of Paradise, and went naked
like Adam. There was a sect of Adam-
ites in Germany in the early part of the
fifteenth century.
If all men had their own, and every bird
her feather, some of them would be as bare
as those that profess themselves to be of the
sect of the Adamites. — Wolsey and Laud,
1641 (Harl. Misc., iv. 510).
The sun plays so warmly upon us, that
some people, who were of no religion before,
talk of t'irning Adamites in their own de-
fence.— T. Brown, Works, i. 172.
Adamitical, pertaining to or resem-
bling Adam ; hence, as applied to cloth-
ing, scanty. Cf. Adamical.
Your behaviour del Cabo will not relish in
Europe, nor your Adamitical garments fence
virtue in London. — Gentleman Instructed, p.
169.
Adam's ale, water. Prof. De Mor-
gan, writing to M. Biot, mentioned thiR
common phrase as illustrating China
ale or beer as applied to tea. The ex-
pression was quite new to M. Biot and
other Frenchmen. He wrote back,
" L1 Adams ale qui clutrme tons ceux
de nos philoloaues a qui je la raconte "
(N. and Q., 3rd S., vi. 46). Tom
Brown uses Adam by itself in the same
sense. Peter Pindar (p. 3) speaks of
" old Adam's beverage ; " and Adam's
wine is in Jtimieson's Diet., with quota-
tion from Gait.
A Rechabite poor Will must live,
And drink of Adam's ale.
Prior, Wandering Pilgrim.
Your claret's too hot. Sirrah, drawer, go
bring
A cup of cold Adam from the next purling
6prmg.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 11.
Even at the door of death he could not
drink what Adam drank, by whom cam.*
death into the world, so I gave him a little
more eau-de-vie. — Blackmore, Lorna Doom,
ch. lxv.
ADAPT
( 5 )
ADONIS
Adapt, fitted.
[Providence] gave him able arms and back
To wield a flail and carry sack,
And in all stations active be,
Adapt to prudent husbandry.
IfUrfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 1.
If we take this definition of happiness, and
examine it with reference to the senses, it
will be acknowledged wonderfully adapt. —
Swift, Tale of Tub, sect. 9.
Adaptments, a word coined by Wal-
pole as more expressive than "con-
veniences " of what he wished to con-
vey.
All the conveniences, or rather (if there
was such a word), all the adaptments, are
assembled here that melancholy, meditation,
selfish devotion, and despair would require.
— Walpole, Letters, i. 23 (1739).
Addict from, to estrange from ; dis-
incline to.
Fear of punishment will not reform such
persons as by affection conceived hath been
addicted from the expense of fish and the
observation of fish-days. — Privy Council on
Fish-days, 1594 (Eng. Garner, i. 302).
Addition. See quotation.
Milltner. Be pleased to put on the addi-
tion, madam.
Mrs. Dowdy. What does she mean now ?
to pull my skm off, mehap, next. Ha, Peeper,
are these your London vashions ?
Peeper. No, no, addition is only paint,
madam.
Centlivre, Platonick Lady, III. i.
Addle, to earn — a north-country
word. See Peacock's Glossary, &c,
and an old example of its use in Halli-
teell, s. v.
Parson's lass 'ant nowt,an' she weant 'anowt
when Vs dead ;
Mun be a guvness, lad, or summut, and addle
her bread.
Tennyson, Northern Farmer, new style.
Adeep, deeply.
And we shout so adeep down creation's
profound,
We are deaf to God's voice.
Mrs. Browning, Rhapsody of Life's
Progress.
Adempt, taken away.
Receive thankfully, gentle reader, these
sermons faithfully collected without any
sinister suspicion of anything in the same
being added or adempt. — Preface to some of
Latimer's Sermons, 1549 (i. 111).
Adit, approach: usually employed
as a term in mining for an underground
passage, especially one by which water
is conveyed.
Yourself and yours shall have
Free adit.
Tennyson, Princess, vi.
Adjoint, a helper ; joined on to
another. Nares has a single quotation
from Daniel to which Halliwell refers.
You are, madam, I perceive, said he; a
public minister, and this lady is your adjoint.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 108.
Adminicle, a help. It is also a Scotch
legal term = collateral proof. See
Jamieson.
The author would have the sacraments of
Baptism, and of the Body and Blood of Christ,
to be adminicles as it were. — Cran}ner, i. 37.
Admin iculation, prop or support.
Some plant 8 grow straight, some are help't
by admmiculation to be straight. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 217.
Admirables, wonders. For similar
instances see Observables.
Sure in the legend of absurdest fables
I should enrouJe most of these admirables.
Sylvester, third day, first week, 279.
Admiral. See extract.
Admirall is but a depravation of Amirall
in vulgar mouths. However, it will never
be beaten out of the heads of common sort
that, seeing the sea is scene of wonders,
something of wonderment hath incorporated
itself in this word, and that it hath a glimpse,
cast, or eye of admiration therein. — Fuller,
Worthies, ch. vi.
Admissible, to be admitted ; allow-
able. The extract is noteworthy, as
showing that this word, so common now,
was not familiar in Richardson's time.
R. and L. illustrate it with one and the
same quotation from Sir M. Hale. Sir
T. Browne has admittable.
He used to pay his duty to me, and ask
blessing the moment he came in, if admis-
sible. (Is that a word, Harriet ?) — Richardson,
Grandison, v. 64.
Admonitorial, admonishing.
Miss Tox . . in her instruction of the Toodle
family, has acquired an admonitorial tone, and
a habit of improving passing occasions. —
Dickens, Dombey and Son, ch. Ii.
Adonis, a species of wig.
He [Duke of Cumberland] had a dark
brown adonis, and a cloak of black cloth,
with a train of five yards. — Walpole, Letttrs,
ii. 206 (1760).
He puts on a fine flowing adonis or white
periwig. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. III.
ch. six.
ADONISE
( 6 )
AD V1SIVE
Adonise, to dress, or make beautiful,
like Adonis. Fr. JadonUer.
"I must go and adonise a little myself.0
The company then separated to perform the
important offices of the toilette. — Miss Fer-
rier, Marriage, ch. ix.
Adoptability, that which can be
made use of or adopted. See extract,
s. v. Adoptable.
Adopt able, capable of being adopted.
The Liturgy, or adoptable and generally
adopted set of prayers and prayer-method,
was what we can call the Select Adoptabili-
ties, Select Beauties well edited (by (Ecu-
menic Councils and other Useful-Knowledge
Societies) from that wide waste imbroglio
of prayers already extant and accumulated,
good and bad.— Carlyle, Past and Present,
Bk. II. ch. xvit.
Adorate, to adore.
A king this moment, that kings adorate,
The next, a corse, slaves loath to look vpon.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 27.
Adoratory, place of worship.
He found in what appears to have been the
same adoratory a decayed shin-bone sus-
pended from the roof .— Southey, The Doctor,
ch. cxliv.
Adore, to invoke.
What greater wall and barre than the
ocean ? Wherewith the Britans being fensed
and inclosed, doe yet adore the Romans
forces. — Holland's Camden, p. 46.
Adsolve, to resolve.
Durst my sonne
Adsolve to runne beyond sea to the warres?
Chapman, All Fooles, ii. 1.
Adulator, flatterer.
An adulator pleases and prepossesses them
with his dawbing.— T. Brown, Works, iv. 305.
At the beginning of the Exhibition the
public papers swarmed with these Be\f~adu>-
fators.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 131, note.
Your field of preferment was the Versailles
(Eil de Bceuf, and a Grand Monarque walk-
ing encircled with scarlet women and adu-
lators there. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 75.
Adulatress, female flatterer.
Indiana, when the first novelty of tite-a-
tHes was over, wished again for the constant
adulatress of her charms and endowments. —
Mad. D9Arblay, Camilla, Bk. X. ch. xiv.
Adultage, maturity; or have two
words been run by the printer into one ?
Was not this suit come to adultage for
tryal after seventeen years vexation in it
first and last ? — Hacket, Life of Williams,
i. 75.
Adulterise, to commit adultery.
Where did God ever will thee to lie, to
swear, to oppress, to adulterise? — Adams,
ii. 365.
Adumber, to shadow or cloud.
Serene thy woe-adumbr&d front, sweet Saint,
Davies, Holy Rood, p. 26.
Adumbrative, shadowing forth.
We claim to stand there as mute monu-
ments, pathetically adumbrative of much. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. x.
Advantage, the thirteenth in the
baker's dozen. The parenthesis in the
quotation from Hacket is rather ob-
scure, but I suppose it to mean that the
accusations, though so many, were
short measure, on account of their
frivolous character.
If the Scripture be for reformation, and
Antiquity to boot, it is but an advantage to
the dozen, it is no winning cast. — Milton, Of
Reformation in England, bk. i.
These preferM articles to his Majesty, and
the Lords of the Council, against their Dean
for misgovernment, three dozen of articles
(yet none to the vantage), that their num-
ber might supply the nothingness of their
weight.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 91.
When his Holinesse created twelve Car-
dinals at the request of the King of France,
he denied to maxe one at the desire of this
King of England. Surely it was not [but ?]
reasonable in proportion that his Holinesse
giving the whole dozen to the King of France
might allow the advantage to the King of
England.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. ix. 27.
Advantage self, to take advantage.
It is observed of wolves, that when they
go to the fold for prey, they will be sure to
advantage themselves of the wind. — Adams,
H. 121.
Adventurement, hazard.
Wiser Baymundus, in his closet pent,
Laughs at such danger and adventurement.
Hall, Satires, IV. iii. 34.
Ad view, to see ; observe.
All which when Artegall, who all this while
Stood in the preasse close covered, well
advfwed,
And saw that boaster's pride and graceless
guile,
He could no longer beare, but forth issewed.
Spenser, F. Queen, V. iii. 20.
Advisive, monitory. The title of
one of Herrick's poems in his Hes-
perides (p. 249) is " A p araeneticall or
advisive Verse to his friend, Mr. John
Wicks.' '
ADVOCATE
( 7 )
AFFECTUAL
Advocate, to invoke.
("The mercy of God] is not to be advocated
upon every vain trifle. — Andrewes, Sermons,
▼.534.
Advocation, an advowson.
Our . . . Counties, Honours, Castles,
Manours, Fees or Inheritances, Advocations,
Possessions, Annuities, and Seignories what-
soever, descended unto us . . . — Parliament
Boll, I. Ben. 4 (Holland's Camden, p. 757).
We see some parents, that have the dona-
tions or advocations of Church livings in their
hands, must needs have some of their chil-
dren . . . thrust into the ministry. — Sander-
son, iii. 125.
Advoke, to summon.
By this time Queen Katharine had pri-
vately prevailed with the Pope to advoke the
cause to Rome.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. i. 48.
Advouzance, advowson. In iii. 17
of the same work Fuller spells it ad-
wwsance.
He obtained licence from the King that
the University might purchase Advouzances
of spiritual livings. — Fuller, Hist, of Camb.,
ii. 38.
Advowson, to obtain or present to a
benefice.
There moughtest thou, for but a slender
price,
Advowson thee with some fat benefice.
Hall, Satires, II. v. 10.
iEGROTAT, a Cambridge phrase (see
quotation) ; an ceger is the correspond-
ing Oxford term.
I sent my servant to the apothecary for a
thing called an agrotat, which I understood
. . . meant a certificate that I was indis-
posed.— Babbage, Passages from the Life of a
Philosopher, 37 (1864).
Aereou8, airy ; unsubstantial ; frivo-
lous.
In cases doubtful! it is dangerous
Tadmitte light Councells ; for for want of
weight
Twil make the case to be more ponderous
The whilst such Councells prove Aereous.
Davits, Microcosmos, p. 50.
Aeriality, airiness; unsubstantiality.
The very excess of the extravagance, in
fact, by suggesting to the reader continually
the mere aeriality of the entire speculation,
furnishes the surest means of disenchanting
him from the horror which might else gather
upon his feelings. — De Quincey, Murder as
one of the Fine Arts, Postscript.
Afpatuated, infatuated.
They who from the first beginning, or but
now of late, by what unhappiness I know
not, are so much affatuated, not with his
person only, but with his palpable faults, and
dote upon his deformities, may have none to
blame but their own folly, if they live and
die in such a stricken blindness, as next to
that of Sodom bath not happened to any
sort of men more gross or more misleading.
— Milton, Eikonoklastes, Preface.
You'll see a hundred thousand spell-bound
hearts
By art of witchcraft so affatuate,
That for his love they'd dress themselves in
dowlas
And fight with men of steel.
Taylor, Ph. van. AH, Pt. II. v. 2.
Affectatob, affecter. In the original
the word is qfectatores, which, of course,
suggested this form. N. has the parti-
ciple affectate.
Those affectators of variety seem equally
ridiculous who, when they have spoken
barbarously once, repeat the same thing
much more barbarously. — Bailey's Erasm.
Colloq., p. 79.
Affection, motion or utterance.
The Apostles indeed spake from the Spirit,
and every affection of theirs was an oracle ;
but that, I take it, was their peculiar privi-
lege.— Andrewes, Sermons, v. 57.
Affection, to feel affection for.
This verb is not quite peculiar to the
Welsh-English of the Rev. Hugh Evans
(Merry Wives of Windsor, L i.). The
participle affectioned (Rom. xh. 10) is
not very uncommon.
However we may affection our own, we
have showed no regard for their liberty. —
Walpole to Mann, i. 141 (1742).
Affectionate, angry; impetuous: in
the extract from Brooks it means
affected.
He doth in that place affectionately and
unjustly reprove both the Bishop of Rome
and Alexandria. — Whitaift, ii. 185.
What bitterness and cursing was there
betwixt Epiphanius and Chrysostom! what
affectionate dealing of Theophilus against
the same Chrysostom ! what jarring betwixt
Hierome and Augustine ! — Ibid. ii. 436.
In every action resolve to be discreet and
wise, rather than affectionate and singular. —
Brooks, i. 226.
Affectionless, impassive ; unswayed
by passion.
Vpon the Law thy judgements al waves ground
And not on Man ; for that's affection-les ;
But man in passions strangely doth abound.
Sylvester, Quadrains of Pibrac, st. 85.
Affectual, belonging to desire, as
distinguished from act.
Lust not only affectual, but actual is dis-
pensed with. — Adams, i. 205.
AFFIDAT10N
( 8 ) AFTERNOON MEN
Affidation, assurance ; affidavit
The Empresse swore and made affidation to
the Legat. . . The same oath and affiliation
tooke likewise her brother Robert Earl of
Glooester. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 02.
Afflict, conflict.
The life of man upon earth is nothing else
than a warfare and continual affiiet with his
ghostly enemies. — Becon, ii. 542.
Affrighten, to terrify.
Fit tales
For garrulous beldames to affrighten babes.
Southey, Botany Bay Eclogues, iv.
Africanisms. African provincial-
isms, such as mark the Latinity of some
of the Fathers.
He that cannot understand the sober,
plain, and unaffected style of the Scriptures,
will be ten times more puzzled with the
knotty Africanisms* the pampered meta-
phors, the intricate and involved sentences
of the fathers, besides the fantastic and de-
clamatory flashes, the cross-jingling periods
which cannot but disturb and come athwart
a settled devotion, worse than the din of
bells and rattles. — Milton, Of Reformation in
England, bk. i.
After-bale, subsequent sorrow.
Let not women trust to men ;
They can flatter now and then,
And tell them many wanton tales,
Which do breed their after-bales,
Greene, Philomela.
After- birth, used metaphorically.
He finds a new charge, or rather no new
one, but the after-birth of the second cause,
heard and censur'd before about tampering.
Backet, Life of Williams, ii. 133.
After-day, a future day (the plural
is in L. and N., but in a somewhat
different sense).
But something whispers in my dying ear,
There is an after-day ; which day I fear.
Quarles, Emblems, ii. 13.
After-dinner is used adjectivally,
but less frequently as a substantive, as
in the second extract.
In after-dinner talk
Across the walnuts and the wine.
Tennyson, Miller's Daughter.
The barons swore with many words
Twas but an after-dinner's nap.
Ibid. The Day-dream.
After-friends, future friends.
Or rather giue me (if thy grace so please)
The Ciuik Garland of green oaken boughes,
Thrice -three times wreathed about my
glorious browes,
To euer-witnes to our after-friends,
How I haue rescew'd my con-citizens.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 44.
After- hands, future labourers.
Tho' she perhaps might reap the applause of
great,
Who learns the one Pou Sto whence after-
hands
May move the world.
Tennyson, Princess, iii.
Afterhood, in subjection (?).
Remember that love is a passion, and that
a worthy man's reason must ever have them
afterhood. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 66.
Afterings, the last milk of a cow.
See quotation, s. v. strip, and Jamieson,
8. v. Bp. Hall, quoted by L., speaks of
the afterings of our Lord's sufferings.
It were only yesterday as she aimed her
leg right at t' pail wi' t' afterings in ; she
knowed it were afterings as well as any
Christian. — Mrs. Gaskeil, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. zv.
After- meal, a late meal (aft-meal is
inN).
Why should not thy soul have her due
drinks, breakfasts, meals, under-meals, bevers,
and after-tneals as well as thy body ? — Ward,
Sermons, p. 28.
Aftermen. See quotation.
If thou comest hither .... yoked with a
crafty or a wilful foreman that is made be-
forehand, and a mess of tame aftermen
withal, that dare not think of being wiser
than their leader, or unwilling to stickle
against a major part, whether they go right
or wrong, or resolved already upon the ver-
dict, no matter what the evidence be, consider
what is the weight and religion of an oath. —
Sanderson, ii. 268.
After-morn, the morrow.
On that last night before we went
From out the doors where I was bred,
I dream'd a vision of the dead,
Which left my after-morn content.
Tennyson, In Memoriam, cii.
Afternoon men, men who prolonged
their dinner and drinking far into the
afternoon. In the second extract Bp.
Earle seems to imply that theatres
formed the sole afternoon business of
law-students.
Beroaldus will have drunkards, afternoone
men, and such as more then ordinarily de-
light in drink, to be mad. — Burton, Democ. to
Reader, p. 44 (see also p. 74).
Your Innes of Court men were vndone
but for him, hee is their chiefe guest and
imployment, and the sole businesse that
makes them afternoones men. — Earle, Micro-
cosmograi)hie (A Player).
AFTER-SPRING
( 9 )
AGRONOMIAL
After-spring, fresh 'strength. The
word is in L. in a different sense.
To recreate him, and to put an after-spring
into his decaying spirits, .... the Lord
Chancellor was created Viscount Brackley. —
Hacked Life of Williams, ii. 30.
Agathokakological, with a mingling
of good and evil.
Upon the agathokakological globe there
are opposite qualities always to be found in
parallel degree3.Southeyy The Doctor , ch. liii.
Agemate, one of the same age; a
contemporary.
My father Anchises heere with do I cal to
remembraunce,
Whilst I beheld Priamus thus gasping, my
sire his agemate. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 584.
Aoenid, adopted "from A.S. agen,
own, proper ; aqnian for agenian, to
own, to appropriate " (^. and Q., 5th
S., x. 409). The meaning is that
the Duke of Buckingham (to whom
the passage refers) was, as it were,
adopted by James I.
The royall Majesty, which first took bim
into favour, agenid and trained up for his
own turn by certain degrees in the most
pertinent affairs and mysteries of state. —
Howell^ Dodona's Grove, p. 122.
Agentess, female agent.
I shall to-morrow deliver to your agentess,
Mrs. Moreland, something to send you. —
Walpole, Letters, ii. 31 (1757).
Aggest, to heap together.
I have ever dissented from their opinion
who maintain that the world was created a
levell champian, mountains being only the
product of Noah's flood, where the violence
of the waters aggested the earth, goared out
of the hollow valleys.—- Fuller, Ch. Hist., bk.
ix., Dedic.
Aggravative, aggravation.
It is to be noted that as we rose up to
Oates's plot by a climax of aggravatives, so
we must descend to the Bye-House by a
scale of lenitives and emollients.— North,
Examen, p. 319.
Aghasted, struck with terror.
My limbs do quake, my thought aghasted
UL—Sackvillc, Duke of Buckingham, st. 65.
Agitant, agent ; one who makes him-
self busy about a matter.
The chief agitant saw that this tryal upon
so firm a courage was uneffectual and ridicu-
lous.— Hacket, JJfe of Williams, ii. 90 (see
also p. 208).
Now am I ready for any plot ; I'll go find
some of these agitants. — The Committee,
Hi. 1.
Agket, an innocent person ; a di-
minutive formed from Lat. agnus =
lambkin. Cf. eaglet^ lancet, &c. So
Agneta is a Christian name ; in Italian
Agnete.
Sad melancholly will bring us to folly,
And this is death's principall magnet ;
But this course I will take — it never shall
make
Me look otherwise than an agnet.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 71.
Agonyclitee. The AgonyclytaB were
a sect in the seventh century who always
prayed standing, as thinking it un-
lawful to bow the knee (a y6w kXivuv).
To Qod he will not bow his knee,
Like an old Agonyclitee.
Ward, England's Reformation,
p. 361.
AgbAff, clasp (Fr. agrafe).
A gorgeou* hall
Lighted up for festival ;
Braided tresses, and cheeks of bloom,
Diamond agraff, and foam-white plume.
L. E. London, Poems, i. 2.
Agreeability, agreeableness. L.
and R. have one and the same example
from Chaucer, where it signifies easi-
ness of disposition. L. marks it as
rare. Mad. D'Arblay thought she had
invented the word, which she uses
several times in her diary ; she also has
diaagreeabUity, q. v.
She was all good humour, spirits, sense,
and agreeability. Surely I may make words
when at a loss, if Dr. Johnson does. — Mad.
D*Jrblay, Diary, i. 42.
Every winter there is a gay and pleasant
English colony in that capital, of course more
or less remarkable for rank, fashion, and
agreeafnlity with every varying year. —
Thackeray, The Neiecomes, ch. xxxb.
Agreements (a Gallicism) =* Fr.
agreements.
This figure, says he, wants a certain gay
air ; it has none of those charms and agree-
ments.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 52.
Agrin, on the grin.
That large-moulded man,
His visage all agrin as at a wake,
Made at me thro' the press.
Tennyson, Princess, v.
Agronomial, belonging to the man-
agement of farms. L. has agrono-
mical.
Rapid as was Leonard's survey, his rural
eye detected the signs of a master in the art
agronomial. — Lytton, My Novel, Bk. V. ch. ii.
AID-SOU LDIER
( io )
ALCOHOL
Aid-souldier, an auxiliary soldier.
Paullinus . . . commanded the most choke
of the aid-souldier*. — Holland's Camden, p.
54.
Aigret, an ornament for the head.
Oh many an aigrette and solitaire have I
sold to discharge a lady's play-debt. — Foote,
The Minor, Act II.
Stomachers and Paris nets,
Ear-rings, necklaces, aiqrets.
Anstey, New Bath Guide, letter 3.
When at court or some dowager's rout,
Her diamond aiarette meets our view,
She looks like a glow-worm dressed out,
Or tulips bespangled with dew.
H. $ J. Smith, Rejected Addresses, -p. 104.
Aimworthiness, good aim.
These worthy fellows waited not to take
good aim with their cannon, seeing the
others about to shoot, but fettled it anyhow
on the slope, pointing it in a general direc-
tion, and, trusting in God for aimworthiness,
laid the rope to the breech and fired. —
Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. liv.
Air, to set to music.
For not a drop that flows from Helicon
But ayred by thee grows streight into a song.
J. Cobb, Commendatory verses prefixed to
Ayres and Dialogues by H. Lawes (1653).
Air, to take an airing.
A message from Mrs. Schwellenberg this
morning, to ask me to air with her, re-
ceived my most reluctant acquiescence. —
Mad. D'ArMay, Diary, v. 4.
Airqonation, aerostation. Walpole,
writing in 1784, coins this word, and
airgonaut for aeronaut, those more
usual terms perhaps not being then
formed, though in 1786 Peter Pindar
uses aeronaut (p. 151, note). L. gives
Burke as an authority for aeronaut, but
as there is no reference, this does not
fix the date. See quotation, s. v. Air-
gonaut.
Airgonaut, aeronaut. See Airqon-
ation.
You know how little I have attended to
those airgonauts; only t'other night I diverted
myself with a sort of meditation on future
airgonation. — Walpole, Letters, iv. 375 (1784).
Airwards, up in the air.
Eagles such as Braudon do not sail down
from the clouds in order to pounce upon
small flies, and soar airtcards again, con-
tented with such ignoble booty. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. iv.
Aislet, little ait or island.
He enjoyed a party of pleasure in a pood
boat on the water to one of the aits or atslets
in the Thames. — Miss Edgevorth, Patronage,
ch.
Alabastrine, of alabaster.
Another-while vnder the Crystal! brinks,
Her alabastrine well-shap't limbs she shrinks,
Like to a Lilly sunk into a glasse.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 1081.
Alamodalitt, f ashionableness.
Doubtless it hath been selected for me
because of its alamodality — a good and preg-
nant word, on the fitness of which some Ger-
man, whose name appears to be erroneously
as well as uncouthly written Qeamoenus, is
said to have composed a dissertation. Be
frieased, Mr. Todd, to insert it in the inter-
eaved copy of your Dictionary. — Southey,
The Doctor, Interchapter
Alarum, a clock which will make a
considerable noise to awake people at
any hour at which it may have been
set. The word is frequent in Shake-
speare and other dramatists to signify
a flourish or alarm of trumpets.
She had an alarum to call her up early. —
C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. ori.
Albacorb, dolphin (Portuguese).
In the sea the fish which is called the
Albacore, as big as a salmon, folio we th them
[flying fish] with great swiftness to take
them. — T. Stevens, 1579 (Eng. Garner, i.
134).
The albacore that followeth night and day
The flying fish, and takes them for his prey.
Dennys, Secrets of Angling (Ibid. i. 166).
Albbrge, house or lodging. Ital.
albergo, Fr. auberge, Sp. alhergue^ Eng.
harbour.
We omit to speake of the great mens
Serraglios . . . the Alberges of Janizaries, the
several Seminaries of Spachies. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 33.
They [the Hospitallers] were conveyed to
their severall Alberges in Europe. — Fuller,
Holy War, Bk. V. ch. v.
At this day the knights of Malta, who
have but foure Alberqies or Seminaries in all
Christendome, have three of them in France.
— Ibid., Bk. V. ch.
Alchymk, to pour over, or fuse.
True gold is alehymed over with a false
sophistication. — Adams, ii. 63.
Alcohol. See extract. The word is
Arabic, and is applied to the black
sulphid of antimony, which is used as
a collyrium. Cf. Ezekiel xxiii. 40 in
Heb. and LXX. The idea of fineness
and tenuity probably caused the word
to be applied also to the rectified
spirit.
ALDERMAN
(
II
)
ALL FOURS
They pat betweene the eye-lids and the
eye ft certaine blacke powder with a flue
long penril, made of a minerall brought from
the kingdome of Fes, and called Alcohols. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 67.
Alderman, a Presbyterian elder.
Jamieson says that the word was
formerly used to denote a mayor in
Scotch boroughs.
A kinp ia not obnoxious to be interdicted
or deprived of the Sacraments by their
aldermen, who can show no more for the
proof of such officers, with whom they
organize a Church, than the Pope can for
his unlimited jurisdiction. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 32.
Alb-haunter, a frequenter of ale-
feasts or ale-houses.
Nor do they speak any better of the
Inf eriour Clergy ... of whom they tell us . . .
That they are Popish Priests, or Monks, or
Friars, or Ale-haunters. — Hey tin's Hist, of the
Presbyterians, p. 281.
Ale-keeper, keeper of an ale-house.
One William Quick, an ale-keeper within
the county of Devon, was suppressed by the
Justices of Assize. — House of Lords, MSS.
temp. James I. (Arch.,xti. 233).
Alembic, to extract or distil.
I have occasioned great speculation, and
diverted myself with the important mysteries
that have been alembicked out of a trifle. —
Walpole, Letters, i. 208 (1749).
Aliment, to nourish.
Whilst they give the common people to
understand that they are busied about no-
thing but contemplation and devotion in fast-
ings, and maceration of their sensuality — and
that only to sustain and aliment the small
frailty of their humanity — it is so far other-
wise that, on the contrary, God knows what
cheer they make. — Vrquharfs Rabelais, Bk.
IL ch. rxari.
Alimentiveness, feeling which in-
clines to taking nourishment.
We then assigned to man an organ of
alimentiveness, and this organ is the scourge
with which the Deity compels man, will-I
nill-I, into eating. — E. A. Poe, Imp of the
Perverse.
All- alive, very sharp or wakeful.
Never was there in woman such a sagacious,
such an all-alive apprehension as in this. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii. 133.
All along, fallen at full length.
He that foots it best may be sometimes
found all along. — Brooks, vi. 441.
I found a woman of a matchless form
Stretch'd all along upon the marble floor.
Tuke, Adventures of Five Hours, Act II.
Feigning to slip, she fell all along, crying
out, as in the utmost agony, that she had
wrenched her ancle. — Johnston, Chrysal, ch.
zxv.
All and all, on the whole : usually
written " all in all," and is so written in
ch. xli. of the book quoted.
Take it all and all, I never spent so happy
a summer. — Miss Austen, Mansfield Park,
ch. zxii.
All Ball, the universe.
They'll tell thee how, when first the Lord
had spred
Men on the earth, and justly levelled
His strait long measure th' All - Ball to
divide,
He did for thee a plentious land provide.
Sylvester, The Lane, 1382.
All-fired, excessively ; out and out.
" I knows I be so all-fired jealous I can't
abear to hear o' her talkin', let alone writin',
to—" " Out with it. To me, you were going
to say." — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
ch. xl.
Allforches. The Span, al/orja = a
wallet ; hence applied in extract to the
stomach.
They humbly came their Majesties to greet,
Begging their Majesties to come and treat
On every sort of fruit their grand all-
forches ;
The couple smiled assent, and asked no
3uestions,
ved to gratifytheir great digestions.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 97.
All fours. A perfectly fitting com-
parison is said to go or run on all fours.
All four as in ono or two of the sub-
joined extracts is less common. That
from Adams gives the saying in a
slightly different form. Ld. Coke (Lit-
tleton, I. i. 1) refers to the ancient say-
ing, " Nullum simile quatuor pedibus
earrit."
All similitudes run not, like coaches, on
four wheels. — Adams, i. 498.
You'll hardly find
Woman or beast that trots sound of all four ;
There will be some defect.
Manmion, Antiquary, Act. I.
I do not say this comparison runs on all
four; there may be some disparity. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 387.
No prophecy can be expected to go upon
all fours. — Sou they, The Doctor, ch. xciv.
All- fours, a game at cards, popular
among the vulgar. See extract from
T. Brown, s. v. insensible. Hence in
The Rovers (Act II.) Canning, design-
ing to ridicule a scene in a German
ALL-HOLLANTIDE ( 12 )
ALMER
play in which the characters were dis-
covered playing chess, introduces his
an playing all-fours. See the passage
quoted, s. v. noddy, where some other
terms connected with the game will be
found.
Sq. Richard. She and I, mayhap, will have
a bawt at all-fours without you.
Sir Fr. Noa, noa, Dick, that won't do
neither; you mun learn to make one at
ombre here, child. — Cibber, Prov. Husband,
Act II.
The doctor's friend was in the positive
degree of hoarseness, puffiness, red-facedness,
all-fours, tobacco, dirt, and brandy ; the doc-
tor in the comparative, hoarser, puffier, more
red-faced, more all-foureu, tobaccoer, dirtier,
and brandier. — Dickens, Little Dorrit, ch. vi.
All-hollantide, All Hallows-tide, or
All Saints-tide. See H.
He'll give her a black eye within these three
days,
Beat half her teeth out by All-hallontide,
And break the little household stuff they
have.
Jonson, Fletcher, and Middleton,
Tlie Widow, Act V.
Lincoln is kept in close imprisonment from
All-hollantide till the end of Christmas. —
Hack*, Life of Williams, ii. 131.
Allieman, relation by marriage.
There was not a gentleman in the two
counties of Carnarvon and Anglesey, of three
hundred pounds a yeer, but was his kinsman
or allieman in the fourth degree. — Fuller,
Ch. Hi*., XI. iv. 9.
Alliohten, to lighten.
Another died, whereby their boat was
somewhat allightned. — Fuller, Worthies, Dor-
setshire, i. 314.
Allmight, almightiness.
Our Christ the sonne of God, chief authour of
all good,
Was He by His allmight that first created
man.
Puttenham, ArtofEng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xix.
Allooiambnt, lodging ; quarters : an
Italian word Anglicized.
The allogiaments of the garrison are uni-
forme. — Evelyn, Diary, March 23, 1644.
Allowance, to put on an allowance.
You have had as much as you can eat,
you're asked if you want any more, and you
answer " no." Then don't you ever go and
say you were al/oioanced, mind that. — Dick-
ens, Old Curiosity Shop, ch. xxxvi.
All - scient, all-knowing : a hybrid
substitute for omniscient.
If there be God immortall, All-scient,
AU-urighty, just, benign, benevolent ;
Where were his wisdom, goodnesse, justice,
power,
If Vice Hee damne not, nor give Vertue
dower. — Sylvester \ Little Bartas, 751.
All to one, altogether.
It will be all to one a better match for
your sister: two thousand a year without
debt or drawback, except the little love-child
indeed. — Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility,
ch.
Allude, to compare mystically; to
refer.
Some have alluded these three, gold, myrrh,
and frankincense, to the three theological
virtues, faith, hope, and charity. — Adams, ii.
10.
Here will arise a quarrel for the Papists,
who, when they hear of this mount, they
presently allude it to their Church. — Sibbes,
ii. 444.
Our Bishop was wont to say that Queen
Elizabeth's Parliaments were most tractable
which sate but a short time, ended before
they were acquainted with one another's in-
terests, and had not learned to combine,
which makes me allude it to Theophrastus'
date tree. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 84.
All up, total failure or destruction.
"All is up and undone ! " cries Murphy. —
Fielding, Amelia, Bk. XII. ch. vi.
A-double 1, all, everything; a cobbler's
weapon ; u-p, up, adjective, not down ;
S-q-u-double e-r-s, Saueers, noun substantive,
a educator of youth. Total, all up with
Squeers. — Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. Ix.
Almain comb. See quotation. The
translator's note says that no reflection
on German cleanliness is intended ; but
they wore their own hair, which they
would sweep out of their eyes with
their hand ; while the French, wearing
periwigs, were " seldom seen without a
comb in their hand." Grose gives
Welch combt with the same meaning.
Afterwards he combed his hair with an
Alman comb, which is the four fingers and
the thumb. — UrqidiarVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch.
xxi.
Almanog raphes, an almanac-maker.
We acknowledge the delicacy of the
almanog rap her, but at the same time it must
be plain to everybody that this means, Mer-
cury in infernal combination with the sun. —
E. Roe, Land of the North Wind, p. 87 (1875).
Almkr, an almsgiver.
The churle thatneuerchaunc't vpon a thought
Of charitie, nor what belonges thereto,
If Qod His grace haue once his spirit brought
To f eele what goode the faithf nil aimers doe,
The loue of Christ will so his spirit wooe,
ALMIGHTY-MOST ( 13 )
ALTERNACY
That he will leaue barnes, corne, and bagges
of coine,
And land and life, with Jesus' love to joine.
Breton, Longing of a Blessed Hearty p. 10.
Almighty-most, the most all-power-
ful : a redundant expression, as almighty
does not admit of degrees.
Therefore, O People, let as Praise and Pray,
TV Almighty-most (whose mercy lasts for
Ky).— Sylvester, The Captaines, 1287.
Almightyship, omnipotence. It is
curious that in each of the two extracts
in which I have found the word the
reference should be to Jove and Danae.
She taught the amorous Jove
A magical receipt in love,
Which arm'd him stronger, and which help'd
him more
Than all his thunder did, and his almighty-
ship before. — Cowley, Essays {Avarice).
Not Jove himself such transports knew,
When Danae's charms the captive god
did hold,
Tho' he the pleasure to pursue
Mortgag'd his poor almightyship to gold.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 83.
Almondinb, a mineral of a red colour ;
precious garnet.
They would pelt me with starry spangles
and shells,
Laughing and clapping their hands between,
All night, merrily, merrily ;
But I would throw to them back in mine
Turkis and agate and almondine.
Tennyson, The Merman.
Alms-penny, small charitable dona-
tion.
Father, here is an alms-penny for me ; and
if I speed in that I go for, I will give thee
as good a gown of grey as ever thou did'st
wear.— Petit, Old Wives Tale.
It's probable He gave them an alms-penny,
for which reason Judas carried the bag, that
had a common stock in it for the poor. —
Barnard, Life of Heylin, sect. 104.
Alnascharism, day-dreaming : the
reference of course is to the well-known
story of The Barber's Fifth Brother, in
the Arabian Nights.
Already with maternal alnascharism she
had, in her reveries, thrown back her head
with disdain, as she repulsed the family
advances of some wealthy but low-born
heiress. — Miss Edgeworth, Vivian, ch. i.
Aloft is used more than once in
Cecilia for aloof. I did not mark the
first instance, supposing it to be a mis-
print.
Delville stood aloft for some minutes,
expecting Sir Robert Floyer would station
himself behind Cecilia. — Mad. WArblay,
Cecilia, Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Already, present : used adjectivally.
Lord Hobart and Lord Fitzwilliam are
both to be earls to-morrow ; the former of
Buckingham, the latter by his already title. —
Walpole, Letters, i. 160 (1746).
Alsatian, a rogue, or debauchee,
such as haunted Alsatia or Whitefriars.
Alsatians are graphically described in
Scott' 8 Nigel.
He spurr'd to London, and left a thousand
curses behind him. Here he struck up with
sharpers, scourers, and Alsatians. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 491.
Alsatia phrase, slang or cant term,
such as was used by the ruffians of
Whitefriars.
The second instance to shew the author's
wit is not his own, is Peter's banter (as he
calls it in his Alsatia phrase) upon transub-
stantiation. — Swift, Tale of Tub. Apology for
Author.
Alt. To be in alt, a musical term
applied to being in the clouds, or in a
passion, or in an exalted frame of mind.
The fair fugitive was all in alt. — Richard'
son, CI. Harlowe, v. 145.
Sophy. Moderato, moderato, madam ! your
ladyship's absolutely in alt.
Lady S. In alt, madam ?
Sophy. Tes, in alt. Give me leave to tell
your ladyship that you have raised your
voice a third octave higher since you came
into the room. — Colman, Musical Lady,
Act I.
" Gome, prithee be a little less in alt," cried
Lionel, " and answer a man when he speaks
to you."— Mad. UArblay, Camilla, Bk. H.
ch. v.
Altarage. See second extract.
In the time of King Henry the Eighth
there came a great and mighty wiud, that
rent down churches, overthrew altarages. —
Adams, i. 07.
All the altaragia, the dues that belong to
them that serve at God's altar, and which
the laws of God and man bound to the altar,
they have loosened. — Ibid. i. 128.
Altel, altar.
If ... he come to church, take holy
water, hear mass devoutly, and take altel
holy bread, he is sure enough, say the
Papists. — Bradford, ii. 314.
Alternaoy, alternation.
Lorenzo's [sonnets] are frequently more
clear, less alemlnques, and not inharmonious,
as Petrarch's often are, from being too crowd-
ed with words, for which room is made by
numerous elisions, which prevent the soften-
ALTERNIZE
( 14 )
AMBITION/ST
ing alternacy of vowels and consonants. —
Walpole, Letters, iv. 549 (1705).
Alternize, to alternate.
I only saw him once, but that was in a
tete-a-tete, altemized with a trio by my
son that lasted a whole afternoon. — Mad.
UArUay, Diary, vii. 355.
Alteza, height. See quotation, s. v.
Excelsitude. Nashe seems to use the
word as though it were naturalized.
Althoff, although. Fielding re-
peatedly makes his uneducated charac-
ters use thqf or althof.
He affected somewhat of the rustic phrase
of his own country, which was Gloucester-
shire; as, to instance in a word, althoff
instead of although, as we pronounce. —
North Examen, p. 510.
Altify, to heighten. Fuller in his
Worthies (i. 234), remarking on the
Cumberland proverb —
M Skiddaw, Lanvellin, and Casticand
Are the highest hills in all England,"
says " every county is given to magnify
(not to say altify) their own things
therein."
Altitudes, passion ; excitement.
Clar. Who makes thee cry out thus, poor
Brass?
Brass. Why, your husband, Madam ; he's
in his altitudes here.
Vanbrugh, Confederacy, Act V.
If we would see him in his altitudes, we
must go back to the House of Commons
. . . there he cuts and slashes at another
rate. — North, Examen, p. 258.
"The girl is got into her altitudes, Aunt
Hervey," said my sister. " You see, Madam,
she spares nobody." — Richardson, CI, Har~
lowe, l. 350.
Sophia. Sir, I have tried while I could to
treat you with some degree of respect ; you
put it out of my power; resentment and
contempt are the only
Contrast. Clarissa Harlow in her altitudes/
What circulating library has supplied you
with language and action upon this occasion ?
— Burgoyne, Lord of the Manor, Act II. sc. i.
Alveary, a hive. L. has the word,
but no illustration of the literal sense.
Ther's not the least foulnes seen in our
alvearies or hives, for we abhor all immun-
dicities and sordidnes. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 137.
Aly, having to do with ale : as
applied to a nose — red.
Acoystrell
Whose crusty chaps, whose aly nose,
Whose lothsom stinking breath
Whose toothles gumma, whote bristled
beard,
Whose visage all like death,
Would kill an honest wench to view.
Breton, Toyes of an Idle Head, p. 55.
Amafrose, amaurosis, a weakness in
the optic nerve causing loss or dimness
of sight.
She is back't
By th' Amafrose and cloudy Cataract,
That (gathering up gross humors inwardly
In th' optique smew) quiteputs out the eye.
Sylvester, The Furies, 377.
Amateurish, unprofessional ; in the
style of an amateur. See extract, s. v.
Dilettantish.
I found him standing in a stable .
superintending the somewhat amateurish
operations of the man who had undertaken
to supply the ostler's place. — Black, Adven-
tures of a Phaeton, ch. v.
Amaze, to be amazed.
Amaze not, man of God, if in the spirit
Thou'rt brought from Jewry unto Nineveh.
Greene, Looking Gla&sfor England, p. 119.
Madam, amaze not : see his majesty
Return'd with glory from the Holy Land.
Peele, Edw. I., i. 1.
Amazeful, astonished.
The Queen, nigh sunk in an amazefull
swoun,
Bespake him thus.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1398.
Amazon ical, belonging to the Ama-
zons.
Tbeare wear Amazonical woommen with
targat. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 475.
Ambassadorial, pertaining to an
ambassador.
I had no occasion to be in such a hurry to
prepare your ambassadorial countenance. —
Walpole to Mann, iii. 341 (1759)
Ambidexterity, versatility.
My father's disappointment was in finding
nothing more from so able a pen but the
bare fact itself, without any of that specu-
lative subtllity or ambidexterity of argument-
ation upon it, which heaven had bestow'd
upon man on purpose to investigate truth,
and fight for her on all sides.— -Sterne, Tr.
Shandy, iii. 23.
Am bit ion ate, to aim at ambition.
These may be glad if they can preserve
the petty Provinces of their Parochial and
Independent Episcopacies which they so
infinitely ambitionated. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 252.
Ambitionist, ambitious man.
[Napoleon] lost head, as they say, and be-
came a selfish ambitionist and quack. —
Carlyle, 3Iisc., iv. 146.
'AMBLTGON
( *5 )
A MO UND
Ambligon, having obtuse angles.
The Buildings Ambligon,
May more receive than Mansions Oxygon,
(Because th' acute and the rect- Angles too
Stride not so wide as obtuse Angles doe).
Sylvester, The Columnea, 198.
Ambbosiatb, ambrosial.
Ev*n thus the Mercury of heaven
Ushers th' ambrosiate banquet of the gods.
Decker, Satiromastix {Hawkins, Eng. D.,
iii. 181).
Ambulate, to walk, or wander.
Now Morpheus . . .
Amused with dreams man's ambulating soul.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 43.
Ambulino Communions. 1 hod thought
that the remark of Lord Cecil at the
Hampton Court Conference referred to
the custom of the clergy walking about
the church, and giving the elements to
the people ; but Heylin (Survey of the
Estate of Guemzey and Jursey (1656),
Bk. VI. ch. v. p. 371), commenting on
the order that had been made in those
islands to receive the Holy Communion
either sitting or standing, observes,
"Our Synodists more moderate than
those of the Netherlands, who have
licenced it to be administered unto men
even when they are walking."
Ld. Cecil. The indecencie of ambuling com'
munions is very offensive, and hath driven
many from the Church. — Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
X. i. 20.
Amen, to end. as amen does a prayer ;
also to say amen to.
Yea verily, this very evening have I amenyd
the volume.— Southey, Letters, 1812, ii. 281.
Who has not heard the ancient words?
and how many of us have uttered them
knowing them to be untrue? and is there
a bishop on the bench that has not amen'd
the humbug in his lawn sleeves, and called
a blessing over the kneeling pair of per-
jurers ? — Thackeray, Nevocouies, en. Ivii.
Americanism, a word or phrase pe-
culiar to the United States, or originat-
ing there. Many so-called American-
isms are good old English. There is an
article on Americanisms in the Fenny
Cyclopaedia.
You know very well that quoting a foreign
language is quite different from using those
stupid Americanisms which are only fit for
negro-concerts. — Black, Adventures of a Phae-
ton, ch. vii.
Amissness, error.
God forgive us our amissnesses I — British
Bellman, 1648 (Hurl. Misc., vii. 626).
Ammunition-bread, bread belonging
to soldiers* rations.
That great Achilles might employ
The strength designed to ruin Troy,
He dined on lion's marrow, spread
On toasts of ammunition-bread.
Prior, Alma, iii. 215.
The king . . allows them soldier's pay,
that is, five sols or twopence halfpenny a
day ; or rather, three sols and ammunition
bread. — Smollett, Travels, Letter v.
Amnestia. R. says, "It is used in
the Latin form by Howell to denote
f orgetf ulness ; " and he cites from the
Letters, iii. 6. The extract shows
that the term was also used by him to
signify amnesty. Sanderson has the
Eng. form.
He required that every one should return
to his former obedience, offring an amnestia
for what had pass'd. — Hotoell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 127.
Amorette. This word is variously
employed. In Chaucer's Romaunt of
the Rose, 892, it seems to mean a love-
knot (so Jamieson and L.); in Ibid.
4765 Tyrwhitt and L. explain it, "an
amorous woman." H. thinks that in
both passages it = a love affair, a little
amour, a sense which it certainly bears
in Walsh's Letters, as quoted by Latham.
N. cites a passage from Hey wood! s
Love's Mistress where it signifies "a
love sonnet/' In Puttenham's Arte of
Poeste} Bk. II. ch. xii., it appears to
denote " an amorous woman. ' In the
subjoined it = amorous looks.
How martial is the figure of his face,
Tet lovely, and beset with amorets.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 168.
Should Paris enter in the courts of Greece,
And not lie fettered in fair Helen's looks ?
Or Phoebus scape those piercing amorets,
That Daphne glanced at his deity.
Ibid. p. 173.
Amoring, love-making.
Whilst he, not dreaming of thy folly,
Lies gaping like a great Lob-lolly,
On Canan Latmus loudly snoaring,
Insensible of thy amoring.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 213.
Amound, to amount (?).
The countrey where they live Psychania
hight,
Great Psychany, that hath so mighty bounds,
If bounds it have at all. So infinite
It is of bignesse, that it me confounds
To think to what a vastnesse it amounds.
H. More, Life of the Soul, ii. 24.
AMOVEMENT
( 16 )
ANCHOkfTTSH
Ahovemext, removal.
In like sort his brother Geffrey, a Knight
Templar, is put out of the Oouncell, both of
them much maligned by the Nobilitie, who
had often before laboured their amouemeat.
— Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 134.
Amphibion, an amphibious animal.
L. has it as an adj.
Edward, the third of that name, ended his
life, having reigned a jubilee full fifty years.
A Prince no less successful than valiant ; like
an Amphibion, he was equally active on water
and laud.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., IV. L 12.
Man may be call'd the great Amphybium
of nature. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 189.
Amphitheatral, amphitheatrical.
Then furious windes to skies huge stones
eject;
Which, like a co passe turnd about, erect
A Bound amphitheatral.
Sandys, Travels, p. 278.
Amuletto, a charm, as against the
plague ; or perhaps in the extract it
means a disinfectant. The word had
assumed its English dress before this.
Amulet occurs in Browne's Vulgar
Errors.
Would you thrust a child into a pest-house
without necessity, and without an amuletto ?
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 166.
Amusable, capable of being amused.
She had experienced somewhat of Madame
de Main tenon '8 difficulty (and with fewer
resources to meet it), of trying to amuse a
man who was not amusable. — Mrs. Gaskdl,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. v.
Amuse, amaze.
To sit o'erwhelm'd with thought, with dark
amuse,
And the sad sullenness of griev'd dislike.
Machin, Dumb Knight, IV. i.
Amuser, a deceiver; especially by
procrastination, or raising side issues.
The verb is still so used.
The French are the greatest amusers in the
world. If propositions are made which they
resolve not to accept, they will not directly
say so, but suspend and go upon other matter
which they intend shall have advantage by
the hopes of the former. — North, Examen,
p. 137.
Amuzatoby, a diversion or dis-
traction.
But now (as an amuzatorv to make the ill
governed people thinke they are not for-
gotten) the new chiefe Justiciar . . . procures
that 4 knights in every shire should inquire
of the oppressions of the poore. — Daniel,
Hist, of England, p. 149.
Amygdaloid, toad-stone.
Chattering stony names
Of shale and hornblende, ray, and trap, and
tuff,
Amygdaloid and trachyte.
Tennyson, Princess, iii.
Anaglyph, a symbolic writing known
only to the Egyptian priests : the hiero-
glyphs were understood by well-edu-
cated laymen.
The language of the world ... is an
anaglyph — a spoken anaglyph, my dear. If
all the hieroglyphs of the Egyptians had
been A B 0 to you, still, if you did not know
the anaglyph, you would know nothing of the
true mysteries of the priests. — Lytton, Cox-
tons, Bk. VII. ch. vii.
Anagnost (Gr. ), reader.
King Francis . . . caused my books (mine,
I say, because several false and infamous
have been wickedly laid to me) to be care-
fully and distinctly read to him by the most
faithful and learned anagnost in this king-
dom.— Urquhart's Rabelais, bk. iv., Bp. Ded.
Analogue, something analogous or
answering to another thing.
The Basques speak a lingo utterly different
from all European languages, which has no
analogue, and must have come from a dif-
ferent stock from our ancestors. — C. Kingsley,
1864 (Life, ii. 168).
Analyse, analysis.
He published a little tractate called the
Holy Table, under the name of a Lincolnshire
minister. The analyse of it may be spared,
since it is in many hands. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, ii. 104.
It is also used by Henry More, Mys-
tery of Iniquity y p. 276 (HalVs Modern
English, p. 175).
Anathemate, to curse; anathematize.
A countrey it seemeth anathemated for the
death of Christ. — Sandys, Travels, p. 145.
AnautjESTHESIe. More, in The Inter-
pretation Generall affixed to his writings,
defines this, " without self-sensedness
or relishing one's self."
Strong sympathy
Of the divided natures magiok band
Was burnt to dust in anautasthesie.
H. More, Life of the Soul, iii. 68.
Anaut^jsthet. More defines this,
" One that feels not himself, or at least
relisheth not himself."
Here Simon just became spotlesse anau-
t&sthet. — H. More, Life of the Soul, iii. 67.
Anchoritish, hermit-like.
Him and his noiseless parsonage, the pen-
sive abode for sixty years of religious reverie
ANCHORLESS
( *7 )
ANIMA TE
and anchoritish self-denial, I have described
further on. — De Quincey, Autob. Sketches,
i. 134.
Anchorless, without an anchor.
My homeless, anchorless, unsupported mind
had again leisure for a brief repose. — Miss
Bronte, Vtllette, ch. vi.
Ancorist, anchoress.
He gave a visit to a womau lately turn'd
an ancorist, and renowned for her holiness. —
Filler, Worthies, Yorkshire (ii. 498).
Andabates, fencers who fought on
horseback, hoodwinked. L. has anda-
batism = ambiguity.
With what eyes do these owls and blind
andabates look upon the Holy Scriptures. —
Becon, i. 331.
Andirons. Pothooks and hangers is
an expression applied to written charac-
ters, but in the quotation the less appro-
priate andirons is employed.
San. He has sent his duty before him in
this letter, sir.
Ant. What have we here, pot-hooks and
andirons ?
San. Pot-hooks ! Oh dear, sir ! I beg your
pardon ; no, sir, this is Arabick.
Vibber, Love Makes a Man, I. i.
Anecdotarian, a retailer of anec-
dotes.
Oar ordinary anecdotarians make use of
libels, but do not declaredly transcribe and
ingraft them into their text. — North, Exa-
*en„p. 644.
Anecdotic, given to anecdote.
He silenced him without mercy when he
attempted to be anecdotic. — Savage, R. Med-
Hcott, Bk. III. ch. vi.
Angelhood, angelic nature or charac-
ter.
Angli, Angeli ! (resumed
From the mediaeval story)
Sach rose angelhoods, emplumed,
In such ringlets of pure glory.
Mrs. Browning, Song for Ragged Schools.
Angerful, angry.
Ever when
Twould make God's Name redoubted among
men,
(In humane phraze) it calls Him pitiful!;
Repentant, jealous, fierce, and angerfull.
Sylvester, The Arke, 205.
Angerless, free from anger.
And shall a Judge seH-anyerUss prefer
To shamefull death the strange adulterer?
Sylvester, Tfie Arke, 222.
Angled, applied by Sylvester to a
badger driven into an angle of his hole.
The word usually means having angles.
Cf. the modern slang " cornered."
The angry beast to his best chamber flies.
And (angled there) Bits grimly inter-gerning.
Sylvester, The Decay, 536.
Anolized. Anglicized is the more
usual form. Cf . Komized, Scotized.
These Norman lords in the next genera-
tion by breathing in English ayre, and wed-
ding with English wives, became so perfectly
Anglized and lovers of liberty, that they
would stand on their guard against the king
on any petty discontentment. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., III. ii. 56.
This Doctour was a Dutchman very much
Anglized in language and behaviour.— Ibid.,
Hist, of Cambridge Univ., viii. 16.
Angor, pain. See Latham.
For man is loaden with ten thousand lan-
guors:
All other creatures onely f eele the angors
Of few diseases.
Sylvester, The Furies, 607.
Anguishes, griefs (uncommon in the
plural).
Ye miserable people, you must go to God
in anguishes, and make your prayer to Him. —
LatimeTi i. 144.
This same outward man is further to be
regarded by us, forasmuch as his infirmities,
frailties, distemperatures, aches, and an-
guishes are so intimately felt by his divine
inmate.— if. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 32.
Anheale, to pant. The extract is
from a translation of a Latin sermon
preached by Latimer before the Con-
vocation, 1536.
All men know that we be here gathered,
and with most fervent desire they anheale,
breathe, and gape for the fruit of our con-
vocation.— Latimer, i. 51.
An high-lone, quite alone. See H.,
s. v. a- high- lone.
But e'er tliis colt, we so did toil on,
Was foal'd, and first fgan stand an high-lone ;
Bless us ! we had such thund'ring weather,
As heav'n and earth would come together.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 16.
A KIM advertise, to inform or call
attention to.
Whole tribes of males and females trotted,
bargd it thither to build and enhabite,
which the saide kioges, whiles they weilded
their swords temporall, animadvertised of,
assigned a ruler or governour over them that
was called the king's provost. — JYashe, Len-
ten Strife (Harl. Misc., vi, 151).
Animate, to become lively; to re-
vive ; usually, to make lively. Cf. the
same writer's use of reanimate, q. v.
c
ANKLE-BELL
( 18 )
ANTENATED
Mr. Arnott, animating at this speech,
glided behind her chair. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Cecilia, Bk. I. ch. vi.
Ankle-bell, a bell attached to the
ankle.
The brutes of mountain back
That carry kings in castles, bow'd black
knees
. Of homage, ringing with their serpent hands,
To make her smile, her golden ankle-Mis.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Ankle-deep, up to the ankles.
And brushing ankle-deep in flowers,
We heard behind the woodbine veil
The milk that bubbled in the pail,
And buzzings of the honied hours.
Tennyson, In Memoriam, lxxxviii.
Anklet, ornament for the ankle.
They strip her ornaments away,
Bracelet and anklet, ring, and chain, and zone.
Southey, Kehama, I. ii.
I would like to go into an Indian Brahmin's
house and see . . . slim waists cased in Cash-
mir shawls, Kincob scarfs, curly slippers,
gilt trousers, precious anklets and bangles. —
Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. xxviii.
Ankle-wing. Mercury was repre-
sented with wings at his ankles (ta-
laria).
Such a precipitate heel,
Fledged as it were with Mercury's ankle-
wing,
"Whirls her to me. — Tennyson, Lucretius.
Annal-book, history.
Bleys
Laid magic by, and sat him down, and wrote
All things and whatsoever Merlin did
In one great annal-book.
Tennyson, Coming of Arthur.
Annihilate, to wear out.
Such as are not annihilated with labour
have no title to be recreated with liberty.—
Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. ii. 33.
Annominate, to name.
How then shall these chapters be annomi-
nated?Southey, The Doctor, ch. viii.
Annular. The Dicta, give this word
= like a ring ; but annular-finger
means the ring-finger.
Then calling for a Bason and a Pin
He pricks his annular finger, and lets fall
Three drops of blood.
Beaumont, Psyche, v. 50.
A noil, to anoint, as in extreme unc-
tion.
Pope Innocentius I., in his Epistle i. chap.
8, saith that not only priests, but laymen in
cases of their own and others' necessities,
may anoile.—Bp. Hall, Works, ix. 89.
Suppose then one that is sick should have
this Pica, and long to be annoiled; why
might not a lay-friend annoil as well as bap-
tize ?—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 218.
Anonymal, anonymous.
Take the original thereof out of an anony-
mal croniclering manuscript. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Lincoln (ii. 9).
Anorexie, want of appetite.
One while the Bonlime, then the Anorexie,
Then the Dog-hunger or the Bradypepsie.
Sylvester, The Furies, 450.
Another. The vulgar tu quoque,
you're another, which is part of the
slang of the streets, is, as might be
expected, not modern.
Roister. If it were an other but thou, it were
a knaue.
M. Mery. Ye are an other your selfe, sir, the
lordd us both saue.
Udal, Roister Doister, iii. 5.
" Tou mistake me, friend," cries Partridge :
" I did not mean to abuse the cloth ; I only
said your conclusion was a non sequitur."
M You are another," cries the sergeant, " an'
you come to that ; no more a sequitur than
yourself." — Fielding, Tom Jones, Book IX.
ch. vi.
Anserine, pertaining to a goose.
When the flesh gives a shiver or creeps,
it is called goose skin ; according to
some a goose is then walking over
one's grave.
Nor the snake that hiss'd, nor the toad that
spat,
Nor glimmering candles of dead men's fat,
Nor even the flap of the Vampire Bat,
No anserine skin would rise thereat,
It's the cold that makes him shiver.
Hood , The Forge.
From the class of modern authors who
use really nothing to write with but steel
and gold, some no doubt will let their pens
descend to posterity under the designation,
of "anserine" — of course intending always
a mere figure of speech. — E. A. Foe, Margi-
nalia, xi.
Answerless. An answerless answer
is one which offers no substantial reply,
while professing to do so. L. has an-
swerlet&lUy with quotation from Bp.
Hall.
Here is an answerless answer, without con-
fessing or denying either proposition. —
Bramhall, ii. 627.
Antenated, born before the time.
Somewhat of the evangelical relish was in
them [the Sybilline prophecies] antenated, and
in being before the Gospels were written. —
Racket, Life of Williams, ii. 48.
ANTHONYS PIGS ( 19 ) ANTI-EPIGRAMMATIST
Anthony's (St.) Pigs. See extract
and H.,s.v. Fuller tells us also that
this name was given to the scholars of
the City of London School. See ex-
tract, $.v. Paul's pigeons.
He will follow him like a St. Anthony's Pig.
St. Anthonie is notoriously known for the
Patron of hogs, having a Pig for his Page in
all pictures. . . . There was a fair Hospital
built to the honour of St. Anthony in Ben-
net's Fink in the City; the Protectors and
Proctors whereof claimed a priviledge to
themselves to garble the live Pigs in the
Markets of the City ; and such as they found
starved, or otherwise unwholesome for man's
sustenance, they would slit in the ear, tie a
bell about their necks, and let them loose
about the City. None durst hurt or take
them up (having this Livery of St. Anthony
upon them) ; but many would give them
bread, and feed them in their passage, whom
they used to follow, whining after them. —
Fuller, Worthies, London (ii. 56).
Anthropomorphose, to change from
the form of a man : at least this is the
sense in the extract, the only place in
which I have met with this verb ; but
anthropomorpkites were those who at-
tributed a human form to one who had
it not, i. t. the Deity.
I humbly desire to see some of those human
cretures that you have anthropomorphosyd,
and transform'd to brute animals. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 3.
Anthroposophist, one who has
studied man ; but in the extract it seems
to be used in contradistinction to theo-
logian, arid to imply one who does not
know much about God.
If folks would but believe that the Apos-
tles talked not such very bad Greek, and had
tome slight notion of the received meaning
of the words they used, and of the absurdity
of using the same term to express nineteen
afferent things, the New Testament would
be found to be a much simpler and more
Krerely philosophic book than 4< Theologians "
('Anthroposophists" I call them) fancy.— C.
Kmg$Uyt Yeast, ch. xv.
Anthroposopht, knowledge of men.
The veriest novice could not have made
his advances upon such an occasion more
awkwardly than our boasted professor of
a*throposophy. — Th. Hook, Man of Many
friends.
Antianarchic, opposed to anarchy.
This then is the fruit your antianarchic
Girondins have got from that levying of
J* in Calvados— Carlyle, Fr. Set., Pt. III.
Bk IV.ch.ii.
Anti-Beckktist, opposer of Becket.
Cf. Becketize.
John of Oxford was . . a great Anti-Becket-
tst.— Fuller, Worthies, Oxford (ii. 229).
Anti-camera, antechamber, or, if the
spelling is to be followed, the chamber
opposite the principal one.
The Great Seal and the keeper of it waited
two hours in the Anti-camera, and was sent
home without the civility of admission.—
Racket, Life of Williams, i. 205.
Anticeremonial, opposed to cere-
monies.
It doth no where appear that our blessed
God is so Anti-ceremoniall a God as some
men have vehemently fancied. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 97.
Antichthones (arri x9uv), people on
the other side of the earth ; at the
Antipodes.
( Those Antichthones which are on the other
side of the globe of the earth, are now [in
darkness] while it is day with us.— Bp. Hall.
Works, v. 478.
Anticlinal, inclining in opposite
directions: applied to a ridge from
which strata dip on either side.
I climbed a vast anticlinal ridge.— C. Kings'
ley, 1849 (Life, i, 174).
Anticronism, confusion in dates.
This confounding so many Bacons in one
bath caused anticronismes.— Fuller, Ch. Hist,
III. vii. 18.
Some justly qnarrell at VirgilPs fiction,
making Dido fall in love with Eneas, who
indeed was dead many years before her cradle
was made; others have sought ingeniously
to solve the anticronisme in history by the
plea that she fell in love with his picture. —
Ibid., Worthies, Cheshire.
Antideity, an opposer or rival of
the Deity.
Know, Diulls incarnate, Antideities,
To make and marre are two repugnant
things. — Davies, Mirum in Modum, p. 28.
Antidominicarian, one who would
abolish the Sunday.
The Sadducees might deny and overthrow
the resurrection, ... or the Antidominicarians
the Lord's Day.— Gauden, Tears of the Church.
p. 283.
Anti-epigrammatist, one who writes
epigrams against or in answer to
another.
He was as good a Poet as any in that
age, and delighted to be an Anti-epigram*
matist to John White, Bishop of Winchester.
^Fulhr, Worthies, Surrey (ii. 389).
C 2
ANTJEPISCOPALIST ( 20 ) ANTIPATHISE
Antiepi800PALI8T, one opposed to
episcopacy. The running heading of
p. 603 of Gauden' s Tears of the Church
is "Of Episcopacy and Anti-episcopa-
litts in Q. Eliz. dayes."
Antievanoelical, opposed to the
gospel.
Those penurious practises and sacrilegious
principles which some men follow are as
much antievangelicall as they are anti-
eptscopall. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
577.
Antifame, contrary report.
It is not worth the making a schism be-
twixt newsmongers to set up an antifame
against [a ridiculous report]. — Fuller, Holy
State, Bk. III. ch. xxiii.
Anti-friarist, one opposed to friars.
He wrote also a smart Book on this Sub-
ject. . . Whether Friars in Health, and
Begging, be in the state of perfection ? The
Antt-Friarists maintaining that such were
Rogues by the Laws of God and Man. —
Fuller, Worthies, Wilts (ii. 450;.
Antifriction, antidote to friction;
smoother.
Oil of flattery, the best patent antifriction
known, subdues all irregularities whatsoever.
-^Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. viii.
Antifuliginous, hostile to smoke.
And thou, O Michael, ever to be praised,
Angelic among Taylors, for thy laws
Antifuliginous; extend those laws
Till every chimney its own smoke consume.
Southey, To A. Cunningham.
Antioallican, opposed to the French.
There was an Antigallican Society (see
extracts, v. Gregorian) established in
1745, to oppose French designs. See
JS. and Q., IV. iii. 482.
Since it is so much the humour of the
English at present to run abroad, I wish
they had antigallican spirit enough to pro-
duce themselves in their own genuine Eng-
lish dress. — Smollett, France and Italy, Letter
vi.
Antioropelo8, something to protect
the legs against moist mud (dvri vyp6c
*n\6c).
The edge of a great fox-cover . . . some
forty red coats and some four black . . . the
surgeon of the Union in mackintosh and
antif/ropelos. — C. Kinysley, Yeast, ch. i.
Her brother had on his antigropelos, the
utmost approach he possessed to a hunting
equipment.— O. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch.
▼ii.
Anti-infant al, hostile to infants.
Gauden (Tear* of the Church, p. 279)
speaks of "that Anti-infarUall Christ
which they [Anabaptists] say is so pre-
dominant in them.
Anti-Ejssar, an opponent of mo-
narchy.
These waspish over-weening idle drones
Are mortal plagues to ev'ry Publike-weall ;
Bight anti-Ktsars vndermyning thrones.
Davies, Jaicrocosmos, p. 72.
Antiliturgicall, opposed to liturgy.
The graver sort even of Antiliturgicall
Preachers and people too . . . confine them-
selves to a more constant method and form
of prayer. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
00.
Antiliturgist, one opposed to the
liturgy.
Our late Anti-liturgists thought set forms
of prayer might do well at sea, though not
at land. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 91.
Antilogy, contradiction.
Alas! how miserably is truth torn by
antilogies and little better than scolding. —
Tears of the Press, 1681 (Harl. Misc., iv.
449).
Antimagistratical, opposed to ma-
gistrates.
All spirits which are autiepiscopall are in
some respects antimagistraticall, and most-
what antimonarchicall.— Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 550.
Antimatrimonialist, one opposed to
marriage.
If she make a private purse, which, we are
told by anti~matrimoniali$t$, all wives love to
do, it goes all into the same family at the
long run. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 144.
Antimilitant, peaceful or peace-
loving.
"What remaiued for an active militant
parson to do was to hold his own against all
comers. Her father, it is true, was an excep-
tion to this ; but then he was so essentially
antimilitant in all things, that she classed
him in her own mind apart from all others.
— Trollope, Barchester Towers, ch. zxi.
Antinational, unpatriotic.
The great power and compass of the
German language, which the vilest of anti-
national servilities obscured to the eyes of
those that occupied thrones, had gradually
revealed themselves to the popular mind of
Germany. — De Quincey, Last Days of Kant.
Antipathic, causing antipathy.
Every one seems to have his antipathic
animal.— C. Kingsley (Life, ii. 41).
Antipathisk, to be contrary or
opposed.
ANTIPERISTEZE ( 21 )
ANYTHING
Thai which antipathises against one thing
sympathiseth with another. — Adams, Works,
m. 157.
Antiperisteze. Cowley (quoted in
H.) defines antiperistasis, "the oppo-
sition of a contrary quality by which
the quality it opposes becomes height-
ened or intended." One would have
expected the verb to be atUiperistasize.
Davies, it will be seen, spells it ante.
Bat if the Sonle through the Almighties
poWr,
(Anteperisteting hir pow'rs with grace)
Breaks through those muddy walla which
hir immure,
And would compel hir fowle affects t'
embrace;
Shee then (sans pride) might looke God in
the face.
Davies, Mirurn in Modum, p. 15.
Axtiphonetic, returning the sound ;
rhyming.
Moore and Tom Campbell themselves admit
41 ffpinach "
U perfectly antiphonetic to " Greenwich."
Ingoldsby Legends (Cynotaph).
Aktipractise, to oppose.
Men that are sound in their morals, and
a minutes imperfect in their intellectuals,
are best reclaimed when they are mignarized
sad strok'd gently. Seldom anything but
severity will make them antirpractise, for
then they grow desperate. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 95.
Antiquitarian, a contemptuous term
for one who would now be called a
medievalist.
I shall distinguish such as I esteem to be
thehinderers of reformation into three sorts:
(1) Antiquitarians (for so I had rather call
them than antiquaries, whose labours are
useful and laudable), (2) libertines, (3)
Politicians. — Milton, Of Reformation in Eng-
land, bk. i.
Axtiruhoub, to raise a counter re-
port
The Queen's party gave out that the King
of France had sent over a vast army for her
assistance, and the King's side antirumoured
(who could raise reports easier than armies)
that the Pope bad excommunicated all such
*ho rides against him. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., III.
▼iii. 14.
Axti-slavite, one opposed to slavery.
The whole controversy between slave-
holders and anti-slavites hinges on the proofs
from God's book.— Dean, Life of Theodore
*w**r, p. 181 (1877).
Antithet, opposite statement or
position.
It is sometimes true, the popular sayiug,
that sunshine comes after storm. Some-
times true, or who could live? hut not
always; not even often. Eoually true is
the popular antithet that misfortunes never
come single. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. xxvi.
Antitypal, of the nature of an anti-
type. The Diets, have antitypical,
antitypous.
How am I to extricate my antitypal charac-
ters, when their living types have not yet
extricated themselves ? — C. Kingsley, Yeast
(Epilogue).
Antivitruvian, contrary to Vitru-
vius, the well-known Roman architect ;
used as an epithet for those who undid
or destroyed architectural monuments.
Some of our late Architects or Antivitru-
vian Builders have endeavoured with their
axes and hammers to break down more good
Church-work in twice seven years than the
best master-builders can hope to repair in
seventy-seven. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 21 (Preface).
Anti-Wicliffjst, opposer of Wick-
liffe.
John of Milverton .... was a great Anti-
Wiccliffi»t.— Fuller, Worthies, Bristol (ii.
297).
Antling, a young ant.
Within the formicaries antlings were found,
too callow to push out-doors, but not far
removed from their maturity, who were of a
pale yellow colour. — McCook, The Agricul-
tural Ant of Texas, p. 20 (1879).
Ants pathes, to seek, apparently a
proverbial expression for very careful
seeking. There is no corresponding
expression in the original.
[After discussing the origin of the name of
the village of Over-Burrow.] But if it re-
cover the ancient name, it may thanke others
and not mee, although I have sought as
narrowly and diligently for it as for ants
pathes. — Holland's Camden, p. 753.
Anything. The comparison in the
subjoined quotation is often made still
by those who are at a loss for some-
thing more definite.
The same maiden, where the lokers on
quaked and trembled for feare, daunced
without any feare at all emong sweardefl and
kniues, beyng as sharpe as any thyng. — UdaVs
Erasmus, Apophth., p. 32.
O my dear father and mother, I fear your
girl will grow as proud as anything. — Rich-
ardson, Pamela, ii. 57.
ANYTHINGARIAN ( 22 )
APOSTUMED
The tear-drop in his little eye again began
to spring,
His bosom throbb'd with agony, he cried like
anything.
Ingoldsby Leg. (Misadv. at Margate).
Anythingarian, a man indifferent
to all creeds. See also extract, s. v*
BIFARIOUS.
Lady Sm. What religion is he of ?
Li. Sp. Why, he is an anythingarian.
Lady Ans. I believe he has his religion to
chose, my lord.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
They made puir Bobbie Burns an any-
thingarian with their blethers. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xzii.
Anythingarunism, an indefinite state
of opinion.
Schiller's * Gods of Greece ' expresses, I
think, a tone of feeling very common, and
which finds its vent in modern Neo-Platon-
ism — Anythingarianism. — C. Kingsley. 1851
{Life, i. 215).
Apart, to stop.
But when I saw no end that could apart
The deadly dewle which she so sore did make,
With doleful voice then thus to her I spake.
SackvilU, The Induction, st. 14.
Apause, to bring to a stand-still.
With this saying he was apaused.— Phil-
pot, p. 86.
Apeak. The anchor is said to be
apeak when the cable is drawn so as to
bring the ship directly over it.
The anchor was soon apeak, the sails filled,
and we were underway. — Wolcot, P. Pindar,
p. 162.
Apedom, state of apishness.
The Gombroonians had not yet emerged
from this early condition of apedom. They,
it seems, were still homines caudati. — De
Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 87.
Aperitive, an aperient medicine. The
Diets, have it as an adj.
A physician was yesterday consulted, who
advised some gentle aperitives, as his strength
will bear it. — Richardson, Grandison, iv. 311.
Aphrodisian, pertaining to Aphrodite
or Venus : Aphrodisian dames = cour-
tesans.
They showed me the state nursery for the
children of those aphrodisian dames, their
favourites. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch.
lvi.
Apiarian, pertaining to bees.
When we are told to go to the ant and the
bee, and consider their ways, it is not that
we should borrow from them formic laws or
apiarian pohcy.—Southey, I%e Doctor, ch.
xcvi.
Apocha, a receipt.
The debt was not cancell'd to that rigid
and hard servant, for if he had his apocha or
quietance, to speak after the manner of men,
he were free from all insequent demands.—
Racket, Life of Williams, i. 25.
Apochryphy, to make apocryphal or
of doubtful truth.
Others dare venter a diuiner straine,
And rime the Bible, whose f oule feet profane
That holy ground, that wise men may decide
The Bible ne'er was more Apochryphide
Than by their bold excursions.
Davies, Paper Persecutors, p. 80.
Apologetic, an apology. See quota-
tion, s. v. deprecatory.
It looks as if he wrote on apologetic to the
mob on behalf of the prisoner. — North, Ex-
amen, p. 305.
Apological, parabolical ; of the nature
of an apologue.
To this silent objection Christ makes an
apological answer. — Adams, ii. 166.
Apoplectics, one seized with apo-
plexy.
So often we see there is life in an apoplco
tick, though he seem to be dead. — Racket,
Life of Williams, ii. 134.
APosiopestic, belonging to an aposi-
opesis, or a sentence left unconcluded.
He leapt incontinently up, uttering, as he
rose, that interjection of surprise so much
descanted upon, with the aposiopestic break
after it, marked thus, Z — -ds. — Sterne, Tr.
Shandy, iii. 211.
Apostemate, iinposthume ; abscess.
Have you no convulsions, pricking aches,
sir, ruptures or apostemates? — Jonson, Fletcher,
and Middleton, The Widow, IV. ii.
Apostemkd, corrupted. See Apos-
TUMED.
Now you see the heart has carried on the
contrivance, and from this ajpostem'd member
flows the corruption of atheism. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 252.
Apostoliqueship, holiness (applied
to the Pope).
Some evill spirit of an heritique it is which
thus molesteth his apostolioiteship. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 173).
Apostumed, corrupted. See Apos-
TEMED.
There is in both of you, if it were well
taken to heart, enough to prick the swelling,
and let out the apostumed matter of pride
from a many of us. — Andrewes, i. 161.
APOSTYLE
( *3 )
APPROACH
Apostyle, to note in margin (the
noun is in Halliwell).
He apostylea that article with his own
hand, to be shown to this day in the MS.
extant in the Vatican Library. — Racket, life
of Williams, ii. 156.
Apothbosise, to deify.
0 exalted among birds, apotheosised goose !
did not thy heart exult, even when thy liver
parched and swelled within thee? — Lytton,
Pelham, ch. xxii.
Appal, terror.
Nor think I but great Hector's spirits will
suffer some appall. — Chapman, Iliad, xiv.
314.
Appassionate, to influence with pas-
sion. R. gives appassionated as used
by Sidney (Arcadia, bk. ii. p. 210),
and seems to think the word peculiar
to him, but this is not so.
By your hyperbole and many other waies
seeking to inveigle and appassionate the
mind. — Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk.
III. ch. vii.
Appealingness, beseechingness.
It was ready sympathy that had made him
alive to a certain appealingness in her be-
haviour towards him. — G. Eliot, Daniel De-
rondo, ch. xxxv.
Appellate, to call.
One of these old soldiers was what the
Spaniards, with the gravity peculiar to their
language, call a Caballo Padre; or what
some of our own writers, with a decorum
not less becoming, appellate an entire horse.
— Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxxvi.
Applaud, to congratulate.
1 Hue againe, and applaud myselfe in this
happinesse, and wish it might ever continue.
— Hall, Epistles, Dec. II. Ep. i.
Neither speak I of gross sinners, not
grafted into Christ ; but even to those that
applaud themselves in their holy portion,
and look to be saved. — Adams, Works, iii.
89.
The covetous, when he hath gotten goods,
as if he had gotten the true good, applauds
his soul, as if it were the soul of some swine.
— Ward, Sermons, p. 17.
Can I do him all the mischief imaginable,
and that easily, safely, and successfully, and
so applaud myself in my power, my wit, and
my subtle contrivances ? — South, Sermons, iii.
113.
Appladsion, congratulation.
The same Musicians came againe with this
last part, and greeted them both with a
Psalme of new applausions. — Puttenham,
Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk. I. ch. xxvi.
Apple-arbiter, Paris.
Whom her beardless apple-arbiter
Decided fairest.
Tennyson, Lucretius.
Apple-drane, a wasp. H. gives it
as a west country word (and the ex-
tract is in the Devonshire dialect), but
he spells it apple-drone.
Leek bullocks 8 tinged by apple-dranes,
Currantin' it about the lanes,
Yokes theese way dreaved and that.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 156.
Apple-pie order, exact order ; per-
haps a corruption of cap-h-pied.
I am just in the order which some folks —
though why
I am sure I can't tell you — would call apple-
. pit.
Ingoldsby Legends (Old Woman in Grey).
Apple-wife, apple woman. The ex-
tract will be found more at length ; s. v.
Bread and crow.
Pomona, the first apple - wife. — Nashe
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 108).
Appliant, obedient.
Pharao giving no credit unto Moses, the
prophet of God, but appliant unto the lusts
of his own heart, what time he heard of the
passage of God's people, having no fear or
remembrance of God's work, he with his
army did prosecute after, intending to de-
stroy them. — Latimer, i. 86.
Applicator, applier.
'Tis ridiculous ... to content themselves
either with no idoneous physitians and fit
medicines, or with such quacking applica-
tions and applicators as are no way apt for
the work. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 494.
Apportionate, to apportion.
Those Opurrnpia, fostering allowances,
were due to parents because they were
parents, yet by free apportionating them
according to the duty and wisdom of the
children, as they might provide for their own
posterity.— Racket, Life of Williams, ii. 75.
Apprend, apprehend.
Wherefore the soul so full
Of life, when it raies out, with presse
presence
Oretakes each outgone beam ; apprends it by
advertence.
R. More, Sleep of the Soul, ii. 28.
Approach, a path or drive leading
to a house. Miss Edg^worth always
italicizes this word, as if it were scarcely
a recognized one in this sense.
Till the travellers arrived at Vivian Hall,
their conversation turned upon trees, and
APRONEER
( «4 )
ARC HI VOLT
avenues, and serpentine approach**. — Miss
Edgeworth, Vivian, ch. i.
Aproneer, a tradesman or shopman.
It seems to have been used contemptu-
ously by Cavaliers for the partisans or
officials of the Parliament party, many
of whom were of humble origin. Shake-
speare has "apron-men11 (Coriolamu,
IV. vi.) ; so has Tom Brown ( Works,
iii. 292) ; and Gauden, p. 244 of the
work cited, speaks of "the apron
antipathy of a rustick, mechanick,
and illiterate breeding " to Church
ministers.
He is scared with the menaces of some
prating Sequestrator or some surly Aproneer.
—Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 238.
Every sturdy aproneer
Arm'd with battoon did straight appear.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 3.
Apron-string. We still speak of a
timid or effeminate person as tied to
liis mother's apron-string, and this per-
haps is the meaning of the proverb
given by Udal ; one who has no wisdom
of her own, but is entirely dependent
on her mother's bidding. The speaker
in the second extract is a hen-pecked
husband.
Ve say in English, As wise as a gooce, or
an wise as her mother's aperen string. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 118.
He cursed the apron-string tenure, by
which he said he held his peace. — Richardson,
Grandison, iv. 23.
A homebred lordling,' who, from the mo-
ment he slipped his mother's apron-strings,
had fallen into f oily.— Miss Edgeworth, Helen,
ch. viii.
Aqua vita man, usually meant a
seller of drams. N. has it in this sense
with references to Jonsonand Beaumont
and Fletcher ; a more modern instance
is subjoined. In the first quotation it
means a quack who pretended to sell
the elixir of life.
I met with a story of an ancient Hebrew,
a reverend rabbi, who, that he might the
more lively convince the people in his time
of their neglect of practice in this excellent
grace, put himself into the habit of a
mountebank or travelling aqua vita man, and
made proclamation of a sovereign cordial
water of life he had to sell. — Ward, Sermons,
p. 21.
We journeyed over Alpine mountains,
drenched in clouds, and thought of harlequin
again, when he was driving the chariot of the
sun through the morning clouds, and so was
glad to hear the aqua vita man crying a dram.
— WalpoU, Letters, i. 216 (1749).
Araphorostic, not stitched (Gr. «, i
Aa^i), without a seam).
Do you think, because you are as impervi- |
ous as an araphorostic shoe, that I. John.
Busselton, am equally impenetrable ? — '
Lytton, Pelham, ch. xxxiii.
i
Arbalestrier, a crossbow-man.
The arbalestrier' >s face, notwithstanding a i
formidable head, was . . . gay and quiet. —
Reade, Cloister and Hearth, cb. xxiv.
Arbitratrix, arbi tress.
She is the greatest one knot of strength
in the Western world, and for the situation
fittest to disjoyn or unite her neighbour
forces, and consequently to be arhitratrix
and compoundresse of any quarrel that may
intervene. — Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 4.
No ! this is her prerogative alone
Who Arbitratrix sit' of Heav'n and Hell.
Beaumont, Psyche, xix. 168.
Arbolist, a cultivator of trees ; an
arborist, for which word it may be a
misprint (L. gives the subjoined ex-
tract ; 8. v. arborist), only in that case it
is misprinted again at p. 131.
They . . . are rather of the nature of the
mulberry, which the arbolists observe to be
long in begetting and keeping bis buds, but
the cold seasons beingpass'd, he shoots them
all out in a night. — Howell, Dodonofs Grove,
p. 11.
Arboreal, pertaining to trees.
He inferred that the soul of Xerxes must
once have animated a plane tree, aud re-
tained a vi.vid feeling connected with his
arboreal existence. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
ccxv.
Archbishopess, wife of an arch-
bishop.
Were he Archbishop of Canterbury, and
actual ly at my feet, I would not become
archbishopess. — Mad. PArblay, Diary, iv.
245.
Archiepiscopality, the status of an
archbishopric.
Offa being dead, down fell the best pillar
of Lichfield Church to suport the archiepis-
copality thereof. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. iii. 39.
Architecture, to build.
This was architecture thus
By the great Oceanus.
Keats, FingaVs Cave.
Archivolt, ornamental band of mould-
ings on the face of an arch.
The piers are enriched with groupes of
small columns supporting arches ornamented
with archivolts of mouldings enriched with
billeting.— .rfn-Atfo/., iii. 164 (1796).
ARCHOLOGY
( «5 )
ARMURE
Archoloot. See quotation.
That which Mr. Blakealee, with a some-
what clumsy pedantry, calls archology, mean-
ing the science of government. — Saturday
Beview, 27th October, 1877, p. 530.
Arch up, to support or exalt.
Thus mutually arching up one another,
they [the Jesuits] filled the ears of all'
Papists with load relations of the transcend-
ent industry, piety, learning, of the men of
their society. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. viii. 19.
Arctbd, joined.
Thart no doubt a Goddess©, too Phoebus
sister, or arcted
Too Nymphs in kynred.
Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 315.
Argufy, to argue. H. says that he
believes he has heard it in the sense of
" signify." It clearly has this meaning
in the two first extracts, the second of
which is from a letter from Dr. Bur-
ney.
I've done, (she mntter'd) I was saying
It did not argufy my playing ;
Some folks will win, they can not choose,
JJut, think or not think, some must lose.
Shenstone, To a Friend.
But what argufies all this festivity ? 'tis
all vanity and exhalation of spirit. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 41.
I have no learning, no, not I,
Nor do pretend to argufy.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. v.
Argumental, argumentative. Pope
is the earliest authority for this word
in the Diets.
Thus they dispute, guilding their tongues
report
"With instances and argumentall sawes.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R,
Grinuile, p. 49.
Argument ate, to argue : the word is
put into the mouth of a pedantic school-
master.
Nunc are you to araumentate of the quali-
fying of their estate first. — Sidney, Wanstead
Play, p. 62?.
Arianistical, Arian.
The eldest had just been baptised, and
introduced as a member of the arianistical
dipping community, where my master and
his family attended. —Life of J. Lackington,
Letter xxix.
A-ring, in circumference.
It grew in two orchards of the king's,
whereof the greater was twenty days a-ring.
—Adams, i. 369.
Arithmocract, the rule of numbers,
of a majority.
A democracy of mere numbers is no de-
mocracy, but a mere brute arithmocracy,
which is certain to degenerate into an och-
locracy, or government by the mob, in which
the numbers have no real share. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, Preface (1854).
Arithmocratic, belonging to an arith-
mocracy, q.v.
American democracy, being merely arith-
necrotic, provides no representation whatso-
ever for the more educated and more experi-
enced minority, and leaves the conduct of
affairs to the uneducated and inexperienced
many, with such results as we see. — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, Preface (1862).
Armigerous, bearing arms (heraldic-
ally).
They belonged to the armigerous part of
the population, and were entitled to write
themselves Esquire in any bill, quittance, &c.
whatsoever. — De Quincey, Essays (Bentley).
Arm in arm. Persons are said to walk
arm in arm when the arm of the ono
is linked in or supported by the arm of
the other.
To see then this pair [God and Caasar] thus
near, thus coupled, thus, as it were, arm in
arm together, is a blessed sight. — Andrewes,
v. 130.
Arm-in- armly, in a friendly manner.
A clerk who had observed them go out
together so arm-in-armly could not believe
it amicable, but followed them, and came up
just time enough to beat down their swords.
— Walpole to Mann, i. 258 (1743).
Arming-iron, fish-hook.
He allowed that even Izaak Walton of
blessed memory could not have shown cause
for mitigation of the sentence, if Bhad&man-
thus and his colleagues in the court below
had . . . sewed him, metempsychosized into
a frog, to the arming-iron with a fine needle
and *\\k.—Southey, The Doctor, ch. ccxii.
Arm-strong, powerful in the arms..
Alcides (the arme-strong darling of the
doubled night) by wrastling with snakes in
his swadling cloutes should prophecie to the
world the approaching wonders of his prow-
esse. — Greene, Menaphon, p. 56.
Armure. H. gives this word, with
references, as meaning armour, but in
the extract it signifies rather armed
force.
A certain oountrie to the ende that it
might have quiet and rest, no more to bee
vexed with toe armure and ordinaunce of
Alexander, offred vnto the same a good por-
oion of their possessions. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophtk.,?. 223.
ARRACHEMENT ( 26 ) ASBESTON STONE
Arrachement, excerpt.
These precious souls of ours, the very ex-
nalations and arrachements,if I may so speak,
of the breath of God. — Sanderson, i. 184.
Arrear, to raise.
K. James. I wish that the doctrine of pre-
destination may be tenderly handled, lest on
the one side God's Omnipotency be ques-
tioned by impeaching the doctrine of His
eternal predestination, or on the other side a
desperate presumption arreared by inferring
the necessary certainty of persisting in grace.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. i. 20.
Arrear, the rear.
Finally the arrear, consisting of between
three and four thousand foot, one hundred
men at arms, and six hundred light horse,
was led by the lord Dacres.— Heylin, Reform-
ation, i. 92.
The 27th day brings in Sir Roger Chomley,
Chief Justice of the King's Bench, and Sir
Edward Mountague, Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas ; the Duke of Suffolk, and
Sir John Cheek on the morrow after, shut-
ting up the arrear. — ibid. ii. 83.
Abrose, to bedew.
Tour day is lengthen 'd, and
The blissful dew of heaven does arrose you.
Tico Noble Kinsmen, V. iv.
Arround, to surround.
Or than Tiburnus woods and orchard-
grounds,
Moystned with gliding brooke which it
arrounds.
Heath's Odes of Horace, Bk. I. Ode vii.
Arrow, vulgarism for e'er a.
I don't believe there is arrow a servant in
the house ever saw the colour of his money.
— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. V. ch. viii.
I now carries my head higher than arrow
private gentlewoman of Vales. — Smollett,
Humphrey Clinker, i. 126.
Arrowlet, a small arrow.
As if the flower,
That blows a globe of after arrowlets.
Ten thousandfold had grown, flash 'd the
fierce shield
All sun. — Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Art and part, a Scotch legal phrase
to express complicity, but common now
in England.
These [dreams] came from the old man
which is corrupt (Eph. iv. 22), who had art
and part, as the Scottish indictment runs, in
all our Bishop's persecutions. — Hacket, Life
of Williams, ii. 86.
He arose at his leisure, and strolled about
the room with as unconcerned an aspect as if
nothing had happened amiss, and as though
he had neither art nor part in this frightful
discomfiture. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i.6.
My Lord Chancellor,
You have an old trick of offending us ;
And but that you are art and part with us
In purging heresy, well we might, for this
Your violence and much roughness to the
Legate,
Have shut you from our counsels.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, iii. 4.
Artificious, artificial.
Salt of a palish or greene colour; the
which by a certaine artijicwus devise, they
boyle untill it bee exceeding white. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 268.
Artly, artiflcially.
A crabstock, if it have a cyen of some
delicate apple artly grafted in it, look what
branches are suffered to grow out of the
stock itself, they will all follow the nature of
the stock. — Sanderson, i. 431.
ART8HIP, artistic skill.
TV Art ship rare
Which gilds the Seeling or this Globe so fair.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 118.
Arts-man, an artisan or artificer;
usually the word means an artist or an
expert. N. observes that the term is
used for artificer in Chapman's Homer,
but gives no reference.
Like an oak, a poplar, or a pine,
New fell'd by arts-man on the hills, he
stretch 'd his form divine
Before his horse and chariot.
Chapman, Iliad, xvi. 448.
As, than.
How may the herte be more contryte and
meke as whan of very contrvcon . . we aske
mercy and f orgyuenesse of almyghty god ? —
Bp. Fisher, i. 210.
I stayed full four months, and never made
better cheer in my life as then. — Urquhart's
Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xzxii.
Darkness itself is no more opposite to
light as their actions were diametricall to
their words. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 48.
I rather like him as otherwise. — Scott, St.
Ronan's Well, ii. 121.
Asbest, Anglicized form of asbestos.
See next entry.
Th' Arcadian Asbest being once enflam'd
Will ne'er be quencht.
Dames, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 52.
Asbeston stone, a mineral substance
which is incombustible. The follow-
ing quotation points to another quality
which explains its derivation.
My mind is like to the asbeston stone,
Which, if it once be heat in flames of fire,
Denieth to becomen cold again.
Greene, Alphonsus, Act II.
ASCEASE
( *7 )
ASSEMBLE
ASCEASE, tO a886SS.
Iidford, now a small village, bat in ancient
time a famous towne, which ... . (as it is
written in that booke whereby William the
First tooke the survey and value of England)
was not wont to be rated and asceased at any
other time, nor otherwise than London was.
— Holland's Camden, p. 199.
Aseity, independent existence, t. e.
a se.
Tell me then, by what mysterious light
have you discovered that aseity is entail'd on
matter ? — Gentleman Instructed, p. 425.
Aside, distant.
Whose worke this was the tiles there did
declare, being imprinted with these words,
Legio XX., that is the twentieth legion,
which, as I have shewed already before, abode
at Cheater, scarce size miles aside from hence.
—Holland's Camden, p. 681.
Asked. Persons whose banns are put
up are said to be asked, or asked in
Church : on the third publication they
are said to be asked out See Outasked.
He is commonly called King Edward the
Fifth, though his head was asfod, but never
married to the English Grown; and there-
fore in all the Pictures made of him, a dis-
tance interposed forbiddetb the banes be-
twixt them. — Fuller, Worthies, Westminster
(ii. 105).
Askeb, a species of newt.
Tho* the anguish had the sensation of
glowing heat, it might, notwithstanding that,
be a bite as well as a burn ; and if so, possibly
a newt, or asker, or some such detested rep-
tile had crept up, and was fastening his
teeth.— Sterne, Tr. Shandy, iii. 210.
Askingly, with an entreating manner.
How askingly its footsteps hither bend !
It seems to say, "And have I then one
friend? n — Coleridge, To a Young Ass.
Asleep, numbed: in the second
quotation it = stunned.
His legge, flagging down by the horse's
syde, by title and litle was all aslepe, and
in maner sterke stife. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 235.
So saying, she ups with her brawny arm,
and gave Susy such a douse on the side of
the head as left her fast asleep for an hour
and upward. — H. Brooke, Foot of Quality,
i. 82.
Aslopen, asleep.
The Major first began to open,
And rouse up Collin half aslopen.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 1.
Asmeab, smeared over.
So I came into Smithfield, and the shame-
ful place, being all asmear with filth, and fat,
and blood, and foam, seemed to stick to me.
—Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. xx.
Aspector, beholder.
Huge Lyons, Dragons, Panthers, and the
That in th' aspectors harts doe terror strike.
Davits, An Extasie.
Asper, a Turkish coin of small value :
its equivalent in English money is some-
what variously estimated in the follow-
ing extracts.
Every five men had allowance of but five
aspers of bread in a day, which are but two-
pence English.— Sanders, Voyage to Tripoli,
1584 (Arber, English Garner, ii. 20).
Aspers , whereof twentie are neare vpon a
shilling.— Sandys, Travels, p. 27.
The foolish paltry fellow
Shew'd me some trifles, and demanded of me,
For what I valued at so many aspers,
A thousand ducats.
Massing ery Renegado, i. 3.
Asquat, in a cowering or huddled up
manner. In the extract the word seems
to be used rather in invidiam than
with any very definite meaning.
There was the odious Solmes sitting asquat
between my mother and sister. — Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, i. 101.
Assassini. The earliest instance of
assassin in the Diets, is from Bacon,
and somewhat later than the subjoined,
where the word still has a foreign
dress ; and is moreover used of those
Saracen fanatics from whom the more
general application of the term has
been derived.
Conrade . . . was murthered by two assas-
sini.— Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 100.
Asseize, to seize.
Then laid they violent hands upon him;
next
Himself imprisoned, and his goods asseized.
Marlowe, Edw. II., i. 2.
Assemblation, gathering.
The time and place of the asseniblation was
generally notified, as also what learned
divine was to preach the funeral sermon. —
North, Examen, p. 204.
Assemble, to compare or liken.
Bribes may be assembled to pitch. — Lati-
mer, i. 188.
Consider how those preachers throughout
all this book are compared unto stars and
angels. . . . The other be assembled unto
most filthy locusts. — Bale, Select Works, p.
379.
A SSE VERA TORY ( 28 )
ASTUCIOUS
AS6BVEBAT0RY, positively affirming.
After divers warm and asseveratory answers
made by Mr. Atkins, the captain stopped
short in his walk. — North, Examen, p. 247.
A ssi eg er, besieger: the verb is in
the Diets.
Yet ( trading time) he thought he would
prouide
No lesse to keep, then coole th' assiegers
pride. — Hudson, Judith, iii. 254.
Assisor, one who fixes the rate at
which things are to be sold. Daniel
(Hist, qf J5ng.,p. 169) mentions "false
assisors " among those against whom
the writ of Trailbaston was issued.
See extract, s. v. trailbaston.
Associate to, associate with.
They associate the ideas of pain to those
lessous and virtues which the pleasure of
encouragement ought alone to inculcate. —
H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 110.
Assoil, solution.
We dissemble againe vnder couert and
darke speaches, when we npeake by way of
riddle (enigma), of which the sence can
hardly be picked out, but by the parties owne
assoile. — Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk.
III. ch. xviii.
Assubtile, to refine.
They came by instinct diuine, and by
deepe meditation, and much abstinence (the
same assubtiling and refining their spirits) to
be made apt to receaue visions, both wak-
ing aud sleeping, which made them vtter
Srophesies, and fortell things to come. —
*uttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk. I. ch. iii.
Asterial, having to do with the
stars.
If the deep learn'd asterial quaclp
Paint Time to life In almanacks,
He has on brow a lock of hair,
But all his head beside is bare.
Ward, England's Reformation, p. 298.
Asterisk, a star or shape of a star :
usually confined to that mark in print-
ing or writing.
The lanthorn is in the centre of an asterisk
of glades, cut through the wood of all the
country round, four or five in a quarter. —
North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 258.
Asterisk, "to mark with an asterisk.
I need not asterisk the quaint words and
expressions : they stand forth and shew them-
selves.— North, Examen, p. 279.
Astoroy, want of natural affection.
See Rom. i. 31 ; 2 Tim. iii. 3, in the
Greek. Astorgy in the extract is per-
sonified.
Upon an Ostrich, more unnatural
Than barbarous She, rode meagre Astorgy,
Vowing aloud to tear in sunder all
Those cords with which true Love delights
to tie '
The Souls of Parents and of Children, and
Shatter the links of every Nuptial Band.
Beaumont, Psyche, xxii. 107.
Astoundment, astonishment. Lamb
uses the word again in the essay on
" Mnckery End."
What a collegiate aspect has that fine
Elizabethan hall where the fountain plays,
which I have made to rise and fall, how
many times ! to the astoundment of the
young urchins, my contemporaries. — Elia,
Old Benchers of Inner Temple.
Astracism, starriness.
If Jove, esteeming me too good for earth,
Baise me to match the fair Aldeboran,
Above the threefold astracism of heaven.
Marlowe, 2 Tamb., iv. 4.
Astray, to stray away.
As oft as they astraid
From God their guide, He on their shoulders
laid
The barbare rock of Moab.
Hudson's Judith, ii. 852.
Astroite. See extract.
At Laffington near Gloucester are found
certain stones about the breadth of a silver
peny and thickness of an half-crown, called
astroites, or star-stones, being fine pointed
like a star and flat. They are of a greyish
colour, and the fiat sides are naturally finely
engraven, as it were. — Defoe, Tour thro*
Great Britain, ii. 326.
Astrolatry, star-worship.
To this succeeded astrolatry in the East,
and geolatry in the West. — Cox, Mythol. of
Aryan Nations, i. 95.
Astrologise, to consider the various
motions and conjunctions, &c, as an
astrologer does with the stare.
I have elsewhere astrologised this case of
the faction prevailing at Oxford. — Northt
Examen, p. 801.
Astrologue, astrologer. Cf. phi-
lologue, thcologue, &c, which are in the
Diets.
For I am a Physician too,
Chymistry know profoundly well,
An Astrologue infallible.
nUrfey, Plague of Impertinence.
Astucious, astute ; subtle. Fr. as-
tucieux. Is the word, as an English
one, peculiar to Scott ?
Louis, . . like all astucious persons, was as
desirous of looking into the hearts of others.
ASTUCITY
( 29 ) ATTENTATION.
i»
as of concealing his own. — Scott, Quentin
Burward, i. 170.
It was indeed natural that one who seldom
saw things according to their real forms and
outlines should view them according to the
light in which they were presented to him
by a bold and astucious man, possessing the
claim of such near relationship. — Ibid., Fair
Maid of Perth, h. 69.
Astucity, astuteness.
Consider Maximilien Robespierre . . . with-
out head, without heart, or any grace, gift,
or even vice beyond common, if it were not
vanity, astucity, diseased rigour (which some
count strength) as of a cramp. — Carlyle,
Misc., iv. 05.
Polymetis at any rate folds his map togc
ther, and flings himself on bed, resolved to
try on the morrow morning; with astucity,
with swiftness, with audacity. — Ibid., Fr.
Rev., Pt. I. Bk. I. ch. iii. ,
Asylum, a place for the reception of
lunatics. This sense is not in the
Diets. S. Pegge in 1785 (ArchasoL, viii.
44) says, " The name asylum has been
of late revived/1 and applied in this
way.
Ataballes, kettle-drums.
From the Moors' camp the noise grows
louder still,
Battling of armour, trumpets, drums, and
ataballes, — Dry den, Spanish Fryar, I. i.
Ataghan, a scimitar. More often
written yataghan.
The other seeks his ataghan,
And clasps its je weird hilt.
Oh ! much of gore in days of yore
That crooked blade has spilt.
Hood, The Key.
Atheist. The earliest authority for
atheist or atheism given in the Diets,
is Bacon's Essays; the extract seems
to imply that in Ascham's time the
word still wore its Greek dress, though
it was in not uncommon use.
They plainly declare of whose schole, of
what religion they be : that is, Epicures in
living and 'AOtot in doctrine. This last
word is no more unknown now to plain
Englishmen than the person was unkuown
some time in England, until some English-
man took pains to fetch that devilish opinion
out of lt&\j.—Ascham, Schoolmaster, p. 90.
Athit. The reading in the edition
of 1577 is at hyt. Muvor explains it
" ill-breeder8.', Wright, Prov. Diet.,
"ill-conditioned."
No storing of pasture with baggedglie tit,
With ragged, with aged, and euil athit.
Tusscr, Hvsbandrie, p. 85.
Atlantic, strong as Atlas. Milton
has Atlantean.
Bearing an ensign in a mimick fight upon
your atlantick shoulders.— T. Brown, Works,
ii. 180.
Atomistic al, relating to atoms. The
atomistical hypothesis is that which
refers the origin of matter to a fortui-
tous concurrence of atoms.
The atomistical hypothesis does not weaken
the force of my reason ; notwithstanding I
must tell you a wise man will not easily
believe that dull and dead atoms are able to
frame a living creature. — Gentleman Instruct*
ed, p. 427.
Atony, want of tone.
The cause of Kant's death was . . the aton
of the digestive organs. — Be Quincey, Last
Bays of Kant.
Atrip. Sails are said to be atrip when
hoisted to the top of the mast, as high
as possible.
A sail ! a sail ! I plainly spy,
Betwixt the ocean and the sky ;
An argosy, a tall built ship,
With all her pregnant sails atrip.
Cotton, Winter, 1689 {Eng. Garner, 1. 216)
Atroce, atrocious.
The prodigious vanity and nonsense as
well as atroce wickedness of these doings are
not describable but by the very remains
which the authors themselves have left of
them. — North, Examen, p. 258.
Let me take a turn or two of reflection
upon this most atroce machine. — Ibid. p. 392.
Attemptless, without trying.
Why then, Casane, shall we wish for aught
The world affords in greatest novelty,
And rest attemntless, faint, and destitute ?
Marlowe, 1 Tamburlaine, ii. 5.
Attend, attendance.
Boast, petty kings, and glory in your fates,
That stars have made your fortunes climb so
high,
To give attend on Rasni's excellence.
Greene, Looking Glass for England, I. i.
Attendress, female attendant. Ful-
ler is somewhat t autologous in speak-
ing of " a female attendress"
A female Attendress at the Table, neglect-
ing other Qentlemeu which sat higher, and
were of greater Estates, applyed herself
wholly to him. — Fuller, Worthies, Somerset
(ii. 287).
Attentation, temptation.
What can be so quicksighted as the Devil,
that spies the first spark of attentation, and
blows it into a fame?—Hacket, Life of WiU
liams, i. 99.
ATTRIST
( 30 )
A UTHOR
Attrist, to sadden.
I am full of all these reflections, but shall
not attrist you with them. — Walpole, Letters,
iii. 382 (1771).
How then could I write when it was im-
possible but to attrist you! when I could
speak of nothing but unparalleled horrors. —
Ibid. iv. 525 (1793).
At twice, after two trials.
Please but your worship now
To take three drops of the rich water with
you,
I'll undertake your man shall cure you, sir,
At twice i' your own chamber.
Jonson, Fletcher, and Middleton,
The Widow, iv. 2.
Audition. Walpole says of the
Cock Lane Ghost, which did not mani-
fest itself except by knockings.
I went to hear it, for it is not an appari-
tion, but an audition.— Letters, ii. 333 (1762).
Auditive, hearing.
It sometimes falleth out that a man hears
not a great sound or noise, though it be nigh
him. The reason is, his heart is fixed, and
busily taken up in some object, . . . and the
ears, like faithful servants, attending their
master, the heart, lose the act of that audit-
ive organ by some suspension, till the heart
hath done with them and given them leave.
— Adams, i. 265.
Augusteity, augustness ; majesty.
Too little it was belike to be styled by
ordinary parasites the shepherd of shepherds,
spouse and head of the Church, oecumenical
bishop, prince of priests, unless he might be
advanced above all Augusteity and Deity in
this most hyperbolical manner. — Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 5.
Augustious, august.
He knew these augustiovs preparations
would be ridiculously disappointed. — Racket,
Life of Williams, i. 169.
Aural, pertaining to the ear.
That aural acquaintance with Latin phrases
which the unlearned might pick up from
pulpit quotations constantly interpreted by
the preacher, could help them little when
they saw written Latin. — G. Eliot, Bomola,
ch. lxiii.
Aurific, gold-making.
This opinion, however, was in part changed,
in consequence of some experiments made
with an aurific powder given him by a
stranger. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. clxxxvi.
Aurigation, chariot-driving. (Lat.)
If a man indulges in the vicious habit of
sleeping, all the skill in aurigation of Apollo
himself, with the horses of Aurora to execute
his notions, avail him nothing. — De Quincey*
Eng. Mail-coach.
Auroral, pertaining to the morning ;
bright.
What a scene and new kingdom for him,
all bathed in auroral radiance of hope. . . .
They are all a delusion and piece of demonic
necromancy, these same auroral splendours.
—Carlyle, Misc., iv. 115 (1837).
Autarchy, self-sufficiency. See L.,
who gives an instance from Valentine'*
Sermons, 1635, but doubts whether it
means self-sufficiency or self-govern-
ment; on the whole he decides in fa-
vour of the former, despite the spelling.
The following examples from contempo-
rary authors show that he is right
You that so composed your lives by jejune
and empty contemplations of an autarchy in
virtue by the rules of nature, what stately
lives would you have led and lived, if the
grace and hopes of the gospel had appeared
to you by the rules of faith. — Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 28.
[Conscience is] in man the principal part
of God's image, and that by which man re-
sembleth most the autarchy and self-suffici-
ency of God. — Ibid. p. 98.
Some averre that as the Germans (affect-
ing an autarchy or sole-sufficiency amongst
themselves,) disdained commerce in customes
or civile government with the Romans, so
they communicated not with them in their
religion.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. i. 6.
Authentic, the original.
Which letter in the copy his Lordship read
over, and carried the authentic with him. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 24.
Had he put them out to the Bank by pro-
curing several copies to be transcribed, learn-
ing thereby had been a gainer and a saver,
had he onely secured the originals ; whereas
now her losse is irrecoverable : principall and
interest, authenticks and transcripts, are all
imbezzled. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., I. vi. 9.
Authentic, forming a precedent
A signal professor can not perish without
a train, and in his very destruction his ex-
ample is authentick. — South, Sermons, iii. 100.
A spreading atheism and domineering,
reigning sensuality, sins now made national
and authentick. — Ibid. iii. 351.
Author. N. says that Chapman fre-
quently uses this verb ; L. gives quota-
tion from Beaumont and Fletcher ; and
R. mentions that Chapman and Beaumont
and Fletcher employ it, as though such
use were confined to them. In all the
passages cited in the Diets, it means to
cause or originate, and this is its mean-
ing in the first of the subjoined ex-
A UTHORISM
< 3i )
AVOUCHABLE
tracts; but in the second it signifies
" to vouch f or," " to be authority for ; "
and in the third authoring =» literary
authorship.
The consonancie of the names [Liscare] or
trechery of the people hath authored the re-
port that Iscariot was here borne. — Sandys,
Travels* p. 250.
Some tricks and crotchets he has in his head,
As all musicians have, and more of him
I dare not author.
Massinger, Fatal Dowry, iv. 2.
There are, besides these more obvious
benefits, several others which our readers
enjoy from this art of dividing ; though per-
haps most of them too mysterious to be
presently understood by any who are not
initiated into the science of authoring. —
Fielding, Jos. Andrews, Bk. II. ch. i.
AUTH0RI8M, sense of being an author.
He [Burke] is a sensible man, but has not
worn off his authorism yet, and thinks there
is nothing so charming as writers, and to be
one.— fFalpole, Letters, ii. 269 (1761).
Authobshipness, condition of being
an author.
Of this I have been sensible from the mo-
ment my authorshipness was discovered.—
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 240.
Autokinetical, self-moving.
Self-moving substance, that be th' definition
Of souls, that 'longs to them in generall.
Therefore the soul's autokineticall
Alone.
H. More, Immortality of the Soul.
I. ii. 25,26.
Automatised, made into an automa-
ton.
A god-created man, all but abnegating the
character of man; forced to exist, automa*
tised, mummy wise (scarcely in rare moments
audible or visible from amid his wrappers
and cerements) as Gentleman or Qigman. —
CarlyU, Diamond Necklace, ch. i.
Automatory. See quotation.
They made the water go from one glass
to another, and contrived a thousand little
automatory engines, that is to say, moving
of themselves. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. I.
ch. xxiv.
Autopathy "denotates (says More)
the being self-strucken ; to be sensible
of what harms us, rather than what is
absolutely evill."
Base fear proceeds from weak autopathy.
—H. More, life of th* Soul, iii. 06.
Autobial, pertaining to an author.
How delicate and graceful are the transi-
tions from subject to subject ! — a point se-
verely testing the autorial power. — E. A
Foe, Marginalia, cvi.
Autotheist, one who is his own god.
He begins to mistake more and more the
voice of that very flesh of his, which he fan-
cies he has conquered, for the voice of God,
and to become, without knowing it, an auto*
theist.—C. Kingsley, Letter, Dec. 26, 1855.
Autumn ian, autumnal.
The boughes . . withered, and, like autum-
nian leaves, dropt to the ground. — Decker,
Seven Deadly Sins, p. 11.
Auxiliab, an auxiliary : usually an
adj.
I hail you my auxiliars and allies. — Taylor,
Ph. van Artevelde, Pt. II. v. i.
Avalanche. The earliest example
in L. of this now well-known word
is from Byron. Smollett spells it
VALANCHE, q. V.
Avarous, avaricious. Richardson and
Latham give this word, but no example
more recent than Gower ; it was, how-
ever, frequently used by Adams more
than 200 years later.
A whole country will not content one
avarous caterpillar. — Adams, i. 79.
. The very fool of all is the avarous, for he
will lose his friends, starve his body, damn
his soul, and have no pleasure for it. — Ibid.
i. 249.
Avocation, that which calls us away
from something else. The word is so
often misused as synonymous with
vocation (see Hall's Modern English,
p. 214), that it seems worth while to
give the two quotations following.
Heaven is his vocation, and therefore he
counts earthly employments avocations. —
Fuller, Holy State, Bk. IV. ch. ix.
Though she could neither sleep nor rest in
her bed, yet, having no avocation from it, she
was found there by her father at his return.
— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VI. ch. xiii.
Avoset, a bird with a long beak
curiously curved back at the end, and
with pied plumage.: it has become rare
in England.
Gone are ruffs and reeves, spoonbills, bit-
terns, avosets ; the very snipe, one hears,
disdains to breed.— C. Kingsley, 1830 {Life,
i. 8).
Avouchable, incontrovertible.
The darkness of her face here is as avouch'
able as the brightness of her clothes else-
where.— Fuller, Pisaah Sight, IV. v. 25.
The most avouchable evidence of Chris-
tianity flourishing in this island in this age
is produced from the Bishops representing
AVOWANCE
( 32 ) BABIL0N1CALLY
Britain in the Councills of Aries . . . Nice
. . . Sardis . . . Ariminum. — Ibid., Ch.
Hist., I. iv. 20.
Avowance, avowal ; evidence.
In avowance of [its having civil privileges]
it showeth more Burrow-townes then any
Shire (though thrice as big) lying in the
kingdome of Mercia. — Fuller, Worthies,
Bucks (i. 151).
Avuncular, pertaining to an uncle.
Clive, in the avuncular gig, is driven over
the downs to Brighton, to his maternal aunt
there.— Thackeray, Xtwcomes, ch. v.
Clive had passed the avuncular banking-
house in the city, without caring to face his
relations there.— Ibid. ch. xl.
Avunculizk, to follow or imitate an
uncle.
Seeing he was sister's son to blackmouth'd
Sanders, it is much that he doth not more
avunculize in his bitterness against Protest-
ants.—fatter, Worthies, Hants (i. 414).
Award, to avert, ward off. See H.
In his Raign a supplication was preferred
that the Temporal Lands given to pious uses,
but abusively spent, might have been seized
to the King. This was wisely awarded by
Chichley, Arch-bishop of Canterbury, by
putting the King on the design of recover-
ing France. — Fuller, Worthies, Radnor (ii.
008).
Awaredom, caution.
I am glad you are aware of Mrs. Pitt ;
pray continue your awaredom. — Walpolt to
Mann, iii. 64 (1764).
Awbe, a bullfinch ; called also an alp
or alph (?).
Canara byrds come in to beare the bell,
And goldfinches do hope to get the gole ;
The tatting Awbe doth please some fancie
wel,
And some like best the byrde as black as
cole. — Gascoigne, Philomene, 35.
Awed, dreaded.
Could Sampson have been firmly bound
hand and foot by the Philistine cords, so as
he could not have stirred those mighty limbs
of his, what boy or girl of Gath or Ascalon
would have feared to draw near, and spurn
that awed champion ? — Hall, Invisible World,
Bk. III. sect. in.
Axier, axis.
Thy hands the axier to maintain my world.
Greene, looking Glass for London, p. 136.
Axinomancy. See extract
[Jet] was moreover employed in the form
of divination called axinomancy. Laid on a
hatchet made hot, it was stated not to con-
sume if the desires of the consulting party
were destined to be fulfilled.— Arch., xliii.
617 (1870).
Axless, without an axle. The word
should be axleless, but this would not
suit the metre.
'Tis a wondrous thing to see that mighty
mound
Hingeless and axless turn so swiftly round.
Sylvester, Little Bartas, 264.
Ayles, the beards of corn. H. gives
it as an Essex word.
These twice-six colts had pace so swift, they
ran
Upon the top-ay/sj of corn-ears, nor bent
them any whit. — Chapman, Iliad, xx. 211.
Azure, to make blue. The Dicta,
only give the past participle.
Who azvr'd the firmament ? Who enamel'd
the meadows with a thousand different
flowers ?— Gentleman Instructed, p. 894.
B
Baalist, a worshipper of Baal:
applied in the first extract to Papists,
in the second to Anglicans.
And lastly, too, Tobacco's smoakie-mists,
Which f camming from Iberian Baalists)
No small addition of Adustion fit
Bring to the nmoak of the Unbottom'd Pit.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 190.
We went to the Minster, when the pipes
played, and the puppets sange so sweetely,
that some of our soildiers could not forbeare
dauucing in the holie quire, whereat the
Baallists were sore displeased.— Lttter from
Neh. Warton, 1642 (Arch., xxxv. 332).
" if too busie after they have found a
good scent," Gent. Bee., p. 78. See H.
Oft when I rise at early morn,
And hear the cheerful echoing horn,
I'm forc'd from the inspiring noise
To hunt a pack of idle boys ;
And when they babble in their din,
I am a special whipper-in.
' Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. o. xxi.
Babeship, infancy.
He had not euen from his tendre babeship
been nousled in the preceptes of philosophic.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apopkih., p. 194.
Babble. Hounds are said to babble Babilonicallt, sumptuously, refer-
BABOONERY ( 33 ) BACK-SCRATCHER
ring to the splendour of Babylon. Cf.
Cleopatrical.
O ! he is attended upon most Babiloniccdly ;
and Xerxes so overcloyd not the Hellespont
with his foystes, gallies, and brigandines, as
he mantleth the narrow seas with his retinue.
— Nashe, Lenten Stujfe (Harl. Misc., vi. 162).
Baboonery, assemblage of baboons.
On the other side of the Bocke ffrewe a
Groue, in whose vtmost part appear 'd a vast,
withered and hollow tree, being the bare re-
ceptacle of the Baboonerie. — Chapman, Masque
of Mid. Temple.
Baboon is h, like a baboon.
He had a dingy bronze complexion, tawny
eyes, tolerable teeth, and a long, wrinkled,
smirking, baboonish physiognomy. — Miss
Ferrier, Inheritance, Vol. I. ch. ii.
Baby. To smell of the baby = to be
childish.
There are some that in their childhood are
so long in their home booke that, doe what
they can, they will smell of the Baby till they
can not see to read.— Breton, Courtier and
Countryman, p. 9.
Bachelorhood, bachelorship.
I can fancy nothing more cruel after a
long easy life of bachelorhood than to have to
sit day after day with a dull handsome
woman opposite.— Thackeray, The ATevxomes,
ch. xl.
Sir Hugo in his bachelorhood had been be-
guiled into regarding children chiefly as a
product intended to make life more agreeable
to the full grown.— G.Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. lix.
Bachelorize, to be or act as a
bachelor. Jam's says in a note, "A
word made on purpose, answerable to
the original bachillear."
I am a Salamanca bachelor of arts, and
there is no bachelorizing beyond that. —
Jarwfs Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. vii.
Bachelor's fare. See quotation.
Lady Ans. Colonel, some ladies of your
acquaintance have promised to breakfast
with you, and I am to wait on them ; what
will you give us ?
Col. Why, faith, Madam, bachelor's fare,
bread and cheese and kisses.— thrift, Polite
Conversation, Conv. i.
Bachelry. Bachelry intention =
intention of remaining a bachelor.
He holding place and estimation as heir of
Arcadia, obtained me of my father, the King
of Argos, his brother helping to the conclu-
sion with protesting his batchelry intention.
— Sidney, Arcadia, p. 237.
Back. Give the back = to leave.
Had even Obstinate himself but felt what
I have felt of the powers and terrors of what
is yet unseen, he would not thus lightly have
given us the back.—Bunyan, Pilgrim's Pro-
gress, Pt. I. p. 10.
Back-broken, with a broken back ;
over-heavily weighted. H. refers to
Florio for back-break. Cf. Break-
back.
How best the Sonne should bear an empire's
lode
(Which weaknesse oft back-broken vnder-
goes). — Davies, Microcosmos, p. 16.
Backermo8T, furthest back. Cf.
Higiiermost. The extract is from the
Church wardens' Accounts at Minching-
hampton, 1669.
Two seat roomes in the gallery at Hampton
in the backermost seat. — Arch., xxxv. 449.
Back-hand, a term at tennis.
Lady Betty. Nay, my lord, there's no
standing against two of you.
L. Fop. No, faith, that s odds at tennis, my
lord ; not but if your ladyship pleases, I'll
endeavour to keep your back-hand a little,
tho' upon my soul you may safely set me
up at the line. — Ctbber, Careless Husband,
AotlV.
What ! are you there to keep up her back-
hand, Mr. Freeport ? — Colman, Eng. Merchant,
Act IV.
Back-handed, remiss.
Modesty ... is often the most beggarly
and back-handed friend that merit can have
in its pay. — Godwin, Mandeville, ii. 180.
Back-head, false hair at the back of
the head.
I thought of poor Mrs. Penelope Arby — you
all know her. I saw her in imagination sur-
rounded with parrots and lapdogs ! So spring-
like at past fifty, with her pale pink lustring
and back"head. — Richardson, Grandison, vii.
223.
Backload, a good load ; as much as
can be carried on the back.
It came into my mind, that to arrive at
universal holiness all at once, I would take a
journey into the Holy Land, and so would
return home with a backload of sanctimony.
— Bailey's Erasmus, p. 182.
Backscraper, back-scratcher, q. v.
Chopsticks and backscrapert are curious
things.— JFolcot, P. Pindar, p. 238.
Back-scratcher, an instrument for
scratching parts of the back that might
be otherwise inaccessible : the end of
it was in the shape of a hand. An
article on these instruments, with illus-
trations, will be found in Chambers's
Book of Day 8, ii. 238.
D
BACKSTONE
( 34 )
BAG
There was also a head of Indian corn there,
and a backscratcher, of which the hand was
ivory, and the handle black. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. iv.
Backstone, a stone to bake oat-cakes
on. See H., a. v. " As nimble as a cat
on a hot bakslon" is a north-country
proverb.
The oats, oh the oats, and the silver, silver
oats!
Here's to the oats With the backstone on
the board!
Well go among them when the barley has
been laid in rotes :
"When all is home to mow-yard, we'll kneel
and thank the Lord.
Exmoor Harvest Song (Lorna Doone, ch. xxiz.)
Backstring, a leading string behind,
by which the nurse or mother guided
the child.
Even misses, at whose age their mothers wore
The hackstring and the bib, assume the dress
Of womanhood.
Cowper, Winter Evening, 227.
Back-timber, clothes.
Was there ever more riot and excess in
diet and clothes, in belly-cheer and back'
timber, than we see at this day ?— Bp. Hall,
Works, v. 543.
Back winter, frost after the regular
winter has passed.
This and every towne hath its hack winters
or frostes that nippe it in the blade (as not
the clearest sunneshine but hath his shade,
and there is a time of 6icknes as well as of
health) : the back&irinter, the froste biting,
the eclipse of shade and sicknesse of Yar-
mouth was a great sicknesse or plague in it
1348.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Hari. Misc., vi.
152).
Bacon-hog, a specially fat hog fit
for bacon. In the original, Erasmus
speaks of Acarnanian pigs, which were
the sleekest kind.
My followers are smooth, plump, and
buxom, and altogether as lusty as so many
bacon-hogs or sucking calves. — Kennet, Eras-
mus's Praise of Folly, p. 17.
Bacon ize, to turn into bacon.
He hath not learnt
That pigs were made for man, born to be
brawn'd
And baconized. — Southey, Nondescripts, iv.
Bacon-slicer, a clown, though the
note say 8 it is strictly a braggadocio or
vapourer.
If he have not abetter judgement, a better
discourse, and that expressed in better terms
than your son, with a completer carriage and
civility to all manner of persons, account me
for ever hereafter a very elounch and 1>acnn-
slicer of Brene. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. I.
ch. xv.
Badge. Mr. Grosart suggests that
the word in the extract may mean
" procuring forfeited estates by beg-
ging." Badger, q. v., is a retailer of
corn. Such had not always a very
good reputation for honesty. Perhap3
Davies means, " some follow her [For-
tune] by forestalling or regrating the
produce of the land." His marginal
note is " Land badgers."
Some others followed her by bodging land.
— Davies, Humour's Heaven on Earth, p. 37.
Badger, a huckster; retailer. See
Bajulate.
The wealth of this town consisteth much
in buying of come, and selling it againe to
the mountaines; for all the inhabitants be
as it were a kinde of hucksters or badgers. —
Holland's Camden, p. 555.
Badger. To overdraw ones badger
is, according to Hood, slang for over-
drawing one's banking account.
His checks no longer drew the cash,
Because, as his comrades explained in flash,
He had overdrawn his badger.
Hood, Mtss Kihnansegg.
Badgerly, aged (?). We say, gray
as a badger.
I always think when I see those badgerly
virgins fond of a parrot, a squirrel, a monkey,
or a lapdog, that their imagination makes
out husDand and children in the animals. —
Richardson, Grandison, v. 300.
Badminton, a species of compounded
drink, so named from the Duke of
Beaufort's place, where it had its
origin.
Here . . . the cares or enterprises of life
are soothed or stimulated by fragrant
cheroots or beakers of Badminton. — Disraeli,
Lothair, ch. xxx.
Baffle, to trifle ; to make much ado
about nothing.
The vexatious side baffled before the master,
as long as he could, upon trifles, keeping
back the true points. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, ii. 78.
Bag, applied apparently to a quantity
of water which had been confined as in
a bag. _
A servant brought him a letter wherein
was an account of a bag of water, which was
broke in his greatest colliery. — North, Life of
Lord Guilford, i. 268.
BAG
( 35 )
BALANCE
Bag, to put in a bag. See extract.
They [the Welsh] had a kind of play
wherein the stronger who prevailed put the
weaker into a sack ; and hence we have bor-
rowed our English by-word to express such
betwixt whom there is apparent odds of
strength, " He is able to put him up in a
Bagge."— Fuller, Worthies, Cardigan (ii. 579).
Baoatello, a trifle.
It doth not become the children of God . .
so to please themselves with toyes and baga-
tellots as to neglect their meat. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 102.
Bag- fox, a fox turned out of a bag
to be hunted.
Thus the bag-fox, (how cruelly, alack !)
Turned out with turpentine upon his back,
Amidst the war of hounds and hunters flies ;
Shows sport ; but, luckless, by his fragrance
dies.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 187.
To have a sort of hag-fox to turn out,
when fresh game cannot be had, is an enjoy-
ment which most of my readers have doubt-
less experiened.— Miss Ferrier, Inheritance,
Vol. I. ch. x.
Baggage, stuff; rubbish. We still
speak of bad liquor as "loaded." Gas-
coigne reckons it as among the signB
of an impossible golden age
When brewers put no baoage in their beere.
the Steele Glas, p. 79.
For throu^he cruditye and lacke of perfect
concoction in the stomacke is engendred
great abundance of naughty baggage and
hurtfull phlegme. — Touchstone of Complex-
ions, p. 118.
Baggage, worthless. The substan-
tive, applied contemptuously to a
woman, is common. In the second
quotation there is a comma at baggage ;
I think by a mistake ; if not, baggage
is a substantive, and means rubbish.
Booth himself coufest, in the hearing of
those witnesses, that Pregion had nothing to
do with that baggage woman. — Racket, Life
of Williams, n. 123?
For four cellars of wine, syder, ale, beer,
with wood, hay, corn, and the like, stored up
for a year or two, he gave not account of six-
pence, but spent it upon baggage, and loose
franions. — Ibid. ii. 128.
Bagonet, to bayonet ; or as a sub-
stantive. In the first quotation it is not
meant as a vulgarism ; in the second,
where the word is a substantive, Mr.
Sam Weller is the speaker.
I came not into the world to be cannon-
aded or bagonetted out of it.— Gentleman In-
structed, p. 535.
Now, genTmen, fall on, as the English
said to the French when they fixed baggi-
nets. — Pickwick Papers, ch. xix.
Bags, breasts.
But cursed cruell be those wicked Hags
Whom poysonous spight, envy, and hate
have won
T'abhorred sorcery, whose writhled bags
Fould fiends oft suck, and nestle in their
loathsome rags.
H. More, Pre-existence of the Soul, st. 47.
Bails, hoops to bear up the tilt of a
boat.
An act of Parliament passed in 1736-7 . . .
prohibits close Decks and Bails nailed down
in the Wherries.— Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Bri-
tain, i. 143.
Bajulate, to carry. Lat. bajulare.
Fuller puts in margin, " Hence bagers,'
i. e. Badgers, q. v.
The gentry of this county well content
themselves in the very badness of passage
therein, as which secureth their provisions
at reasonable prices ; which, if mended, Hig-
glers would mount, as bajulating them to
London.— Fuller, Worthies, Sussex (ii. 381).
Baker-kneed. Grose says, "one
whose knees knock together in walk-
ing, as if kneading dough."
His voice had broken to a gruffish squeak,
He had grown blear-eyed, baker-kneed, and
gummy. — Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 13.
Baker-legged, same as Baker-
kneed, q. v.
iEsop . . was . . flat-nos'd, hunch-back'd,
blabber-lipp'd ; a long misshapen head ; his
body crooked all over, big-belly'd, baker-
leggyd, and his complexion so swarthy that
he took his very name from *t ; for JSsop is
the same with JSthiop.— L' Estrange, Life of
JEsop.
Balaam-basket, or box, an editor's
receptacle for articles unfit for insertion.
The term (the allusion is obvious)
seems to have originated with Black-
wood's Magazine.
An Essay for the Edinburgh Review, in
"the old unpolluted English language,"
would have been consigned by the editor to
his balaam-basket. — Hall, Modern English, p.
17.
Balance, balances ; scales.
We are not angry with the clarke of the
market if he come to our stall, and reprooue
our ballance when they are faultie. — Gosson,
Schoole of Abuse, p. 54.
Are there balance here to weigh
The flesh?
Shakespeare, Mer. of Venice, IV. i.
Ermensewl, that is, the pillar or stay of
the poor, pictured with a banner in one hand
D 2
BALANITE
( 36 ) BANBURY GLOSSES
with a red rose, in the other a pair of bal-
lame. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. i. 6.
Balanite, a species of gem: per-
haps the carbuncle or the Balaia ruby.
Ducange quotes from Rymer, v. 80:
" Unum scrinium auri . . . gamitum
de saphiris . . Balanitibus et a His
petrarus."
A garland braided with the flowry folds
Of yellow citrons, turn-sols, mary-golds,
Beset with balanites, rubies, chrysolites,
The royall Bride-groom's radiant brows be-
dighto. — Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1016.
Balbutient, stammering ; lisping.
I have with tongue balbutient
Prattled to th' weaker ear.
H. More, Sleep of the Soul, iii. 24.
Baldabb (?). The extract is the
translation of " ea cura quietos solli-
citat."
Theire brayns vnquieted with this baldare be
buzing. — Stanyhurst, jEn., iv. 400.
Baldicoot, bald coot. The name of
this bird is applied to the monks on
account of their shaven crowns.-
This comes of your princesses, that turn
the world upside down, and demean them-
selves to hob and nob with these black baldi*
coots. — Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, iii. 4.
Baldrib. H. (who gives no exam-
ple) says, " Not the same as the spare-
rib, as generally stated, which has fat
and lean, and is cut off the neck. The
baldrib is cut lower down, and is de-
void of fat ; hence the name, according
to Minsheu." In the first extract it is
applied to a thin and lanky Puritan.
Faith, thou art such a spring baldrib, all
the mistresses in the town will never get
thee up. — Middleton, Mayor of Quinboroitgh.
Act III.
Who in all forms
Of pork, baked, roasted, toasted, boil'd, or
broil'd ;
Leg, bladebone, baldrib, griskin, chine, or
chop,
Profess myself a genuine Philopig.
Southey, To A. Cunningham.
Balk, a beam or rafter. See the
Diets. ; but they have no instance later
than Fairfax.
See! round the room on every beam and
balk
Are mingled scrolls of hieroglyphic chalk.
Crablte, Borough, Letter xi.
The stiffest balk bends more or less ; all
joists creak. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I.
ch. xii.
Ball, a stout fellow. The word in
the orig. is ribault, which in the Glos-
sary appended to the edition of Rubo-
lais by L. Barr6 is explained, " En
general, homme robuste ; par extension,
bandit, libertin ; du teuton, 'bald?
hardi"
He was a strong-built ball, and an old dog
at fisticuffs.— UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. IV.
ch. xii.
Ballace, to ballast; also as a sub-
stantive. See extract, s. v. Calvar.
Therewith they are accustomed to ballace
their ships. — Sandys, Travels, p. 204.
And all of them, unburtheued of their load,
Are ballassed with billows watery weight.
Marlowe, Dido, I. i.
For ballace, empty Dido's treasury.
Ibid. iii. 1.
Ball aster, one who has to attend to
providing ships with ballast.
The office of Ballaster, and of Lading, Last-
age, and Ballasting of Ships and Vessels on
the River Thames. — Commons Journals, vii.
740 (1669).
Balloon, to convey as in a balloon.
The extract is addressed to Time.
Thy pinions -next — which, while they wave,
Fan all our Birth-Days to the grave, —
I think ere it was prudent,
Balloon' d me from the Schools to Town,
Where I was parachuted down,
A dapper Temple student.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 19.
Balneo, bath. Bagnio is the com-
mon form.
Then began Christian Churches . . to out-
shine . . the Balneos and Theatres of free
Cities.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 351.
Bamboche, a doll or puppet.
These figures were brought by the mob in
grand procession . . . and then after numer-
ous platoons and volleys of squibs discharged,
these Intmboches were with redoubled noise
committed to the flames. — North, Examen,
p. 574.
Banbury glosses. Is Latimer al-
luding to some well-known story in
connection with Banbury, referred to
also in the mock speech attributed to
Corbet ?
Id this your realm they have sore blinded
your liege people and subjects with their
laws, customs, ceremonies, and Banlmiy
glosses, and punished them with cursings. — -
Latimtr, ii. 299.
The malignants do compare this common-
wealth to an old kettle with here and there
a fault or hole, a crack or flaw in it; and
that we (in imitation of our worthy brethren
BANDEA U
( 37 )
BANKER
of Banbury) were intrusted to mend the
said kettle ; but, like deceitful and cheating
knaves, we have, instead of stopping one
hole, made three or four score. — Speech of
Mile* Corbet, 1647 (Harl. Misc., i. 274).
Bandeau, band.
Well, sir, that bandeau you quarrelled with
was worn by every woman at court the last
birthday.— Mad. ITArblay, Diary, i. 93.
Bound the edge of this cap' was a stiff
bandeau of leather. — Scott, Ivanhoe, i. 11.
Bandore. Kennet, s. v. abunda,
gives "Bandore, a widow's veil to
bind over or cover her head and face."
I hoped to fix my future rest,
And took a widow to my nest.
Jove in Pandora's box confined
A hundred ills, to vex mankind ;
To vex one bird, in her bandore
He had at least a hundred more.
And soon as time that veil withdrew,
The plagues o'er all the parish flew.
Prior, Turtle and Sparrow, p. 398.
Banerer, banner-bearer.
The lorde Haward, the'king's banerer, rode
next. — Account of Burial of Edward IV.
{Arch., I 351).
Bangle, a frequentative form of
bang, to beat. In the eastern counties
corn is said to be bangled when beaten
about by the wind. The Imp. Diet.
defines bangle, " to waste by little and
little ; to squander carelessly." A
bangling hawk is one that beats about
in the air, instead of rising steadily,
and then swooping down on the quarry.
See JV. and Q., V. x. 409.
No bangling hawk, but with a high flier
will mend her pitch.— Ward, Sermons, p. 83.
Bangles. See extracts; also *. v.
Kikcob.
The ankles and wrists ornamented with
large rings or bangles. — Archaol., viii. 266
(1787).
Her bracelets (she used to say, I am given
to understand tney are called bangles, my
dear, by the natives) decorated the sleeves
round her lean old hands. — Thackeray, New-
comes, ch. xv.
Bangster, the victor ; one who bangs
or beats his adversary.
If you are so certain of being the bangster,
to very certain I meau of sweeping stakes,
what harm will Miss Clara come to by your
having the use of her siller ? — Scott, St. Bo-
Kan's Well, i. 183.
Bang-tailed, short-tailed (slang).
w These bang-tailed little sinners any
good ? " said Drysdale, throwing some cock-
a-bondies across the table. "Yes, I never
like to be without them and a governor or
two." — Hughes, Tom Broicn at Oxford, ch. vi.
Bang-up, fine ; first-rate. Cf. Slap-
up. Bang-up also = to make smart
(slang). The second quotation is from
an article by Archbishop Whately on
Miss Austen's novels.
Dance a bana-up theatrical cotillion. —
H.$ J. Smith, Rejected Addresses, p. 188.
We could not resist giving a specimen of
John Thorpe . . . altogether the best por-
trait of a species which, though almost ex-
tinct, cannot yet be quite classed among the
PalsBotheria, the Bang-up Oxonian. — Quar-
terly Review, xxiv. 308.
Pat to his neckcloth gave an air
In style, and a la militaire ;
His pocket too a kerchief bore
With scented water sprinkled o'er ;
Thus banged-up, sweeten 'd, and clean shav'd
The sage the dinner-table braved.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. v.
Banister. See quotation.
He was bound apprentice to a banister-
maker, which was a large sort of hamper
then in use for the carrying of charcoal to
the furnaces on horseback, one on each side
a horse. — Yorkshire Diaries (Surtees Soc.), p.
311 (1732).
Banjore. See extract. In the form
banjo the word has become familiar to
us.
" What is this, mamma ? it is not a guitar,
is it ? " ** No, my dear, it is called a banjore ;
it is an African instrument, of which the
negroes are particularly fond." — Miss Edge-
worth, Belinda, ch. xviii.
Bank. To bank a fire is to load it
with coal so pressed down that, while
the fire will last a long time, it burns
very slowly.
The ship was lying at anchor with fires
banked, and it was understood that they were
waiting for a Queen's messenger. — H. Kings-
ley, Ravenshoe, ch. 11.
Banker, one who makes banks. See
Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary, s. v.
He told me that cranberries had not been
discovered at that place [DersinghamJ till
within his memory, and that the discovery
was made by some bankers (men who work
in the fens) from Lincolnshire. — Freeman,
Life of W. Kirby, p. 156 (1862).
Banker, to banquet.
Foillanus and his three brethren, going
homeward in the night, after they had well
hankered with St. Gertrude and her nuns,
were killed in a wood. — Bale, Select Works,
p. 192.
BANKERESS
( 38 )
BARBARE
Bankeress, banker's wife.
Some of those bankers are as high and
mighty as the oldest families. They marry
noblemen's daughters, by Jove, and think
nothing is too good for 'em. But I should
go, if I were you, Arthur. I dined there a
couple of months ago, and the bankeress said
something about you. — Thackeray, Newcomes,
ch. xxiv.
Bankless, shoreless ; unbounded.
For thou of beauty art the bancklesse Sea.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 15.
Bankruptism, bankruptcy. " Pol-
tick Bankruptisme " is the title of the
first of Decker's Seven Deadly Sinnes.
Banneret, to make a knight -ban-
neret
Nor doth it sound a little to the honour of
Herefordshire, that amongst the thirteen
then banneretted in the King's Army, three
fell out to be her Natives. — Fuller, Worthies,
Hereford (i. 464).
Bannier. The old Fr. banniere = a
district or manor. lt Banneria, dis-
trictus, jurisdiction officium bannerii "
(Ducange). At the same time the Ital.
bagnio, Span, banc, and Fr. bagne all =
a place where slaves are kept, as well
as a bath.
He encouraged the inhabitants . . that they
should be of good cheer, for before night
there should be Elaianians in Galeri market
as cheap as birds. . . . And it fell true that
[the EmperourV] souldiers were sold by mul-
titudes in Galen's bannier towards the even-
ing.— Howell, Dodo/no's Grove, p. 83.
Upon the Castle Hill [in Chios] there is a
JBannia . . . containing seuerall roomes, one
hoter than another with conduits of hot
water, and naturall fountaines. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 12.
Banterer. See quotation (see also
citation from Swift in R.).
Occasions given to all men to talk what
they please, especially the banterers of Oxford
(a set of scholars so called, some M-A.), who
make it their employment to talk at a ven-
ture, lye, and prate what nonsense they
please ; if they see a man talk seriously they
talk floridly nonsense, and care not what he
Bays.— A. Wood, Life, Sept. 6, 1678.
Banyan, a loose gown, like that worn
by the Banyans. See next entry.
I have lost nothing by it but a banyan,
shirt, a corner of my quilt, and my bible
singed. — Sufferings of a Dutch Sailor, 1725
(Harl. Misc., viii. 297).
Proceed we next
Unto the old Incumbent at his gate,
With silken skull-cap tied beneath his chin,
His banyan with silver clasp wrapt round
His shrinking paunch.
Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. XI. ch. iv.
Banyan day. See quotation.
They told us that on Mondays, Wednes-
days, and Fridays the ship's company had
no allowance of meat, and that these meagre
days were called banyan days, the reason of
which they did not know ; but I have since
learned they take their denomination from a
sect of devotees in some parts of the East
Indies who never taste flesh. — Smollett, Bod.
Random, ch. xxv.
Baptime, baptism.
Were I to give thee baptime I would choose
To christen thee the bride, the bashf ull muse.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 26.
Fall on me like a silent dew,
Or like those maiden showers
Which by the peepe of day do strew
A baptime o'er tne flowers. — Ibid. p. 100.
Baptizable, fit for or capable of bap-
tism.
As for the condition limiting persons bap-
tizable, which is actual believing, this also
the Church of Christ understood in a limited
and temporary sense. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 284.
Bar. Many bars = many degrees :
the metaphor may be taken from music,
or perhaps from the game of throwing
the bar.
It is to be observed that these kind of
objections are commonly wheedles; and if
governours hearken to them, they are pro-
bably lost ; and those who are the objectors
laugh in their sleeves, and in their turn out-
do, many bars, all that themselves found
fault with. — North, Life of Lord Guilford \
a. 122. J '
The immodest ones outdo the worst of us
by a bar's length, both in thinking and acting.
— Richardson, Cl. Harlmce, iii. 118.
I outdo Rousseau a bar length. — Sterne,
Tr. Shandy, vi. 145.
Baratress, a female quarreller or
fighter.
A baratresse, daring with men, though a
mayd, to be buckling.— Stanyhurst, JEn., i.479.
Barbal, belonging to a beard. D'Ur-
fey tells a story of a man who pawned
his beard for £100,000.
And what could greater token be
Than that of barbal dignity ?
Collin's Walk, cant. 4.
Barbare, barbarous.
As oft as they astraid
From Ood their guide, He on their shoulders
laid
The barbare yock of Moab.
Hudson's Judith, ii. 854.
1
BARBAR Y
( 39 ) BARNABY-BRIGHT
Barbary, barbarity.
Nothing but cruel barbary and lion-like
fierceness beareth rule.— Becon, iii. 42.
Barbkcu. See quotation. Tlie word
is used also as a verb in the West
Indies, and applied to dressing a hog
by splitting it to the backbone and
broiling it on a gridiron.
Look at the negroes on the barbecu / It
was indeed time to stop, for on the barbecu,
or terrace of white plaster, which ran all
round the front, lay sleeping full twenty
black figures. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch.
xix.
Barbers' music, rough music. A
guitar or some such instrument was
formerly kept in a barber's shop for
the amusement of customers while
waiting their turn. The instrument,
being thus thrummed on by all comers,
was not usually of much excellence.
My lord called for the lieutenant's cittern,
and with two candlesticks with money in
them for symbols [cymbals] we made bar-
bers' music. — Pepys, June 5, 1600.
Barbiton, a lyre. A Latin word
treated as English by Ascham.
Lutes, harpes, all maner of pypes, barbi-
tons, sambukes, with other instruments . .
be condemned of Aristotle. — Ascham, Toxo-
pkilus, p. 39.
Bab-boy, a boy who serves at the
bar of a public-house. Barman is more
usual.
His nods and scrapes are only the effects
of a habit that he [acquired when he was a
bar-boy. — T. Brown, H'orks, iii. 97.
Bare board, without putting down
stakes.
She was not onely able to lay down her
stake, but also to vve ready silver with the
King of Spaine, when he, notwithstanding
both his Indies, was fain to go on bare board.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI. vii. 3.
Barge, to go in a barge.
Whole tribes of males and females trotted,
farad it thither to build and inhabite, which
the saide kinges, whiles they weilded their
swords temporall, animadvertised of, assigned
a ruler or governour over them, that was
called the king's provost. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc^ vi. 151).
Bargee, a man who goes in a barge.
The Diets, give bargeman and barger.
I am sorry to have wasted a day in the
company of a man who sets up for a country
gentleman with the tongue of a Thames
barge* and the heart of a Jew pawnbroker.
—Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxiii.
The bargees nicknamed Lord Welter " the
sweep," and 6aid he was a good fellow, but a
terrible blackguard. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe,
ch. xlii.
Bar-geese. Barnacles were said to
grow on trees in Scotland, whence they
dropped into the sea and became solan
geese (see N., s. v. barnacle), Cf.
Claik-geese.
The (Trees-brood) Bar-geese mid th* Hebri-
dian wave,
Vnto his tune their far-flow'n wings doo
wave. — Sylvester, The Trophies, 1048.
Barguest, a goblin in the form of a
beast; also called a boh-ghost It is a
north-country word. H. has an ex-
planation of it, but no example. See
Willaris Glossary, West Riding ; Ro-
binson's Whitby Glossary, E. D. S.
He understood Greek, Latin, and Hebrew,
and therefore, according to the apprehension,
and in the phrase of his brother Wilfrid,
needed not to care " for ghaist or barghaist,
devil or dobbie."— Scott, Rob Roy, i. 223.
He had read of such apparitions, and been
sufficiently afraid of meeting a barguest in his
boyish days ; but in no instance had he ever
heard of the ghost of an animal. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. ccxiv.
Baring. See extract.
The process of baring or removing the
superficial soil preparatory to digging the
ironstone. The baring, as it is called by the
quarrymen, consists not only of the natural
surface soil, but also of the upper soft bed of
the ferruginous rock. — S. Sharp, 1871 (Arch.,
xliii. 120).
Barken, crust over, as a tree with
bark (V).
The best way's to let the blood barken
upon the cut — that saves plasters. — Scott,
GuyMannering, i. 239.
With the night came a shrewd frost that
barkened the blood on my wounds. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxiv.
Barkers, pistols. Cf. Bull-dog.
u Barkers for me, Barney," said Toby
Orankit. M Here they are," replied Barney,
producing a pair of pistols. — Dickens, Oliver
Twist, ch. zrii.
I'll give you five for those pistols
being rather a knowing one about the pretty
little barkers. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. xxiv.
Barnaby-Bright, St. Barnabas' Day,
June 11, under the old style was re-
garded as the longest day in the year,
though June 10 would answer to June
21 (new style). See N. and Q.t 6th
Sen, Vol. II.
BARNACLES
( 40 ) BARTON HOUSE
Barnaby-Bright, Barnaby-Bright,
The longest day, and the shortest night.
Old Rhyme.
The steward, after having perused their
several pleas, adjourned the court to Barnaby-
bright, that they might have day enough
before them. — Spectator, No. 6*23.
Barnacles, spectacles, as being bi-
nocular. See quotation, 0. v. Un-
illusory.
Jack. Your eyes dasell after your washing ;
these spectacles put on ;
Now view this ray sour; tell mee, is it not a
good one?
Grim. They bee gay bamikles, yet I see
never the better.
Edwards, Damon and Pitheas
(Dodsley, O. P/., i. 279).
Barn akin, the outer wall of a castle,
within which the barns, stables, &c.
were placed. See H., 8. v. barnekin.
The barnakin or outer ballium was also
added, which was surrounded by a strong
rampart and wet ditch.— Arch., x. 102 (1792).
Barn-gun, an eruption in the skin.
Same as Red-gum, q. v.
" Thou art not come to me," she said,
looking through my simple face as if it were
but glass, u to be struck for bone-shave, nor
to be blessed for ham-gun. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. xviii.
Barometry, barometrical science,
which has for its object the measur-
ing the weight of the atmosphere for
meteorological purposes.
A scrap of parchment hung by geometry
(A great refinement in barometry)
Can, like the stars, foretell the weather.
Strift, Elegy on Partrige.
Baronet, sirloin, q. v.
The sight of the roast beef struck him
dumb, permitting him only to say grace, and
to declare he must pay his respects to the
baronet, for so he called the sirloin. — Fielding,
Tom Jones, Bk. IV. ch. x.
Baronette, wife of a baronet
She had a leash of baronets with their
baronettes. — Trollope, Barchester Towers, ch.
XXXV.
Baronetted, created a baronet.
He thinks he has nicked a scandal tellin
how Sir Francis Withins was knighted for
bringing the first Abhorrence. In truth he
deserved to have been baronetted if he had
stood to it. — North, Examen, p. 500.
Baronry, barony.
They haue gotten vnto their kingdomes
Many noble baronries and erldomes,
With esquyres landes and kni^htes fees.
Dyaloqe betwene a Genttllman and
Husbandman, p. 186.
Barrel. The expression in the text
may perhaps illustrate the common but
rather obscure saying, "Never a barrel
the better herring," noticed «. v. Her-
ring.
They disdain to pay any more civility or
outward respect to their minister than they
challenge to themselves, or than they give to
their meanest comrades, which are of the
same bran and barrtll with themselves. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 245.
Barren, to make barren.
That time of yeare when the inamored
Sunne,
Clad in the richest roabes of lining fiers,
Courted ye Virgin aigne, great Natur's
Nunne,
Which barrains earth of al what earth
desires.
G» Jfarkham, Tragedie of <&> R.
Grinuile, p. 44.
Barren, barren land.
My last dream is, to have the sewage con-
veyed along the line of rails by pipes, giving
the railway companies an interest therein,
and so to fertilize especially the barrens of
Surrey and Berkshire. — C. Kingsley, 1859
{Life, ii. 100).
Barring - out takes place when
schoolboys shut the master out of the
school, and refuse to let him in except
on certain conditions. See EL, s. v.
Not schoolboys at a barring-out
Rais'd ever such incessant rout.
Sunft, Journal of a Modern Lady.
Revolts, republics, revolutions, most
No graver than a schoolboys' barring-out.
Tennyson, Princess, Conclusion.
Barrow-bunter, barrow-woman ; fe-
male costermonger.
I saw a dirty barrotobunter in the street
cleaning her dusty fruit with her own spittle.
— Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, i. 140.
Bars, a gambler's term. See quota-
tion. H. says, "To bar a die was a
phrase used among- gamblers : see Mr.
Collier's notes to the Ghost of Richard
III., p. 75."
They haue certayne termes, as a man
would saye, appropriate to theyr playing;
whereby they wyl drawe a mannes money,
but paye none, whiche they cal barres, that
surely he that knoweth them not maye soone
be debarred of all that ever he hath afore he
learne them. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 55.
Barton house, manor-house. See
H., s. v.
On the other side of the lane was Giffard's
house (the Barton liouse) and a square high
BASCA UDAL
( 4i )
BASKET-HARE
garden wall. — Relation of the Action before
Cyrencester (1642), p. 5*
Bascaudal.
In a cup from Stanton Moor, Derbyshire,
deeper than usual, the bascaudal character
was confined to the upper part. — Arch., xliii.
367 (1870).
Base. H. gives this as a Cumber-
land word for the perch.
The boisterous base, the hoggish tunny
fat. — Dennys, Secrets of Angling (Eng. Garner,
i. 166).
Bashaw, a Pasha, and so a great or
an imperious man.
In every society of men there will be some
Baskawes, who presume that there are many
rules of law from which they should be ex-
empted.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 82.
He desired my company to a minister of
state upon business, but the Bashaw was in-
disposed, t . e. not to be accoate&.^-Gentleman
Instructed, p. 203.
The fair Mrs. Pitt has been mobbed in the
park, and with difficulty rescued by some
gentlemen, only because this bashaw (Duke
of Cumberland) is in love with her. — Walpole,
Letters, i. 213 (1749).
B ashless, bold ; unabashed. In the
first extract it meass " bashful," but
this is probably meant for a blunder on
the part of the rustic speaker.
Com on, com on, master school-master, bee
not so bashless. — Sidney, Wanstead Play, p.
619.
Blush now, you bashles dames, that vaunt of
beautie rare,
For let me see who dares come in, and with
my deare compare.
Breton, Arbor of Amorous Devises, p. 4.
Bashhent, shame. "Inter quo*
minor est displicisisse pudor " is trans-
lated—
Where to controll lesse feare it were, lesse
bashment to displease. — Holland's Camden,
p. 86.
Bash- rao, a term of reproach.
Wilt loose thy roiall sole prerogatiue,
To make vngratef ul base Bash-rags to thriue ?
Davies, An Extasie, p. 95.
Basilean, royalist.
Now touching that which is spoken of the
oak in the last walk, if any intemperate
Basilean take exceptions thereat, let him
know that, as 'twas said before, most of them
are but traducements and pretensions; yet
it is a human principle (and will ever be so
to the world's end) that there never was yet
any Prince (except one), nor will there ever
be any hereafter, but had his frailties. —
Howell, Letters, iv. 23.
Basilisco, a piece of ordnance. Ba-
silisk is the more common form.
Give but fire
To this petard, it shall blow open, madain,
The iron doors of a judge, and make you
entrance,
When they (let them do what they can)
with all
Their mines, their culverins, and basiliscos,
Shall cool their feet without.
Massinger, Unnatural Combat, i. 1.
I had rather stand in the shock of a to*
silisco than in the fury of a merciless pen.—
Browne, Religio Medici, Pt. II. sect. iii.
Basket. To bring to the basket —
to reduce to poverty ; to go to the basket
= to go to prison, where the inmates
ate of the broken meats brought in a
basket from the sheriff's table: see
N., s. v. To leave in the basket = to
leave in the lurch; perhaps refers to
articles which do not sell readily.
Arrested ! this is one of those whose base
And abject flattery help'd to dig his grave ;
He is not worth your pity, nor my anger ;
Go to the basket, aud repent.
Massinger, Fatal Dowry, v. 1.
God be praised! I am not brought to the
basket, though I had rather live on charity
than rapine. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 6.
Whatever he wants, he has only to ask it,
And all other suitors are " left in the basket*1
Ingoldsby Legends (House-warming).
Basket-beagles, beagles used in
hunting a hare that was turned out of
a basket to be coursed. Cf. Basket-
hare.
Such were the members of the Killnakelty
hunt, once famous on the turf and in the
field, but now a set of venerable grey-headed
sportsmen, who had sunk from fox-hounds
to basket-beagles aud coursing. — Scott, St.
Bonan's Welt, i. 19.
Basket - buttons, buttons with a
device upon them like basket-work,
instead of a crest or monogram.
The concert began : song, sentimental, by
a light-haired young gentleman in a blue
coat and bright basket-buttons. — Sketches by
Boz (Mistaken Milliner).
Basket-clerks. See quotation ; also
citation from Spelman in R, s. v.
Basket.
The clergy lived at first upon the mere
benevolence of their hearers, who gave what
they gave, not to the clergy, but to the
Church ; out of which the clergy had their
portions given them in baskets, and were
thence called sportularii, basket-clerks. — Mil-
ton, Means to drive Hirelings out of the
Church.
Basket-hare, a hare carried in a
basket, and then turned out to be
c ou reed. Cf. Basket-beagle.
BASSEMAINS
( 4* )
BATTERFANG
Gome, open this portable tomb ; 'slife here's
nothing in it ; ferret him, or he'll never bolt.
It looks an if we had brought a basket-hare
to be set down and hunted. — The Committee,
Act IV.
Bassemains, compliments : the word
of course is really French. According
to H. and N. it is in Spenser, but they
give no reference.
Do my bassemains to the gentleman, and
tell him I will do myself the honour to wait
on him immediately. — Farquhar, Beaux
Stratagem, iii. 2.
Mr. Ranter, pray do the doctor's baise-
mains to the lady, and (squire her hither. —
Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xlvi.
t Basset, to play at basset
He had bassetted away his money and his
good humour. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 492.
Bastard. Fuller's etymologies seem
worth preserving as curious, if not
correct. He gives in the margin Cttja-
cius as the authority for the first deriv-
ation, and Kilianus for the second.
Henry Fitz-roy, naturall son to King
Henry the Eighth, . . . confuted their ety-
mology who deduced bastard from the Dutch
words boes and art, that is, an abject nature ;
aud verifyed their deduction, deriving it from
btsteaerd, that is, the best disposition ; such
was his forwardness in all martiall activities,
with his knowledge in all arts and sciences. —
Fuller, Worthies, Essex (i. 341).
Bastard, a mongrel, I suppose, though
it seems distinguished from this in the
extract.
He hath your greyhound, your mungrelb
your mastife, your terrier, your spaniel . . •
small ladies' puppies, caches and bastards. —
Return from Parnassus, ii. 5.
Bastinade, bastinado. The more
English form of the word is unusual.
They would upon second thoughts submit
to a bastinade rather than occasion bloodshed.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 351.
Presents ! present the rogues the bastinade,
— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 91 .
Bat-blind, blind as a bat.
O Bat-blind Fooles, doe ye infatuate
That Wisdome that makes Wisdome gouerne
Fate ? — Davits, Holy Rood, p. 13.
Bath. Bath was proverbial for the
number of its beggars: see Fullers
Worthies (Somersetshire) ; hence Go to
Bath = be a beggar.
" Go to Bath ! " said the Baron. A defiance
so contemptuous roused the ire of the adverse
commanders. — Ingoldsby Legends (Grey Dol-
phin).
Bath-coatino, a sort of stuff or cloth.
My landlord shewed me one (great-coat)
made of Bath-coating. — Life of J. Laclrinyton,
Letter zix.
Bathetic, pertaining to bathos.
A fatal insensibility to the ludicrous and
the bathetic. — Academy, July 3, 1875, p. 5.
Bath rings. Bath has given its
name to many things for which this
watering-place was supposed to be
famous. Bath buns, Bath tricks (which,
however, are made at Bridgewater), Bath
pipe, Bath coating, Bath fagots, Bath
chaps, Bath chairs, Bath Olivers, Bath
post. Hair-rings also seem to have
been one of its specialties.
A lock of hair which was so perfectly
strong that I had it woven into Bath rings. —
Archaol., vii. 104^(1785).
Battaglio, the body of an army.
Battalia is used in this sense (Richard
III., V. iii.).
I look upon the Defamers, Dividers, and
Destroyers of the Church of England (what-
ever they are or seem) to be no other than
the perdues or forelorn hope of Popery,
which by lighter skirmishes open advantages
to the Pope's main Battaglio. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 366. ,
Batter. See extract.
The angular columns ... all stand, as the
workmen term it, battering, or sloping in-
wards.— Archaol., x. 185 (1792).
Baiter, to plaster or paste. A few
lines lower down he says it is enough
to make any man turn satirist " to see
such batter euerie weeke besmeare Each
publike post and Church dore."
To behold the wals
Battered with weekely newes composM in
Pauls.
A. Holland (Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 81).
Batterdasher, a weapon ; perhaps a
mace.
The halls of justices of the peace were
dreadful to behold, the skreens were gar-
nished with corslets and helmets, gaping
with open mouth, with coats of mail, lances,
pikes, halberts, brown bills, batterdashcrs,
bucklers, and the modern coli vers and petro-
nils (in King Charles I.'s time) turned into
muskets and pistols. — Aubrey, Miscellanies,
p. 215.
Batterfang, to belabour, or beclaw :
still in use as a provincialism. See
Robinson's Whitby Glossary (E. D. S.).
The Pastor lays on lusty bangs,
Whitehead the Pastor batterfangs.
Ward, England's Reformation, p. 124.
BATTLE
( 43 ) BA YARD OF TEN TOES
Battle. The battle was kept, i. o.
was fought.
The battaiU was kepte in Cherronea. —
UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 373.
Battle-bolt, a cannon-ball.
The rushing battle-bolt sang from the three-
decker out of the foam.
Tennyson, Maud, I. i. 13.
Battled, embattled ; built with bat-
tlements. There is a quotation from
Turberville in R., and a reference in H.
The valleys of grape-loaded Tines that glow
Beneath the battled tower.
Tennyson, Dream of Fair Women, at. 55.
Battledore seems to be used in the
extract for a sort of rolling-pin.
Bowl them [the gumbalsl with battledores
into long pieces, and tie them up in knots,
and so dry them. — Queen's Closet Opened, p.
222 (1655).
Battle-flags, colours carried in
battle.
It hangs there we may say between the
privileged Orders and the unprivileged, as a
ready-made battle prize, ana necessity of
war from the very first : which battle-prize
whoever seizes it may thenceforth bear as
battle-flag with the best omens. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Bk. IV. ch. i.
Till the war-drum throbbed no longer, and
the battle-Jlags were furled,
In the Parliament of man, the Federation of
the world. — Tennyson, Locksley Hall.
Battle-royal, a fight between seve-
ral cocks, the one that holds out the
longest being of course the victor ; and
so any vehement quarrel.
1st Nurse. Tour husband is the noted'st
cuckold in all our street.
2nd burse. You lie, you jade ; yours is a
greater.
Phil. Hist — now for a battle-royal.
Howard, All Mistaken, Act I.
What aggravates the reproach and the
disgrace upon us Englishmen is those species
of fighting which are called Battle-royal, and
the Welsh T&am.—Archaol., iii. 148 (1775).
A bottle-royal speedily took place between
the two worthy mothers-in-law. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. vi.
Bauble. N. quotes a passage, *. v.,
in which he says bauble is used " appar-
ently as an adjective/' I have cited
another, s. v. Curtsey.
Baudery. Applied in the subjoined
passage to physical, not moral, dirt —
the smoke from a candle.
And have our roofe,
Although not archt, yet weather proofe,
And seeling free
From that cheape candle baudery.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 141.
Bawdy basket, a prostitute.
Many a faire lasse in London towne,
Many a bawdie basket borne vp and downe :
Many a broker in a thridbare gowne,
Many a bankrowte scarce worth a crowne,
In London.
Futtenham, ArtofEng. Poesie,
Bk. III. ch. xiz.
Baw vaw, trifling. The word seems
to be two contemptuous interjections
joined together, and used adjectivally.
See R., 8. v. baw.
I stay not thye body, ne on baw vaw trom-
perye descant.— Stanyhurst, Mn., iv. 401.
" Bawwaw," quoth Bagshaw, seems
to be a proverbial saying implying a
denial of that to which it refers. Baw-
waw = beware (?), cf. extract s. v. Ko ;
but see preceding entry.
All this may passe in the queene's peace,
and no man say bo to it ; but •' Bamcaw,"
quoth Bagshaw to that which drawlacheth
behmde, of the first taking of herrings there.
—Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 174).
Bay, bidding: perhaps an abbre-
viation of " to obey."
Friar, I am at beck and bay,
And at thy commandment to sing and say,
And other sports among.
Peele, Edward I., p. 381.
Bay, to defy, as one who stands at
bay, but see next entry.
Great king, no more bay with thy wilf idlings
His wrath's dread torrent.
Sylvester, Ihe Lawe, 610.
Bay, to confine as in a bay. Pos-
sibly in the second extract bay'd=z
cowed. See previous entry.
Hee whose powerfull hand
Bayed-vp the Red Sea with a double wall.
Sylvester, second day, first weeke, 1169.
Then (zealous) calling on th' immortall God,
He smot the sea with his dead-liuing rod :
The sea obeyed, as bayfd; the waues con-
troul'd,
Each upon other vp to Heaven do folde.
Ibid., The Lawe, 694.
Even so God's finger, which these waters
bay*d,
Beeing with-drawen the ocean swell'd and
sway'd. — Ibid. 720.
Bay, baize. Fr. bate.
The Flemish bay and say makers petitioned
to have free trade. — Markham, life of Lord
Fairfax, p. 320.
Bayard of ten toes, Shanks's mare,
BAYOU
( 44 )
BEARDY
q. v. Breton says of the " honest poore
man " —
His trauell is the walke of the woful, and
his horse Bayard often toes. — Good and Badde,
p. 14.
At last he [Coryat] undertook to travail
into the East Indies by land, mounted on an
hone with ten toes.— Fuller, Worthies, Somer-
set (ii. 291).
Bayou, a channel for water.
Penetrated in all directions either by
bayous formed by nature, or canals which
cost little more trouble in making than
ditches. — T. Flint, Recoil, of Valley of Missis-
sippi, p. 301 (1826).
A great bayou which runs down into an
arm of the Mississippi. — W. H. Russell,
Diary, North and South, i. 41 1 (1863).
Beacon. See extract.
A Beacon (we know) is so called from
beckoning, that is, making signs, or giving
notice to the next Beacon. — Fuller, Worthies,
Somerset (ii. 282).
BEAD-nooK.
The Greeks with bead-hooks fought,
Kept still aboard for naval fights, their heads
with iron wrought
In hooks and pikes.
Chapman, Iliad, xv. 356.
Beak, to attack with the beak.
Like cocks for ever at each other beaking. —
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 140.
Beak, thieves' cant for magistrate.
" I suppose you don't know what a beak is,
my flash com-pan-i-on ? " Oliver mildly re-
plied that he had always heard a bird's mouth
described by the term in question. "My
eyes, how green!" exclaimed the young
gentleman. " Why a beak's a madg'strate ;
and when you walk by a beak's order, it's not
straight forerd, but always a going up and
niver a coming down agin." — Dickens, Oliver
Ttcist, ch. viii.
The pies and jays that utter words,
And other Dicky gossips of birds,
That talk with as much good sense and de-
corum
As many Beaks who belong to the quorum.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Bkakless, without a beak. The beak-
less bird = the bat.
Hence beak-le js-Bird ; hence winged-Beast,
they cride,
Hence plume-less wings! (thus scorn her
either side). — Sylvester, The Decay, 276.
Beam-ends. A person entirely at a
loss is said to be thrown upon his
beam-ends: a nautical metaphor.
He laughed the idea down completely;
and Tom, abandoning it, was thrown upon his
beam-ends again for some other solution. —
Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit, ch. xl.
Beamily, radiantly.
Thou thy griefs dost dress
With a bright halo, shining beamily.
Keats, To Byron,
Beamling, a little beam.
Rightly to speake, what Man we call and
count,
It is a beamling of Diuinity,
It is a dropling of th' Eternall Fount,
It is a moatling hatcht of th' Vnity.
Sylvester, Quadrains of Pibrac, st. 13.
Bean. The black of a bean = some-
thing very minute.
Neither will this uncharitable censure, if
it were true, advantage his cause the black of
a bean. — Bramhall, ii. 91.
Beany, in good spirits, like a horse
after a feed of beans.
So goes one's day; all manner of incon-
gruous things to do, and the very incongruity
keeps one beany and jolly. — C. Kingsley,
Letter, May, 1856.
Bear, a kind of barley that has more
than two rows of grain in the ear.
Jamieson says four rows.
The valleys for the most part are covered
with beer or bigg, and the hills with snow.
—Modern Account of Scotland, 1670 {Harl.
Misc., vi. 136).
I was only wanting, said Triptolemus ...
to look at the fear-braird, which must be sair
laid wi' this tempest. — Scott, The Pirate, ch.
vi,
Bearance, endurance. In the original
tolerantiam.
Their minds are inured to temperance and
bearance, and therefore undergo those things
which are inevitable more moderately than
other persons. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 407.
Bearbind, bindweed. Hood spells
it bear-bine.
The Boots I speak of are in general small
and soft, not unlike the Roots of Asparagus
or of Bearbind.— Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain,
iii. 242.
The bear-bine with the lilac interlaced,
The sturdy burdock chok'd its slender neigh-
bour,
The spiry pink. — Hood, Haunted House.
Beardy, bearded.
Beard-less Apollo's beardy Sons did once
With iuice of hearbs rejoin the scattered
bones
Of the chaste prince, that in th' Athenian
court
Preferred death before incestuous sport.
Sylvester, third day, first veeke, 688.
BEARERS
( 45 ) BEAUTY-SLEEP
Bearers, helpers : a legal term.
If we cannot hope to get ourselves quite
off, yet, as men use to do in common pay-
ments and taxes, we plead hard to nave
bearers and partners that may go a share
with ns.— Sanderson, i. 185.
Bearess, she-bear.
And when he got raps and taps and slaps,
Snatches and pinches, snips and snaps,
As if from a tigress or bearess,
They told him how lords would oourt that
hand,
And always gave him to understand,
While he rubb'd, poor soul,
His carrotty poll,
That his hair had been pull'd by a M Hairess."
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Bear-leader, a travelling tutor, be-
cause he has the charge of a cub. See
extract s. v. Gerund-grinder.
And as I almost wanted bread,
I undertook a bear to lead,
To see the brute perform his dance
Through Holland, Italy, and France ;
But it was such a very Bruin,
. • • . • • •
I took my leave, and left the cub
Some humbler Swiss to pay and drub.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xxiii.
They pounced upon the stray nobility, and
seized young lords travelling with their bear-
leaders.— Thackeray, Bk. of Snobs, ch. vii.
Bears. Are you there with pour
bears ? = Are you still harping on the
same string ? or, Are you there again ?
According to Joe Miller (No. 123) this
was the exclamation of a man who,
not liking a sermon which he had heard
on Elisha and the bears, went on the
next Sunday to a different church, but
found the same clergyman and the
same discourse.
Another when at the racket court he had
a ball struck into his hazard, he would ever
and anon cry out, Estes votts la avec vos ours ?
Are you there with your bears? which is
ridiculous in any other language but Eng-
lish.— Howell, Forraine Travell, sect. 3.
0, quoth they, here is an accident may
save the man ; are you there with your bears ?
we will quit the exercise of the House's
right rather than that should be.— North,
Examen, p. 220.
Beasthood, the nature or condition
of beasts. R. has beastlihood.
Many a Circe island with temporary en-
chantment, temporary conversion into heart-
hood and hoghood. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III.
Bk. I. ch. vii.
Beaten, experienced ; inured ; also
trite, in which sense it is used now, but
only with the words path or track.
There the Roman king with the strength
only of his old beaten souldiers (veteran i
exercitus) . . . had the better. — Holland's
Zdvy, p. 10.
A beaten politician of our times, learned in
the wisdom of newer state, . . . would have
projected Moses a far more commodious plot.
— Ward, Sermons, p. 117.
A man beaten to the trade may wrangle
and harangue better than one that is unex-
perienced in the science of chicane. — Gentle'
man Instructed, p. 522.
To ply the world with an old beaten story
of your wit, and eloquence, and learning. . .
. . I confess I have neither conscience nor
countenance to do it. — Swift, Tale of Tub,
Dedic. to Lord Somers.
Beat trade, to carry on trade.
In Holland the wives are so well vers'd in
bargaining, cyphering, and writing, that, in
the absence of their husbands in long sea-
voyages, they beat the trade at home. — Hotcell,
Letters, I. ii. 15.
Ever since our merchants have beaten a
peaceful and uninterrupted trade into this
town and elsewhere. — Ibid. I. vi. 3.
Beau ideal, perfect model ; the high-
est conceivable type. The expression
is Anglioized, but Irving uses it in its
French form.
From poetry or romance young people
usually form their early ideas of love, before
they have actually felt the passion ; and the
image which they have in their own minds
of the beau ideal is cast upon the first objects
they afterwards behold. This, if I may be
allowed the expression, is Cupid's Fata Mor-
gana. Deluded mortals are in ecstasy whilst
the illusion lasts, and in despair when it
vanishes. — Miss Edgeworth. Belinda, ch. xix.
The common orders of English seem won-
derfully captivated with the beau ideal which
they have formed of John Bull.— Irving,
Sketch Book (John Bull).
My ambition is to give them a beau ideal
of a welcome. — C. Bronte, J. Eyre, ch. xxxiv.
Beauidealize, to form a beau ideal,
q.v.
I shall spare you the flowers I have
gathered, the trees I have seen, leaving you
to beauidealize them for yourself. — L. E.
Landon (Life by Blanchard, i. 60).
Beauty-sleep, the sleep before mid-
night.
"Are you going? it is not late; not ten
o'clock yet." " A medical man, who may be
called up at any moment, must make sure
of his beauty-sleep." — Kingsley, Two Years
Ago, ch. xv.
Would I please to remember that I had
BEA-WAYMENTJNG ( 46 )
BECKETIST
roused him up at night, and the quality
always made a point of paying four times
over for a man's loss of his beauty-sleep. I
replied that his loss of beauty-sleep was rather
improving to a man of so high a complexion.
— Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. bdv.
Bea-waymentino, bleating.
Tell me, if wolves the throat
Have caught of thy dear dam,
Canst thou, poor lamb, become another's
lamb?
Or rather, till thou die,
Still for thy dam with bea-waymenting cry ?
Sidney, Arcadia, p 396.
Bebang, to beat, cudgel.
A s worn e brother of his . . . bebang eth
poore paper in laud of bag-pudding. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. 3fisc, vi. 150).
Bebasse, to kiss heartily.
Queen Dido shal col the, and smacklye
bebasse thee. — Stanyhurst, AZn., i. 670.
Bebay, to indent ; to form bays.
We fro land harbours too mayne seas gyddye
dyd enter,
Voyded of al coast sight with wild fluds
roundly bebayed.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iii 196.
Beblain, to strike with blains.
Beblaine the bosome of each mistres
That bares her brests (lust signes) ghests to
allure.
Davies, Humour's Heaven on Earth, p. 43.
Bebless, to surround with benedic-
tions.
If I have seen or suffered any Poor
To lye and dye Naked, or out of Door :
Nay, if his loynes be-blest not mee from
harm,
Because my Fleece and Cottage kept them
warm.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, iii. 499.
Beblotched, covered with blots, or
blotches of ink.
Down comes a proof in such a barbarous
state, so beblotched and bedeviled, that I am
swearing, Master Bedford, with very good
reason.— R. Southey, Letters, 1807 (i. 412).
Bebogged, embogged.
After long travelling, his feet were fixed
in Ireland, where he was not bebogg'd (as
some, otherwise his equals) with ill success.
—Fuller, Worthies, Dorset (i. 313).
Bebooted, an emphatic form of
booted.
Couriers arrive bestrapped and bebooted. —
Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch iii.
Bebost, embossed.
In hir right hand, which to and fro did shake,
She bare a skourge, with many a knottie
string,
And in hir left a snaffle bit or brake,
Bebost with gold, and many a jingling ring.
Gascoigne, Complaint of Philomene.
Bebotch, to afflict with botches.
Then petti-botching brokers all bebotch,
That m a month catch eighteene pence in
pound.
Davies, Humour's Heaven on Earth, p. 44.
Bebroid, to cover with embroidery.
Vestures of gould most ritchlye bebroyded.
Stanyhurst, JEn., w. 497.
Bebump, to knock about.
You have so skilfully hampered, bo-
thwacked, belammed, and bebumped the
catchpole. — Urquhatfs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch.
• • •
ami.
Bbcack, to defile with ordure. Ajax
is of course a pun on " a jakes."
Another comes with wit, too costiue then,
Making a glister-pipe of his rare pen,
And through the same he all my brest bc-
cackes,
And turnes me so to* nothing but Ajax.
Davies, Paper 's Complaint, p. 75.
Becapped, furnished with a cap.
He thus appear'd in sprightly glee,
Becappyd in due conformity ;
For to give him a sportsman's air
Some fair hand did his cap prepare.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. v.
Becedered, spread out like a cedar (?).
So neer that oft ones target's pike doth
pearce
Another's shield, and sends him to his herse ;
And gawdy plumes of foes (be-Cederedbrnue)
Oft on their foes vnplumed crests do wane.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 318.
Becheck, to rebuke.
But brutish Cham, that in his brest accurst
The secret roots of sinf ull Atheisme nurst :
With bended brows, with stout and stern
aspect,
In scornf ull tearms his Father thus be-cheekt.
Sylvester, The Arke, 103.
Beck, to imprison : thieves' cant Cf .
Beak.
The circle with the two dots was writ by
another of our brotherhood, and it signifies
as how the writer . . . was becked, was asking
here, and lay two months in Starabin. —
Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lv.
Becketi8T, one like Becket, The man
referred to, it will be seen, was not
contemporary with Becket. Cf. Anti-
Beck ETI8T.
He was a great Becketist, viz. a stout
BECKETIZE
( 47 )
BEDINNER
opposer of Regal Power over Spiritual Per-
sons ; on which, and other accounts, he wrot
a Book to Pope Innocent the Fourth against
King Henry the Third.— Fuller, Worthies,
Wilts (ii. 467).
Bbcketize, to favour Becket. Cf.
Frbderize, Spaniolize, Ac. Sp3aking
of Cleveland the poet (Leicestershire),
Fuller speaks of some who have
" Clevelandized" i. e. tried to imitate
Lira.
He finds little favour from our Historians
of his age, because they do generally Becket-
ize.— Fuller, Worthies, Devon (i. 276).
Becloak, to cover as with a cloak.
Torn limbs, tost truncheons, Shiver, Fire,
and Smoak,
As with thick clouds, both Armies round
becloak.— Sylvester, Battaile of 1'vry, 138.
Becollier, to blacken as a collier.
See 8. v. Becollow.
Beoollow, to dirty.
Too foule-mouthed I am to becollow or
becollier him with such chimnie-sweeping
attributes of smoking and parching. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 165).
Becoronet, to adorn" with a coronet.
Open scoundrels rode triumphant, be-
chademed, becoronetted, bemitrea.—Carlvle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. i.
Becrampouned, encircled or fastened.
A crampon is the socket of gold in
which a jewel is set ; an ouch.
With green shrubs and pure gould neatly
becrampound,
His shafts on shoulders rattle.
St any hurst, Mn., iv. 154.
Becravated, adorned with a cravat.
What, Tony, i' faith ? what, dost thou not
know me ? By'r Lady, nor I thee, thou
art so becravated and so beperiwigged.— Con'
greve, Way of the World, in. 15.
BecriM80N, to redden.
O why was the earth so beautiful, be-
crimsoned with dawn and twilight, if man's
dealings with man were to make it a vale of
scarcity, of tears, not even soft tears? —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. VII. ch. vi.
Becrown, to crown.
Then father Anchises a goold boul massye
becrotming,
With wyne brim charged, thee Gods celestial
h&jleih.—Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 537.
Becrutched, furnished with crutches.
My master was at the gate becrutched; I
told him I'd liever have seen him in another
disguise.— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. Iv.
Becupided, covered with Cupids.
The Colisee . . is a most gaudy Ranelagh,
gilt, painted, and becupided like an opera.—
Walpole, Letters, iii. 375 (1771).
Becurse, to assail with curses.
He was going and leaving his malison on
ns root and branch ; I was never so becursed
in all my days. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. xlviii.
Bedevilment, confusion ; trouble.
The lawyers have twisted it into such a
state of bedevilment that the original merits
of the case have long disappeared from the
face of the earth. — Dickens, Bleak House,
ch. vui.
If you will open your bedevilments to me
when they come thick upon you, I may show
you better ways out of them than you can
find for fyourself . — Ibid., Hard Times, ch.
xxiii.
Bedfast, confined to bed ; bedridden
My old woman is bedfast. — Mrs. GaskelU
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. ii.
Bedfordshire. To be for Bedford-
shire = inclined for bed. Many names
of places are used punningly in various
phrases : e. g. land of Nod in extract.
Cf.LoTHBURY, Needham's Cross, Birch-
ING-LANE, &C, &C.
Lady Ans. I'm sure 'tis time for all honest
folks to go to bed.
Miss. Indeed my eyes draw straws (she's
almost asleep) . . .
Col. I'm going to the land of Nod.
Ner. Faith I'm for Bedfordshire.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. iii.).
The time for sleep had come at last,
And there was the bed, so soft, so vast,
Quite a field of Bedfordshire clover.
Hood, 3fiss Kiltnansegg.
Bediadem, to adorn with a diadem.
Open scoundrels rode triumphant, bedia-
demed% becoronetted, be mitred. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. i.
Bediamond, to adorn with diamonds.
Astarte's bediamonded crescent
Distinct with its duplicate horn.
E. A. Foe, Ulalume (ii. 21).
Bediafer, to mark in patterns; to
enamel, which is the word used in some
copies.
The purling springes, groves, birdes, and
well-weav'a bowers,
With fields bediaperd with flowers,
Presente their shappes.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 457.
Bedinner, to provide with dinner.
On the ninth morning of April these forty
Swiss blockheads arrive. . . They are ha-
BEDIP
( 48 ) BEFEATHERED
rangued, bedinnered, begifted. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. x.
Bedip, to imbrue.
The warrior's spear bedipp*d in blood,
And discord wild in angry mood.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. ii.
Bedizenment, coarae or gaudy adorn-
ment.
Strong Dames of the Market, they sit
there . . with oak-branches, tricolor bedizen'
ment, firm seated on their cannons. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. IV. ch. iv.
Bedlamer, a Tom o' Bedlam (see
H.) or mad beggar.
This country [the Border] was then much
troubled with Dedlamers. — North, Life of
Lord Guilford, i. 271.
Bedocumkntize, to supply or support
with evidence.
Let them revolve the digests of our Eng-
lish discoveries, cited up in the precedencs
(sic) and bedocumentized most locupleatley. —
Afashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 157).
Bedowst, washed over; thoroughly
wetted.
A bruised barke with billowes all bedowst.
Gosson, Speculum Humanum, p. 76.
Bedress, to dress up.
The bride, whose tonish inclination
Attended to the ruling fashion,
To make her entry had bedress'd
Her upright form in all her best.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. v.
Bedrifted, driven about.
And poor Orleans Egalit6 himself, for one
begins to pity even him ; what does he do
with them? The disowned of all parties,
the rejected and foolishly bedrifted hither
and thither, to what corner of nature can he
now drift with advantage ? — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. lii.
Bedumb, to make dumb.
Every soul is more deafened and bedumbed
by increasing corruptions, by actual sins. —
Dp. Hall, Cord. {Deaf and Dumb).
Bedusk, to darken.
How be yt, blynd bayards, we plod on with
phrensie bedusked. — Stanyhurst, j£n., ii. 254.
Bedusted, covered or mixed with
dust. ■
Stoanes dismembred from stoans, smooke
foggye bedusted. — Stanyhurst, Mn., ii. 632.
Bee-hive chair, a sort of porter's
chair with a wicker-work top.
In front of the chimney stood a wooden
bee-hive chair. ,-^Southey, The Doctor, ch. iv.
Beek, to bake. The word would now
be regarded as a Scotticism.
Go home now, and make thyself merry
with thy wealth, while Christ stands mourn-
ing in the streets; . . . beek thy pampered
limbs at the fire, whiles He shakes through
cold. — Adams, ii. 9.
Be-epithet, to adorn with epithets.
Your campaign in Scotland rolled out and
well be-epitheted would make a pompous
work.— Walpole, Letters, i. 157 (1746).
Beer. See extract. The age referred
to by Fuller is that of Erasmus, who
complained of the ale (cervisia) of
Queen's College, Cambridge, as " raw,
smal, and windy." Skelton also is
speaking of " King Harry's [VIII.]
time."
The Dutchman's strong beere
Was not hopt over heere,
To us 'twas unknowne ;
Bare ale of our owne
In a bowle we might bring
To welcome the king.
Skelton, Elynour Rummin
(Harl. Misc., i. 415).
Whereby it appears ale in that age was the
constant beverage of all colled gea before the
innovation of beere (the child of Hops) was
brought into England. — Fuller, Hist. ofCamb.,
v. 48.
Beer, to drink beer.
He surely had been brandying it or 1*eerinj,
That is, in plainer English, he was drunk.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 138.
Beer-chiller, a pot or vessel used to
warm beer. The name seems to be
given on the Incus a non lucendo
principle. In another part of the same
volume (Mr. Watkins TotUe) Dickens
speaks of " a pint pot, the contents of
which were chilling on the hob."
We should have gone dreaming on until
the pewter pot on the table, or the little
beer-chiller on the fire, had started into life,
and addressed to us a long story of days gone
by. — Sketches by Boz (Parlour Orator).
Bees'-winged, having a filmy sub-
stance in it like a bee's wing. This is a
sign of age in port.
His port is not presentable, unless bee$%-
winged. — Hall, Modern English, p. 32.
Befeathered, sprinkled with feathers.
Like as the haggard, cloisterM in her mew,
To scour her downy robes, and to renew
Her broken flags, preparing to o'erlook
The tim'rous mallard at the sliding brook,
Sets off from perch to perch, from stock to
ground,
From ground to window; thus surveying
round
Her dove-befeathered prison.
Quarles, Emblems, III. i. 33.
BEFET1SHED
( 49 )
BEGRUNTLE
Befetished, given over to fetichism,
q. v.
I object only to a connoisseur in swearing,
as I would to a connoisseur in painting, &c.,
kc; the whole sett of 'em are so hong
round and befetisKd with the bows and
triuckets of criticism. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, ii.
157.
Be fettered, manacled ; enslaved.
They are the mute representatives of their
tongue-tied, btfettered, heavy-laden nations.
—Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. x.
Befoul, to dirty, bespatter.
Lawyers can live without befouling each
other's names ; doctors do not fight duels. —
Trollope, BarchesUr Towers, ch. xxi.
Be frilled, adorned with a frill.
Mrs. Farebrother, the Vicar's white-haired
mother, bef rilled and kerchiefed with dainty
cleanliness. — G. Eliot, Jfiddlemarch, ch. xvii.
Befumb, to cloud or intoxicate.
If such a folly hath btfunCd tout brain,
And fill'd your phant'sie with presumption
vain.
With idle hopes ; away with those conceits.
Sylvester, Maiden's Blush, p. 141.
Bkfdrrbd, covered with furs.
The winter came, the winds were bleak,
And the cold breeze blew o'er the lake ;
When Madam Syntax never stirr'd,
But well beruff'd and well befurr'd.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. v.
Begarded, covered with gards or
embroidery.
My too strait-laced tM-beyarded girles
The skurome of nicenesse (London mistresses)
Their skins imbroder with plague's orient
pearls.
Davies, Humour's Heaven on Earth, p. 43.
Begarnish, to adorn.
See how the charger bends with thy lord's
fish,
What Sparagus begarnishes the dish.
Stapylton, Juvenal, v. 04.
Beggar. The knowledge that a
beggar has of his dish is proverbially
intimate; referring to the clap -dish
which beggars carried to attract atten-
tion. See N., s. v. clap-dish, who notes
the proverb, but gives no illustration.
Know him ! d'ye auestion it ? Odds fish !
Sir, does a beggar Know his dish ?
Prior, The Conversation, p. 80.
Lady An*. Do you know him, Mr. Never-
out?
Xev. Know him ? Ay, Madam, as well as
a beggar knows his dish.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Beggar-my-neighbour, a simple a^d
childish game at cards, described in H.,
but without quotation. Southey's de-
scription is more complicated.
I cannot call to mind anything which is
estimated so much below its deserts as the
game of Beggar-my-neighbour. It is gener-
ally thought fit only for the youngest
children, or for the very lowest and most
ignorant persons iuto whose hands a pack of
cards can descend. . . . You take up trick
by trick ; the trump, as at other g»mes. takes
every other suit. If suit is not followed,
the leader wins the trick ; but if it is, the
highest card is the winner. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. cxlii.
Beggary, beggarly ; poor. See ex-
tracts, s. w. Clamper, Cold roste.
Snch beggary wretches as had nothing to
leese were nothing medled withal. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 130.
Begift, to load with gifts.
On the ninth morning of April these forty
Swiss blockheads arrive. . . . They are ha-
rangued, bedinnered, begifttd. — Carlyte, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. x.
Begild, to adorn as with gilding.
The Diets, have btgilt, with an extract
from Jonson.
Doth a man perceive his heart a little be-
gilded with ostentation ? — Adams, ii. 465.
The lightning-flash from swords, casks, cour-
ti laces,
With quiv'ring beams begilds the neighbour
grasses. — Sylvester, Battaile of Yvry, p. 102.
Begirdle, to encircle.
Like a ring of lightning, they volleying
and ca-iraing begirdle her from shore to shore.
—Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. VII. ch. iii.
Beglittered, irradiated.
This sayd, shee turned with rose color
beaunlye beglittered. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 376.
Beg roan, to assail with groans.
Not ten days hence Patriot Brissot, be-
shouted this day by the patriot galleries, shall
fiud himself begroaned by them on account
of his limited patriotism. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. II. Bk. VI. ch. itf.
Begruntle, to make uneasy ; at least
this seems to be the meaning in this
passage. Perhaps the effect is put for
the cause. Persons who are uneasy
groan or gruntle, which last word is
used of pigs in the Rehearsal and in
Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV.
ch. xvi.
The Spaniards were beqmntled with these
scruples.— /fcwfrrf, Life of Wit Hams, i. 131.
E
BEGUTTED
( 5° )
BEL AD YSHIP
Begutted, with the inside taken out
or destroyed.
The rats, it seems, had play'd the rig
In tearing up the Doctor's wig :
All discomposed awhile he strutted,
To see his peruke thus begutted.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. ii.
Behack, to hack to pieces.
The tree is all to be~hackt for the wood
thereof, reputed of soveraigne vertue. —
Sandys, Travds, p. 127.
Behallowed, consecrated.
Whose head 'beefrindged with behallowed
tresses
Seemes like Apollo's when the moone hee
blesses. — Herrick, Appendix, p. 433.
Behatted, furnished with a hat.
Most haply too, as they untied him.
He saw his hat and wig beside him ;
So thus bewigg'd and thus behatted,
Down on the grass the Doctor squatted.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. iii.
Beheaven, to make happy ; to raise
to heaven. The word is used by Davies
several times.
Now shee Chimeraes, then she Beauties
frame,
That doe the mynde beheau'n with matchless
blisse. — Davies, Miruin in Modum, p. 8,
Behem, to surround, hem in.
Armies of pains extreme
Afresh invade mee, and mee round behem.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, i. 688.
Whom on each side behem
A late Repentance or a flat Despair.
Ibid., Tobacco Battered, 681.
Behest, to promise.
He apertly behesteth to send the Holy
Ghost.— Philpot, p. 379.
Beholding, attractive.
When he saw me, I assure you, my beauty
was not more beholding to him than my
harmony. — Sidney, Arcadia, Bk. I. p. 50.
Behorrored, shocked ; terrified.
And the Turkish women for'ard
Were frightened and behorrored.
Thackeray, The White Squall.
Behoved, necessary; it would now
be regarded as a Scotticism.
He had all those endowments mightily at
command which are behoved in a scholar.—
Socket, Life of Williams, i. 39.
Behump, to fit with a hump, or per-
haps to raise a swelling upon a person.
Behump them, bethump them, belump
them, belabour them, pepper them. — Ur-
quhart's Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. liii.
Behypocrite, to accuse of hypocrisy.
O Christ ! wert Thou on earth as once Thou
wert,
How would'st Thou now behypocrit man's
hart. — Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 75.
Being, was used formerly where we
should now put having; unless we
joined being with some such word as
engaged, obliged, &c.
Being to take footing on a new earth, the
inhabitants might prove stronger than the
invaders, — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 71.
Being to meet a lawyer at the Rummer,
where I now left him, he was obliged to
leave your ladyship. — Centlivre, The Artifice,
Act III.
The King being to go to Holland leaves the
regency in the hands of seven lords. — Mis-
son, Travels in Eng., p. 271.
Being to pass near his door, for he lives
but two miles from Maidenhead, I sent him
word I would call. — Walpole, Letters, ii. 468
(1763).
When the general tenor of his character,
and the circumstances of his being to pay
that sum the next day came to be considered,
the whole artifice was seen through. — John-
ston, Chrysal, i. 201.
It ended in Charles's being to meet him at
breakfast. — Miss Austen, Persuasion* ch. vii.
Being to go to a ball in a few days, she
was very impatient to get rid of the erup-
tion.— Miss Edgeicorth, Out of Debt, Out of
Danger, ch. ii.
Be-inked, stained with ink.
One dark little man stood, sat, walked,
lectured, under the head-piece of a bandit
bonnet-grec, and within the girth of a sorry
paletot much be-inked, and no little adust. —
Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxzv.
Bejewel, to cover with jewels ; to
make brilliant.
They found . . . women so over-dressed,
so bejewelled, so coarse. — Mist Edgeicorth,
Helen, ch. xxzv.
The westering sun slants into the church-
yard by some unwonted entry, a few prism-
atic tears drop on an old tomb-stone, and a
window that I thought was only dirty is for
the moment all bejewelled. — Dickens, Uncom-
mercial Traveller, xxi.
Bejig, to dance about.
No more he fiddled to the people,
When they bejigg'd it 'neath the steeple.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour HI. c v.
Belack, to blame.
As for my preaching itself, I trust in God
my lord of London cannot rightfully belack
it, nor justly reprove it. — Latimer, ii. 329.
Beladyship, to address by the title
of ladyship. Cf. B em a dam.
BEL A UD
( 5i )
BELL
It would have done anybody's heart good
to bare heard how Mrs. Twist did be-ladyship
my poor mother. — Nares. Thinks I to My-
self, ii. 38.
Belaud, to cover with praise.
She would not care to read the volumes
over which her pretty ancestresses wept and
thrilled a honored years ago; which were
commended by divines from pulpits, and
belauded all Europe over. — Thackeray, Vir-
ginians, ch. xzvi.
A man may be puffed and belauded, envied,
ridiculed, counted upon as a tool, and fallen
in love with, or at least selected as a future
husband, and yet remain virtually unknown.
— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xv.
Belave, to wash.
Me in Thy Blood belave,
And in my soule Thy sacred lawes ingraue.
Sylvester, The La tee, 1112.
That long large Sea, which with his plentious
waves
A third or fourth part of the world be-laues.
Ibid., The Captaines, 147.
Belcher, a handkerchief named after
Belcher, a noted pugilist, used both as
adjective and substantive.
The silver fork and the flat iron, the
uvislin cravat and the Belcher neckerchief,
would but ill assort together. — Sketches by
Boz {Pawnbroker9 s Shop).
Mr. Wilkins had brought a pint of shrimps
neatly folded up in a clean belcher to give a
zest to the meal. — Ibid. (Miss Evans and the
Eagle).
Bkle, den or covert. Cf. Scotch
bield.
The fox will not worry near his bele, but
rangeth far abroad, lest he be espied. —
Sandys, p. 64.
Belka vinos, leavings.
He had nothing for his pence but the wast
heleavings of others' beastly labours. — Greene,
Thieves falling out, 1615 (Earl. Misc., viii.
392).
Belecture, to beset with lectures.
She now had somebody, or rather some-
thing, to lecture and belecture as before. —
Savoy e, Reuben Medlicott, Bk. I. ch. xvi.
Beletter, to write to.
It was now high time for Dr. Modew, the
Vice-Chancellour, and Master Roger Askham,
the University Oratour, to bestir themselves.
The latter belettered all the Lords of the
Privy-Councill. — Fuller, Mist, of Cambridge,
vii. 26.
Belfry. The belfry is sometimes
referred to as the part of the church
where the very poorest were. Gaud on
(Tears of the Ch. p. 253) speaks of
" teaching school in a belfry " as a
means of livelihood for a deprived
minister.
And being always desirous to climb highest
in the Church, reckoning themselves more
worthy to sit there than another, I fear me
poor Magdalene under the board and in the
oelfry hath more forgiven of Christ than they
have. — Latimer, i. 16.
A poor woman in the belfry hath as good
authority to offer up this sacrifice, as hath
the bishop in his pontificalibus. — Ibid. i. 167.
Man would have cleared the Pharisee, and
condemned the Publican, when they both
appeared in the temple together — the one,
as it were, in the choir, the other in the
belfry. — Adams, ii. 188.
Beliefless, unbelieving ; infidel.
Praise you his bounty, you that past the
Poles
Beare HeaVn's Embassage to Belief-less
Soules. — Sylvester, Henrie the Great, 512.
Believable, credible : unbelievable
is not so uncommon.
It would certainly be more natural-like
and believable. — Mrs. Trollope, Michael Arm-
strong, ch. iv.
Belight, to alight.
A mouse of high degree, which lost his way,
Wantonly walking forth to take the air,
And arriv'd early, and beliglUed there
For a day's lodging.
Cotoley, Essays (Agriculture).
Belitter, to heap confusedly.
A chamber hung either with Dutch pic-
tures or looking-glasses, belittered with uri-
nals or empty gally-pots. — The Quack's Aca-
demy, 1678 {Harl. Misc., ii. 33).
Bell, applied to the noise made by
deer, especially at rutting-time. Tenny-
son uses it of hounds. The first extract
is from an inscription at Wharhcliff.
" Praye for the soul of Sir Thomas Wort-
ley. . . He caused a lodge to be built on this
crag in the midst of Wharncliff (the old
orthography) to hear the harts bell, in the
year of our Lord 1510. n It was a chase,
and what he meant to hear was the noise of
the stags. — Walpole, Letters, ii. 5 (1766).
Here the bellowing harts are said to har-
bour, the throating bucks to lodge, the bell-
ing roes to bed, the beating hares to form,
the tapping conies to sit, and the barking
foxes to kennell. — Fuller, Pisgah Sight, III.
(pt. i.) ix. 1.
Waife again changed the key of his primi-
tive music — a melancholy belling note, like
the belling itself of a melancholy hart, but
more modulated into sweetness. — Lytton,
What will he do with it ? Bk. V. ch. iv.
E2
BELLAMOURE
( 5* )
EEMURMUR
Then, pressing day by day through Lyonesse,
Lost in a rocky hollow, belling heard
The hounds of Mark.
Tennyson, Last Tournament.
Bellamoure, a fair lady-love; it
occurs several times in Davies.
No Bella mou re should then be better hu'd.
Davies, Microcosms, p. 22.
His wisdonie's pow'r
Did choose me for his chiefest Bellamoure.
Ibid. p. 92.
Belled, having a bell.
A hawk belled pouncing on a bird.
Arck.,xxxiv. 436 (1852).
Belle-dame, a fashionable lady : bel-
dam formerly meant grandmother, then,
old woman ; it is now always used in
a disparaging sense. N. says that in
Spenser the word has the meaning of
fair lady, but if he refers, as I suppose,
to F. Q.f 111. ii. 43, the name is given
by Bruomurt " to her aged nourse " and
= Granny.
Should we see the value of a German
prince's ransom gorgeously attiring each of
our Ulle-dames, if neither merchant, butcher,
brewer, laceman, mercer, milliner, nor tailor
would trust V — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i.
375.
Bellows, to blow as with a bellows ;
to pu£.
She pouted out her blubber-lips, as if to
bellows up wind and sputter iuto her hone-
nostrils. — Ricltardson, Cl. Harloice, v. 318.
Belly-gut, a lazy, greedy fellow.
Since then thou wouldst not have a belly-
gut for thy servant, but rather one brisk and
agile, why then dost thou provide for thy
mind a minister fat and unwieldy ? — Bailey's
Erasmus, p. 346.
Belongings. The Diets, give this
word as meaning endowments or qual-
ities, with a quotation from Meamre
for Measure, I. i., but it also signifies
family, relations, or household.
When Lady Kew said, Sic volo, sic juheo, I
promise you few persons of her ladyship's
oelongings stopped, before they did her bid-
dings, to ask her reasons. — Thackeray, New-
comes, ch. xxxni.
Belump, is intended probably to have
much the same meaning as behump,
q. v.
Bemad, to make mad or furious ; see
quotation, s. v. Wouxdable ; the Diets,
have the participle bemadding^ but only
with the quotation from Lear, III. i.
The patriarch herein did bewitch and
bemad Godfrey.— Fuller, Holy War, Bk. II.
ch. v.
How much Andronicus was bemadded
hereat may easier be couceived than ezprest.
—Ibid., Profane St'Uc, V. xviii. 16.
B em adam, to salute with the title of
madam.
They do so all to bemadam me, I thiuk
they think me a very great lady. — Jonson,
Bart. Fair, v. 3.
Bemantled, covered as with a mantle.
The village spire but dimly seen,
The straw-roof 'd cot upon the green
With spreading vine bemantled o'er.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. ii.
Bemean, to lower.
For this time I renounce my gentility, and
lessen and bemean myself to the lowness of
the offender.— Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. II.
Bk. III. ch. xx.
Bemitre, to adorn with a mitre.
Open scoundrels rode triumphant, bedia-
demed, becoronetted, bemitred. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. i.
B EM OAT, to surround with a moat.
A silver Brook in broken streams doth gush,
And headlong down the horned Cliff doth
rush;
Then, winding thence above and under
ground,
A goodly Garden it be-moateth round.
Sylvester, 1th day, 31.
Bemoisten, to bedew.
Affected by this tender grace,
A tear stole gently down her face ;
And, wiping her bemoisten*d eye,
She offered this sincere reply.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. vi.
Bemouth, to declaim.
They heard the illustrious furbelow 'd
Heroically in Popean rhyme °
Tee- to- 1 urn 'd, in Miltonic blank bemouth'>d.
Southey, Nondescripts, i.
Bemud, to cover with mud, and so
to confuse.
[This hath] so troabledly bemudded with
gnefe and care every cell or organ-pipe of
my purer intellectual faculties, that no more
they consort with any ingenuous playful
merriments. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl.
Misc., vi. 157).
Bemubmur, to murmur round. See
quotation, s. v. Beshout.
Be murmured now by the hoarse-flowing
Danube, the light of her patriot supper-par-
ties gone quite out, so lies Theroigne. —
Carlyle, Fr. Jfet., Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. viii.
BEMUZZLED
( S3 )
BE POUNCE
'4
\
Bemuzzled, muzzled up.
The young lion's whelp has to grow up all
bestrapped, bemuzzled in the most extraor-
dinary manner. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 86.
Ben. Oil of ben = benzoin ; an oint-
ment held to be of great efficacy. See
several references in H.
I think I smell him, 'tis vermilion sure,
ha ; oil of ben ; do but show him me, widow.
— Jonson, Fletcher, and Middleton, The
Widow, ii. 1.
Bender, a sixpence, because easily
bent (slang).
u What will you take to be paid out ? " said
the butcher. " The regular chummage is two-
and-six. Will you take three bob?" " And
a bender" suggested the clerical gentleman.
" Well, I don't mind ; it's only twopence a
piece more/' said Mr. Martin. "What do
you say now? we'll pay you out for three-
and-sixpence a week." — Dickens, Pickwick
Papers, ch. xlii.
" How much a glass think you ? " says
Fred, pulling another bumper; "a half-
crown think ye ? a half-crown, Honeyman ?
By cock and pye it is not worth a bender." —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xi.
Benedictor, an eulogist.
Ministers have multos laudatores, paucos
datores, many praisers, few raisers; many
benediciors, few benefactors. — Adams, i. 179.
Bene factor ate, to provide as a bene-
factor, to present.
The bishop has sent a Dr. Nichols to me,
to desire I would assist him in a plan for the
east window of his cathedral, which he in-
tends to benefactorate with painted glass. —
Walpole, Letter*, Hi. 282 (1769).
Benefacture, beneficence.
Give me the open champain of a general
and il limited benefacture. — Bishop Hall,
Works, viii. 256.
Benefice, benefit. The first extract
is from a letter from Jane Seymour to
the Lords of the Council, announcing
the birth of her son, 1537.
We have thought good to certifie you of
this same, to the intent ye might not onely
render unto God condigne thanks and praiso
for so great a benefice, but also continually
pray for the long continuance and preserv-
ation of the same. — Fuller, Church History,
VII. ii. 11.
Verely this thvng by the benefice of philo-
sophic was roted in hym, that he stode in
drede of no man liuyng. — UdaTs Erasmus* s
Apophthegmes, p. 70.
Beneficial, beneficent.
He fell to prayer rehearsing how beneficial
God had been unto him. — Latimer, i. 541.
Beneficious, beneficent.
The Beauchamps .... acknowledge Hab^r
de Bnrgo .... beneficious to them, and tontine
the same by their armories. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 362.
Ben J, a liquid or paste of intoxicat-
ing qualities procured from narcotic
plants such as henbane, hemp, &c. ;
also called Bang or Bhang.
Mesmerism and magic-lanterns, benj and
opium winna explain all facts. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xxi.
Bent, beck.
Naturall men must haue God at their bent'
—Hall, Contempt. (Golden Calfe).
Benter, debenture. The speaker is
an uneducated man.
Out alas ! where shall I make my mone,
My pouche, my b enters, and all is gone
Edirards, Damon and Pitheas
(Dodsley, O. PI. i. 281).
Benvenue, a welcome.
I having no great pieces to discharge for
his ben-venue or welcomming in, with this
volley of rhapsodies or small-shotte he must
rest pacified. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 158).
Bepatched, adorned with patches (on
the face) ; also patched (of a gar-
ment). See extract, s. v. Betatterkh.
The use of patches is not unknown to the
French ladies, but she that wears them must
be young and handsome. In England, youug,
old, handsome, ngly, all are bepatch'd till they
are bedrid. — Misson, Travels in Eng., p. 214.
Brperiwigged, having the head co-
vered with a wig.
What, Tony, i' faith ? what, dost thou not
know me ? By 'r Lady, nor I thee, thou art
so becravated, and so beperiwigged. — Con-
greve, Way of the World, iii. 15.
Bepester, to plague, injure.
Valens with his Arian heresy had hepes-
tered the Christian world. — Adams, i. 456.
Bepilgrimed, visited by pilgrims.
Mr. Lock hart thinks there was no literary
shriue ever so bepilf/rimed, except Forney in
Voltaire's time. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 108.
Bepommkl, to maul.
I have known a harmless good old srul
of eighty still bepommelled and stoned by irre-
proachable ladies of the straitest sect of the
Pharisees. — Thackeray, Virginians, ch. xlix.
Bepounpe, to bepowder ; in the ex-
tract = to stud.
BEPUFF
( 54 )
BESHO UT
Thee beam* with brazed copper were costlye
bevounced ;
Ana gates with the metal dooe creake in
shrubated harshing.
St any hurst, JEn., i. 433.
Bepuff, to flatter.
Even the Lord Mayor himself was a Re-
ality— not a Fiction conventionally bepuffed
on one day in the year by illustrious frieuds,
who no less conventionally laugh at him on
the remaining three hundred and sixty-four
days. — Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, ix.
Bepuzzle, to puzzle.
How Yarmouth of itselfe so innumerable
populous and replenished, and in so barraine
a plot seated, should not onely supply her
inhabitants with plentifull purveyance of
sustenance, but provant and victuall more-
over this monstrous army of strangers, was
a matter that egregiously bepuzled and en-
tranced my apprehension. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 140).
Berampired, fortified.
O Gods, o countrey, o Troywals stronglye
berampyerd. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 251.
Berascal, to call rascal. Cf . Bevil-
LAIN.
She beknaved, berascaUed, berogued the
nnhappv hero. — Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk.
II. ch. hi.
Berebus, to cover with rebusses.
His [Sir I. Hawkewood'sl Coenotaph . .
{arched over, and, in allusion to his name
berebussed with Hawkes flying into a Wood)
is now quite flown away and abolished. —
Fuller, Worthies, Essex (i. 350).
Beribanded, adorned with ribbons.
Nutbrown maids and nutbrown men, all
clean-washed, loud-laughing, bedizened and
beribanded ; who came for dancing, for treat-
ing, and, if possible, for happiness. — Carlyle,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. II. ch. ii.
Beribbon, to deck with ribbons.
He was so beribbon'd all over, that one
would have thought all the milliners in the
place had join'd their stocks to furnish him.
— T. Brown, Works, iv. 210.
Her attire was as flaunting as her air and
her manner : she was rouged and beribboned.
— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, vii. 26.
Beride, to ride by the side.
'Tis so, those two that there beride him,
And with such graces prance beside him,
In pomp, infallibly declare
Themselves the sheriffs ; he the Mayor.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 2.
Berinse, to wash.
So turn, good Lord, O turn the hearts of
Princes,
Whose rage their realms with Saints' dear
bloud berinses.
Sylvester, Bcthulia's Rescue, vi. 218.
Berretta, a priest's cap.
When at the corner cross thou did'st him
meet,
Tumbling his rosaries hanging at his belt,
Or his berretta, or his tow red felt.
If all, Sat., IV. vii. 52.
Berubrick, to mark as a red letter
day.
We have l*e~ru1rrick'd each day in the week,
almost in the yeer, with English blood. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. ii. 43.
Berdffed, wearing ruffs.
The winter came, the winds were bleak,
And the cold breeze blew o'er the lake ;
When Madam Syntax never stirr'd
But well IterujjFd and well bef urr'd.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. v.
Bescorch, to burn. Stanyhurst (^n..,
ii. 284) speaks of " that od Hector . . .
that with wyld fire thee Greekish nauye
beskorched"
Bescoundrel, to abuse as a scoundrel.
" Surly Sain " is Dr. Johnson.
Surly Sam, inflamed with Tory rage,
Nassau bescoundrels.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 101.
Bescour, to overrun.
France too is bescoured with a Devil's pack,
the baying of which at this distance of half
a century still Bounds in the mind's ear. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. IH. Bk. V. ch. v.
Beseechingnes8, deprecation ; en-
treaty.
The husband's determination to mastery
which lay deep below all blandness and
beseechingness had risen permanently to the
surface now. — G. Eliot, Romola, ch. xlviii.
Beseen, garment, clothes. The parti-
ciple beseen is used by old writers for
" clad."
The Curate in his best Beseen solemnly
received him at the Churchyard stile.— Defoe,
Tour thro* G. Britain, i. 405.
Beset, to place beside, and so to
transmit.
Was never fox but wily cubs begets,
The bear his fierceness to his brood besets.
Hall, Sat., IV. iii. 69.
Beshackle, to hamper, perplex.
Who this King should bee, beshackled theyr
wits.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi.
170).
Beshout, to greet with shouts. See
quotation, *. v. Begroan.
So fare the eloquent of France, bemur-
mured, beshauted.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III.
Bk. IV. ch. viii.
BESHRIVELLED ( 55 )
BESPY
Beshrivelled, wrinkled ; withered.
Ill-luck in its worst guise is seen
In that beshrivelled face and mien.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour HI. c. iii.
Besing, to celebrate in song.
When Britain first, at Heaven's command,
arose, with a great deal of allegorical con-
fusion, from out the azure main, did her
guardian angels positively forbid it [proper
provision for an aged pauperess] in the
Charter which has been so much testing, —
Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, iii.
Bbskokb, to tinge with smoke.
They burn up rapidly, and from within
there rises by machinery an uncombustible
statue of Wisdom, which by ill-hap gets be-
smoked a little ; but does stand there visible
in as serene attitude as it can. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. VI. ch. iv.
The besmoked evergreens were sprinkled
with a dirty powder, like untidy snuff-takers.
— Dickens, Hard Times, ch. xxh.
Besmutted, touched with smut.
So at Marseilles, what one besmutted, red-
bearded corn-ear in this which they cut ; one
gross man we mean with copper-studded
face ?— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. HI. Bk. V. ch.
iii.
Besoil, to soil, cast aspersions on.
See extract, *. v. Betoil.
That which the Commons called The Re-
monstrance of the state of the Kingdom
came forth by their voice Decemb. 15, to
besoil his Majesty's reign with studied bitter-
ness.— Racket, life of Williams, ii. 164.
His rosy face besoiled with un wiped tears.
Coleridge, Foster- Mother's Tale.
Besom-weed, the besom-plant ; cytisus
scoparius. See N. and (>., 5th s., x.
Others will perswade, if any list to believe,
that by a witch-bridle they can make a pair
of horses of an acre of besome-weed. — Fuller,
Holy Slate, Bk. V. ch. iii.
Besoothe, to soothe.
When they were gone, Hee 'gan embrace and
basse
The trembling Lady ; who besoothes him thus.
Sylvester, Bethulia's Rescue, vi. 00.
Bespaded, provided with spade.
The neighbouring villages turn out ; their
able men come marching to village fiddle, or
tambourine and triangle, under their Mayor,
or Mayor and Curate, who also walk bespaded
and in tricolor sash. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
II. Bk. I. ch. xi.
Besparkle, to sparkle. In some
copies the word is dixparkling.
Mount up thy flames, and let thy torch
Display thy bridegroome in the porch,
In his desires
More towring and besj>arkling than thy fires.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 449.
Bespeak. See quotation.
"*,?e D8en thinking of bringing out
that piece of yours on her bespeak night."
" When ? » asked Nicholas. « The night of
her bespeak, her benefit night when her
friends and patrons bespeak the play."—
Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. xxiv.
Bespeak, to speak ill of, or ill-
omened ly.
My tongue is so farre from bespeaking
such lands with any ill successe, that I wish
to all lawfully possessed of them . . . that
peaceably and prosperously they may enjoy
them.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI. vii. 14.
Bespectacled, fitted with spectacles,
and so dim-sighted.
It is impossible that a white-veiled, lank,
and bespectacled duenna should move or
excite a wanton thought. — Jarvis's Don
Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. II. ch. xvi.
In a most blinkard, bespectacled, logic-
chopping generation, Nature has gifted this
man with an eye.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II.
Bk. I. ch. ii.
Bespeeched, pestered by speakers.
Silence is deep as eternity; speech is
shallow as time. Paradoxical does it seem ?
Woe for the age, woe for the man, quack-
ridden, bespeeched, bespouted, blown about
like barren Sahara, to whom this world-old
truth were altogether new.— Carlyle, Misc..
iv. 138. * '
BE8PILL, to spill about.
By every drop of blood bespilt,
By Afric's wrongs, and Europe's guilt,
Awake! arise! revenge!
Sout/iey, To tfte Genius of Africa.
Bespouted, bespeeched, q. v.
Bespue, to foul with vomit.
That bespues
Her husband.
Stapylton, Juvenal, vi. 108.
Bespurtle, besprinkle.
Come down, thou ragged cur, and snarl
here; I give thy dogged sullenness free
liberty: trot about, and bespurtle whom thou
pleasest. — Marston, The Malcontent, i. 2.
They sputter their venom abroad, and be-
spurtle others. — Adams, iii. 21.
Bespy, to beset with espionage.
Poor Pitt ! They little know what work he
has with his own Friends of the People,
getting them bespied, beheaded. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. viii.
BESTAR
( 56 )
BETATTERED
Best a r, to illumine, or to spangle.
The poem from which the second ex-
tract is taken has also been attributed
to Herrick. In the last quotation the
word means adorned with a star of
some knightly order.
O lady-cow,
Thou shalt no more bestar thy wanton brow
With thine eyes' rayes.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 274.
A rich mantle he did wear,
Made of tinsel gossamer ;
Btstarred over with a few
Diamond drops of morniug dew.
Mennis, Oberon's Apparel (1655).
The late first lord of the Admiralty . . .
remains among his bestarred colleagues still
Mr. Smith. — Spectator, June 12, 1880, p.
739.
Bkst-be-trdst, credit.
Thy muse is a nayler, and wears clothes
upon best-be-trust ; thou'rt great in some-
body's books for this, thou know'st where :
thou wouldst be out at elbows and out at
heels too, but that thou layest about thee
with a bill for this, a bill. — Dekker, Satiro-
mastix (Hawkin's Eny. Dr., III. 173).
Beste, a game like loo : sometimes
written beast.
For these you play at purposes,
And love your loves with A's and B's ;
For these at Beste and L'Ombre woo,
And play for love and money too.
Hudibras, III. i. 1007.
She could willingly claw Admiral Pen-
guin's eyes out for not being able to save
her from being beasted ; while Dame Owlet is
. . . thinking to herself how fortunate she is
to have snug in her own hand the happy card
that is to do the business. — Wares, Thinks I
to Myself, ii. 136.
Besteeb, to guide, pilot.
How blest wert thou that didst thee so
besteere. — Davies, Sonnet to Sir T. Erskin.
Bestock, to stock or furnish.
And now yf ther a man be founde,
That lookes for such prepared grownd,
Lett hym, but with indifferent skill,
Soe good a soile becstocke and till.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 439.
Bestow at, to bestow or spend on.
Two shafts I vainly did bestow
At two great princes, but of both my arrows
neither slew. — Ghapman, Iliad, v. 209.
Bbstraddle, to straddle across.
My mischievous imagination would picture
him spurring a cask of hardware, like rosy
Bacchus bestriding a beer-barrel, or the little
gentleman who bestraddles the world in the
front of Hutching's Almanack. — Irving,
Salmayundi, No. 12'
Bestrapped, strapped up.
The young lion's wbelp has to grow up all
bestrapped, bemuzzled.—Carlyle, Misc., iv. 86.
Bestroke, to caress.
Who would not then consume
His sonle to ashes in that rich perfume,
Bestroaking fate the while
He burns to embers on the pyle ?
Herrick, Appendix, p. 449.
Bestuck, studded.
Thou little tricksy Puck,
With antic toys so funnily bestuck,
Light as the singing-bird that wings the air.
Hood, Ode to my Son.
Besdlly, to render foul or un pleas-
ing. The verseH in which the extract
occurs are attributed by some to W.
Stroude.
The limber corps, besully'd o'er
With meagre paleness, does display
A middle state 'twixt flesh and clay.
Bp. Corbet on Faireford Windows.
Bekung, celebrated in song.
Bewailed, bewept, besung by the whole
French people to this hour, it may be re-
garded as Barrere's masterpiece. — Carlylt,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. vi.
Beswabm, to overrun.
On th' other side, Thrace subtle Greece be-
swarms. — Sylvester, The Colonies, 356.
Besweeten, to make sweet. In some
copies the word is besweettd.
The elves present, to quench his thirst,
A pure seed-pearl of infant dew,
Brought and besweetned in a blew
And pregnant violet.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 126.
Bes weltered, draggled.
Doughtye Cloanthus
And oother Trojans with rough seas stormye
besweltred. — Si any hurst, ALn., i. 497.
Bktaint, stained.
What gars this din of mirk and baleful harm,
Where every wean is all betaint with blood ?
Greene, James IV., i. 3.
Betake, to take wrongly ; to mistake.
So He was . . . the Lamb that hath been
slain from the beginning of the world : and
therefore He is called jxuje sacrifirium, a con-
tinual sacrifice ; and not for the continuance
of the mass, as the blanchers have blanched
it and wrested it, and as I myself did once
betake it.— Latimer, i. 73.
Betattereh, torn.
She brought a gown with her, but so be-
pat ch'd and bttatter'd, 111 warrant you it had
been two hundred years out of fashion. — T.
Brown, Works, i. 240.
BETHEL
( 57 )
BE VILLAIN
Bethel See quotation.
In the year 1680 Bethel and Cornish were
choseu sheriffs. The former used to walk
about more like acoru-cutter than Sheriff of
London. He kept no house, but lived upon
chops, whence it is proverbial for not feast-
ing to Bethel the city. — North, Examen, p.
93.
Bethuxder, to strike as with thunder.
A Tuileries sold to Austria and Coblentz
should have no subterranean passage. Out
of which might not Coblentz or Austria issue
some morning, and, with cannon of long
range, foudroyer, bethunder a patriotic Saint-
Antoine into smoulder and ruin? — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. v.
Bethwack, to belabour.
You have so skilfully hampered, bethwacked,
belammed, and bebumped the catchpole. —
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xiii.
Betide, fortune.
My wretched heart, wounded with bad betide,
To crave his peace from reason is addrest.
Greene, from Never too Late, p. 299.
Betitle, to entitle.
The king-killers were all swept away, and
a milder second picture was painted over the
canvas of the first, and betitled, Glorious
Revolution. — Carlyle, Misc., Hi. 82.
Betoc8IX, to sound the tocsin, or to
assail with the tocsin.
It has deliberated, beset by a hundred
thousand armed men with artillery- furnaces
and provision-carts. It has been betocsined,
bestormed.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk.
VII. ch. v.
Bbtoiled, wearied with toil.
Poor Lackalls, all betoiled, besoiled, en-
crusted into dim defacement. — Carlyle, Fr,
Rev., Pfc. I. Bk. IV. ch. iii.
Betbample, to trample down.
Oat of which strange fall of formulas,
tumbling there in confused welter, U tram-
pled by the patriotic dance, is it not passing
strange to see a uew formula arise ? —Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. iv.
Betraynted, same as bedreinted (?),
i. e. drenched, fully imbued. " With
teares all bedreint " (Chaucer, Court of
Love, 577).
I thus muttered with roystring phrensye
betray/tied. — Stanyhurst, Mn., ii. 611.
Betterment, improvement. In the
extract from Bunyan no betterment =
nothing to choose.
In very deed, God doth as doth a prudent
Sire,
Who little careth what may crosse his child's
desire,
But what may most availe unto his better-
ment.
Sylvester, Paradox at/ at fist Libertie, 243.
Truly, said Christian, I have said the truth
of Pliable, and if I should also say the truth
of myself, it will appear there is no better-
ment 'twixt him and myself. — Pilgrim's Pro-
yress, Pt. i. p. 35.
What betterment has since taken place in
workhouses is largely due to her initiative. —
Guardian Newspaper, June 9, 1880, p. 767.
Beturbaned, adorned with a turban.
In the extract it rather means suggest-
ive of a turban.
He had composed the first act of his
"Sultan Selim;" but, in defiance of the
metre, he soon changed the title to " Sultan
Amurath," considering that a much fiercer
name, more bewhiskered and beturbaned. —
De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 48.
Between ity, intermediate condition.
In the second extract cuckoldom is re-
ferred to.
The house is not Gothic, but of that
betweenity that intervened when Gothic de-
clined and Palladian was creeping in. — Wal-
pole, Letters, ii. 174 (1760).
This state of man, and let me add obscenity,
Is not a situation of IteUceemty,
As some word-coiners are disposed to
call't—
Meaning a mawkish as-it-were-ish state,
Containing neither love nor hate —
A sort of water-gruel without salt.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 206.
The letters were written not for publica-
tion . . . and to rejoin heads, tails, and
betweenities which Hayley had severed. —
Southey, Letters, iii. 448.
Betwit, to taunt.
Strange how these men, who at other times
are all wise men, do now in their drink bet in it
and reproach one another with their former
conditions. — Pepys, April 2, 1661.
Be-ulcer, to cover with ulcers.
Satan . . . having Job in his power . . .
only be-ulcered him on his skin and outside
of his body. — Fuller, Worthies, Yorkshire (ii.
520).
Beveiled, covered with a veil.
Wee keepe thee midpath with darcknesse
mightye beueyled. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 369.
Bevillain, to abuse as a villain.
North has also berogue, p. 117, which
word, however, is in N. with a quot-
ation from another writer. Cf. Br-
rascal.
After Mr. S. Atkins had bevillained the
Captain sufficiently, he was bid consider till
the afternoon.— North, Examen, p. 247.
BE VOMIT
( 58 ) BIBLIOLOGIST
Bevomit, to vomit at or round.
Mentz is changing into an explosive crater ;
vomiting fire, bevomited with fire. — Carlyle,
Ft. Ret,., Pt. in. Bk. III. ch. iv.
Bewelcome, to greet with welcome.
King Helenas, with a crowding coompanye
garded,
From towne to us buskling, vs as his freends
freendlye bewelcomd.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 350.
Bewhiskeb, to adorn with whiskers.
Soe extract, s. v. Bet urban ed.
'Twas she who bewhisker'd St. Bridget. —
Sterne, 2V. Shandy, iv. 12.
The rest of the train had been metamor-
phosed in various ways; the girls trussed
up in the finery of the ancient belles of the
Bracebridge line, and the striplings beiohis-
kered with burnt cork. — Irving, Sketch-Book
(Christmas Dinner).
Bewhistle, to whistle round.
Dumouriez and his Staff strike the spurs
in deep ; vault over ditches into the fields,
which prove to be morasses; sprawl and
{riunge for life, bewhistled with curses and
ead.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. IIL Bk. III. ch. vi.
Bewhiten, to jnake white.
The cot that's all bewhiten1 d o'er,
With children playing at the door.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xix.
Bewigqed, adorned with a wig. See
quotation, 8. v. Behatted.
There was one individual who amused
us mightily: this was one of the betrigged
gentlemen in the red robes. — Sketches by
Boz (Doctors* Commons).
She saw strange old women, painted, pow-
dered, and bewigged, in hideous imitation of
youth. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. riv.
The pile was in half a minute pushed over
to an old betrigged woman with eye-glasses
pinching her nose. — G. Eliot, Daniel De-
ronda, ch. i.
Bewinged, furnished with wings.
An angel throng, bewinaed, bedight
In veils and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears.
E. A. Poe% Conquering Worm (ii. 31).
Bewizard, to affect by magical arts.
She cannot, by what conjuring you will,
Be more beunzarded than I'm bewitched.
Taylor, St. Clement 's Eve, i. 2.
Bewound, to inflict wounds.
With wounded spirit I salute Thy wounds,
O tM-bewounding Sacrifice for sinne !
Davies, Muse's Sacrijice, p. 16.
Bewpers, material for flags.
With my cozen Richard Pepys upon the
'Change about supplying us with bercpers
from Norwich, which I should be glad of, if
cheap. — Pepys, June 16, 1664.
Beysaunce, obeisance.
The ancient trade of this realm in education
of youth ([before the late time replenished
with all mischief) was to yoke the same with
the fear of God, in teaching the same to use
prayer morning and evening, ... to make
beysaunce to the magistrates, kc.— Hugyard,
Displaying of the Protestants, p. 85 (1556).
Bib-all-night, a confirmed toper.
Bats, Harpies, Syrens, Centaurs, Bilt-all-
nights. — Sylvester, Lacryma Lacrymarum,
101.
Bibation, drinking.
Royal cheer and deep bibation. — S. Naylei**
Reynard the Fox, 4.
Bibbf.ry, drinking.
I never eat any confections, page, whilst I
am at the bibbery. — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk.
I. ch. xl.
Bible-oath, a solemn oath taken on
the Bible. Cf. Book oath.
Madam Marwood took a book, and swore
us upon it, but it was but a book of poems.
So lonp as it was not a Bible-oath, we may
break it with a safe conscience. — Congreve,
Way of the World, v. 2.
They say this Oomnenus is sworn friend
and minister to the Devil. I tell thee Satan
took his Bible-oath to back him out in aught
he put his hand to. — Taylor, Isaac Comnenus,
i.3.
I doubted the correctness of your state-
ment, though backed by your lordship's
Bible-oath. — Thackeray , Virginians, ch. xcii.
Biblicalitt, any matter connected
with the Bible.
He would study theology, bibltcalities, . . .
then seek to obtain orders. — Carlyle, Life of
Sterling, Pt. I. ch. xv.
Bibliogony, birth or pedigree, t. e.
authorship of books.
If, I say, the book of the Doctor were in
like manner to be denominated, according to
one or other of the various schemes of biblio-
aony, which have been devised for explaining
its phenomena, the reader might be expected
in good earnest to exclaim, " Bless us, what a
word on a title-page is this ! " — Sou they, The
Doctor, Interchapter xiii.
Bibliologist, one learned in biblio-
graphy.
If it has not been satisfactorily ascertained
whether there were one, two, three, or four
John Websters, after so much careful investi-
gation by the most eminent bibliologi&ts, . . .
by whom can the question be answered con-
cerning the authorship of this Opus? —
Southey, The Doctor, Interchapter xviri.
BIBLIOLOGY
( 59 )
BILAND
Bibliology, book-lore.
He must be little versed in bibliology who
has not learnt that such reminiscences are
not more agreeable to an author himself than
they are to his readers (if he obtain any) in
after times. — Southey, The Doctor, Inter-
chapter x.
Bibliopolio, pertaining to book-
selling.
Sartor Resarius . . . was not then even a
book, but was still hanging desolately under
bibliopolic difficulties, now in its fourth or
fifth year, on the wrong side of the river,
as a mere aggregate of Magazine Articles. —
Carlyle, Lift of Sterling, Pt. II. ch. ii.
Bid and Beads. This appears from
the context to be some sort of neckcloth
or ruffle.
I have not been able yet to laugh him out
of his long bid and beads. Indeed that is
because my mother thinks they become him ;
and I would not be so free with him as to
own I should choose to have him leave it off.
If he did, so particular is the man, he would
certainly, if left to himself, fall into a King-
William's cravat, or some such antique chin-
cushion, as by the pictures of that prince
one sees was then the fashion. — Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, ii. 6.
Biddable, complying ; obedient.
She U exceedingly attentive and useful,
and not at all presumptuous ; indeed I never
saw a more biddable woman. — Dickens, Dom-
bty and Son, ch. viii.
A more gentle, biddable invalid than the
poor fellow made can hardly be conceived. —
H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xliv.
Bident, an instrument with two
prongB.
They are all bound t' him (on my word} :
Mara for his Cuirace, Shield, and Sword ;
The blust'ring JSol for his bident,
And Neptune for his massy trident.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 232.
Bienness, prosperity.
There was a prevailing air of comfort and
" bienness " about the people and their houses.
— Black, Princess of Thule, ch. ii.
Bifabious, twofold ; facing both
ways.
He is a violent moderator among such
Ufarious anythingarians, that always make
their interest the standard of their religion.
— T. Brown, Works, iii. 97.
Biforked, having two ridges. Bi-
furcated is more common. ''The bi-
forked hill " is Parnassus.
Tis true with little care, and far less skill,
I pace a Poney on the bifork'd Hill.
Colman, Vagaries Vindicated, p. 175.
Bifront, twofaced.
While bi-front Janus' frosty frowns do
threat.
Sylvester, second day, first weeke, 492.
O ! let the honour of their names be kept,
For haviug quencht so soon so many fires,
Disarm'd our arms, appeas'd the heav'nly
ires,
Calm'd the pale horror of intestin hates,
And dammed up the bi- front Father's gates.
Ibid., the Handy-Crafts, 49.
Bio, winter barley. See quotation
from Had. Misc., 8. v. Bear ; also L.
The big (viz. a four-rowed barley) is seldom
ripe.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 273.
They have commonly pottage to dinner
composed of cale or cole, leeks, barley or big,
and butter. — Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, ii.
104.
Biqth, size ; bigness. The extract is
part of a receipt " for to kill a corn."
Take of the bigth of a walnut of all yeast
that is hard, and sticks to the tub side. —
Queen's Closet Opened, p. 104 (1655).
Big-wig, a high official ; in the quot-
ation from Dickens, an eminent lawyer.
«• Well have a big-ma, Charley ; one that's
got the greatest gift of the gab to carry on
his defence." .... "What a game! what
a regular game ! All the big-wigs trying to
look solemn, and Jack Dawkins addressing
of 'em as intimate and comfortable as if
he was the judge's own son making a speech
arter dinner." — Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xliii.
Her husband was a member of the Cham-
ber of Deputies, a Conseiller oVEtat, or other
French big-wig. — Thackeray, The Newcomes,
ch. xlvi.
So you are going to sit among the big-wigs
in the House of Lords.— IT. Kingsley, Oeoffry
Hamlyn, ch. xlv.
Bigwiggism, pomposity, as exhibited
by big-wig*, q. v.
I determined not to try anything in Lon-
don for a good many years at least. I didn't
like what I saw when I was studying there—
so much empty bigwiggism and obstructive
trickery. — G. Eliot, Middltmarch, ch. xvii.
Biland, peninsula. At p. 668 of
Holland's Camden it is used indiffer-
ently with the word " promontory " in
reference to the 8. W. portion of Car-
narvonshire. It is also spelt byland.
From S. Michael's Mount Southward, im-
mediately there is thrust forth a biland or
demi-Isle. — Holland's Camden, p. 189.
Beneath this, lyeth West-Gower, and by
reason of two armes of the Sea winding in,
on either side one, it becometh a. biland. —
Ibid. p. 646.
BILGE
( 60 ) BIRD IN THE HAND
Bilge, to knock a hole in the bilge,
being that part of the bottom of a ship
on which she would rest if aground.
We chased a schooner, which ran on shore
and bilged. — Marryat, Fr. Mitdmay, ch. xiv.
Bilk, fallacious. The word was com-
mon as a verb, and is still in use ; also
as a substantive = nothing, as in the
second quotation (see also Jonson,
Tale of Tub, I. i. ; Hudibras, III. Hi.
376) ; but the adjectival use is rarer.
To that [Oates's plotj and the author's
bilk account of it I am approaching.— ybrtk,
Examen, p. 129.
Bedloe was sworn, and being asked what
he knew against the prisoner, answered,
Nothing. . . . Bedloe was questioned over
and over, who still swore the same bilk. —
Ibid. p. 213.
Billeting, an architectural term ap-
plied to an ornament often used in
Norman work, being an imitation of
wooden billets placed in a hollow
moulding.
The piers are enriched with groupes of
small columns supporting arches ornamented
with archivolts or mouldings enriched with
billeting.— W. Wilkins, 1796 {Arcfiaol., xii.
164).
Billy-roller. See extract.
" What is the billy-roller ?"..." It's a
long stout stick, ma'am, that's used often
and often to beat the little ones employed in
the mills wheu their strength fails." — Mrs.
Trollope, Michael Armstrong, ch. xiv.
Bilocation. See extract.
" The word bi location has been invented to
express the miraculous faculty possessed by
certain saints of the Roman Church, of being
in two places at once. — E. Tylor, Primitive
Culture, i. 447.
Bind. See extract, and H., s. v.
A bind of eels consists of ten sticks, and
every stick of twenty-five eels. — Archaol.,
xv. 367 (1806).
Bind. When a falcon seized on its
prey it was said to bind with it.
A hardie hawke is highly esteemed, and
they have a kind of them . . so strangely
courageous, that nothiug flieth in the aire
that they will not bind with. — Sandys, Tra-
vels, p. 76.
A cast of haggard falcons, by me mann'd,
Eyeing the prey at first, appear as if
They did turn tail ; but with their labouring
wings
Getting above her, with a thought their
piuions
Cleaving the purer element, make in,
And by turns bind irith her.
Massinger, The Guardian, I. i.
Bind prentice, lay under compul-
sion.
His promise had bound him prentice. —
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 57.
Bingo, brnndy (slang). It is in allu-
sion probably to this sense of the word
that Scott culled the sottish baronet in
St. Honoris Well Sir Bingo Binks.
Some soda-water with a dash of bingo
clears one's head in the morning. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxiii.
BlNGY, sour.
I've heerd my aunt say as she found out
as summat was wrong wi' Nancy as soon as
the milk turned bingy% for there ne'er had
been such a clean lass about her milk-cans
afore that. — Mrs. Cask ell, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xv.
Biographke, the subject of a bio-
graphy.
There's too much of the biographer in it,
and not enough of the biographee. — Athenaum,
Nov. 29, 1879, p. 637.
Biographist, biographer.
Want of honest heart in the Biographists
of these Saints . . betrayed their pens to such
abominable untruths. — Fuller, JVorthies, ch.
• • a
in.
Birch, to strike with the birch; to
flog.
There I was birch* d, there I was bred,
There like a little Adam fed
From Learning's woeful tree !
Hood, Ode on Prospect of
Clapham Academy.
Bird- baiting. See quotation, and H.,
s. v. Bird-batting.
These people who now approached were no
other, reader, than a set of young fellows
who came to these bushes in pursuit of a
diversion which they call bird-baiting. This
... is performed by holding a large clap-net
before a lantern, and at the same time beating
the bushes : for the birds when they are dis-
turbed from their places of rest or roost
immediately make to the light, and so are
enticed within the net. — Fielding, Jos. An-
drews, Bk. II. ch. x.
Bird-bow, a bow for shooting bird-
bolts, q. v. in N. The extract is from
a deposition mude towards the end of
the sixteenth century.
About one fnrdeboioe shot from the said
Master Throckmorton's House, this Exanim-
ate, walking with Penry. saw lying before
him in ye way a Roll of Paper. — Arbtr, In-
trod, to Mar prelate Controversy, p. 134.
Bird in the hand, something cer-
tain or practical, as opposed to the bird
BIRDLESS
( 61 )
BISHOPESS
in the bush, which is remote and un-
certain.
The Prince knew well where he was now ;
when all their capitulations were held to
be star-shootings, flashes, aud meteors, with-
out the bird in the hand. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 163.
Simple ! let fly the bird within the hand.
To catch the bird again within the bush,
Tennyson, Harold, II. ii.
Birdless. See extract.
He had hearde of a certaine rocke in the
Indies, whiche by reason of the exceeding
height of it is called io Greke aopvo*. bird-
lesse, as if ye would saie, so high that the
birdes mate not get to the toppe of it. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 217.
Birdlime, a thief ; one to whom other
people's property sticks ; also as an
adj. thievish. Cf. Lime-fingered.
My rogue of a son has laid his birdlime
fingers ou't. — Vanbrugh, Confederacy, III. ii.
That birdlime there stole it. — Ibid. v. 2.
Bird's-eye, having yellow spots like
birds1 eyes.
He wore a blue bird's-eye handkerchief
ronnd his neck. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. xviii.
Birdsnie, a term of endearment. Cf.
Pigsnie.
Oh my sweet birdsnie, what a wench have
I of thee ! — Davenport, City Xight-Cap, Act
Alt
Birds of a feather, people of the
same character or appearance. The last
extract gives the full form of the pro-
verb.
Reboam, scorning these old senators,
Leans to his younglings, minions, flatterers,
Birds of a feather that with one accord
Cry out, importune, and persuade their lord
Not sillily to be by such disturb 'd.
Sylvester, The Schisms, 80.
These, for distinction, and that they might
be known al! birds of a feather, are suited in
cassocks with a white guard athwart, which
gave this the name of the Parliament of
white bends. — Hist, of Edward II., p. 58.
The idle and dissipated like birds of a
feather fock together. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. lxv.
Birthdays seems to he used in ex-
tract for days of infancy.
Kent thy birthdays, and Oxford held thy
youth. — Epitaph on Sir Ph. Sidney, 1591
(Eng. Garner, i. 292).
Biscuit-worms, weevils. The fol-
lowing is from the first edition of the
Ancient Mariner (Lyrical Ballads,
1798) ; in later editions the line runs,
•' It ate the food it ne'er had eat."
The marineres gave it biscuit-worms,
And round and round it flew.
Coleridge, Ancient Mariner, Pt. i.
Bisexed, of two sexes. Sylvester
calls Adam and Eve "our bisexed
parents free fcom sin n (Colonies, 22).
The word (but for the context) might
be taken as = hermaphroditical, in
which sense Sir T. Browne uses bisexous.
Bishop, to exercise episcopal func-
tions (not only to confirm).
Harding and Saunders bishop it in England.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. ii. 12 (margin).
Richard Smith, titulary Bishop of Chalce-
don, taking his honor from Greece, his profit
from Euglaud (where he hi shaped it over
all the Romish Oatholiques), was now very
busie. — Ibid. XI. ii. 7.
Bishop. In 1831 two men, Bishop
and Williams, drowned an Italian boy
in Bethnal Green, in order to sell his
body to the doctors. In the extract
the speaker intends to throw overboard
a young fellow whose father he had
murdered some years before. In spite
of this passage, Bishop has escaped the
unenviable privilege enjoyed by Burke,
a. v., of adding a new word to the Eng-
lish language.
I Burked the papa, now Y\\ Bishop the son.
Inyoldshy Leg. (Account of a new play).
Bishop. It is said of milk, soup, &c.
that is burnt that the bishop has put
his foot in it ; see first extract.
If the porridge be burned too, or the meat
over-roasted, we say, The bishop hath put his
foot in the pot, or, The bishop hath played the
cook, because the bi whops burn whom they
lust, and whosoever displeaseth them. —
Tyndale, i. 304.
Spare your ladle, sir; it will be as the
bishop's foot in the broth. — Milton, Animadv.
on Remonstr., sect. 1.
Lady Ans. "Why sure* Betty, thou art
bewitcht ; this cream is burnt too.
Lady Sm. Why, Madam, the bishop has set
his foot in it. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. i.).
Have an eye to th' milk, and see as it
does n a' boil o'er, for she cauna stomach it
if it's bishopped e'er so little. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. iv.
Bishopess, female bishop, or a bishop's
wife. In the extract the Popish lam-
pooner puts the word into the mouch
of Queen Elizabeth.
I'll see who 'tis that dare deny 'em
For Bishops, full as good as I am ;
BISHOPLESS
( 62 ) BLABBER-LIPPED
Only in jurisdiction lens
Than us, their Supream Bishopese.
Ward, England's Reformation,
c. ii. p. 165.
Bishoplbss, without a bishop.
Landaff, . . for the poorness thereof, lay
Bishopless for three years after the death
of Bishop Kitchin. — Fuller, Worthies, Wales
(ii. 560).
Bishopric. The county palatine of
Durham was so called ; the Bishop pre-
vious to Will. IV., 6 & 7, 19, having
had palatine authority therein.
The air in this Bishopric is pretty cold and
piercing.— Defoe, Tour thro* G. Brit., iii. 220.
Mr. Greaves . . danced at the [York] As-
sembly with a young lady from the bishopric.
— Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. iii.
BiSHOPSHiP, episcopacy.
If therefore the superiority of bishop ship
be grounded on the priesthood as a part of
the moral law, it cannot be said to be an
imitation. — Milton, Reason of Ch. Gov., Bk. I.
ch. 111.
With the abolition of Most Christian King-
ship, and Most Talleyrand Bishopship, all
loyal obedience, all religious faith, was to
expire. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. vii.
Bisk, to erase ( Wright's Prov. Diet.).
Southey is referring to a chapter in The
Doctor which some prudish book-club
had exscinded. He seems to mean
that it was cut out, not merely blotted
out with a pen.
The chapter condemned to that operation,
the chapter which has been not bisked, but
semiramised, is the hundred and thirty-sixth
chapter, concerning the pedigree and birth
of Nobs. — Southey, The Doctor, chapter extra-
ordinary.
Bisyllable, dissyllable, which is the
more usual word.
To every bisillable they allowed two times,
and to a trissillable three times. — Puttenftam,
Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Bit, at full, unrestrained (so we
speak of giving the reins to passion).
Israel, whom God calleth Jeshurun, and
oompareth to an heifer fed in large and
fruitful pastures, going always at full bit,
grew fat and wanton.— Sanderson, iii. 194.
BiTCHBRY, whoredom.
Thither run Sots purely to be drunk that
they may . . forget the treachery of their
friends, the falsehood of their wives, the dis-
obedience of their children, the roguery of
their lawyers, the bitchery of their paramours,
or the ingratitude of the world. — T. Brown.
Works, iii. 04.
Bite. The Diets, illustrate this word
in the sense of a deception, but in
all the examples the word is preceded
by the article ; it was, however, also
used as an interjection = the modern
expression, Sold 1 and also adjectivally,
as by (Dibber. In the Spectator, No.
604, the greater part of which refers to
this word (see also No. 47), there is a
story of a man condemned to be hung,
who sold the reversion of his body to
a surgeon for a guinea. "This witty
rogue took the money, and, as soon as
he had it in his fist, cries, Bite/ I am
to be hang'd in chains."
Miss. I'm sure the gallows groans for you.
Nev. Bite, Miss ; I was but in jest. — Swift,
Polite Conversation (Con v. i.).
Ld. Mo. Tift possible I may not have the
same regard to her frown that your Lordship
has.
Ld. Fop. That's Bite, I am sure ; he'd give
a joint of his little finger to be as well with
her as I am. — Gibber, Careless Husband, Act
III.
Bite in, to swallow or conceal.
It was worth seeing how manly hee could
bite in his secret want, and dissemble his
over-late repentance. — Hall, Epistles, Dec. i.
Ep. 5.
Let him, being put into that torturous
engine of burning brass, called the horse,
bite in his anguish. — Adams, i. 439.
Bite-sheep, a scurrilous corruption
of Bishop* Gauden speaks of those
who called the Bishops "the Popes, the
Antichrists, the Bite-sheeps, the Oppress-
ors," &c, and goes on to say, "These
foule glosses first made by Martin Mar-
prelate" (Tears of the Church, p. 617).
Bitter, to make bitter: the com-
pound embitter is common.
Tis hops that give a bitterness to beer.
Would not horse-aloes bitter it as well ?
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 23 .
Bizzarre, eccentric. L. gives the
word, but no earlier example than from
Hume.
Matter and Motions are bizarr things,
humoursome and capricious to excess. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 659.
Although he was very grave in his own
person, he loved the most bizarr and irregular
wits.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 117.
Blabber-lippkd, having thick lips.
See extract, s. v. Baker-legged.
Van. My poore cosin that attends the
Dutchesse, Lady Jeronime.
Eur. What, that blaberlipt blouse ? — Chap-
man, Mons. DJ Olive, v. i.
BLABBING-BOOKS ( 63 ) BLACK SHEEP
Blabbing-books, tell-tales.
These are the nettlers, these are the
blabbing-books that tell, though not half, your
fellow* feats. — Milton, Animadv. on Remonst.
Def., sect. 1.
Black, ugly. Cf . the Latin niger.
Though I am black, I am sure all the world
will not forsake me ; and, as the old proverb
fc, though I am black, I am not the devil. —
Peek, Old Wives1 Tale, p. 453.
To break off this for the entertainment of
vanity is more absurd than for a husband to
leave his fair and chaste wife, peerless for
beauty and innocency, for the embraces of
a black and stigmatical strumpet. — Adams,
iii. 89.
Black- art, magic.
These Wizzards ween to win it by Black'
Art.— Sylvester, The Trophies, p. 631.
Tet will he never study the black and
senseless art of calculating his birth and
death. — Ward, Sermons, p. 54.
Black-artist, a magician.
Let's also flee the furious-curious Spell
Of those Black- Artists that consult with
HeU
To finde things lost.
Sylvester, Little B arias, 408.
Black-a-top, black-haired.
Can you fancy that black-a-toji, snub-nosed,
sparrow-mouthed, paunch-bellied creature?
— Bailey's Erasmus, p. 31.
Blackaviced, dark - complexioned.
See Jamieson, s. v.
I would advise her blackaviced suitor to
look out; if another comes with a longer
or clearer rent-roll, he's dished. — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xix.
Blackback, the great black-backed
gull Larus Marinus.
Below them from the Gull-rock rose a
thousand birds, and filled the air with sound ;
the choughs cackled, the hacklets wailed, the
great blackbacks laughed querulous defiance
at the intruders. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. xxxii.
Blackguard, to abuse.
There's enough of this chaff ; I have been
called names and blackguarded quite suffi-
ciently for one sitting. — Thackeray, New-
comes, ch. xrix.
Black-heart, a species of cherry.
The unnetted black-hearts ripen dark,
All thine, against the garden wall.
Tennyson, The Blackbird,
Black Monday. Easter Monday in
1360 was so cold that many of Edward
III.'s soldiers, then before Paris, died.
See H. and N. North's explanation
refers to some eclipse, but I have been
unable to discover any eclipse, likely to
be meant by him, occurring on a Mon-
day ; perhaps he had an idea that the
extreme cold on Easter Monday 1360
was caused by an eclipse. Blade Mon-
day also = the Monday on which school
reopens.
The darkness was greater than under the
great solar eclipse that denominated Black
Monday. — North, Examen, p 505.
She now hated my sight, and made home
so disagreeable to me, that what is called by
school-boys Black Monday was to me the
whitest in the whole year. — Fielding, Tom
Jones, Bk. VIII. ch. xi.
Black -mouthed, abusive; foul-
mouthed. See extract, s. v. A vunculize.
Black-on-white, manuscript: usually
written black-and-white, as in the first
quotation.
Now am I down in black and white for a
tame fool ; is it not so ? — Richardson, Grandi-
son, ii. 6*9.
The original covenant stipulating to pro-
duce Paradise Lost on the one hand and five
pounds sterling on the other still lies (we
have been told) in black-on-white, for in-
spection and purchase by the curious, at a
bookshop in Chancery Lane. — CaiiyU, Misc.,
iii. 79.
His accounts lie all ready, correct in black-
on-white to the uttermost farthing. — Ibid.,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. II. ch. viii.
Black ox (see N.) is applied to one
worn out with age or care. A different
proverb seems referred to in the ex-
tract.
Was he not known to have been as wild a
man, when he was at first introduced into
our family, as he now is said to be ? Tet
then the common phrase of wild oats, and
black oxen, and such-like were qualifiers. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i. 344.
Black- pot, drinking pot, and so a
reveller.
I'll be prince of Wales over all the black-
pots in Oxford. — Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 100.
Black sheep, a reprobate; a mau-
vaU svjet. See another extract from
Thackeray, «. v. Cloth.
Jekvl . . is not such a black sheep neither
but what there are some white hairs about
him.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 312.
Their father had never had the courage to
acquaint them with his more true, kind,
and charitable version of Tom's story. So
he passed at home for no better than a black
sheep. — Thackeray, Netccomes, ch. v.
BLADDER Y
( 64 )
BLAY
Bladdery, swollen out like bladders,
la dim sea-cave with bladdery sea-weed
strewed. — Coleridge, To a Lady.
See as they float along th' entangled weeds
Slowly approach, upborne on bladdery beads.
Crabbe, The Borough, Letter be.
Blade, to take by force, as with the
sword or blade.
At Damon's lodging if that you see
Any sturre to arise, be still at hande by mee ;
Bather than I will lose the spoile, I will blade
it out. — Edwards, Damon and Pithias
(Dodsley, O. Pl.,i. 248).
Blader, one who makes knife-blades.
One may justly wonder how a knife may
be sold for one penny, three trades, anciently
distinct, concurring thereunto, Mailers, haft-
makers, and sheath-makers, all since united
into the Corporation of Cutlers. — Fuller,
Worthies, Yorkshire (ii. 492).
Blades. This seems to have been one
of the cant names for the roaring boys in
the seventeenth century. Cf. Un blade.
I do not all this while account you in
The list of those are called the blades that
roar
In brothels, and break windows ; fright the
streets
At midnight, worse than constables; and
sometimes
Bet upon innocent bell-men to beget
Discourse for a week's diet; that swear
dammes
To pay their debts, and march like walking
armories.
With poniard, pistol, rapier, and batoon,
As they would murder all the king's liege
people,
And blow down streets.
Shirley, The Gamester, Act I.
Blanches, a glosser. It is usually a
sporting term, and so Latimer uses it,
p. 76. See N. , *. v.
So He was . . the Lamb that hath been
slaiu from the beginuing of the world ; and
therefore he is called jugc sacrificium, a con-
tinual sacrifice ; aud not for the continuance
of the mass, as the blanchers have blanched
it and wrested it, and as I myself did once
betake it. — Latimer, i. 73.
Bland. See quotation.
She filled a small wooden quaigh from an
earthen pitcher which contained bland, a sub-
acid liquor made out of the serous part of
the milk. — Scott, The Pirate, ch. vi
Blandation, an illusion ; something
that appears, but is unreal, like flattery
(the usual meaning of the word).
There's no bodie, nothing — a meere blanda-
tion, a deceptio visus. — Chapman, Widdowea
Teares, Act V.
Blandtloquous, smooth-speaking.
Though he flatter with the voice of the
hyena at the door, and give Wandiloqwnis
proffers, yet "Janua fallaci non sit aperUx
viro." — Adams, ii. 64.
Blandish down, to soften.
At her right hand in this cause labours
fair Josephine, the widow Beauharnais,
though in straitened circumstances: intent,
both of them, to blandish down the grimneas
of republican austerity, and recivilize man-
kind.— Carlyle, Fr. Bev., Pt. III. Bk. VII.
ch. ii.
Blanket. An illegitimate child is
said to be born on the wrong side of the
blanket.
Thof my father wan't a gentleman, my
mother was an honest woman ; I didn't come
on the wrong side of the blanket, girl. — Smollett +
Humphrey Clinker, ii. 185.
This person was natural son to a gentle-
man of good family. . . " Frank Kennedy,"
he said, " was a gentleman, though on the
wrong side of the blanket."— Scott, Guy Man-
nering, i. 83.
Blanketing, material of which blan-
kets are made.
Witney, ... so famous for the manufac-
tures of blanketing and rugs. — Defoe, Tour
thro1 G. Britain, ii. 275.
Blastbob, gust of wind. Stanyhuret
(JSn., i. 559) has blastpuf in the same
sense.
Thee boughs flap whurring, when stem
with blastbob is hacked.— Stanyhurst, j£n.9
iv. 467.
Blasterus, destructive ; blasting.
Much lyke as in corneshocks sindged with
blasterus hurling
Of South wynd whizeling.
Stanyhurst, <En., ii. 314.
Blater, a calf (slang). To cry beef on
a blater — to make a fuss about nothing.
Don't be glim-flashy ; why you'd cry beef
on a blater. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. Ixxxii.
Blay, to bleat.
The multitude to Jove a suit imparts,
With neighing, Maying, braying, and barking,
ftoring and howling for to have a king.
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 398.
Then adieu, dear flock, adieu :
But alas, if in your straying
Heavenly Stella meets with you,
Tell her in your piteous Maying
Her poor slave's unjust decaying.
Ibid., Astr. and Stella, ninth song.
He knows not the bleaying of a calf from
the song of a nightingale.— Ilrid., Wanstead
Pastoral, p. 622.
BLAZES
( °5 )
BLINKARD
Blazes. Like blazes = very vehe-
mently ; like fire (slang).
The hone was to maddened by the wound,
and the road bo steep, that he went like blazes.
— Be Quineey, Spanish Nun, fleet. 24.
Blazonmbnt, ostentatious publication.
Perhaps the person least complacently dis-
posed towards him at that moment was Lady
Mai linger, to whom going in procession up
this country-dance with Grandoourt was a
blazonment of herself as the infelicitous wife
"who had produced nothing but daughters*—
Cr. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxvi.
Bleach, bleak.
His devotion is rather to be admired than
his discretion to be commended, leaving a
f rnitfull soile for a bleach, barren place. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., I. vi. 4.
Bleab, to loll or thrust out.
To go on a man his tiptoes, stretching out
the one of his armes forwarde, the other
backwarde, which if he blered out his tunge
also, myght be thought to daunoe anticke
verye properlye. — Aseham, Toxophilus, p. 47.
LAngula, a promontorie or hill lying in the
sea ; a narrows peece of land, or a long ridge
running into the sea, like a toong Hearing out
of the mouth.— NomencUtor (1585), p. 389.
[They] stood staring and gaping upon Him,
wagging their heads, writhing their mouths,
yea, blearing out their tongues. — Andrewes,
u. 173.
Blkbt, Blitum Virgatum, Strawberry
Blite.
Such hearbs as haue no straight and direct
root, run immediatly into hairie threds, as we
may see plainly in the orach and bleet. —
Holland, Pliny, six. 0.
. Buenos.
8he left the JSolian harp in the window,
as a luxury if she should wake, and coiled
herself up among lace pillows and eider
blemos.—C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. n.
Bless oneself, to be surprised. See
extract from Gentleman Instructed,
s. v. Smart.
Sir Francis bless'd himself to find such
mercy from one whom he had so grievously
provok'd.— Hacket, life of Williams, i. 84.
Gould Sir Thomas look in upon us just
now, he would bless himself, for we are re-
hearsing all over the house.— Miss Austen,
Mansfield Park, ch. xviii.
Bless self from, have nothing to do
with.
Since my master longs to be undone,
The great fiend be his steward ; I will pray,
And bless myself from him.
Massinger, City Madam, II. i.
Simeon and Levi seemed to have just cause,
the whoredom of their own sister, yet their
father calls them brethren in evil for it,
blesseth his honour from their company, and
his soul from their secrecy. — Adams, ii. 322.
Blindation, something that shuts
out the light
We will not sit down charmed with the
concealments of these authors, who affectedly
build up blindations before one of the foulest
knots of iniquity that ever denied the sun's
light. — North, Examen, p. 196.
Blindish, somewhat blind.
Gerard's heart was better than his nerves :
he saw his friend's mortal danger, and passed
at once from fear to blindish rage.— itawfe,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxiv.
Blindless, without blinds.
It was my wont to wander all solitary,
gazing at the stars through the high blindless
windows. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xx.
The new sun
Beat through the blindless casement of the
room. — Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
Bundling, blind.
O that my head were a fountain of tears,
to weep for and bewail the stupidity, yea,
the desperate madness, of infinite sorts of
people that rush upon death, and drop into
hell blindling. — Ward, Sermons, p. 57.
Blindman's Holiday, the time when
it is too dark to do anything. Florio
(1597) has the phrase, s. v. feriato,
" vacancie from labour, rest from work,
blind man '$ holiday; " perhaps because
then the blind are at no disadvantage.
What will not blind Cupid doe in the
night, which is his blindman's holiday? —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 167).
Indeed, madam, it is blindman's holiday; we
shall soon be all of a colour. — Swift, Polite
Conversation (Conv. iii.).
Blink. H. says, " According to Ken-
nett, MS. Lansd., 1033, a term in set-
ting, when the dog is afraid to make his
point, but being over-aw'd comes back
from the scent," Hence applied to
persons who wilfully shut their eyes to
something.
There's a bitch, Towwonse, by G — she
never blinked a bird in her life. — Fielding,
Jos. Andrews, Bk. I. ch. xvi.
It is prettily said on behalf of the poetic
side of the profession ; there is a prosaic ene
—well blink it.— Lytton, What will he do
with it? TSk. I. ch.iv.
Then those that did not blink the terror saw
That Death was cast to ground.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Blink abd, purblind. See quotation
b.v. Bespectacled. The Diets, only
give the word as a substantive.
F
BLITHE
( 66 )
BLOOMLESS
Blinkard history has for the most part
all but overlooked this aspect. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. ▼.
Blithe, to rejoice.
Take heed by me that blith'd in baleful
bliss. — Saekville, Duke of Buckingham, st. 68.
Blob, a babble, splotch, or blot.
Tom's friend, being of an ingenious turn
of mind, suggested sealing with ink, and the
letter was accordingly stuck down with a
blob of ink. — Hughes, Tom Brown's School'
days, Pt. I. ch. iii.
14 All that it wants," said Bell, with a criti-
cal eye, ** is a little woman in a scarlet shawl
under the trees there, .... making a little
blob of strong colour, you know, just like a
lady-bird among green moss. — Black, Adven-
tures of a Phaeton, ch. ▼.
Block, the head (slang).
I cleaned a groom's boots a Toosday, and
he punched my block because I blacked the
tops. — H. Kingsley, Bavenshoe, ch. xxxv.
Blondness, fairness.
How lovely this creature was, . . herself
so immaculately blond, . . and yet with this
infantine blondness showing so much ready,
self -possessed grace. — G. Eliot, Middlemarch,
ch. xvi.
Blood. Bad blood = anger or dis-
union.
Partly to make bad blood, and partly to
force the king to let the parliament meet
and sit, which by diverse prorogations had
been put off, and might be so again, they
instituted a method of petitioning the king
that the parliament might meet and sit. —
North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 25.
Blood. Best of blood = nearest of
kin.
He is my brother, and my beet of blood. —
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act V.
Blood-guiltless, free from homicide
or murder.
I am glad you have got rid of your duel
blood-guiltless. — Walpole to Mann, iii. 40
(1753).
Bloods, blood relations.
I have so many cousius, and uncles, and
aunts, and bloods that grow in Norfolk, that
if I had portioned out my affections to them,
as they say I should, what a modicum would
have fallen to each ! — Walpole, Letters, i. 90
(1741).
Bloods, lives. The singular is com-
mon in this sense, but the Diets, give
no instance of the plural.
Your majesty remembers, I am sure,
What cruel slaughter of our Christian bloods
These heathenish Turks and Pagans lately
made. — Marlowe, 2 Tamburlaine, II. i.
Much less can the Seminaries dying in
England for treason arrogate to themselves
the glory of martyrdom, though a vicious
affectation of it hath hardened them to such
a prodigality of their bloods. — Adams, i. 92.
Worthy to be bought with all labour, with
expense of goods, with expense of bloods. —
Ibid. iii. 92.
Bloods. In Peregrine Pickle, ch.
zvi., it is stated that the senior boys at
Winchester " were distinguished by the
appellation of bloods." The term is
now unknown in the school, even by
tradition.
Blood-sloken, blood soaked.
The blood that they have shed will hide no
longer
In the blood-sloken soil, but cries to Heaven.
Taylor, Ph. van AH., Pt. II. ii. 1.
Bloodstick, "a short heavy stick
used by farriers to strike their lancet
when bleeding a horse " (H., who, how-
ever, gives no example).
The handle [of the Protestant flail] resem-
bled a farrier 8 bloodstick. — North, Examen,
p. 573.
Bloodsuck, to 8ii ck blood. Shake-
speare has the participial adj., " blood-
sucking sighs" (3 lien. VI. , V. iv.).
Thus bloodsucketh he the poore for his own
private profite. — Greene, Quip for Upstart
Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 418).
Blood-supper, a murderous or blood-
thirsty person. Blood-sucker is used
by Shakespeare and others in this
sense.
A cruell deuelisshe bio ud supper dronken
in the bloude of the sayntes and martens
of Christ. — Simon Fish, Suj>plication for the
Beggars, p. 6.
Blood - thirsting, thirsting after
blood.
Assassination, her whole mind
Blood-thirsting, on her arm reclined.
Churchill, The Duellist, iii. 68.
Blood- warm, of the temperature of
blood.
The Temper of the Water is equal to new
Milk, or Blood-warm, procuring a moderate
perspiration. — Defoe, Tour thro* G. Brit.,
iii. 65.
Bloodyful, full of blood. The word
in original is crudeles.
His brest he vncloased, thee wound, and
Uuddyful altars. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 340.
Bloomless, without bloom or blossom.
m*mg^
BLOOMSBURY-BIRDS ( 67 )
BL UCHERS
The hills are heathy, save that swelling
slope,
Which hath a gay and gorgeous covering on,
All golden with the never-bloomless furze,
Which now blooms most profusely.
Coleridge, Fears in Solitude.
Bloomsbuby-Birds.
Oar corner -miching priests with the
Bloomesberry- Birds their disciples, and other
hot-spirited recusants, cut out the way with
the complaints of their (no-grievous) suffer-
ings, which involved us in distractions. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 134.
Bloused, clothed in a blouse or loose
frock.
There was a bloused and bearded French-
man or two. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch.
xsriii.
Blow, to defile. Cf. Fly-blow.
He suffered them most patiently to lay
their hands most violently upon Him, and
to bind Him, and to lead Him forth as a
thief, and to scorn Him and buffet Him, and
all-to blow or file Him with their spittings.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 72.
Blowen, a showy woman : used dis-
paragingly (thieves' cant).
Why don't they have a short simple service
now and then, that might catch the ears of
the roughs and the Moreens, without tiring
out the poor thoughtless creatures1 patience,
as they do now ? — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. zi.
Blowgdn, a gun whose missile was
propelled by the breath.
Many of them too are armed with the
pocuna, or blowgun, of the Indians; more
deadly, because more silent, than the fire-
arms.— C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xxiii.
Blow hot and cold, to be treacherous
or inconsistent The expression alludes
to the story referred to in the first ex-
tract.
The hermit turned his guest out of doors
for this trick, that he could warm his cold
hands with the same breath wherewith he
cooled his hot pottage. — Adams, i. 169.
Though she acknowledged she had power
from the Emperor to cause cessation of
arms in the Palatinate, and undertook to
put that power forth, yet with the same
breath she blew hot and cold. — Hacket, Life
of Williams, i. 180.
I could not lightly agitate and fan
The airier motions of an amorous fancy,
And by a skill in blowing hot and cold,
And changeful dalliance, quicken you with
doubts. — Taylor, Virgin Widow, iv. 5.
Blow-line.
Great anglers . . . who could do many
things besides handling a blow-line. — C.
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, Introd.
Blown, flattered or puffed up. See
N., 8. v.
I have to do
With many men, and many natures. Some
That must be blown and soothed, as Lentulus,
Whom I have heaved with magnifying his
blood. — Jonson, Catiline, I. i.
Blown off, exploded.
A gross fallacy and inconsequence, con-
cluding ab imparibus tanquam paribus, and
more than sufficiently confutea and blown
off.— South, iii. 222.
Blow-out, an entertainment or feast.
" She sent me a card for her blow-out," said
Mowbray, " and so I am resolved to go." —
Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 264.
The giving good feeds is, with many of
these worthies, the grand criterion by which
the virtues and talents of mankind are mea-
sured. In the city, and amongst the junior
branches of certain honourable professions,
which shall be nameless, the phrase is
stronger, but the value and meaning are pre-
cisely the same : these persons call a similar
favour either a "spread" or a "blow-out."
Whenever I hear a man use either of these
expressions I take out my note-book and
insert his name in a list which I keep there,
the classification of which I shall here omit,
seeing that it may be sufficient to observe,
that the page in which the muster-roll of
such persons is written, is that which is the
farthest removed from another list which I
also keep-— of gentlemen. — Th. Hook, Man of
Many Friends.
Blubberation, crying.
They sang a quartette in grand bluhberation,
The stranger cried, Oh ! Mrs. Haller cried,
Ah!
H. and J. Smith, Rejected Addresses, p. 177.
Blub-cheeked, swollen-cheeked.
Bough-blustering Boreas, nurst with Ri-
phean snowe.
And bltib-cheekt Auster, puft with fumes
. before,
Met in the midst, jostling for room, do roar.
Sylvester, Tfie Lawe, 1004.
Bluchers, boots of a somewhat com-
mon and clumsy description.
Islington clerks . . walked to town in
the conscious pride of white stockings and
cleanly-brushed Bluchers. — Sketches by Boz
{Bloomsbury Christening).
It will not unfrequently happen that a pair
of trowsers inclosing a pair of boots with iron
heels, and known by the name of the cele-
brated Prussian General who came up to
help the other christener of boots at Water-
loo, will be flung down from the topmost
story. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xi.
I wouldn't have come in these Bluchers, if
I had known it. Confound it, no. Hoby
himself, my own bootmaker, wouldn't have
F 2
BL UDDER
( 6S )
BLUE RUIN
allowed poor F. B. to appear in Bluchers, if
he had known that I was going to meet the
Duke. — Ibid. ch. xiii.
BLDDDER,to talk nonsensically. Bale,
in his Declaration of Bonner 8 Articles
(Art. xxxvi.), calls that Bishop "this
bussard, this beast, and this bluddering
papiste."
Ye are much better overseen than learned
in the Scriptures of God, as your old blind
bluddering predecessors hath been. — Bale,
Select Works, p. 193.
Blue, to make blue.
[God] playd the painter when He did so
The turning globes, blew'd seas, and green'd
the field.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1175.
Blue. To look blue = to be sad or
discomfited, referring perhaps to the
miserable look of a person who is very
cold ; so bluely = badly.
He still came off but bluely. — UrquharVs
Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xxxv.
Our cavalier had come off but bluely, had
the lady's rigour continu'd. — T. Brown,
Works, i. 284.
Wise sir, I fear
We shall come off but blewly here.
Ward, England's Reformation,
cant. i. p. 67.
But when Boscawen came, La Clue
Sheer'd off, and look'd confounded blue.
Warton, Newsman's Verses for 1760.
The cunningest engineers can do nothing.
Necker himself, were he ever listened to,
begins to look blue. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I.
Bk. V. ch. i.
Blue, to make look blue (?) ; to dis-
concert (?).
King Edward III., who was deeply in love
with the Countess of Salisbury, was very for-
ward to take up a (blue) garter which
happen'd to drop from the lady's leg while
she was dancing at a ball. . . This action set
many of the company a laughing, which very
much blew'd the Countess. — Misson, Travels
in Eng. p. 170.
Blue, learned, or fond of literature
(applied to women) : often employed
disparagingly ; also as a substantive, a
learned woman.
He was a little the more anxious not to be
surprised to-night, lest his being too tired for
walking should be imputed to his literary
preference of reading to a blue. At tea Miss
Planta again joined us, and instantly be-
hind him went the book ; he was very right,
for nobody would have thought it more odd
or more blue. — Mad. D'Arblay% Diary, iv. 219.
Le» Dames des Roches, both mother and
daughter, were remarkable and exemplary
women ; and there was a time when Poic tiers
derived as much glory from those blue ladies
as from the Black Prince. — Southey, Tlie
Doctor, ch. lxxxix.
Blue blood, a Spanish expression for
noble blood ; proDably from the blue
veins of the Gothic race appearing be-
neath the fair skin, as distinguished
from the dark Moors, in whom this
would not be visible.
There were some foreign officers ; one in
particular, from Spain, of high rank and
Dirth, of the sangre azul, the blue blood, who
have the privilege of the silken cord, if thev
should come to be hanged. — Miss Edgeworth,
Helen, ch. xv.
Her blood may be as blue as King Philip's
own, but it is Spanish still. — Kingsley, West"
ward Ho, ch. xxix.
Mary. They call him cold,
Haughty, ay, worse.
Renard. Why, doubtless Philip shows
Some of the bearing of your blue blood.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, i. 5.
Blue-cap, a Scotchman. The refer-
ence in the first quotation is to the
battle of Bannockbourn.
A rabble multitude of despised Blue-caps
encounter, rout, and break the flower of
England. — Hist, of Edward II., p. 39.
Although he could neither write nor read,
Tet our General Lashly cross'd the Tweed,
With his gay gang of bleio-caps all.
Merry Drollerie, p. 93.
Blue eyes, black eyes.
To whom are wounds, broken heads, blue
eyes, maimed limbs ? — Ward, Sermons, p. 150.
Blueism, the possession or affectation
of learning in a woman.
He had seen the lovely, learned Lady
Frances Bellamy, and had fallen a victim to
her beauty and Blueism. — Th. Hook, Man of
Many Friends.
Blue point, something worthless. A
point was a tag or lace, and blue was
the usual colour of a servant's livery ;
hence blue point = some coarse lace or
string on a servant's coat. Point by it-
self was qsed in this disparaging sense.
In matters not worth a blewe poinct . . we
will spare for no cost.— Udal*s Erasmus'*
Apophth., p. 8.
He was, for the respect of his qualities,
not to be estemed worth a blewe point or a
good lous. — Ibid. p. 187.
I am sworn servant to Virtue ; therefore a
point for thee and thy villanies.— -JRreton,
Dream of Strange Effects, p. 17.
Blue buin, gin of apparently an in-
ferior quality. In a political tract
BLUES
( 69 )
BLUSH
published in 1753, the English are
spoken of as " expensive in blew beer"
which may perhaps mean the same as
blue ruin (^. and Q., I. ii. 246).
He sipped no olden Tom or ruin blue,
Or Nantz or cherry brandy.
Keats, A Portrait.
Some of the whole-hoggery in the House
of Commons he would designate by Deady,
or Wet and Heavy, some by weak tea, others
by Blue ruin, Old Tom, which rises above
Blue ruin to the tone of threepence a glass,
and, yet more fiery than Old Tom, as being a
fit beverage for another Old One who shall be
nameless, gin and brimstone. — Southey, The
Doctor, Interchapter xvi.
His ear caught the sound of the word
Morbleu!
Pronounced by the old woman under her
breath;
Now, not knowing what she could mean by
Blue Death,
He conceived she referred to a delicate brew-
ing.
Which is almost synonymous, namely, Blue
Ruin.
Ingoldshy Legends (Bagman's Dog).
Blues. Police, from the colour of
their uniform.
Well, that's the row, and who can guess the
upshot after all ?
Whether Harmony will ever make the
" Arms " her house of call ;
Or whether this here mobbing, as some
longish heads fortell it,
Will grow to such a riot that the Oxford
Bluet must quell it.
Hood, Row at the Oxford Arms.
Blue-stocking, a learned lady. 8ee
L., who quotes Bos well's account of the
origin of this term ; but De Quincey
(Autob. Sketches, i. 358) refers it rather
to an old Oxford Statute enjoining the
wearing of blue stockings on the stu-
dents. Southey says that Madame de
Stael collected round her "a circle
of literati, the blue legs of Geneva"
(Doctor, ch. xxxiv.). Walpole, writing
to Hannah More, playfully makes it a
verb = to put on blue stockings.
When will you blue-stocking yourself, and
come amongst us.— Letters, iv. 381 (1784).
That d— d, vindictive, blue-stocking^ wild
cat.— Scott, St. Rough's Well,u. 245.
Blue-stockinger, a literary lady.
Who would not be a blue-stockinger at this
rate?— J/arf. D'ArUay, Diary, i. 326.
Blueth, blueness, a cant word of
Walpole's.
[Strawberry Hill] is now in the height of
its green th, blueth, gloomth, honeysuckle,
and seringa-hood. — Walpole, Letters, i. 347
(1754).
I will not, however, tell you that I am
content with your being there, till you have
seen it in all its green th and bltuth. — Ibid. i.
363.
Bluet, blueish.
The lips were bluey pale. — Southey, Thalaba,
Bk. II.
Blunderbuss, a blunderer. R. says
Pope uses it metaphorically in Dunciad,
iii. 150, but it is rather a pun than a
metaphor, and is not confined to Pope.
In tf. and Q., IV. iii. 661, an old story
is related of a lady in a cathedral town
asking the schoolmaster, " Is my son in
a fair way to be a canon?" u A very
fair way, madam ; he is a blunderbuss
already." The second extract is de-
rived from the same quarter.
If any man can shew me a greater Lycr, or
a more bragging coxcomb than this blunder-
buss, he shall take me, make me his slave, and
starve me with whey and buttermilk. —
Blautus, made English, Preface (1694).
No wise man hardly ever reprehends a
blunderbuss for his bulle, any other way than
by laughing at him. — Wooiston, Sixth Disc,
on Miracles, p. 50 (1729).
He too pronounced ex cathedra upon the
characters of his cotemporaries. . . One is a
blunderbuss, as being a native of Ireland, an-
other a half-starved louse of literature from
the banks of the Tweed. — Smollett, Humphrey
Clinker, 1. 122.
Bldnderbussier, a man armed with
a blunderbuss.
To these we may add . . some of the
blunderbussiers of the Rye. — North, Examen,
p. 302.
Blunkette, a light-blue colour. See
H., s. v.
Some (floures) lyghte and entermedled
wyth whytishe, some of a sad or darke
greene, some watrishe,6/unA;tftfc,gray, grassie,
hoarie, and Leeke coloured. — Touchstone of
Complexions, p. 100.
Blunt, money (slang).
" It's all very well," said Mr. Sikes, " but I
must have some blunt from you to-night/'
"I haven't a piece of coin about me,"
replied the Jew. — Dickens, Oliver Tunst,
ch.
Blush. To blush like a black or
blue dog = not to blush at all (see N.,
s. v. black dog). A friend informs me
that " to blush like a blue dog in a dark
entry " is a phrase familiar to him in
this sense from childhood, and such
seems to be the meaning in the extract
BLUSTER-MASTER ( 70 )
BOB
from Swift ; but Gosson appears to em-
ploy it as a threat. It has been sug-
gested that one who has been beaten
black and blue might be said to blush
in this way.
If it bee my fortune too meete with the
learned woorkes of this London Sabinus, that
can not playe the part without a prompter,
nor vtter a wise worde without a piper, you
shall see we will make him to blush like a
black t dogge, when he is graveled. — Gosson,
Apologie of School of Abuse, p. 75.
Lord Sp. (to the Maid). Mrs. Betty, how
does your body politick ?
Col. Fye, my lord, you'll make Mrs. Betty
blush.
Lady Sm. Blush ! Ay, blush like a blue doo.
Stcift, Polite Conversation (Con v. i.).
Bluster-master, a great blusterer.
Among all devices to thrust him under
water that was sinking already, none was
hatch t of more despight and indignity than
a book publish 'd by a Bluster- Master ', ann.
1636, call'd a Coal from the Altai.— Hacket,
l*fe of Williams, ii. 99.
Blustery, noisy ; bragging. Bluster-
ous and blustering are more common.
He was a man of incurably commonplace
intellect, and of no character but a hollow,
blustery, pusillanimous, and unsound one. —
Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. III. ch. v.
Bo. To say bo to a thing = to gain-
say it. A shy or stupid man is sup-
posed not to be able to say Bo to a
goose ; the idea perhaps is taken from
a timid child, who might easily be
frightened by the gabble and hiss. Mr.
Random's somewhat obvious repartee
is anticipated in Swift's Polite Conv.
(Conv. i.).
All this may passe in the Queene's peace,
and no man say bo to it. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 174).
We have such a household of serving
creatures, unless it be Nick and I, there's
not one amongst them all can say bo to a
goose. — Hey wood y Woman Killed tetth Kind"
ness (Dodsley, O. Plays, iv. 118).
A scholard, when just from his college broke
loose,
Can hardly tell how to cry Bo to a goose.
Sicift, Hamilton's Bawn.
The soldier with great vociferation swore
I was either dumb or deaf, if not both, and
that I looked as if I could not say Boh!
to a goose. Aroused at this observation, I
fixed my eyes upon him, and pronounced
with emphasis the interjection, Boh! —
Smollett, Hod. Random, ch. hv.
Boa, a long fur coiled round the
neck and shoulders.
Poor Shenstone hardly appears more ri-
diculous in the frontispiece of his own
works, where, in the heroic attitude of a
poet who has won the prize, and is about to
receive the crowu, he stands before Apollo
in a shirt and boa, as destitute of another
less dispensable part of dress as Adam in
Eden. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. cczxii.
Boak, to butt (as a buck).
On the reverse [of a coin] a bull booking
with his homes. — Holland? t Camden, p. 99.
Board. Beneath or under board =
secretly or underhand ; above board is
still common. South has knock under
board where we should say * knock
under.1 Sidney uses under board for
under hatches.
The Bishop so covertly and clearly con-
veyed his matters, playing under the board
after his wonted fetches. — Foxe, v. 526
(1553).
I was taken by pirate, who, putting me
under board prisoner, presently set upon
another ship. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 29.
Those need not to play beneath board who
have all the visible game in their own hands.
— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, I. iii. 6.
For persons of honour, power, or place to
caress and sooth up men of dangerous prin-
ciples, and known disaffection to the govern-
ment, with terms and appellations of respect,
is manifestly for the government to knock
under-board to the faction. — South, vi. 80.
Here was no acting under board or out of
sight ; three millions of men were spectators.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 386.
Boat. To be in the same boat = to
be in the same condition or circum-
stances.
What ! haue ye pain? so likewise pain haue
we;
For in one boat we both imbarked be ;
Vpoo one tide, one tempest doth vs tosse ;
Your common ill, it is our common losse.
Hudson, Judith, iii. 352.
Boataqe, shipping ; traffic by boats.
For the town of Penrith in Cumberland he
cut a passage with great Art, Industry, and
Ezpence, from the Town into the River Pet-
tenll, for the conveiance of B outage into the
Irish Sea. — Fuller, Worthies, Westmoreland
(ii. 428).
Boat, to bellow. R. has boation.
The Papists teach us to pray unto Thee,
and unto all the company of heaven, with
boaying and bleating in the quire. — Becon,
111. «Od%
Bob, a shilling (slang). See quota-
tions s. v. Bender and Magpie.
I changed a shilling (which in town the
people call a Bob). — Ingoldshy Leg. (Misad-
ventures at Margate).
BOBBER
( 7i )
BODY
" Well, please yourself," quoth the tinker ;
" you shall have the hooks for four bob, and
you can pay me next month." " Four bobs —
four shillings : it is a great sum," said Lenny.
— Lytton, My Novel, Bk. IV. ch. v.
Bobber, a scoffer. Cf. N., s. v. Bob.
The Cholerique are bitter taunters, dry
bobbers, nyppinge gybers and skornefuU
mockers of others. — Touchstone of Complex-
ions, p. 99.
Bobbery, disturbance: an Anglo-
Indian word.
Ill bet a wager there'll be a bobbery in the
pigsty before long, for they are ripe for mis-
chief.— Marryat, Peter Simple, ch. ii.
He escapes from the city, and joins some
banditti,
Insensible quite to remorse, fear, and pity ;
Joins in all their carousals, and revels, and
robberies,
And in kicking up all sorts of shindies and
bobberies,
Ingoldsby Legends (Hermann).
Bobbish, well ; in a satisfactory state
(slang). It is given as a Wiltshire
word in Britton's Beauties of Wilt-
shire, 1825.
"The pigs is well," said Mr. Squeers;
" the cows is well, and the boys is bobbtsh" —
Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. Mi.
And now are you all bobbish, and how's
Sixpennorth of halfpence? — Ibid., Great
Expectations, ch. iv.
Bobby, a slang term for a policeman,
the force having been instituted by Sir
Robert Peel. Cf . Peeler.
They don't go a headerin' down here wen
there an't no Bobby nor gen'ral Gove fur
to hear the splash. — Dickens, Uncommercial
Traveller, iii.
Bob-fool, to play, to mock.
What, do they think to plav bob-fool with
me ? — Greene, Alphonsus K. of Arragon, Act
Bob jerom, a short, unfashionable
wig : the one referred to in the second
extract was the " coachman's best."
"Hate a plaistered pate; commonly a
nutnacull; love a good bob jerom." "Why,
this is talking quite wide of the mark," said
Mr. Hobson, u to suppose a young lady of
fortune would marry a man with a bob
jerom." — Mad. VArblay, Cecilia, Bk. IX.
ch. i.
The effect of this full-buckled bob jerom
which stuck hollow from the young face and
powdered locks of the ensign was irresistibly
ludicrous. — Ibid., Camilla, Bk. III. ch. xiii.
Bobtail. See extract.
Cousins by manage, or kinred (as they
commonly terme it) by bobtails.— Nomen-
tlator, p. 533.
Bobtail, a species of arrow-head.
See extract.
Those that be lytle brested and big toward
the hede called by theyr lykenesse taper
fashion, reshe growne, and of some roerrye
f ellowes bobtayles, be fit for them whiche shote
vnder hande. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 126.
Bocher. H. sayB, " A fish called a
bocher is mentioned in Brit. BiU.s ii
490."
The bocher sweet, the pleasant flounder
thin. — Denny s, Secrets of Angling (Eng. Gar*
ner, i. 175).
Boddice, paib op, stays.
What a natural fool is he that would be a
pair of bodice to a woman's petticoat, to be
truss'd and pointed to them.—Marston, Mal-
content, iii. 1.
Showed my wife the periwigg made for
me, and she likes it very well, and so to my
brother's, and to buy a pair of boddice for
her.— Pepys, Oct. 30, 1663.
Bodelouce, body-louse.
And home she went as brag as it had been a
bodelouce,
And I after her. as bold as it had been the
goodman of the house.
Gammer Gurton's Needle, ii. 3 (1551).
Bodilise, to make gross, or cor-
porealise.
Unless we endeavour to spiritualise our-
selves, . . . age boditises us more and more,
and the older we grow the more we are
erabruted and debased. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. clxxxiv.
Bodkin Beard, a beard that came
down in a point. Taylor, the water-
poet (Superbice Flagellum), mentions
among beards, "Some sharp, stiletto-
fashion, dagger-like."
Scarfs, feathers, and swerds,
And thin bodkin-beards.
Skelton, Elynour Eummin (Harl.
Misc.,i.4L6).
, Bodkin lottery.
Every cobbler here . . . shall outsing Mr.
Abel; . . . every trumpet that attends a
bodkin lottery sounds better than Shore. — T.
Brown, Works, ii. 245.
Body. This verb seems formerly to
have been used in a technical sense
by the Independents. A congregation
formed into a Church was said to be
bodied^ and they who agreed to this
consented to bodying. See another
extract from Gauden, 8. v. Independ-
EKTED.
BOEDIED
( 72 )
BONE
That Church-way which they called Con-
gregational, or bodying of Christians.— Crov*
den. Tears of the Church, p. 18.
He will not gratine such a Minister or
such a little Congregation in a new exotick
way of bodying , that is, formally covenanting
and verbally engaging with them and to them
beyond the baptismal] bond and vow. — Ibid.
p. 37.
Boedied, query bodied; but if so,
what does it mean ?
I went to Dr. Keffler, who married the
daughter of the famous chymist DrebbeU,
inventor of the boedied scarlet. — Evelyn,
IHary, Aug. 1, 1666.
Boa, to botch.
I would they would . . . become sincere
confessors, or else leave hogging of heresies
to their own damnation. — Pnilpot, p. 308.
Bog. To take bog = to scruple or
boggle at
Daily experience showeth that many men
who make no conscience of a lie, do yet take
some bog at an oath. — Sanderson, ii. 230.
Boggle-de- botch, a me 88 or hash.
A fine boggle-de-botch I have made of it.
... I am aware it is not a canonical word —
classical, I mean ; nor in nor out of any dic-
tionary perhaps — but when people are warm,
they cannot stand picking terms. — Miss
Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xxvi.
Boglbt, little bog.
Of this tufty flaggy ground, pocked with
bogs and boglets, one especial nature is that
it will not hold impressions. — Blackmore,
Lorna Doone, ch. lix.
Bogtbot, to live the life of an Irish
peasant or bogtrotter.
It is a thousand times better, as one would
think, to bogtrot in Ireland, than to pirk it in
preferment no better dressed. — North, Ex-
amen, p. 323.
Bole. See extract.
Close to the spot . . there was a bole, by
which is meant a place where in ancient
times . . miners used to smelt their lead
ores. — Archaolog., vii. 170 (1786).
Boller, drinker; one fond of the
flowing bowl.
A feloe hauying sight in Phisiognomie . . .
when he had well vewed Socrates gaue plain
sentence that he was ... a greate boiler of
wine, and a vicious foloer of all naughtie
appetites. — UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 36.
Bolts, chains or confinement.
He shall to prison, and there die in bolts.
Marlowe, Edw. II., I. i.
He had stood in the pillory himself, and
had been imprisoned and laid in bolts at
Suffolk for a considerable time.—- Sprat, Rela-
tion of Young's Contrivance, 1692 (Harl. Misc.,
Bomba8E, to close up, as with bom-
bace or cotton. Bombast is the more
usual form, but see N., " to bombas his
hyring " = to stop his ears.
"What reason hym leadeth to my suite
too boombas his hyring? — Stanyhurst, JEn.9
iv. 451.
Bomdination, humming. Sir T.
Browne, as auoted by R, and L., has
bombUation in this sense.
The most sonorous fliers of this order are
the larger humble-bees, whose bombination*
booming, or bombing may be heard from a
considerable distance. — Kirby and Sptnce,
Entomology, ii. 304.
Bonadvbnturb, a species of ship or
boat used in fishing.
This business by the busses, bonadventures,
or fisher-ships . . . will bring plenty unto
his Majesty's Kingdoms. — England's Way to
Wealth, 1614 (Harl. Misc., iii. 397).
BoNA-PlDiCALLY,heartily; thoroughly.
Two men who love nonsense so cordially
and naturally and bona-fidically. — Souihey,
Letters, 1822 (iii. 314).
Bonarbt. See quotation.
Such as those Bonarets in Scythia bred
Of slender seeds, and with green fodder fed,
Although their bodies, noses, mouths, and
eys,
Of new-yeand lambs have full the form and
guise ;
And should be very lambs, save that (for
foot)
Within the ground they fix a lining root,
Which at their nauell growes, and dies that
day
That they have brouz'd the neighbour grass
away. — Sylvester, Eden, 570.
Bond-led, led in bonds : the refer-
ence is to the sacrifice of Isaac.
The Father makes the pile : Hereon hee layes
His bond-led, blind-led Son.
Sylvester, Maiden's Blush, 1784.
Bond page, a slave who served as
page.
One of the bondpaaes of this Pollio had by
ohaunce broken a dnnkyng glasse of cristaU
stone. — UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 289.
Bonk, to steal (slang). See quotation,
«. v. Slack-bake.
Bone, a feigned obstacle. " I have a
bone in my leg " is a jocular excuse for
not moving.
He refused to speake, allegeing that he had
a bone in his throte, and he could not speake.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 375.
BONE OF CONTENTION ( 73 )
BOOK-OATH
Net. Miss, come, be kind for once, and
order me a dish of coffee.
Mist. Pray go yourself; let us wear out
the oldest first ; besides, I can't go, for I have
a bone in my leg.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. iii.).
Bone of contention, the cause of a
quarrel, as between fighting dogs.
While any flesh remains on a bone, it con-
tinues a bone of contention. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, i. 249.
Now the precious leg while cash was flush,
Or the Count's acceptance worth a rush,
Had never excited dissension ;
But no sooner the stocks began to fall,
Than, without any ossification at all.
The limb became what people call
A perfect bone of contention.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Bon-mine. Faire bonne mine = to
put a good countenance on a matter. In
the extract it seems to mean a feint of
resistance by way of bravado.
We expected they would have disputed
our passage over the river Dun, but they
onely made a bon-mine there, and left us the
Toone of Doncaster to quarter in that night.
—Sir G. Dudley to Prince Rupert, 1644, p. 3.
Bon-mot, a witticism. This French
expression is naturalized.
She is absolutely governed by a favourite
maid, and as full of the bon-mots of her parrots
as I used to be of yours, my loves, when you
were prattlers. — Richardson, Grandison, vii.
223.
Ton need not hurry when the object is
only to prevent my saying a bon-mot, for
there is not the least wit in my nature. — Miss
Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. ix.
Booby, to behave like a booby.
Those brainless pert bloods of our town,
Those sprigs of the ton who run decency
down;
Who lounge, and who loot, and who booby
about,
No knowledge within, and no manners with-
out.— Irving, Salmagundi, No. iii.
Booby ism, stupidity ; folly.
The donkeys who are prevailed upon to
pay for permission to exhibit their lamentable
ignorance and boobyism on the stage of a
private theatre. — Sketches by Boe (Private
Theatres).
Boody, to sulk. Anglicized form of
Fr. bonder.
" Gome," said she, " don't boody with me ;
don't be angry because I speak out some
home truths." — Trollope, Barchester Towers,
ch. xxvii.
He is left to boody over everything by
himself, till he becomes a sort of political
hermit. — Ibid., Prime Minister, ch. lxxvi.
Boohoo, to cry : an onomatopceous
word.
From that moment the babes ne'er caught
sight
Of the wretch who thus sought their un-
doing,
But pass'd all that day and that night
In wandering about and boohooing.
Ingoldsby Leg. (Babes in the Wood).
Bookery, study ; also a library of
books.
Let them that mean by bookish business
To earn their bread, or hopeo to profess
Their hard got skill, let them alone, for me,
Busy their brains with deeper bookery.
Ball, Satires, II. ii. 28.
The Abbe Morellet . . . has a bookery in
such elegant order that people beg to go
and see it.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 346.
Bookhood, bookishness.
The preceding paper was given me by a
gentleman, who has a better opinion of my
bookhood than I deserve. — Walpole, Letters,
vi. 398 (1772).
Bookism, bookishness ; studiousness.
There was nothing, he said, of which he had
less ambition than a character for bookism
and pedantry.— M ad. D'Arblay, Diary, iv. 176.
Book-learning, education ; scholar-
ship: a common phrase among the poor.
The common wish of advancing their
children in the world made most parents in
this station desire to obtain the advantage
of what they called book-learning for any
son who was supposed to manifest a dis-
position likely to profit by it. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. c.
Book-money, surplice fees.
He had all the book-money, that is, the fees
for marriages, burials, and christenings. —
Sprat's Relation of Young's Contrivance, 1692
(Had. Misc., vi. 219).
Book-monger, writer of books.
He was a great Book-monger ; and on that
score Bale (no friend to Friers) giveth him.
a large testimonial.— Fuller, Worthies, Wilts
(ii. 468).
Book-muslin, open or clear muslin.
The lady in the back parlour, who was
very fat, and turned of sixty, came in a low
book-muslin dress and short kid gloves. —
Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. xiv.
Book-oath, oath taken on a book:
usually the Bible. Cf. Bible-oath.
He that layeth his hand upon a book in
this wise, and maketh there a promise to do
that thing that he is commanded, is obliged
there, by book-oath, then to fulfil his charge.
— Exam, of W. Thorpe (Bale, Select Works,
p. 111).
BOOKWRIGHT
( 74 )
BORE
Bookwright, author.
In London, at this moment, any young
man of real power will find friends enough
and too many among hia fellow booktcrights.
— C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xi.
Bool, bawl.
Singing-men that . . in churches or chapels
may roar, bool, bleat, yell. — Becon, ii. 300.
Boorn, explained by Fuller in the
margin, " That is, the Wort or boiled
liquor." The extract is part of a re-
ceipt for Metheglin.
Take to every six Gallons of water one
Gallon of the finest Honey, and put it into
the Boorn, and labour it together half an
hour.— Fuller, Worthies, Wales (ii. 664).
Boot. Both R. and L. mention this
as part of a coach used for luggage,
and this is now its meaning, but
formerly it accommodated passengers
also.
On Sunday following, the King in the
afternoon came abroad to take the air with
the Queen, his two brothers, and the Infanta,
who were all in one coach ; but the Infanta
sat in the boot with a blue ribbon about her
arm, of purpose that the Prince might dis-
tinguish her. — Howell, Letters, I. iii. 16.
He received his son into the coach, and
found a slight errand to leave Buckingham
behind, as he was putting his foot in the
boot. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 196.
Boot-garters. See quotation.
His leathern breeches were faultless in
make, his jockey boots spotless in the
varnish, and a handsome and flourishing
pair of boot-garters, as they are called, united
the one part of his garments to the other. —
Scott, Redgauntlet, i. 326.
Boot-hose, boot-stockings, q. v.
To the maid
That wash'd my boot-hose there's an English
groat.
Beaum. and Fl., Knight of B. Pestle, iv. 2.
This old gentleman, with his boot-hose and
beard, used to accompany his young master.
—North, Life of Ld. Guilford, i. 33.
" This is what I call coming to the point,"
said Mr. Touchwood, thrusting out his stout
legs, accoutred as they were with the ancient
defences called boot-nose, so as to rest his
heels upon the fender. — Scott. St. Ronan's
Well, ii. 296.
Bootless, irremediable.
Yet rather, when I have the wretch's head,
Then to the king, my father, will I send.
The bootless case may yet appease his wrath.
If not, I will defend me as I may.
Sackville, Ferrex and Forrex, ii. 2.
Boot-stocxings, very long stockings,
covering the leg like jack- boots.
The Author was sent from Shaftesbury, on
a little pony with a servant, not with a pair
of new boots, but ingloriously in a pair of
worsted boot-stockings, which my father ob-
served would keep my under-stockings from
the dirt as well as the best pair of boots in
Shaftesbury. — Bowles, Note to Banwtll Hill.
Tou will not observe his boot-stockings
coming high above' the knees; the coat
covers them, and if it did not, you would be
far from despising them now [t. e. in rough
weather]. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. lvii.
Boozer, drunkard.
This landlord was a boozer stout,
A snuff-taker and smoker.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 303.
Boozy, drunken.
Ere the Doctor could be starred out of Lis
boozy slumbers, and thrust into his clothes
by bis wife, the schoolmistress was safe in
bed. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. iii.
Borborites. See extract. Gr. (Mp-
/3opoc, dung or mire.
They saw not onely worthy and Reformed
Bishops, but the whole Reformed Church of
England and the Majesty of the Prince so
tome and bespattered by those Borborites,
those uncleane Spirits. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 672.
Bordrie, baldrick.
The meeting of the gentry was not then
at tipplinp-houses, but in the fields or forests,
with their hawks and hounds, with their
bugle-horns in silken bor dries. — Aubrey, Mis-
cellanies, p. 216.
Bore, a 'dull, tiresome person. L.
gives this, with quotation from the
Return from Parnassus, but the word
in that passage is bur. He cites then
from nothing earlier than TalfouroVs
Memoirs of C. Lamb. The first ex-
tract is from A Supplement to the last
Will and Test, of Anthony, Earl of
Shaftsbury, with his last words as they
were taken in Holland, where he died
January 20, 1682 (London, 1683) ; but
what precise meaning the word has there
is not clear to me. I doubt whether it
is used in the modern sense. The fire-
blower to a chemist was called a Lungs,
and there is some pun on this ; the
bores perhaps = Hollanders, Dutch
boere. In Burgoyne it seems = a slow
clumsy fellow, and this is the earliest
undoubted instance I have yet found
of any approach to its present sense.
As referring to a tfdng, L.'s first instance
BORN DA YS
( 75 ) BOTTLE-COASTER
is from Disraeli's Coningsby. See ex-
tract from Peter Pindar, s. v. Vulgab.
My Lungs (my Ignoramus Friends) is yours ;
But for my leights, I leave 'em to the Bores,
To blow the bellows of each new Sedition
On any change of Faction or Religion.
Supplement, &c., ut supra.
A spring of the chaise broke at the bottom
of the hill ; the boy was quite a bore in tying
it up, so I took out my luggage, and deter-
mined to walk home. — Burgoync, Lord of the
Manor, Act I. (1781).
'•He is known by fifty names," said Mr.
Monckton ; "his friends call him the moralist;
the young ladies, the crazy man, the maca-
ronis, the bore." — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia,
Bk. I. ch. viii. (1782).
Learning's become a very bore ;
That fashion long since has been o'er.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. vi.
Seeing a great house ... is generally
allowed to be the greatest bore in the world.
— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. ix.
Born days, a vulvar expression for
the whole life ; all the days since one
was born.
There was one Miss Byron, a North-
amptonshire lady, whom I never saw before
in my born days. — Richardson, Grandison, i.
103.
Craiglethorpe will know just as much of
the lower Irish as the Cockney who has never
been out of London, and who has never in
all his bom days seen an Irishman but on the
English stage. — Miss Edgeworth, Ennui, ch. ix.
Borrow, to warrant ; to assure. See
quotation in R. from Spenser's State of
Ireland.
Her eyes carried darts of fire,
Feathered all with swift desire ;
Yet forth these fiery darts did pass
Pearled tears as bright as glass,
That wonder 'twas in her eyne
Fire and water should combine,
If the old saw did not borrow,
Fire is love, and water sorrow.
Greene, from Never too Late, p. 296.
Boscaresque, abounding in shrub-
bery.
His [Evelyn's] garden was exquisite, being
most boscaresque, and, as it were, an exemplar
of his book of forest trees. — North, Life of
Li. Guilford, ii. 252.
Bosh, nonsense : a Turkish word.
I always like to read old Darwin's Loves of
the Plants, bosh as it is in a scientific point
of view. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, en. x.
Bosk, a bush. See H., s, v.
And so by tilth and grange,
And vines, and blowing bosks of wilderness,
We gained the mother-city thick with towers.
Tennyson, Princess, i.
Bosket, shrubbery.
There hovers the white Celestial ; in white
robe of linon moucheU, finer than moonshine ;
a Juno by her bearing; there in that bosket.
— Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. ix.
B'jsom-hung, declined on the bosom.
All whose poor seed, like violets in their
beds,
Now grow with bosom-hung and hidden beads.
Chapman, Iliad, Dedic, 151.
Bosom sermons. H. says, " Bosom-
sermons are mentioned in the Egerton
Papers^ p. 9," but he gives no explana-
tion. In the subjoined the term seems
to mean discourses learned by heart.
The quotation is the marginal note to a
story of a boy who was taught a long
oration by rote, and was put out by a
question being asked in the middle.
Bosome sermons and oracions of an other
mannes making. — UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 243.
Boss, a term of reproach. Cotgrave
gives, " A fat bosse. Femme Hen grasse
et grosse ; une coche"
Disdainful Turkess, and unreverend boss!
— Marlowe, 1 lumburlaine, III. ill.
Boss, master : an Americanism.
" So, boss" began the ruffian, not looking at
him, " we ain't fit company for the likes of
that kinchin, eh?" — H. Kingsley, Geoffry
Hamlyn, ch. xxiii.
Botanographist, a writer on botany.
Doctor Bowie, my most worthy Friend,
and skilful Botanographist. — Fuller, Worthies,
Northampton (ii. 157).
Botling, a species of fish.
The peel, the tweat, the botlina, and the rest,
With many more that in the deep doth lie
Of Avon, Usk, of Severn, and of Wye.
Denny s% Secrets of Angling
(Eng. Garner, 1. 175}.
Bottle-bellied, with a stomach
swelling out like a bottle.
He is like some choleric, bottle-bellied old
spider, who has woven his web over a whole
chamber. — Irving, Sketch-Book {John Bull).
Bottle- boy, apothecary's assistant.
He . . . utterly fulfilled the ideal of a bottle*
boy, for of him too as of all things, I presume,
an ideal exists eternally in the supra-sensual
Platonic universe. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. i.
Bottle-coaster, tray or carriage in
which the decanters were sent round
the table after dinner.
I wish you had seen the two Lady R.s,
sticking close to .one another; their father
BOTTLED-ALE ( 76 )
BOW
Pushing them on together, like two decanters
>n a bottle-coaster, with such magnificent dia-
mond labels round their necks.— Miss Edge"
vorth, Belinda, ch. v.
Bottled-ale. See extract. Dean
Alexander Howell, the person referred
to, was born 1510, died 1601.
Leaving a Bottle of Ale (when fishing) in
the Grasse, he found it some dayes after, no
Bottle, but a Gun, such the sound at the
opening thereof ; and this is believed (Casu-
alty is Mother of more Inventions than In-
dustry) the original of Bottled-ale in England.
—Fuller, Worthies, Lancashire (i. 647).
Bottle-green, the colour of the green
glass of which bottles are made. See
quotation s. v. Mountain dew.
The bottle-green was a famous suit to wear,
and I bought it very cheap at a pawnbroker's.
. . . 1*11 be married in the bottle-green. —
Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. li.
At the drawing-room he looked quite
handsome in his uniform of the Newcome
Hussars, bottle-green and silver lace.— Thack-
eray, The Newcomes, ch. xxxti.
Bouch, mouth (French). It was also
used for an allowance of meat or
drink to a servant in a palace. See N.,
8. v.
Heere loa behold Boreas from bouch of north
bio Pelorus
Oure ships ful chargeth.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 702.
Boucherus, butcherly.
Much lyke as a fat bul beloeth, that setled
on altar
Half kild escapeth thee missing boucherus
hatchet.— Stanyhurst, ^En., ii. 236.
Boughed, covered or shaded with
boughs.
Up through that wood behind the church.
There leads from Edward's door
A mossy track, all over boughed
For half a mile or more.
Coltridge, Three Grates.
Boult, a narrow piece of stuff. See
H., s. v. bolt.
Though you be crossbites, foys, and nips,
yet you are not good lifts ; which is a great
helpe to your faculty, to filch a boult of satten
or velvet.— Greene, Theeves Falling Out, 1615
(Harl. Misc., viii. 389).
Boundal, bound.
It was well for all sides that the best
divine, in my judgement, that ever was in
that place, Dr. Davenant, held the rains of the
disputation; he kept him within the even
boundals of the cause. — Hacked Life of
Williams, i. 26.
Boundane, boundary*
Thev overranne Iituania, Podolia, Polonia,
and those countreys which are the E&3
boundanes of Europe. — Fuller, Holy War,
Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Boundift, to bound.
Vntffl this day (deer Muse) on euery side
Within straight lists thou hast been bourtdiJCd.
Sylvester, The Vacation, 2.
Bouno-knife. Boung is an old slang
word for purse; boung-knife may
therefore be the knife in the purse or
girdle. Cf. Cattle-bong.
One of them had on ... a skeine like a
lmerybounp-knife.--Greene, Quip for Upstart
Courtier {Harl. Misc., v. 407).
B0DNNIE8, swellings or tumours : an
East Anglian word. Cf. bunion, and
see N. and Q., V. viii. 113.
There be no vices in the world whereof you
maie not see great buddes, or rather great
bounnies and bunches in them. — Trahtron's
Warning to England, 1568 (Mait land's Re-
formation, p. 137).
Bourreau, executioner. Several
French words were introduced at the
Restoration (see Trench, Eng. Past
and Present, p. 122) ; some of these
did not survive, or perhaps ever go be-
yond the author who first employed
them.
No sooner said, but it was done,
The Bourreau did his worst ;
Gaphny, alas ! is dead and gone,
And left his judge accursed.
Prior, The Viceroy.
Bout, a circuit
I love not to fetch any bouts where there
is a nearer way. — Adams, ii. 14.
Bow. To draw or pull the long bote =
to lie or exaggerate. CI the extract
from Fuller, *. v. Loose.
If on your head some vengeance fell,
Mfoirja, for every tale you tell
The listening Lords to cozen ;
If but one whisker lost its hue,
Changed (like Moll Coggin's tail) to blue
I'd near them by the dozen. '
But still, howe'er you dnv> your bow,
Your charms improve, your triumphs grow.
Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 63.
King of Corpus (who was an incorrigible
wag) was on the point of pulling some dread-
ful long bow, and pointing out a half dozen
of people in the room as B. and H. and L. &c
the most celebrated wits of that day —
Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. i. *
Bow. To have a double string, or two
strings to one's bow = to have two re-
sources or alternatives.
BOWERLY
( 77 ;
BR ADO ON
The Conqueror, finding himself quitted of
this obstacle, takes upon him the regiment
of this kingdom with a double string to his
bote; the one of antient title, the other of
conquest. — Mist, of Edward II. , p. 36.
A man in Amsterdam is suffer' d to have
but one religion, whereas in London he may
have ttco strings to his bow. — T. Brown,
Works, iv. 115.
Miss Bertram . . . might be said to have two
strings to her bow. She had Bush worth-feelings
and Crawford-feelings, and in the vicinity of
Sotherton the former had considerable effect.
— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. viii.
Bowebly, large ; burly (?).
He had seene in the citee of Miletus
many and the same right greate and bowerly
images and porturatures. — UdaVs Erasmus s
Apophih., p. 208.
The bowerly hostess, for a cart-horse fit,
Scorns Daphne's reed-like shape, and calls
her chit.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 180.
Bowbt, lamp, or lamp-frame ?
For a bowet to ber light in upon the Sacra-
ment. — Leverton, Chwardens Accts., 1535
(Arch., xli. 353).
Bowie, a large clasp-knife, so called
from Col. James Bowie, a native of
Georgia.
I took the precaution of bringing my
bowie and revolver with me, in case the
worst came to the worst. — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. xxvii.
" No stakes, no dungeons, no blocks, no
racks, no scaffolds, no thumbscrews, no
pikes, no pillories," said Chollop. "No-
thing but revolvers and bowie knives/' re-
turned Mark; ''and what are they? not
worth mentioning.'* — Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit,
eh. zzziii.
Bowse. Bailey says bowse among
sailors is " to hale or pull the tackle.
Commodore Trunnion uses it meta-
phorically. See quotation s. v. Gum ;
also from Ingoldsby Legends, s. v.
Pigeon-toed.
My eyes ! how she did pitch !
And wouldn't keep her own to join no line,
Tho' I kept bowsing, bowsing at her bow-
line.
Hood, Sailor's Apology for Bow-legs.
Bow-string, to strangle with a bow-
string.
A sultan, having bow-stringed his vizier,
promotes some one else to the post. — Savage,
R. Medlieott, Bk. I. ch. ix.
Bow-wow, a dog.
Let my obedience then excuse
My disobedience now ;
Nor some reproof yourself refuse,
From your aggrieved bow-wow.
Cowper, Beau's Reply.
It's all up with its handsome friend; he
has gone to the demnition bow-wows. — Dick-
ens, Nicholas Xickleby, ch. lxiv.
Box. To box the compass = to go
round to all quarters of the compass.
After a week or so, the wind would regu-
larly box the compass (as the sailors call it) in
the course of every day, following where the
sun should be, as if to make a mock of him.
— Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. xlii.
Box. To be in the wrong box is to
be mistaken. L. gives the expression
with a quotation from Sala, but it is
much older.
Sir, quoth I, if you will hear how St.
Augustine expoundeth that place, you shall
perceive that you are in a wrong box. — Ridley,
p. 163 (1554).
I perceive that you and I are in a wrong
box.— J. Udall, Diotrephes, p. 31 (1588).
But Socrates said, Laugh not, Zophirus is
not in a wrong box. — Optick Glasse of Humors
(1639).
Boxage, boscage ; shrubbery.
The rest of the ground is made into seve-
rall inclosures (all hedge worke or rowes of
trees) of whole fields, meadows, boxages, some
of them containing divers acres. — Evelyn,
Diary, Ap. i. 1644.
Box-keepebes8, woman who keeps
the boxes at a theatre.
Every time the box-keeperess popped in her
head, and asked if we would take any refresh-
ment, I thought the interruption odious. —
Thackeray, Miscellanies, ii. 346.
Boy, to provide with boys; spoken
of a wife who had male offspring : also
to guard with boys. L. has the verb in
the sense of "treat as a boy." Bre-
ton's Mavillia (p. 38), when attended
merely by a page, speaks of herself as
" manned but with a poore boye," which
illustrate 8 the second extract.
Nor hast thou in his nuptial arms en joy'd
Barren embraces, but wast girl'd and boy'd.
Corbet, Death of Lady Haddington.
The gates were shut, and partly man'd,
partly boy'd against him. — Fuller, Hist, of
Cambridge, vi. 16.
Boykin, an endearing diminutive of
boy. In the quotation Anchises is
speaking to Mneaa. H. says the word
is to be found in Sir John Oldcastle
and Palsgrave's Acolastus, but he gives
no extract.
But now I'm fixt to go along
With thee, my boykin, right or wrong.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 80.
*
Beadoon, snaffle (?).
BRAG
( 78 )
BRANDLET
I have always made it a rule to feel his
[the horse's] mouth lightly, and generally
more with the bradoon than with the curb. —
Nimrod on Condition of Hunters, 17.
Brag, to challenge: this use is a
Scotticism : see Jamieson.
That was one of the famous cups of Tours,
wrought by Martin Dominique, an artist who
might brag all Paris. — Scott, Quentin Dur-
ward, i. 60.
Braggartly, boastful.
Who ever saw true learning, wisdom, or
wit, vouchsafe mansion in any proud, vain-
glorious, and braggartly spirit? — Chapman,
Iliad, iii., Comment.
Braggle. See extract.
There is a way to catch eels by "braa-
gling ; " thus : — Take a rod small and tough,
of sallow, hazel, or such like, a yard long, as
big as a bean-stalk. In the small end thereof
make a nick or cleft with a knife ; in which
nick put your strong but little hook baited
with a red worm, and made sure to a line of
ten or twelve good hairs, but easily, that the
eels may null it out. Go into some shallow
place 01 the river among the great stones,
and braggle up and down till you find holes
under the stones. There put in your hook
so baited at vour rod's end, and the eel under
the stone will not fail to take it. Give her
time to put it over ; and then, if your strength
will serve, she is your own. — Lawson, Com-
ments on Secrets of Angling (Eng. Garner, i.
195).
Braggon, a species of drink. I sup-
Sose the same as bragget, mentioned by
'. and L.
Beside ale and beer, the natural drink of
part of this isle may be said to be metheglin,
braggon, and mead. — Hoxcell, Letters, ii. 54.
Brain-foolery, folly.
The very essence of his soule is pure vil-
lany ; the substance of his brain-foolery; one
that beleeues nothing from the starres vp-
ward. — Chapman, Jfons. D'Olive, Act V.
Brain-hill, brain-pan.
Had the Gensdarmerv of our great writers
no other enemy to fight with? nothing to
grind in their brain-mill but orts? — Socket,
Life of Williams, i. 102.
Brain-sick, a fool or madman (usually
an adj.).
Even so, some brainsicks Hue there now-a-
daies,
That lose themselues still in contrary waies.
Sylvester, fourth day, first weeks, 150.
Brain-Wright, creator of the brain.
In this part of the Brayn the Brayn-vright*s
And wisdom© infinite do most appear©.
Davies, Mirum in Modum, p. 7.
Brake. H. says " an instrument
for dressing hemp or flax. See Holly-
band, s. v. brosse" In the extracts it
is a verb or participle.
It [flax] must be watered, dried, braked,
tew-tawecl, and with much labor driuen and
reduced in the end to be as soft and tender
as wooll.— Holland, Pliny, Bk. xix. (proem).
There must be planting, cutting down,
bundling, watring, rippling, braking, wing-
ling, and heckling of hemp.— Howell, Parly
of Beasts, p. 14.
The sad-yell ow-fly made with the buzzard's
wings, bound with black braked hemp. — Miss
Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. viii.
Brake, a snare : the idea being con-
nected with the tangles of a thicket (?).
Alas what should I doe
With that enchanted glass© ? See diuels
there?
Or (like a strumpet) learne to set my lookes
In an eternal brake, or practise juggling,
To keepe my face still fast, my hart still
loose ? — Chapman, Bussy DAmbois, Act I.
Bran, slang for a loaf. See quotation
8. v. Lush.
He purchased a sufficiency of ready-dressed
ham, and a half -quartern loaf, or, as he him-
self expressed it, Ma fourpenny bran." —
Dickens, Oliver Tteist, ch. viii.
Branded, spotted. II. says " a mix-
ture of red and black." The word in
tho original is aUXov.
They saw a branded serpent sprawl
So full amongst them from above.
Chapman, Iliad, xii. 217.
Brander, a gridiron.
A frying-pan, two branders, a flesh-hook
and flaming spoon. — Inventory, 1708 {Dun-
bar, Social Life in Former Days, p. 212).
Brandish, to shine, twinkle. Syl-
vester uses the word in this sense, per-
haps as referring to the gleam of a
brandished weapon ; so Heath in his
translation of Horace, 1638, speaks of
" the ray of a brandished sword."
Thine eys already (now no longer eys,
But new bright stars) doe brandish in the
skyes. — Sylvester, Handy-crafts, 729.
Though waxen old in his long weary night,
He see a friendly Sun to brandish bright.
Ibid., The Arke, 393.
Brandlet, a bird, probably so called
from being branded or marked in a
peculiar way; perhaps the mountain-
finch. See N". and Q., V. x. 409.
The brandlet saith, for singing sweete and
softe,
(In hir conceit) there is none such as she.
Gascoigne, Philomene.
BRAND Y
( 79 )
BRAT
Brandt, to drink brandy. The verb,
which, however, is not given in the
Diets., is usually applied to mixing
brandy with wine.
He rarely had been brandying it or beering,
That ia, in plainer English, he was drunk.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 138.
Brandy-ball, a sweetmeat in favour
with boys.
On one ride was the gaudy riband making
its mute appeal to rustic gallantry ; on the
other, the delicious brandy-ball and alluring
lollipop compounded after the most approved
receipt in the True Gentlewoman's Garland,
and M raising the waters " in the mouth of
many an expectant urchin. — Ingoldsby
Legends (Leech of Folkestone).
Brandt is Latin for a goose, pro-
bably because people took a dram after
eating goose. There may be a catch in
this way. "What is the Latin for a
goose ? " " Ans(w)er, Brandy ; " anser
being the Latin word for goose.
Lord Sm. Well, but after aU, Tom, can you
tell me what's Latin for a goose ?
Net. O my lord, I know that ; why, brandy
is Latin for a goose, and Tace is Latin for a
candle.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. ii.).
Brandy-pawnee, Anglo-Indian for
brandy and water.
" I'm sorry to see you, gentlemen, drinking
brandy-pawnee,1* says he ; " it plays the deuce
with our young? men in India." — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. l.
I took up natural history in India years
ago to drive away thought, as other men
might take to opium or to brandy-pawnee. —
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xv.
Brank. H. says "to hold up the
head affectedly ; to put a bridle or re-
straint on anything." In the extracts
it seems = to clatter, to come in with a
noise. Jainieson has it = to prance.
There was a rattle of horses' feet on the
stones, and the clank of a sabre, and Lieu-
tenant Hornby of the 140th Hussars (Prince
Arthur's Own) came branking into the yard
with two hundred pounds' worth of trappings
on him. — //. Kingsley, Ravenshoe% ch. xxxii.
They came branking into some pot-house,
half a dozen of them, and talked loud about
this and that. — Ibid., ch. xlvii.
Brank. See extract There is a pic-
ture of the brank in the work cited.
At the [Newcastle] town-hall I was shown
a piece of antiquity called a brank. It con-
sists of a combination of iron fillets, and is
fastened to the head by a lock fixed to the
back part of it ; a thin plate of iron goes into
the mouth, sufficiently strong, however, to
confine the tongue, and thus prevent the
wearer from making any use of that restless
member. The use of this piece of machinery
is to punish notorious scolds. I am pleased
to find that it is now considered merely as a
matter of curiosity. — Life of J. Lackington,
Letter xliii.
Brantle, the brawl. N., L., and R.
have bransle, all with the same quota-
tion from the Faerie Queene, III. x. 8.
Pepys spells it bransle, Nov. 15, 1666.
The King takes out the Duchess of York ;
and the Duke the Duchess of Buckingham ;
the Duke of Monmouth my Lady Castle-
maine : and so other lords other ladies ; and
they aanced the Brantle. — Pepys, Dec. 30,
1662.
Brash, eruption ; rash.
He is a churl with a soft place in his heart,
whose speech is a brash of bitter waters, but
who loves to help you at a pinch. — Emtrson,
quoted in Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. ii.
Brasmatias, an earthquake consisting
in violent perpendicular upheavings of
the earth (ppaatrtiv, to boil).- — Arist.
Mund., iv. 30. See N. and Q., V. x.
409.
That kinde of earthquake which as I deeme
naturall Philosophers call Brasmatias. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 620.
Brass, money. In the first quotation
from Bp. Hall it may mean copper
money, as it does in St. Matt. x. 9, &c.,
but in the other extracts it = money
generally.
Shame that the muses should be bought and
sold
For every peasant's brass on each scaffold.
Hall, Satires, I. ill. 68.
Hirelings enow beside can be so base,
Tho' we should scorn each bribing varlet's
brass.— Ibid., IV. v. 12.
" There'll be Fosters i' th' background, as
one may say, to take t' biggest share on t'
profits," said Bell. u Ay, ay, that's but as it
should be, for I reckon they'll ha' to find the
brass the first." — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's
Lovers, ch. xx.
Brass, impudence.
She in her defence made him appear such a
rogue upon record, that the Chief Justice
wondered he had the brass to appear in a
court of justice. — North, Examen, p. 256.
Brassy, like brass, and so, impudent.
In Merchant of Venice, IV. i. it =
hard.
No, Mister Gattle— Betty was too brassy.
We never keep a servant that is saucy.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 73.
Brat, a north-country word for
B RATH EL
( 80 ) BREAD AND CROW
apron or pinafore. Chancer has brail
= cloak (Cant Tales, 16, 349).
~ We had nought on but our hats, an* bit*
o' blue bedgowns, an' brats; see ye may
think we cuddent be varra heeat. — Southey,
The Doctor, Interchapter xxiv.
r. Brathkl, same as brothel, which was
sometimes used for a harlot, and so
generally as a term of reproach for a
woman. Xantippe is the brothel referred
to in the extract.
The scoldyng of brothels is no more to bee
passed on then the squeking of wel wheles.
—UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 26.
Brattice, to board up. See L., 9. v.
bretage.
He led me in and out the marshy places
to a great round hole or shaft bratticed up
with timber. — Blackmore, Lorna Boone, ch.
lviii.
' Bravada, a boast or fanfaronade.
Bravado is more usual. Ital. and Span.
bravata.
And yet all this but a mere flourish, a
faint and feigned bravada. — Sanderson, ii. 340.
Bravade, a boast, or show of courage.
Anglicized form of preceding.
My blood has often curdled in my veins,
when I heard gentlemen magnify their in-
famous conquests, and raise cruel trophies
on the ruins of women's honour : I had not
Eatience to hear the bravades, nor power to
inder 'em. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 65.
Some, however, with outward bravade, but
inward tremblings, went searching along the
walls, and behind the posts, for some lurcher.
— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 101.
Bravado, a braggart.
We will march about like bravadoes,
Huffing, and puffing,
And snuffing, and calling the Spaniard.
Jferry Drollerie, p. 16.
Several letters in the House about the
Fanatickes in several places, coming in great
bodies, and turning people out of the
churches, . . . which makes them stark mad,
especially the hectors and bravadoes of the
House, who show all the zeal on this occmt
Aon.—Pepys, Feb. 28, 1667-68.
Braver, boaster.
Our countrimen . . . would carrie the buck-
lers full easilie from all forreine brauers. —
Nashe, Pref. to Greene's Menaphon, p. 16.
Bravery, chivalry.
The Grandees also, and others of the Cas-
tilian Bravery that conducted the Prince to
the Seas, were feasted in our Admiral at a
true English table, free, pleasant, luxuriously
bountiful.— Hacket, life of Williams, i. 162.
Braveur, courage. Fr. bravoure.
It was want of judgment not to know that,
if the matter of the proclamation was not
defensible, as it was manifestly, yet the
braveur of the carriage had made him friends.
— North, Examen, p. 655.
The conversation and ordinary discourse
of the club was chiefly upon braveur in de-
fending the cause of liberty and property. —
Ibid. p. 572.
Bravo, a brave man: usually em-
ployed opprobriously of a swaggering
ruffian or hired assassin.
Can you therefore think that those bravoe*
who tremble more at the shadow of a dis-
grace than at all the terrors of damnation
will buy pardon at the expense of their
honour?— Gentleman Instructed, p. 67.
Brawl, a bravo. A jurgiis in the
original.
I am his swabber, his chamberlain, his
footman, his clerk, his butler, his book-
keeper, his brawl, his errand boy.— Bailey's
Erasmus, p. 42.
Brawn-fallen, lean ; skinny.
Where brawr^falne cheeks, heart-scalding
sighs, and dimmed eyes with teares,
Doe shewe in Life's anatomy what burthen
Sorrowe beares.
Breton, Melancholike Humours, p. 8.
Poore brawn-falne begger, whereon dost
thou feede? — Aid., Pilgrimage to Paradise,
p. 12.
For our women here in France, they are
such lean braicn-falPn jades. — Farquhar, The
Inconstant, Act 1.
Brat, applied to the roaring of a lion,
and the noise made by a buck.
A horse neigheth, a lyon brayes, a swine
grunts. — Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie,
Bk. III. ch. xvii.
If I did not hear a bow go off and the buck
bray, I never heard deer in my life. — Merry
Devil of Edmonton (Dodsley, O. PI., xi. 156).
Bread-and-butter, used contempt-
uously of young and shy girls : the ex-
pression probably owes its currency to
what Byron says of " your budding
Miss":—
The Nursery still lisps out in all they utter —
Besides, they always smell of bread-and-
butter. — Beppo, st. 89.
One was a middle-aged clergyman, and the
other a lady at any rate past the wishy-
washy bread-and-butter period of life. — Trol-
lope, Barchester Towers, ch. xli.
Bread and crow seems to be used
proverbially for " every one." Perhaps
there is some allusion to JEsop's fable,-
BREAD-BASKET ( 81 )
BREDE
as though the fox ate not only the
crow's bread, bat the crow herself.
The gods and goddesses, all on a rowe,
bread and crow, from Ops to Pomona (the
first apple-wife), were so dumpt with this
miserable wracke that they beganne to
abhorre all moystnre for the sea's sake. —
Xashe, Lenten Stuff (Harl. Misc., vi. 168).
Bread-basket, the stomach. Smol-
lett uses bread-room (which seems to
have been sea slang) in the same sense.
See extract $. v. Slino.
Another came np to second him, bat I let
drive at the mark, made the soup-maigre
ramble in his bread-basket, and laid him
sprawling. — Foote, Englishman in Paris,
Act I.
A heavy blow was struck on the panel
from the inside, and the point of a sharp
instrument driven right through, close to
my knees, with the exclamation, " What do
you think o' that now in a policeman's
bread-basket ? "— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch.
xxxiii.
When you can't fill the bread-basket, shut
it. Go to sleep till the Southern dross comes
out again. — Reade, Never too Late to Mend,
ch. Ixx.
Breadliness, eating together, and
consequent intimacy; what Sir T.
Browne calls commentation.
If yo've any love for me because of yo'r
dead mother's love for me, or because of any
fellowship or daily breadlines* between us
two, pat the hard thoughts of Philip away
from out yo'r heart. — Mrs. Oaskell, Sylvia's
Lovers, ch. xttix.
Bread-room, stomach.
The waiter . . returned with a quartern
of brandy, which Crowe, snatching eagerly,
started into his bread-room at one cant. —
Smollett, L. Greavet, ch. xvii.
Brbadstitch, braidstitch. Gf . Brede.
The extract from Taylor is quoted from
Southey's Doctor, ch. ciii.
Brave bred-stitch, fisher-stitch, Irish-stitch,
and Queen-stitch. — Taylor {the voter poet).
They understand their needle, breadstitch,
cross and change, and all manner of plain
work.—Goldsmith, Vicar of Wakefield, en. xi.
Brbady, of bread. Breaden is more
usual.
Honorius the third, bishop of Rome, com-
manded this new bready god to be honoured.
— Hooper, i. 527.
Break-back, over- weighty. Cf. Back-
break.
All breake-backe Crosses which we vndergo
Are cast vpoo us by this Euill still.
Davie*, Summa Totalis, p. 21.
Break-league, a covenant-breaker.
L. has break-promise and break-vow-
Dido, in Stanyhuret's version {JEn., iv.
657), invokes Divine vengeance on <l al
faythlesse break leages."
Breambacked, with a high-ridged
back like a bream. It is a horse that
is spoken of in the extract.
He was not . . . hollow-backed, bream-
backed, long-backed, or broken-backed. —
Southty, The Doctor, ch. exciii.
Breast. In a breast — abreast.
He then commanded his general ... to
draw up the troops in close order, and march
them under me; the foot by twenty-four
tn a breast, and the horse by sixteen. — Surift,
Voyage to Lilliput, ch. iii.
Breast. To make a clean breast = to
tell everything.
You know all about it ; ... I made a clean
breast to you. — G.Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. lxvi.
Breath. To keep one's breath to cool
one's broth or porridge = to desist
from useless argument or remonstrance.
In tide extract from Bailey the original
is laterem lavat, he washes a tile, i. e.
loses his labour.
My lord, save your breath for your broth ;
I am not now at leisure to attend you. —
Machin, Dumb Knight* Act II.
Truly, sir, you may please, as the proverb
runs, to keep your breath to cool your pottage,
and spend it no longer upon me. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 85.
You have no reason to fear a peace for
these ten years : the pope is the only man
that persuades them to come to an agree-
ment among themselves, but be had as g?ood
keep his breath to cool his porridge. — Bailey's
Erasmus, p. 312.
Breathy swords, swords of thy
breath, i. e. killing words. The Rev.
J. Mitford pronounces this " more bar-
baric than anything we have met with
in Peele," and suggests "breathed
words," but cf. Ps. Iv. 22. Latham
has breathy — sending out as breath.
O help, my David, help thy Bethsabe,
Whose heart is pierced with thy breathy
swords. — Peele, David and Bethsabe, p. 485.
Brede, braid. L. marks this word
as obsolete ; it has been revived by
Keats and Tennyson. See quotation
$. v. Volcanian, and cf. Breadstitch.
Psyche ever stole
A little nearer, till the babe that by us,
Half-lapt in glowing gauze and golden brede,
O
BREECHLOADER ( 82 ) BRIDE WELLING
Lay like a new-falTn meteor on the grass
Uncared for, spied its mother.
Tennyson, Princess, vi.
Breechloader, a rifle that is loaded
at the breech instead of the muzzle.
There are two herons just round the point,
and I have my breechloader and a dozen car-
tridges here.— Black, Prineeis of Thule, ch.
xziii.
Breedlino, a native of the fen country.
L. has the word, but only with quota-
tion from Macaulay. Pepys, describ-
ing a journey from Parson's Drove to
Wisbeach, writes :
Over most sad fenns, all the way observ-
ing the sad life which the people of the place
—which, if they be born there, they do call
the Breedlings of the place — do live.— Sept.
17, 1663.
Breeze, to blow.
At this moment the noise of the distant
fight breezed up louder than ever. — H. Kings-
ley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. zliv.
Brrneaqe, payment for burning reeds
in the fen (?).
To Wyllm Cortys for breneage in the fen.
— Leverton Chwardens. Accts., 1585 (Arch.,
xli. 345).
Brephophagist, eater of children.
The writer's brother made the acquaintance
in California, not a year ago, of a gentleman
who affirmed that babies were excellent eat-
ing. . . . This Brephophagist was a well-
dressed and nicely-mannered man. — E. Roe,
Land of the N. Wind, p. 265 (1875).
Brethreed, brotherhood.
He had a certain breethreed which vsed to
resorte and gather together at his nous. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 377.
Brewers, briars (?). Fuller, in the
margin, calls it " an old English word."
Willhelmus Brewer. His mother, unable
(to make the most charitable constructions)
to maintain, cast him in brewers (whence he
was so named) or in a bed of brakes in New
Forrest.— Fuller, Worthies, Devon (i. 295).
Bribble-brabblk, chattering or quar-
relling.
You are a foolish bribble-brabble woman,
that you are. — The Committee, Act IH.
Bribe-groping, corrupt; bribe-seek-
ing.
The bribe-groping officer, in what court
soever his dition lies, is an oppressing rider.
— Adams, i. 87.
Briberyng, robbing.
God gene her a shamef nil repreefe,
For it is the moost briberynge thef e
That euer was, I make Gk>d a vowe.
Dyaloge betwene a Gentleman and
a Husbandman, p. 137.
Bribes-walking, bribery.
There was bribes-walking, money-making,
making of hands, quoth the prophet. —
Latimer, i. 156.
Bribrebs, female briber.
Now, Belford, see us all sitting in judge-
ment, resolved to punish the fair bribress. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi. 66.
Bric-a-brac (Fr.), odds and ends. A
bric-a-brac shop = old curiosity shop.
Two things only jarred on his eye in his
hurried glance round the room: there was
too much bric-a-brac, and too many flowers.
— H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xxxi.
u Haven't an affair in the world," said
Hans, in a flighty way ; " except a quarrel
with a bric-a-brac man." — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. lxvii.
Briccoll, a species of warlike engine.
Here bends the Briccoll, while the cable
cracks,
Their Crosbowes were vprent with yron
Backs.— Hudson's Judith, in. 109.
Here th' Enginer begins his Ram to rear ;
Here mounts his Trepan, and his Scorpion
there ;
Bends here his Bricol, there his boysterons
Bow. — Sylvester, Bethulia's Rescue, iii. 109.
Brick, a good fellow; mp&ysvoe
dvrjp ? (Aristotle, Eth. , i. 10). This is
the derivation suggested in the first
quotation.
In brief I don't stick to declare Father Dick,
So they called him for short, was a regular
brick ;
A metaphor taken, I have not the page aright,
Out of an ethical work by the Stagyrite.
Ingoldsby Leg. (Brothers of Birchington).
" I may say/' continued Mr. Peacock em-
phatically, " that he was a regular trump-
trump ! " he reiterated with a start, as if the
word had stung him — "trump! he was a
brick.'— Lytton, The Caxtons, Bk. XI. ch. v.
Never mind me, but miud yourself, and
mind that curate; he is a noble brick. — C.
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xvii.
Bricks. Like bricks = vehemently,
quickly. See quotation s. v. Midship-
man.
Bump they comes agin the post, and out
flies the fare like bricks. — Sketches by Box,
The Last Cab-Driver.
Bridewelling, imprisoning in house
of correction. Cf. Newgated.
Here is bridewelling, banishing, and selling
BEIDGELESS ( 83 )
BRISTLE
of people to slavery.— H. Care's Draconica,
A.D. 1688.
Bridgeless, without a bridge, or that
cannot be bridged.
Alone unchanged, a free and bridgeless tide,
Euphrates rolls along.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. v.
Bridgem aster, proprietor of a bridge.
The Bridgemasters were obliged to exact
at the Ferry there exorbitant rates for con-
veying passengers over the Thames, in order
the better to support the said [Staines] bridge.
—Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, i. 233.
Bbidle-cull, a highwayman, who
was usually mounted (thieves' cant).
See quotation from same work, $. v.
Buttock. Cf. Snaffling-lay.
A booty of £10 looks as great in the eye
of a bridle-cull, and gives as much real hap-
piness to his fancy, as that of as many thou-
sands to the statesman. — Fielding. Jonathan
Wild, Bk. I. ch. v.
Bbidleless, without a bridle.
Far over the plain
Away went the bridleless steed.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. vi.
Brtdport dagger. See extract
" Stab'd with a Brydvort Dagger. ," That is,
hangM or executed at tne Gallowes ; the best,
if not the most, hemp (for the quantity of
ground) growing about Brydport.— Fuller,
Worthies, Dorset (i. 310).
Brief, to shorten. R. says, " Dr.
Jamieaon gives instances of the use of
brief as a verb. It is common among
English lawyers, as to brief the plead-
ings-" R. gives no example, and Jamie-
son's are from Scotch writers.
Thy power is confined, thy time is limited ;
both thy latitude and extension are briefed
up.— Adams, ii. 135.
Brig, bridge.
Look thou theer wheer Wrigglesby beck
comes out by the 111.
Feyther run up to the farm, an' I runs up to
the mill ;
Anr I'll run up to the brig ; an* that thou'll
live to see.
Tennyson, Northern Farmer,
New Style.
Brigadier wig, a species of wig used
apparently by elderly men of good
position — worn perhaps by senior
officers in the army.
I . . . had no conception that a man of so
respectable an appearance, in a brigadier vrig
and grave habit, that looked more like a
justice of peace or high sheriff than a de-
bauched rake, could be guilty of any rudeness
or indecent behaviour. — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. III. ch. xiii.
Brigado, brigade. The form in the
extract is due to the rhyme.
Where once they form'd their .troops,
Brigados,
Their horn-works, rampires, pallizados.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 6.
Brilliant, to make brilliant by
polishing.
Thank you a thousand times, dear Madam,
for your obliging letter and the new Bristol
stones you have sent me, which would pass
on a more skilful lapidary than I am for
having been brillianted by a professed artist,
if you had not told me that they came shin-
ing out of a native mine, and had no foreign
diamond dust to polish them.— Walpole,
Letters, iv. 377 (1784).
Brimse, gadfly. See H., 9. v.
I vnderstand they are all in a fustian fume,
they runne to and fro with a nettle in their
noses, and lashe out their heeles, as they had
caught the brimse, which is a plaine token
that the gawle is rubbed, the canker toucht.
— Gosson, Apologie of Schoole of Abuse, p. 64.
Brimstone, a bad, shrewish woman.
I hate the law damnably ever since I lost
a year's pay for hindering our boatswain's
mate's brother from beating his wife. The
brimstone swore I beat her husband, and so
I paid for meddling. — Johnston, Chrysal, ii.
190.
Brince, to pledge in drinking, or to
offer drink. N., 8. v. brinch, quotes that
word from Lyly, and says, " An unusual
word having some reference to drinking.
If an error of the press, I know not
what the reading should be." See also
H. , s. v.
Luther first brinced to Germany the poi-
soned cup of his heresies, blasphemies, and
satanisms. — Jewel, ill. 265.
Brine-seeth, a brine-pit, from the
salt water of which salt is extracted by
boiling.
From Chester we kept directly on East to
Middlewich, . . . chiefly noted for makiug
salt, where are two excellent 1>rine-seeths. —
Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, ii. 385.
Bringing, being brought : for a simi-
lar use of the participle see carrying,
drawing, starching.
She only came on foot to leave more room
for the harp which was bringing in the car-
riage.— Miss Austen, Persuasion, ch. vi.
Bristle, brisk : which is the reading
in some copies.
g 2
BRISTOL MILK ( 84 )
BROOM
The bristle mouse may feed her selfe with
crumms,
Till that the greene-eyed kit ling comes.
Herrtck, Appendix, p. 459.
Bristol milk. See extracts. Pepys
(June 13, 1668) enjoyed "plenty of
brave wine, and above all Bristol milk.'1
Ld. Braybrooke quotes from the first
edition of Byron's Eng. Bards and
Scotch Reviewers (the lines are altered
in later editions) :
Too much in turtle BristoVs sons delight,
Too much o'er bowls of rack prolong the night.
"Bristol Milk." Though as many Ele-
phants are fed as Cows grased within the
Walls of this City, yet great plenty of this
metaphorical Miuc, whereby Xeres or Sherry
Sack is intended. — Fuller, Worthies, Bristol.
The repast was dressed in the furnace, and
was accompanied by a rich beverage made of
the best Spanish wine, and celebrated over
the whole kingdom as Bristol milk. — Ma-
caulay, Hist, of Eng., Vol. I. ch. iii.
Brittany, Britain : now confined to
the district so named in France.
The isle of Albion, or great Brittany. —
Howell, Letters, ii. 55.
Broach-turner, turnspit. Cf. Turn-
broach er.
Dish-washer and broach-turner, loon ! to me
Thou smellest all of kitchen as before.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
»
Broad. See first extract
A broad is the spread of a river into a
sheet of water, which is certainly neither
lake nor lagoon. — Southey, Letters (1812), ii.
307.
Then across the mill-pool, and through
the deep crooks, out into the broads, and
past the withered beds of weeds which told
of coming winter. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe,
ch. vni.
Broad Bottom. See quotation.
The Tories declare against any further
prosecution, if Tories there are, for now one
hears of nothing but the Broad Bottom ; it is
the reigning cant word, and means, the tak-
ing all parties and people indifferently into
the ministry. — Walpole to Mann, i. 93
(1741-2).
Broam, apparently some sort of spirit
or goblin.
The approach of the sun's radiant beams
expelleth goblins, bugbears, hob-thrushes,
brooms, screech-owl mates, night - walking
spirits, and tenebrions. — UrquharVs Rabelais,
Bk. III. ch. xxiv.
Brocado. Swift in the annexed quot-
ation uses the Spanish form of this
word to suit his metre ; elsewhere he
has brocade.
Brocados, and damasks, and tabbies, and
gawses,
Are by Robert Ballantine lately brought over.
Swift, Song on a Seditious Pamphlet.
Brocatall. See extract.
The Vice Chancellor, Heads of Houses,
and Doctors, being seated in magisterial
seates, the Vice Chancellor's chaire and
deske, Proctors, fee, cover'd with Brocatall
(a kind of brocade) and cloth of gold, the
Universitie Register read the founder's grant.
—Evelyn, Diary, July 9, 1669.
Broch steeple, a pyramid ical spire.
H. gives the reference, but not the words
of the subjoined. Broche by itself is
also used for steeple. See N.
Acuminato erat capite, his [Thersites'] head
was made like a broch steeple, sharp© and
high crown 'd, which among all physiogno-
mers imports an ill affected minae. — Optick
Glasse of Humors, p. 41 (1639).
•
Brogger. In the Commons Journals,
i. 108 (1575), mention is made of a
"Bill against broggers and drovers/*
H. explains brogger as "a badger [i. e.
a huckster or hawker] who deals in
corn." He refers to Holinshed ; but in
the extract it may mean one who brogs
or prods on cattle ; another name for
drover. See N. and Q., V. x. 410.
Broke, breach.
Broke for broke, eye for eye, and tooth for
tooth. — Becon, ii. 94.
Brokeress, a female broker or go-
between.
Now beldam Brokresse must bee with
moouye rewarded. — Stany hurst, Conceites, p.
140.
Bronsewinq, a small insect.
You know you've no more fight in you
than a bronsewing. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry
Hamlyn, ch. xxvi.
Bronzify, to bronze, or cast in bronze.
St. Michael descending upon the Fiend has
been caught and bronzified, just as he lighted
on the castle of St. Angelo. . . . He is as
natural as blank verse, that bronze angel,
set, rhythmic, grandiose. — Thackeray, yew-
comes, ch. xxxv.
Broom, to sweep.
He had . . to yell at the woodman for
clearing not enough or too much, to rail at
the poor old work-people brooming away the
fallen leaves. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. lviii.
Broom. The proverb in the extract
is still in constant use to express the
zeal of one new to an office.
BROOM-SQUIRE ( 85 )
BR UCKLE
I will hence to the court with all hast I may,
I think the king he stirring, it is now bright
day;
To wayte at a pinch, still in sight I meane,
For wot yon what? a new fa-come sweepes
deane.
Edwards, Damon and Pithias
(Dodsley, O. PL, i. 233).
Broom-squire. See quotation.
" Did yon ever," said Tom, " hear the story
of the two Sandhurst broom - squires ? "
** Broom-squires ?n u So we call in Berkshire
squatters on the moor who live by tying
heath into brooms." — C. Kingsley, Two Years
Ago, ch. xiv.
Broomstick. To be married over
the broomstick = to live as man and
wife without being married. In some
parts of England this is called " jump-
ing the besom."
Young ladies had fain single women re-
main,
And unwedded dames to the last crack of
doom stick,
Ere marry by taking a jump oJer a broomstick*
Ingoldsby Legends (S. Rom wold).
This woman in Gerrard-street here had
been married very young, over the broomstick
(as we say), to a tramping man. — Dickens,
Great Expectations, ch. xlviii.
Brother, to stand in the relation
of brother, or to address a person as
brother.
Had it not been for the prudent advice of
that admirable somebody ('whose principal
fault is the superiority of ner talents, and
whose misfortune to be brother'd and sister'd
by a couple of creatures who are not able to
comprehend her excellences), I might at one
time have been plunged into difficulties. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi. 407.
By such missions and such brothering and
sistering he kept up his influence among his
people.— Southey, Letters, 1818 (iii. 97).
Brow, effrontery. Cf. Cheek.
They were men of more brow than brain »
being so ambitious to be known, that they had
rather be hiss'd down than not come upon
the stage.— Fuller, Holy State, Bk. IV. ch. zi.
Some of them . . . have . . audacious brows
and seared consciences.— Gauden, Tears of the
Churchy p. 162.
Brow-bending, frowning.
With matrimonie cometh . . . the soure
browbendyng of your wifes kinsfolkes, the
tattelyng toungue of your wifes mother. —
VdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 18.
Brown, a penny (slang).
Two or three chimney-sweeps, two or three
clowns,
Playing at pitch and toss, sport their browns,
Ingoldsby Legends (Netley Abbey)
Brown Bess, the old regulation
musket with a brown barrel : it is no
longer in use.
Religion Jack did never profess,
Till he had shoulder 'd old Brown Bess.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. ii.
Brown-bread, ordinary ; homely.
He's a very idiot and broion-bread clown,
and one I know the wench does deadly hate.
— Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii.
They drew his brown-bread face on pretty
gins,
And made him stalk upon two rolling-pins.
Bp. Corbet on Great Tom of Ch. Ch,
Brownetta, a brunette.
In bodye fine f ewterd, a brave Brownetta. —
Stanyhurst, Conceites, p. 141.
Brown George. See extract, and
cf. L., s. v. George.
He looked disdainfully at the wig ; it had
once been a comely jazey enough, of the
colour of over-baked ginger-bread, one of
the description commonly known during the
latter half of the last century by the name
of a brown George. — Ingoldsby Legends (Jar*
vis's Wig).
Brown George, a brown loaf. See
L., s. v. George, and the extract he
gives from Dryden. The original in
the extract is bou&sin de pain.
The devil of one musty crust of a brotm
GeoWe the poor boys had to scour their
grinders with. — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. iv.
Author's Prologue.
Brown George. See extract, and
L. , s. v. George.
He . . stood behind his oak, holding his
brown George, or huge earthenware recept-
acle, half full of dirty water, in which nis
bedmaker had been washing up his tea-things.
— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxiv.
Brownie, an elf or sprite of a bene-
volent character.
You talk of my being a fairy, but I am
sure you are more like a brownie. — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xxxvii.
Browning, perhaps a form of
Brownie: winds were supposed to be
raised by witches. See $, v. Lapland.
Man is so wicked and vngratious, his wit
so inventine, that he will be sowing, tending,
and plucking that with his own hand that
calls for nothing else at sea but winde ; and
neuer rests till Browning be come. — Holland,
Pliny, Bk. xix. (proem).
Bruckle, brittle (?). Brickie is used
in Auth. Vers., 161 1. H. has " Bruckeled,
wet and dirty;" and Herrick, i. 1)6,
BRUMMAGEM ( 86 )
BUCKEEN
speaks of "bruckeVd children." It is
just possible that the word in Putt en-
ham may bear this meaning, but the
other seems more likely.
Goe now and giue thy life vnto the winde,
Trusting unto a piece of bruckU wood,
Foure inches from thy death, or seaman good,
The thickest planke for shipboord that we
And.
Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Pome,
Bk. III. ch. xix.
Brummagem, applied to what is false,
Birmingham having a reputation for
spurious manufactures. In the first
quotation halfpenny is understood.
He picked it up, and it proved to be a
Brumniejatn of the coarsest and clumsiest
kind, with a head on each side. — Southey,
Tlte Doctor, ch. cxl.
Uncle Sam . . . had the brutality to tell
his nephew in very plain terms, that if ever
he found that Brummaqem gent in Poole's
rooms again, Poole would never again see the
colour of Uncle Sam's money. — Lytton, What
will he do with it ? Bk. IV. ch. xvi.
Brush. See extract, which is given
at greater length, *. v. Pimp.
Small light bavins . . . are called in the
taverns a Brush. — Defoe, Tour thro9 G.
Britain, i. 138.
Brush, hasty departure.
I reminded him, not without blushing,
of my having no money. He answered,
" That signifies nothing ; score it behin^the
door, or make a bold brush, and take no
notice." — Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VIII.
ch. xii.
Broshman, a painter.
How difficult in artists to allow
To brother brushmen even a grain of merit !
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 138.
Brusque, abrupt. A French word
now naturalized. See L., s. v. brush.
You rap out a round rejoinder, which, if
not blunt, is at least brusque. — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xiv.
Brurquerie, bluntness. A Fr. word
Anglicized.
Dorothea looked straight before her, and
spoke with cold brusquerie. — G. Eliot, Middle-
march, ch. ii.
Brute, applied without any ill mean-
ing to a human being. See extract s. v.
Heels in neck. Friar Bacon, having in
his magic glass seen two scholars kill
each other, eoliloquizes —
Bacon, thy magic doth effect this massacre :
This glass prospective worketh many woes ;
And therefore seeing these brave lusty
Brutes,
These friendly youths, did perish by thine
art,
Bod all thy magic and thine art at onoe.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 175.
Bruterer, prophesier, or soothsayer.
This is Tyndale s explanation of the
word (i. 445), which he uses in Deut.
xviii., where " a bruterer, or a maker of
dismal days " = " that useth divination,
or an observer of times," in our version.
Bruterer, I suppose, therefore = one
who sends forth, under real or pretended
inspiration, reports or bruits. " Who
hath believed our report ? " (Isa, liil 1).
Bubbleable, capable of being duped.
If the winner is bubbleable, they will in-
sinuate themselves into his acquaintance. —
The Nicker Nicked, 1669 {Harl. Misc., ii.
109).
Bubble and squeak, fried beef and
cabbage; used also contemptuously,
like gammon and spinach.
Suoh is the sound (the simile's not weak)
Formed by what mortals bubble call and
squeak,
When midst the frying-pan in accents savage,
The beef so surly quarrels with the cabbage.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 29.
Bank and title ! bubble and squeak ! No ! not
half so good as bubble and squeak ; English
beef and good cabbage. But foreign rank
and title ! foreign cabbage and beef ! foreign
bubble and foreign squeak. — Lytton, My Novel,
Bk. VIII. ch. viii.
Bubonic, swollen ; inflated.
Bouse opposition, roared a tipsey cook,
With hands a-kimbo, and bubontc look.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 29.
Buccinatory, blowing or trumpeting.
My uncle Toby instantly withdrew his
hand from off my father's knee, . . . and
then directing the buccinatory muscles along
his cheeks, and the orbicular muscles around
his lips to do their duty, he whistled Iilla-
bullero. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, ii. 121.
Buck.
Half the river fell over a high weir, with
all its appendages of bucks, and hatchways,
and eel-baskets, into the Nun's-pool. — C.
Kingsley, Yeast, ch. Hi.
Buckeen, an inferior sort of squireen,
q. v.
There were several squireens or little
squires, a race of men who have succeeded
to the buckeens described by Young and
Crnmpe. — Miss Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. vii.
The spalpeen ! turned into a buckeen, that
would be a squireen, but can't. — Ibid^ Love
and Laic, i. 4.
BUCKET
( 87 )
BUFF
Bucket, to use a bucket; also to
drench.
Like Danaides' Sieve-like Tab is filling ever,
Bat never fall for all their bucketing.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalities st. 23.
Wo be to him whose head is bucketed with
waters of a scalding bath. — Socket. Life of
Williams, ii. 194.
Bucket. To kick the bucket = to
die (slang).
Chieftain, if thou canst at all
For a shipwrecked Lady angle,
Clew me up thy Castle wall ;
Near thee doth a Bucket dangle.
Chieftain, leave me not to drown ;
Save a Maid without a smicket.
If the Bucket come not down,
Soon shall I be doom'd to kick it.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 55.
M Fine him a pot," roared one, " for talking
about kicking the bucket ; he's a nice young
man to keep a cove's spirits up, and talk
about ' a short life and a merry one.' " — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. ii.
Bucket. To give the bucket = to
dismiss, or give the sack. In the ex-
tract it refers to the rejection of an
offer of marriage.
He were sore put about because Hester
had gPen him the bucket. — Mrs. Gaskell, Syl-
via's Lovers, ch. xxi.
Bucking, jumping up high and sud-
denly.
"He can sit some bucking horses which
very few men will attempt to mount."
" And that same bucking, Miss Brentwood,"
said Halbert," is just what pozzies me utterly.
1 got on a bucking horse in Sydney the other
day, and had an ignominious tumble in the
sale-yard, to everybody's great amusement."
— H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. zxviii.
Buckish, dandified.
Mr. Musgrave, a buckish kind of young
man of fashion. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, ii.
182.
But it so hap'd, among the rest
The farmer's landlord was a guest ;
A buckish blade, who kept a horse
To try his fortune on the course.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xvii.
Buckle, to submit ; to bend (see
2 Hen. TV., 1. i, quoted by L.) : still
in use among shipwrights, Ac.
Teach this body
To bend, and these my aged knees to buckle
In admiration and just worship to you.
Jonson, Staple of News, II. i.
The Dutch, as high as they seem, do begin
to buckle.— Pepys, Dec. 17, 1664.
[I] took up, which I keep by me, a piece of
I
glass so melted and buckled with the heat of
the fire like parchment. — Ibid. Sept. 5, 1666.
A brave man scorns to buckle to fortune. —
T. Brown, Works, ii. 171.
Bucklers. To bang, match, take,
or hold up bucklers = to fight or con-
tend ; to yield bucklers = to submit ;
to carry bucklers from, = to conquer.
See s. v. Braver. Cf. L. and N., s. v.
These great undertakers have snatched up
the bucklers, as if they would make it good
against all comers. — Sanderson, i. 289.
Let any Papist or Precisian in the world give
instance but in any one single thiug doc-
trinally maintained by the Church of Eng-
land, which he can with any colour of truth
except against as a commandment of men,
.... we will yield the bucklers, and confess
her guilty. — Ibid. ii. 159.
A rank coward may take up the bucklers,
and brave it like a stout champion. — Ibid.
ii. 339.
Were it not for God's marvellous blessing
on our studies, and the infinite odds of truth
on our side, it were impossible, in human
probability, that we should hold up the buck'
lers against [the Papists].— Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
X. iii. 20.
They found the king to be well affected
to Bp. Andrewes] for taking up the bucklers
or him against Cardinal BeUarmine. — Heylin,
Ufe of Laud, Bk. i. p. 64.
Their servants at market, or where they
met (in that slashing age), did commonly
bang one another's bucklers. — Aubrey, Misc.,
p. 214.
Buck-log, a beech log. See L., s. v.
buckwheat. Beech is the best firing-
wood, and is called in France bois au
Seigneur,
A brutal cold country this for a man to
camp out in ; never a buck-log to his fire, no,
nor a stick thicker than your finger for seven
mile round.— H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. v.
Buckram, to stiffen or swell out.
His most holy Book . . .
"Was never meant, was never used before,
To buckram out the memory of a man.
Cowper, Winter Walk at Noon, 652.
Buckrahize, to stiffen, as with buck-
ram.
But who would then have heard of, by the
by,
The Vice-suppressing starch'd Society?
That tribe of self-erected Prigs, — whose
leaven
Consists in buckramizing souls for Heaven.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 126.
Buff. In buff = naked.
The slaves . . had stripped the oommis-
sary to his buff. — Jarvit't Don Quixote, Pt. I.
Bk. III. ch. vui.
BUFF
( 88 )
BULK
" I have got as many clothes and things of
all kinds as would serve to set up a Mon-
mouth-street merchant: if the place had
held out but a few days longer, the poor
devils must have done duty tn their Buff;
ha ! ha ! ha ! " " And the properest dress
for them/' returned the admiral ; " who wants
any clothes in such a climate as this?" —
Johnston, Chrysal, ii. 235.
Titian's famed Goddess, in luxurious buff,
Was the first piece the Parson thrust his nose
on. — Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 145.
Buff, fellow, or, as we now say,
buffer.
Mayhap old buff has left my kinsman
here his heir.— Smollett, Roderick Random,
ch. iv.
Buff-coat, a soldier ; or, as an adjec-
tive, military.
Schismatical pravity will grow up under
the licentiousness of war; some profane
buff-coats will authorize such incendiaries. —
Hacket, lift of Williams, ii. 170.
Ti8 a buff-coat objection that his Majesty
consum'd as much in embassies to settle
differences by accord, and did no good, as
would have maintained a noble war, and
made him sure of his demands. — Ibid. ii. 224.
Buffer, fellow (slang). Cf. Buff.
Ill merely observe as the water grew rougher*
The more my poor hero contiuued to suffer,
Till the sailors themselves cried in pity*
"Foot buffer!"
Ingoldsby Legends (Bagman9s Dog).
Buffooniru, like a buffoon ; ridicul-
ous.
All their actions are so buffoomsh and mi-
mical, that any would judge they had learned
all their tricks of mountebanks and stage-
players. — Kennefs Erasmus, Praise of Folly,
p. 120.
Buff-stop. See extract.
Fat flattens the most brilliant thoughts,
Like the buff-stop on harpsichords or
spinnets —
Muffling their pretty little tuneful throats,
That would have chirped away like linnets.
WoUot, P. Pindar, p. 122.
Bugaboo, a hobgoblin ; but in the
extract it seems = a magistrate, as
being a terror to evil-doers.
We have done many a mad prank together,
which I should not like the bugaboos and
bulkies to know. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. Lxxix.
Buqgish, terrifying.
Of father Anchisee thee goast and grislye
rescmblaunce,
When the day dooth vannish, when lights eke
starrye be twinckling,
In sleep mee monisheth, with visadge bug-
gish he feareth. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 372.
Bugle. This word is explained in
the Diets, a bull or buffalo, and this
seems to be its proper meaning; but
Fuller uses it for fallow deer, which is
also the word in our Bible in Deut. xiv.
5; 1 Kings iv. 23, where the older
version gives bugle. For more about
bugle, especially as an Isle of Wight
word and tavern-sign, see iV. and Q ,
II. viii. 423, 461 ; x. 493.
Venison both red and fallow, for so we find
in Solomon's bill of fare, harts, bucks, and
bugles.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, I. v. 2.
Bugle, a ghost. See Jamieson, s. r.
bogilL The extract occurs in a letter
to Aubrey from "a learned friend in
Scotland."
They assigned it [second sight] to Bugies
or Ghosts. — Aubrey, Misc., p. 192.
Bugle-beard, shaggy beard, like a
buffalo. N. has bugle-browed.
Who with his bristled, hoarie, bugle-beard,
Comming to kiss her, makes her lips afeard.
Sylvester, fourth day, first tceeke, 708.
Bugs. To swear by no bugs = to
swear earnestly, i. e. by no mere empty
things. N., s. v. beggars, gives the
phrase " to swear by no beggars."
Caligula . . . bid his horse to supper, gave
him wine to drink in cups of estate, set
barly graines of golde before him to eate, and
swore by no bugs that hee would make him a
Consul. — Gosson, Schoole of Abuse, p. 33.
Buildress, female builder.
Sherah, the daughter of Ephraim the
younger, the greatest buildres* in the whole
Bible. — Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II. ix. 8.
Bulimy, a diseased craving for food ;
hunger like that of an ox ; or, as Bailey
also explains it, hunger keen enough lo
eat an ox. Sylvester has boulime. See
extract, s. v. Anorexie.
I do not mean the helluo librorum, .... nor
those first cousins of the north who labour
under a bulimy for black letter. — Sou they,
The Doctor, ch. xvii.
Bulk, to be prominent ; to occupy
space. L. has it as an active verb.
At the date when Johnson was a poor
rusty-coated scholar . . . were there not chan-
cellors and prime-ministers enough ; graceful
gentlemen, the glass of fashion ; honour-
giving noblemen, dinner-giving rich men ;
renowned fire-eaters, swordsmen, gownsmen ;
quacks and realities of all hues ; any one of
whom bulked much larger in the world's eye
than Johnson ever did ? — Carlyle, Jtise.
iii. 57.
BULK
( 89 )
BULLOCK
Bulk, to belch.
His own commendation rambles within
him, till he hath bulked it out, and the air
of it is unsavoury. — Adams, i. 500.
BuLKEB, prostitute.
He is the treasurer of the thieves' ex-
chequer, the common fender of all bulkers
and shop-lifts in the town. — Four for a
Penny, 1678 (Harl. Misc^ iv. 147).
For all your majors scarce will make
Me think what's past for Virtue's sake ;
Or that this bulker of the town
Came only here to rub ye down.
D Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 4.
In comparison of whom (cheating game-
sters) the common bulkers and pickpockets
are a very honest society. — T. Brown, Works,
in. 60.
Bulky, a constable (thieves' cant).
We have done many a mad prank together,
which I should not like the bugaboos and
bulldes to know. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. lxzix.
Bull, a blunder. The earliest ex-
ample of this word in the Diets, is
from Milton's Apology for Smectym-
nuits. 1642. The following, from
Selden's Table Talk, p. 230, might
possibly be a little earlier, though of
course its exact date cannot be assigned.
Predestination is a point inaccessible, out
of our reach ; we can make no notion of it,
'tis so full of intricacy, so full of contra-
diction ; 'tis in good earnest, as we state it,
half a dozen buns one upon another.
Bull, a crown (slang).
*' But what did he do with you ? " " Put
me in a horsepittle," replied Jo,' whisperiug,
M till I was discharged ; then giv' me a little
money, four half bulls, wot you may call
half-crowns, and ses, ' Hook it ! ' * — Dickens,
Bleak House, ch. xlvi.
Bull, a bubble.
This life is as a vapour, as a shadow passing
and fleeing away, as a fading flower, as a
bull rising on the water. — Dean Novell (Litur-
gical Services, Eliz. Parker Soc., p. 501).
Bull-dog, a pistol. Cf. Barker.
Beau Clincher provides himself with a
case of pocket pistols when meaning
to go to the Jubilee, and thus anti-
cipates a rencontre with an Italian
bravo ;
He whips out his stiletto, and I whips out
my bull-dog. ~ Farquhar, Constant Couple,
iii. 2.
M I have always a brace of bull-dogs about
me." ... So saying, he exhibited a very hand-
some, highly-finished, and richly-mounted
pair of pistols. — &cott, St. Bonan*s Well, ii.
191.
Bull-dogism, the bull-dog character,
such as tenacity, courage, Ac.
He possessed the element of bull-dogism
also. — Savage, B. Medlicott, Bk. II. ch. vi.
Bull-dogs, bailiffs ; also the men who
attend upon the Proctors at the Uni-
versities when making their rounds,
and who pin unruly undergraduates.
Mock. But pray what's the matter, Mr.
Lyric?
Lyric. Nothing, sir, but a shirking book*
seller that owed me about forty guineas for
a few lines. He would have put me off, so I
sent for a couple of bull-dogs, and arrested
him. — Farquhar, Love and a Bottle, iii. 2.
We unworthier told
Of college : he had climb 'd across the spikes,
And he had squeezed himself betwixt the
bars,
And he had breath'd the Proctor's dogs.
Tennyson, Princess, Prologue.
Bulleted, hard and rounded like a
bullet.
Thee clowne stout standeth with a leshe
of bulleted hard stoans. — Stany hurst, Con-
ceites, p. 143.
Bullet-headedness, stolid obstinacy ;
a quality usually found with a head of
that shape.
The great defect of "Ellen Middleton,"
lies in the disgusting sternness, captious-
ness, and bullet-headedness of her husband. —
E. A. Poe, Marginalia, Ixxiv.
Bullfinch, a corruption of bull-
fence ; a stiff fence able to keep bulls
in or out of a field.
Sit down in your saddles and race at the
brook,
Then smash at the bullfinch.
C. Kingsley (Life, ii. 56).
Bullion, a measure of capacity ; an
English form of bouillon, a boiling.
Each boiling in a salt-pan was limited
to twenty-four gallons, which were ex-
pected to produce three and a half peck s
of salt. See N. and Q., V. x. 410.
In the very King's booke which we call
Domesday we read thus. In Wich the King
and Earle have eight salt pits, which in the
whole weeke wherein they boiled and wrought,
yeelded on the Friday sizteene Bullions. —
Holland's Camden, p. 575.
Bullock, used derisively for a papal
brief.
I send you here a bullock which I did find
amongst my bulls, that you may see how
closely in time past the foreign prelates did
practise about their prey. — Latimer, ii. 378.
BULLOCK
( 90 )
B VMMER Y
Bullock, to bully.
You have charged me with bullocking you
into owning the truth ; it is very likely, an't
please your worship, that I should bullock
him ; I have marks enow about my body to
show of his cruelty to me. — Fielding, Tom
Jones, Bk. II. ch. vi.
Bull plum, prunus spinosa.
We own it was a plum-tree indeed, but not
of the kind Mr. Sergeant sets forth, a dama-
scen plum ; our proofs say loudly a bull'
plum. — Foote, The Lame Lover ; Act III.
Bull's-eye, a policeman's lantern.
We don't see but half the bulVs-eye yet,
and don't see at all the policeman which is
a-going on his beat behind the buWt eye. — C.
Kingsley, Letter, May 1856.
Bull's-eye, a coarse sweetmeat
He had just arranged a master-piece ; half-
a-dozen of the prettiest children sitting be-
neath a broken boat, . . . while the black-
bearded sea-kings round were promising them
rock and bull's-eyes, if they would only sit
still like "gude maids." — C. Kingsley, Two
Yean Ago, ch. xv.
Bull's feather, a horn. To bestmo
the bull' 8 feather = to make a cuckold.
One of the pieces in Merrie Drollerie, p.
264, is called The Bull's Feather. Cuck-
olds are styled "knights of the bulVs
feather" in Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
IV. ch. vii.
A good whimsical instrument, take it alto-
gether! But what, thinkest thou, are the
arms to this matrimonial harbinger? . . . Three
crooked horns, smartly top-knotted with
ribands ; which being the ladies' wear, seem to
intimate that they may very probably adorn,
as well as bestow, the bull's feather. — Richard'
son, CI. Harlowe, v. 295.
Bully, some sort of fish.
On a narrow spit of sand between the rocks
a dozen little girls are laughing, romping, and
pattering about, turning the stones for
u shannies " and " bullies, and other luckless
fish left by the tide. — C. Kinysley, Two Years
Ago, ch. ii.
Bully, a name given to the larger
sloe.
** Dick and I be come hither to pick haws
and bullies? ..." I found them plucking haws
and sloes to appease their hunger.19 — Smollett,
Sir L. Greaves, ch. iii.
Bully, used adjectivally, fine; he-
roic. " That's bully " is an American-
ism, and means " that's grand, or fine."
So when Troy chairmen bore the wooden
steed,
Pregnant with Greeks, impatient to be freed
(Those fmlly Greeks, who, as the moderns do.
Instead of paying chairmen, run them thro'),
La'>c:>on struck the outside with his spear,
And each imprison'd hero quak'd for fear.
Swift, Description of a City Shower.
Bully Dawson. See quotations.
The references to this worthy in Tom
Brown are numerous. One of the
Letters from the dead to the living in
from Bully Dawson to a kindred spirit
Homer not only makes Achilles invulner-
able everywhere but in his heel, but likewise
bestows a suit of impenetrable armour upon
his invulnerable body. Bully Dawson would
have fought the Devil with those advantages.
— T. Brown, Works, i. 72.
I never saw such a bouncing, swaggering
puppy since I was born ; Bully Dawson was
but a fool to him. — Goldsmith, She Stoops to
Conquer, III. i.
What is remembered now of Bully Daw-
son? all I have read of him is that he lived
three weeks on the credit of a brass shilling,
because nobody would take it of him. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxv.
Bumb blades, heavy or large swords.
My little rapier
Against your bumb blades! I'll one by one
dispatch you.
Massinger, City Madam, i. 2.
Bumbeloes. See extract; the country
referred to is India.
We were met by above a hundred girls
carrying on their heads to market baskets of
dried fish, which in this country are called
bumbeloes.— Archaol., viii. 262 (1787).
Bumble foot, a club foot.
She died mostly along of Mr. Malone's
bumble foot, I fancy. Him and old Biddy
were both drunk a-fighting on the stairs, and
she was a step below he ; and he, being drunk
and bumble-footed too, lost his balance, and
down they came together. — H. Kingsley,
Ravenshoe, ch. xli.
Bumbo is explained by Smollett in a
note to be " a liquor composed of rum,
sugar, water, ana nutmeg."
[He] returned to his messmates, who were
making merry in the ward-room, round a
table well stored with bumbo and wine. —
Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xxxiv.
Bum-brusher, an elegant name for a
schoolmaster.
I [Dionysius] was forced to turn bum*
brusher in my own defence, a condition which
best suited with a man that delighted in
tyranny and blood. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 86.
Bummert bond, bottomry bond ;
bond of insurance on a ship's bottom.
There was a scrivener of Wapping brought
to hearing for relief against a bumfnery-bond.
—North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 118*.
BUMPTIOUS
( 9i )
BURKE
Bumptious, conceited. See quota-
tion *. v. Gumption.
No, my dearest Padre; bumptious! no, I
deny the charge in toto; I haa not such a
thought, or rather such a feel, in the world.
—Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 324.
Bum-trap, bailiff.
The noble bum-trap, blind and deaf to every
circumstance of distress, greatly rises above
all the motives to humanity, and into the
hands of the jailor resolves to deliver his
miserable prey. — Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk.
VII. ch. iii.
Bun, a dried stalk.
But what shall be done with all the hard
refuse, the long buns, the stalks, the short
shads or shives ? — Holland, Pliny, ziz. 1.
Bungalow, a one-storied house is so
called in India.
He had found her so friendless that he
took her into the vacant place, and installed
her there, as he would have received a
traveller into his bungalow. — Thackeray, The
Xetecomes, ch. v.
Bungerly, clumsy ; slow.
Oftentimes the more shallow in knowledge
the more bungerly in wickedness. — Adams,
ii. 43.
Bunk, berth.
If I knew my business properly, I should
at this point represent Charles as falling
down the companion-ladder and spraining
his ankle, or as having over-eaten himself,
and so pass over the rest of his voyage by
saying that he was confined to his hoik, and
saw no more of it. — H. Kingsley, Bavenshoe,
ch. Ii.
Bunkum, empty declamation, an
American expression said to be derived
from an orator who persisted in speak-
ing, though be had few or no listeners,
alleging that he was speaking to Bun-
combe, a place in N. Carolina, which he
represented.
_ Talk plain truth, and leave bunkum for
right honourables who keep their places
thereby. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch.
xxv.
Bunting lamb. To bunt is to push
with the head as a ram. See N. and
Q., V. x. 410.
And I have brought a twagger for the nones
A banting lamb.
Peele, Arraignment of Paris, I. i.
Bub, twang, or roughness.
Their honest and ingenuous natures com-
ing to the universities to store themselves
with good and solid learning, and there un-
fortunately fed with nothing else but the
scragged and thorny lectures of monkish and
miserable sophistry, were sent home again
with such a scholastic bur in their throats as
hath stopped and hindered all true and gener-
ous philosophy from entering, [and] cracked
their voices for ever with metaphysical gar-
gurismB.— Milton, Season of Ch. Govt., Con-
clusion.
I have a damned fine original for thee, an
aunt of my own, just come from the North,
with the true Newcastle bur in her throat. —
Foote, The Minor, Introduction.
Bur, sweetbread of a calf. The ex-
tract is from a bill which Lackington
says was put up in a shop in Petticoat-
lane.
Bumps and burs sold here, and baked
sheep's-heads will be continued every night,
if the Lord permit. — Life of J. Lackington,
Letter xxviii.
Burdock, a weed, belonging to the
genus Arctium. See quotation from
H. Kingsley *. v. But.
I had lain so many nights
A bedmate of the snail, and eft, and snake,
In grass and burdock.
Tennyson, The Holy Grail, p. 67.
Bureaucrat, nn administrative official ;
a red-tapist. See quotation *.v. Pluto-
crat.
It was whispered that he had in old times
done dirty work for Dublin Castle bureau-
crats.— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xx.
Burgundy, a species of head-dress.
Sir, I was running to Mademoiselle Furbelo,
the French milliner, for a new burgundy for
my lady's head. . . . Oh, sir, that's the pret-
tiest fashion lately come over! so airy, so
French, and all that ! The pinners are dou-
ble ruffled with twelve plaits of a side, and
open all from the face; the hair is frizzled
all up round the head, and stands as stiff as
a bodkin. Then the favourites hang loose
upon the temples, with a languishing lock in
the middle. Then the caul is extremely wide,
and over all is a coronet raised very high, and
all the lappets behind. — Farquhar, Sir Harry
midair, i. 1.
Burke, to stifle: from Burke, who
was hung in 1829 for various murders
by suffocation of people, whose bodies
he afterwards sold to the surgeons. See
s. v. Bishop.
Although neither Burke nor Bishop had
then [a.d. 1800j gained a horrible notoriety,
his own observation mi^bt have suggested to
him how easily the atrocities to which the
former has since given his name might be
committed. — Sketches by Boz (The Black
Veil).
BURN DAYLIGHT ( 92 )
B USHEL
The last new novel seem'd tame and flat,
The leg, a novelty newer than that,
Had tripp'd up the heels of fiction,
It burked the very essays of Burke.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Burn daylight, said of having can-
dles in before it is dark. Scott makes
it = take a lone time. I do not under-
stand Neverout s remark.
Hearsay. Her nose the candle . . .
Shape. How bright it flames! Put ont
your nose, good lady, you burn daylight. —
Cartwright, The Ordinary, i. 2.
Lady 8m. Here, take away the tea-table,
and bring up candles.
Lady Ans. O, Madam, no candles yet, I
beseech yon ; don't let us burn daylight.
Nev. I dare swear, Miss for her part will
never burn daylight, if she can help it.—
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. iii.).
"Your story," said the stalwart Church-
man ; uburn not daylight about it ; we have
short time to spare." — Scott, Ivanhoe, ii. 304.
Burn-grain, destructive of grain.
Turning our seed-wheat-kernel
To burn-grain thistle and to vapourie darnel.
Sylvester, The Furies, 165.
Burnous, a long cloak with a hood
at the back, like that worn by Arabs.
She immediately moved towards her seat,
saying, " 1 want to put on my burnoue." No
sooner had she readied it than Mr. Lush was
there, and had the burnous in his hand. — G.
Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xi.
Burr, an ononis topoeo us word = to
murmur. See another instance from
Wordsworth, *. v. Dor-hawk.
Burr, burr, — now Johnny's lips they burr,
As loud as any mill, or near it.
Wordsworth, The Idiot Boy.
Burrel, a kind of coarse cloth. See
H., 8. v. borel, and N. and Q., V. x.
409. Fr. bure or bureau ; the termin-
ation eau is frequently found as el
in old Fr. : cf . agnel, agneau ; Span.
buriel ; Ital. burello.
His white mantle was shaped with severe
regularity, according to the rule of Saint
Bernard himself, being composed of what
was then called burrel cloth. — Scott, Ivanhoe,
ii. 213.
Burst, a stretch ; expanse.
Here is a fine burst of eountry. — Miss
Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. viii.
Busby, cap wqpi by hussars, ar-
tillery, &c.
The gleaming helmet or the imposing
busby may surmount the feeblest sort of
brain that could with decency have been put
within a human skull. — Black, Adventures of
a Phaeton, ch. xxiv.
Bush. The bush is the box of the
nave of a wheel ; to bush is to put in
or renew this.
Nay, a new pair of wheels are made
(The old ones being much decay'd),
For which he makes such lasting tire
As all the Black-Smiths do admire :
Bushes the naves, clouts th' Axle-trees,
And twenty finer things than these.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 233.
Bush, to beat about as for game ;
unless it be the same as busk (q. v. ),
to make ready (as in dressing).
They are forced to bush about for ways
and means to pay their rent and charges. —
North, Life of Ld. Guilford, ii. 81.
Bush. To beat about the bush = to
go to work in a rourdabout way ; the
metaphor is taken from shooting.
Stand not too long in beating of a bush,
For feare the bird beguile thee with her
flight. — Breton, Mother's Blessing, st. 12.
Then have ye the figure Periphrasis ... as
when we go altout the bush, and will not in
one or a few words expresse that thing
which we desire to have knowen, but do
choose rather to do it by many words.—
Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch.
xviii.
You must know / went round the bush, and
round- the bush, before I came to the matter.
— lanbntgh. Confederacy, iii. 2.
Bush-draining. In some parts of
England, as in the fen-land of Norfolk,
when a road is made, large bushes are
thrown down some few feet below the
level, and then covered with earth and
stones, thus making a rough sort of
drain.
These last cold and wet lands have been
within these forty years greatly improv'd by
draining off the rain-water, which stagnated
on the clayey surface as in a cup, and chilled
the roots of the corn ; an invention called
Bush-draining. — Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain,
ii. 173.
Bushed, wigged.
Pan. A hall thrust full of bare heads,
some bald, some bush'd,
Some bravely branch 'd.
Ron. That s the university,
Larded with townsmen.
Albumazar, i. 3.
Bushel, used adjectivally for large.
When judges a campaigning go,
And on their benches look so big,
What gives them consequence, I trow,
Is nothing but a bushel wig.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 226.
BUSHING
( 93 )
BUTTER
The snowy linen and delicate pantaloon
alternates with the soiled check-shirt and
bushel breeches. — Carlyle, Fr. Rex., Pt. II.
Bk. I. ch. xi.
Bushing. Bushes are sometimes
planted at irregular distances in places
where game is preserved, so that poach-
ers cannot draw a net over the ground.
With what degree of wholesome rigour
his rents were collected, we hear not ; still
less bj what methods he preserved his game,
whether by u bushing" or how. — Carlyle,
Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Bush less, bare ; free from bushes.
Meanwhile the new companions past away
Far o'er the long backs of the busfiless downs.
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine.
Busk. See extract.
This fly, and two links, among wood, or
close by a bush, moved in the crust of the
water, is deadly in an evening, if you come
close [t. e. hidden]. This is called Busking
for trout. — Lavson, Comments on Secrets of
Angling, 1653 (Eng. Garner, i. 194).
Busk, to prepare or make ready (as
in dressing), and so to beat about. See
Bush.
The ship was found busking on the seas
without a mast or rudder.— The Successful
Pyrate, i. 1.
Go busk about, and run thyself into the
next great man's lobby. — Wycherley, Plain
Dealer, iii. 1.
When this shew of suicide had in their
minds filled the place of a defence, . . . the
parties would be less industrious to busk
about for any other. — North, Examen, p. 203.
My lord Rochester was frighted, and was
inclined to fall off from this, and to busk
for some other way to raise the supply. —
Ibid,, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 198.
Buss, omnibus: oftener spelt now
with a single s, as in extract from
Barham *. v. Slip-sloppy.
Humours were rife on the hackney-coach
stands that a buss was building to run from
Lisson-Grove to the Bank, down Oxford
Street and Holborn.— Sketches by Boz ( The
Last Cabdriver),
Bustle, to dispute.
Above 200 yeeres since when Edward the
Third King of England and Philip Valois
bustled for the very kingdome of France. —
Holland's Camden, p. 261.
BU8TUABT, incendiary.
They are the firebrands and bustuaries of
kingdoms. — Adams, ii. 32.
The kindler of this fire is principally Satan.
... He is the great bustuary himself, and
bath other deputed inflamers under him. —
1 bid. ii. 157.
Busy-bodiness, meddling disposition.
If I chance to make an excursion into the
matters of the Commonwealth, it is not out
of curiosity or busybodinesse to be medling
in other men's lines. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., II.
be. 23.
Busy-head, a busy-body.
Many a busie-head by words and deeds
Put in their heads how they may compasse
crownes. — Doxies, Mierocosmos, p. 57.
But, a conical basket used for catch-
ing fish.
The old gentleman had got hold of a fish,
and a big one. The next twenty minutes
were terrible. The old gentleman gave him
the but, and moved slowly down along the
camp-shooting. . . After a time the old gentle-
man began to wind up his reel, and then the
lad, topboots and landing-net and all, slipped
over the camp-shooting (will anybody tell
me how to spell that word? camps-heading
won't do, my dear sir, all things considered),
and lifted the fish (he was nine pound) up
among the burdocks at the old gentleman's
feet. — H. Kingsley, Bavenshoe, ch. lxii.
Butch, to butcher or kill.
Go, pudding-heart !
Take thy huge offal and white liver hence,
Or in a twinkling of this true-blue steel
I shall be butching thee from nape to rump.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. iii. 1.
Butch eress, female butcher.
At length the butcheress informed us . . .
that she still had a leg of veal. — HavanTs
Dead Cities of Zuyder Zee, translated by A.
"Wood, p. 75.
Butcher-woman, female butcher.
A woman that goes much to market told
me t'other day that the butcher-women of
London, those that sell fowls, butter, eggs,
&c., and in general most trades-people, have
a particular esteem for what they call Hand-
sel ; that is to say, the first money they
receive in a morning, they kiss it, spit upon
it, and put it in a pocket by itself. — Misson,
Travels in England, p. 130.
Butler, to act as butler.
Nobody is more a gentleman than my
master ; but the calling he is of allows of
no catering nor buttering. — Jarvis's Don
Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. vii.
Butt, a hassock. See s. v. Butt-
woman.
Butter, to flatter.
I'll butter him, trust me. Nothing com-
forts a poor beggar like a bit of praise when
he's down. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch.
xxv.
Butter. One who looks as if butter
would not melt in his mouth = a de-
BUTTER-WEIGHT ( 94 )
BY-JOB
mure or (sometimes) hypocritical per-
son. N. gives the phrase with extract
of the date of 1687, but he does not
notice the fuller form illustrated in the
extracts.
She looks as if butter would not melt in her
mouthy but I warrant cheese won't choak her. —
Sicift, Polite Conversation (Con v. i.).
I am beginning to think ye are but a queer
ane — ye look as tf butter wadna melt in your
mouth, but I salt warrant cheese no choke ye. —
Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 153.
Butter-weight, over full weight. It
was, perhaps still is, the custom in many
places to allow eighteen ounces, or even
more, to the pound in weighing butter.
They teach you how to split a hair,
Give and Jove an equal share ;
Tet why should we be lac'd so strait,
I'll give my M butter-weight.
Swift, Rhapsody on Poetry.
Buttock and file, a shop - lifter
(thieves' cant).
The same capacity which qualifies a mill-
ben, a bridle-call, or a buttock and file to arrive
at any degree of emineuce in his profession
would likewise raise a man in what the world
esteem a more honourable calling. — Fielding,
Jonathan Wild, Bk. I. ch. v.
Buttwoman. See quotation.
A buttwoman is one who cleans tbe church,
and in service time assists the verger or
pew-opener in showing persons into seats. . .
in the west of England: butt is an old word
for hassock; hence the woman who has
charge of these butts and other such furniture
of the pews is known as the buttwoman.—
Free and Open Church Advocate, June 1, 1878.
Buyable, capable of being bought;
to be obtained for money.
The spiritual fire which is in that man,
which, shining through such confusions, is
nevertheless conviction, and makes him
strong, and without which he had not
strength, is not buyable nor saleable. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. ii.
Buz-wio, big-wig, q. v. ; perhaps the
idea of pompous stupidity is also con-
veyed by the word. Cf . Buzz.
All was upset by two witnesses, whom the
reader . . . will at once know to be false wit-
nesses, but whom the old Spanish buz-wigs
doated on as models of all that could be
looked for in the best. — De Quincey, Spanish
Nun, sect. 21.
Buzz, to pour out the lost drops from
a decanter.
«4
Get some more port, Bowls, old boy,
whilst I buzz this bottle here. What was I a
saving?" "I think you were speaking of
dogs killing rats," Pitt remarked mildly,
handing his cousin the decanter to buzz. —
Thackeray, Vanity Fair, ch. xxxiv.
Buzz. See extract The Anti jacobin
having spoken of " P — r's [Parrs] buzz
prose," adds in a note —
The learned reader will perceive that this
is an elegant metonymy, by which the quality
belonging to the outside of the head is trans-
ferred to the inside. Buzz is an epithet
usually applied to a large wig. It is here
used for swelling, burly, bombastic writing.
— Poetry of A ntijacobin, p. 58.
Buzzard, a coward: more usually
applied to a blockhead. Breton prays
to be delivered
From a conspiracie of wicked knaues,
A flight of buzzards, and a denne of theeues.
PasquiTs Precession, p. 8
An old wise man's shadow is better than a
young buzzard's sword. — G. Herbert, Jacula
Prudentum.
Buzze-mixt, confused noise.
The noyse in it is like that of bees, a strange
humming or buzze-mixt of walking, tongues,
and feet. — Earle, Microcosmographie (PauVs
Walk).
Bychop, a bastard ; one who chops in
on the bye, or in an irregular fashion.
Cf . By-slip ; the Diets, have by-blow.
First I have sent
By-chop away; the cause gone, the fame
ceaseth. — Jonson, Magnetic Lady, IV. ii.
By-founder, a second founder, or
one who has something, but not all,
of the credit attaching to the actual
founder.
As for the bounty of Sir Francis Clerk, it
exceeded the bounds of Benefaction, and
justly entitled him to be a By-founder. —
Fuller, Hist, of Camb., vii. 27.
Bygones, the past. L. notices the
substantival use of this word in the
phrase, " Let bygones be bygones*' but
gives no example.
44 Don't let us rake up bygones" said Tom ;
"if I ever offended you, forgive me." —
Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit, ch. xxxvii.
Nor is it
Wiser to weep a true occasion lost,
But trim our sails, and let old bygones be.
Tennyson, Princess, iv.
I told Kew that bygones had best be bygones.
— Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. lii.
By-job, a job out of the ordinary
course of business.
Dorothy kept the cash, and by that means
kept Jerry within tolerable bounds, unless
when he could secrete a tester for some ty<-
job. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. II. ch. ii.
B Y-NAMED
( 95 )
CABRIOLET
By-named, nicknamed.
Sir Henry Percy, for his overforward spirit
and youthfull heat by -named Hot-Spurre,
who had the leading of the English. — Hoi-
land's Camden, p. 803.
By-paper, a slip of paper.
His manner was, as any abuse or regula-
tion came in his mind ... he set it down
upon some by-paper, or book, used for not-
ing.— North, life of Lord Guilford, i. 209.
By-place, a secluded place.
Theirs was but a by-place, and no great
thoroughfare. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk.
II. ch. xii.
By-point, a side issue.
The Court of Rome meddled not with the
merits of the cause, but fell upon by-points
therein of lesser concernment. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., V. ii. 7.
By-slip, a bastard. Cf. By-chop ;
Side-slip.
As Pope Paul the third carried himself to
his ungracious by-slips (an Incubus could not
have begot worse), who made no further in-
quisition after their horrid facts but to say,
Tbev learnt it not of him. — Racket, Life of
Williams, ii. 37.
By-wit, craft.
She neuer taught him how to crowch, nor
creepe,
Nor scorn, nor scoffe, nor hang the head aside,
Nor sigh, nor sob, nor wipe the eye, and
weepe,
Nor hatefull thoughts in louing lookes to
hide:
No, no, she is of a more heuenly nature,
Then with such by-wit to abuse a creature.
Breton, Soul's Immortal Croume, 1st day.
c
Cab, a cavalier.
Shall not his bloud be doubly avenged up-
on the heads of such barbarious, worse than
bruiting villaines ? But the misery is there
is no bloud amongst the Cabs worthy to be
named in the same day ... as the gallant
Rainsborough's bloud. — Mercurius Mditaris,
Not. 8, 1648.
Cabby, a trowel, or small spade.
little mattocks, pick-axes, grubbing hooks,
cabbies (beches), pruning knives, and other
iustruments requisite for herborising. —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxiii.
Cabinet, secret or confidential. In
this sense cabinet council was in use
long before what we now understand
by that word. Milton, Eikonoklastes, ch.
iv., speaks of a cabinet letter of Charles
I., i. e. a private letter.
Those are cabinet councils,
And not to be communicated.
Massinger, Duke of Milan, ii. 1.
Ton are still my cabinet counsellors, mv bosom
lies open to you. — Ibid., Guardian, ii. 3.
These persons [in 1640] made up the com-
mittee of state, which was reproachfully after
called the junto, and enviously then in the
Court, the Cabinet Council. — Clarendon, Hist,
of Rebellion, i. 211 (ed. 1849).
He was one of the Cabinet Council, andpriyy
to the Prince's going into Spain. — Heylin,
Life of Laud, p. 105.
Others (being onlv of Truth's Councell)
hact not received such private instructions as
themselves, being Cabinet Historians. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., I. v. 28.
Others still gape t' anticipate
The Cabinet Designs of Fate.
Hudibras, II. in. 24.
Cablegram, a message by the electric
cable : the word, it may be hoped, is
not likely to be generally adopted.
Mr. George Francis Train writes to us
from the Langham Hotel under date Wed-
nesday : — " This libel appears in your journal
as a cablegram : — ' New York, 20th. — George
Francis Train has been sent to a lunatic
asylum. ' Will you please make the amende
honorable. — George Francis Train, the
coming Dictator.'1 In answer to this appeal,
we can only say we have pleasure in admit-
ting that the fact of Mr. Train being now in
London is complete evidence that he is not
in an American lunatic asylum. — The Times,
1873.
Cable - hanger. See extract. Ro-
chester is the place spoken of.
Persons who dredge or fish for oysters, not
being free of the fishery, are called Cable-
hangers, and are presented and punished by
the Court. — Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, i.
150.
Caboose, the cooking cabin of a boat
Fog creeping into the cabooses of collier-
brigs ; fog lving out on the yards, and hover-
ins; in the rigging of great ships. — Dickens,
Bleak House, ch. l.
Cabriolet, a sort of cap.
All we hear from France is that a new
madness reigns there, as strong as that of
Pontine was. This is la fureur des cabriolets
CACAM
( 96 )
CADGER
A nglice, one-horse chairs, a mode introduced
by Mr. Ohild. They not only universally go '
in them, but wear them ; that is, everything
is to be en cabriolet. The men paint them on
their waistcoats, and have them embroidered
for clocks to their stockings ; and the women,
who have gone all the winter without any-
thing on their heads, are now muffled up in
great caps with round sides, in the form of,
and scarce less than, the wheels of chaises. —
Walvole to Mann, iii. 100 (1755).
I nave bespoken two cabriolets for her in-
stead of six, because I think them very dear,
and that she may have four more if she likes
them.— Ibid.f Utters, iii. 376 (1771).
Cacam, a wise man (Heb. Dpn), syno-
nymous with Rabbin, and still current
among the Jews as an official design-
ation.
They have it [the Law] stucke in the jambs
of their doores, and couered with glasse;
written by their cacams, and signed with the
names of God. — Sandys, Travels, p. 146.
The Talmud is stuffed with the traditions
of their Rabbins and Cacams. — Howell, Let'
ters, ii. 8.
Cacodemonise, to turn into an evil
demon.
Take the most beautiful angel that ever
painter designed, or engraver copied, put him
on a beard, and the celestial character will be
so entirely destroyed that the simple append-
age of a tail will cacodemonise the Eudemon.
— Southey, The Doctor, Fragment on Beards.
Cacogastric, having a deranged
stomach.
Diderot writes to his fair one that his
clothes will hardly button, that he is thus
stuffed, and thus ; and so indigestion succeeds
indigestion. Such narratives fill the heart of
sensibility with amazement ; nor to the woes
that chequer this imperfect cacogastric state
of existence is the tear wanting. — Carlyle,
Misc., iii. 221.
Caco-zelot, a wicked zealot.
Some spitef ull Caco~zelots . . . have not so
much modesty as to conceale their malice. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 62.
Cacozelotry, evil zeal.
Those holy Bishops . . have been cast upon
Dunghills, as Lazarus and Job, by the coco*
zelotry of some men in our times. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 623.
Cad, a low person ; a menial ; espe-
cially an omnibus conductor. Some
make it an abbreviation of cadger, others
of cadet, others refer it to the Scotch
cadie. The weakest of a brood or a
litter or a flock is called a cad provin- '
cially. CI Cade-lamb.
The spirited proprietor, knowing Mr.
Barker's qualifications, appointed him to the
vacant office of cad on the very first applica-
tion. The buss began to run. — Sketches by
Boz (The First Omnibus Cad).
Not to forget that saucy lad
(Ostentation's favourite cad),
The page, who looked so splendidly clad,
like a page of the " Wealth of Nations."
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Thirty years ago, and even later, the young
men of the labouring classes were " the cads,"
" the snobs," " the blackguards," looked on
with a dislike, contempt, and fear which they
were not backward to return. — Kingsley,
Alton Locke, Preface (1862).
Cadator, a beggar who assumes the
character of a decayed gentleman.
You . . sot away your time in Mongo's
fumitory among a parcel of old smoak-dry'd
cadators. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 179.
Caddle, fuss.
Ther wur no sich a caddie about sick folk
when I wur a bwoy. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. xxxiii.
Caddowe, a coverlet.
They have . . . many goodly flockes of
sheepe, which they sheare twice a yeere, and
make of their course wooll, rugges or shagge
mantles, caddowes also or coverlets, which are
vented into forraine countries. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 63.
Cade, to barrel or put in a cask : the
word is given in the Diets, as a sub-
stantive.
The rebel, Jack Cade, was the first that
devised to put redde-herrings in cades, and
from hym they have their name. Nowe as
wee call it the swinging of herrings when hee
[we ?] cade them, so in a halter was bee
swung, and trussed uppe as hard and round
as any cade of herring he trussed uppe in his
tyme; and perhaps of his being so swung
and trussed up, havyng first founde out the
trick to cade herring, they woulde so much
honour him in his death as not onely to call
it swinging but coding of herring also. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 179).
Cade-lamb, a house lamb, and so a
pet child. See Cad.
Eh, she'd fine work wi' ye, I'll warrant,
bring-in' ye up from a babby, an1 her a lone
woman ; it's ill bringin' up a cade lamb, — G,
Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. x.
Cadge, to beg.
I've got my living by casting fortins, and
begging, and cadging, and such like. — H.
Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xv.
Cadger, the bearer or carrier of
hawks. Bailey, and after him H., give
CADUCAL
( 97 )
CALENDS
"Cadge, a circular piece of wood on
which hawks are carried when exposed
to sale."
The expected pleasure of the first clay's
hawkiog was now bright in his imagination ;
the day was named, the weather promised
well, and the German cadger* and trainers
who had been engaged . . . came down. —
Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xvii.
Caducal, liable to full.
Nought therefore but vain sensibles we see
eaducau. — H. More, Immortality of the Soul,
I. in. 24.
Caduce, a rod or caduceus.
Heralds in blew velvet semee with flenrs
de lys, caduces in their hands aud velvet caps
on their heads. — Evelyn, Diary, Sept. 7, 1651.
Cjesar, to make like Caesar ; to raise
to supreme power.
Crowned, he villifies his own kingdom for
narrow bounds, whiles he hath greater
neighbours; he must be Casared to a uni-
versal monarch. — Adams, i. 491.
Gssarize, to rule.
This pow*r hath highest vertue of Desire,
And Quarizeth ore each appetite.
Dames, Microcosmos, p. 25.
Cage-work, a defence to conceal or
protect men in time of action. See
quotation, *. v. Cobridge-head.
Cageling, small cage-bird.
At last she let herself be conquered by him,
And as the cageling newly-flown returns,
The seeming-injured simple-hearted thing
Came to her old perch back and settled there.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Am I as a child perhaps, chasing a flown
cageling, wbo among the branches free plays
and peeps at the offered cage (as a home not
to be urged on him), and means to take bis
time of coming, if ne come at all? — Black'
more, Lorna Doom, ch.
Cairn ED, crowned with a cairn.
When the lake whiten'd, and the pinewood
roar'd,
And the cairn'd mountain was a shadow.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Caitiff, stingy.
To be reserved and caitiff in this part of
goodness is the sordidest piece of covetous-
ness, and more contemptible than the pe-
cuniary avarice. — Brown, Rel. Med., Pt. ii.
sect. 3.
Cajole. The foreign form of this
word in the extract seems to intimate
that in 1660 it was not naturalized, and
the earliest instance of the verb in the
Dicta, is from Hudibras (1674). L.,
however, hns cajolery ', with a quotation
from Monta^C 8 Devout Essays (1654).
I can neither cogg,«z//<?<)/<%nor complement.
— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 76.
Calais market.
He that bids most (like Calais market),
whatsoever be the cause, shall be sure of the
sentence.— W. Patten, Exptd. to Scotl., 1548
(Eny. Garner, iii. 70).
Calander, a kind of lark. H. gives
the word with one or two references,
but no extract.
He was a Triton of his time, and a sweete-
singing calander to the state. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffs (Harl. Misc., vi. 176).
Calcinize, to calcine ; reduce to
ashes.
God's dread wrath, which quick doth caU
cinize
The marble mountains, and the ocean dries.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 1200.
Calcitrate, to kick.
* The filly was soon scared out of her seven
senses, and began to . . calcitrate it, to wince
it, to frisk it.— Urquharts Rabelais, Bk. IV.
ch. xiv.
Calculate, calculation.
Nor were these brothers mistaken in their
calculates, for the event made good all their
prognostics. — North, Examen, p. 602.
They, as was noted, had calculates of elec-
tions, and knew by their rule of progression
how much the next sessions of Parliament
must be more averse to the Court than the
last was. — Ibid. p. 609.
Calefactory, perhaps the silver ball
filled with hot water, placed on the altar
in winter for the priest to warm his
hands on, lest from their being numbed
any accident should happen : it was
also called the pome.
A calefactory silver and gilt, with leaves
graven, weighing nine ounces and half. —
Inventory of Lincoln Cath., 1536.
Calends. The Greeks did not reckon
by calends; Greek Calends therefore
= never. Suetonius mentions that it
was a favourite expression with the
Emperor Augustus, to denote, as in the
second quotation, the period when some
people might be expected to pay their
debts (Octavius, cap. 87).
The judgment or decree shall be given
out and pronounced at the next Greek Ca-
lends, that is, never. — UrquharVs Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. xz.
**Bnt," quoth Pantagruel, " when will you
be out of debt?" "At the next enduing
term of the Greek Kalends" answered Pan-
H
CALF
( 98 )
CAMELIONIZE
urge, " when all the world shall he content.'1
— Ibid. Bk. III. ch. iii.
Calf. To eat the calf in the cov/s
belly = to count one's chickens before
they are hatched.
I ever made shift to avoid anticipations :
I never would eat the calf in the cow's belly,
as Lord M.'s phrase is. — Richardson, CI. Har-
low, iii. 136.
ril have no more such doings, let me tell ye ;
No, no, no eating calves in the cow's belly.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 258.
Calf-bed, a word formed jocosely on
the model of child-bed.
Tom has lost a cow in calf -bed. — Sou they,
Letters, iii. 305 (1822).
Calf-lolly, a term of reproach.
Jobbinol goosecaps, foolish loggerheads,
flutoh calf-lollies.— Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
I. ch. xxv.
Calf-love, a youthful fancy, as dis-
tinguished from a serious attachment.
It's a girl's fancy, just a kind o' calf-love*;
let it go by. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xx.
Calico, thin. Cf. Tiffany.
In such a place as that your callico body
(tenui corpusculo) had need have a good fire
to keep it warm. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 37.
Calioinosity, darkness. Sir T.
Browne has caligation.
I dare not ask the oracles; I prefer a
cheerful calioinosity, as Sir Thomas Browne
might say. — O. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch.
Caliqrapher, a good writer.
I would have taught him in three weeks a
firm, current, clear, and legible hand; he
should have been a caligrapher. — Scott, Guy
Mannering, i. 280.
An affection sprung up between the old
painter and the young caligrapher. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. i.
Caligulisms, extravagances like those
of Caligula. Walpole says of Fred-
erick Prince of Wales —
Alas! it would be endless to tell you all
his Caligulisms. — Letters to Mann, ii. 103
(1745).
Calino. Bailey gives call as an old
word for bravery: it is just possible
that calino may be connected with
this, and = a gallant.
Amongst our English harmonious calinos,
one is up with the excellence of the brown
bill and the long bowe ; another playes his
prizes in print in driving it home with all
weapons in right of the noble science of de-
fence ; a third writer passing enamorately of
the nature of white-meates. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 158).
Hor. 0,oh!
Tul. Nay, your o, oh's ! nor your colli n-oes
cannot serve your turn. — Dekker, Satiromas-
tix (Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 191).
Calor (Lai), heat.
The one dries up the Humour Radical!,
The other drowns the Calor Natural!.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 517.
Calotypist, a photographer: the
calotype is a particular photographic
process. See L.
Having and holding, till
I imprint her fast
On the void at last,
As the sun does whom he will
By the calotypist' s skill.
Browning, Mesmerism.
Calumnize, to calumniate.
And tho' he strips us to our skins,
We'd have it thought 'tis for our sins,
And make Heav'n guilty of the thing,
Rather than calumnize the king.
D'Urfey, Athenian Jilt.
Calumny, to calumniate.
Whereas before he was an enemy, and
almost a persecutor of Christ, he was now
an earnest seeker after him, changing his
old manner of calumnying into a diligent
kind of conferring both with Master Bilney
and others. — Foxe, Acts and Monuments, p.
1298, ed. 1563.
Calvar, a large ship.
Calvars and magars, hulks of burden great,
Which Brandimart rebated from his coast,
And sent them home, ballass'd with little
wealth. — Greene, Orl. Fur., i. 1.
Calvinisticate, to "imbue with Cal-
vinism.
Cotton Mather is such an author as Fuller
would have been, if the old English worthy,
instead of having been from a child trained
up in the way he should go, had been Calvin-
isticated till the milk of human kindness with
which his heart was always ready to overflow
had turned sour. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
xlvi.
Cambio (Ital.), bill of exchange.
I commend them for their plain downright
dealing, and punctuality in payment of cam-
bios, contracts, and the souldiers' salary. —
Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 20.
Camelionize, to change colour, like
the chameleon.
In your kingshipe I must leave you, and
repeate how from white to redde you camt-
lionized. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 171).
CAMEL-KNEED ( 99 )
CANDLE
Camel-kneed, having knees hardened
like those of a camel. Southey remarks
in a note, that when he used this epithet
he was not aware that the likeness had
been seriously applied to St. James, of
whom Hegesippus says, "His knees
were after the guise of a cameVs knee,
benumbed and bereft of the sense of
feeling by reason of his continual kneel-
ing in supplication to God, and petition
for the people."
I have led
Some camel-kneed prayer-monger through
the c*ve.—Southey, Thalaba, Bk. v.
Camklleb, camel-driver.
Oar Companions had their cradles strucke
down* through the negligence of the Camel-
Urs.— Sandys, Travels, p. 137.
Camenrs, Muses ; the Camoence.
Beuyne Camenes, that with your sacred food
H&oe fed and fosterde vp from tender yeares
A happye man that in your fauour stoode.
Googe, Sonette of Edwardes of the Chappell.
Camisole (Fr.), a loose jacket.
Spenser and others have camis.
Mrs. ODowd, the good housewife, arrayed
in curl-papers and a camisole, felt that her
duty was to act, and not to sleep, at this
juncture. — Thackeray, Vanity Fair, ch. xxx.
Campaigned, employed in campaigns.
" Here" said I. to an old soldier with one
hand, who had been campaigned, and worn
oat to death in the service, " here's a couple
of sous for thee." — Sterne, Sent. Journey,
Montriul.
Campanalian, pertaining to a bell.
Panurge's fancy sometimes hears the
bells bidding him marry, and some-
times dissuading him.
This campanalian oracle fretteth me to
the gats.— Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch.
xxviti.
Camps-squire, groom.
. . . a base campe-squire that sometimes
knowne to be,
Had now usurped five yeares past, and ruled
with tyranme. — Holland's Camden, p. 83.
Canaoua (Ital.), dregs of the people:
the French form canaille has become
naturalized among us. See quotation,
*. v. Rattle-headed.
And what is the subject matter? Low
plebeian invention, proper only for a canag-
ita of poltroons over ale to babble one to
another.— North, Examen, p. 306.
Canaster, a kind of tobacco ; pro-
perly, the rush basket in which it was
packed.
But a plain leg of mutton, my Lucy,
I pr'ythee get ready at three ;
Have it smoking, and tender, and juicy,
And what better meat can there be ?
And when it has feasted the master,
Twill amply suffice for the maid ;
Meanwhile I will smoke my canaster,
And tipple my ale in the shade.
Thackeray, Imitation of Horace
(Misc. t. 76).
Cancer, to crawl like a crab.
Other things advance per saltum — they do
not silently cancer their, way onwards. — De
Quincey, Roman Meals.
Cancered, eaten as by cancer.
The strulbrug of Swift . . . was a wreck,
a shell, that had been burned hollow and
cancered by the fierce furnace of life. — De
Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 05.
Cancro, an ^Italian imprecation ; the
cancer take you.
Not a word but ah and oh, and now and
then rise off his bed in a rage, knitting his
brows with cancro, and then he spake Italian.
— Breton, Phisition's Letter, p. 63.
Agn. I haue a bodie here which once I
lou'd
And honoured above all; but that time's
past . . .
That shall supply at so extreme a need the
vacant gibbet.
Lys. Cancro! what, thy husband's bodie ?
Chapman, Widdowes Teares, Act V.
Candid, usually = fair, unprejudiced ;
in extract, however, it means favourable.
King Charles and Queen Mary came to
Cambridge, were entertained at Trinity Col-
lege with comedies, and expressed candid
acceptance thereof. — Fuller, Hist, of Camb.,
viii. 22.
Candidate, white.
See'st thou that cloud that rides in state,
Part ruby-like, part candidate?
It is no other than the bed
Where Venus sleeps, half smothered.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 288.
Candle. To light a candle to the
devil is to be a subservient assistant in
some evil. The expression refers to a
belief that witches used to burn candles
in token of adoration before an image
of the devil. See N. and Q., II. ix. 29.
Though not for hope of good,
Yet for the f eare of euill,
Thou maist find ease so proffering up
A candell to the deuell.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 148.
Some will offer to kisse the hands which
they wish were cut off, and would be con-
tent to light a candle to the devil, so they
may compasse their owne ends. — Howell,
Forraine Travell, sect. 8.
H 2
CANDLE
( i°o )
CANDLESTICK
Here have I been holding a candle to the
devil, to show him the way to mischief. —
Scott, Fair Maid of Perth, ii. 213.
Candle. Aot to be able to hold a
candle to another = to be iar inferior.
I used to say no one could hold a candle to
our Grace, but she— she looked like a born
queen all the time. — C. Kingsley, Two Year*
Ago, ch. xv.
A Frenchman is conceited enough, but, by
George, he can't hold a candle to a Scutch-
man. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch.
xzxii.
Candle. To burn the candle at both
ends = to expend strength or life or
money, &c, recklessly.
Pay the debts that you owe, keep your
word to your friends.
But don't set your candles alight at both ends.
Ingoldsly Legends (St. Cuthbert).
To double all your griefs, and burn life's
candle,
As village gossips Ray, at either end.
Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, iii. 1.
Candle. The proverb in the extract
explains itself. Compare the expres-
sion, "The game is not worth the
candle.11 Gosson confesses that in
times past he had written comedies,
but adds —
I gaue myself to that exercise in hope to
thritie, but I burnt one candle to seek another,
and lost both my time and my tranell, when
I had doone. — School of Abuse, p. 41.
Candle. Not worth the candle = not
worth the cost or trouble : the proverb
is a French one.
Let him not trot about to view rare col-
lections of cockle-shells, or skeletons, or
tadpoles and spiders; for, after all, these
discoveries are not worth the candle.— Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 556.
Candle-fly, Bailey's translation of
pyralis, a winged insect supposed to
live in fire. Bailey, no doubt, was
thinking of the moth attracted by the
candle.
Why should an owl be an enemy to small
birds, a weasel to a crow, a turtle-dove to a
candle-fly ? — Bailey's Erasmus Colloq., p. 392.
Candle - rents, perhaps originally
some tenure under which certain altars
or shrines were to be supplied with
candles (?).
The Dean and Chapter of Paul's iu giving
up their accounts to the King's Commis-
sioners pretended themselves yearly losers by
some of these chanteries. For generally they
were founded on candle-rents (houses are
London's land), which were subject to casu-
altie, reparations, and vacations. — Fuller, Ch,
Hist,, VI. vi. 16.
The redeeming and restoring of [Lay im-
propriations] was these Feoffees' designe, aud
it was verily believed (if not obstructed in
their endeavours) within fifty yeers rather
purchases than money would have been
wanting unto them, buying them generally
(as candle - rents) at or under twelve yeers'
valuation. — Ibid. XI. ii. 6.
Candle, sale by inch of. The bid-
dings were made while the inch of
candle was burning ; the last bidder at
the time of its going out was the pur-
chaser. The custom is not altogether
obsolete (see N, and Q., IV. xi. 276).
Pleasant to see how backward men are at
first to bid ; and yet when the candle is going
out how they bawl, and dispute afterwards
who bid the most first. And here I observed
one man cunninger than the rest that was
sure to bid the last man, and to carry it ; and
inquiring the reason, he told me that just
as the flame goes out the smoke descends,
which is a thiug I never observed before,
and by that he do know the instant when to
bid last. — Fepys, Sept. 3, 1662 (see also
Nov. 6, 1660).
On a sudden it turns exchange, or a ware-
house for all sorts of commodities, where
fools are drawn in by inch of candle, as we
betray and catch larks with a glass. — Cha-
racter of a Coffee-house, 1673 (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 469).
Sell not favours by inch of candle ; there
is no depending on bought friendship. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 211.
I intend to sell my pains by inch of candle ;
I'll not venture one single pulse but upon
good security and high interest. — Ibid, p.
526.
Candles, a term for the pendulous
produce " madidi nasi.19
The inveterate culprit was a boy of seven,
vainly contending against candles at his nose
by feeblo sniffing. — G. Eliot, Amos Barton,
ch. ii.
Candlestick. Breton seems to mean
that some will say he is sworn to the
candlestick because he praises women,
though I do not understand the connec-
tion. A pajre was said to be " sworn to
the pantofle" (see N.) because he had
to carry his master's slippers. Can
" sworn to the candlestick " mean ad-
dicted to flattery, shedding brightness
and light on objects ?
Some will say that I am suvrne to tht candle-
stick ; such I wish their noses in the socket .
And this I say further, my faith was not yet
so much had in question to bee called to tht*
candlesticke ; bat if he that 'say so have been
•-•
; •••
CAND Y
( ioi )
CANTALOON
brought to the like booke oath, I wish hee had
eaten the strings for his labour. — Breton,
Praise of Vertuous Ladies, p. 57.
Candy, to whiten : generally used of
ice, or snow, or sugar.
The end of all is to shew that his party
were not so ranch to blame in seeking to
cover and protect such an egregious offender
as Fitzharris was, and thereby to candy them
op to posterity. — North, Examen, p. 305.
Cane, a telescope.
Them not transpiercing, lest our eyes should
be
As theirs that Heav'n through hollow Canes
doe see.
Tec see small circuit of the Welkin bright,
The Cane's strict compass doth so clasp their
Sight.
Sylvester, sixth day, first weeke, 545.
Canel coal. See extracts. L. has it
with quotations from Encyclopaedias.
He staid some days with Sir Roger Brad-
shaw, whose lordship is famous for yielding
the Canel (or Candle) coal. It is so termed, as
I guess, because the manufacturers in that
country use no candle, but work by the light
of their coal fires. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 278.
Between Wigan and Bolton is found great
Plenty of what they call Canel or Candle Coal,
the like of which is not to be seen in Britain,
or perhaps in the World. By putting a
lighted Candle to them they are presently in
a Flame, and yet hold Fire as long a* any Coals
whatever, and burn more or less as they are
placed in the Orate, flat or edgewise. They
are smooth and sleek where the pieces part
from one another, and will polish like Ala-
baster. A Lady may take them up in a
Cambrick Handkerchief, and they will not
soil it, tho' they are as black as the deepest
Jet. They make many curious Toys of them.
—Defoe, Tour thro* G. Brit., iii. 248.
Cangeant. N. gives this word with
the extract, and explains it "chang-
ing '* (?) ; but there is no question about
it, as Sylvester himself explains it in
the margin "changeable." He may
have meant it as a French word, clian-
gcanU
The vpper garment of the stately Queen
Is rich gold tissu, on a ground of green ;
Where th' artfnll shuttle rarely did encheck
The cangeant colour of a mallard's neck.
Sylvester, The Decay, 107.
Cank, to cackle.
The canking of some Spanish geese ....
threw poor Jerry into the utmost conster-
nation.— Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. IV.
ch. iii.
Canker- EAT, to eat as a canker.
Those corruptions which Tyme has brought
forth to fret aud canker-eate the same. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 222.
Cannell, kennel.
It was pretty to see how hard the woman
did work m the cannells, sweeping of water,
but then they would scold for drink, and be
as druuk as devils. — Pepys, Sept. 6, 1686.
Cannibalic, pertaining to eaters of
human flesh.
Tom's evil genius did not lead him into the
dens of any of those preparers of cannibalic
pastry, who are represented in many standard
country legends as doing a lively retail busi-
ness in the metropolis ; nor did it mark him
out as the prey of ring-droppers, pea and
thimble riggers, duffers, touters, or any of
those bloodless sharpers, who are perhaps a
little better known to the police. — Dickens,
M. Chuzzlewit, ch. xzxvii.
Canning., power.
Why would I not but because I could not ?
I mean because my canning is taken away b/
sin. — Bradford, ii. 28.
Cant, to toss up or upset.
The inn-keeper, who was here this very
day, held a corner of the blanket, and canted
me toward heaven with notable alacrity. —
Jarvis's Don Quixote, ii. 140.
The best swimmer canted out of a boat
capsized must sink ere he can swim. — Beads,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxvii.
A mischievous black imp canted her over,
and souse she went into the river. — //.
Kingsley, Geqffry Hamlyn, ch. xx.
Cant, a turn over.
The waiter . . . returned with a quartern
of brandy, which Crowe, snatching eagerly,
started into his bread-room at one cant. —
Smollett, L. Greaves, ch. xvii.
Cantab, a Cambridge man.
As for the young Cantabs, they, as was
said, had wandered a little over the south
border of romantic Spain. — Carlyle, Life of
Sterling, Pt. I. ch. xiii.
Cantabank. a common bill id singer :
used disparagingly. Cf. Mountebank,
Saltimbank.
He was no tavern cantabank that made it,
But a Squire minstrel of your Highness'
court. — Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. I. iii. 2.
Cantabbize, to imitate Cambridge.
Know also that this university [Dublin]
did so Cantabrize, that she imitated her in
the successive choice of her Chancellours. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. vii.47.
Cantaloon, some species of stuff.
"Western Goods had their share here also ;
and several booths were filled with Serges,
Duroys, Druggets, Shalloons, Cantalovn*,
CANTANKEROUS (102) CAPE MERCHANT
Devonshire Kersies, &c. — Defoe, Tour thro*
G. Britain, i. 94.
Cantankerous, ill-natured ; cross-
grained. See extract, s. v. Jowdbr.
I hope, Mr. Faulkland, an there are three of
us come on purpose for the game, you won't
be so cantankerous as to spoil the party by
sitting out. — Sheridan, The Rivals, v. 3.
I never knew such a cantankerous fellow
as you are ; you are always fancying I am
finding fault with Sheila. — Black, Princess
of Thule, ch. xv.
Canterbury rack, a gentle pace, like
that used by Canterbury pilgrims ; hence
canter. See s. t>. Rack.
For his grace at meat, what can I better
compare it to than a Canterbury rack, half
pace, half gallop. — Character of a Fanatic,
1675 {Harl. Misc., vii. 637).
Canterbury tale, an idle story. See
first extract ; also 8. v. Full-mouth.
Canterbury Tales. So Chaucer calleth his
Book, being a collection of several Tales pre-
tended to be told by Pilgrims in their passage
to the Shrine of Saint Thomas in Canter-
bury. But since that time Canterbury Tales
are parallel to Fabula Milesia, which are
characterized, nee vera, nee verisimiUs. —
Fuller, Worthies, Canterbury (i. 527).
"What, to come here with a Canterbury tale
of a leg and an eye, and Heaven knows what,
merely to try the extent of his power over
you ! — Colman, The Deuce is in him, ii. 1.
Cantick, a canticle.
[He] gave thanks unto God in some fine
canticks made in praise of the Divine bounty.
— XJrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxiii.
Canting heraldry. See quotation.
Sir Hew Halbert . . was so unthinking as
to deride my family name, as if it had been
quasi, Bear-warden ; a most uncivil jest, since
it . . . seemed to infer that our coat-armour
had not been achieved by honourable actions
in war, but bestowed by way of paranomasia,
or pun, upon our family appellation, — a sort
of bearing which the French call armoires
parlantes, the Latins, arma cantantia, and
your English authorities canting heraldry,
being indeed a species of emblazoning more
befitting canters, gaberlunzies, and such like
mendicants, whose gibberish is formed upon
playing upon the word, than the noble, hon-
ourable, and useful science of heraldry. —
Scott, Waverley, i. 141.
Cantoners, Swiss, as living in can-
tons.
own
67.
Those poor cantoners could not enjoy their
ra in quiet.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i.
Canty, cheerful.
Then at her door the canty dame
Would sit as any linnet gay.
Wordsworth, Goody Blake.
Canvassado, a fencing term (see H.) ;
but in the extract it clearly stands for
camisado (q. v. in N.), a sudden assault.
To marke the ordering of a court de garde,
To note the rules in walking of the rounde,
The scintenils, and euery watch and warde,
And of the mines, and working ynder grounde :
To marke the planting of their ambuscados,
And in the nignt their sodaine canuassados.
Breton, Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 19.
Cap. A woman is said to set her cap
at a man when she shows an inclina-
tion to marry him before she has been
asked ; the allusion perhaps is to her de-
sire to look her best when the favoured
one is present.
I know several young ladies who would be
very happy in such an opportunity of setting
their caps at him. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. IIL ch. xi.
When Lord Buckram went abroad to finish
his education, you all know what dangers he
ran, and what numbers of caps were set at
him. — Thackeray, Book of Snobs, ch. v.
Cap, to p*y respect to, or to be ob-
sequious. The word is common in this
sense, but the following is curious,
from being applied to the knee :
But if a smoothing tongue, a fleering face,
A capping knee, with double diligence
By close colloging creepe into thy £race.
Breton, Mother's Blessing, st. 62.
Cap. To fall under the cap •■= to
come into the head.
It fell not under every one's cap to give so
good advice. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
i. 84.
If the reasons of his decree were special,
and such as came not under every cap, he
cared not to leave the expression of them
to the precipitate dispatch of a blundering
registrar. — ibid. ii. 32.
Cap the globe, to beat everything,
i. e. to be extremely surprising.
" Well," I exclaimed, using an expression
of the district, " that caps the globe, however."
— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxxii.
Cape-merchant, wholesale, dealer;
one who had vessels of his own which
went round the Cape in the way of
trade.
[I] in this history have fetch'd my wares
from the storehouse of that reverend pre-
late [Usher], the Cape-merchant of all learn-
ing, and here in little remnants deliver them
out to petty country chapmen. — Fuller, Cfc.
Hist., II. vi. 4a
CAPERNAITICAL ( 103 )
CAPTE
Capernaitical, belonging to Caper-
naum. Bp. Hall, I suppose, is referring
to St John vi. 52, 59, 60. It is ob-
servable that, if the reprint be correct,
he does not begin the word with a
capital letter.
What an infatuation is upon the Romish
party, that, rather than they will admit of
any other than a gross, literal, capernaitical
emse in the words of our Saviour's sacra-
mental supper, This is my body, will con-
found heaven and earth together. — Bp. Hall,
Works, v. 52L
Caper-witted, flighty.
Sorely then, whatsoever any caper-witted
man may observe, neither was the king's
chastity stained, nor his wisdom lull'd
•deep.—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 227.
Caphotade, a hash. This French
word has not been naturalized among
us, yet Vanbrugh puts it into the mouth
of a valet in the first extract, and of a
waiting- woman in the second, as though
it were then common.
Ah, the traitor! what a capilotade of
damnation will there be cooked up for him.
-The False Friend, iiL 2.
What a capilotade of a story's here ! The
necklace lost, and her son Dick, and a for-
tune to marry, and she shall dance at the
wedding I— The Confederacy, iii 2.
Capitalism, possession of capital.
The Prince de Montcontour took his place
with great gravity at the Paris board,
whither Barnes made frequent flying visits.
The sense of capitalism sobered and dignified
Paul de Florae. — Thackeray, The Newcomes,
ch. xlvi.
Capitalized, headed.
Beauteous as the white column, capitalled
with gilding, which rose at her side. — C.
Bronte, VtUette, ch. xz.
Capon, to geld.
Had I been discover'd
I had been capon'd.
Massinger, Benegado, L i.
Capon. This bird, like the goose, is
taken for an emblem of stupidity.
MeteHus was so shuttle brained that euen
in the middes of his tribuneship he left his
office in Borne, and sallied to Pompeius into
Syria, and by then he had ben with him
in a whyle, came flynging home to Borne
again as vyse as a capon. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth,, p. 34L
Capon justice, a corrupt magistrate,
as bribed by gifts of capons, &c.
Shakespeare perhaps is alluding to the
venality as well as the good living of
uthe justice with fair round belly with
fat capon lined" {As You Like It,
II. vii.;.
Judges that judge for reward, and say
with shame, "Bring you," such as the
country csMa'capon justices. — Ward, Sermons,
p. 128.
They have many things of value to truck
for which they always carry about 'em ; as
justice for fat capons to be delivered before
dinner. — Tom Brown, Works, iiL 26.
In England, during the reign of Elizabeth,
a member of Parliament denned a justice of
peace to be " an animal who for half a doaen
chickens will dispense with half a dozen penal
statutes." — Miss Edgeworth, Ennui, ch. viii.
Capon's feathers. See quotation.
Heylin had previously said that Salcot
was otherwise called Capon.
Salcot of Salisbury, knowing himself ob-
noxious to some court displeasures, redeems,
his peace, and- keeps himself out of such
danger, by making long leases of the best
of his farms and manors ; known afterwards
most commonly by the name of Capon's
feathers.— Heylin, Reformation, i. 212.
Capricorn, chamois. The Diets, only
give the word as signifying the zodiacal
sign.
He shew'd two heads and homes of the
true capricome, which animal, he told us,
was frequently kill'd among the mountainee.
— Evelyn, Diary, 1646 (p. 189).
Caprint, goatish. L. has caprine.
This moment I am as grave and formal in
my gate as a Spanish Don, or a Beader of a
Parish marching in the front of a Funeral ;
the next, as frolicksome as a capriny Mon-
sieur, leaping and frisking about. — Cotton,
Scarronides, Preface.
Caps. To pull caps = to quarrel.
Behold our lofty duchesses pull caps,
And give each other's reputation raps,
As freely as the drabs of Drury's school.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 140.
Captainess, a female captain.
. . . darest thou counsel me
From my dear Captainess to run away ?
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella, 88.
Captate, to catch, ensnare.
Condescending oft below himself in order
to captate the love and civil favour of people.
—Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 266.
Capte, capacity.
To some apophthegmes (where Erasmus
saied nothing) in case my so doyng might
anything helpe the weake and tender capte
of the vnlearned reader, I have put addicions.
—Udal's Erasmus's Apophth. (Translator's
Pref., p. vi.).
A mery conceipt to those that are of capte
to take it — Ibid. p. 357.
CARANT
( *°4 )
CARKLE
Carant, to run. See extract, «. v.
Appledrane, where the word is spelt
currant. Both extracts are in the
Devonshire dialect.
If everybody's ear anting about to once
each after his own men, nobody '11 find
notning in such a scrimmage as that. — C.
Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xxz.
Cabbage, shreds and clippings of
cloth : us u ally spelt cabbage.
Lupes for the outside of his suite has paide ;
But, for his heart, he cannot have it made ;
The reason is, his credit can not get
Toe inward earbage for his cloathes as yet.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 324.
Carbonated, reduced to carbon;
burnt.
AntiepiseopaU Preachers . . being loth to
be Carbonated or Crucified Christians, if
they can help it — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 580.
Carbon ed, broiled.
Supped with them and Mr. Pierce the
purser, and his wife and mine, where we had
a calf s head carboned ; but it was raw ; we
could not eat it. — Pepys, Jan. 1, 1660-61.
Carbuncular, liable to or productive
of carbuncles.
He returned more distempered, and fell
into a succession of boils, fevers, and St.
Anthony's fire ; indeed, I think, into such a
carbuncular state of blood as carried off my
brother. — Walpole to Mann, iii. 67 (1754).
Carcass, a hollow bomb or vessel
filled with combustibles. L. has car'
cass-shell.
Here also is the House where the Firemen
and Engiueers prepare their Fire-works,
charge Bombs, Carcasses, and Qranadoes for
the public service. — Dsfoe, Tour thro* G.
Britain, i. 135.
Card, a character (slang).
Mr. Thomas Potter, whose great aim it was
to be considered as a ** knowing card," a
" fast goer,*' and so forth, conducted himself
in a very different manner. — Sketches by Boz
(Making a Night of it).
" The fact is," ' said Lavender, with good-
natured impatience, "you are the most
romantic card I know." — Black, Princess of
Thule, ch. x.
Carder. This name was applied to
some Irish rebels because they cruelly
punished their victim** by driving a
card or hackle into their bicks, and
dragging it down the spine. See
Wilde's Irish Popular Superstitions,
p. 79. In i. 4 of the drama quoted, a
woman is spoken of as sure not to be-
tray a secret, even if she was carded.
It's in terror of hi 3 life he lives, continu-
ally dramiug day and night, and croaking of
carders, and thrashers, and oak boys, and
white bovs, aud peep-o'-day boys. — Miss
Edgetoorth, Love and Law, ii. 3.
This shall a Carder, that a Whiteboy be,
Ferocious leaders of atrocious bands.
Hood, Irish Schoolmaster.
Cardinal. R. and L. have a quota-
tion from Ayliffe, who says they are so
called as being the hinges of the Church,
but Fuller, agreeing in the derivation
from cardo, differs as to the applica-^
tion.
Cardinals are not so called because the
hinges on which the Church of Rome doth
move, but from Cardo, which signifieth the
end of a tenon put into a mortals, being ac-
cordingly fixed and fastened to their respect- !
ive Churches. — Fuller, Worthies, ch. iv. 1
Cardinalize, to redden like the hat
or stockings of a cardinal. L. has the
word as meaning to make a cardinal.
The redness of meats being a token that
they have not got enough of the fire, whether
by boiliug, roasting, or otherwise, except
shrimps, lobsters, crabs, and cray-fishes,
which are cardinalized with boiling. — Lr-
quharfs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxxix.
Cardophagi, thistle-eaters, i. e. don-
keys.
Kick and abuse him, you who have never
brayed ; but bear with him, all honest fellow-
cardophagi ; long-eared messmates, recognize
a brother donkey! — Thackeray, Virginians,
ch. xix.
Care, mountain ash.
Ton must know that of old Dart Moor
was a forest — its valleys filled with alder and
hazel, its hill-sides clothed with birch, oak,
and * care' mountain ash. — C. Kingsley, 1849
(Life, i. 173).
Careaway, a reckless person. In the
extract from Adams there is a pun on
carraway.
But as yet remayne without eyther forcast
or consideration of any thinge that may after-
ward turn them to benefite, playe the wan-
ton yonkers, and wilfull Careaway es. — Touch-
stone of Complexions, p. 99.
If worldly troubles come too fast upon a
man, he hath a herb called care-atcay. —
Adams, ii. 466.
Carklb, to crinkle.
The blades of grass . . turned their points
a little way, and offered their allegiance to
wind instead of water. Yet before their
carkled edges bent more than a driven saw,
down the water came again. — Blackmorc,
Lorna Doone, ch. xix.
CARLINGS
( 105 )
CARP-FISH
Carlings. " Timbers lying fore and
aft, along from one beam to another,
bearing up the ledges on which the
planks or the deck are fastened"
{Bailey's Diet).
There are carlinps at the aides and scores
in the beams in midships. — Archaol., xx. 556
(1324).
Cabling Sunday. See extracts;
though H. gives Palm Sunday as Curl-
ing Sunday, but says the dish referred
to is sometimes eaten on the previous
Sabbath.
Passion Sunday was that which intervened
between mid Lent and Palm Sunday. It is
called to this day, in the north of England,
Car Una Sunday.— Arckaol., xv. 356 (1806).
Carting Sunday or Carl Sunday. Carlings
or Carls are gray peas steeped in water, and
fried the next day in butter or fat. . . They
are eaten on the second Sunday before
Easter, formerly called Carl Sunday. The
origin of the custom seems forgotten. —
Robinson'* Whitby Glossary, 1875 (E. D. S.).
Carlip, a species of firearm.
The carlip is but short, wanting some
inches of a yard in the barrel. — The Unhappy
Marksman, 1659 {Harl. Misc., iv. 7).
Carmosel. Bailey gives "Car-
mousal, a Turkish merchant-ship.*1
I and six more . . . were sent forth in a
galliot to take a Greek Carmosel. — Sanders,
Voyage to Tripoli, 1587 (Eny. Garner, ii. 20).
Carnaged, bearing the marks of
carnage or slaughter.
Look yonder to that carnaged plain. —
Soutkey, Joan of Are, Bk. ix.
C ark ate, in the flesh. In the ex-
tract incarnate is used as though the
in were privative.
I fear nothing . . . that devil earnate or
incarnate can fairly do against a virtue so
established. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 46.
Carosse (Fr.), carriage.
The number of carosses is incredible that
are in this city. — Sandys, Travels, p. 259.
Carpenter, to do carpenter's work.
He drew, he varnished, he carpentered, he
glued. — Miss Austen, Persuasion, ch. xi.
The Salle des Menus is all new carpentered,
bedizened for them.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev.. Pt. I.
Bk. IV. ch. iii.
Here he took to gardening, planting, fish-
ing, carpentering, and various other pursuits
of a similar kind. . . . On all such occasions
Mr. Grim wig plants, fishes, and carpenters
with great ardour. — Dickens, Oliver Twist,
eh. liii.
Carfe*e. "The stifning Carpese"
is mentioned by Sylvester among " ve-
nemous plants ' ' {The Furies, 172).
Carpet. When a subject or plan is
mooted, it is sometimes said to be
brought upon the carpet, i. e. on the
table : carpet was formerly used for
table-cloth.
This is the family relation of these three
brothers whose lives are upon the carpet
before me. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
Preface, p. xv.
A word unluckily dropping from one of
them introduced a dissertation on the hard-
ships suffered by the inferior clergy ; which,
after a long duration, concluded with bring-
ing the nine volumes of sermons on the
carpet. — Fielding, Jos. Andrews, Bk. I. ch.
xvi.
He shifted the discourse in his turn, and
(with a more placid air) contrived to bring
another subject upon the carpet. — Graves,
Spiritual Quixote, Bk. X. ch. xi.
Carpet-bagger, a slang term, intro-
duced from America, for a man who
seeks election in a place with which he
has no connection.
Other "earpet-bagoers" as political knights-
errant unconnected with the localities are
called, have had unpleasant receptions. —
Guardian Newspaper, April 7, 1880.
Carpet gentry, effeminate gentry.
Which [strength and manhood] our strait-
buttoned, carpet, and effeminate gentry want-
ing, cannot endure to hold out a forenoon or
afternoon sitting without a tobacco bait, or a
game at bowls. — Ward, Sermons, p. 119.
Carpetless, without a carpet.
The well-scoured boards were carpetless. —
Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xli.
Carpet-monger, a carpet knight.
To any other carpet-munger or primerose
knight of Primero bring I a dedication. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 144).
Carpet-swab, carpet-bag (slang).
That sailor-man he said he'd seen that morn-
ing on the shore
A son of something — 'twas a name I'd never
heard before ;
A little gallows-looking chap — dear me! what
could he mean ?
With a carpet-swab and mucking togs, and a
hat turned up with green.
Ingoldsby Legends (Misadv. at Margate).
Carp- fish, a punning name for a
critic or caviller.
But I waigh it not, since the tongue of
an adversary cannot detract from verity. If
any the like carp-fsh whatsoever chance to
nibble at my credits, hee may perchannce
swallow down the sharp hook of reproach
CARRIAGEABLE ( 106 )
CASE
and iufamie ere he be aware. — Optick Glass*
of Humours, p. 10 (1639).
Carriageable, fit for carriages.
The mules would do four or five times aa
much work if they were set to draw any
kind of cart, however rough, on a carriageable
road. — E. Tylor, Mexico and Mexicans, p. 84
(1861).
Carriage-company, people who keep
their carriages ; so in the first quota-
tion carriage-lctdy.
No carriage-lady, were it with never such
hysterics, but must dismount in the mud
roads, in her silk shoes, and walk. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. v.
There is no phrase more elegant and to my
taste than that in which people are described
as " seeing a great deal of carriage-company"
— Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. ix.
Carriaged, behaved.
The mistress of the house a pretty, well-
carriaged woman, and a fine hand she hath.
—Pepys, June 20, 1662.
One that hath not one good feature in her
face, and yet is a fine lady, of a fine iaillt,
and very well carriaged, and mighty discreet.
—Ibid, June 14, 1664.
Carriages, behaviour: the plural is
peculiar.
My carriages also to your father in his
distress is a great load to my conscience. —
Bunyan, Pilgrim's Progress, Ft. ii. p. 11.
Carrionere, stinkard.
Fie, quoth my lady, what a stink is here !
When 'twas her breath that was the car-
rionere.— Herrick, Hesperides, p. 227.
Carrots, red hair.
In our village now, thoff Jack Qauge the
exciseman has ta'en to his carrots, there's
little Dick the farrier swears hell never for-
sake his bob, though all the college should
appear with their own heads. — Sheridan,
Rivals, i. 1.
Carroty, red : applied to hair. See
quotation from Scott, s. v. Peery.
Kitty. This is a strange head of hair of
thine, boy ; it is so coarse and so carotty.
Lovel. All my brothers and sisters be red
in the poll. — Ibwnsend, High Life Below
Stairs, Act L
Tom is here with a fine carrotty beard,
and a velvet jacket cut open at* the sleeves,
to show that Tom has a shirt. — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. xxiL
Carry-castle, an elephant
The scaly dragon being else too lowe
For th* Elephant, vp a thick tree doth goe,
So, closely ambush t almost every day,
To watch the Carry-Castle in his way.
Sylvester, sixth day, first tceeke, 65.
Carrying, being carried. Cf. Bring-
ing, Searching for similar construction.
["WolseyJ died at Leicester Abbey, as he
was carrying to London, where he was
buried.— 2>*/k, Tour thro' O. Britain, t 29.
How Don Quixote set at liberty several
unfortunate persons, who were carrying,
much against their wills, to a place they did
not like. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk.
III. ch. viii (heading).
( The trunks were fastened upon the car-
riages, the imperial was carrying out — Miss
Edgeworth, Belinda, ch. xxv.
Cart. To put the cart before the
horse = to reverse the proper order.
While she liued she bad a school and
taughte ; and when she was dedde, she had
maisters her self. . . The tale in appar-
ency bothe is standyng against all naturall
reason, and also setteth the carte before the
horses.— UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 859.
Carted, drawn in a cart to execution ;
it was usually applied to those who
were flogged at the cart's tail.
Nor as in Britain let them curse delay
Of law, but borne without a form away,
Suspected, tried, condemned, and carted in
a day. — Crabbe, Tale L
Carterly, pertaining to the cart,
and so rustic, clownish.
Thence sprouteth that obscene appellation
of Sarding Sandes, with the draffe of the
carterly hoblobs thereabouts. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 160).
Caryatid, a female figure dressed in
long robes, supporting an entablature.
"When the Greeks subdued the Carians
they introduced these architectural
figures, dressed after the Cariatic man-
ner, in memory of their triumph.
Two great statues, Art,
And Science, Caryatids, lifted up
A weight of emblem.
Tennyson, Princess, iv.
Cascade, to fall in a cascade.
In the middle of a large octagon piece of
water stands an obelisk of near seventy feet,
for a Jet-d'-Eau to cascade from the top of
it— Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain,n. 218.
Case, suppose ; in case.
What if he staggers? nay, but case he be
FoiPd on his knee ?
That very knee will bend to Heav'n, and woo
For mercy too. — QuarUs, Emblems, ii. 14.
Case, a garment.
Doubtless [Job] had his wardrobe, his
change and choice of garments. Yet now
how doth his humbled soul contemn them,
as if he threw away his vesture, saying, I
CASEINE
( io7 )
CAT
have worn thee for pomp, given countenance
to a silken cast. — Adams, i. 57.
Finding thirty Philistines, he [Samson]
bestowed their corps on the earth, and their
casa on their fellow countrymen. — Fuller,
Pivah Sight, n. xi. 21.
Their shooes waxed not old, but their feet
did; their eases were spared, and persons
•pffled.— Ibid. TV. iii. 8.
Casein e. Kingsley more than once
uses the expression in the extract = the
correct thing, the cheese, caseine being
the basis of cheese.
Horn minnow looks like a gudgeon, which
is the pure caseine. — C. Kingsley, Letter,
Hay, 1856.
Casquetel, small casque or helmet.
She to her home repair 'd.
And with a light and unplumed casquetel
She helm'd her head.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. ix.
Cassakin, a little cassock.
Inhnmane soules, who toucht with bloudy
Taint, J
111 Shepheards, shear© not, but even flay
your fold,
To tarn the Skin to Cassakins of Gold.
Sylvester, St. Lewis, 544.
Cassation, annulling. See N., s. v.
caste, which verb is used a few lines
lower down in the place whence the
first extract is taken.
Who sees not in this overture an utter
cessation of that liturgy which is pretended
to be left free.— Bp. Hall, Works, x. 302.
The first election for being made in the
night, out of due time, and without solemne
ceremony, is oppugned by the king's pro-
curators: the last was argued by some of
the monkes to be ill by reason there was no
cassation of the first.— Daniel, Hist. ofEnq.,
p. 112. ^
Cassino, a game at cards.
lady Middleton proposed a rubber of
t'assino.—Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility,
ch. rxiii.
"Two whist, cassino, or quadrille tables
*dl dispose of four couple." . . u Great case,
little cass, and the spades, Ma'am."— Nares,
Vnnks I to myself, ii. 132.
Cassock, now confined to ecclesi-
astical dress, but once applied to the
dress not only of soldiers, but of
women.
Who would not thinke it a ridiculous thing
to see a lady in her xnilke-house with a veluet
gown, and at a bridall in her cassock of
mockadoV—Puttenham, Art. of Eng. Poesie.
Book III. ch. xxiv.
Her taffta cassock might you see
Tucked up above her knee.
Greene, p. 302.
She wore a chaplet on her head,
Her cassock was of scarlet red.
Ibid. p. 305.
Casson, cant term for beef.
Here's ruffpeck and casson, and all of the
best,
And scraps of the dainties of gentry cofe's
feast. — Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Cast, " a second swarm of bees from
one hive "(H).
Such as hope that Mariners will hold up if
Fishermen be destroyed, may aa rationally
expect plenty of hony and wax, though only
old stocks of Bees were kept, without either
casts or swarmes.— Fuller, Worthies, ch. viii.
Cast, to throw the thrashed com
from one side of the bam to the other,
so as to cleanse it from dust, &c.
Some winnow, some fan,
Some cast that can.
In casting provide,
For seede lay aside.
Tusser, Husbandries p. 53.
Cast, a portion of bread : perhaps
applied to the loaves joined together
on being taken out of the oven. See
H.
An elephant in 1630 came hither ambassa-
dor from the great Mogul (who could both
write and read), and was every day allowed
twelve cast of bread, twenty quarts of Canary
sack, besides nuts and almonds — B. Jonson,
Discoveries {Hear-say news).
Castellar, pertaining to a castle.
It was a curious sample of ancient castellar
dungeons, which the good folks the founders
took for palaces. — Walpole, Letters, iv. 480
(1789).
Castellet, a little castle.
The erection of a castellet at this point
would then become desirable. — Arcmol.,
xxix.30(1841).
Castle-monger, a builder or pro-
prietor of castles.
His subjects, but especially the Bishops
(being the greatest castle-mongers in that age),
very stubborn, and not easily to be ordered. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., HI. ii. 53.
Casure, cadence.
Some of the Catholics, allured with the
pleasant casure of the metre, and sweet
sound of their rhyme, should go to their
assemblies. — Calfhill, p. 298.
Cat. See quotation.
At the edge of the moat opposite the
wooden tower, a strong pent-house, which
CAT
( 1 08 ) CATCHPOLE-SHIP
they called a cat, might be seen stealing to-
wards the curtain, aiid gradually filling up
the moat with fascines and rubbish, which
the workmen flung out of its mouth. — JRcadet
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xliii.
Cat. Enough to make a cat speak
» something astonishing or out of
the way : often applied, as in three of
the subjoined extracts, to astonishingly
good liquor.
Gome on your ways, open your mouth
here is that which will give language to you,
eat. — Tempest, ii. 2.
I have spoken for ale that will make a cat
speak. — Breton, Packet of Mad Letters, p. 50.
A spicy pot,
Then do's us reason,
Would make a cat
To talk high treason.
D'Urfey, Two (Queens of Brentford, Act I.
Then I came to large ropes stretched out
from the mast, so that you must climb them
wi th your head backwards. The midshipman
told me these were called the cat-harpings,
because they were so difficult to climb that a
cat would expostulate if ordered to go out by
them. — Marry att, Peter Simple, ch. vii.
Talk, miss ! it's enough to make a Tom cat
speak French grammar, only to see how she
tosses her head. — Dickens, Nicholas Nicklehy,
ch. xii.
Cat, cat of nine tails ; the lash.
Bash coalised kings, such a fire have ye
kindled; yourselves tireless, your fighters
animated only by drill-sergeants, mess-room
moralities, and the drummer's cat. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. VII. ch. iii.
The cat was purring about the mat,
But her mistress heard no more of that
Than if it bad been a boatswain's cat.
Hood, Tale of a Tempest.
Cataclysmic, pertaining to a cata-
clysm or deluge.
What if the method whereon things have
proceeded since the Creation were, as geology
as well as history proclaims, a cataclysmic
method ? — C. Kingsley, Yeast (Epilogue).
Catamaran (Tamil. Katta, tied ;
maram, trees), properly a small raft,
in which sense, 1. e. a floating stage, it
is sometimes employed even in England.
It seems also to have been used at the
beginning of this century for a sort of
fire -ship ; hence perhaps its application
to a cross or cantankerous old woman ;
or perhnps this use was simply suggest-
ed by the first syllable. See N. and Q.,
V. vi. 318, 437, from which the first
and last extracts are taken.
Great hopes had been formed at the Ad-
miralty [in 1804] of certain vessels which
were filled with combustibles and called
catamarans. — Lord Stanhope, Life of Pitt, iv.
218.
" The cursed drunken old catamaran," cried
he ; " I'll go and cut her down by the head."
— Marryatt, Peter Simple* ch. vi.
" What a woman that Mrs. Mackenzie is ! *
cries F. B. ; '* what an infernal tartar and
catamaran.** — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. lxxv.
The fan of her screw propeller came in
contact with a floating catamaran, and both
blades of her screw were bent. — Times, Oct.
25, 1876.
Cat and doo like, a quarrelsome life.
He that compareth our instruments with
those that were vsed in ancient times, shall
see them agree like dogges and cattes, and
meete as jump as Germans lippes. — Gosson,
School of Abuse, p. 27.
They keep at Staines the old Blue Boar,
Are cat and dog, and rogue and whore.
Swift, Phyllis.
Married he was, and to as bitter a precisian
as ever eat flesh in Lent ; and a cat and dog
life she led with Tony, as men said.— -Scott,
Kenilworth, ch. ii.
Cata-physical, infra-natural.
A visual object, falling under hyper-
physical or cata- physical laws, loses its shadow.
-De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 837.
Cata-presbyter, one opposed to the
priesthood, or an opposition preacher.
Giiuden seems to apply the term to the
ministers of dissenting sects who were
opposed to the Anglicun priesthood,
and to each other.
Various factions . . have each their Anti-
Ministers, their Cata- Presbyters, or counter-
preachers bandying one against the other. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 429.
CATAruLTiER, the worker of a cata-
pult.
The besiegers . . sent forward their sappers,
Sioneers, catapultiers. and crossbowmeu. —
bade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. xliii.
Catch, a strongly - built vessel of
8m a 11 burden : now more often spelt
ketch.
One of the ships royal with the catch were
sent under the command of Captain Love. —
Howell, Letters, I. iv. 1.
The fleete did Rail, about 103 in all, besides
small catches. — Pepys, April 25, 1665.
Catcher, one who sings a catch.
" But where be my catchers ? Gome, a
round, and so let us drink." (Stage Direction :
This catch sung and they drink about.) —
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act IV.
Catchpole-ship, office of a publican
or tax-collector.
CATCH SHILLING ( 109 )
CAUDATION
This catchpole-ship of Zaccheus carried ex-
tortion in the face. — Bp. Hall, Works,u. 386.
Catch shilling, something of no
great value, but meant to be of a popular
character, so as to sell.
The other article is upon a catch penny or
rather catch shilling u Life of Wellington." —
Southey, Letters, ii. 402 (1815).
Catechise, to chastise or reprove:
often so used by the poor, not without
some authority for it in literature. Per
contra, I have been informed by a
Gloucestershire clergyman that there
chastise sometimes =» to question.
Your father has deserved it at my hands,
Who, of mere charity and Christian truth,
To bring me to religious purity,
And as it were in catechising sort,
To make me mindful of my mortal sins,
Against my will, and whether I would or no,
Seized all I had.
Marlowe, Jew of Malta, ii. 2.
They might have been reclaimed, if used
with gentle means, not catechised with fire and
fagot.— Fuller, Holy War, Bk. III. ch. xx.
He did not fail of catechizing his young
friend on this occasion. He said he was
sorry to see any of his gang guilty of a breach
of honour ; that without honour priggery was
at an end. — Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. HI.
ch. vi.
Catechise, catechism : the word
occurs frequently in Gauden, e. g. pp.
316, 549.
The Articles, Creeds, Homilies, Catechise,
and Liturgy, with which they were, or might
have been, well acquainted. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 55.
Caterbrall, a sort of dance ; a
brawl danced by four persons. In
Davies's Wit's Bedlam, p. 3, the word is
spelt guarter-brauleSy and is applied to
the music appropriated to the dance.
Angell-fac'd fairies (clad in vestures white)
Shal come in tripping hlithsom Madrigal Is
And foote fine horne-pipes, jigges, and cater-
brails. — Davits, An Extasie, p. 94.
Catebhllar, an extortioner.
They that be the children of this world, as
covetous persons, extortioners, oppressors,
caterpillars, usurers, think you they come to
God's storehouse ? — Latimer, i. 404.
Near of kin to these caterpillars [pawn-
brokers] is the unconscionable tallyman. —
Four for a Penny, 1678 (Harl. Misc.,\v. 148).
Burton in his sermon on Prov. xxiv. 22 . . .
abused the text and the Bishops sufficiently,
calling them instead of fathers, step-fathers,
for pillars, caterpillars. — Barnard, Life of
Heytin, sect. 61.
Cathedraticals, dues paid by the
clergy to the Bishop.
Tou do not pay your procurations only,
but your cathedraticals and synodals also. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 54.
Cathood, the state of being a cat.
Were I endowed with the power of sus-
pending the effect of time upon the things
around me, . . . decidedly my kitten should
never attain to cathood. — Southty, The Doctor,
ch. xxv.
We have a face with a certain piquancy,
the liveliest glib-snappish tongue, the liveliest
kittenish manner (not yet bardeued into cat'
hood ), with thirty pounds a year and prospects.
— Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. v.
Cats and dogs. To rain cats and
dogs = to pour with rain. Two or
three derivations of this phrase have
been suggested, but perhaps the true
one is still to seek: rani Aogag = surpris-
ingly, or corruption of Fr. catadoupe,
wat erf ull ?
I know Sir John will go, though he was
sure it would rata cats and dogs. — Swift,
Polite Conversation (Conv. ii.).
It was as dark as pitch, and metaphorically
rained cats and dogs. — Ingoldsby Legends
(Grey Dolphin).
CAT's-rELLET, a game, perhaps the
same as tip-cat.
Who beats the boys from cafs-pellet and
stool-ball? — British Bellman, 1048 (Ilarl.
Misc., vii. 625).
Cattery, an establishment of cats.
An evil fortune attended all our attempts
at re-establishing a cattery. — Southey, The
Doctor, p. 684.
Caucus. See quotation, though I
think Lord Lytton has not given the
usual meaning of the word, which sig-
nifies a meeting of one particular party
to select candidates, &c. The term
appears to have arisen in America in
the earlier half of the hist century. The
first innings of this kind were held
in ship-yards in Boston ; hence called
caulker* 8 meetings. See N. and Q.t
1st S., vol. zi. ; 3rd S., vols, xi., xii.
44 1 think of taking a hint from the free and
glorious land of America, and establishing
secret caucuses : nothing like 'em." *• Cau-
cuses ?" u Small sub-committees that spy
on their men night and day, and don't suffer
them to be intimidated to vote the other
way." — Lytton, My Novel, Bk. XII. ch. xii.
Caudation, the possession of a tail.
Crawley ... no sooner felt his hand en-
counter a tail, alight in size, bnt stiff as a
CAULIFLOWER
( no )
CENTRICAL
pug's and straight as a pointer's, than he
uttered a dismal howl, ana it is said that for
a single moment he really suspected prema-
ture caudation had been inflicted on him for
his crimes. — Reade, Never too late to mend,
ch. Ixxvi.
Cauliflower, a name given to a wig
which resembled that vegetable.
Of battles fierce and warriors big,
He writes in phrases dull and slow,
And waves his cauliflower wig,
And shouts, M St. George for Marlborow ! "
Thackeray, The Drum.
Caulker, a dram, as distinguished
from the heavy, which is beer or porter.
Take a caulker? Summat heavy then?
No ? Tak a drap o' kindness yet for auld
langsyne. — C. KinysUy, Alton Locke, oh. zxi.
Cauponation, tricks of adulteration,
such as innkeepers (caupones) prac-
tised with their liquors.
Better it were to have a deformity in
preaching, so that some would preach the
truth of God, and that which is to be
preached, without cauponation and adulter-
ation of the word, .... than to have such
a uniformity that the silly people should
be thereby occasioned to continue still in
their lamentable ignorance. — Latimer, ii. 347.
Causeway, to pave.
The stripped hawthorn and hasel bushes
were as still as the white worn stones which
causewayed the middle of the path. — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xii.
Causey, to pave as a causey or
causeway.
These London kirkyards are causeyed with
through-stanes. — Scott, Nigel, i. 54.
Cautioner, bail. Among the canons
approved by Charles I. for the Church
or Scotland was the following : —
That no Presbyter should hereafter become
surety or cautioner for any person whatso-
ever, in civil bonds and contracts, under pain
of suspension. — Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 299.
Cavalcade, to go in procession.
He would have done his noble friend better
service than cavalcading with him to Oxford.
— North, Examen, p. 112.
Cave in, to sink in or give in, like an
abandoned mining-shaft.
A puppy, three weeks old, joins the chase
with heart and soul, but caves in at about
fifty yards, and sits him down to bark. — H.
Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. zxviii.
Cavies, cavaliers.
In the meane while . . . were at least
sixty great gunnes shot off, which beat up
the dirt bravely about the Cavies eares. —
True Relation of a brave defeat given by the
forces in Plimouth to Skettum Greenvile, 1645,
p. 4.
Celibataire, bachelor.
His hard-hearted betrayer seemed to drop
tears, while the despairing celibataire de-
scanted on his " whole course of love." —
Godwin, Mandeville, ii. 268.
Celical, heavenly.
By stars I craue you, by the ayre, by the
celical houshold,
Hoyse me hence. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 610.
Cellar, a case or box (we still have
salt-cellar) ; more especially a case for
liquors ; a cellaret
Run for the cellar of strong waters quickly.
— Jonson, Maanetic Lady, III. i.
His wife afterwards did take me into my
closet, and give me a cellar of waters of her
own distilling. — Pepys, April 1, 1668.
Cellarous, belonging to a cellar.
A little side-door, which I had never ob-
served before, stood open, and disclosed
certain cellarous steps. — Dickens, Uncom-
mercial Traveller, ix.
Censoress, female censor.
u This is not very politic in us, Miss Bur-
ney ; to play at cards and have you listen to
our follies." " There's for you ! I am to pass
for a censoress now."— Mad. D'ArUay, Diary,
i. 157.
Centenary, a centenarian ; it usually
means a period of a hundred years, or a
hundredth anniversary.
Centenaries, he thought, must have been
ravens and torlowes.—Southty, The Doctor,
ch. cxxxii.
Centre bit, a tool for boring large
circular holes: much used by house-
breakers.
And Sleep must lie down arm'd, for the vil-
lainous centre-bits
Grind on the wakeful ear in the hush of
the moonless nights.
Tennyson's Maud, I. i. 11.
His intelligence bored like a centre-bit into
the deep heart of his enemy. — Reade, Never
too late to mend, ch. ii.
Centrical, central.
I knew the church, however ; it had occa-
sionally formed a centrical point in my ram-
bles.— Godwin, Mandeville, 1. 186.
To me wealth and ambition would always
be unavailing; I have lived in their most
centrical possessions, and I have always seen
that the happiness of the richest and the
greatest has been the moment of retiring
from riches and from power. — Mad. DAr-
blay. Diary, v. 431.
" It is time then," said Fitzurse, "to draw
CENTRONEL
(
III
)
CHALK
oar party to a head, either at York, or some
other centrical place." — Scott, Ivanhoe, i. 202.
Centronel, a sentinel.
These milk-white doves shall be his centronels,
Who, if that any seek to do him hurt,
Will quickly fly to Cytherea's fist.
Marlowe, Dido, II. i.
Centumyirate, a body of a hundred
men.
A cause . . . might reasonably have lasted
them as many years, finding food and rai-
ment all that term for a centumvirate of the
profession. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, ii. 198.
Centurie, I suppose the common and
corrupt pronunciation of sanctuary.
Sanctuarram or the Centurie, wherein
debtonrs taking refuge from their credi-
tours, malefaetours from the judge, lived,
the more the pity, in all security. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist^ vi. 286 {Hist, of Abbeys).
Cerebrosity, brain : the word is put
into the mouth of an ignorant pedant.
Attend and throw your ears to mee ... till
I have endoctrinated your plumbeous cere-
brosities. — Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 622.
Ceremonize, to practise ceremonies.
They suspected lest those who formerly
had outrunne the canons with their addi-
tionall conformitie {ceremonizing more than
was enjoyned) now would make the canons
come up to them, making it necessary for
others what voluntarily they had preprac-
tised themselves. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., XL
iiL 14.
Ceremony, to marry; to join by a
ceremony.
Or if thy vows be past, and Hymen's bands
Have ceremonied your unequal hands,
Annul, at least avoid, thy lawless act
With insufficiency, or pre-contract.
Quarles, Emblem*, v. 8.
Cebts, certainly: usually written
certes.
But certs I know that such mistake their
ground.
Fuller, David's Heavie Punishment, st. 27.
For certs I know their labour was but lost.
Ibid. st. 38.
Cest, a girdle ; or, as Sylvester ex-
Slains it in the margin, " spouse-belt."
tichardson and Latham have the same
single quotation from Collins.
Thou trimm'st the trammels of thy golden
hair
With myrtle, thyme, and roses; and thy
brest
Gird'st with a rich and odoriferous cest.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 949.
Ceston, girdle ; especially the girdle
of Venus.
Mer. Venus, give me your pledge.
I en. My ceston, or my fan, or both?
Peele, Arraignment of Paris, iii. 2.
As if love's sampler here was wrought,
Or Citherea's ceston, which
All with temptation doth bewitch.
Merrick, Hesperides, p. 177.
Chaff, to banter.
A dozen honest fellows grinned when their
own visages appeared, and chaffed each other
about the sweethearts who were to keep
them while they were out at sea.— C. Kings-
Icy, Two Years Ago, ch. xv.
Chainless, free ; unfettered.
If the free Switzer yet bestrides alone
His chainless mountains, 'tis but for a time.
Byron, Ode, 130.
Chainlet, little chain.
"If you condemn a bow of ribbon for a
lady, monsieur, you would necessarily dis-
approve of a thing like this for a gentle-
man," holding up my bright little chainlet of
sUk and gold. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch.
xxviii.
Chaired, installed or enthroned. The
word more usually applies to that
ceremony formerly undergone by a
newly-elected M.P., of being carried
in procession in a chair, as depicted by
Hogarth.
Aldwyth. And when doth Harold go ?
Morcar. To-morrow — first to Bosham,
then to Flanders.
Aldw. Not to come back till Tostig shall
have shown
And redden'd with his people's blood the
teeth
That shall be broken by us, — yea, and thou
Chair' d in his place. — Tennyson, Harold, i. 2.
Ch alder, a chauldron.
The quantity of coals which, one year with
another, are burnt and consumed in and
about this City, is supposed to be about
600,000 Chalders, every Chalder containing
thirty-six bushels, and generally weighing
8000 weight.— Defoe, Tour thro' O. Britain,
ii. 144.
Chalk, to run up a score, that being
marked with chalk.
I shall be better than my word, and pro-
secute you more constantly than a city vint-
ner does a cof^try parliament man that
chalk1 d it plentifully last winter session. — T.
Brown, Works, i. 182.
Chalk. Old maids who wished to be
married were said to eat chalk, which,
with oatmeal, lime, Ac, seems to have
been a remedy for the green-sickness.
CHALKS
(
112
)
CHANCEL
How can any man in his right wits believe
that ten thousand green-sickuess maidens . .
would rather die martyrs to oatmeal, loam,
and chalk than accept such able doctors and
such pleasant physick for their recoveries in
that only elixir vita, man and matrimony ? —
Reply to Ladies' and Bachelor* Petition, 1694
{Harl. Misc., iv. 438).
As for your part, Madam, you might have
had me once ; but now, Madam, if you should
by chance fall to eating chalk or gnawing the
sheets, 'tis none of my fault. — Farquhar,
Constant Couple, v. 3.
Before that any voung, lying, swearing,
flattering, rakehelly fellow should play such
tricks with me, I would wear my teeth to
the stumps with lime and chalk. — Ibid., The
Inconstant, ii. 1.
DiscoulerM, pale, as bastard pearl,
Or oyster, or chalk-eating girl
That oatmeal with it chew'd.
B'Urfey, Plague of Impertinence.
Chalks. By long chalks = by many
degrees.
They whipp'd and they spurr'd, and they
after her press'd,
But Sir Alured'4 steed was by long chalks
the best. — Ingoldsfty Leg. (S. Bomtoold).
A3 regards the body of water discharged
. . . the Iudus ranks foremost by a long chalk.
— Be Quincey, System of the Heavens.
Chalks. To walk one's chalks is a
slang expression to signify going away.
Corruption of calx (?).
In a few minutes Tom came in. " Here's
a good riddance! The prisoner has fabri-
cated his pilgrim's staff, to speak scientific-
ally, and perambulated his calcareous strata."
"What?" "Cut his stick, and walked his
chalks, and is off to London." — C.Kingsley,
Two Years Ago, ch. i.
Chaloupe, a shallop ; a small craft
Bailey here uses the French form of
the word, though in his Diet he only
gives the English one.
There was a pretty many of us upon the
shore of Calais, who were carried thence in a
chaloupe to a large ship. — Bailey's Erasmus,
p. 255.
Chamber is used adjectivally for
effeminate or wanton: so chambering
(roiraif) in Rom. xiii. 13.
The good Kalander ; . . loved the sport of
hunting ; ... in the comparison thereof he
disdained all chamber-delight — Sidney, Ar-
cadia, p. 33.
Will you
Forbear to reap the harvest of such glories,
Now ripe and at full growth, for the embraces
Of a slight woman, or exchange your triumphs
For chamber-pleasures ?
Massinger, Bashful Lover, v. 3.
Thou shalt not neede to fear the chamber*
scapes,
The siunes 'gainst Nature, and the brutish
rapes. — Bavies, An Extasie, p. 92.
Chamber, home ; dwelling-place.
a London .... the seat of the British Em-
pire, and the kings of Eugland's chamber.—
Holland's Camden, p. 421.
Chambeb-stead, a place for a cham-
ber. Cf. Girdle-stead, Market-stead,
Ac.
But if love be so dear to thee, thou hast a
chamber-stead,
Which Vulcan purposely eontrivM with all
fit secrecy ;
There sleep at pleasure.
Chapman, Iliad, xiv. 230.
Chambrier, a chamberlain.
And thou shalt have with thee the Graces,
• ••«••••
For they, to grace thee not despising,
Shall daily wait upon thy rising,
(And never Asian cavaliers
Could boast they had such chamlfriers).
Cottony Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 270.
Champertou8. Champerty, a legal
term, is in the Diets.: it refers to parting
or dividing the land. In the extract
Bp. Hull refers to his controversy with
five dissenting ministers, who wrote
under the name of Smectymnuus. He
probably calls their combination chain-
pertous on account of this division of
labour.
This champertous combination hath gone
about by mere shews of proof to feed the
unquiet humours of men. — Bp. Hall, Works,
x. 372.
Champion, the tenant of open, un-
enclosed land, who by custom allows
the incoming tenant to summer-fallow
such ground as is meant for wheat.
The occupier of woodland or enclosures
keeps the whole until the end of his
term.
New fermer may enter (as champions say)
On all that is fallow at Lent ladle day :
In woodland, old fermer to that will not
yeeld,
For loosing of pasture, and feede of his
feeld. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 34.
Cbampionize, to play the champion.
With reed-like lance, and with a blunted
blade,
To championize vnder a tented shade.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 359.
Chancel, applied to a sacred division
in a heathen temple.
CHANCY
( "3 )
CHAPMANR Y
The priest went into the prine chauncell,
and (as though he had spoken with God)
eame forth againe, and annswered that
Jupiter did by assured promisse make him a
graunt of his boune that he asked. — UdaTs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 233.
Fierce Mars flew through the air,
.... and then his own hands wrought,
Which from his fane's rich chancel, cnrM, the
true JSneas brought.
Chapman, Hiadt v. 507.
Chancy, uncertain.
By a roundabout course even a gentleman
may make of himself a chancy personage,
raising an uncertainty as to what he may do
next.— <?. Eliot, Darnel Deronda, ch. xxviii.
Change. To put the change upon a
person =* to deceive or mislead.
I have so contriv'd that Mellefont will
presently in the chaplain's habit wait for
Cynthia in your dressing-room ; but I have
mtt the change u»on her, that she may
oe otherwise employed. — Congreve, Double
Dealer, v. 17.
Those enchanters who persecute me are
perpetually setting shapes before me as they
really are, and presently putting the change
upon me, and transforming them into what-
ever they please.— Jorvu's Don Quixote, Pt.
II Bk. II. ch. ix.
Tou cannot out the change on me so easy
as you think, for I have lived among the
quick-stirring spirits of the age too long to
swallow chaff for grain. — Scott, Kerrilworth,
eh. iii.
Change-Church, one who holds vari-
ous ecclesiastical preferments in suc-
cession.
Boso . . . was a great Change-Church in
Borne. — Fuller, Worthies, Hertfordshire (i.
429).
Change-house, a Scotch public-house.
When the Lowlanders want to drink a
cheerupping cup, they go to the public-
house called the change-house, and call for
a chopin of twopenny.— Smollett, Humphrey
Clinker, ii. 09.
Changes. To ring changes is to
direct or regulate variations, or to re-
peat certain formula) in various order.
L. has illustrations of the literal use of
this phrase in regard to bells, but not
of its metaphorical meaning.
She considereth how Quickly mutable all
things are in this world, God ringing the
changes on all accidents, and making them
tunable to His glory. — Fuller, Holy State,
IV. xiii. 12.
If it had been necessary to exact implicit
and profound belief by mysterious and
borisonant terms, he could have amazed the
listener, . . . and have astounded him by
ringing changes upon Almugea, Cazimi, &c. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxxxvi.
Channellize, to hold as in a channel.
His Yaines and Nerues that channellize His
Blood,
By violent conuulsions all confracted.
Davies, Holy Hoode, p. 20.
Chant, to deal dishonestly in horses.
Jack Firebrace and Tom Humbold of
Spotsylvania was here this morning chant-
ing horses with 'em. — Thackeray, Virginians,
ch. x.
Chap, a fellow: an abbreviation of
chapman: merchant was used in the
same contemptuous way. Bonner
speaks of Latimer and Hooper as mer-
chants (see MaitlanoVs Essays on the
Reformation, p. 369, note). The ear-
liest authority for chap in the Diets, is
Byrom.
Those crusty chaps I cannot love,
The Diuell doo them shame.
Breton, Toyes of an Idle Head, p. 55.
Chapel is the kitchen, "Ganeo, &c,
a glutton, such an one whose cha\ypel
is the kitchen, and hie bellye his ged "
(Nomenclator, p. 526).
Chaperon, to take charge of a young
unmarried lady at balls or in public
places. Fr. chaperon, hood.
I shall be very happy to chaperon you at
any time, till I am confined, if Mrs. Dash-
wood should not Kke to go into public—
Miss Austen, Senst and Sensibility, ch. xx.
My godmother, knowing her son, and
knowing me, would as soon have thought of
chaperoning a sister with a brother as of keep-
ing anxious guard over our incomings and
outgoings. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxi.
Chapleted, garlanded ; filleted.
His forehead chapleted green with wreathy
hop. — Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Chaplinary, chaplaincy.
There also passed some other Acts ....
for enabling Lay-Patrons to dispose of their
Prebendaries and Chanlinaries unto Stu-
dents.— Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians, p.
297.
Chapmanable, marketable; fit for
selling.
In the craft of catching or taking it, and
smudging it (marchant and chapmanable as
it should be), it sets a worke thousands.—
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 159).
Chapmanry, traffic or custom.
He is moderate in his prices, . . . which
gets him much chapmanry. — Document
dated 1691 (Archeol^ xu. 191).
I
CHAPTER
( ii4 )
CHART
Chapter, to divide into chapters.
Notwithstanding this general tradition of
Laugton's chaptering the Bible, some learned
men make that design of far ancienter date.
—Fuller, Worthies, Canterbury (i. 528).
Chapter, head. L. has the verb
chapter = to take to task, bring to
chapter and verse. Fr. chapitrer. In
the first three extracts the noun seems
to have something of this meaning.
He forgetting all playes fast and loose with
me to y8 sum of 350 1. ... an hard chapter,
you'll say, forme. — Bp. Frampton, 1699 (IAfe
of Ken, p. 766).
This was yet a harder chapter (concio) than
the former. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 144.
Necessity is a hard chapter (telum). — Ibid.
p. 209.
There are some chapters on which I still
fear we shall not agree. — Walpole, Letters,
iii. 150 (1766).
On that charming young woman's chapter
I agree with you perfectly. — Ibid. iv. 508
(1791).
Character, a cipher: in the extract
from Richardson it = short-hand.
I interpreted my lord's letter by his
character. — Pepys, Jan. 18, 1660.
Sir H. Bennet's love is come to the height,
and his confidence, that he hath given my
lord a character, and will oblige my lord to
correspond with him. — Ibid. Judy 15, 1664.
She found no other letter added to that
parcel; but this, and that which I copied
myself in character last Sunday whilst she
was at Church, relating to the smuggling
scheme, are enough for me. — Richardson, Cl.
Harlowe, iv. 296.
Characteristic. See quotation. But
does it not mean the mention of the
reigning sovereign by name? When
Lord Weymouth at last took the oaths
to Queen Anne, and had her prayed for
by name in his chapel, Ken ceased to
attend there.
In another letter addressed to Lloyd, he
[Ken] says, " I never use any characteristic
in the prayers myself, nor am present when
any is read." By this expression he meant
that he never attended any solemn days of
thanksgiving or public fasts appointed by
the Government. — Life of Ken by a Layman,
p. 653.
Chare -folk, people hired to do
domestic work by the day. See R.,
s. v. chare.
Such who, instead of their own servants,
use chair-fotke in their houses, shall find
their work worse done, and yet pay dearer
for it.— Fuller, Worthies, Kent (i. 481).
Chari Christ. See extract.
They [the Irish] take unto them Wolves
to be their godsibs, whom they tearme Chari
Christ, praying for them and wishing them
well, and so they are not afraid to be hurt
by them. — Holland's Camden, p. 146.
Charioteer, to drive a chariot.
Therefore to me be given
To roam the starry path of Heaven,
To charioteer with wings on high,
And to rein-in the Tempests of the sky.
Southey, Ode to Astronomy.
Charivari, rough music ; disturbance ;
riot : a French word, but almost natural-
ized among us.
We . . . played a charivari with the ruler
and desk, the fender and fire-irons. — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
Charley, a fox.
A nice little gone or spinney where
abideth poor Charley, having no other cover
to which to betake himself for miles and
miles, when pushed out some fine November
morning by the Old Berkshire. — Hughes, Tom
Brown's Schooldays, ch. i.
" And all after a poor little fox ! M " You
don't know Charley, I can see/1 said Halbert.
" Poor little fox indeed ! why it's as fair a
match between the best-tried pack of hounds
in England and an old dog-fox as one would
wish to see."— if. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. xxviii.
Charley. The old watchmen were
called Charlies ; some say because
Chari es I. in 1640 extended and im-
proved the watch system in the metro-
polis.
No bumpkin makes a poke the less
At the back or ribs of old Eleanor S.
As if she were only a sack of barley ;
Or gives her credit for greater might
Than the Powers of Darkness confer at night
On that other old woman, the parish
Charley. — Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Bludyer, a brave and athletic man, would
often give a loose to his spirits of an even-
ing, and mill a Charley or two, as the phrase
then was. — Thackeray, Sketches in London
(Friendship).
Charmer, some sort of fashionable
dance.
We march'd up a body of the finest,
bravest, well-dressed fellows in the Uni-
verse; our commanders at the head of us,
all lace and feather, and like so many beaux
at a ball. I dcn't believe there was a man
of 'em but could dance a charmer. — Farqithar,
The Inconstant, i. 2.
Chart, to map out.
CHART
( "5 )
CHEAT
What ails us who are sound
That we should mimic this raw fool the
world,
Which charts us all in its coarse blacks or
whites.— Tennyson, Walking to the Mail,
Chart, the mariner's compass. Card
is so used by Shakespeare, &c, from
the card on which the various points
are marked.
The discovery of the chart is but of late
standing, tho' of great importance. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 412.
Chased. A man was said to be
chased when the bottle was pushed
towards him that he might help him-
self.
Why, when I fill this very glass of wine,
cannot I push the bottle to you, and say,
u Fairford,you are chased?"— Scott, Redyaunt*
let, Letter i.
Chasted, kept chaste.
Ah, chasted bed of mine, said she, which
never heretofore couldest accuse me of one
defiled thought, how canst thou now receive
this disastred changling? — Sidney, Arcadia,
Bk. II. p. lot).
Chastelinq, one who is chaste.
Becon says (iii. 568) that in St. Matt,
xix. we are told of "three kinds of
chagtelings"
Chasule, chasuble. See Chesil.
Fuller says a priest was formally de-
graded
By taking from him the patin, chalice,
and plucking the chasule from his back.—
Fuller, Ch. Hist., IV. ii. 6.
Chat, point ; state of the case (slang).
Has the gentleman any right to be in this
room at all, or has he not? Is he com-
mercial, or is he — miscellaneous? That's
the chat, as I take it.— Trollope, Orley Farm,
ch. vi.
Chatmate, companion; one who
chats with another.
The toothlesse trotte her nurse . . was her
only chatmate and chambermaide. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe {Karl. Misc., vi. 167).
Chattation, chat ; conversation.
Miss Baldwin would have dinner served
according to order, and an excellent dinner
it was, and our chattation no disagreeable
s&uce—Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 219.
Chattbbist, chatterer. The extract
occurs in a letter supposed to be written
by Hugh Peters, from the other world,
to Daniel Burgess — both being dissent-
ing preachers of note and fluency.
Ton are the only modern chatterist that t
hear has succeeded me. — T. Brown, Works,
ii. 204.
Chattery, light conversation.
She then would not sit herself, but came
and stood by me at the window, and entered
into an easy and cheerful chattery, till the
return of the Queen. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary,
m. 273.
All Windsor, and almost all Berkshire,
assembled on this occasion ; of course there
was no lack of chattery and chatterers. —
Jbid. v. 17.
Her continued and unmeaning chattery
made the abort term of her stay appear long.
— Jbid., Camilla, Bk. VIII. ch. ii.
Chaucertsms, expressions such as
were used by Chaucer.
The many Chaucertsms used (for I will not
say affected by him [Spenser]) are thought
by the ignorant to be blemishes. — Fuller,
Worthies, London (U. 80).
Chaud, heat: a French word em-
ployed as English, one would think,
unnecessarily.
The over-hot breathings of Ministers, like
the chaud of Charcoale, stifle and suffocate
the vital spirits of true Religion. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 574.
Chaumberdakyns. See quotation.
At the Commons' petition to the King in
Parliament that all Irish begging-priests
called Chaumberdakyns should avoid the
Bealm before Michaelmas next, they were
ordered to depart. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., IV. ii.
29.
Chavel, to chew.
Dissrm'd of teeth, this cha veils with his
gnms. — Stapylton's Juvenal, x. 231.
Chawbacon, peasant, or country la-
bourer. Cf. Bacon-sliceb.
The chawbacons, hundreds of whom were
the Earl's tenants, raised a shout that well-
nigh brought down the roof of the Court-
house.— Savage, R. Medlicott, Bk. II. ch. x.
Cheap Jack, an itinerant vendor of
hardware, Ac, who puts up his articles
at a certain price, and gradually cheap-
ens them until he gets a purchaser.
He also recommends his wares with a
good deal of patter or oratory.
You don't mean to say that you would
like him to turn public man iu that way,
making a sort of political Cheap Jack of him-
self. — G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. vi.
Cheat, the gallows (thieves' cant).
Cf. Nobbing-cheat.
See what your laziness is come to ; to the
cheat, for thither will you go now, that's
I 2
CHE A TEE
( 116)
CHERR Y
infallible.— Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. IV.
ch. ii.
Cheatee, a dupe.
In this city
(As in a fought field, crows and carkasses)
No dwellers are but cheaters and eheateez.
Albumazar, I. i.
Checkle, to chuckle.
Some things are of that nature as to make
One's fande checkle while his heart doth ake.
Bunyan, Pilgrim* s Progress, Pt. ii., Introd.
Check-string, a string held by the
coachman, the end of which passes into
the carriage, and so enables any one in-
side to signal the driver to stop.
The young man was in the high road to
destruction, and driving at such a rate that
he must soon have overset the whole under-
taking— it was time to pull the check-string.
— Colman, Man of Business, Act III.
Cheek, impudence. So we speak of
having the face to do a thing. In the
old play or Morality called ffycke*
Scorner (Hawkins, Eng. Dr.> i. 101),
Freewill says to Perseverance, who has
rebuked him, " I take hyt in full grete
scorne that thou shouldest thus cheke
me ; " perhaps, however, cheke in this
place = check. Cf. Brow.
"You don't happen to know why they
killed the pig, do you?" retorts Mr. Bucket,
with a steadfast look, but without loss of
temper. " No ! " " Why, they killed him,M
says Mr. Bucket, u on account of his having
so much cheek : don't you get into the same
position." — Dickens, Bleak House, ch. liv.
She told him, with a raised voice and flash-
ing eyes, she wondered at his cheek, sitting
down by that hearth of all hearths in the
world. — Reads, Cloister and Hearth, ch. xlviii.
Chebk ball, " Gena, Mala, the cheeke
balle " (Nomenclator, p. 28).
Large balls of cheeks, taper to chin,
From ear to ear she's mouth'd.
Ward, England's Reformation,
cant. i. p. 13.
Cheeky, impudent.
« You will find, Sir," said Lee, " that these
men in this here hut are a rougher lot than
you think for ; very like they'll be cheeky.7*
— H. Kingsley, Geojfry Hamlyn, ch. xxvi.
"I will say this for you," remarked In-
gram slowly, "that you are the cheekiest
young beggar I have the pleasure to know."
—Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xvii.
Cheese. See first extract, and so any
low curtsey.
What more reasonable thing could she do
than amuse herself with making cheeses ? that
i», whirling round . . . until the petticoat is
inflated like a balloon, and then sinking into a
curtsey. — De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, ch. vi.
It was such a deep ceremonial curtsey as
you never see at present : she and her sister
both made these " cheeses " in compliment to
the new-comer, and with much stately agility.
— Thackeray, Virginians, ch. xxii.
Cheese. The cheese = the right or
best thing. Cf. Caseine. Some have
thought it a corruption of la chose = the
thing. There is, however, an old pro-
verb. " After cheese comes nothing " —
cheese being the crown and completion
of dinner.
" You look like a prince in it, Mr. Lint,"
pretty Rachel said, coaxing him with her
beady black eyes. " It is the cheese," replied
Mr. Lint. — Thackeray, Codling $by.
Cheese-toaster, a jocular name for
a sword. See quotation from Smollett,
«. V. FLU8TBATI0N. Cf. TOASTING-IRON.
I'll drive my cheese-toaster through his body.
— Thackeray, The Virginians, eh. x. '
Chequer, to pay in, as into the ex-
chequer ; to treasure up.
There stayed Wisdom's matcht to nimble
Wit,
And Nature chequers up all gifts of grace.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 32.
There were some dawninps of this in the
question which was not earned for chequering
tne disbanding money into the Chamber of
London. — North, Examcn, p. 506.
Chequin, a sequin. The Turkish
sequin is worth from six to seven shil-
lings; it appears, however, from the
second quotation that coining among
the Turks is of late introduction.
I am sorry to hear of the trick that Sir
John Ayres pat upon the Company by the
box of hail-shot, . . . which he made the world
believe to be full of chequins and Turkey
gold. — Howell, Letters, I. iv. 28.
In Turkey . . the government coins only
pence and halfpence, which they call par-
raws, for the use of the poor in their
markets; and yet vast sums are paid and
received in trade, and dispensed by the
government; but all in foreign money., as
ollars, chequeens, pieces of eight, and the
like.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 14.
Chermez, Coccus ilicis,&n insect from
which a scarlet dye is procured.
There lives the Sea-Oak in a little shell,
There grows untill'd the ruddy Cochinel ;
And there the Chermez, which on each side
arms
With pointed prickles all his precious arms.
Sylvester, Eden, 600.
Cherry, to redden.
Close in her closet, with her best complexions,
CHERRYLET
( 117 ) CHIFFONIERE
She mends her face's wrinkle-full defections ;
Her cheek she cherries, and her ey she cheers,
And fains her (fond) a wench of fifteen yeers.
Sylvester, The Decay, 122.
Chrrbylbt, little cherry.
What fresh Buds of scarlet Rose
Are more fragrant sweet then those,
Then those Twins thy Strawberry teats,
Curled-purled Cherryleis ?
Sylvester, Ode to Astreta.
Then Nature for a sweet allurement setts
Two smelling, swelling, bashful cherelettes.1
Herrick, Appendix, p. 434.
Cherubimic, pertaining to cherubs:
the adjective cherubic formed from the
singular is the usual form.
80 saying, Mr. Robinson he quitted
With cherubimic smiles and placid brows.
WoUot, Peter Pindar, p. 6.
Chebdbins. To be in the cherubim
= to be in the clouds ; unsubstantial.
Diogenes mocking soch quidificall trifles,
that were al tit the cherubim, said, Sir Plato,
your table and your cuppe I see very well,
but as for your tabletee and your cupitee I
see none soche. — Udal's Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 139.
Cheshire cat. I have not met with
any satisfactory explanatidh of the
phrase.
Lo ! tike a Cheshire cat our court will grin.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 91.
Mr. Newcome says to Mr. Pendennis in
his droll, humorous way, " That woman grins
like a Cheshire cat." Who was the naturalist
who first discovered that peculiarity of the
cats in Cheshire ? — Thackeray, A'ewcomes, ch.
xxiv.
Chesil, chasuble or chesible. See
Chasule.
How is it meet or comely that those shave-
lings with their stoles and chesils should
have mere souldiers or richer armour and
artillery than we?— Fuller, Holy State, Bk.
I. ch. xiii.
Chest- worm, angina pectoris (?).
How then wilt thou bear universal tortures
. . . such as of which the pangs of childbirth,
burnings of material fire and brimstone,
gnawings of chest-worms, drinks of gall and
wormwood, are but shadows? — Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 60.
The approof s and reproofs of it [conscience J
are so powerful and terrible, the one cheering
more than any cordial, the other gnawing
more than any chest-worm, tormenting worse
than hot pincers. — Ibid. p. 98.
Cheval-glass, a large swing-glass in
a frame.
In the places of business of the great
tailors, the cheval-glasses are dim and dusty
for lack of being looked into.— Dickens, Un-
commercial Traveller, xvi.
Chicaneur, a dishonest or shifty
man. An attempt has been made to
introduce this word in an English form,
and chicaner is used by Locke and
Burke, but it cannot be said to be
naturalized.
His lordship was sensible of the prodigious
injustice and iniquitable torment inflicted
upon suitors by vexatious and false adver-
saries, assisted by the knavish confederating
officers, and other chicaneurs that belong to
the court. — North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii.
73.
Chicken. To be no chicken = to be
old.
Then, Cloe, still go on to prate
Of thirty-six and thirty-eight ;
Pursue your trade of scandal packing,
Tour hints that Stella is no chicken.
Swift, Stella's Birthday, 1720.
I swear she's no chicken; she's on the
wrong side of thirty if she be a day. — Ibid.,
Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
Chicken-pecked, under the rule of a
child, as hen-pecked = under the rule
of a woman.
What am I the better for burying a jealous
wife ? To be chicken-peck' d is a new perse-
cution more provoking than the old one. —
Burgoyne, The Heiress, Act III. so. i.
Chicken stake, a small stake.
These dignified personages seem to have
played for what would not at present be
called a chicken stake. — Archaol., viii. 133
(1787).
Chiefkry, body of chiefs.
Much about this time, he, together with
the chief try or greatest men of Ulster, by
secret parties combined in an association
that they would defend the Bomish religion.
— Holland's Camden, ii. 123.
Chieflet, a petty chief.
The Chief or chief et . . came out and inter-
changed a few words of masonic laconism
with Salem. — W, G. Palgrave, Arabia, i. 22
(1805).
Chi E FN ess, superiority.
Some have said that the first in the seni-
oritie of admition was accounted the princi-
pall ; but . . . their chiefnesse was penes Regis
arbitrium. — Fuller, Worthies, ch. vi.
Chiffoniere, a cupboard (etymolo-
gically where rags may be stowed away,
but usually applied to an .ornamental
cupboard in a arawing-room). A French
word, but naturalized.
Adele was leading me by the hand round
CHILD
( "8)
CHIPEENER
the room, showing me the beautiful books
and ornaments on the consoles and chiffon-
teres. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xiii.
The box was found at last under a chiffon-
ier.— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. lxxz.
Child. To be with child is used for
being eager or longing for anything.
I sent my boy, who, like myself, is with
child to see any strange thing. — Pepys, May
14, 1660.
I went to my lord and saw bis picture,
very well done, and am with child till I get it
copied out. — Ibid. Oct. 9, 1660.
I am with child to hear what it was be said
('* Aveo scire quid dixerit "). — Bailey's Eras'
mus, p. 355.
Childkind, children spoken of col-
lectively.
During the Carnival all mankind, woman-
kind, and childkind think it not unbecoming
to play the fool. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling,
Pt. II. ch. vii.
Childly, in a child-like manner. B.,
L., and H. give the word as an adjective,
with reference to Gower, Lydgate, and
Hoccleve respectively. Latimer used
it later on (i. 537) : " a childly love."
In the extract it is an adverb.
Then she smiled around right childly, then
she gazed around rig[ht queenly. — Mrs.
Browning, Lady Geraldine*s Courtship.
CHiLDSHir, relationship as a child.
Concluding Christ as the first effect of
God's ordination, a mediator, in some sort of
God's actual choice, and our potential child-
ship. — Adams, iii. 101.
Child's part, portion of inheritance
pertaining to a child.
[A hospital] which one of the said sisters
built and enriched with her own patrimony
and child's part. — Holland's Camden, p. 574.
Chill-cold, icy cold.
A chill-cold Bloud (still flowing from Dismay)
Fleets through my veines.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 49.
Chim-cham, crooked ; awkward. In
all the examples in the Diets, the word
is him-kam ; but see L., s. v. cam.
The reason of all this chim-cham stuff is
the ridiculous undertaking of the author to
prove Oates's plot (before he comes at it) out
of Coleman's papers, that are nothing to the
purpose. — North, Examen, p. 151.
Chin, to put chin to chin, and so to
embrace.
She shewed me a troupe of faire ladies,
every one her lover colling and kissing, chin-
ning and embracing, and looking babies in
one another's eyes. — Breton, Dreame of
Strange Effects, p. 17.
Chincloth, a muffler or band round
the chin. The Diets, have chinclout.
Upon the head they put a cap, which they
fasten with a very broad chincloth. — Misson,
Travels in Eng., p. 90.
Chin-cushion, a name given to cra-
vats which were puffed out under the
chin. See extract, 8. v. Bid and Beads.
Chink, to chuckle.
He chinked and crowed with laughing
delight.— Mrs. Gaskell, Ruth, ch. 18.
Chink, the sound of the grasshopper.
Because half a dozen grasshoppers under a
fern make the field ring with their importu-
nate chink j whilst thousands of great cattle
reposed beneath the shadow of the British
oak, chew the cud, and are silent, pray do
.not imagine that those who make the noise
are the only inhabitants of the field. — Burke,
Fr. Revolution, p. 68.
Chink, fit or burst (of laughter).
Mv lord and lady took such a chink of
laughing that it was some time before they
could recover. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i. 35.
His kind face was all agape with broad
smiles, and the boys around him were in
chinks of laughing. — Mrs. Gaskell, Crawford,
ch. ix. *
Chinkers, money ; coins.
Are men like us to be entrapp'd and sold
And see no money down, Sir Hurly-Burly ?
We're vile crossbow-men, and a knight are
you,
But steel is steel, and flesh is still but flesh,
So let us see your chinkers.
Taylor, Ph. van Artevelde, Pt. II. iii. 1.
Chip, tasteless. See next entry.
His appetite was gone, and cookeries were
provided in order to tempt his palate, but all
was chip.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, \\.
205.
Chip in porridge. See second ex-
tract ; also preceding word.
If Porridge were my only cheer,
Thy Praise or Blame must both appear
Two tasteless chips thrown in't.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 5.
The Burials Bill . . will be passed— if
passed at all — because it is thought by the
majority to resemble the proverbial chip in
porridge, which does neither good nor harm.
—Church Times, June 25, 1880.
Chipeener, a high-heeled shoe. See
N., 8. ^ chioppinc, who gives several
forms of the word, but not this.
I do not love to endanger my back with
stooping so low ; if you would wear chipeen-
ers, much might be done. — Revenge; or, A
Match in Newgate, Act III.
CHIQUANCERY ( 119 )
CHOOSE
Chiquakcsry, chicanery.
I chall not advise this honourable house to
use any chiquancery or pettifoggery. — Hacket,
Life of William8,u. 151.
Chjrographosophic, a judge of hand-
writing.
- Bat what sort of handwriting was it ? "
asked I, almost disregarding the welcome
coin. ** Ou then — aiblins a man's, aiblins a
maid's: he was no chirographosophic himsel'."
— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xxiv.
Chiromachy, a hand-to-hand fight.
Things came to dreadful Chiromachies, such
scamiDgs and fightings with hands and arms
of flesh.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 544.
Chiselmanship, carving or sculpture
of an un artistic sort. Mr. Peacock
tells me that he got the word out of
one or other of Mr. Buskin's books.
No climbing plant was permitted to defile
this elaborate piece of chiselmanship. — Pea-
cock, Rolf Skirland, i. 86 (1870).
Co it, to chirp. N. has chiller.
He soars like an eagle, not respecting the
chitting of sparrows. — Ward, Sermons, p. 108.
Chitterling, a little chit, or child.
For Theseus, like a boisterous Suiter,
To spirit her away made bold,
When she was but poor ten years old,
A little snotty chitterling,
But now she's quite another thing.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 268.
Chittes. See extract.
Lenticula is a poultz called chittes, whiche
(because wee here in England haue not in
vse to eate) I translate peason. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 101.
Chivalresque, pertaining to chivalry.
Godwin uses it as a French word, ital-
icizing it.
His misanthropy, therefore, had a strange
mixture in it of the gallant and the chevale-
resque. — Godwin, Mandeville, ii. 71.
His account of the Duke of Wellington
might almost have seemed an exaggerated
panegyric, if it had painted some warrior m
a chivalresque romance. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, vii. 169.
Chivy, to chase (slang).
IVe been a chivied and a chivied, fust by
one on you and nixt by another on you, till
Tm worritted to skins and bones. — Dickens,
Bleak House, ch. xlvi.
Chock, quite. Chock full is common
= quite full, or choke full.
I drew a shaft
Chock to the steel.
Taylor, Ph. van AH., Pt. II. iii. 1.
Choice-full, offering plenty of
choice.
For costly toys, silk stockings, cambrick,
lawn,
Heer's choice-full plenty.
Sylvester, The Colonies, p. 681.
Choired, assembled in choir.
Then, his eye wild ardours glancing,
From the choired gods advancing,
The Spirit of the Earth made reverence meet.
Coleridge, To the Departing Year.
Choised, selected ; chosen.
Choised seede to be picked and trimly well
fide,
For seede may no longer from threshing
abide. — Tusser, Husbandries p. 133.
Choke-bail, a choke-bail action =
one in which bail was not admissible ?
Bailiff. We arrest you in the King's name,
at the suit of Mr. Freeman, guardian to Jere-
miah Blackaere, Esquire, in an action of ten
thousand pounds.
Widow. How ? how ? in a chokebail action.
— WycherUy, Plain Dealer, v. 3.
Chokey, causing to choke ; also in-
clined to choke, as one who is ready to
cry.
It is the Heart but not the core of Eng-
land, having nothing course or choaky therein.
—Fuller, Worthies, Warwick (ii. 402).
The allusion to his mother made Tom feel
rather chokey. — Hughes, Tom Brown's School
Days, Pt. I. ch. iv.
Choose, as you like ; an expression
of indifference.
Boy. They will trust you for no more
drink.
Mer. Will they not? let 'em choose. —
Beaum. and Fl., Knight of B. Pestle, iv. 5.
Nev. Miss, Pray be so kind to call a serv-
ant to bring me a glass of small beer : I know
you are at home here.
Miss. Every fool can do as they're bid:
make a page of your own age, and do it
yourself.
Nev. Chuse, proud fool ; I did but ask you.
—Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Nev. Miss, shall I help you to a pigeon? . . .
Miss, No, Sir, I thank you.
Nov.. Why then you may chuse.
Ibid. (Conv. ii.).
Choose. To choose = by choice.
The sluggard saith, There is a lion in the
way, and then he steppeth backward, and
keepeth aloof off. But the worthy magis-
trate would meet with such a lion, to choose,
that he might win awe to God's ordinance,
and make the way passable for others, by
tearing such a beast in pieces. — Sanderson,
ii. 260.
CHOP
( 1 20 ) CHREMATISTIC
The Scots, to cAks*, prefer a monarchy be-
fore any other government, so they may
govern their monarch. — Socket, life of
Williams, ii. 222.
Widow. Wilt thou choose him for guardian,
whom I refuse for husband ?
Jerry. Ay, to choose, I thank you. — Wych~
erley, Plain Dealer, iv. 1.
Ben. One of two things I must choose —
either to be a lord or a beggar.
Mrs. J/. Be a lord to choose — though I
have known some that have chosen both. —
Farquhar, Twin Rivals, ii. 3.
"Oh then," said Miss Darnford, ** pray let
us hear it, to choose." — Richardson, Pamela,
a. 136.
Chop, an exchange.
The Duke had made it his humble request,
and drew on the King hardly to make a
chop with those demeasnes. — Maeket, Life of
Wtlliams, i. 187.
Chop. First chop = first-rate. A
slang expression, which seems to come
from the Anglo-Chinese, in which lan-
guage chop is a word of very varied
meaning.
u As for poetry, I hate poetry." u Pen's
is not first chop,9* says Warrington. — Thack-
eray* The Xewcomes, ch. iv.
You like to be master, there's no denying
that ; you must be first chop in heaven, else
you won't like it much. — G. Eliot, Middle-
march, ch. xiii.
Chop. At the first chop = imme-
diately, or, as we say, at a blow.
Let them look ou God's word, and compare
their judgment with the Scripture, and see
whether it be right or no, and not believe
them at the first chop, whatever they say. —
Tyndale, i. 241.
While Philippus in the daye time toke his
reste and slepe, a sorte of the Grekes (whiche
had in a great nombre assembled about bis
doore) toke peper in the nose, and spake
many wordes of reproch by the King, for
that by reason of his slugging they might
not at the first chop be brought to his speche.
—UdaVs Erasmu/s Apophthi, p. 199.
Choplogb, chopper of logic, and so,
sharp answerer.
Mery. Well, dame distance, if he beare
you thus play choploge ;
Oust. What will he?
Mery. Play the deuill in the horologe.
Vdal, Roister-Doisler, iii. 2.
He . . with lacke of vitailles brought those
choployes or greate pratlers as lowe as dogge
to the bow. — Ibid., Erasmus's Apophth., p.
250.
Chop-logic, argument.
Cloth-Breeches, as breefe as he was proud,
swore by the pike of his staff e that his chop-
logicke was not worth a pinne, and that he
would turne his own weapon into his bosome.
— Greene, Quip far am Upstart Courtier (Harl.
Jfwr, v. 399).
Your chop4oaike hath no great subtilty,
for simply you reason of foysting, and ap-
propriate that to yourselves (to you men I
mean) as though there were not women-
foysts and nips as neate in that trade as
you. — Ibid^ Theeves Falling Out (Jbid. viii.
885).
Chopological, a contemptuous and
ludicrous substitute for tropologiccU*
Cf. Craziologist, Futilttabian.
80, say they, the literal sense killeth, and
the spiritual sense giveth life. We must
therefore, say they, seek out some chopologi-
cal sense. — Tyndale, i. 308.
Choppimob, same as chipeener, q. v. ?
Which judges, upon every encounter, gave
reward to the best deserver, as scarfs, gloves,
choppimors, ribbons, and such like. — Journey
of E. of Nottingham, 1605 (Harl. Misc., iii.
Choric, like or belonging to a chorus
(in a Greek tragedy).
He painted to himself what were Dorothea's
inward sorrows, as if he had been writing a
choric wail. — G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch.
xxxvii.
Chorus, to speak together; to join
in chorus.
Let evVy song be chorust with his name ;
And music pay her tribute to his fame.
Defoe, True-Born Englishman, Pt. II.
Then they all chorused upon me — ** Such a
character as Miss Harlowe's," cried one — ** A
lady of so much generosity and good sense,"
another. — Richardson, Ct. Harlowe, vi. 228.
Choose, to cheat De Quincey pro-
poses a curious etymology for this
-word. See extract 8. v. Jowser, The
correct derivation is given in the Diets.
Chowder. The Imp. Diet, says:
" In New England, a dish of fish boiled
with biscuit, &c. In Spanish, chode is
a paste made with milk, eggs, sugar,
and flour. In the West of England
chowder-beer is a liquor made by boil-
ing black spruce in water, and mixing
with it molasses." It is probably the
last that is referred to in the extract.
My head sings and simmers like a pot of
chowder. — Smollett, L. Greaves, ch. ivii.
Chrematistic. ".The art of getting
wealth is so called by Aristotle in his
Politics" (note by Fielding in loc.).
See L. s. v. chrematistics*
CHRESTOMATHIC ( 121 )
CHUCKLE
I am not the least versed in the chre-
matistic art, as an old friend of mine called
it I know not how to get a shilling, nor
bow to keep it in my pocket if I had it. —
Fielding, Amelia, Bk. I&. ch. v.
Chrestomathic, learning good things.
The second belongs to a science which
Jeremy, the thrice illustrious Bentham, calls
Phtbisosoics, or the art of destruction ap-
plied to noxious animals, a science which
the said Jeremy proposes should form part
0! the course of studies in his Chrestomathic
tchooX—SoHthey, The Doctor, ch. ccxxviii.
Christ-cross-bow to Malachi. Was
there some primer beginning with the
alphabet, and ending with a list of the
Uld Testament books ?
Five years with a bib under his chin ; four
years in travelling from Christ-cross-row to
Malaeki.Stente, Trist. Shandy, iv. 133.
Christdom, the rule of Christ " whose
service is perfect freedom."
They know the grief of men without its
wisdom;
They sink in man's despair without its
calm;
Are slaves without the liberty in Christdom,
Are martyrs, by the pang without the palm.
Mr*. Browning, Cry of the Children.
Christbd.. Made one with Christ is,
1 suppose, the meaning. Gauden says
that the sectaries amused the silly vul-
gar " with their new notions and strange
expressions of being Godded with God,
Christed with Christ, Spirited with the
Spirit, and the like affectations " {Tears
of the Church, p. 196).
Christ enter, Christendom.
Would God this same word might not be
without a lye saide of some publique officers
of Chrittentee, by whome sometimes is bussed
vp and hanged on the galoes a poore sely
soole that hath percase pielfed away tenne
grotes, where theimselfes by great pielage
... do growe daily and encreaae in welth
and richesse, do manne saying blacke is their
tjtn.— UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 118.
Christianize, to adopt in part the
Christian religion. This neuter sense
of the verb L. notes as rare, but gives
no example.
Prester John (though part he Judaize)
Both in some sort devoutly Christianize.
Sylvester, Colonies, 370.
Christlb, to cry.
"And I've seed mun do what few has;
I've seed mun christle like any child/
" What ! cry ? n said Amyas ; " I shouldn't
have thought there was much cry in him."—
C. KingUey, Westward Ho, ch.
Chromolithic (Gr. xpupa, colour;
Xt0o£. stone). See extract.
An impression of a drawing on stone,
printed at Paris in colours, by the process
termed Chromolithic. — Proc. of Soc. of A ntiq .,
i. 22 (1844).
Chronicler, to chronicle.
Take the original thereof out of an ano-
nymal croniclering manuscript. — Fuller,
Worthies, Lincoln (ii. 9).
Chryselephantine, formed of gold
and ivory.
She stood motionless, gazing upon the sky,
like some exquisite chryselephantine statue,
all ivory and gold. — C. Kingsiey, Hypatia, ch.
ix.
Chrtsocoll, carbonate of copper (Gr.
Xpwoc coAAa), as found with or adhering
to gold.
Now as with Gold grows in the self -same
Mine
Much Chrysocholle, and also Silver fine,
So supreme Honour and Wealth (matcht by
none)
Second the Wisdom of great Salomon.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 001.
Chubbed, chub-faced ; fat
Young Skinker, eldest son to a wealthy
squire, a chubbed unlucky bov, about the ape
of Lord Richard, put one hand within the
other, and desired Harry to strike thereon.—
H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 22.
Chuck, to throw.
Tes, faith, as I've a soul to save,
I will for nothing dig her grave ;
Yes, I would do it too as willing
As if her hand had chuck' d a shilling.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. i.
Her toilet was simple. She had merely to
" chuck " her bonnet and shawl upon the bed.
— Dickens, Chuzzlewit, ch. xlix.
Opinions gold or brass are null.
We chuck our flattery or abuse
Called Csesar's due, as Charon's dues,
I' the teeth of some dead sage or fool,
To mend the grinning of a skull.
Mrs. Browning, M Died.1'
Chuck-farthing, trifling.
Two neighbouring sovereigns were at war
together about some pitiful chuck-farthing
thing or other. — Richardson, CI. Harlotce, iv.
840.
Chuckle. Chuckle chin = double
chin.
The dewlaps from his chuckle chin
That had with gorging pampered been.
D%lhfey, Athenian Jilt.
Chuckle, to mix, throw together.
Between eight and nine in comes my lady's
CHUCKLEHEAD ( 122 )
CICHPEASE
woman to range in order and method all the
little trinkets of the toilet. She chuckles to-
gether a whole covy of essences and per-
fumes.— Gentleman Instructed, p. 117.
Chuckleuead, a fool.
Is not he much handsomer and better
built than that great chucklehead. — Smollett,
Bod. Random, ch. iii.
Chufpiness, churlishness ; morose
clownishness.
In spite of the chuffiness of his appearance
and churlishness of his speech, this wag-
goner's bosom being "made of penetrable
stuff," he determined to let the gentleman
pass. — Miss Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. xvi.
Chum, properly a chamber-fellow,
and so an intimate friend.
As it was plain that the person who had
robbed him had possessed himself of his key,
he had no doubt, when he first missed his
money, but that his chum was certainly the
thief.— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VIII. ch. xi.
Chump- end, thick end: usually ap-
plied to the thick end of a joint of meat.
Biddy . . . distributed three defaced bibles
(shaped as if they had been unskilfully cut
off the chump-end of something), more illegibly
{ Hinted at the best than any curiosities of
iterature I have since met with. — Dickens,
Great Expectations, ch. x.
Chumpish, sullen ; ill-tempered.
He made the simple wench his wrath abide ;
With chumpish looks, hard words, and secret
nips,
Grumbling at her w^en she his kindness
Bought.— Sidney, Arcadia, p. 391.
Chubch. This verb is only used
now in regard to a woman returning
public thanks after childbirth ; she is
then said to be churched, and the offici-
ating clergyman is said to church her ;
but Gauden, speaking of the schisms
made by sectaries, calls them " strange
methods of new churching men and
women " (Tears of the Church, p. 39).
Cient, scion. Did this spelling come
from an idea that the word was derived
from Lat. dens, moving, and so shooting
forth?
He had a numerous and beautiful female
kindred, so that there was hardly a noble
stock in England into which one of these his
dents was not grafted. — Fuller, Worthies,
Leicester (i. 567).
Churchlkss, without a Church.
I confess no such place as Trekingbam
appeareth at this day in any Catalogue of
English Towns ; whence I conclude it a Parish
some years since depopulated, or never but a
Churchlesse Village.— Fuller, Worthies, Lin-
coln (ii. 19).
Churchlet, little church.
I shall not need to instance in the many
defects . . incident to these (Ecelesiola and
Congregatiuncula) little Churchlets and scat-
tered Conventicles. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 32.
Churchlt, ecclesiastical. The
proeme from which the extract is taken
is written with a jocose affectation of
archaism.
Diverse grave points also hath he handled
of churchly matters, and doubts in religion
daily arising, to great clerks only apper-
taining.—Gay, Proeme to Shepherd's Week.
Churchbcot, payment due to the
Church.
[Knute] also charges them to see all
Churchscot and Bomescot fully cleered before
his returne— Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 18.
Churl, to grudge.
A traveller coming into a certain house
desired some meat : the mistress being some-
thing nice and backward to give him victuals,
"You need not," says heyuchurle me in a
piece of meat." — Aubrey, Miscellanies,^. 182.
Churn-boots, boots like a churn in
shape. In H alii well's Nursery Rhymes
of England, No. 477, one couplet runs —
44 She churns her butter in a booty
And instead of a churn-staff she puts in
her foot."
There is also a Scotch song to the same
effect.
Here is the sleeping hamlet of Bondy:
chaise with waiting-women ; horses all ready,
and postilions with their churn-boots im-
patient to be gone.— Car/yfc, Fr. Rev., Pt.
II. Bk. IV. ch. iii.
Churn-staff, the stick or pole used
in churning. See extracts, s. w. Churn-
boot, Pandola.
Chyme, to extract by chemical pro-
cess.
What antidote against the terror of con-
scieuce can be chymed from gold ? — Adams,
i. 163.
Cicatrine, scarring ?
'Tis not like thy aloe, cicatrine tongue
bitter: no, 'tis no stabber, but like thy
goodly and glorious nose, blunt, blunt, blunt.
— Dekker, Satiromastix (Hawkins, Eng. Dr,
IH. 170).
Cichpkare, dwarf pea or vetch. See
L.f s. v. chich; and extract, s. v. Fenc->
GREEK.
CIDERAND
( 123 ) CIRC UMAMB AGIO US
A certain dapper fellow . . did before the
kings presence, cast or throw a kind of smal
pake, called a Cichpease, through a needles
eje.— Touchstone of Complexions, Preface.
Cider- and, cider mixed with spirits
or some other ingredient. Cf. Hot
WITH, COLD WITHOUT.
Barnabas, the surgeon, and an exciseman
were smoking their pipes over some cider'
**f.— Fielding, Jos. Andrews, Bk. I. ch. xvi.
Cigarette, diminutive of cigar ; mild
tobacco rolled in paper.
If you forgive me we shall celebrate our
reconciliation in a cigarette. — Black, Princess
»f Tkule, ch. x.
Cilick, hair-cloth. Sir T. Browne has
the adj. cfficiou*.
We have heard so much of monks . . .
with their shaven crowns, hair-cilices, and
vows of poverty. — Coriyle, Past and Present,
Bk. n. en. i.
Cinque and Quatre, one who has
entered his fiftieth year. See H., 8. v.
cincater.
{Prometheus.)
Oh Jupiter, I'm glad to see thee,
And now thou 'rt here, take pity, prithee,
Upon a poor old Cinque and Quater,
Had paid for playing the Creator.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 173.
Cinque and Sice. The phrase in the
extract seems to mean being fearless or
desperate ; the idea perhaps being that
of a player who counts on having the
highest throws of the dice. Cains in
Ms Essay on Eng. Dogs, transL by
Fleming, 1576, says that our country-
men love mastiffs " for their careless-
ness of life, setting all at cinque and
«*" (Eng. Garner, iii. 253).
Cinque-outposts, the five senses.
I was fallen soundly asleep; the cinque-
o*t*post$ were shut up closer than usually,
u>d my senses so treble-locked, that the
noon, had she descended from her watery
orb, might have done much more to me than
»He did to Bndymion. — A Winter Dream,
1M9 {Hart. Misc., vn. 203).
I had fallen into so sound a sleep, as if the
""roost* (my five outward senses) had been
trebly lockt up.— Howell, Parly of Beasts,
p.32. y J
Ciper, cypress.
A eiver by the churche seat abydeth
By oure old progeniotours long tyme de-
▼outlye regarded.— Stany hurst, JEn., ii. 740.
Ciphers, shorthand. Cf. Character.
His speeches were much heeded, and taken
by divers in ciphers. — Hacket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 82.
Circuits er, to go circuit ; also, one
who does so. L. has the noun, which
is sometimes spelt circuiter.
Here we drop our circuiteer ; which charac-
ter lasted till his lordship was made solicitor-
general.— AbrtA, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 92.
But now to return to his lordship, and his
circuiteering. — Ibid. i. 261.
Those infinitely grander Drudges,
The big-wiggfd circuiteering Judges.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 125.
Circuity. L. defines this, " tendency
to assume a circular form," and this
definition accords with the use of the
word in the extract that he gives, but
the word has other meanings, though
all of course having in them the idea
of something circular. Thus in Udal
it = extent or round ; in Andrewes it =
beating about the bush.
Alexander . . . conferred vnto the same
besides his owne former royalme a dominion
of muohe more targe and ample circuitee then
the same whiche he was Lorde of before. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 220.
Very clear it is, the prophecy, without all
circuity, noting, naming, and in a manner
pointing to it. — Andrewes, i. 157.
Circularnes8, roundness, circularity.
In forme, at the first view, in a mass, it
doth pretend to some Circularness. — Fuller,
Worthies, Warwick (ii. 402).
Circulator, a juggler, one who goes
round showing tricks.
I could never yet esteem these vapouring
Seraphicks, these uew Gnosticks, to be other
than a kind of Gipsy-Christians, or a race
of Circulators, Tumblers, and Taylers in the
Church. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 200.
Circulizk, to encircle.
It was vnsow'd, and made with buttons fast
Of orient pearle of admirable size
Which loopes of azur'd silk did circulize.
Davies, An Extasie, p. 90.
Mother of pearle their sides shal circulize.
Ibid. p. 93.
Circtjm ambages, indirectnesses, beat-
ings about the bush.
From you I shall not meet with . . . the de-
preciating ia differences, the affected slights,
the female circumambages, if I may be allowed
the words. — Richardson, Grandison, iii. 165.
Circtjmambagiou8, round about, not
keeping to the point.
Reader, thou mayest have thought me at
times disposed to be circumambagious in my
manner of narration. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. xl.
CIRCUMBIND ( 124 )
CIVETED
Circumbind, to bind round.
The fringe that circumbinds it too
Is spangle-work of trembling dew.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 96.
Circum-cross, to mark round with a
cross : in shaking hands a sort of rude
cross is formed.
I am holy while I stand
Circum-crost by thy pure band ;
But when that is gone, again
I, as others, am profaue.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 243.
Circumferent, surrounding.
As this is soft and pliant to your arme
In a circumferent flexure, so will I
Be tender of your welfare and your will.
Chapman, Gentleman Usher, Act IV.
Circumgyratory, revolving.
That functionary, however, had not failed
during his circumgyratory movements, to
bestow a thought upon the important object
of securing the epistle. — E. A. Poe, Bans
Pfaal (i. 5).
Circumjacencies, suburbs.
All the mongrel curs of themcircumjacencies
yelp, yelp, yelp, at their heels, completing
the horria chorus. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
iv. 16.
Circum-mortal, surrounded by mor-
tality.
I've paid thee what I promised ; that's not
all;
Besides I give thee here a verse that shall
(When hence thy circum-mortall part is gone)
Arch-like hold up thy name's inscription.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 179.
Circumroundabout, a beating about
the bush (a tautologous hybrid).
Tou must now come with your hums and
your haws, and the whole circumroundabout $
of female nonsense, to stave off the point
your hearts and souls are set upon. — Richard'
son, Grandison, vi. 155.
Circumscriptible, capable of being
confined or limited. Cf. incomprehen-
sible in Atb. Creed.
He that sits on high and never sleeps,
Nor in one place is circumscriptible.
Marlowe, 2 Tamburlaine, ii. 2.
Circumspacious, large in circumfer-
ence.
When Cato the severe
Entred the circumspacious theater ;
In reverence of his person, every one
Stood as he had been turn'd from flesh to
stone.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 323.
Ciroumspangle, to surround with
spangles ; to illumine.
I've travail'd all this realm throughout
To seeke and find some few immortals out
To circumspangle this my spacious sphere,
(As lamps for everlasting shiniug here).
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 286.
Circumstant, one standing round ;
a spectator.
Apollo's curse
Blast these-like actions, or a thing that's
worse,
When these circumstants shall but live to see
The time that I prevaricate from thee.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 82.
Circumstipated, surrounded.
He was well lodged at Whitehall, pen-
sioned, and circumstipated with his guards. —
North, Examen, p. 223.
Cirque-couchant, lying coiled up.
Until he found a palpitating snake,
Bright, and cirque-couchant in a dusky brake.
Keats, Lamia.
Citheron, a cittern or guitar.
Others who more delighted to write songs
or ballads of pleasure, to be sung with the
voice, and to the harpe, lute, or citheron, and
such other musical instruments, they were
called melodious poets. — Puttenham, Eng.
Poesie, Bk. I. ch. zi.
Citizenry, townspeople.
He . . sided with the magistracy, not with
the citizenry. — Taylor, Survey of Germ.
Poetry, i. 185.
No Spanish soldiery nor citizenry showed
the least disposition to join him. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, ch. xiii.
Citron, a liquor distilled with the
rinds of citrons : it is also called citron-
water.
Now deep in Taylor and the books of
martyrs,
Now drinking citron with his Grace and
Charteris.
Misc. by Swift, Pope, and
ft, rope, a
, iv. 222.
Arbuthnot
Cityness, political matter. Gr. ttoXlc
= city or state, iroXtru'a.
They take exception at the very Title
thereof, " Ecclesiastical Politic," as if un-
equally yoked ; Church with some mixture of
Cttynesse. — Fuller, Worthies, Devon (i. 290).
Civantick. Cervantic ?
I heard Jervas Fulwood, now their chap-
lain, preach a very good and civantick kind
of sermon, too good for an ordinary congre-
gation—i^s, May 24, 106*8.
Civeted, perfumed. '
Fops at all corners, ladylike in mien,
Civeted fellows, smelt ere they are seen.
Cowper, Tirocinium, 830.
CIVILITY
( "5)
CLARET
Civility, a civil office.
What an enormity is this in a christian
realm, to serve in a civility \ having the profit
of a provostship, and a deanery, and a parson-
age.— Latimer, i. 122.
Civilize, to behave with decency.
I civilize, lest that I seem obsccene,
But Lord (Thou know'st) I am vnchaste,
voclean.
Sylvester, The Lawe, p. 1100.
Clack, punctually ; exactly.
The only infelicity of the whole matter is,
as I said, that the money was not got ; if that
had fallen in clack, the King had compleated
a negotiation of as great difficulty, and with-
al utility for the people of England as had
been done in any King's reign. — North, £r-
cjua, p. 535.
Clad, to clothe.
The lamenting of deathes was chiefly at the
very burialls of the dead, . . . which was done
not onely by cladding the mourners their
f riendes and seruauntes in blacke vestures of
shape dolefull and sad, but also by wofull
countenaunces and voyces, and besides by
poeticaU mournings in verse. — Puttenham,
Eng. Poesie, Bk. I. ch. xxiv.
What, shall I clad me like a country maid ?
—Greene, James IV., iii. 3.
The inlanders . . . live of milke and flesh,
•nd clad themselves in skins. — Holland's
Camden, p. 29.
Claik-grese, «. = barnacles. See
Bab-obese.
Concerning those claik~geese, which some
with much admiration have beleeued to grow
out of trees ... I would gladly thinke that
the generation of these birds was not out of
the logges of wood, bat from the very ocean.
-Hollands Camden, ii. 48.
Clair obscure, distribution of light
and ebade. See L., s. v. chiaroscuro.
As masters in the clair obscure
With various light your eyes allure.
Prior, Alma, ii. 25.
Clam, cold moisture ; clamminess.
Around you is but starvation, falsehood,
corruption, and the clam of death. — Carlyle,
fir. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. V. ch. v.
Clam, clammy (?). More is speaking
of the Egyptian darkness, such as men
might feel, and handle with their hands,
and he says that it
The hand did smite
With a dam pitchie ray shot from that
CentraU Night.
H. More, Sleep of the Soul, iii. 33.
Clamjamfebt, a mob or assembly.
See Jamieson, «. v.
I only know the whole clamjamfery of them
were there. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
ch. iz.
Clamorous ness, loud talking ; clam-
our.
The obstinate maintainers of errour come
with their tongues tipt with clamorousnesse,
as their proselyte Auditors do with eares
stopt with prejudice.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., I.
v.7.
Clamper, to put together clumsily (?).
He weiicth up many brokenended matters,
and fettes out much rifraffe, pelfery. trump-
ery, baggage and beggerie ware clamparde vp
of one that would seme to be fitter for a shop
in dede than to write any boke. — Ascham,
Toxophilus, p. 83.
Clami'RING, clamouring.
The people, already tired with their own
divisions (of which his clampring had been a
principal nurs), and beginning now to espie a
haven of rest, hated anything that should
hinder them from it; asking one another
whether this were not hee, whose evil tongue
to [no ?] man could escape ? — Sidney, Arcadia,
Bk. v. p. 446.
Clangour, to clang.
At Paris all steeples are clangouring, not for
sermon. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Ft. III. Bk. I.
ch. iv.
Clapbread, oatmeal cake clapped or
beaten thin and hard. Defoe {Tour
thro9 G. Brit, j iii. 254) speaks of " sour
oat-cakes for bread, or clapat-bread, as
it is called." He is referring to the
borders of Lancashire and Westmore-
land.
The great rack of clapbread hung overhead,
and Bell Robson's preference of this kind of
oatcake over the leavened and partly sour
kind used in Yorkshire was another source
of her unpopularity. — Jfrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's
Lovers, ch. iv.
Clap-sticks. See quotation.
He was not disturbed ... by the watch-
men's rappers or clap-sticks. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. 1.
Claret, blood (pugilistic slang).
The words are a pound of flesh — that's clear
as mud.
Slice away then, old fellow, but mind ! if you
spill
One drop of his claret that's not in your bill,*
I'll hang you like Haman, by Jingo, I will !
Jngoldsby Legends (Mer. of Venice).
" You be all covered wi' blood, sir." . . .
Drysdale joined in assurances that it was no-
thing but a little of his friend's "claret,"
which he would be all the better for losing.
—Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xii.
CLA VERS
( "6)
CLERUM
Clayers, keys.
Where as by art one selfly blast breath M oat
From panting bellowes, passeth all about
Winde - instruments ; enters by th' vnder
clavers,
Which with the keys the Organ -master
quavers. — Sylvester, The Columnes, 732.
Clavestock, a chopper for cleaving
wood.
A elauestoek and rabetstock carpenters crane,
And seasoned timber for pinwood to haue.
Tusser, p. 38.
Clawer, a flatterer.
But few, if dead, are flattered, if their friends
Iiue not in wealth or greatnesse; so the
scopes
Of all such claioers scratch for priuate ends.
Davits, Muse's Teares, p. 9.
Cleanish, rather clean.
A bed at one corner with coarse curtains,
. . . but a coverlid upon it with a cleanish look.
— Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi. 303.
Clear, undetected.
Among the Lacedemonians, a clear theft
pass'd for a vertue. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 75.
Clearcake, some sort of cake or
sweetmeat, the qualities of which are
described iti the quotation.
I used to call him the clearcake; fat, fair,
sweet, and seen through in a moment.—
WalpoU to Mann, ii. 153 (1746).
Cleet. See extract In Arch., x\i\i.
352, mention is made of an urn " with
four small bowed handles or cleats.11
The four corners [of the coffin] were
strengthened by iron handles or elects. — Arch.,
xxxi. 252 (1845).
Cleopatrical, profusely luxurious,
after the manner of Cleopatra. Cf.
Babilonical.
I went, then saw, and found the great expense,
The fare and fashions of our citizens.
Oh Cleopatrical ! what wanteth there
For curious cost, and wondrous choice of cheer.
Hall, Sat., HI. iii. 17.
Clergy, ministers of heathen reli-
gion.
The Druid» (for so they call their diviners,
wisemen, and estate of clergie) esteem no*
thing in the world more sacred than Misselto.
.... Their priests or clergie men chuse of
purpose such groves for their divine service.
— Holland's Camden, p. 14.
Clergy, applied to women.
I took her to be one of the clergywomen
that belong to the place. — Foote, Trip to
Calais, ii. 1.
I found the clergy in general persons of
moderate minds and decorous manners; I
include the seculars and regulars of both
sexes. — Burke, Fr. Revolution, p. 118.
From the clergywomen of Windham down
to the charwomen the question was dis-
cussed.— Mrs. Oliphant, Agnes, i. 10.
Clergy, used adjectivally. L. gives
one instance from a living writer.
The first half day they rode they light upon
A noble deargy host, Kitt Middleton.
Bp. Corbet, Iter Boreale,
Not fearing lest he should meet with some
outward holy thing in religion which his lay
touch or presence might profane; but lest
something unholy from within his own heart
should dishonour and profane in himself that
priestly unction and clergy- right whereto
Christ hath entitled him. — Milton, Reason of
Ch. Government, Bk. II. ch. iii.
A corslet is no canonical coat for me, nor
suits it with my cfcrgiy-profession to proceed
any further in this warlike description. —
Fuller, Holy State, Bk. IV. ch. xvii.
Observe those cfcrw-sticklers on the civil
stage, and you shall seldom find them
crowned with a quiet death. — Ibid. Bk. V.
ch. xviii.
Clergy of belly, respite claimed by
a pregnant woman.
Who therefore in a streight may freely
Demand the clergy of her belly.
Butler, Hudibras, III. i. 884.
Clerk-ale, a feast for the benefit of
the clerk. See L., a. v. In the second
extract it seems to be the actual liquor
— perhaps some benefaction for the
clerk on Easter Sunday.
At the summer assises held in Exon, anno
1627, an order was made by Walter then
Chief Baron, and Denham one of the puisne
barons of the court of Exchequer, for sup-
pressing all revels, Church-ales, Clerk-ales
which had been used upon that day. — Hey-
lin. Life of Laud, Bk. iv. p. 256.
He, and some other frolicksome fellows,
being one Easter Sunday morning at the
clerk's house at Langford, near Wellington,
drinking (as it is called) clerk's-ale, they over-
heard the old man rehearsing the verses of
the Psalms. — Life of J. Lackington, Letter iii.
Clero-mastic, a scourger of the
clergy.
These dero-masticks and Church-destroyers
still maintain a most implacable war against
the Church of England. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 49.
Clerum, a visitation or convocation
sermon ; a concio ad clerum, or an ex-
ercise for a divinity degree.
This I heard in a clerum from Dr. Collings.
— Fuller, Hist, of Camb. Univ., vi. 6.
CLE VER
( i*7 )
CLOCK
On Saturday following, immediately after
the derum, he should go up into the pulpit
of St. Mary's. — Ibid. vii. 17.
Clevrr, handsome.
There is a clever (nitidu.ni) neat Church. —
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 242.
Click, to snatch.
* I take 'em to prevent abuses,"
Cants he, and then the Crucifix
And Chalice from the Altar clicks.
Ward) England's Reformation,
cant. iv. p. 397.
Click, a sharp noise. The Diets, only
give it as a verb.
To the billiard-room I hastened ; the click
of balls and the hum of voice resounded
thence. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxi.
Client age, following; clientele.
They sent unto him their disciples, together
with them which were of the faction and
clientage of Herod.— Bp. Hall, Works, iv. 168.
Clientele, patronage : an unusual
sense of this word.
Oar laws, said I, against those whose
clientele you undertake have beeu disputed
both by Churchmen and Statesmen. —
Backet, Life of WiUiams, i. 213.
Climacterian, one who is fond of a
climax.
Observe the author's steps continually
rising ; we shall find him on many occasions
a great dimacterian. — North, Examen, p. 23.
Climacteby, the working up to a
climax.
He wrought upon the approaches to Oates's
plot with notable disposition and climacterv,
often calling before he came at it. — North,
Examen, p. 233.
He is an artist at disposition and climactery
for the setting off his positions. — Ibid. p. 478.
Climbable, capable of being climbed.
I . . climbed everything climbable, and eat
everything eatable. — Savage, R. Medlicott,
Bk. II. ch. iii.
Cling, to make cling; to fasten or
clinch. The original is " Hoerent
paridibu* scalce"
They clinge thee scalinges too wals.
Stanyhurst, Mn., ii. 412.
Clint, to clench or make fast.
This grievance did continue, and was com-
plained of all this and most of the next
long's reign, till the statute of praemunire
was made, which dinted the naile which now
was driven in.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. ix. 28.
Clintino, a noise or thud, as of a
horse's foot.
Mountains stretch 'd around,
Gloomy was their tinting,
And the horse's hoofs
Made a dismal dinting.
Thackeray, Peg of Limavaddy.
Clip, to fly, from cutting the air or
waves. A swift-sailing ship is called a
clipper, though other derivations have
been proposed for this (^. and Q., 5th
S., vols, vi., vii.). The idea of cutting
is perhaps connected with the old mean-
ing of clip, to embrace, and so to press,
squeeze, nip. L. has one exmnple of
clip = fly, from Dryden, Ann. Mir.,
st. 86.
If profit's golden-finger 'd charm inveigles
We clip more swift than eagles.
Quarles, Emblems, i. 13.
The wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.
Ibid. ui. 12.
Oh that the pinions of a clipping dove
Would cut my passage through the empty
air. — Ibid. iv. 2.
Had my dull soul but wings as well as they,
How I would spring from earth, and clip
away. — Ibid. v. 13.
Clip, to embrace. The latest example
in the Diets, of the word in this sense
is from Ray the naturalist. In some
parts of the country the custom still
prevails on certain days of "clipping
the Church," i. e. a number of people
surround the church with joined hands.
Another example of clip = embrace
will be found in Kingsiey's, Saint's
Tragedy, ii. 1.
Yon fair sea
That clips thy shores had no such charms
for thee. — Cowper, Expostulation, 551.
The Northmen, led
By Sweyne and Olaf , landed yesternight
In Porlock Bay, and clipped us round at
Stoke. — Taylor, Edwin the Fair, v. 5.
like a fountain falling round me,
Which with silver waters thin
Clips a little water Naiad sitting smilingly
within. — Mrs. Browning, Lost Bower.
Cliqueism, party exclusiveness.
Their system is a sort of worldly-spiritual
cliqueism: they really look on the rest of
mankind as a doomed carcase which is to
nourish them for heaven. — G. Eliot, Middle*
march, ch. xvii.
Cloath, skin(?).
I also did buy some apples and pork, by
the same token the butcher commended it
as the best in England for cloath and colour.
—Pepys, Nov. 1, 1666.
Clock, beetle.
The Brize, the black-arm'd Clock, the
CLOCKLESS
( 128)
CLOTH
Gnat, the Butterflie.—iT. More, Life of the
Soul, i. 41.
Clockless, without a clock.
0 learned, Nature-taught Arithmetician,
Clockless so just to measure time's par-
tition.
Sylvester, third day, first toeeke, 379.
Clodder, to coagulate.
He took the blood of calves and goats,
mixing it with water that it might not dod-
der and congeal together. — Bp. Mall, Works,
iv. 500.
Clodhopper, a country fellow; a
clown.
1 heard one of your clodhoppers say the
other day, " The squire is a good gentleman,
he often gives me a day's work." Now I
should think it was the clodhopper gave the
gentleman the day's work. — Reade, Never too
late to mend, ch. i.
Clodhopping, clumsy ; loutish ; heavy-
treading, as one who is accustomed to
go over ploughed fields.
What a mercy you are shod with velvet,
Jane ! a clodhopping messenger would never
do at this juncture. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch.
Clod-pate, thick head. In Cymbe-
line, IV. ii., clot-pole is used in the same
sense.
There is more logic in that remark . . *
than I expected from your clod-pate. — SmoU
left, L. Greaves, ch. viii.
Clog, an old-fashioned wooden al-
manac. See H., s. v.
The lineal descendant of that rimstoke was'
still in use in the middle of England at the
close of the seventeenth century, though it
was then, says Plot, a sort of antiquity so little
known that it had hardly been heard of in
the southern parts, and was understood but
by few of the gentry in the northern. Clogg
was the English name, whether so called
from the word log, because they were gener-
ally made of wood, and not so commonly of
oak or fir as of box ; or from the resemblance
of the larger ones to clogs " wherewith we
restrain the wild, extravagant, mischievous
motions of some of our dogs," he knew not.
— Southey, The Doctor, ch. xc.
Clogdogdo, an incumbrance, like a
clog tied to a dog. See quotation s. v.
Clog.
A wife is a scurvy clogdogdo, an unlucky
thing. — Jonson, Silent Woman, IV. i.
Cloke-father, a cover or stalking-
horse.
Some suspect him to be little better than
a counterfeit, and a cloke-father for a plot of
the Pope's begetting. — Fuller, Holy War, I.
viii. 2.
Andronicus the Emperour cunningly de-
rived the whole hatred hereby on young
Alexius (whose power he never used or
owned, but onely to make him the cloak-
father for odious acts). — Ibid., Holy State, V.
xvm. 9.
The book goes under the name of Car-
dinal Allen, though the secular priests say he
was but the cloak-father thereof, and that
Parsons the Jesuite made it. — Ibid., Ch. Hist.,
IX. vii. 24.
Clome, earthenware. The first extract
is supposed to be in the Devonshire
dialect
Now, zester Nan, by this yow see
What zort of vokes gert people be ;
What's cheny thoft is clome.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 169.
In your account of the ceremonies now
practised in Devon at Christmas regarding
the apple-trees, you are wrong in calling it a
clayen cup; it should be a clome or ctomen
cup: thus all earthenware shops and china
shops are called by the middling class and
peasantry clome or clomen shops, and the
same in markets where earthenware is dis-
played in Devon are called' clome standings.
— Correspondent, Jan. 12, 1825, in Hone's
Entry-day Book, ii. p. 1652.
The Hang's Grace looked but sourly upon
me, and said it should go hard but that the
pitcher which went so oft to the well should
be broke at last. Thereto I making answer
that that should depend on the pitcher,
whether it were iron or clomb, he turned on
his heel, and presently departed from me. —
H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. i.
Close- fights, things used to conceal
or protect men in time of action. See
quotation s. t>. Cobridgk-hkad.
After the close 'fights were made ready
above, ... up comes the master. — John
Reynard* 5 Deliverance (Harl. Misc., i. 188).
Close-time, the time during which it
is unlawful to shoot game, or to fish.
He had shot in the course of his walk some
young wild-ducks, as, though close-time was
then unknown, the broods of grouse were
yet too young for the sportsman. — Scott,
Waverley, i. 197.
They came on a wicked old gentleman
breaking the laws of his country, and catch-
ing perch in close-time out of a punt. — H.
Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. lxiv.
Cloth. The cloth = the clerical
profession, or the clergy. In Tom
Jones it is used of the military profes-
sion. See extract s. v. Another.
Much civility passed between the two
clergymen, who both declared the great
honour they had for the doth. — Fieldiny,
Jos. Andrews, Bk. I. ch. xvi.
CLOTHED
( i*9 )
CL UMME
Another black sheep in the Church?
thought I, with a little sorrow ; for I don't
care to own that I have a respect for the
cloth.— Thackeray, Book of Snobs, ch. xxvii.
If there is one epithet I hate more than
soother, it is that execrable word cloth — used
for the office of a clergyman. I have no
time to set forth its offence now. If my
reader cannot feel it, I do not care to make
him feel it. Only I am sorry to say it over-
came my temper. " Madam," I said, " I owe
nothing to my tailor."— G. Macdonald, An-
nals of a Quiet Neighbourhood, ch. xiii.
Clothed. This, I suppose, means
that the figure of our Lord was repre-
sented as clothed.
Henry Portman, Esq. also placed at the
Bast End a cloathed Besurrection-piece,
painted by Sir James Thomhffl.— 2>e/<*. Tour
thro' G.Brit., ±245.
Clothes-horse, a stand on which
clothes are hung to dry.
We keep no horse but a clothes-horse.—
Sketches by Bot {Hackney-coach Stands).
If she were not healthier by God's making
than ever she will be by yours, her charity
would be by this time double-distilled selfish-
ness ; the mouths she fed, cupboards to store
pod works in ; the backs she warmed, clothes-
hones to hang out her wares before God. —
Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, iv. 2.
Cloth-market, a cant term for bed.
3Vt. Misg, your slave ; I hope your early
riang will do you no harm ; I find you are
but just come out of the Cloth-market.—
*"/<, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Cloth of pleasance, a napkin where-
with to wipe the cup after drinking (?),
or a cloth held under a person's chin
while drinking, like the houselline:-
cloth (?). * S
To-day when as I filled into your cups,
And held the cloth of pleasance whiles you
one reached me such a rap.
Marlowe, Dido, I. i.
Cloud. Under a cloud = in diffi-
culties, or, sometimes, with a slur on
one's character.
I have known him do great services to
g^tlemen under a cloud.— Fielding, Amelia,
ok. V. ch. iv.
I will s»y that for the English, if they were
«eua, that they are a ceeveleesed people to
gentlemen that are under a cloud. — Scott,
fodgauntlet, ii. 285.
Coavinses', the sheriff's officer's, . . coffee-
room is at the back, and the shadows of
■everal gentlemen under a cloud loom cloudily
npou the blinds. — Dickens, Bleak House,
Cloudlet, small cloud.
m Over the whole brilliant scene Vesuvius
rising with cloudlets playing round its summit.
— Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. xxxix.
Sire, I replied, joys prove cloudlets,
Men are the merest Ixions.
Browning, The Glove.
Clownify, to make dull or clownish.
I wish you would not so clownifie your wit
as to bury your vnderstanding all vnder a
clod of earth.— Breton, Courtier and Country-
man, p 7.
Is not the Clowiyfying of wit the Foolify-
ing of understanding?— /to*, p. 8.
Clownist, an actor of clowns' parts.
We are, sir, comedians, tragedians, tragi-
comedians, comi-tragedians, pastorists, hu-
morists, clownists, satirists. — Middltton,
Mayor of Quinborough, v. 1.
Cloynino, cheating.
Such texts as agree not with the cloynings of
your conjurors, and the conveyances of your
sorcerers, must needs be seasoned with Aris-
totle's physics, and sauced with John Donse's
subtleties.— Bale, Select Works, p. 170.
Club, a clown.
The fair flatte truthe that the vplaudishe
or homely and playn clubbes of the countree
dooeu vse, nameth eche thing by the right
names.— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 289.
Clubbers, associates ; those who club
together.
Tap. Humbled myself to marriage with
my Froth here,
Gave entertainment
Well. Yes, to whores and canters,
Clubbers by night.
Massingtr, New way to pay old debts, I. i.
Clubster, a frequenter of clubs, and
so a boon companion. In the second
quotation, and in the third a. v. Spend-
itore, North applies the word to mem-
bers of the Green-Ribbon Club.
He was no clubster listed among good fel-
lows.—North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 145.
The house was doubly balconied in the
front, as may be yet seen, for the clubsters
to issue forth in fresco with hats and perukes.
— Ibid., Examen, p. 572.
Clue. In the full clue, as applied
to sails, seems to mean spread to full
extent.
The next day following, if it were fine, they
would cloud the whole skie with canvas by
spreading their drabled sailes in the full clue
abroad a drying.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 149).
Clumme. Bailey in his Diet, has clum,
a note of silence : perhaps this is the
K
CLUMPY
( 130 ) CO AD VENTURE
meaning in the extract ; the punctua-
tion favours the idea of its being an
interjection.
He is as freckled about the gils, and lookes
as red as a fox, clumme, and is more surly
to be spoken with than ever he was before. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 165).
Clumpy, in clumps.
Leaning about among the clumpy bays,
Look at the clear Apollo while he plays.
Leigh Hunt, Foliage, p. 0.
Clums, dull ; clumsy.
Wherefore the prudent Law-givers of old,
Even in all Nations, with right sage foresight
Discovering from farre how clums and cold
The vulgar wight would be to yield what's
right
To virtuous learning, did by law design
Great wealth and honour to that worth
divine. — H. More, CupuTs Conflict, st. 61.
Clunch, stumpy ; thick-set.
I found him [Dr. Beattie] pleasant, un-
affected, and unassuming, and full of con*
versible intelligence, with a round, thick,
clunch figure, that promises nothing either
of his works or his discourse. — Mad.D'Arblay,
Diary, Hi. 397.
She is fat, and clunch, and heavy, and ugly ;
otherwise, they say, agreeable enough. — Ibid.
iv. 272.
Clunch, to clench.
His fingers are not long and drawn out to
handle a fiddle, but his fist is cluncht with
the habit of disputing. — Earle, Microcosms
graphie (A Downright Scholar).
Clunchfist, a miser ; one who is
close-fisted.
Who though your chests
Vast sums of money should to you afford,
Would ne'ertheless add more unto that hoard,
And yet not be content, you clunchfist s, das-
tards.— Urouhart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. liv.
CLU9TEB0US, thronging ; gathered in
a cluster. See extract 0. v. Gate.
Clutterment, noise ; turmoil.
The philosopher . . . thought most seriously
to have withdrawn himself unto a solitary
privacy, far from the rustling clutterments of
the tumultuous and confused world. — Ur-
quhart's Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xiii.
Cly, to take : a cant term. See ex-
tract in H., s. v. pannam.
Here safe in our skipper let's cly off our
peck,
And bowse in defiance o' th' Harman-beck.
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Clyfakeb, pickpocket (thieves1 cant).
They were gentlemen sharpers, and not
vulgar cracksmen and clyfakers. — Lytton,
Felham, ch. lxxxii.
Clypakino. See extract
'• Harry was on the cross." "On the
cross?" said Charles. "Ah!" the boy
said; "he goes out clyfaking, and such.
He*8 a prig, and a smart one too ; he's fly, is
Harry." "But what is clyfakinq?" said
Charles. " Why, a prigging of wipes, and
sneeze-boxes, and ridicules, and such." — H.
Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xxxv.
Clyster-pipe, a contemptuous name
for an apothecary. Cf. the less oppro-
brious " Gallipot."
John Haselwood, a proud, starch'd, formal,
and sycophantizing cRster-vipe, who was the
apothecary to Clayton when he practiced
physick.— Life of A. Wood, May 3, 1661.
Coach, a tutor or instructor ; also, as
a verb, to instruct : a slang word which
has now almost attained to a recognized
place in the language.
He had already been down several times in
pair-oar and four-oar boats, with an old oar
to pull stroke, and another to steer and coach
the young idea. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. ii.
Warham was studying for India with a
Wancester coach. — G. Eliot, Deronda, ch. vi.
I coached him before he got his scholarship;
he ought to have taken honours last Easter,
but he was ill. — Ibid. ch. xxxvii.
Coachfulness, abundance of coaches.
My purpose was fitly inaugurated by the
Dolphin's Head, which everywhere expressed
past coachfulness and present coachlessness.
— JXckens, Uncommercial Traveller, xxii.
Coachlessness, want of coaches. See
extract *. v. Coachfulness.
Coachlet, little coach.
In my light little coachlet I could breathe
freer.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. I.
ch. viii.
Coadjutant, a helper.
Oates or some of his coadjutants being
touched (not in conscience, but) with the
disappointment of their work, and sensible
of a better trade on the other side, might
have made a short turn, and like elephants
have overrun their own party. — North, Kr-
amen, p. 198.
Coadjutatob, assistant : coadjutor is
the usual form.
I do purpose ... to act as a coadjutator
to the law, and even to remedy evils which
the law cannot reach. — Smollett, Lancelot
Greaves, ch. ii.
Coadventure, to share in a venture.
L. has coadverUurer from Howell*
Letters.
This hee shall observe better in Italy, where
CO-AGENCY
( 13O
COB -HO USE
the Prince holdeth it no disparagement to
co-adventure, and pat in his stake with the
Marchant. — Howell, Forraine Travell, sect. vii.
Co-agency, co-operative power.
Now therefore began to open upon me
those fascinations of solitude which, when
acting as a co-agency with unresisted grief,
end in the paradoxical result of making out
of grief itself a luxury.— Be Quincey, Autob.
Sketches, i. 22.
Coal-CARrierly, servile ; black-
guardly. See N. on carrying coal*.
I heard your father say that he would,
many you to Peter Ploddall, that puck-fist,
that smudge-snout, that coal-carrierly clown.
-Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng. Dr. iii. 302).
Coalescency, coalescence ; aggre-
gation. Gauden speaks of the primi-
tive Churches growing " by an nappy
diffusion and holy coalescency to such
great and goodly combinations" {Tears
of the Church, p. 34).
Coalise, to coalesce. See quotation
*. v. Cat.
Swedish Qnstav, sworn Knight of the
Queen of France, will lead coalised armies.
-CailyU, Ft. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. v.
CoAL-KlNDLRR, a stirrer-up of burning
questions. See next entry.
It may be a coal-kindler would think such
counsel as this not worth the hearing. —
Backet, Life of Williams, ii. 104.
Coals. To stir coals = to quarrel, or
incite to quarrel. The third extract is
supposed to occur in a letter from a
servant
He gaue oonnsaill that nothing was to
be denied vnto Alexander on their behalf,
onlesse thei had assured trust and confidence,
if he would take peper in the nose, or stiere
cofc*, to wrynge hym to the wurse with
dynte of sworde. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 328.
After soche sorte did he vpbraid to the
people their rashe and vnaduised stierinq of
*ol**> and arisinges to warre.— Ibid. p. 382.
What, as I sed to him, Cuzzen Titus, signi-
fies stirring up the coles, and macking strife,
to make rich gentilfolkes live at varience ? —
Richardson, d. Harlowe, iii. 262.
Coal-scuttle bonnet, a bonnet
shaped like a coal-scuttle.
There was Bliss Snevellici .... glancing
from the depths of her coal-scuttle bonnet at
Nicholas. — Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch.
zxiii.
She knew Miss Lydia was passing, and
though Hetty liked so much to look at her
fashionable little coal-scuttle bonnet, with the
wreath of small roses round it, she didn't
mind it to-day.— G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch.
xviii.
Coal-whipper, one engaged in load-
ing and unloading collier vessels.
The young ladies exhibited a proper dis-
play of horror at the appearance of the coal-
whippets and ballast-heavers. — Sketches by
Boz (Steam Excursion).
He had such a pair of legs as a painter
would have given to an Irish chairman, or
one of the swarthy, demon-like coal-whippers
to be seen issuing from those black arches in
the Strand.— Savage, Reuben Medlicott, Bk. I.
oh. iii.
Coast man, master of a coasting
vessel; a fisherman. The extract re-
fers to the month of February, when
Lent usually begins.
To coast man ride,
Lent staffe to prouide.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 86.
Coatless, without a coat.
Seven or eight sallow starved beings, . .
coatless, shoeless, and ragged, sat stitching,
each on his truckle bed. — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. zxi.
Coat-money, an exaction levied by
Charles I. on the pretext of providing
clothing for troops. Cf. Conduct-
money, with which it is always joined.
Such illegal actions, and especially to get
vast sums of money, were put in practice \j
the King and his new officers, as monopolies,
compulsive knighthoods, coat, conduct, and
ship-money, ... as gave evident proof that
the King never meant ... to recall parlia-
ments.— Milton, Eikonoklastes, ch. i.
He was put into such a good condition,
that he was able both to raise and maintain
an army with no charge to the common
subject, but only a little coat and conduct
money at their first setting out. — Heylin, Life
of Laud, Bk. iv. p. 382.
Coax, an enticement ; a wheedling :
the usual noun is coaxing.
He held out by turn coaxes and threats ; in
short everything but an amnesty. — Marryat,
Fr. Mildmay, ch. i.
Cob, to beat.
I was sentenced to be cobbed with a wor-
sted stocking filled with wet sand. — Marryat,
Fr. Mildmay, ch. ii.
Cob-house, or walls, a house or
walls built of cob, i. e. marl mixed with
straw.
The subject of the cob-icalls of the western
counties, and of the use of concrete gener-
ally in all ages, . . . has beeu curiously illus-
trated in the Quarterly Revieio, vol. Iviii. —
Archaol., xxx. 495 (1844).
K 2
COBRIDGE-HEAD ( 132 ) COCK-FIGHTING
The main village . . . consisted of a nar-
row street of cob-houses white-washed and
thatched. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. vi.
Cobridge-head. See quotation.
The English fashion was to heighten the
ship as much as possible at stem and stern,
both bv the sweep of her lines and also by
stockades (" close-fights and cage-works ") on
the poop and forecastle, thus giving to the
men a shelter, which was further increased
by strong bulk-heads ("cobridae- heads")
across the main-deck below, dividing the ship
thus into a number of separate forts, fitted
with swivels ("bases, fowlers and murder-
ers") and loop-noled for musketry and arrows.
— C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xx.
Cobwebbkry, flimsy intricacy.
Welcome is his word, there where he
speaks and works, and growing ever wel-
come* ; for it alone goes to the heart of the
business ; logical cobtcebbery shrinks itself to-
gether, and thou seest a thing, how it is, how
it may be worked with. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. ii.
Cock, a familiar form of address =
fellow ; and usually has " old " pre-
fixed. In Erasmus there seems to be a
pun ; the French being polite and liberal
in their entertainments.
He has drawn blood of him yet : well done,
old cock. — Massinger, Unnatural Combat ,11. i.
I am going to an old club of merry cocks
(vetustissimum Gallorum contubernium) to
endeavour to patch up what I have lost. —
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 378.
He was an honest old cock, and loved his
Sipe and a tankard of cyder as well as the
est of us. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk.
VIII. ch. xxiv.
Cock. That cock won't fight = that
will not do.
I tried to see the arms on the carriage, but
there were none ; so that cock wouldn't jight.
— C Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xxiv.
Cockadoodle, to crow like a cock
(onomatopoeou8).
The peacocks, with their spotted coates
and affrighting voyces, for heralds, they
prickt and enlisted; and the cockadoodling
cocks for their trumpeters. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 170).
# Cock-a-doodlb bboth. See quota-
tion.
He complains that "he can't peck," yet
continues the cause of his infirmity, living
almost entirely upon cock-a-doodle broth, —
eggs beat up in brandy and a little water.—
Meade, Never too late to mend, ch. lxxxv.
Cock-bbead, food for fighting cocks.
Yon squall at us on Shrove-Tuesday ; you
feed us with cock-bread and arm us with
steel spurs that we may mangle and kill each
other for your sport ; you build cock-pits,
you make us fight Welsh mains, and give
subscription cups to the winner. — South cy,
The Doctor, ch. clxiv.
Cocker, a dog of the spaniel kind,
used in raising woodcocks, &c.
I myself was acquainted with a little Blen-
he&mvocker, one of the smallest, beautif ullest,
and wisest of lapdogs or dogs . . . Shandy,
so hight this remarkable cocker, was ex-
tremely shy of strangers. — Carlyle, Jftsc,
iv. 171.
The worthy old gentleman, having finished
his oration, settled himself on a great bench
inside the chimney, and put his hawk on a
perch over his head, while his cockers coiled
themselves up close to the warm peat-ashes.
— C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. v.
Cocker, cock-fighter.
He was the greatest cocker in England ; he
said Duke John won him many battles, and
never lost one. — Steele, Conscious Lovers, Act
IV.
If the king was content a man should
out, he made a mark at his name ; but if he
would not part with him, he found some
jocular reason to let him stand, as that he
was a good cocker, understood hunting, kept
a good house.— North, Examen, p. 78.
Cockernobe, a term of abuse, applied
in the quotation to hermits ; it means,
I suppose, stuck-up persons.
And also by these prelates these cocker-
noses are suffered to live in pride and hy-
pocrisy, and to defoul themselves both bodily
and ghostly. — Testament of W. Thorpe (Bale's
Select Works, p. 130).
Cocket. H. says, "To joyne or
fasten in building as one joyst or stone
is cocketted within another." — Thomasii
Did., 1644.
In brest of the Godesse Gorgon was cocketed
hardlye
With nodil vnjoyncted by death.
St any hurst, Conceites, p. 138.
Cock-kightino. To beat cock-fighting
= to surpass everything. In the first
extract there is a literal reference to
cock-fighting.
Ministers1 scufflings and contests with one
another is beyond any Cock-fghting or Bear-
baiting to the vulgar envy, malice, profane-
nesse and petulancy. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 228.
I fear the contradiction of no man alive or
dead, when I assert that my friend Chevy
Slime being held in pawn for a bill, heats any
amount of cock-fighting with which I am
acquainted.— Dickens, Martin Chuzzlctcit, ch.
vii.
COCKHORSE
( *33 )
COCKSHY
The Squire faltered oat, " Well, this beats
cockfighting! the man's as mad as a March
hare, and has taken Dr. Rickeybockey for
little Lenny. — Lytton, My Hovel, Bk. in.
ch. xi.
Cockhorse, on high, and so, elated.
The ladies sit on cockhorse upon scaffolds
in open view. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 167.
My gentlemen return'd to their lodgings
on cockhorxe, and began to think of a fund
for a glorious equipage. — Ibid. p. 215.
Cocking, shooting, as of wood-cock,
&c.
"You shoot?" "No." "Pity; there
ought to be noble cocking in these woods." —
C Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xi.
Cocking, sparring or disputing, as
between fighting-cocks.
Betwene Aristippus and Diogenes the
Cynike there was moche good cocking and
striaing whether of them should win the
spnrres and beare the bell." — UdaVs Eras-
tnns's Apophth., p. 45.
Cockle, whimsical, maggotty. Jamie-
son gives cockle-headed as meaning
this. There is no corresponding word
in the original.
His cockle brains were dashed out near the
Osaona or high-cross. — UrquharVs Rabelais,
8k. IV. ch. xiii.
Cocklba, a screw; more properly
spelt cochlea, so called from its spiral
form, like a cockle.
Inventions for drawing off the waters out
of the fenns about it being by bucketts,
mills, cockleas, pumps, and the like. — Evelyn,
Diary, Sept. 12, 1641.
Cockle-demois, half cockle-shells ?
Next . . march t a mock-maske of Baboons
. . . casting Cockle-demois about in courtesie,
by way of lardges. — Chapman, Masque of
Mid. Temple.
Cockles, ringlets j cockle means to
twist or wrinkle.
The Queen bad inkling ; instantly she sped
To curl the cockles of her new-bought head.
Sylvester, The Decay, 07.
Cockles. Cockle* of the heart = the
inmost recesses of the heart L., who
gives the phrase, but without example,
say 8, " The most probable explanation
lies (1) in the likeness of a heart to a
cockleshell ; the base of the former be-
ing compared to the hinge of the latter ;
(2) in the zoological name for the
cockle and its congeners being Car-
dium, from the Greek, xaptia = heart."
The sight . . . after near two months ab-
sence rejoiced the very cockles of Jerry's
heart.— Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. XII.
ch. xiv.
Polyglot toss'd a bumper off ; it cheer'd
The cockles of his heart.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 147.
Cocklet, young cock.
Were I to stop praying and remembering
my own sins daily, I could become a Demo-
critus Junior, and sitting upon the bench of
contemplation, make the world my cockpit,
wherein main after main of cocklets — the
" shell " alas ! " scarce off their heads " come
forth to slay and be slain mutually, for no
quarrel, except " thou-cock art not me-cock,
therefore fight."— C. Kingsley, 1845 (Life, i.
103).
Cocknyed, cockered ; in original
fotum.
But Venus enfuseth sweet sleepe to the
partye resembled.
Too woods Idalian thee child nice cocknyed
heauing
In seat of her boosom.
Stanyhurst, AEn., i. 677.
Cockneyism, that which belongs to
or denotes a cockney or Londoner.
Tom . . recognised the woman's Berkshire
accent beneath its coat of cockneyism. — C.
Kingsley, TSco Years Ago, ch. xxiv.
Cock of the circuit. See quota-
tions. The second shows that it was a
title for leading counsel generally, not
for one in particular, and so far the
phrase differs from cock of the school,
cock of the walk, &c.
And here 1 am to shew what great appli-
cation and industry he used in that branch
of his practise, which in a few years raised
him to the post, as they call it, of cock of the
circuit, which supposeth him (as truly he
was) a counsel of one side or other in every
cause of value to be tried. — North, Life of
Lord Guilford, i. 68.
He was exceedingly careful to keep fair
with the cocks of the circuit. — Ibid. p. 69.
Cook-rood, i. e. cock -road, a net for
catching birds, especially woodcocks.
See N., s. vv. cockshut, and glade.
Thou hast thy cockrood, and thy glade
To take the precious phesant made.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 247.
Cockshy, something put up as a
mark to be thrown at.
This was as if the great geologists . . . had
invited two rival theorists to settle the ques-
tion of a geological formation by picking
up the stones and appealing to the test of
a cockshy. — Lord Strangford, Letters and
Papers, p. 215.
COCK-STRIDE ( 134 )
COGGLED Y
Cock-stride, a curious measure of
length. There is an old saying —
At New Year's tide
The days lengthen a coclfs-stride.
It is now February, and the Sun is gotten
up a cocke-stride of his climbing. — Breton,
Fantastickes (February).
Cock-tail, a drink.
James, my fine fellow, jist look alive, and
breng me a small glass of brandy, will ye ?
Did ye iver try a brandy cock-tail, Cornel ? —
Thackeray, Tlie Ncwcomes, ch. xiii.
Cock-thrapplkd, applied to a hunt-
ing horse whose windpipe bends like a
bow when he bridles. See N., s. v.
cock-throppled.
He was not . . . restiff, vicious, neck-re-
versed, or cock - thrappled, ewe -necked or
deer-necked, high on the leg, brokeu-kneed,
... or sickle-hammed. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. cxliii.
Cock-treading. The extract seems
to distinguish this both from the yolk
and white.
Then beat the yolks of six new laid eggs,
and put them into the wine on the fire ; then
take the cock-treading of twelve eggs and the
white of one egge, and beat them into au
oyl. — Queen* s Closet Opened, p. 47.
Cockwater. The extract is part of
a humane receipt for "cock-water for
a consumption." Southey {Doctor, ch.
xxiv.) refers to it.
Take a running cock, pull him alive, then
kill him, cut him abroad by the back, take
out the entrails, and wipe him clean, then
quarter him and break his bones, then put
him into a rose-water still with a pottle of
sack.— Queen's Closet Opened, p. 14 (1655).
Cockyoly birds, little birds.
Major Campbell prepares the charming
little cockyoly birds, and I call the sun in to
immortalise them. — C. King si ey, Two Years
Ago, ch. xv.
Codd, the name given by the Charter-
house boys to the old pensioners ; per-
haps an abbreviation of codger.
Yonder sit some threescore old gentlemen
pensioners of the hospital. Tou hear them
coughing feebly in the twilight — the old
reverend blackgowns. Is Codd Ajax alive,
you wonder ; the Cistercian lads called these
old gentlemen Codds, I know not wherefore.
— lliackeray, The Newcomes, ch. lxxv.
Codger, old fellow. (See L., 8. v.
cozier) : in the first extract it seems =
a precise person, a Squaretoes.
He gave himself the airs of an old justice
of the peace, and said if he did not find the
affair given up, nothing should induce him
ever to help me again. What a mere codger
that lad has turned out! — Mad. D'Arbiay,
Camilla, Bk. IX. ch. iv.
He's a rum codger you must know,
At least we poor folk thiuk him so.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. i.
" I haven't been drinkiug your health, my
codger? replied Mr. Squeers. — Dickens, Nicho-
las Nickleby, ch. lx.
My uncle Sam is more anxious about my
sins than the other codgers, because he is my
fodfather. — Lytton, What will he do with it ?
\k. IV. ch. ix.
Ccelest, celestial ; blew cosiest = sky-
blue.
Her vtmost robe was colour blew Ccelest. —
Hudson, Judith, iv. 58.
Coembody, to unite in one body.
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit will then
become coembodied in this Divine body. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 252.
Coffin, in the extract = bier, not
what we now call coffin.
For mendynge of coffen that carrys the
corsses to church. — Churchwardens' Accounts
of S. MichaeTs, Cornhill, ed. by Overall, p.
112.
Co-found, to found at the same time.
Fuller ( Worthies, London, ii. 58), says
that the steeple of St. Paul's "was origin-
al \y co-founded by King Ethelbert with
the Body of the Church. " Co-founder =
joint founder, is in the Diets.
Coo-boat, a small boat or cock-boat.
As for the Western Scottish, he so over-
awed them, as that no man who built ship
or cog-boat durst drive into it above three
nailes. — Holland's Camden, ii. 206.
Olave fled in a little cog-boat unto his
father-in-law, the Earle of Bosse. — Ibid.
p. 210.
Cogfoist, a cheat.
I had thought you would have had a sack
to have put this law-cracking cogfoist in
instead of a pair of stocks. — Wily Beguiled
(Hawkins, Eng. Dr. iii. 907).
Coggle, a round stone. " Coggles, a
large gravel stone used for paving"
(Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary).
A flint is sooner broken with a gentle
stroke upon a feather-bed, than strucken
with all tne might against a hard coggle. —
Sanderson, i. 207.
Coggledy, rickety; coggly in this
sense is in Jamieson.
Take care of that step-ladder though ; it ia
coggledy, as I observed when you came down.
— Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xxv.
COGITABUND
( *35 )
COLLATION
COGITABUND, thoughtful.
These gentlemen with very eogitabund
aspects made up the three degrees of com-
parison amongst 'em. — Tom Brown, Works,
iii. 15.
" I do think Latin words sound very odd.
I dare say, Miss Buruey, you know Latin
very well ? " I assured her to the contrary.
tf Well," said the little fool, " I know one
word." "Do you? Pray, what is it?"
**Why, it's eogitabund; it's a very droll
word."— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 313.
Bosch, in a clerical dress, is seated in an
easy-chair, coqitabund, with a manuscript
open before him. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
cxii.
Cognominate, to sirname or nick-
name. See extract s. v. Diphrelatic.
Coos, false dice.
It were a hard matter for me to get my
dinner that day wherein my master had not
sold a dozen of devices, a case of cogs, and
a suit of shifts in the morning. — Greene,
James IV^ ii. 1.
Cogue, a keg.
Their drink is ale made of beer-malt, and
tunned up in a small vessel called a cogue;
after it has stood a few hours, they drink it
out of the cogue, yest and all. — Modern Ac-
count of Scotland, 1670 (Harl. Misc., vi. 141).
A cogue of true orthodox Nantz would have
corrected the crudity of the custard. — T.
Brown, Works, ii. 304.
Cohabitatb, to dwell together.
Shall the graces of God cohaJtitate with the
vices of Satan ?— Adams, ii. 306.
Cohibit, to restrain.
It was scarce possible to cohibite people's
talk.— North, Life of Lard Guilford, i. 298.
Cohorn, a brass cannon, so named
from Cohorn, the celebrated engineer.
It was determined in a council of war that
five of our largest ships should attack the
fort on one side, while the battery played it
on the other, strengthened with two mortars
and twenty-four cohorns. — Smollett, Rod.
Random, ch. xxxii.
Coinless, penniless ; poor.
Ton thought me poor and friendless too,
And look'd for homage you deem'd due
From coinless bards to men like you.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. vii.
Coin-made, mercenary, or simoniacal.
Coyne-made Pastors let the flock decay. —
Dames, Muse's Teares, p. 13.
COINQUINATION, pollution. CI CONIN-
QUINATE.
Vntil I make a second inundation
To wash thy purest Fame's coinquination,
And make it fit for fin all conflagration.
Davies, Commendatory Poems, p. 14.
Cokaghee, a liquor. See quotation
s. v. Stire.
Cold roste. H., who gives this
expression without example, explains
it 4C nothing to the point or purpose ; "
in the extract it means insigniiicunt.
He passed by a beggerie little toune of
cold roste in the mountaines of Sauoye. —
UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 297.
Cold without, spirits mixed with
cold water, and without sugar.
I laugh at fame. Fame, sir ! not worth a
glass of cold without; and as for a glass of
warm with sugar, and five shillings in one's
pocket to spend as one pleases, what is there
in Westminster Abbey to compare with it?
— Lytton, My Novel, Bk. VI. ch. xx.
Cole, slang term for money. Wal-
pole gives a ballad, 1741, in which the
following occurs : —
This our captain no sooner had flnger'd the
cole,
But he hies him aboard with his good Madam
Vole. — Letters to Mann, i. 22.
Gome, my soul,
Post the cole;
I must beg or borrow.
Burgoyne, Lord of the Manor, Act III.
Moreover, the whole of the said cash or cole
Shall be spent for the good of said old woman's
soul.
Ingoldsby Legends {Old Woman in Grey).
Cole-fish, a species of gadus.
Cole-fish and poore-John I haue no need
off. — Breton, Packet of Letters, p. 24.
Colibri, humming-bird.
"Look, Frank, that's a colibri; you've
heard of colilrris?n Frank looked at the
living gem which hung, loud humming, over
some fantastic bloom, and then dashed away,
seemingly to call its mate, and whirred ana
danced with it round and round the flower-
starred bushes, flashing fresh rainbows at
every shifting of the lights. — C. Kingsley,
Westward Ho, ch. xvii.
Colicky, pertaining to the colic.
See L., who, however, has no example.
I have the pleasure to hear that my mother
is already better — a colicky disorder to which
she is too subject. — Richardson, CI. Harlowc,
ii. 256.
Collation, conference.
Baronius and Binnius will in no ease allow
this for a Oouncill (though elsewhere ex-
tending that name to meaner meetings) onely
COLLATIONER ( 136 )
COLTSTA VES
they call it a Collation, because (forsooth ^ it
wanted some Oouncill-formalitieB. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. ii. 90.
Collation ek, one who partakes of a
repast
We, meanwhile, untitled attendants, stood
at the other end of the room, forming a
semicircle, and all strictly facing the royal
collationers. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, iii. 90.
Collatitious, contributing.
Neither would he impatronize his name to
the credit of that work which should be
raised up by other men's collatitious liber-
ality.—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 46.
Collegian, same as Collegiate, q. v.
It became a not unusual circumstance for
letters to be put under his door at night
enclosing half-a-crown . . . for the Father
of the Marshalsea, "with the compliments
of a collegian taking leave." — Dickens, Little
Dorrit, ch. vi.
Collegiate, an inmate of a debtor's
prison.
His beginnings were debauched, and his
study and first practice in the goal. For
having been one of the fiercest town-rakes,
and speut more than he had of his own, his
case forced him upon that expedient for a
lodging, and there he . . . busied himself
with the cases of his feWow-collegiates. —
North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 123.
Collepixie, a will o' the wisp ; also
called collepisHe.
I shall be ready at thine elbow to plaie the
parte of Hobgoblin or Collepixie, and make
thee for feare to weene the deuill is at thy
polle.— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 125.
Colliflory, cauliflower. Gerard
spells it cole-flory.
There grow out of the same colewort other
fine collifories (if I may so say), or tendrils.
— Holland, Pliny, xix. 8.
Colligener, csenobite, one living in
a monastery or college.
St. Augustine in his book entitled De operd
monachorum crieth out against idle colliytners.
— Hutchinson, Image of God, p. 203.
I shoke the dust of my fete against those
wicked colliyyners and prestes, accordinge to
Christ e 'a commaundement. — Vocacyon of
Johan Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc., vi. 454).
Collions. See quotation. A Hert-
fordshire word.
I am told that collions is another term for
the same gateway flitch gate], but I never
heard it used.— Sir G. C. Lewis, Letters (1840),
p. 111.
Coll in nt.
Take a handful of hysop, of figs, raisins,
dates, of each an ounce, of Collipint half a
handfull, French barley one ounce. — Queen's
Closet Opened, p. 206 (1655).
Collocutory, conversational
"We proceed to give our imitation, which is
of the Anuebean or Collocutory kind. — Poetry
of Antijacobin, p. 10.
Colloquino, conversing. Perhaps a
misprint for colloguing*
What will the ghosts of your grandfathers
to the seventh generation say to this, Alton ?
Colloguing in Pagan picture galleries with
shovel - hatted Philistines? — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Colloquise, to converse.
All I had now to do was to obey him in
sileuce ; no need for me to colloquise further.
— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. rrii.
Colon er, colonist.
[A certain tract of land] they made over
to coloners and new inhabitants. — Holland's
Camden, p. 138.
Colour Y, fond of, or adorned with,
colour.
Behold there starts up a little man . . .
roundly charging you with being too airy
and cheery — too volatile and versatile — too
flowery and coloury. — Miss Bronte, Villette,
ch. xxviii.
Colt, a cheat or slippery fellow.
L. has the verb in this sense.
Potiphar's wife accused Joseph, and the
Elders Susannah, of such crimes as they
were innocent of and themselves guilty. An
old trick, by which C. Verres, like a cunning
colt often holpe himself at a pinch. — Sander-
son, ii. 224.
Colt. To have a colt's tooth = to
be fond of youthful pleasures, to be
wanton ; hence Marlowe uses colt for
tooth.
Nay, we will break the hedges of their mouths,
And pull their kicking colts out of their
pastures. — 2 Tamburlaine, iv. 4.
Coltstaves, a coltstaff, or cowl staff,
is a long pole used for carrying loads
suspended therefrom. A man who had
been beaten by his wife was set astride
on this, and carried in a derisive pro-
cession ; it was sometimes called riding
skimmington, or riding the stang, or, as
in the second extract, simply riding.
See N., s. v. skimmington. .
I know there are many that wear horns
and ride daily upon coltstaves, but this pro-
ceeds not so often from the fault of the
female as the silliness of the husband who
knows not how to manage a wife. — Howell,
Letters, iv. 7.
COL UMBINE
km)
COME DOWN
Down to Greenwich, where I And the
stairs full of people, there being a great
riding there to day for a man, the constable
of the town, whose wife beat him. — Fepys,
Jane 10, 1667.
Columbine, a plant, so called from
the Lat. columba, a pigeon, as when its
outer petals are pulled off it resembles
that bird ; others say, because pigeons
are fond of it.
Next we will act how young men wooe,
And sigh, and kiss, as lovers do ;
And talke of brides, and who shall make
That wedding-smock, this bridal-cake ;
That dress, this sprig, that leaf, this vine ;
That smooth and silken columbine.
Her rick, Hesperides, p. 231.
And the wild hop fibred closely,
And the large-leaved columbine.
Arch of door and window-mullion
Did right sylvanly entwine.
Mrs. Browning, The lost bower.
Columel, column.
We have in a distinct columel assigned the
places of their habitation. — Fuller 9 Worthies,
ch. xv.
The cathedral . . . challengeth the pre-
cedency of all in England for a majestick
Western front of columel work. — Ibid.
Northampton (ii. 159).
Column al, of the form of a column.
Columnar is the commoner word.
Crag overhanging, nor column al rock
Cast its dark outline there.
Southey, Thalaba, 6k. xii.
Com at ability, accessibility.
* If a man was to sit down coolly and con-
sider within himself the make, the shape,
the construction, comatability, and conveni-
ence of all the parts which constitute the
whole of that animal, woman, and compare
them analogically" — "I never understood
rightly the meaning of that word," quoth
my uncle Toby.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, \. 212.
Comb-brush, a ladies' maid, or under
ladies' maid. In Foote's Bankrupt, a
waiting-woman is called Kitty Comb-
brush. In the first extract it is a ladies*
maid who is addressed.
"Its very well, Mrs. Flipflap, 'tis very
well ; but do yon hear — Tawdry, you are not
so alluring as you think yon are— Comb-brush,
nor I so much in love. — Vanbrugh, False
Friend, iii. 2.
The maid who at present attended on
Sophia was recommended by Lady Bellaston,
with whom she had lived for some time in
the capacity of a comb-brush. — Fielding, Tom
Jones, Bk. XVII. ch. viii.
Comb-feat, a dressing or thrashing ;
to comb the head of a person has the
same meaning.
"Oome hither, I must show thee a new
trick, and handsomely give thee the comb-
feat " (un tour de peigne). With this he
took him by the throat, saying to him, " Thou
flayest the Latin, by Saint John I will make
thee flay the fox, for I will now flay thee
alive." — Urouhartfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. vi.
Die Joan and Will ; give Bess to Ned,
And every day she combs his head.
Swift, Joan cudgels Ned.
ril carry you with me to my country-box,
and keep you out of harm's way, till I find
you a wife who will comb your head for you.
—Lytton, What will he do with it? Bk. IV.
ch. xvi.
Combind, to bind together.
It . . . their wills combind s
To belch their hates, vow'd murdrers of thy
fame.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R. Grinuile,
p. 51.
Combinemrnt, combination.
Having no firme combinements to chayne
them together in their publique dangers,
they lay loose to the advantage of the com-
mon enemy. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng. p. 2.
Comburoess, a fellow-burgess. The
Diets, give comburgher.
The Government of this Town is by a
Mayor and Aldermen, and not, as some
write, by an Alderman and twelve Corn-
burgesses. — Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, iii.
37.
Come-at-able, attainable ; accessible.
The poultry was not so come-at-able as
their neighbours desired. — T. Brown, Works,
iv. 133.
To be sure the best beer of all did not
appear,
For I've said twas in June, and so late in
the year
The Trinity Audit Ale is not come-at-able,
As I've found to my great grief, when dining
at that table.
Ingoldsby Legends (S. Dunstan).
Comedient, comedian.
This doth the Comedy handle so in our
private and domestical matters, as with
hearing it, we get as it were an experience
what is to be looked for of a niggardly
Demea, . . . and not only to know what
effects are to be expected, but to know who
be such by the dignifying badge given them
by the comedient. — Sidney, Defence of Foesie,
p. 552.
Come down, to pay.
Do you keep the gentleman in discourse,
while I speak to the prisoner, and see how
he can come down.— Johnston, Chrysal., i. 139.
COME DOWN ( 138 ) COMMERCIALISM
Come down, used substantially for
a fall.
"Why, you are the unlicensed doctor."
" I was, said she, " but now I'm your wor-
ship's washerwoman." The dignitary col-
oured, and said that was rather a come down.
— Beade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lii.
Come-off, evasion ; escape.
Had e'er disorders such a rare come-off? —
Tuke, Adventures of Five Hours, Act V .
It would make one grin to observe the
author's come-off from this and the rest of
the charters in this time. — North, Examen,
p. 644.
Come out. When a young lady be-
gins to enter into society, she is said to
be out, or to come out. See Out.
She has seen nothing at all of the world,
for she has never been presented yet, so she
is not come out, you know ; but she's to come
out next year. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk.
VI. ch. ii.
Comet, a game, long since obsolete,
but mentioned by Southerne (see L.)
about fifty years before the subjoined
notice of it ; also by Farquhar in Sir
Harrv Wildair, ii. 2. It was some-
thinglike speculation, and was a favour-
ite with Frederick, Prince of Wales.
The evenings, we walk till dark; then
Lady Mary, Miss Leneve, and I play at comet.
— WalpoU to Mann, i. 203 (1742).
Southey names it among other old
games at cards, and adds —
Is there any one, I s%, who has ever heard
of these games, unless he happens to know,
as I do, that rules for playing them were
translated from the French of the Abb6
Bellecour, and published for the benefit of
the English people, some seventy years ago,
by Mr. F. Newbery. — The Doctor, ch. cxlii.
Come you seven, I suppose a phrase
used in some game, like " seven's the
main," and so a gambler.
Shall I be made
A foolish nouioe, my purse set a broch
By euerie cheating come you seauen ?
Chapman, All Fooles, II. i.
Comfort ati ve, that which ministers
comfort ; the Diets, have it as an adj.
The two hundred crowns in gold ... as a
cordial and comfortative I carry next my
heart.— Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV.
ch. vi.
Comic, a comic writer. (L. gives a
quotation from the Toiler where it
means comedian.)
Thus did he study some paltry half hour
with his eyes fixed upon his book, but as the
comic saith, his mind was in the kitchen. —
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xx.
Comitial. The comitiall ill or disease
is the epilepsy or falling-sickness, so
called because if any one were seized
with it during the comitia or public
assemblies, the meeting was broken up,
the omen being considered bad.
So melancholy turned into madnes,
Into the jpalsie deep-affrighted sadoes ;
Th' U-habitude into the dropsie chill,
And Megrim growes to the Comttial4U.
Sylvester, The Furies, p. 583.
Our [asses] liver, hoofs, or bones being
redue'd to powder are good, as the naturalists
note, against the epilepsy or comitiall sick-
nesse. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 26.
Commacerate, to make lean.
They are the most traytours themselves to
his life, health, and quiet, in continual com-
macerating him with dread and terror. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 177).
Commend, compliment. L. says this
word is only found in the plural, but
the extract shows this to be a mistake.
The singular also occurs in Pericles, ii.
2 (quoted by R.), but there it means
praise.
Phy. Thanks, master jailer, and a kind
commend.
Jail. As much unto your ladyship.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act V.
Commends, a commendation.
You give yourself a plausible commends. —
Marmion, Antiquary, Act I.
Commentation, comments or notes.
I suspect North means the word for
commentition = lie : though he may
use the word = gloss. Milton has
commentitious.
His papers of long study, and much com-
mentation, with his choice books, were either
rifled, or, it may be, burnt with Cawood
Castle.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 207.
At this rate he works to cover the real
truth of the proceedings of those times, and
in their room sets up mere inventions and
commentations of faction. — North, Examen, p.
234.
Commenty, community. The extract
is a quotation from Prov. xxiv. 24 ;
nations is the word in the Aath. Version.
Him shall the people curse, yea, the com-
menty shall abhor him. — Becon, ii. 807.
Commercialism, trading spirit.
And this was the consistent Nemesis of all
poor George's thrift and cunning, of his
determination to carry the buy-cheap-and-
sell-dear commercialism,in which he had been
COMMEROVS
( *39 )
COMPASSL Y
brought up, into every act of life. — C. Kings-
ley, Alton. Locke, ch. xxxix.
Commbrocs, cumbrous.
If your honour will hear these challenges,
ye shall hear such eommerouse trifles and
brabbles that ye shall be weary. — Abp.
Parker, p. 249.
Commix at ion, mingling.
The trim commutation
Of conf us'd fancies, full of alteration,
Makes th" understanding dull.
Sylvester, Eden, 700.
Commode, a procuress.
A pretty lodging we have hit upon ; the
mistress a commode, and the master a — but
who can this ward be? — Foote, Englishman
in Paris, Act I.
Commode, accommodating.
So, sir, am I not very commode to you ? —
Cibber, Prov. Husband, Act IV.
Commodely, conveniently.
You found the whole garden filled with
masks, and spread with tents, which remained
all night very commodely. — Walpole to Mann,
ii. 289 (1749).
I don't mean to treat you with a rowing for
a badge, but it will fall in very commodely
between my parties. — Ibid., Letters, ii. 103
(1750).
Commoner, a sharer. L. has it in
the sense of one having rights of com-
mon with others, but Fuller uses the
word in a more general sense.
Lewis would not leave them, that they
might not leave him, but resolved to be a
commoner with them in weal and wo. — Fuller,
Holy War, TV. xvi.
Common ebess, wife of a commoner.
Peers, commoners, and counsel, peeresses,
co*moneresses and the numerous indefinites
crowded every part. — Mad. D'ArHay, Diary,
▼. 197.
Commonplacbness, ordinariness ; an
absence of anything striking or re-
markable.
Our Vicar . . . happens to be rather drowsy
and even depressing in the monotony of his
eommomplaccness. — Black, Adventures of a
Phaeton, ch. xix.
Commorant, a resident.
Rabbi Jacob, a Jew born, whom I remem-
ber for a long time a commorant in the Uni-
versity.—Aodbet, Life of Williams, i. 10.
I never heard a respondent better hunted
m all my time that I was a commorant in
Cambridge. — Ibid. i. 32.
Commotion, to move, disturb; the
extract will be found at more length
«. v. Upbraid.
He felt it commotion a little and upbraid
him. — Xashe, Lenten Stujjfe (Harl. Misc. vi.
166).
Comographic, description of a kwuij.
(See quotation.)
Condemn not this our Como-graphic or
description of a country-town as too low and
narrow a subject. — Fuller, Hist, of Waltham
Abbey, p. 17.
Compack, pack together.
But th1 art of man not only can compack
Features and forms that life and nature lack,
But also fill the aire with painted shoals
Of flying creatures.
Sylvester, sixth day, first weeke, 888.
Them giuing children moe than in the
heauen
Are starrie circles light as flrie leauen :
And mo then Northren windes (that driues
the rack)
Of Cyrene sands in numbers can compack.
Hudson, Judith, i. 318.
Compact, to agree.
Saturne resolued to destroy his male chil-
dren, either hauing so compacted with his
brother Titan, or to preuent the prophesie,
which was that his sonne should depose him.
—Sandys, Travels, p. 225.
Compactile, fastened together.
These [garlands] were made up after all
ways of art, compactile, sutile, plectile. — Sir
T. Brown, Tract II.
Companioned, accompanied.
He bowed to the ground, and would have
taken my hand, his whip in the other : I did
not like to be so companioned; I withdrew
my hand. — fiichardson, CI. Harlowe, ii. 5.
C0MPANIONLES8, solitary.
There she sat and sewed, and probably
laughed drearily to herself, as companionless
as a prisoner in his dungeon. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xvii.
Company-keeper, a"reveller, or rake.
Yet be it acknowledged that at the Age of
sixteen I became a company-keeper, being led
into idle conversation by my extraordinary
love to singing. — Memoirs of P. P., Clerk of
this Parish.
Compass, in a circular fashion. Cf.
"Compassed window" (Trail, and
Cress, i. 2). A few lines below the
extract Sandys speaks of "a compost
roofe."
The other part . . . doth containe within
a concaue about three yards square, the roofe
hewne compasse. — Sandys, Travels, p. 167.
C0MPA8SLT, fittingly ; in good order.
Th' Eternall-Trine who made all compassly,
Makes the vnder waues the vppers want
supply. — Sylvester, The Lawe, p. 640.
COMPETITIONER ( 140 )
CON-ARGUER
Competitioner, a fellow-petitioner.
They spake to the Saints . . . moving them
to be competitioners with us to the throne of
grace.— Bp. Hall, Works, ix. 365.
Compile, accumulation.
Hence sprang the loves of Joue, the Sonne's
exile,
The shame of Mars and Venus in a net,
Juno's forsaken bed, Saturn's compile
Of frantike discontentment, which beset
All heauen with armes.
G. Markham, Tragedie of
Sir J2. Grinuile, p. 51.
Compitor, competitor; for which it
is perhaps a misprint
Harald, being at hand, carried it ; the first
act of whose raigne was the banishment, and
surprizing all the treasure of his stepmother,
Queen Emma ; then the putting out the eyes
of Alfried her sonne his compitor, — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng., p. 18.
Complain, complaint.
He sick to lose .
The amorous promise of her lone complain,
Swoon'd murmuring of love, and pale with
pain. — Keats, Lamia.
Complect, to weave together. Ster-
ling blames Carlyle for using this word.
See extract s. v. Environment.
By what chains, or indeed infinitely com-
plected tissues, of meditation, this grand
theorem is here unfolded . . . it were per-
haps a mad ambition to attempt exhibiting.
— Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. viii.
Complexionless, without a complex-
ion ; colourless.
In those four male personages, although
complexionless and eyebrowless, I beheld four
members of the Family P. Salcy. — Dickens,
Uncommercial Traveller, xxv.
Compliant, a complier ; the word is
usually an adj. Fuller reckons among
the objections to the Liturgy —
It being a compliant with the Papists in a
great part of their service doth not a little
confirm them in their superstition and idol-
atry.—Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. x. 8.
Complicacy, complex nature.
Among the earliest tools of any complicacy
which a man-of -letters gets to handle are his
class-books. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. II.
ch. iii.
Comply, to bend, or, perhaps, to em-
brace.
Witty Ovid by
Whom faire Corinna sits, and doth comply
With yvorie wrists his laureat head.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 221.
Compoundable, capable of being
compounded.
A penalty of not less than forty shillings
or more than five pounds compoundable for a
term of imprisonment. — Dickens, Uncommer-
cial Traveller, xii
Compresbyter, fellow - presbyter.
Milton, in the same book, but two or
three pages earlier, has the adj. com-
presbyteruzl, and this is given by R.
and L.
Cyprian in many places . . . speaking of
presbyters calls them his compresbyters, as
if he deemed himself no other, whereas by
the same place it appears he was a bishop. —
Milton, Of Reformation in Eng., bk. L
Compulse, to compel.
Many parents constrain their sons and
daughters to marry where they love not, and
some are beaten aud compulsed — Latimer, i.
170.
Before calamity she is a tigress ; she rends
her woes, shivers them in compulsed abhor-
rence.— Miss Bronte, Villette, en. xxiii.
Compursion, drawing together.
He deemed it most prudent, in the situ-
ation he was in at present, to bear it, if pos-
sible, like a Stoick ; which, with the help of
some wry faces and compursions of the mouth,
he had certainly accomplished, had his im-
agination continued neuter. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, iii. 210.
Compdtate, to compute.
Garisons disposed in senerall limits of the
land with their companies, consisting of
sundry strange nations, computated in all to
be fifty-two thousand foote, and three hun-
dred horse. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 4.
Computator, computer.
The intense heat ... is proved by compu-
tators, from its vicinity to the sun, to be
more than equal to that of red hot iron. —
Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 153.
Comradeship, intimate fellowship.
Some of his Madeira acquaintanceships
were really good ; and one of them, if not
more, ripened into comradeship and friend-
ship for him. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt.
II. ch. v.
Con, to direct the course of a ship.
See Cun.
Con the ship, so ho ! mind your steerage.
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xx.
I could con or fight a ship as well as ever.
— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. viiL
Con-arguer, an opposer ; an arguer
on the contrary side.
This method put the con-arguers and ob-
jectors straight into the midst of the plot. —
North, Examen, p. 234.
CONCEDENCE ( 141 ) CONCUPISCENTIAL
CONCEDKNCB, COnC638ion.
All I had to apprehend was that a daughter
so reluctantly carried off would offer terms
to her father, and would be accepted upon a
mutual conctdence ; they to give up Solmes,
she to give up me. — Richardson, CI. Harlow,
iii. 116.
Conceiter, fancier. Greene (Mena-
pkon, p. 23) calls Dolphins " sweete
conceipters of Musicke."
Concblbbbate, to celebrate together.
Here I could fareake out into a boundlesse
race of oratory, in shrill trumpetting and
oncelebrating the royall magnificence of her
government. — Nashe, Lenten* Stuff* (Harl.
J//*\, vi. 149).
Wherein the wives of Amnites solemnly
Concelebrate their high feasts Bacchanall.
Holland's Camden, ii. 231.
Concerned, Irish expression for in-
toxicated ; or, flustered with drink.
Which, and I am sure I have been his serv-
ant four years since October,
And he never call'd me worse than sweet-
heart, drunk or sober ;
Not that I know his .Reverence was ever
concerned to my knowledge,
Tho' yon and your come-rogues keep him
out so late in your wicked college.
Swift j Mary, the cook-maid, to Dr. Sheridan.
Oh, she's a light-skirts! yea, and at this
present
A little, as you see, concerned with liquor.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. H. iii. 3.
Concerner, one who belongs to or
has concerns with another (?).
He had
His loves too and his mistresses ; wasenterM
Among the philosophical Madams, was
As great with them as their conctrners; and
I hear
Kept one of them in pension.
Maine, City Watch, i. 1.
CoNCESsiBLE, capable of being granted.
It was built upon one of the most con-
cfisible postulatums in Nature. — Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, vi. 157.
One could pity this poor Irish people;
their case is pitiable enough. The claim
they started with in 1641 was for religious
freedom. Their claim, we can now all see,
was just; essentially just, though full of
intricacy ; difficult to render clear and con-
cewble. — Carlyle, Cromwell's Letters, &c., ii.
44.
Concinnb, neat ; elegant.
Beauty consists in a sweet variety of col-
ours, and in a conctnne disposition of different
parts.— ^cfeau, i. 398.
Concipient, conceiving.
Here many a foetus laugh and half encore,
Clings to the roof, or creeps along the floor ;
By puffs concipient some in ether flit,
Ana soar in bravos from the thundering pit.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses, p. 140.
Concord, to set at one ; to bring into
harmony.
He lived and died with general councils
in his pate, with windmills of union to con-
cord Borne and England, England and Borne,
Germany with them both. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 102.
The king was now at Whitehall, and the
French agents plied it to concord conditions
for the royal marriage. — Ibid. i. 212.
Concord, a legal instrument, defined
by Bailey, " an agreement between par-
ties who intend the levying of fines
upon lands one to another.*'
One John Throkmorton, a justicer of
Cheshire in Queen Elizabeth's days, for not
exhibiting a judicial concord with all the de-
fects of the same, but supplying or filling
up what was worn out of the authentical
original, was fined for being over officious. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. i. 0.
After the licence actually obtained, and
the king's silver paid, without which the
concord is no fine, the fine is perfected,
though in some other respects deficient.
Hence, as I take it, the concord is called a
fine levied, and not because it is finis litium.
—North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 204.
Concordious, harmonious.
The King found himself at more leisure
and freedom in the absence of the Lord
Marquess to study the calling of a comfort-
able and concordious Parliament. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, i. 109.
Concordiodsly, harmoniously.
The business was concordiously despatched.
—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 22.
Concorrdpt, to corrupt together.
His foule contagion concorrupted all
His fellow-creatures.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 4.
Concrede, to entrust: perhaps mis-
print for concredit.
[I] did not all this time imagine or conceit
that he intended in any way to defraud the
trust concreded to him by the Parliament.—
Sir Hugh Cholmley's Revolt, 1643, p. 4.
Concubinize, to take as a concubine.
The extract is quoted by Southey in
The Cid, p. 29.
If thou beholdest a beautiful woman, con*
cubtnite her, though she seem coy ; thou
wilt be a better man. — Owen's transl. of
Mabinogion.
CONCUPISCENTIAL, lustful.
C0NCUPISC1BLE ( 142 ) CONFORMITAN
By the practise of these austerities I
thought you had quench 'd those concupiscent
fi'a# flames.— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 134.
Concupiscible, to be desired ; it
usually means desiring, lustful, as in
Meat, for Meat. V. i.
Never did thy eyes behold or thy concu-
piscence covet anything in this world more
concupiscible than widow Wadman. — Sterne,
Tr. Shandy, v. 47.
Concurrent, an opponent ; a Latin-
ism.
After him, Gratian took upon him the
Empire . . . : whereat Marimus, a Spaniard
borne, his concurrent, and withal descended
in right line from Oonstantinus the Great,
. . . wm . . highly discontented. — Holland's
Camden, p. 82.
Whose sonne Patrick was by the Barrets
his concurrents murdered in feud. — Ibid. ii.
40.
Therefore proceedes he by all meanea to
vexe and disgrace him, and to advance his
concurrent the Archbishop of Yorke. — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng., p. 72.
Concutient, meeting together with
violence.
The negroes on the maternal estate . •
would meet in combat like two concutient
cannonballs. — Thackeray, Virginians, ch. xl.
Condiddle, to purloin. H. gives it
(but without example) as a Devonshire
word.
" Twig the old connoisseur," said the
Squire to the Knight, M he is condiddling the
drawing."— Scott, S. Ronan's Well, i. 71.
Conditure, a seasoning.
Halec or Alec . . . was a conditure and
sawce much affected by antiquity.— &'r T.
Brown, Tract iv.
Conduct, or Conduct money, an ex-
action levied by Charles I. on the pre-
text of paying travelling expenses of
troops. Cf . Coat-money, with which it
is always joined. The second extract
is furnished in the notes to Hales' 8
Areopagitica, 2nd ed.
Who shall then sticke closest to ye, and
excite others ? Not he who takes up armes
for cote and conduct and his four nobles of
Danegelt.— -Milton, Areopagitica, p. 50.
He will join as many shields together as
would make a Roman testudo or Macedonian
phalanx, to fortify the nobility of a new
made lord that will pay for the impresting
of them, and allow him coat and conduct
money. — Butler, Characters {The Herald).
Confab, an abbreviation of confabu-
late. L. has it as a substantive.
Mrs. Thrale and I were dressing, and as
usual confabbing. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i.
120.
Confectionary, store-room, the place
where confections are kept.
Here, ladies, are the keys of the stores, of
the confectionary, of the wine-vaults. — Rich-
ardson, Grandison, ii. 226.
Confer, to confer on.
I tell them all that high Jove bowed his
head,
As first we went aboard our fleet for sign we
should confer
These Trojans their due fate and death.
Chapman, Iliad, ii. 907.
Confessal, confession.
When the matter is so plaine that it can
not be denied or traversed, it is good that it
be justified by confessal and auoidance. —
Puttenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch.
Confessionaire, a penitent ; one who
has made confession.
By means of this supposed ingenuity,
Lovelace obtains a praise instead of a merited
dispraise, and, like an absolved confessionaire,
wipes off, as he goes along, one score, to begin
another. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, ii. 153.
Confessionary, a place for hearing
confessions.
We concur in opinion that these stalls, of
which kind there are many in good preserv-
ation, have been improperly termed confes-
sionarUs or confessionals. — Archaol. x. 299
(1792).
Confine, a neighbour. (L. marks
this word as rare and obsolete, and sup-
plies a single instance ; it seems worth
while to add another. Sylvester is
speaking of the confusion of languages.)
Or if we talk, but with our neer confines,
We borrow monthes, or else we work by
signes.
Baltylon, 260.
Confiscate, in the extract is applied
to the man, though of course it is his
goods that are really referred to.
For which notorious crimes, . . . he was
committed unto ward, and breaking prison,
was confiscated and proclaimed traytor. —
Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 331.
Conflagrate, to burn.
Popularity is as a blaze of illumination,
or alas ! of conflagration kindled round a man
. . . conflagrating the poor man himself into
ashes and caput mortuum. — Carlyle, Jfisc,
iv. 144.
Con form it an, conformist. Cf. Nox-
conformitant.
CONFRAIR Y
( '43)
CONNATIVE
With God, I dare boldly say, there is
neither Caivinist nor Lutheran, Protestant
nor Puritan, Con/ormitan or Non-oonform-
itan, but faith and love in Christ is all in all.
— Ward, Sermons, p. 8.
Con fr airy, a fraternity.
The confrairies are fraternities of devotees
who inlist themselves under the banners of
particular saints. — Smollett, France and Italy,
Letter xxvii.
Confrigerate, to freeze together.
There stands He shaking in a f eauer-fit,
While the cold aire His wounds confrigerates.
Davies, Holy Soode, p. 16.
Confront, an opposition.
He finds the Parliament professing hos-
tility against him by their command and
overt act, denying him way into the town of
Hull, and the use of his Magazine ; a confront
no less outrageous than if they had given
him battel.— Hacket, Life of fFilliams, ii.
187.
Congredients, things that come
together ; component parts.
The congredients, the preparations . . . are
so held as to be conveyed to a cleanly mind
by no language. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, vi.
201.
Congregationer, Congregational ist
or Independent.
O how these blasphemed the name, and
slander'd the footsteps of God's Anointed,
who laid our good King forth as a Papist
to their rabble, since he would neither be
for the Consistorians nor Congregationers. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 197.
Cohgbession, meeting ; contact ; col-
lision.
Not perplexing you in first or last with
anything handled in any other interpreter,
further than I must conscionably make con-
gression with such as have diminished, man-
gled, and maimed my most worthily, most
tendered author. — Chapman, Comment on II. i.
Coninquinate, to pollute together.
O let these wounds, these woundes inde-
prauate
Be holy sanctuaries for my whole Man ;
That though sinnes sores it oft coninquinate,
Yet there it may be made as white as
swanne. — Davies, Holy Rood, p. 28.
Conjugacy, marriage.
Every History of England shews at large
what good and great works Bishops and
other Church-men in England did, not onely
in their Papal Celibacy, but in their Primi-
tive and later Conjugacy. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 355.
Conjugation, marriage.
Dick heard, and tweedling, ogling, bridling,
Turning short round, strutting and sidleing,
Attested glad his approbation
Of an immediate conjugation.
Cottper, Pairing Time anticipated.
Conjugial. See quotation.
Conjugial for conjugal, though allowed by
a few Latiu examples, is a pedantry on
Swedenborg's part. — C. Kingslcy, Lett, and
Mem., ii. 259.
Conjuring, solemn entreaty: con-
juring usually = leger-de-main from
the idea of the dealer in magic con-
juring spirits to assist him : the penult-
imate of the word in this sense is
short ; in the extract most people would
pronounce it long. Gauden is speaking
of the exhortations in the New Test,
to peace and charity.
These holy charms, these pious and pa-
thetic conjurings, these Divine prayings and
charitable beseechings are much forgotten. —
—Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 132.
Conjuror. To say that a man is no
conjuror implies that he is not very
wise ; this sense is given in L., but the
quotation appended hardly illustrates
it. Cf. Witch.
Sir Sampson has a son that is expected to-
night ; and by the account I have heard of his
education can be no conjuror. — Congreve, Love
for Love, ii. 0.
I was never taken for a conjuror before, I'd
have you to know.
Lord! said I, don't be angry, I am sure I
never thought you so :
You know, I honour the cloth ; I design to
be a Parson's wife ;
I never took one in your coat for a conjuror
in all my life.
Swift, Petition of Frances Ham's.
Conks. See quotation.
"Well yo' lasses will have your conks"
(private talks), "I know; secrets 'bout
sweethearts and such like." — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia* s Lovers, ch. vi.
Conn, the steerage. See Con.
He only discovered my departure by the
tittering of the other midshipmen and the
quartermaster at the conn. — Marry at, Fr.
Mildmay, ch. iv.
Connational, belonging to the same
nation.
It is a sanction of nature to spare the
blood of citizens, connatural, collateral, con-
national with ourselves. — Adams, i. 183.
Connative, f ell ow - native. The
meaning of the extract seems to be
that the heathen have some excuse for
CONNIVE
( *44 )
CONSORTIER
using tobacco, it being indigenous to
their country.
Yet tb* Heathen have with th' ill some good
withall,
Sith their [there ?] connative 'tis connaturall.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 40.
Connive on, to connive at
Pray you connive
On my weak tenderness.
Massinger, The Picture, iii. 2.
Connive with, to tamper with or to
pass over.
And for those statutes made for the pre-
servation of religion, they are all . . .in full
force, and in free execution ; nor were they
ever intended to be connived with in the
least syllable. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i.
178.
Connixation, swallowing up in snow.
As we have never had a rainbow to assure
ns that the world shall not be snowed to
death, I thought last night was the general
connixation. — Walpole, Letters, ii. 337 (1782).
Conquerlesb, invincible.
The damned Nauie did a glimmering send,
By which Sir Richard might their power
reueale,
Which seeming conqueriesse did cenquests
lend.
G. Markham, Drag, of Sir R. Grinuile, 57.
Conquest, to conquer.
To conquest these fellowes the man I wil
play. — Preston, King Cambists (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., i. 261).
Consacre, to consecrate.
Lo here these Champions that have (bravely-
Withstood proud Tvrants, stoutly consacring
Their lives and soules to God in suffering.
Sylvester, Triumph of Faith, iii. 5.
There was a Peach-Tree growing there amid
God-Camosh Temple, to him consacred.
Ibid. Maiden's Blush, 672.
Consciuncle, applied contempt-
uously to an over - scrupulous con-
science. Cf. Pa&siuncle.
The canonists are good bone-setters for a
bone that was never broken; their rubrics
are filled with punctilios not for consciences,
but for consciuncles. — Hacket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 08.
Conrentiently, with full consent;
ex animo.
Mentally, spiritually, charitably, cordially,
and consentiently he still adhered to the
Catholick Conformity and Unity. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 4.
Consequences, a game, something
like cross-readings.
They met for the sake of eating, drinking,
and laughing together, playing at cards or
consequences, or any other game that was
sufficiently noiqy. — Miss Austen, Sense and
Sensibility, ch. xxiii.
Consequential, an inference or re-
sult.
It may be thought superfluous to spend so
many words upon our author's precious
observations out of the Lord Clarendon's
History, and some consequentials as I have
done. — North, Examen, p. 29.
Consequentialness, pompous arro-
gance.
Let
Her pamper'd lap-dog with his fetid breath
In bold bravado join, and snap and growl,
With petulant consequentialness elate.
Southey, To A . Cunningham.
Conservatory, preservative. Jer.
Taylor has the word in this sense as a
substantive.
She transmits a souvrain and conservatory
influence through all the members, without
which the whole man must in the fleetest
article of time be but a cadaver. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 143.
Considerables, things of import-
ance; for similar uses, see *. v. Ob-
6ERVABLE8.
He had a rare felicity in speedy reading of
books, and as it were but a turning them
over would give an exact account of all
considerables therein. — Fuller, Holy State,
II. x. 7.
The passages behind the curtain (consider-
ables concealed from us) might much alter
the case.— Ibid., Ch. Hist., II. ii. 34.
Few considerables in that age (which was
the crisis of regal and papal power in this
land) will escape our discovery herein. — Ibid.
III. iii. 29.
Consolate, consolatory.
Both my love and my gratitude would
make a visit now and then from my dear
Miss Howe the most consolate thing in the
world to me. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vii.
40.
Consolatrix, female consoler.
Love, the consolatrix, met him again. —
Mrs. Oliphant, Salem Chapel, eh. xxvi.
Console, a pier-table or bracket; a
French word, but naturalized with us.
Adele was leading me by the hand round
the room, showing me the beautiful books and
ornaments on the consoles and chiffonieres.
— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xiii.
Consortier, taker of a part in a con-
cert.
His lordship had not been long matter of
CONSPIRACY ( 145 ) CONTEMPTUOUS
the viol, and a sure consortier, but he turned
composer.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii.
Conspiracy, combination (physical).
If she at still, that is best, for so is the
conspiracy of her several graces, held best
together to make one perfect figure of beauty.
Sidney, Arcadia, Bk. III. p. 383.
C0.V8PIS8ATE, to thicken together.
For that which doth conspiesate active is.—
H. More, Infinity of Worlds, st. 14.
* C0N8TABILITY, office of a constable.
The King still creates a Constable for the
ceremony of the coronation; but his Con-
stability ceases immediately after the cere-
mony is over.— Misson, Travels in Eng., p.
Constable. To outrun the constable
= to get into pecuniary difficulties.
Afterwards there was another trick found
oat to get money, and after they had got
it, mother Parliament was called to set all
right, fcc., but now they have so outrun the
constable.— Selden, Table Talk (Money).
" Harkee, mv girl, how far nave yon over-
run the constable ?nl told him that the debt
amounted to eleven pounds, besides the ex-
peace of the writ.— Smollett, Roderick Ban'
dan, ch. xxiii.
Poor man ! at th' election he threw t' other
day,
All his victuals, and liquor, and money away ;
And some people think with such haste he
began,
That soon he the constable greatly outran.
AnsUy, New Bath Guide, Letter vii.
Constitutionality, adherence to the
constitution ; constitutionalism.
Rule afterwards with utmost constitution''
*Kty; doing justice, loving mercy, being
shepherd of this indigent people, not shearer
merely, aid shepherd's similitude.— Carlyle,
J>. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. II. ch. iv.
Consulage, consulate.
At Council we debated the buisinesse of
the Consulage of Leghorne. — Evelyn, Diary,
*W. 8, 1672.
Consult, a person consulted; a
doctor.
u Has she taken the dose of emetick?"
nvs the doctor. " Yes," answered the maid,
" bat it had no effect." " Bon," cries the con-
suit, ** a happy prognostic." " It cast her into
convulsions," continued the maid. " Better
yet," says the consult*1 — Gentleman In-
Krurfef,p.543.
Conbultivelt, purposely.
I feare it would be a theame displeasant to
the pave modesty of the discreet present
magistrates, and therefore consultivefy I over-
slip it.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Hart. Misc.,
vi.140).
Consulto, council.
^ I troubled his Highness with a long rela-
tion of the consulto we had about His
Majesty's taking the oaths. — Rochet, Life of
Williams, i. 144.
Scarce any in all the consulto did vote to
my Lord Duke's satisfaction. — Ibid. i. 109.
Consumedly, excessively.
I believe they talkM of me, for they
laugh 'd consumedly. — Farquhar, Beaux Stra-
tagem, III. i.
" Have you seen his new carriage ? M saya
Snarley. ** Yes," says Yow, " he's so consum-
edly proud of it, that he can't see his old
friends while he drives." — Thackeray, Shabby
Genteel Story, ch. iii.
We might, if we chose, go into a small
parlour smelling consumedly of gin and coarse
tobacco. — Black, Adventures of a Phaeton,
ch. xviii.
Consumeless, unconsuinable ; inde-
structible.
Look, sister, how the queasy - stomach 'd
graves
Vomit their dead, and how the purple waves
Scald their consumeless bodies.
Quarles, Emblems, iii. 14.
Consumptuous, consumptive.
This vitall and natural Balsam of piety
once decayed, dried up, or exhausted by un-
christian calentures, no wonder if the whole
constitution of Religion grow weak, ricketty
and consumptuous. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 262.
Containment. L. has this word as
competence ; in the subjoined passage
it seems to mean substance, that which
was contained in the estate.
Twenty pounds a moneth, a vast sum . . •
enough to shatter the conteinmevt of a rich
man's estate.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. iv. 9.
Contemplant, med itative ; observant.
Contemplant Spirits! ye that hover o'er
"With untired gaze the immeasurable fount
Ebullient with creative Deity.
Coleridge, Religious Musings,
Contempt, to contemn; for which,
perhaps, it is a slip of the pen or of
the press.
I regretted that the Swedes and Danes
should so much contempt each other. — Southty,
Letters, 1822 (iii. 350).
Contemptuous, denpised.
The preste to she we no compassion, the
levite to ministre no mercye, and, last of all,
the contempt vouse Samaritane to exercise all
L
CONTENTATION ( 146 ) CONTRA YERVA
the offices of pitye. — Vocaeyon of Johan Bale,
1553 (Ilarl. Misc., vi. 451).
Contentation, usually = content ; but
in the extract means contention. It
may be a misprint, but N. gives an in-
stance of contention being employed,
where contentation, i. e. content, seemB
to be meant.
There is no weak contentation between
these, and the labour is hard to reconcile
them. — Adams, i. 454.
Contentfulness, satisfaction.
With great content all the day, as I think
I ever passed a day in my life, because of
the contentfulness of our errand, and the
nobleness of the company, and our manner
of going. — Pepys, July 24, 1665.
Contenument, continuance.
The worst I wish our English Gentry is,
that, by God's blessing on their thrift, they
may seasonably out-grow the sad impres-
sions which our Civil Wars have left in their
Estates, in some to the shaking of their con-
tenument. — Fuller, Worthies, Yorkshire (ii.
523).
Contexture, to weave.
Round his mysterious Me there lies, under
all these wool-rags, a Garment of Flesh (or
of Senses) contextured in the Loom of Heaven.
— Carlyle, Sartor Kesartus, Bk. I. ch. z.
Conticent, silent.
The servants have left the room, the guests
sit conticent. — Thackeray, Virginians, ch. Ii.
Continent, applied by Fuller to the
inland part of our own island ; in the
second quotation it signifies the limit
or boundary ; that which contains.
The Danes not only assailed the skirts
and outsides of the land, but also made iu-
rodes many miles into the continent thereof.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. iv. 45.
Nor do we forget, though acted out of the
continent of England, that cruel murder in
the isle of Garnsey.— Ibid. VIII. ii. 24.
Continent, earth.
Stay, Sigismund, forget'st thou I am he
That with the cannon shook Vienna wall,
And made it dance upon the continent ?
Marloive, 2 Tatnburlaine, I. i.
Continuando, continuation.
He . . makes a very lacquey of Fitzharris,
whose plot was to be only a continuando of
that which he held forth. — North, Examen,
p. 233.
Continuations, one of the numerous
euphemisms for trousers. Cf. Inde-
bcribables, Inexplicables, Inexpres-
sibles, Unmentionables.
A sleek man ... in drab shorts and con-
tinuations, black coat, neck-cloth and gloves.
— Sketches by Boz ( Winglebury Duel).
Contrabanded, smuggled ; contra-
band.
Christian shippes . . . are there also searched
for concealed Slaues, and goods contrabanded.
— Sandys, Travels, p. 87.
Contraconscient, repugnant to con-
science.
The most reprobate wretch doth commit
some contraconscient iniquities, and hath the
contradiction of his own soul by the rem-
nants of reason left in it.— Adams, i. 249.
Contractly, by contraction.
The family of D'Alanson, now contractly
called Dalison. — Holland's Canhden, p. 544.
Contrair, contrary.
So Amram's sacred sonne, in these projects
Hade one selfe cause have two contrair
effects. — Hudson* s Judith, ii. 224.
Contrast. This word is of some-
what late introduction (Howell uses the
Italian form), and at first it meant a
dispute. Modern Diets, do not give
this meaning, and indeed the earliest
authority for the noun furnished there
is from Bp. Law about the middle of
the last century. In V index Anglims,
1644 {Ilarl. Misc., ii. 41), contrast is
reckoned among that " ridiculous mer-r
chandise" which verbal innovators
" seek to sell for current . . and I am
deceived if they will not move both
your anger and laughter." Daniel, how-
ever, had used it in 1617.
He married Matilda the daughter of
Baldouin, the fift Earl of Flaunders, but
not without contrast and trouble. — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng., p. 26.
In open consistory when there was such
a contrasto 'twixt the cardinals for a supply
from St. Peter, he declared that he was well
satisfy'd that this war in Germany was no
war of religion. — Howell, Letters, I. vi. 8.
There was tough canvassing for voices,
and a great contrasto in the conclave 'twixt
the Spanish and French faction. — Ibid. I.
vi. 53.
In all these contrasts the Archbishop
prevailed, and broke through mutinies and
high threats. — Hacket, Life of WilliatM, ii.
209.
Contra-terva, a species of birth-
wort which grows in Jamaica, and is
used as an antidote against poison or
infection.
No Indian is so savage but that he knows
the use of his tobacco and eontra-yerta. —
Bp. Hall, Works, viii. 167.
CONTR1ST
( 147 )
CONVE Y
Contrist, to sadden.
He heard the litanies and the mementos
of the priests that carried his wife to be
boried, upon which he left the good pur-
pose he was in, and was suddenly ravished
another way, saying, Lord God, must I again
contrist myself? — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. II.
cb. 1U.
Twould be as much as my life was worth
to deject and contrist myself with so bad
and melancholy an account. — Sterne, Irist.
Shandy, ii. 198.
Control, a ruler.
Hen formed to be instruments, not con-
trols—Burke, Fr. Revolution, p. 34.
Controvebtistical, controversial.
Eudoxus told him in controvert isti cat de-
bates, there was no appeal from reason to
the sword. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 850.
Costruth, to agree in truth ; a hybrid
word coined by Hall.
All the holy doctrines of Divine Scripture
do, as that Father said aright, <rvva\i)Qiuuv,
u rontruth with " each other. — Bp. Hall,
Works, viii. 662.
Contumace, seems to be a legal term ;
ft declaration that a person is contu-
macious or in contempt.
That no man's name should be expressed
in the pulpit, except the fault be notorious
and pnblick, and so declared by an assize,
excommunication, contumace, and lawful ad-
monition.— Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians,
p. 358.
Contumacitt, perversity ; contumacy
is more common.
A solemn high-stalking man ; with such a
fund of indignation in him, or of lateut
indignation ; of contumacity, irrefragahility.
—Carlyle, Misc., iv. 80.
Contuma"x, contumacious.
The more, sir, that ye busy for you to
dnw him towards you, the more contumam
he is made, and the further fro you. — Exam,
of W. Thorpe (Bale's Select Works, p. 121).
She was pronounced to be contumax for
defect of appearance. — Heylin, Reformation,
U.64.
Contusive, bruising.
Te Imps of Murder, guard her angel form,
Check the rude surge, and chase the hovering
storm ;
Shield from contusive rocks her timber limbs,
And guide the sweet Enthusiast as she swims.
Poetry of A nti jacobin, p. 150.
Convel, to tear or mangle.
They ought and must repute, hold, and
take all the same things for the most holv,
most sure, and most certain and infallible
words of God, and such as neither ought or
can be altered or convelled by any contrary
opinion or authority. — Fuller, Ch. Hist^ V.
iii. 35.
Convenience, a vehicle ; though in
this sense it seems always to be joined
with leathern.
Now I consider thy face, I remember thou
didst come up in the leathern conveniency
with me.— Centli vre, Bold Stroke for a Wife,
Act V.
A rascally slave of a chairman takes me
upon the north side of my outward man with
one of the poles of his leathern conveniency.
— T. Broicn, Works, iii. 117.
What sport would our old Oxford acquaint-
ance make at a man packed up in this
leathern convenience with a wife and chil-
dren.— Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. XII.
ch. xi.
Conventical, conventual, derived
from or belonging to a convent.
The gardener . . . had mortgaged a month
of his conventical wages in a borachio or
leathern cask of wine. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
V. 115.
Conventicle. The quotation refers
to the Animadversions upon Sir Richard
Bakers Chronicle by Thomas Blount
of the Inner Temple. The earliest quota-
tion that I have found in any Diet,
under "conventicle" is from Hall's
Chronicle, about, 160 years after Wic-
lif's death.
The said Animadversions were called in
and sileno'd in the beginning of January, by
Dr. Mews, the vice-chancellour, because
therein, p. 30, 'tis said that the word conven-
ticle was first taken up in the time of Wick-
liff.— A. Wood, Life, Jan. 1671-2.
Conversableness, readiness to con-
verse.
The women of the family of Porretta par-
ticularly, he says, because of their learuiug,
freedom, and conversablene$s,h&ve been called,
by their enemies, Frenchwomen. — Richard'
son, Grandison, iii. 251.
Conversation, conversazione.
Lady Pomfret has a charming conversation
once a week. — Walpole, Letters, i. 71 (1740).
Con version er, missioner.
The Conversioner (understand Parsons the
Jesuite) mainly stickleth for the Apostle
Peter to have first preached the gospel here.
— Fuller, Ch. Hist., I. i. 7.
Convey, conveyance or transfer.
A clown's sonne must be clapt in a velvet
pantophle, and a velvet breech ; though the
presumptuous a»«se be drowned in the mer-
cer's booke, and make a convey of all his
L 2
C0NV1VAL
( 148)
COPPERS
lands to the usurer. — Greene, Quip for an
Upstart Courtier {Hart, Misc., v. 403).
Convival, a guest.
The number of the conuiuals at priuate
entertainments exceeded not nine, nor were
vnder three. — Sandys, Travels, p. 78.
Convolute, that which is rolled up,
as in a ball.
But the lower lip which is drawn inwards
with the curve of a marine shell — oh, what
a convolute of cruelty and revenge is there ! —
Dt Quincey, System of the Heavens.
Convulnerate, to join in wounding.
For as thornes did His head convulnerate,
So rods all round Him did excoriate.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 13.
Cony-gat, a rabbit-burrow.
This weasel-monger, who is no better than
a cat in a house, or a ferret in a cony-gat,
shall not dissuade your majesty from a
gardener, whose art is to make walks plea-
sant for princes. — Pede, The Gardener's
Speech, p. 579.
Conyngby, a rabbit-warren.
There is a conyngry called Milborowe heth
granted by the King to John Honteley. —
Document, circa 1521 (Archaol., xxv. 313).
Cookebies, dainties.
His appetite was gone, and cookeries were
provided in order to tempt his palate, but all
was chip. — North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii.
205.
Cool. This word is sometimes used
in speaking of a sum of money : it
usually implies that the sum is large.
See extract from Smollet, «. v. Shake-
bag.
Suppose you .don't get sixpence costs, and
lose your cool hundred by it, still it's a great
advantage. — Miss Edgeworth, Love and Law,
i. 2.
" She had wrote out a little coddleshell in
her own hand a day or two afore the accident,
leaving a cool four thousand to Mr. Matthew
Pocket." ... I never discovered from whom
Joe derived the conventional temperature of
the four thousand pounds, but it appeared to
make the sum of money more to him, and
he had a manifest relish in insisting on its
being cool. — Dickens, Great Expectations, ch.
lvii.
Coolth, coolness; a word formed
like Walpole's blueth, gloomth, greenth.
In the evening my father and Mrs. Thrale
seated themselves out of doors, just before
the Blue-room windows, for coolth and chat.
— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, ii. 77.
Coome, a measure containing four
bushels. See L., s. v. comb.
His Majesty measured out his accumulated
gifts, not by the bushel or by the coome, but
by the barn-full.— Hacket, Life of Williams 9
i. 63.
Coon, shortened form of racoon, and
applied to a person : it is an American-
ism that has been adopted in England ;
a gone coon is one who is in extremity.
If you start in any business with an empty
pocket, you are a gone coon. — Reade, Never
too late to mend, ch. xxxvi.
Cooperage, the place where coopers'
work is done.
[The Ipswich people have] room for erect-
ing their magazines, warehouses, roap-walks,
cooperages, &c., on the easiest terms. — Defoe,
Tour thro' G. Britain, i. 26.
Cop, to throw.
Then clatter went the earthen plates,
" Mind, Judie ! " was the cry ;
I could have copH them at their pates,
" Trenchers for me," said I.
Bloomfeld, The Hotkey.
Coparceny, equal partnership.
The English exiles . . . had a church
granted unto them, yet so as they were to
hold the same in co-parcenie with the French
Protestants, they one day, and the English
another.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VIII. ii. 43.
Cope, now always an ecclesiastical
vestment; but, as Wheatley remarks,
not formerly so invariably.
Xantippe had pulled awaie her house-
ban des cope from his backe, even in the open
strete, and his familiar companions gaue
hym a by warnyng to auenge soche a
naughtie touche or pranke with his tenne
coramandements.-- UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 27.
The side robe or cope of homely and course
clothe soche as the beggerie pnilosophiers,
and none els vsen to weare. — Ibid. p. 47.
Cope, an exchange or bargain.
Thomas, maids when they come to see the
fair,
Count not to make a cope for dearth of hay.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 157.
Cope. Gain cope = to attain equality.
If I should set the mercies of our land to
run along with Israel's, we should gain cope
of them, and outrun them. — Adams, i. 350.
Cofpers. Hot coppers is a slang ex-
pression for a mouth parched through
excessive drinking.
We were playing Van John in Blake's
rooms till three last night, and he gave us
devilled bones and mulled port. A fellow
can't enjoy his breakfast after that without
something to cool his coppers. — Hughes, Tom
Brown at Oxford, ch. iii.
COPPIL
( *49 )
CORNET
Coppil. Bailey has "Coppel, Cup*
pel, a pot in which goldsmiths melt
and fine their metal: also, a sort of
crucible used by chymists in purifying
gold or silver." In the extract it is a
verb = to refine.
Both which (as a most noble Knight, Sir
K. D., hath it) may be illustrated in some
measure by what we find passeth in the cop-
pitting of a fixed metal], which, as long as
any lead, or drosse, or any allay remains
with it, contiiiueth still melting, flowing,
and in motion under the muffle. — Howell,
tarty of Beasts, p. 148.
Copwebless, without cobwebs. Prof.
Skeat [Etymol. Diet.] says that "cob-
web" is derived "either (1) from W.
cob j a spider, and £. web) or (2) a
shortened form of aUercop^web, from
the M. E. attercop, a spider. Cf. the
spelling copwebbe, Golden Boke, c.
xvii." Another and later instance of
this spelling is subjoined.
Amongst the Civil Structures, Westminster
Hall is eminent . . . built with copwebless
beams, conceived of Irish wood. — Fuller,
Worthies, Westminster (ii. 103).
Copy, a legal instrument, or the pro-
perty held thereby (cf. Macbeth, III. ii,
quoted by L., *. v.).
I am the lamle-lord, Keeper, of thy holds,
By copy all thy living lies in me.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 170.
What poor man's right, what widow's copy,
or what orphan's legacy would have been
safe from us ? — Andrewes, Sermons, v. 27.
I finde that Waltham Abbey (for Benedic-
tines at the first) had its copie altered by
King Henry the Second, ana bestowed on
Augustiniane. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. 1.
Copy of countenance, a flam or
humbug.
Whatsoever he prateth of a rigorous de-
monstrative way as being only conclusive, it
is bat a copy of his countenance. He cannot
be ignorant, or if he be, he will find by ex-
perience that his ghttering principles will
fail him in his greatest need, and leave him
in the dirt.— Bramhall, ii. 367.
Now he saw all that scheme dissolved, he
returned to his integrity, of which he gave
an incontestable proof, by informing Wild of
the measures which had been concerted
against him ; in which, he said, he had pre-
tended to acquiesce, in order the better to
betray them ; but this, as he afterwards con-
fessed on his death-bed, i.e. in the cart at
Tyburn, was only a copy of his countenance ;
far that he was at that time as sincere and
hearty in his opposition to Wild as any of
his companions. — Fielding, Jonathan Wild,
Bk. III. ch. xiv.
If this application for my advice is not a
copy of your countenance, a mask, if you are
obedient, I may yet set you right. — Foote,
The Author, Act 11/
Coran tree, currant tree.
The borders of which grass plots are coran
trees. — Survey of the Manor of WimJbledon,
1649 {Arch., x. 424).
Corduroy, a thick ribbed cotton stuff.
Prof. Skeat (Etymol. Diet. s. v. cord)
say 8 that the word is not easily traced,
but is said, without evidence, to be a
corruption of cordc du rot or king's
cord. Cf . Duroy.
Clad in a tight suit of corduroy, spangled
with brass buttons of a very considerable
size, he at the first stood at the door as*
tounded. — Pickwick Papers, ch. zii.
Coreless, weak, without pith.
I am gone in years, my Liege, am very old,
Coreless and sapless, weak, and needs must
crave
Support of secular force.
Taylor, Isaac Comnenus, II. i.
Cork shoes, seem to have been worn
by the wealthy or fashionable. See
extract «. v. Cut-fingered.
Strip off my Bride's array,
My corke-shoes from my feet,
And, gentle mother, be not coy
To bring my winding-sheet.
Roxburgh* Ballads, i. 249.
Corn aline, cornelian.
For tablet fine
About his neck hangs a great cornaline.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 919.
Cornelius, a cornuto, a cuckold.
Who can deride me
But I myself ? Ha, that's too much ! I know
it,
And spight of these tricks am a Cornelius.
Shirley, The Gamester, Act V.
Corner-cap, a square cap.
It was my hap in a little field neere unto a
church in a countrey towne to overtake a
little old man in a gowne, a wide cassock, a
night-cap, and a corner-cap, by his habit
seeming to be a Divine. — Breton, A Mad
World, p. 8.
Corner-miching, skulking or sneak-
ing. See quotation *. v. Bloomsbury,
and H. s. v. mich. Bp. Hall ( Works,
ix. 260) speaks of some one as " spider-
catcher, corner-creeper, C. E., pseudo-
catholic Priest/'
Cornet, to play on the cornet.
Here's a whole chorus of Sylnans at hand
cometting and tripping th' toe. — Chapman,
Widdowes Teares, Act III.
CORNIFICATION ( 150 ) CORRESPONDENCE
Cornification, formation of horn.
The short and straight horns were stunted
in their growth ; their natural tendency was
to twist like a sheep's horn ; and the habit of
cornification is more likely to have been
formed nearer home than in the interior of
Africa.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxviii.
Cornish, cornice.
The hinder part, being something more
eminent than the other, is surrounded with
ten small pillars adjoyning to the wall, and
sustaining the cornish. —Sandys. Travels, p.
166. *' * *
Cornish Diamonds, transparent
quartz. See extract *. v. Cut-fingered.
The Cornish Boy in the last extract
is Opie, the artist. Fuller, Worthies
(Cornwall Proverbs), quotes —
" Hengsten Down well ywrought.
Is worth London Town dearly bought " —
and adds, "The Cornish diamonds
found therein may be pure and orient
. . . the coarsest in this kind are higher,
and the purest still the lowest."
Not far from hence is Hengeston Hill,
which produces a great plenty of Cornish
diamonds.— Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Brit, ii. 5.
Speak, Muse, who form'd that matchless
he&d?
The Cornish Boy in tin-mines bred ;
"Whose native genius, like his diamonds, shone
In secret, till chance gave him to the sun.
WoLcot, P. Pindar, p. 129.
Cornish-huo, a peculiar lock in
wrestling. " It is figuratively applic-
able to the deceitful dealing of such
who secretly design their overthrow
whom they openly embrace. "—Fuller,
Worthies {Cornish Proverbs).
And a prime wrestler as e'er tript,
E'er gave the Cornish-hug, or hipt.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 202.
His St. Maw's Muse has given the French
troops a Cornish huy, and flung them all
upon their hack*.— Character of a Sneaker,
1705 (Hart. Misc., ii. 354).
Cornless, without corn.
He seemed fully alive to the cornless state
of the parson's stable.— Lytton, Pelham, ch.
lxiv.
Corn-riq, corn-rick.
Joe "Waahford had himself been found,
when the hue-and-cry was up, hid in a corn-
rig at no great distance from the scene of
daughter.— Ingoldsby Legends (Jarvis's Wig).
Cornute, a horned person, a cuckold.
The Diets, have it as a verb.— Shake-
speare (Merry Wives, III. v) uses the
Italian torin corniUo.
Your best of friends, your dearest Phylocles,
Usurps your bed, and makes you a cornute.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act III.
Coronal oath, coronation oath. L.
has the word as an adjective, but only
as a term in anatomy.
Thelaw and his coronal oath require his
undeniable assent to what laws the parlia-
ment agree upon. — Milton, Eikonoklastes, ch.
vi.
Coronet, cornet ; this spelling is not
infrequent in Civil War Literature.
We found means to steale upon [them]
with Vrries party . . . taking two coronets
and killing forty or fifty men.— Battaile near
Newbury in Berkshire, Sept. 20, 1643, p. 2.
Coronis, in the Greek means some-
thing curved, and so the curved line or
flourish at the end of a book or chapter,
and then for the end generally. The
word had a place in Latin, but Hacket's
precedent has not been followed by
English writers.
The coronis of this matter is thus; some
bad ones in this family were punish 'd strictly,
all rebuk'd, not all amended.-— /fodbrf. Life
of Williams, ii. 38.
Corps, substance, income.
He added ... to the Doctor of the Chair
for Law, the corps of a good prebend in the
church of Salisbury. — Heylin, Life of Laud,
p. 180.
Corpslet, corslet,
While th' Armorers with hammers hard and
great
On stithies strong the sturdy Steele doth
beate.
And makes thereof a corpslet or a jacke.
Hudson's Judith, i. 369.
Corrept, chiding, abusive.
If these corrept and corrupt extasies or
extravagancies be not permitted to such
fanatick triflers . . . they presently medi-
tate the most desperate separations. — Gau-
den, Tears of the Church, p. 212.
Correptory, rebuking. Gauden
(Tears of the Church, p. 430) speaks of
" the Epistles correptory or consolatory
to the Seven Asian Churches."
Correspondence. The derivation in
the extract seems to be meant seriously.
I loved familiar letter-writing, as I had
more than once told her, above all the species
of writing: it was writing from the heart
(without the fetters prescribed by method
or study) as the very word cor-respondence
implied.— Richardson, d. Harlotce, iv. 291.
.-**
CORROBORANT ( 151 )
COSTUME
Corroborant, a support ; more com-
mon as an adjective. See another ex-
ample from Southey, %. v. Simples.
Next to this it imported to comfort the
stomach, and to cherish the root of mas,
that is to say, the brain, with its proper
corro?>orants, especially with sweet odours
and with music. — Southey, The Doctor t ch.
217. y
Corroboratic, strengthener.
Get a good warm girdle, and tie round you ;
tis an excellent eorroboratick to strengthen
the loins.— r. Brown, Works, ii. 186.
Corrodt. See quotation from Fuller,
and *. v. Solvable.
There be small corrodies in Cambridge for
cooks decayed. — Pp. Gardiner (Abp. Parker's
Correspondence, p. 20).
Xor must we forget the benefit of corrodies,
so called a conradendo, from eating together :
for the heirs of the foresaid founders (not by
coartesie, but composition for their former
favours) had a priviledge to send a set num-
ber of their poor servants to Abbeys to diet
therein. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI. iv.
Corrol, wrinkle?
Spring with the larke, most comely bride,
and meet
Your eager bridegroome with auspitious feet.
The morn's farre spent ; and the immortall
Stume
Corrols his cheeke to see those rites not done.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 231.
Corsart, a pirate.
I will not presume to prie into the secrets
of the Almighty disposer of all things, whose
handmaid Nature is, how farre he lets loose
the reins to the ill spirit of the aire, to cause
such sudden impressions upon the elements,
whereof there are daily wonderful] examples
amongst this crue of corsaries. — Howell, Do-
dona's Grove, p. 83.
Corvy, some engine or instrument
used in a siege.
Here croked Coruies, fleeing bridges tal,
Their scathf ul Scorpions that ruynes the wall.
Hudson's Judith, iii. 111.
Cosmocrat, " Prince of this world."
Tou will not think, great Cosmocrat,
That I spend my time in fooling.
Southey, Devil's Walk.
Cosmopolite, usually means a citizen
of the world, one who is equally at
home in all countries. Adams, how-
ever, always uses it of a worldling. He
has a sermon (ii. 123) on the rich fool,
entitled The Cosmopolite, or World's
Favourite.
The vanity of carnal joys, the variety of
vanities, are as bitter to us as pleasant to
the cosmopolite or worldling. — Adams, i. 229.
Cosmopolitism, citizenship of the
world ; the condition or attitude of a
person who feels no special ties to one
place or circle more than another.
Indulgent to human nature in general, and
loving it, but not with German cosmopolitism
— first and best loving her daughter, her
family. — Miss Edgeworth, Patronage, ch. xiv.
Cosmorama, a view of the world.
"A species of picturesque exhibitions.
It consists of eight or ten coloured
drawings laid horizontally round a
semi-circular table, and reflected by
mirrors placed diagonally opposite to
them. The spectator views them
through convex ienses placed immedi-
ately in front of each mirror. The
exhibition takes place by lamp-light
only" (Imp. Diet.).
The temples, and saloons, and cosmoramas,
and fountains glittered and sparkled before
our eyes. — Sketches by Boz ( VauxhaZl by day).
Cosset, to nurse or coddle ; in use in
Sussex. Spenser has cosset for a pat-
lamb. Breton (Fantastickes, April)
uses the word adjectivally ; " the cosset
lamb is learned to butt." It is also
used for a pet of any sort, or (dispar-
agingly) = a minion. See extract s. v.
Tantany.
In the beginning of the late King's dayes,
Episcopacy and the state of the Church was
even pampered and cosetted by so excessive a
favour and propensity as made it seem his
chief favourite. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 375.
I have been cosseting this little beast up, in
the hopes you'd accept it as a present. — H.
Kingsley, G. Hamlyn, ch. xxvi.
C08TELET (Fr.), cutlet.
At night he desired the company of some
known and ingenious friends to join in a
costelet and a Ballad at Chattelin's. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, i. 91.
It had a fire-place and grate, with which
he could make a soup, broil costeletts,OT roast
an egg. — Ibid. ii. 270.
Coster-boy, a boy selling costards,
fruit, vegetables, &c, in the streets.
The girl found for them the man they
wanted . . . laying down the law to a group
of coster-boys, for want of better audience. —
C. Kingsley, Tico Years Ago, ch. xxiv.
Costume, to dress.
They are all costumed in black.— C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
COSTUOUS
( 152 ) COUNTER-CURSE.
Costuous, costly.
Nor in costuous pearls in their copes, per-
rours, and chasuble*, when they be in their
prelately pompous sacrifices. — Bale, Select
Works, p. 526.
Cotemporan, a contemporary.
I am not out of hopes that, when times
will bear it, some of the cotemporans, faithful
historians (at present not unprepar'd for it),
will suffer their labours to oome forth.—
North, Examen, p. 187.
Coterel. See extract.
Here [Sheppey-isle] are several Tumuli in
the marshy parts all over the island, some
of which the inhabitants call Coterds ; these
are supposed to have been cast up in memory
of some of the Danish leaders who were
buried here. — Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, i.
153.
Cothurn, tragic buskin.
How the cothums trod majestic,
Down the deep iambic lines,
And the rolling anapaestic
Curled like vapour over shrines.
Mrs. Browning, Wine of Cyprus.
Cotloft, cockloft ; garret.
These [idle heirs] ate the tops of their
houses indeed, like cotlofls highest and
emptiest. — Fuller, Holy State, I. nv. 2.
Cotton, to cocker ; some things are
carefully preserved in lavender and
cotton.
"It is the most infernal shame," said
Losely, between his grinded teeth, u that I
should be driven to these wretched dens for
a lodging, while that man, who ought to
feel bound to maintain me, should be rolling
in wealth, and cottoned up in a palace : but
he shall fork out."— Lytton, What will he do
with it? Bk. vi. ch. v.
Countable, accountable.
If we be countable, and we are countable at
the day of judgment for every idle word we
speak . . . what less than damnation can they
expect that . . . blaspheme God and His holy
truth ? — Sanderson, li. 49.
Countenance. The phrase in the
extract is rather peculiar ; it means that
the two armies drawn up opposite each
other passed the day in this confront-
ation without actually engaging.
Both armies furnished with braue men of
warre, and circumspect, depart without in-
counter . . . and so they passed the day in
countenances, and nothing was done. — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng.,p. 191.
Counter, to encounter or meet in
opposition ; it is also a technical term
in pugilism. See last extract
Then Diogenes again countreyng saied, If
Aristippus had learned to be contented with
rawe herbes, he should not nede to be the
Kioges hound. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 46.
A lie. Falcons that tyrannize o'er weaker
food,
Hold peace with their own feathers.
Har. But when they counter
Upon one quarry, break that league as we do.
Albumazar, V. i.
His answer countered every design of the
interrogations. — North, Examen, p. 246.
** Brandy-and-water in the morning ought
not to improve the wind," said Tom to him-
self, as his left hand countered provokingly,
while his right rattled again ana again upon
Trebooze's watch-chain. — C. Kingsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. ziv.
Counterband, contraband.
I have not seized any ships of yonrs ; you
carry on no counterband trade. — Walpole to
Mann, ill. 309 (1759).
Plate of all earthly vanities is the most
impassable; it is not counterband in its
metallic capacity, but totally so in its per-
sonal.— Ibid., Letters, iii. 305 (1769).
Counterbanded, contraband.
If there happen to be found an irreverent
expression or a thought too wanton, they are
crept into my verses through my inadvert-
ency ; if the searchers find any in the cargo,
let them be staved or forfeited like counter-
banded goods. — Dryden, Preface to Fables.
Countehbane, antidote ; the refer-
ence in the second extract is to the Tree
of Life.
Th' inchanting Charms of Syren's blandish-
ments,
Contagious Aire — ingendring Pestilence,
Infect not those that in their mouthes have
ta'en
Angelica — that happy counter-baen.
Sylvester, third day, 721.
Strong counter-bane, O sacred plant divine.
Ibid., Eden, 228.
Counterbias, to set against
Nor was it so much policy or reason of
State, as strength of true Reason, and the
pre valencies of true Religion which so cou nter-
biassed that King's judgement against Pres-
bytery.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 604.
Counterbrave, boast or challenge
against another.
Nor thy strength is approv'd with words,
good friend, nor can we reach
The body, nor make th' enemy yield with
these our counterbraves.
Chapman, Iliad, xvi. 580.
Counter-curse, reciprocal cursing.
Uncharitable arrogancies have . . . filled
and inflamed men's minds with cruell
counter-curses and angry Anathemas again sb
COUNTERFORCE ( 153 )
COUPLET
each other. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 407.
Counterforce, opposing or counter-
balancing power.
Hen began to see the necessity of an ade-
quate counterforce to push against this over-
whelming torrent. — De Quincey, Soman Meals.
Counterguard, a small rampart to
protect a bastion.
Furiously playing off his two Gross bat-
teries at the same time against the counter'
guard which faced the counterscarp. — Sterne,
Tr. Shandy, v. 17.
Counter-jumper, a shopman.
"Sir, you should know that my cheek is
not for jou." •• Why," said he, stifling his
anger, ** it seems free enough to every counter-
jumper in the town." — C. KingsUy, Westward
Hof ch. z.
Counterleague, to confederate a-
gainst.
This king . . . (upon this defection of King
Baliol, and his league made with France)
counterleague* with all the princes he could
draw in, eyther by gifts or allyance, to
strengthen his partie abroad. — Daniel, Hist.
of Eng., p. 163.
Wise men thought a peace could not well
be concluded between those crowns, without
somewhat privately agreed to the prejudice
of the Protestant princes or their interests ;
but not publicly, lest they should take the
alarm and counterleague it. — North, Examen,
p. 21.
Counterly, belonging to the counter
or prison (?).
Ye stale counterly villain ! — Preston, AT.
Cambists {Hawkins, Eng. Dr., i. 305).
Counterplead, to enter counterpleas.
There is a tale that once the Hoast of Birds,
And all the Legions of grove - haunting
Heards,
Before the Earth ambitiously did strive,
And counterplead for the Prerogative.
Sylvester, The Decay, 261.
Counter-pole, opposite pole.
This u prandium," this essentially military
meal, was taken standing .... Hence the
posture in which it was taken at Borne, the
very counter-pole to the luxurious posture of
dinner. — De Quincey, Roman Meals.
Counterpuff, opposing breeze.
The lofty Pine that's shaken to and fro
With Couriter-puJ* of sundry winds that
blow.— Sylvester, The Fathers, 246.
Counterpush, to thrust against ; op-
pose.
On th' other side the Towns-men are not slow
With counterplots to counterpush their foe.
Sylvester, The Decay, 961.
Counterpush, a thrust against.
Neither of them had regard to save himself,
so he might wound and mischief his enemy,
but were both with a counterpush that quite
pierced their targets, run into the sides,
and thrust through. — Holland, Ltvy, p. 39.
Counter-refer, to refer back inter-
changeably.
The sincerity of any business may be known
by the means used to accomplish it ; for if
either be false and perfidious, the other will
be so also; and they counter-refer to each
other.— Nort h, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 102.
Counter-scarf, counterscarp ; the
rhyme shows that it is not a misprint,
though it may be the cause of a mis-
spelling.
See, see, quoth he, these dust-spawn, feeble
dwarfs,
See their huge castles, walls, and counter'
scarfs. — Sylvester, Babylon, 179.
Counter-seas, cross-seas.
[The Irish Sea] rageth all the yeer long
with surging billows and counter-seas, and
never is at rest nor navigable, unlesse it be
in some few summer daies. — Holland's Cam-
den, ii. 60.
Counter-service, reciprocal service.
One cannot use th' ayde of the Powrs below
Without some Pact of Counter-services,
By Prayers, Perfumes, Homage, and Sacri-
fice.—Sylvester, The Trophies, 716.
Counterset, to match or parallel.
In all thy writings thou hast such a vaine,
As but thy selfe thy selfe canst counterset.
B. Cox to Davies (Davies,
Humour's Heaven, p. 5).
Counter-tune, musical part answering
to another, as the tenor with the treble
or bass, &c. Sylvester (Columnesy
743) speaks of "the sweet-charming
cvunter-tunes " formed by the humors,
seasons, and elements.
Coupee, to cut or bow as in dancing ;
also, a eubst.
Fleers, cringes, nods, and salutations,
From lords in debt to purple judges,
And coupees low from pauper drudges.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, c. 3.
Here's one ne're cares who th' nation's ruling,
So daughter be not kept from schooling ;
Would lose his freedom like a puppy,
Bather than she not learn to conpee. — Ibid.
Yon shall swear, Til sigh; you shall sa!
sa ! and 111 coupee, and if she flies not to my
arras like a hawk to its perch, my dancing-
master deserves to be damned. — Farquhar,
Constant Couple, iv. 1.
Couplet, to compose couplets.
COURAGEMENT ( 154 )
COUSIN
Me thinks, quoth Sancho, the thoughts
which give way to the making of couplets
can not be many. Couplet it as much as your
worship pleases, and I will sleep as much as
I can.— Jar vis's Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV.
ch. xvi.
Couragement, encouragement.
This made the Rebel 1 rise in strength and
pride,
From Sov'raigne's weaknesse taking courage-
ment
T' assault their gates.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 6*2.
Courant. See extract.
I mv selfe have seene so fine and small a
thread, that a whole net knit thereof, to-
gether with the cords and strings called
Courants, running along the edges to draw it
in and let it out, would passe all through
the ring of a man's linger. — Holland, Pliny,
Bk. XIX. ch. i.
Courses, sails.
My uncle ordered the studding-sails to he
hoisted, and the ship to be cleared for en-
gaging, but finding that (to use the seamen's
phrase) we were very much wronged by the
ship which had us in chace, and which by
this time had hoisted French colours, he
commanded the studding-sails to be taken
in, the courses to be clewed up, the main-
topsail to be backed, the tompions to be
taken out of the guns, and every man to
repair to his quarters. — Smollett, Rod. Ran-
dom, ch. lxv.
Coursing, disputing in the schools.
See L. , s. v. courser.
180 bachelors this last Lent, and ail things
earned on well, bnt no coursing, which is very
bad.— A. Wood, Life, Mar. 23, 1678.
Court-element, flattery. Cf. N., s.v.
court-holy-water.
For the rest I refer me to that famous
testimony of Jerome . . . whose interpreta-
tion we trust shall be received before this
intricate stuff tattled here of Timothy and
Tit'is, and I know not whom their successors,
far beyond court element, and as far beneath
true edification. — Milton, Eikonoklastes, ch.
zvii.
Courtesy. To make courtesy = to
raise scruples.
When Dionysius at a banket had com-
manded that all the companie should ad-
dresse themselfes to maske ech man in
purple . . . Plato refused to doe it . . . but
Aristippus made no courtesie at the matter. —
Udafs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 69.
So said King Alexander very like himselfe
to one Paullns, to whom he had geuen a
very great gift, which he made curtesy to
accept, saying it was too much for such a
mean person, "What, quoth the King, if it be
too much for thyselfe, hast thou neuer a
friend or kinsman that may fare the better
by it?— Puttenham, English Poesie, Bk. III.
ch. xxiv.
Courtierism, aspect or behaviour of
a courtier.
Prince Schwartzenberg in particular had a
stately aspect . . . beautifully contrasted
with the smirking saloon-activity, the perked-
up courtierism, and pretentious nullity of
many here. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 196.
Courtledge, an append nge to a
house ; usually written curtilage : a
legal term.
At the back, a rambling courtledge of barns
and walls, around which pigs and bare-foot
children grunted in loving communion of
dirt. — C. Kingsley, Westvcard Ho, ch. xiv.
Court-of-guard, the place where the
guard musters. See quotation s. v.
canvassado : also the watch itself.
Maugre the watch, the round, the court-of-
guard,
I will attend to abide the coward here. —
Greene, Orl. Furioso, p. 94.
They keepe a court-of-guard nightly ; and
almost every minute of the night the watch
of one sort giues two or three knoles with a
bell, which is answered by the other in order.
—Sandys, Travels, p. 233.
Court- water, flattery : usually court-
holy-water, q. v. in N. Cf. Court- ele-
ment.
He is after the nature of a barber, and first
trims the head of his master's humour, and
then sprinkles it with court-uxUer. — Adams,
i. 5^3.
Cousin. To have no cousin = to
have no equal ; to be cousin = to be
like. See quotation, from Chaucer's
Prologue in JR.
Of the same Pirrhus he saied at an other
time that if he had had the feacte to hold
and kepe an empire, as well as he could achiue
and winne it, he had had no cousin. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth.. p. 248.
The same author (p. 292) says of Augustus
Caesar, who would only have his deeds re-
corded by good and grave writers, that he
was " in deede in this behalf cousin to Alex-
ander," of whom a similar trait had been
previously related.
Lo heer are pardons half a dosen,
For ghostely riches they have no cosen.
Heyvood, Four Ps (Dodsley,
O. PI, i. 101).
Cousin. My dirty cousin, or my
cousin the vjeaver, is a contemptuous
COUSIN BETTY ( 155 )
CO W-HIDE
address, usually preceded by "marry
come up.'*
Miss. Gome, here's t' ye to stop your mouth.
.W. I'd rather you would stop it with a kiss.
MUs. A kiss ! marry come up, my dirty cousin.
Swift , Polite Conv. (Con v. ii.).
Marry come up ! I assure you, my dirty
cousin, thof his skin be so white, and to be
sure it is the most whitest that ever was seen,
I am a Christian as well as he. — Fielding,
Tom Jones, Bk. IV. ch. xiv.
Cousin Betty, a half-witted person.
I dnnnot think there's a man living — or
dead for that matter— as can say Foster's
wronged him of a penny, or gave short
measure to a child or a Cousin Betty. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xiv.
Cousinry, kindred.
The family was of the rank of substantial
gentry, and duly connected with such in the
counties round for three generations back.
Of the numerous and now mostly forgettable
cuxsinry we specify farther only the Mashams
of Otes in Essex. — Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 21.
Cousins. To call cousins = to claim
relationship.
He is half-brother to this "Wit word by a
former wife, who was sister to my lady
Wishfort, my wife's mother ; if you marry
Hillamant, you must call cousins too. — C'on-
yr»w, Way of the World, i. 5.
Over the great drawing-room chimney is
the coat armour of the first Leonard, Lord
Dacre,with all his alliances. Mr. Chute was
transported, and called cousin with ten thou-
sand quarterings. — Walpole, Letters, i. 262
(1752).
My new cottage ... is to have nothing
Gothic about it, nor pretend to call cousins
with the mansion-house. — Ibid. iii. 48 (1766).
Unluckily Sir Ingoldsby left no issue, or
*e might now be calling cousins with («*-
dnant) Mrs. Otway Cave, in whose favour
the abeyance of the old barony of Bray has
recently been determined by the Crown. —
Ingoldsby Legends (Ingoldsby Penance).
Coventry. One with whom others
refuse to associate is said to be sent to
Coventry. Two explanations are given
in A: and Q., I. vi. 318, 589. (1 ) That
formerly in Coventry the citizens would
not mingle with the military stationed
there. (2) That in 1642, when Charles
1- was marching from Birmingham to
Shrewsbury, the Parliamentary party
seized on all suspected persons that
they met with in those parts and sent
them to Coventry.
Though he frequently in the course of the
evening repeated, *'I depend upon your
promise, I build upon a conference, I sent his
dependence and his building to Coventry by
not seeming to hear him." — Mad, D'Arblay,
Diary, iii. 434.
Lord Etherington would find him, bodily
indeed at St. Ronan's, but so far as society
was concerned, on the road towards the
ancient city of Coventry — Scott, St. Ronan's
Well, i. 201.
Cover, to lay the table, or prepare a
banquet.
These scholars know more skill in axioms,
How to use quips and sleights of sophistry,
Than for to cover courtly for a King.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 169.
Cover-shame, savin, as producing
abortion.
Those dangerous plants called cover-shame,
alias savin, and other anti-conceptive weeds
and poisons. — Reply to Ladies and JUatchelors
Petition (Harl. Misc., iv. 440).
Coverslut, a covering worn to con-
ceal dirt or untidiness. L. marks it
rare, and gives quotation from Burke.
Those women that can purchase plads need
not bestow much upon other clothes, these
cover-sluts being sufficient. — Modern Account
of Scotland, 1670 (Harl. Misc., vi. 139).
Covin-tree. In a note to the sub-
joined extract Scott says, uThe large
tree in front of a Scottish castle was
sometimes called so. It is difficult to
trace the derivation ; but at that dis-
tance from the castle the laird received
guests of rank, and thither he conveyed
them on their departure." May it not be
connected with convenio, as being the
place of meeting ?
I love not the castle when the covin-tree
bears such acorns as I see yonder. — Scott,
Quentin Durward, i. 38.
Cow-babe, a coward.
Peace, lowing cow-babe, lubberly hobberde-
hoy. — Davits of Hereford, Scourge of Folly,
Epig. 212.
Cow-dab, same as Cowshed, q. v.
Let but a cow-dab show its grass-green face,
They're up without so much as saying grace,
And lo ! the busy flock around it pitches.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 141.
Cowhearted, cowardly.
A thousand devils seize the cuckoldy row-
hearted mongrel. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
IV. ch. rix.
The Lady Powis, not prevailing with him
to go again to the Earl of Shaftsbury, patted
him with her fan, and called him a cowhearted
fellow. — North, Exatnen, p. 258.
Cow-hide, a whip ; also to thrash.
CO WITCH
( 156)
COZZE
And what might be their aim ?
To rescue Afric's sable sons from fetters,
To save their bodies from the burning shame
Of branding with hot letters ;
Their shoulders from the cow-hide's bloody
strokes,
Their necks from iron yokes ?
Hood, A Black Job.
He got his skin well beaten — cow-hided, as
we may say — by Charles XII. the rough
Swede, clad mostly in leather. — Carlyle,
Misc., iv. 356.
Cow-itch, cowage (see L. *. v. and
Grey's note in loc.); a sort of kidney-
bean belonging to £. Indies, the pod of
which is covered with down of an irri-
tating nature when applied to the skin.
With cow-itch meazle like a leper,
And choak with fumes of Ouiney-pepper ;
Make lechers and their punks with dewtry
Commit phantastical advowtry.
HudWras, III. i. 319.
Cowmeat, fodder; pasture; horse-
meat is a common expression.
Som cuntries lack plowmeat,
And som doe want cowmeat.
Tusser, p. 102.
Cowshed, cow-dung.
Queen. O dismall newes ! what, is my soue-
raigne blind?
Lemot. Blind as a beetle, madam, that a while
houering aloft, at last in cowsheds fall.
Chapman, Humerous dayes mirth, p. 96.
Cowsliped, covered with cowslips.
CI Prim rosed.
Rich with sweets, the western gale
Sweeps along the cowslijfd dale.
Southey, Wat Tyler, Act I.
COW'S THUMB.
What need I bring more topicks for illus-
tration, since you see 'tis as plain as a cow's
thumb ?—T. Brown, Works, i. 40.
Want you old cloaks, plain shoes, or formal
gravity? You may fit yourself to a cow's
thumb among the Spaniards. — Ibid. in. 26.
Cow-thistle. "'The seeds of the
great Cow-thistle dryed and made in
powder1 are recommended as a cattle
medicine in MascaTs Government of
Cattel (1662). We do not know what
plant is intended ; it is perhaps a mis-
print for Sow-thistle" (Britten and
Hollands Eng. Plant Namesy E. D.
S.). It is not, however, a misprint, as
the word occurs also in the following
extract of the date 1605.
You should have a wife that . . would . .
bridle it in her countenance like a mare that
were knapping on a cow-thistle. — Breton, I
pray you be not angry, p. 6.
Cowtheb, to cower.
Plantus in his Rudens bringeth in fishermen
cowthring and quaking. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 180).
Coxcomb, a species of silver lace
frayed out at the edges.
It was as necessary to trim his light grey
frock with a silver edging of coxcomb, that he
might not appear worse than his fellows. —
Johnston, Chrysal, ch. xi.
Coy, a decoy. See N. s. v., who seems
to regard it as very rare.
They must couragiously accuse themselves
in their examination, that they may be more
forcible witnesses against the Bishop; but
shall be as so many coy-duks to cry a little in
the ears of the world, until the great mallard
be catch 't in the coy. — Hacket, life of Wil-
liams, ii. 133.
Coy-duck, decoy-duck. See quot-
ation 8. v. Coy.
No man ever lost by keeping a coy-duck. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 43.
His mam scope is to show that Grotius
under a pretence of reconciling the Protestant
Churches with the Roman Church, hatli
acted the part of a coy-duck, willingly or
unwillingly, to lead the Protestants into
Popery. — BramhaU, iii. 504.
Coytinoe, throwing (?), perhaps in
some peculiar way.
If they be true dise, what shyfte wil they
make to set ye one of them with slyding,
with cogging, with foysting, with coytinyc,
as they call it. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 54.
Coze or Cose, to be snug.
He is in no temper to meet his fellow-
creatures — even to see the comfortable gleam
through the windows, as the sailors co*e
round the fire with wife and child. — C.
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. iii.
Coze, a snug conversation.
Miss Crawford . . . proposed their going
up into her room, where they might have a
comfortable coze. — Miss Austen, Mansfidd
Park, ch. xxvi.
Cozling, a little cousin.
For money had stuck to the race through life,
(As it did to the bushel when cash so rife
Posed Ali Baba's brother's wife),
And down to the cousins and cozlings,
The fortunate brood of the Kilmanseggs,
As if they had come out of golden eggs,
Were all as wealthy as *' Goslings."
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
COZZE, a fish.
The cod and cotze that greedy are to bite.
— Denny s, Secrets of Angling (kng. Gamer,
i. 166).
CRAB
( 157 ) CRADLE-TOMBED
Crab. To catch a crab = to fall
backwards by missing a stroke in row-
ing; to this of course the rower is more
liable in rough weather. In the ex-
tract the fisherman puns on the two
sorts of crabcatching.
Harold. Fellow, dost thou catch crabs?
Fisherman. As few as I may in a wind,
and le68 than I would in a calm. — Tennyson,
Harold, ii. 1.
Crabbish, cross; sour.
Sloth . . regards not the whips of the most
crabbish Satyristes. — Decker, Seven Deadly
(tits, ch. iv.
Crab- paced, sour-looking.
Such crab faced, cankerd, carlish chuffs,
Within whose hatef ull brestes
Such malice bides, such rancour broyles,
Such endles enuy rests,
Esteame them not.
A. Neuyll, Verses prefixed to
Goose's Eg log s.
Crabsidle, to go sideways like a crab.
Some backwards like lobsters, and others
crabsidling along, and all toiling with a waste
of exertion. — Sou they, Letters (1800), i. 105.
Crabsnowted, same as Crab-faced,
q. v.
But as for those crabsnowted bestes,
Those ragyng feends of hell,
Whose vile, malicious, hatef ull mindes
With boyling rancour swell.
A. Neuyll, Verses prefixed
to Googis Eglogs.
Crack, to break into a house ; thieves'
cant See quotation *. v. Crib.
If any enterprising burglar had taken it
into his hea-d to crack that particular crib
known as the Bridge Hotel, and got clean
off with the swag, he might have retired on
the hard-earned fruits of a well- spent life
into happier lands. — H. Kingsley, Bavenshoe,
ch. zxxvii.
Crack, a lie.
Miss N. There's something generous in
my cousin's manner. He falls out before
faces to be forgiven in private.
Tony. That's a damned confounded crack.
Goldsmith, She stoops to conquer, Act II.
Crackhalter, a rogue : applied to a
mischievous boy. Shakespeare (Taming
of Shrew, V. i.) has crack-hemp.
Tou crackhalter, \i I catch you by the ears,
111 make yon answer directly. — Gascoigne,
Supposes, i. 4.
Plutarch with a caueat keepeth them out,
not so much as admitting the Title crackhalter
that carieth his maister's pantouffles to set
foote within those doores. — Gosson,Schoole of
Abuse, p. 30.
Crackheaded, crazy.
I believe, in my conscience, she likes our
crackheaded old doctor as well as e'er a young
gentleman in Christendom. — Mad.DArUay,
Camilla, Bk. V. ch. iii.
Crackless, whole ; without flaw.
Then sith good name's (like glasse) as frail
as clear,
All care should keep it cracklesse in thy Dear.
Davies, Sir T. Overbury's Wife, p. 6.
Crackrope, a rogue, fit to be hung.
Cf. Crackhalter.
Away, you crackropes, are you fighting at
the court gate? — Edwards, Damon and
Pitheas (Dodsley, O. PL, i. 270).
Robin Goodfellow is this same cogging,
pettifogging, crackropes, calves'-skins com-
panion.— Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 307).
Cracksman, a burglar.
Some mortals disdain the calm blessings of
rest,
Your cracksman, for instance, thinks night"
time the best.
Jngoldsby Legends (S. Aloys).
Whom can I play with? whom can I
herd with? Cracksmen and pick-pockets. —
Lytton, What will he do with it ? Bk. VII.
en. v.
I have heard him a hundred times if I
have heard him once, say to regular cracks-
men in our front office, You know where I
live ; now, no bolt is ever drawn there ; why
don't you do a stroke of business with me ? —
Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. zxv.
Cradle. Tusser Redivivus defines
this " A three-forked instrument of wood
on which the corn is caught as it falls
from the sithe." Tusser reckons among
11 Husband lie Furniture " —
A brush sithe and grass sithe, with rifle to
stand,
A cradle for harlie, with rubstone and sand.
Husbandrie, p. 37.
Cradlehood, infancy.
A chronographical latine table, which they
have hanging up in their Guildhall of all
their transmutations from their cradlehoode
infringeth this a little. — Naslie, Lenten Stuffs
(Harl. Misc., vi. 151).
Cradle-practice, an easy cure, such
as the speaker could effect when he
began his career.
The cure of the gout — a toy, without boast
be it said, my cradle-practice. — Massinger,
Emp. of East, iv. 4.
Cradle-tombed, still-born, or dead in
infancy.
CRADLE-WALK ( 158 )
CRAVAT
One in the feeble birth beeomming old,
Is cradle-toomb7d.
Sylvester, Babylon, p. 511.
Cradle- walk, a walk over which the
trees meet in an arch, like the top of a
cradle.
The cradle-walk of hornebeame in the
garden is, for the perplexed turning of the
trees, very observable. — Evelyn, Diary, June
9, 1662.
The garden is just as Sir John Germain
brought it from Holland; pyramidal yews,
treillagos, and square cradle-tcalks with win-
dows clipped in them. — If'atpole, Letters, ii.
451 (1763).
Cragguk, seems to be used in extract
for a lean scraggy person.
Anaximenes the rhetorician had a panche
as fatte and great as he was able to lugge
away withall, to whome Diogenes came, and
spake in this maner, I pray you geue to vs
lene craggues some beafy to. — XJdaVs Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 147.
Crambe, cabbage. Calfhill and Gan-
den seem to use this word as an English
one — the reference of course is to the
crambe repetita of Juvenal, vii. 154.
I marvel that you, so fine a feeder, will fall
to your crambe. — Calfhill, p. 320.
No repeated Crambes of Christ's discipline,
of Elders and Elderships ... no engine was
capable to buoy up Presbytery. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 17.
Cramoisy, crimson (Fr. cramoisi).
A blustering, dissipated human figure with
a kind of blackguard quality air, in cramoisy
velvet or other uncertain texture. — Carlyle,
Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. i.
He gathered for her some velvety cra-
moisy roses that were above her reach. — Mrs.
Gaskell, North and South, ch. in.
Crampon (Fr.), an iron hook.
Man with his crampons and harping-irons
can draw ashore the great Leviathan. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 7.
Cramp -stone. Cramp -rings were
formerly consecrated on Good Friday,
and supposed to be efficacious in cramp.
See N., 8. v. Cramp-Ring.
Ric. I have the cramp all over me.
Hil. What do you think
Were best to apply to it ? A cramp-stone,
as I take it,
Were very useful.
Mas singer, Hie Picture, v. 1.
Crane's-bill. See quotation.
Is there any blue half so pure, and deep,
and tender, as that of the large crane's-bill,
the Geranium prat en se of the botanists? —
Black , Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. xx.
Crank, applied to a ship which from
overloading cannot keep a steady course.
See quotation from Cook's Voyages in
K. In the subjoined it is upplied meta-
phorically to a drunken man.
I have heard as how you came by your
lame foot by having your upper decks over-
stowed with liquor, whereby you became
crank, and rolled, d'ye see, in such a manner
that by a pitch of the ship your starboard
heel was jammed in one of the scuppers. —
Smollett, Peregrine Pickle, ch. ii.
Cranky, cross.
I would like some better sort of welcome
in the evening than what a cranky old brute
of a hut-keeper can give me. — H. Kingsley,
Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xxvii.
Cranok, or Cornook is the same as
the coomb, or half a quarter.
In the same yeere [1318] corne and other
victuals were exceeding deere. A cranok of
wheate was sold for three-and-twenty shil-
lings, and wine for eight denires. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 175.
Crants, crown or chaplet (German,
Kraniz). The word occurs in Hamlet*
V. i. ; though in some editions "rites"
has been substituted. L. says, "This
word, which never became English,
seems to have been used by Shake-
speare on the strength of his having
learned that rose-crown is the trans-
lation of the name of one of his charac-
ters, Rosencrantz" But if 1603 be the
date of Hamlet the extract shows that
the word had been used eleven years
before. See also Jamieson, s. v. crance.
The filthy queane wean a craunce, and is
a Frenchwoman forsooth. — Greene, Quip for
Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 419).
Crape, to crisp, or friz: from the
French creper.
The hour advanced on the Wednesdays
and Saturdays is for curling and craping the
hair, which it now requires twice a week. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, iii. 29.
Crates.
He descends as low as his beard and asketh
. . . whether he will have his crates cut low
like a juniper bush, or his suberches taken
away with a rasor ? — Greene* Quip for Upstart
Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 406).
Cravat, to wear a cravat.
I redoubled my attention to my dress;
I coated and cravatted. — Lytton, Pelham,
ch. xxxiii.
So nicely dressed, so nicely curled, so
booted and gloved and cravated, he was
charming indeed.— Miss Bronte, ViUette, ch.
xiv.
CRAVAT-STRING ( 159 )
CREEP-MOUSE
Cravat-string, the ends of the
cravat were of a great length, and came
down over the chest. Brown refers to
it several times as a prominent part in
a beau's dress.
Come, Dick, says I (to a brother of the
orange and cravat-string) d — me, let us to
the play.— T. Broum, Works, ii. 314.
The raffling pantaloon declares the flame,
And the well-ty'd cravat-string wins the
dame.— Ibid. iv. 223.
Craven. To cry craven = to give
in; to fail.
When all humane means cry craven, then
that wound made by the hand of God is
cured by the hand of His Vicegerent. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. vi. 33.
Crawl, to growl : so growl q. v. =
crawl.
My guts they yawle, crawle, and all my
belly rumbleth. — Gammer Gurton's Needle,
II. i.
Craw-thumper, a beater of the breast ;
a name given to Romanists from their
doing so at confession.
"With purer eyes the British vulgar sees,
We are no craic-tkumpers, no devotees.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 138.
Crayse. H. says the crow's-foot;
but it is distinguished from this in the
extract : it probably = buttercup. See
Eng. Plant Names (E. D. S.).
The little larke-foot shee'd not passe
Nor yet the flowers of three-leaved grasse,
With milkmaids Hunney-suckle's phrase,
The crow's-foot, nor the yellow crayse.
Roxb. Ballads, i. 340.
Crazyoloqist, a contemptuous cor-
niption of craniologist Cf. Fotili-
TARIAN, FOOLOSOPHER.
The feeling of local attachment was pos-
sessed by Daniel Dove in the highest degree.
Spurzheun, and the crazyologists would have
found out a bump on his head for its local
habitation.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. xxxiv.
Cream, to pour in cream.
He sagared, and creamed, and drank, and
thought, and spoke not. — Miss Edgeworth,
Helen, ch. zxzvi.
Crease, a Malayan dagger.
And on the tables every clime and age
Tumbled together, celts and calumets
The cursed Malayan crease, and battle-clubs
From the isles of palm.
Tennyson, The Princess, Prologue.
Creasy, creased, as when the skin is
wrinkled up.
From her lifted hand
Dangled a length of ribbon and a ring
To tempt the babe, who reared his creasy
arms,
Caught at and ever miss'd it, and they
laugh 'd, — Tennyson, Enoch Arden.
Creature, drink. In the first ex-
tract Mrs. Day finds her puritanical
servant, who had been drinking with
an Irish footman, intoxicated ; in the
last extract it means food generally.
The Irish call whisky "the creature."
Oh fie upon't! who would have believ'd
that we should have hVd to have seen
Obadiah overcome with the creature? — The
Committee, Act IV.
The confusion of Babel was a parcel of
drunkards, who fell out among themselves
when they had taken a cup of the creature.
— T. Brown, Works, i. 32.
Come, master, let us go and get something
to eat ; you will never be able to hold out as
Mr. Whitfield does. He seems to like a bit
of the good cretvr as well as other folks. —
Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. VII. ch. ii.
Crede. In Bailey's Diet, there is,
"To Cree (wheat or barley), to boil
it soft."
Take rie and crede it as you do wheat for
Furmity, and make a cawdle of it. — Queen's
Closet Opened, p. 159, 1655.
Creek, to form a creek or creeks.
The towne is . . . fortified by Art and
Nature. . . . The salt water so creeketh about
it, that it almost insulateth it — Holland's
Camden, p. 451.
Creepers, "small low irons in a
grate between the andirons" (Halli-
well). The extract is said to be the
answer given by a curate to Archbishop
Laud, who asked him what he thought
of the Bishops.
I can no better compare you than with the
huge brass andirons that stand in great men's
chimneys, and us poor ministers to the low
creepers ; you are they that carry it out in a
vain-glorious show ; but we, the poor curates,
undergo and bear the burthen. — Rome for
Canterbury, 1641 (Harl. Misc., iv. 379).
Creepie, a stool.
Methinks some of ye might find her a
creepie to rest her foot. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. Iv.
The three-legged creepie-stooU, that were
hired out at a penny an hour to such market-
women as came too late to find room on
the steps, were unoccupied. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. ii.
Creep-mouse, quiet.
It will not much signify if nobody hears a
word you say, so you may be as creep-mouse
CREEPY
( 160 )
CROAKY
as yon like, but we must have you to look at.
— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. xv.
Creepy, crawling as with fear.
One's whole blood grew curdling and
creepy. — Browning, The Glove.
Crenelkt, an embrasure or loop-hole.
From [these structures] the besieged de-
livered their missiles with far more freedom
and variety of range than they could shoot
through the oblique but immovable loop-
holes of the curtain, or even through the
slopiug erenelets of the higher towers. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xliii .
Crenkllation, an embrasure.
All the professions are so book-lined, book-
hemmed, book-choked, that wherever these
strong hands of mine stretch towards action,
they 2nd themselves met bv octavo ramparts
flanked with quarto crenellations. — Lytton,
The Cartons, Bk. XII. ch. vi.
Crepundio (?).
Our quadrant crepundios . . spit ergo in
the mouth of euerie one they meete. — Nashe,
Pref. to Greene* » Menaphon, p. 8.
Crib, cant term for stomach. Cf.
Bread-basket.
Here's pannum and lap, and good poplars of
Tarrum,
To fill up the crib, and to comfort the
quarron.— Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Crib, a house (thieves' cant). See
quotation s. v. Crack.
There were two young brothers made it
up to rob the squire's house down at Gidleigh.
Thev separated in the garden after they
cracked the crib, agreeing to meet here in
this very place, and share the swag. — H.
Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. v.
Criminative, accusatory.
The courtiers are often furious and (ac-
cording to the doctrines there) criminative
against the judges that are not easy, as being
morose, ill-bred, and disrespectful. — North,
life of Lord Guilford, i. 200.
Crimp. See extract. H. gives this
as a Norfolk word, but in the quotation
London is spoken of.
The brokers of these coals are called
crimps; the vessels they load their ships
with at Newcastle, keels. — Defoe, Tour thro*
G. Britain, ii. 144.
Crimp, to decoy into the army, navy,
or other service.
To the reverend fathers it seemed that
Denis would make an excellent Jesuit, where-
fore they set about coaxing and courting,
with intent to crimp him. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iii. 197.
Criniparous, hair-producing.
Bears' grease or fat is also in great request,
being supposed to have a criniparous or hair-
producing quality.— Poetry of Antijacobin
(note), p. 83.
Crinital, having hair : as applied to
a star, it refers to a train of light left
by it.
He the star crinital adoreth.
Stanyhurst, jEn., ii. 726.
Crippledom, state of being a cripple.
What with my crippledom and thy piety,
a wheeling of thy poor old dad, we'll bleed
the bumpkins. — Meade, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. lv.
Cripply, crippled.
Because he's so cripply, he beant to work
no more. — Mrs. Trollope, Michael Armstrong,
ch. iii.
• Crisp, a fine lace or lawn: in the
extract silver = (I suppose) embroidered
with silver.
Vpon her head a siluer crisp she pind
Loose wauing on her shoulders with the wind.
Hudson, Judith, iv. 51.
Criticaster, a contemptuous word
for critic. Cf. Poetaster. See also
quotation «. v. Critickin.
That people which is a God in intellect
and in heart, compared with the criticasters
that try to misguide it with their shallow
guesses and cant.— Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. xxvii.
The rancorous and reptile crew of poet-
icules who decompose into criticasters. —
Swinburne, Under the Microscope, p. 36.
Criticism, minute point.
Was it because he stood on this punctilio
or criticisme of credit, that he might not
hereafter be charged with cruelty for exe-
cuting his wife, that first -he would be
divorced from her?— Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. iv.
25.
Critickin, small critic.
Mr. Critickin,— for as there is a diminutive
for cat, so should there be for critic, — I defy
you.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxxii.
Many are the attempts which have been,
made, and are making in America too as well
as in Great Britain, by critics, critickins, and
criticasters (for these are of all degrees), to
take from me the Ignotum, and force upon
me the Magnificum in its stead. — Ibid. In-
terchapter xix.
Croaky, hoarse.
His voice was croaky and shrill, with a tone
of shrewish obstinacy in it, and perhaps of
sarcasm withal. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling,
Pt. II. ch. iv.
CROCHET
( 161 )
CROPPIE
Crochet, apparently a vestment;
misprint for rochet (?) : tinea vestis in
original. Erasmus is speaking of the
garb of popes, cardinals, and bishops.
Their upper crocket of white linen is to
signify their unspotted purity and innocence.
—Kennefs Erasmus** Praise of Folly, p. 126.
Crock, to dirty ; also, as a substan-
tive, dirt. In the quotation from Miss
Bronte crack seems to be used = a pot
covered with dirt : thus combining the
two meanings of the word given in L.,
«. v.
Do yon think, ma'am, that I was very fond
of such dirt beneath my feet, as I couldn't
condescend to touch with kitchen tongs with-
out blacking and crocking myself by the con-
tact?— Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. xlii.
Here I stand talking to mere mooncalfs
with Uncle Pumblechook waiting, and the
mare catching cold at the door, and the boy
grimed with crock and dirt from the hair of
bis head to the sole of his foot. — Ibid., Great
Expectations, ch. vii.
A shocking ugly old creature, Miss ; almost
m black as a crock. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. xviii.
Crocket£d, ornamented as with
crockets.
I had been long by the waterside at this
lower end of the valley, plaiting a little
crown of woodbine crocketed with sprigs of
heath. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. xxi.
Crockets, knobs on a stag's head.
You will carry the horns back to London,
and you will have them put up, and you will
discourse to your friends of the span and the
pearls, of the antlers and the crockets. —
blacky Princess of Thule, ch. xxv.
Crock-saw, a long-toothed iron plate
like a saw, which hangs at the back of
the fire-place to carry the pots and
crocks ; this can be held by when the
fire is low.
Master Huckaback stood up, without much
aid from the crock-saw, and looked at mother
&ad all of us. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch.
xiv.
Croft, a corruption of carafe (Fr.),
a fflafls bottle for water.
The Bishop crowned his glass, quoting
Pindar in praise of the virtues of cold water
with a jovial air, and pushed the croft to the
Vicar.— Savage, R. Medlicott, Bk. III. ch. xiii
Crofter, the holder of a croft or
small piece of ground.
Now there is no more tacksmen to be the
masters of the small crofters, and the crofters
tLey would think they were landlords them-
selves if there were no dues for them to pay.
— Black, Princess of Thule, ch. iv.
Croisee, a crusader; one marked
with the cross.
When the English croisees went into the
East in the first Crusade, a.d. 1096, they found
St. George ... a great warrior-saint amongst
the Christians of those parts. — Archttol., v.
19 (1779). •
Crome, hook or pincer.
What shall I speak of the other blessed
martyrs whereof some were . . . rent a pieces
with hot burning iron cromes. — Beam, ii. 150.
Crommell, cromlech ; a monument
formed by two large upright stones with
a third placed transversely on the top.
Up sprang the rude gods of the North,
and the resuscitated Druidiam passing from
its earliest templeless belief into the later
corruptions of crommell and idol. — Lytton,
Cottons, Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Croodle, to cuddle.
" There," said Lucia, as she clung croodling
to him, " there is a pretty character of you,
sir." — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. x.
Croon, to murmur softly.
Any other woman would have been melted
to marrow at hearing such stanzas crooned
in her praise. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxiv.
Along the lonely highway this was the
devil's dirge he had been crooning to himself.
— Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. xxiv.
Crop. See quotation.
Who was Crop the Conjuror, famous in
trivial speech, as Merlin in romantic lore, or
Doctor Faustus in the school of German
extravagance ? — Southey, The Doctor, ch . cxxv.
Crop-doublet, a short doublet.
Hospitality went out of fashion with crop-
doublets and cod pieces. — Love will find out
the way, I. i.
Crope, crept. The Diets, give no
later example of this form than fiom
Chaucer and Gower.
Another witness crope out against the
Lord Stafford.— i\ or/A, ICxamen, p. 217.
The Captain was just crope out of Newgate,
and, as was observed, began his fire at a
distance. — Ibid. p. 273.
Cropper, a heavy fall ; a tumble
neck and crop.
This is the man that charged up to my as-
sistance when I was dismounted among the
Suns, and kept by me, while I caught another
orse. What a cropper I went down, didn't
I? — II. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. lvii.
CRorriE. Irish rebel.
Wearing the hair short and <s without
powder was, at this time, considered a mark of
M
CROPSHIN
( 162 )
CROUP
French principles. Hair bo worn was called
a " crop." Hence Lord Melbourne's phrase,
u crop imitating wig " [Poetry of A nti-jaco-
bin, p. 41]. This is the origin of " croppies "
as applied to the Irish rebels of 1789. — Letter*
of Sir G. C. Lewis, p. 410.
Cropshtn. See extract.
There was a herring, or there was not, for
it was but a cropshtn (one of th£ refuse sort
of herrings). — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 176).
Cross. To be on the cross = to be a
thief. See quotation *. v. Cly-faking.
The young woman is Bess, and perhaps she
may be on the cross, and I don't go to say
that what with flimping and with cly-faking,
and such like, she mayn't be wanted some
day .... Flimping is a style of theft which
I have never practised, and consequently of
which I know nothing. Cly-faking is stealing
pocket-handkerchiefs. — H. Kingsley, Ravens-
hoe, ch. lx.
Cross as two sticks, extremely cross.
We got out of bed baok'ards, I think, for
we're as cross as two sticks. — Dickens, Martin
Chuzzlewit, ch. xxix.
When her chamber-door was closed, she
scolded her maid, and was as cross as two
sticks. — Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. xzxiii.
Cross-bars, bars sinister, the heraldic
mark of illegitimacy.
Few are in love with Cross-bars, and to be
brother to a by-blow is to be a bastard once
removed.— Gentleman Instructed, p. 11.
Crossbars, misfortunes. " Hence
grew my crossbars" is Stanyhuret's
version ( JSk., ii. 108) of " Hinc mihi
prima mali lobes"
Crossbitino, cheat.
I grant that affronts, tergiversations, cross-
bitings, personal reflections, and such like,
might make the King and the Duke angry
with him. — North, Examen, p. 55.
Cross-buttocks, blows across the
back or loins.
Many cross-buttocks did I sustain, and pegs
on the stomach without number. — Smollett,
Roderick Random, ch. xxvii.
Cross- invite, to return an invitation.
His lordship chose to be so far rude as not
to cross-invite, rather than bear the like con-
sequences of such another intercourse of his
own designing. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
ii. 142.
Crossish, rather cross.
Jane, who sometimes used to be a little
crossish, and Cicely too, wept sadly. — Richard-
ton, Pamela, i. 128.
Cross-jingling, antithetical See
quotation from Milton s. v. Africanism.
Cross-patch, a peevish person. Cf.
Patchy.
Cross-patch, draw the latch,
Sit Dy the fire and spin.
Old Nursery Rhyme.
Thou's fitter to be about mother than me ;
I'm but a cross-patch at best, an' now it's
like as if I was no good to nobody. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xxvi.
Cross-point, a step in dancing.
Nay but, my friends, one hornpipe further,
a refluence back, and two doubles forward :
what, not one cross-point against Sundays ?
— Greene, James IV., IV. iii.
Cross- week, Rogation- week. The
editor of Pilhington says because the
invention of the Cross occurred at that
time (May 3), but it is only occasion-
ally that that festival occurs in Rogation
week. Might it not be so called from
the Cross being carried about the parish
in the Rogation processions ?
From whence came all the gang-days to be
fasted in the cross-week ?—Pilkington, p. 550.
The parson, vicar, or curate, and church-
wardens . . shall in the days of the rogations
commonly called Cross-week or Gang-days
walk the accustomed bounds of every parish
—Grindal, p. 141.
Crotcheteer, a man who has whims
or crotchets.
In every large constituency there are bands
of crotcheteers, and a candidate who cares to
attach these crotcheteers to him by lavish
promises will generally find his account, at
any rate for the time being, in so doing. —
London, Dec. 21, 1878, p. 580.
Crotells, the ordure of a hare. N.
has crott for ordure generally, with a
quotation from Howell. The speaker
in the extract is supposed to be a man
who has been turned into an otter.
The fewmets of a deer, the leases of a fox,
the crotells of a hare, the dung of a horse,
and the spraints that I use to void backward,
are nothing so foetid [as the excrement of
man]. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 8.
Oroup, to croak.
Then as in time of spring the water is warme,
And crouping frogs like fishes there doth
swarme ;
But with the smallest stone that you can
cast
To stirre the streame, their crouping staves
as fast.— Hudson* s Judith, III. 48.
CROUP
( i«3 )
CRUP
Croup, a gambling term (see quota-
tion). The superintendent of the play
at a gambling table is called a croupier.
I have a game in my hand, in which if
you'll croup me, that is, help me to play
it. yon shall go five hundred to nothing. —
Cibher, Provoked Husband, II. i.
Cbowdeb, a fiddler. This word is in
the Diets. : but Fuller's jocular deriva-
tion may be noticed.
There is a company of pretenders to
Masick, who are commonly called Croicders,
and that justly too, because they crowd into
the company of gentlemen both unsent for
and unwelcome. — Fuller, Worthies, ch. z.
Crowdes, an underground vault
Within the Church, Saint Wilfride'a Needle
was in our grandfathers' remembrance very
famous : a narrow hole was this, in the Crowdes
or close vaulted roome under the ground. —
Holland's Camden, p. 700.
Crown. The poem which follows
the extract is in auiebean stanzas of
ten lines, each stanza beginning with
the last line of the preceding one.
Stephen again began this dizain, which
was answered unto him in that kind of verse
which is called the Crown. — Sidney, Arcadia,
p. 217.
Cbqwnkd, high-crowned.
A poor decrepit old woman, however, in
her crowned hat, .... was terribly battered
and burnt. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk.
IILch. xx.
Cbow-tbee.
I like Thornfield, its antiquity, its retire-
ment, its old crow-trees ana thorn-trees. —
C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xv.
Crow-trodden, having crow's feet
or wrinkles under the eyes, and so,
aged. Breton prays to be delivered.
From a stale peece of flesh that is twice
sodden,
And from a bloud-raw roasted peece of beefe,
And from a crauen hen that is crow-trodden.
PasqulVs Precession, p. 9.
Cruciada, the Spanish cruzada,which
meant both a crusade, and a papal bull
giving privileges to those who joined
therein. It bears the latter sense in the
extract.
The Pope's Cruciada drew thou sands of
soldiers to adventure into the Holy War. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 196.
Cruciatory, torturing.
These cruciatory passions do operat some-
times with such a violence that they drive
him to despair. — Howell, Parly of Beasts,
p. 7.
Crucifixion, torture.
Say, have ye sense, or do ye prove
What crucijlrions are in love ?
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 169.
Crucify, to pillory.
So Bruin fared,
But tug^d and pull'd on th' other side,
like senv'ner newly crucify'd.
Hudibras, I. Hi. 152.
Is't possible that you whose ears
Are of the tribe of Issachar's,
And might (with equal reason) either
For merit or extent of leather,
With William Pryu's before they were
Retrench'd and crucify'd compare.
Ibid., Letter to Sidrophel, 14.
Crud, curdle.
Barbarous nations who lived of milke, ....
had the feat of crudding it to a pleasant
tartnesse and to fat butyr. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 601.
Crug, the commons of bread at
Christ's Hospital.
He had his tea and hot rolls in a morning,
while we were battening upon our quarter
of a penny loaf — our crug — moistened with
attenuated small beer in wooden piggins,
smacking of the pitched leather jack it
was poured from. — Lamb, Essays (Christ's
Hospital).
Crump, a deformed or crooked per-
son. It was more used as an adjective,
and the diminutive crumpled is still
common, though not applied to the
body.
That piece of deformity! that monster!
that crump! — Vanbrugh, AZsop, Act II.
If I stand to hear this crump preach a
little longer, I shall be fool enough perhaps
to be bubbled out of my livelihood. — Ibid.,
Act III.
Crumpler, cravat, from the creases
in which it is folded.
If I see a boy make to do about the fit of
his crumpler, and the creasing of his breeches,
and desire to be shod for comeliness rather
than for use, I cannot 'scape the mark that
God took thought to make a girl of him. —
Blackmore, Lorna Boone, ch. iii.
Crunch, to crush.
A crunching of wheels and a splashing
tramp of horse-hoofs became audible on the
wet gravel. — C. Bronte , Jane Eyre, ch. xviii.
Crup, abbreviated form of crupper;
from stress of rhyme.
Alarum'd thus from sleep I rouse,
And got a-strid the ridge of house,
Deeming it politick and proper
T'avoid the scandal of Eves-dropper ;
M 2
CRUP-SIIOULDERED ( 164 )
CULPABLE
And listening sate where I got up,
Till I had almost gauled my crup.
Cottony Scarronides, p. 37.
Crup-shouldered.
Hee hath almost no hayre on his head,
and he hath lost one of his eares ; hee goes
crup shouldered, and sits downe by leisure. —
Breton, Miseries of Mavillia, p. 49.
Crusado, a Portugese coin ; those
referred to by Pepys were received in
payment of Queen Catherine's dowry.
Spoke to my Lord about exchange of the
erusados into sterling money.— Pepys, Jane 2,
1662.
Crutch-back, a crooked back.
JEsope, for all his crutch-back, had a quick
wit.— Nine Worthies of London, 1692 (Harl.
Misc., viii. 437).
Crying-out, confinement. The verb
is more common (Hen. VIII., V. i. ;
Pepys, July 12, 1668, &c).
Aunt Nell who, by the way, was at the
crying-out, and was then so frighted, so
thankful to God, and so happy in her own
situation (no, not for the world would she be
other than she was), now grudges the nurses
half their cares.— Richardson, Grandison, vi.
823.
Cuck, to cuckoo.
Clucking of moorfowls, cuclcing of cuckoos,
bumbling of bees. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
III. ch. ziii.
Cuck, to duck on the cucking-stool.
What think you of Alee that sells butter?
Her neighbour's head clothes she off pluck't,
And she scolded from dinner to supper,
Oh such a scold would be cuckt.
Roxburgh Ballads, i. 54.
Cuddy, a lout ; it is one of the nick-
names of the donkey.
It cost more tricks and troubles by half.
Than it takes to exhibit a six-legged calf
To a boothf ul of country Cuddies.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Cue-ball, piebald ; skewbald.
A gentleman on a cue -ball horse was
coming slowly down the hill. — Blackmore,
Lorna Boone, ch. xxxix.
Cuff, an old fellow or miser.
Gi. You must know I boarded with An-
t rooms.
Ja. What with that rich old cuff ?
Gi. Yes, with that sordid hunks.
Bailey's Erasmus Colloq., p. 371.
Zounds! they are just here; ten to one
the old cuffm&j not stay with her; 111 pop
into this close! — Colman, Polly Honeycombe,
Scene III.
Cuit, a kind of sweet wine. See H.
Infused also it is many waies, and after-
wards either preserved in cuit, or incorporat
with hony.— Holland, Pliny, xix. 5.
Cule, fundament.
Then foloweth my lord on his mule,
Trapped with gold under her cule,
In every point most curiously.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me
and be nott tcrothe, p. 56.
Cull, a fool ; cully is the more usual
form.
The old put wanted to make a parson of
me, but d — n me, thinks I to myself, I'll
nick you there, old cull ; the devil a smack of
your nonsense shall you ever get iuto me. —
Fieldina, Tom Jones, Bk. VII. ch. xii.
I will show you the way to empty the
pocket of a queer cull, without any danger of
the nubbin g cheat. — Ibid. Bk. VIII. ch. xii.
I never had a better run of company in
my life than to enquire into that affair ; and
they all of the right sort — your secret, grave,
old rich culls, just fit to do business with —
Johnston, Chrysal, ii. 17.
Culmen, height or acme (Latin).
He had the advantage of the common tend-
ency of things to change, which from a cut-
men at the Restoration went continually de-
clining towards the Yale of bitterness to the
Crown, sedition, and rebellion. — North, Kj>
amen, p. 118.
The copying these shameless and barbarous
practices of that age is the culmen of the his-
torian's art and invention. — Ibid. p. 145.
Culottic, having breeches, and so
belonging to the more respectable
classes as opposed to the Sansculottes.
See quotation s. v. Habilatory.
Young Patriotism, Culottic and Sansculot-
tic, rushes forward emulous. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. VI. ch. iii.
Let the guilty tremble therefore, and the
suspect, and the rich, and in a word all
manner of Culottic men. — Ibid. Pt. III. Bk.
V. ch. ii.
Culottism, the opposite of Sanscu-
lottism, q. v.; the rule or influence of
the more respectable classes ; literally,
breeched ness or inexpressibleness.
Sansculottism, anarchy of the Jean-Jacques
Evangel, having now got deep enough, is to
perish in a new singular system of Culottism
and arrangement. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III.
Bk. VII. ch. i.
He who in these epochs of our Europe
founds on garnitures, formulas, culottisnts of
what sort soever, is founding on old cloth
and sheepskin, and cannot endure. — Ibid.
ch. vi.
Culpable, a culprit.
One thing more is to be remembered which
CULT
( 165)
CURABLE
▼a* talked in coffee-houses concerning his
lordship; bat by those only who were the
culpable*.— North, life of Lord Guilford, II.
*i*xO.
Cult, worship.
Yet how distinguish what our will may
wisely save in its completeness, from the
heaping of cat-mummies and the expensive
f»?t of enshrined putrefactions?— G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxii.
Cultch. See extract ; " they " =
people of Colchester.
The Spat cleaves to Stones, old Oyster-
shells, pieces of wood, and such-like things
at the bottom of the sea which they call
luftch.- Defoe, Tour thro9 G. Brit., i. 9.
Culvert age, forfeiture of vassal's
land to the lord. When the King of
France was about to invade England
King John summoned —
All earles, barons, knights, and who else
could bear armes of any condition, to bee
ready at Doner presently upon Easter, furn-
ished with horse, armour, and all military
prouision . . . vnder peine of Culuertage ana
perpetuall servitude. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng.,
p. 116.
Cum for y, a plant ; belli* perennis.
To restore and well flesh them, they com-
monly gave them hog's flesh, with oil, butter,
and boney ; and a decoction of Cumfory to
bouze.— Hir T. Brown, Tract V.
Cum-twang, a term of abuse or re-
proach, apparently = miser. See quot-
ation at large *. v. Huddle-duddle.
Gray-beard huddle-duddles and crusty
cum-twangs. — Hashe, Lenten Stuffe {Hart,
Misc., vi. 147).
Cun, to give directions. Cf. Con ;
arid see H. s. v. cund.
I must confess you did not steer, but how-
somever you cunned all the way, and so, as
you could not see how the land lay, being
bliud of your larboard eye, we were fast
ashore before you knew anything of the mat-
ter.—-*Swo#er<, Peregrine Pickle, ch. ii.
Cunicular, pertaining to the cradle,
childish.
They might have observed, even in his
funicular days, in this. Lodo wick Muggleton,
an obstinate, dissentious, and opposive spirit.
— Account of Lodotcick Muggleton, 167o (Harl.
J/«c.,i. 610).
Cunny-BERRY, rabbit-hole.
Swearing . . . that the walls should not
keep the coward from him, but he would
fetch him out of his Cunny-berry.— Sidney,
Arcadia, p. 277.
Cr;p, to drink. The verb occurs in
Ant.andCleup-t II. vii.=to supply with
drink, and N. gives the past p irticiple
cupped, intoxicated, with extract from
Taylor. To cup usually means to draw
blood by means of a cupping-glass, as
in the second extract.
The former is not more thirsty after his
cupping than the latter is hungry after his
devouring. — Adams, i. 484.
The pleurisy ... is helped much by cupping :
I do not mean drinking. — Ibid. i. 487.
Cupboard. To cry cupboard = to
be hungry.
Footman. Madam, dinner's upon the table.
Col. Faith I'm glad of it ; my belly began to
cry cupboard.
Sicift, Polite Conversation (Conv. ii.).
Cupidity, is now almost confined to
the sense of avarice, but in the Bub-
joined it means that love over which
Cupid is supposed to preside.
Love, as it is called by boys and girls, shall
ever be the subject of my ridicule. Does it
not lead us girls into all manner of absurd-
ities, inconveniences, undutifulness, dis-
grace ? Villainous cupidity! — it does. —
Richardson, Grandtson, vi. 105.
She calls her idle flame love — a cupidity
which only was a something she knew not
what to make of. — Ibid. vi. 179.
Cup- moss, Lecanora Tartar ea.
Crowd close, little snipes, among the cup-
moss and wolf s-foot, for he who stalks past
you over the midnight moor, meditates a
foul and treacherous murder in his heart. —
H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. vi.
Cupping-house, a tavern.
How many of these madmen ramble about
this city ! that lavish out their short times in
this confused distribution of playing, dicing,
drinking, feasting, beasting ; a cupping-house,
a vaulting-house, a gaming-house, share their
means, lives, souls. — Adams, i. 277.
Cuprite, libation.
Juppiter almighty, whom men Maurusian,
eating
On the tabils varnisht, with cuprits magni-
fye dulye. — Stany hurst, AZn,, iv. 214.
Cup-shotten, drunken.
This is no part of that sober wisdom which
St. Paul commendeth to you, but of that
cup-shotten wisdom which he there condemn-
etn. — And races, v. 15.
The spring-tide of their mirth so drowned
their souls that the Turks coming in upon
them cut every one of their throats, to the
number of twenty thousand ; and quickly
they were stabbed with the sword that were
cup-shot before. — Fuller, Holy War, Bk. III.
ch. xvi.
Curable, curative ; not, as now,
capable of being cured.
CURACY
( 166 ) CURTEL
Nicephorus and the Tripartite History re-
port of a miraculous fouutaine by the high-
way side, where Christ would have departed
from the two disciples : who, when Hee was
conversant upon earth, and wearied with a
long journey, there washed His feet ; the
water from thenceforth retaining a curable
vertue against all diseases. — Sandys. Trauels,
Bk. III. p. 174.
Curacy, guardianship.
Perhaps the republican party concluded
such issue must come to the Crown young,
and then they had a game de integro by way
of curacy and protectorship. — North, Examen,
p. 290.
Curat ess, a female curate, or curate's
wife.
A very lowly curate I might perhaps essay
to rule ; but a curatess would be sure to get
the better of me. — TroUope, Barchester
Towers, ch. zzi.
Curb, to swindle or rob in some way.
N. gives an instance of the word = to
cringe ; it may refer therefore to those
who for the purposes of fraud attack
their victims with flattery and compli-
ment.
Though you can f oyst, nip, prig, lift, curbe,
and use the black art, yet you cannot cross-
bite without the helpe of a woman. — Greene,
Theeves falling out, 1615 (Hati. Misc., viii.
380).
Curbless, unrestrained.
That beck itself was then a torrent, turbid
and curbless. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. ix.
Curdle, curd, coagulation.
There is a kind of down or curdle on his
wit, which is like a gentlewoman's train,
more than needs. — Adams, i. 501.
Curious, to work curiously or elabor-
ately.
For tablet fine
About his neck hangs a great cornaline.
Where some rare artist curiousing upon't
Hath deeply cut Time's triple-formed front.
Sylvester, Magnificence, p. 920.
Curmudgel, a form of curmudgeon,
adopted apparently from stress of
rhyme.
"Would one
Be so ungrateful a Curmudgel
To steal away his Age's Cudgel ?
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 185.
Curning, churning, grinding.
Flie where men feele
The curning axel- tree ; and those that suffer
Beneath the chariot of the snowy beare.
Chapman, Bussy D'Avifois, Act V.
Curr, an onomatopoeous word, to ex-
press the noiBe of owlets.
The owlets hoot, the owlets curr,
And Johnny's lips they burr, burr, burr,
As on he goes beneath the moon.
Wordsworth, The Idiot Boy.
Curricle, to drive as in a curricle.
Who is this that comes curriding through
the level yellow sunlight, like one of respect-
ability keeping his gig? — Carlyle, Misc., iv.
98.
Currier, a candle ; same as quarter,
y. v. in N. Lights were used in catch-
ing birds.
The Currier and the lime-rod are the death
of the fowle, and the faulcon's bels ring tho
death of the mallard. — Breton, Fantastickes
(January).
Curtainle88, without curtains.
I rose up on my curtainless bed, trembling
and quivering. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch,
xxxii.
Curtalize, to curtail or crop.
He spake much of his own abilities . . . and
therefore how unworthy it was to curtalize
his eares, generally given out by the Bishop's
servants as the punishment intended unto
him.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. ii. 6i.
Curtana, a eword without an edge,
borne before our Sovereigns at their
coronation, typifying mercy. It is said
to have belonged to Edward the Con-
fessor.
Homage denied, to censures you proceed ;
But when Curtana will not do the deed,
You lay that pointless clergy-weapon by,
And to the laws, your sword of justice, fly.
Dryden, Hind and Panther, ii. 419.
Curted, curt, laconic.
Bee your words made (good Sir) of Indian
wore,
That you allow mee them by so small rate :
Or do you curted Spartans imitate,
Or do you mean my tender ears to spare ?
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella* 92.
Curtel. " Double curtel, a musical
instrument that plays the bass "
(Bailey). Brown used the word in
another place. See extract «. v. Out-
grunt. In the first extract it seems =
a measure (of liquor).
The poore prisoners complaine how cruel
they [gaolers] be to them : extorting with
extraordinary fees, selling a duble curtail, as
they call it, with a duble juge of beere for
2 pence, which contains not above a pint
ana a halfe. — Greene, Quip for an Upstart
Courtier, 1592 (Harl. Misc., v. 409).
I knew him by his hoarse voice, which
sounded like the lowest note of a double
courtel.—T. Brown, Works, ii. 182.
CURTSEY
( 167 ) CUT AND COME AGAIN
Curtsey. The Editor of Ward ex-
plains this as "a short cut," which
makes sense, but is there any authority
for this use of the word ?
The whole shire must be troubled to hear
mad judge of a cwrtsty made out of the path,
or a blow given upon the shoulder, upon
occasion of a wager, or such like bauble-tres-
passes which I shame to mention. — Ward's
Sermons , p. 131.
Curtsie-capping, low salutations.
If they do so admire me in silks, how would
they cap me and curtsey me, and worship me,
if I were in velvets. — H. Smith, Sermons, i.
206.
Great Scipio sated with fain'd curtsie-capping,
With court eclipses, and the tedious gaping
Of golden beggars.
Sylvester, third day, first weeke, 1060.
Cushion, the seat of justice.
[Chief Justice Hales] became the cushion
exceedingly well. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 114.
The Court of Common Pleas had been out-
witted by the King's Bench, till his lordship
came upon the cushion. — Ibid. i. 123.
Cushion, to put aside or suppress ; a
metaphor taken from billiards.
The apothecary trotted into town, now in
full possession of the Vicar's motives for
desiring to cushion his son's oratory. — Savage,
R. Mtdlicott, Bk. II. ch. x.
Cushion. Queen Mary was often mis-
takenly believed by herself and others
to be pregnant ; hence Queen Mary1 8
Cushion = protuberance, that produces
nothing. — Some suspected Mary of an
attempt to palm off a supposititious
child on the nation.
Thus his pregnant motives are at last
proved nothing out a tympany, or a Oueen
Mary's cushion. — Milton, Euconoklastes, ch. Hi.
It is an hyperbole, beyond the conception
of humanity, that a King pretending to
so much reason, religion, and piety, should
praise (or rather mock) Qod for a child,
whilst his Queen had only conceived a pillow,
and was brought to bed of a cushion .... This
was the old contrivance of another Mary-
Queen.— Letter from the Pope, 1689 (Harl.
Misc., i.S70).
Cushiony, like a cushion.
The merchant was a bow-legged character,
with a flat and cushiony nose, like the last
new strawberry. — Dickens, Uncommercial
Traveller, ch. x.
Custodial, the tabernacle in which
the Host is reserved.
The priest . . . then took the custodial,
and showed the patient the Corpus Domini
within. — Reade. Cloister and Hearth, ch. lxii.
Custom, to -frequent as a customer ;
to deal at.
Did we here find you out, customed your
house,
And help'd away your victuals, which had
else
Lain mouldy on your hands?
Maine, City Match, ii. 5.
Customer, a country customer = a
simple fellow, a yokel ; customer is also
usea in an opposite sense, as meaning
sharp or able ; this latter is noticed
byL.
The country fellow . . . picked a quarrel
with the map, because he could not find
where his own farm stood. And such a
country customer I did meet with once. —
Ueylin, Cosmographie, Preface.
Cut, to run ; common as a slang ex-
pression, but the subjoined are early
instances of its use in this sense .
Caligula lying in Fraunce with a greate
armie of fighting menne, brought all his
force on a sudden to the sea side, as though
hee intended to cutte ouer and inuade Eng-
land.— Gosson, Schoole of Abuse, Ep. Ded.
I fear to faint if (at the first) too fast
I cut away, and make too hasty haste.
Sylvester, first day, first weeke, p. 841.
Cut, to ignore an acquaintance. L.
has the word with quotation from
Disraeli's Young Duke. The subjoined
is many years earlier.
That he had cut me ever since my mar-
riage, I had seen without surprise or resent-
ment.— Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility,
eh. xliv.
Cut, the act of purposely ignoring an
acquaintance.
We met and gave each other the cut direct
that night — Thackeray, Snobs, ch. ii
Cut. To cut the grass from under a
person is to disconcert him, to leave
nim without any plea or stand-point.
We usually say ground instead of grass.
My lord Clifford, under pretence of making
all his interest for his patron my Ld. Arling-
ton, cutt the grasse under his feet, and pro-
cur'd it for himself, assuring the king that
Lord Arlington did not desire it. — Evelyn,
Diary, Aug. J8, 1673.
Cut and comb again, a vulgar ex-
pression to signify that there is abund-
ance.
Col. I vow 'tis a noble sirloyn.
Nev. Ay, here's cut and come again, Miss.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. ii.).
Something of bold and new design
Dug from the never-failing mine,
CUT- A WA Y
( i «8 )
CYULE
That's work'd within your fertile brain,
Where all is cut and come again.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. ch. iv.
Cut and come ayain was the order of the
evening, as it had been of the day ; and I
had no time to ask questions, but help meat
and ladle gravy. — Blackmore, Lorna Doom,
ch. xxix.
Cut-away, a coat, the skirts of which
are cut away, so that they do not hang
down as in a frock-coat : also used as
an adjective.
He had ... a brown cut-away coat with
brass buttons, that fitted tight round a spider
waist. — Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, ch.
viii.
" The hounds ! " calls out a fifth-form boy,
clad in a green cut-away, with brass buttons
and cord trousers. — Hughes, Tom Brown'*
Schooldays, Pt. I. ch. vi.
Cute, vulgar abbreviation of acute ;
sharp, clever. See extract from Foote,
9. V. MlSCHIEFFUL.
Truly, Madam, I write and indite but
poorly ; I never was htte at my learning. —
Goldsmith, Good-natured Man, iv. 2.
"I believe,'' continued this candid per-
sonage (who had never been in any of the
States) " they [Yankees] are the cruellest set
on the face of the earth, but then they are
the 'cutest (that.is their own word), and they
are a precious sight too 'cute to disable the
beast that carries the grist to the mill. —
Reade, Never too late to mend, ch. xxiii.
Cuteness, the quality indicated by
the preceding word.
Who could have thought so innocent a face
could cover so much cuteness? — Goldsmith,
Good-natured Man, II. i.
Cut-fingered. Cork shoes (q. v.)
were fashionable ; " cut-fingered pumps,
whatever these may be, seem to have
been the reverse. It may mean pumps
the worse for wear, with a gash in them
here and there like a cut finger.
Tie as good to go in cut-fingered pumps as
cork shoes, if one wear Cornish diamonds on
his toes. — Nashe, 1591 (Eng. Garner, i. 501).
Cut-throatery, murder.
To let my house before my lease be out is
cut-throatery. — Wily Beguiled (Hatckin's Eng.
Dr., iii. 300).
Cuttle-bono, a knife used for cutting
purses : or, perhaps, a knife carried in
the purse or girdle. Boung is a cant
term for purse.
[He] unsheathed his cuttle-bony, and from
the nape of the necke to the taile dismem-
bered him. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Harl.
Misc., vi. 172).
Cutty pipe, a short pipe.
I was whiling away my leisure hours with
the end of a cutty pipe. — Scott, Introduction
to Count Robert of Paris.
That was the only smoke permitted during
the entertainment, George Warringtou him-
self not being allowed to use his cutty pipe.
— Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xxiii.
Cut up, grieved.
Poor fellow, he seems dreadfully cut up. —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxii.
Cut- water, the fore part of a ship's
prow.
One tree was sold for £43 ; eighteen horses
were had to draw one part of it when slit,
and out of it the cut-water to the Royal
Sovereign was made. — Defoe, Tour thro' G.
Britain, ii. 196.
Cyclop^dy, circle of knowledge.
If respect be had to the severall arts there
professed, Sigebert founded schools in the
plurall; but if regard be taken of the cy-
dopady of the learning resulting from thane
severall sciences, he erected but one grand
school.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. ii. 56.
Cymbal-doctors, teachers givingf orth
an empty sound ; the allusion, of course,
is to 1 Cor. xiii. 1.
These petty glosses and concerts .... are
so weak and shallow, and so like the quibbles
of a court sermon, that we may safely reckon
them either fetched from such a pattern, or
that the hand of some household priest
foisted them in, lest the world should forgrt
how much he was a disciple of those cymbal-
doctors. — 3filton, Eikonoklastes, ch. viii.
Cypher-tunnels. See quotation.
Peter-pence . . . was a penny paid for
every chimney that smoaked in England,
which in that hospitall age had few smoak-
lesse ones; the device of cypher-tunnels, or
mock-chimneys merely for uniformity of
building, being unknown in those days. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. iii. 46.
Cyule, a sort of boat
Who being embarqu'd in forty cyules or
pinnaces, and sailing about the Rets* coasts
. — Holland's Camden, p. 128.
After that came three Sonne* of a Spanish
knight with thirtie ciules with them, and in
every ciule thirtie wives. — Ibid. ii. 66.
DAB
( 169 ) DAMAGEMENT
D
Dab, a contemptuous term for a trifle.
See extract *. v. Pushery.
The Count may have procnred for her
some dirty dab of a negotiation about some
acre of territory more for Hanover. — Wal-
pole to Mann, ii. 53 (1745).
Catting the leaves of a new dab called
Anecdites of Polite Literature, I found my-
self abused for defending my father. — I bid..
Letters, ii. 337 (1762).
Dab, a pinafore. The word is in
Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary (E. I). &)■
Beckon with my washerwoman ; making
her allow for old shirts, socks, dabiis, and
markees, which she bought of me. — Hue and
Cry after Dr. Swift, p. 9, 2nd ed. 1714.
Dab-wash. See extract.
That great room itself was sure to have
clothes hanging to dry at the fire, whatever
day of the week it was; some one of the
large irregular family having had what was
called in the district a dab-wash of a few
articles forgotten on the regular day. — Mrs.
. Gaskell, Syfaia's Lovers, ch. vi.
Dacha-saltee, a franc or tenpence,
from the Italian died soldi. Cf . Saltee
(slang).
What with my crippledom and thy piety,
a wheeling of thy poor old dad, we'll bleed
the bumpkins of a dacha-saltee. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. lv.
Daddle, hand (slang).
"VVerry unexpected pleasure! tip us your
daddle. — C. Kinysley, Alton Locke, ch. 21.
Daemonic, pertaining to a daemon.
He may even show sudden impulses which
have a false air of damomc strength, because
they seem inexplicable. — {•?. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. xv.
D<£Monocbacy, a rule of daemons.
A demonocracy of unclean spirits
Hath governed long these synods of your
Church. — Taylor, Isaac Comnenus, ii. 3.
D^emonologeb, one skilled in daeinon-
ology.
If the Devil himself, black accuser as he
is, could, out of his infernal copia, have sup-
plied more livid defamation of a departed
prince than this, I am no damonoloaer. —
North, Examen, p. 652.
Dagger-cheap, dirt cheap. The
Dagger was a low ordinary in Holborn,
referred to by Ben Jonson and others ;
the fare was probably cheap and nasty.
See my note in N. and Q., V. iii. 395.
We set our wares at a very easy price ; he
[the Devil] may buy us even datffjer-cheap as
we say. — A ndreics, Sermons, v. 546.
Dagonals, org ie8 in honour of Dagon.
A banquet worse than Job's children's, or
the Dagonals of the Philistines (like the
Bacchanals of the M&nades) when for the
shutting up of their stomachs, the house fell
down and broke their necks. — Adams, i. 160.
Daintification, dandyism.
He seems a mighty delicate gentleman;
looks to be painted, and is all daintification
in manner, speech, and dress. — Mad. D'Ar-
blay, Diary, i. 327.
Daintipy, to make dainty ; to refine
away.
My father charges me to give you his
kindest love, and not to daintify his affection
into respects or compliments. — Mad. D'Ar-
blay, Diary, i. 414.
Daintihood, nicety ; daintiness.
It is no little difficulty to keep pace with
her refinement, in order to avoid shocking
her by too obvious an inferiority in dainti-
hood and ton. — Mad. D*Arblay, Diary, i.
356.
Dainty. To make dainty usually
means to scruple, or to be particular
(see N.), but here = to feast, or to pre-
pare a delicacy.
The Arcadians lived on acorns, the Argives
on apples . . . and Jacob here made dainty
of lentils. — Adams, i. 5.
Dainty -chapped, particular as to
eating.
You dainty-chapped fellow, you ought to
be fed with hay, ii you had such commons as
you deserve. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 42.
Dainty-modth, an epicure.
The word Oimbri no more signifieth a
thief e than .... Sybarita a delicate dainty-
mouth. — Holland's Camden, p. 10.
Daisy -cutteb, a trotting horse.
The trot is the true pace for a hackney ;
and, were we near a town, I should like to
try that daisy-cutter of yours upon a piece
of level road (barring canter) for a quart of
claret at the next inn. — Scott, Bob Roy, i. 44.
Damagement, injury.
And the more base and brutish pleasures bee,
The more's the peine in their accomplish-
ment,
And the more vs'd they are excessiuely,
The more's the soule and bodie's damage-
ment.— Davies, Microcosmos, p. 44.
DANCERS
( 170 ) DARING-GLASS
Dancers, stairs (slang or thieves'
cant).
Come, my Hebe, track the dancers, that is,
go up the stairs. — Lytton, What will he do
with it? Bk. III. ch. xvi.
Dance upon nothing, an euphemism
for hanging.
Just as the felon condemned to die,
With a very natural loathing,
Leaving the Sheriff to dream of ropes,
From his gloomy cell in a vision elopes,
To caper on sunny greens and slopes,
Instead of the dance ujton nothing.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Dandified, smart, like a dandy.
These two were at first more than usually
harsh and captious with Olive, whose pros-
perity offended them, and whose dandified
manners, free-and-easy ways, and evident
influence over the younger scholars, gave
umbrage to these elderly apprentices. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xviii.
Daneweed, Eryngium campestre.
See H. 8. v. Danes-blood, and L. s. v.
Danewort.
Everything hereabouts is attributed to the
Danes, because of the neighbouring Daventry,
which they suppose to have been built by
them. The road hereabouts too being over-
grown with Danetceed, they fansy it sprung
from the blood of the Danes slain in battle ;
and that if upon a certain day in the year
you cut it, it bleeds. — Defoe, Tour thro? O.
Brit., ii. 416.
Danger. To make danger = to
hesitate.
I was commanded ... to swear that I
should truly answer unto such articles and
interrogatories as I should be bv them ex-
amined upon. I made danger of it awhile at
first, but afterwards being persuaded by them
... I promised to do as they would have me.
— Dalaber, 1526 (Maitland on the Reformation,
p. 13).
Dangerfdl, dangerous.
They'll talk like learn'd astronomers,
Of living creatures made of stars,
As lion, Scorpion, Bear, and Bull,
And other things less danqerfvl.
Ward, England1 $ Reformation,
c. ii. p. 172.
Danglement, act of dangling.
It was an infaust and sinister augury for
Austin Caxton, the very appearance, the very
suspension and danglement of any puddings
whatsoever right over his ingle-nook, when
those puddings were made by the sleek
hands of Uncle Jack. — Lytton, Caxtons, Bk.
VII. ch. i.
Dap. H. says, " a hop ortnrn ; hence
the habits of any one. — West." The
original is. Sola viri molles aditus et
tempora noras.
His daps and sweetening good moods to
the soalye were opaed.--Stanyhurst, JEn.,
iv.446.
Darbies, handcuffs (slang). In the
first extract the reference is to a man
involved in difficulties by usurers, ore.
They tie the poore soule in such Darbies
bands. — Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier,
1592 (Harl. Misc., v. 405).
" Stay," cried he, " if he is an old hand, he
will twig the officer." * Oh, I'm dark, Sir,"
was the answer : " he won't know me till I
put the darbies on him." — Reade, Never too
late to mend, ch. i.
Darbyshirian. H. gives darby =
ready money, and the passage seems to
admit of some such interpretation, but
it is obscure. Hall describes himself
as asked to a feast, and accepting at
once, for if he had shown the least
reluctance, his host would have been
glad to excuse him. He counsels men
therefore to take immediately whatever
is offered. But though I suppose this
to be the general sense of the passage,
I cannot interpret it word by word. I
give it as in Mr. Singer's edition, punc-
tuation and all, though that can hardly
be right ; in the notes it is passed over
sicca pede, after the manner of many
commentators where the text is really
difficult.
Two words for money, Darbyshirian wise ;
(That's one too many) is a naughty guise.
Ball, Sat. III. iii. 11.
Dardanium, a bracelet. The wealth
of the Durdani or Trojans struck the
simpler Greeks with wonder ; hence
Dardanian became an epithet of gold,
and so a golden ornament is called
Dardanium.
A golden ring that shines upon thy thumb,
About thy wrist the rich Dardanium.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 28.
Daredevil, a bold, reckless man. L.
gives it as substantive and adjective,
but has only example of the latter.
I deem myself a daredevil in rhymes.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 189.
I know a set of exiles over there,
Dare-devils, that would eat fire and spit it out
At Philip's beard.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, III. i.
Daring-glass. Larks were dared or
fascinated in various ways (see N. s. v.
dare) ; one mode was by mirrors which,
DARKLE
( 171 ) DAVYS SOW
I suppose, dazzled and confused them,
making it easy to capture them.
New notions and expressions . . are many
times . . the daring-glasses or decoy es to
faring men into the snares of their dangerous
or damnable doctrines. — Gauden, Tears of the
Churchy p. 197.
Darkle, to grow dark.
** I am inclined to think, sir," says he, his
honest brows darkling as he looked towards
me, w that yoa too are spoiled by this wicked
world." — Thackeray, Ntwcomes, ch. lxvt
The chapel is lighted, and Founder's Tomb
with its grotesque carvings, monsters, her-
aldries, darkles and shines with the most
wonderful shadows and lights. — Ibid., ch.
Ixxv.
Darklixgs, in the dark ; usually,
darkling ; it may be that the word is,
in the extract, in apposition with serv-
ants and = people iu the dark.
Thou wouldest fain persuade me to do like
some idle wanton servants, who play and
talk out their candle-light, and then go dark-
It nys to bed. — Bp. Hall, Works, vii. 344.
Darn, a euphemism for damn.
"My boy," said another, "was lost in a
typhoon in the China sea ; darn they lousy
typhoons." — H. KingsUy, Ravenshoe, ch. vi.
Dartle, to dart — a frequentative
forui.
All that I know
Of a certain star
Is, it can throw
(Like the angled spar)
Now a dart of red,
Now a dart of blue ;
Till my friends have said
They would fain see too '
My star that parties the red and the blue.
Browning, My Star*
Dartman, javelin-thrower.
Without an aim the dartman darts his spear,
And chance performs th' effect of valour there.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 304.
Dasher, one who is extravagant, os-
tentatious, or fast.
She was astonished to find in high life a
degree of vulgarity of which her country
companions would have been ashamed ; but
all such things in high life go under the
general term dashing. These young ladies
were dashers. Alas ! perhaps foreigners and
future generations may not know the mean-
ing of the term. — Miss Edgevcorth, Almeria,
p. 292.
A club
Yclept Four-horse is now the rage,
And fam'd for whims in equipage.
Dashers ! who once a month assemble,
Make creditors and coachmen tremble ;
And dressM in colours vastly fine,
Drive to some public-house to dine.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. 18.
Dastardice, cowardice.
I was upbraided with ingratitude, dastard-
ice, and all my difficulties with my angel
charged upon myself, for want of following
my blows. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi. 49.
Datary, chronologer.
Die quinto Elphegi. I am not datary
enough to understand this. I know Elphegus
to be Archbishop of Canterbury, and Martyr,
and his day kept the nineteenth of April. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. iv. 8.
Dauohterling, little daughter.
What am I to do with this daughter or
daughterling of mine ? She neither grows in
wisdom nor in stature. — Miss Bronte, Villette,
ch. zxv.
Dauk, Hindustani dak, a post for
letters, also a relay of horses or palan-
quin bearers. The telegraph is called
tar dak or wire post.
After the sea voyage there isn't much
above 1000 miles to come by dauk. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xliv.
Daukin, a fool ; diminutive, perhaps,
of daw, and coined by Calf hill to rhyme
with Maukin.
If mother Maukin had been such a daukin
as to think every minister to be a minstrel,
as you do every mystery to be a sacrament,
then Martial 1 and Maukin, a dolt with a
daukin, might marry together.— Calf hill, p.
236.
Dauntingne8SE, fear.
Claudius .... foresends Publius Ostorius
Scapula, a great warrior, pro-praetor into
Brittaine, where he met with many tur-
bulencies, and a people hardly to be ariuen,
howsoeuer they might be led; yet as one
who well knew his mestier, and how the first
euents are those which incusse a daungting-
nesse or daring, imployed all means to make
his expeditions sodaine, and his executions
cruell. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 4.
Davy's sow. David Lloyd, a Welsh-
man, had a sow with six legs ; on one
occasion he brought some friends and
asked them whether they had ever seen
a sow like that, not knowing that in his
absence his drunken wife had turned
out the animal, and gone to lie down in
the sty. One of the party observed
that it was the drunkest sow he had
ever beheld. The proverb in the second
quotation is a gratuitous addition of
Bailey '8 ; the original simply has teniu-
lentus.
DAVY JONES ( 172 )
DEAD
He came to us as drunk as Davy's sow. —
Swift, Polite Conversation (Con v. in.).
When be comes home, after I have been
waiting for him till I do not know what time
at night, as drunk as David's sow, he does
nothing but He snoring all night long by my
aide. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 127.
Davy Jones. To go to Davy Jones
or his locker is nautical English for to
die or perish. It has been ingeniously
conjectured that the sea, which is so
often the sailor's cemetery, was called
Jonah's locker (Jonah ii. 5, 6), that the
prophet's name was corrupted into
Jones, and Davy prefixed as being a
common name in Wales (N. and Q., I.
iii. 509).
I have a consort off these islands, and be
cursed to her. She'll find me out some-
where, though she parted company in the
bit of a squall, unless she is gone to Davy
Jones too. — Scott, Pirate, ch. viii.
You thought, I suppose, I bad gone to
Davy's locker. . . I read the account of the
shipwreck of the Dauntless. — 3fiss Ferrier,
The Inheritance, Vol. III. ch. xix.
Even in the appellations given him [the
Devil] by familiar or vulgar irreverence, the
same pregnant initial prevails, he is the
Deuce, and Old Davy, and Davy Jones.—
Southey, The Doctor, ch. clxxv.
Dawbinq. See extract.
At this period [16th cent.] the ancient
process of forming walls by means of in-
durated earth was still extensively employed ;
in the eastern counties this was called dawb-
iny, and the term is still retained in Norfolk
and Suffolk.— Arctueol. xxx. 495 (1844).
Dawn light, morning light
The return of the beautiful daicn light,
whom the powers of darkness had borne
away. — Cox, Aryan Mythology, ii. 5.
Day, credit ; a distant day being fixed
for payment. Gascoigne reckons-" it
among the signs of the Millennium.
"When drapers draw no gaines by giuing day.
Steele Glas., p. 50.
Faith then 111 pray you 'cause he is my
neighbour,
To take a hundred pound, and give him day.
Jonson, Tale of a Tub, iv. 1.
If a mean man . . . have something to
sell to his necessitous neighbour that must
buy upon day ... it is scarce credible, did
not every day's experience make proof of it,
how such a man will skrew up the poor man
that falleth into his hands. — Sanderson, ii.
354.
Day-fever. The sweating sickness
wok, I suppose, so culled from the short
time of its duration : it was mortal in a
few hours.
Fracastorius also writing how that pestilent
day-fever in Britaine, which we commonly
call the British or English swet, hapned by
occasion of the soile. — Holland's Camden, p.
24.
Day-lights, eyes (slang).
Good woman! I do not use to be so
treated. If the lady says such another word
to me, d n me, I will darken her day-
lights.— Fielding, Amelia, Bk. I. ch. x.
Day net, a net for small birds:
another instance from Burton will be
found, p. 469.
As larks come down to a day net, many
vain readers will tarrie and stand gazing
like silly passengers, at an an tick picture in
a painter 8 shop, that will not look at a
judicious peece. — Burton, Democ. to Reader,
p. 5.
Madam, I would not have you with the lark
Play yourself into a day net.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act II.
Dayshine, daylight.
Wherefore waits the madman there
Naked in open dayshine 7
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Day's-man, usually an umpire, but
here a worker by the day.
He is a good day's-man, or journeyman, or
tasker, which is an excellent mystery of well-
living and redemption of time, a working
up our salvation m holiness and righteous-
ness all the days of our life. — Ward, Sermons,
p. 105.
Day-tall, hired for the day ; work-
ing by the job.
Holla ! you chairman, here> sixpence ; do
step into that bookseller's shop, and call me
a day-tall critick. — Sterne, Trist. Shand., iii.
143.
Deacon, minister. In the extract it
is used generally, not of the third order
of the ministry.
They whom God hath set apart to His
ministry are by Him endued with an ability
of prayer ; because their office is to pray for
others, and not to be the lip-working deacons
of other men's appointed words. — Milton,
Apol.for Smectymnuus.
Dead, a dead heat.
Mammon well follow'd, Cupid bravely led ;
Both touchers ; equal fortune makes a dead ;
No reed can measure where the conquest lies ;
Take my advice ; compound, and share the
prize. — Quartes, Emblems, Epig. x.
Dead, in a faint.
Sir J. Miunes fell sick at Church, and going
DEADE YE
( 173 )
DEAR
down the gallery stairs, fell down dead, but
come to himself again, and in pretty well. —
Pepys. Sept. 11, 1664.
Talking with my brother ... I looking
toother way, heard him fall down, and turned
my head, and he was fallen down all along
upon the ground dead, which did put me into
a great fright ... he did preset tly come to
himself.— Ibid. Feb. 7, 1666-67.
I presently fell dead on the floor, and it
was with great difficulty I was brought back
to life. — Fielding, Amelia, Bk. I. ch. ix.
We there beheld the most shocking sight
in the world, Miss Bath lying dead on the
floor. .... Miss Bath was at length re-
covered, and placed in her chair. — Ibid., Bk.
III. ch. ix.
Dead-eye, " A round flattish wooden
block, encircled by a rope or an iron
band, and pierced with holes, to receive
the laniard, . . used to extend the
shrouds and stays, and for other pur-
poses " (Imp. Diet.) : but in the extract
it seems to oe put for dead-light.
So I lay and wondered why light
Came not, and watched the twilight,
And the glimmer of the sky-light
That shot across the deck ;
And the binnacle pale and steady,
And the dull glimpse of the dead-eye,
And the sparks in fiery eddy
That whirled from the chimney neck.
Thackeray, The White Squall.
Dead life, the memory of one that
i* dead : so in some parts of England
the dead year of a person = the year
following his decease.
The king .... was slain upon the tomb
of their two true servants, which they caused
to be made for them with royal expenses and
notable workmanship, to preserve their dead
lites.— Sidney, Arcadia, Bk. II. p. 130.
Dead-lights, strong wooden ports
made to fit the cabin windows in a
ship, go as to keep out the waves in a
storm.
The timbers are straining, and folks are com-
plaining,
The dead-lights are letting the spray and the
rain in.
In(fdd4by Legends (Brothers of Birchington).
Dead men. See extract
Lord Sm. Ooine, John, bring us a fresh
bottle.
Vol. Ay, my lord, and pray let him carry
off the dead men, as we say in the army
(meaning the empty bottles).— Strift, Polite
Uonvtnation (Conv. ii.).
Deads. See extract.
I got into a great furze-croft, full of deads
(those are the earth-heaps they throw out of
the shafts) where no man in his senses dare
go forward or back in the dark, for fear of
the shafts. — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. xiii.
Deady, a slang name for gin. Jon
Bee's Slang Diet. 1823, says, " so called
after the rectifier's name in reality
without slangery. Deady is dead now,
and this word must be transferred to
our addenda in the next edition " [where
obsolete slang is placed]. Sou they,
however, seems to mean beer by the
word in the following —
Some of the whole-hoggery in the House
of Commons he would designate by Deady,
or Wet and Heavy ; some by weak tea,
others by Blue-Ruin. — Southey, The Doctor,
Interchapter xvi
Deaf (applied to nuts), without a
kernel.
These inward dispositions are as the kernel ;
outward acts are as the shell ; he is but a
deaf nut therefore, that hath outward service
without inward fear. — Bp. Hall, Works, v. 81.
Every day, it seems, was separately a blank
day, yielding absolutely nothing — what chil-
dren call a deaf not, offering no kernel. —
De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 91.
Deaf as a door, stone-deaf: we
usually say, deaf as a post.
He is as deafe asadoore; I must tell him a
tale in his eare, that all the towne must be
privie to, or else hee can not hcare mee. —
Breton, Miseries of Mavillia, p. 49.
Deal. See N., s. v. dele-urine, who
says, " Said to be a species of Rhenish ;
certainly a foreign wine, but I know
not whence named, unless it was im-
ported at Deal, and then it should be
spelt accordingly. But Ben Jonson,
who was a correct man, spelt it Dele."
But Shirley, quoted by N., spells it Deal.
So does Adams. " Dutch in the ex-
tract of course = German.
He . . . calls for wine that he may make
known his rare vessel of deal at home ; not
forgetting to [tell ?] you that a Dutch mer-
chant sent it him for some extraordinary
desert. — Adams, i. 500.
Dean, deacon.
Eke praye (my Priests) for them and for
yourselues,
For Bishops, Frelats, Aichdeans, deans, and
priests,
And al that preach or otherwise professe
God's holy word, and take the cure of soules.
Oascoigne, Steele Glas, p. 76.
Dear, to endear.
Nor should a Sonne his Sire loue for reward,
But for he is his Sire, in nature dear'd.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 64.
DEATH
( 174)
DECANTATE
Death and the cobbler; in the
original nuptice Mortis cum Morte.
Pe. Whence is our Gabriel come with this
bout look ? What, is he come out of Tro-
phonius's cave ?
Ga, No, I have been at a wedding.
Pe. What wedding is it that you have
been at ? I believe at the wedding of Death
and the Cobbler. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 316.
Deathiness, an atmosphere of death.
Look ! it burns clear ; but with the air around
Its dead ingredients mingle deathiness.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. V.
Deathling, applied by Sylvester to
Adam and Eve, as subject to death ;
in Swift dtatklings = children of Death
personified.
Alas fond death-lings / O behold how cleer
The knowledge is that you have bought so
deer. — Sylvester, The Imposture, p. 375.
The int'rest of his realme had need
That Death should get a num'rous breed ;
Young deathlings, who by practice made
Proficients in their father's trade,
With colonies might stock around
His large dominions underground.
Swift, Death and Daphne.
Deathy, pertaining to death.
The cheeks were deathy dark,
Dark the dead skin upon the hairless skull.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. II.
Deaurate, golden.
Of so eye-bewitching a deaurate ruddie dy
is the skin-coat of this landtgrave.— Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 164).
Deave, to deafen, stun, or bewilder.
Indeed we were deaved about the affa-
bility of old crabbit Bodle of Bodletone-
brae, and his sister Miss Jenny, when they
favoured us with their company at the first
inspection ball.— Go/f, The Provost, ch. xxziv.
"You know my name; how is that?"
"White magic; I am a witch . . . foolish
boy, was it not cried at the gate loud enough
to deave one."— Reade, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. u.
Debarrass, to rid ; disembarrass.
But though we could not seize his person,
said the captain, we have deharrassed ourselves
tout a fait from his pursuit.— Mad. D'Arblay.
Cecilia, Bk. VII. ch. v.
I was deltarrassed of interruption ; my
half-effaced thought instantly revived. — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. x.
Clement had time to debarass himself of
his boots and his hat before the light streamed
in upon him.— Reade, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. lxxxiv.
Debarkment, disembarkation.
Our troops ought not to have shut them-
selves up in the Goleta, but have met the
enemy in the open field at the place of de-
barkment.— J arms' s Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk.
IV. ch. xii.
Debate, to full off, to abate.
Artes are not bothe begunne and perfected
at once, but are increased by time and studie,
which notwithstanding when they are at the
full perfection doo debate and decrease againe.
— Webbe, Eng. Poetrie, p. 04.
Debauchness, dissipation ; riotous
living. R. has debaiichedness and de-
bauchtness.
Those are commonly least patient of Phy-
sitians or Chirurgeons hands, who need them
most, crying out of other men's severities
which are occasioned, yea, necessitated, by
their own debauchnesse and distempers. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 390.
Debellation, a putting a stop to
war. R. and L. have the word with
the same quotation from Sir T. More,
where it signifies, conquest.
Here is a two-fold army, one marching
against another, seditio et sedatio ; an insur-
rection and a debellation; a tumult and its
appeasement. — Adams, iii. 281.
Debordment, excess (Pr. deborder).
They have almost made this Church an
Augean stable, so that it is an Herculean
work to cleanse it of all those debordments
and defilements fain upon Christian Reli-
gion.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 214.
Deboshment, excess ; debaiichedness.
An ordinarie honest fellow is one whom it
concernes to be calPd honest, for if he were
not this he were nothing ; and yet he is not
this neither ; but a good dull vicious fellow
that complyes well with the deboshments of
the time, and is fit for it.— Earle, Microcos-
mographie, No. 77.
It is an otter whom I remember to have
transmuted from a mariner or seaman for
his deffoshments here; and I observe there
are no people so given to excesses as seamen
when they come ashore. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 5.
Debouche, to turn out of.
We sat and watched them debouche from
the forest into the broad river meadows. —
H. KingsUy, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xviii.
Debt-bind, to oblige.
Behold Camillus, he that erst reviv'd
The state of Rome, that dying he did find,
Of his own state is now, alas, depriv'd,
Banish 'd by them whom he did thus debt-bind.
Sackville, Duke of Buckingham, at. 43.
Decantate, to chant, or sing out.
If every one of us, as Virgil saith, had an
hundred tongues and an hundred mouths,
yet were we not able sufficiently to decantate,
sing, and set forth His praises.— Becon, i. 182.
DEC A Y
( i7S )
DEDAL1AN
These men . . . impertinently decantate
against the Ceremonies of the Church of Eng-
land.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 99.
Decay, to slacken.
One giueth the start speedily, and perhaps
before he come half way to th' other goafe,
decay eth his pace as a man weary and faint-
ing.— Pultenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Dkcayablk, capable of decay.
Were His strength decayable with time
there might be some hope in reluctation ;
but never did or shall man contest against
God without coming short home. — Adams,
iii. 111.
Dbcede, to depart or secede.
Three things are essential to Justine the
English Reformation from the scandal of
schume, to shew that they had, 1. just cause
for which, 2. true authority by which, 3. due
moderation in what they deceded from Borne.
—Fuller, Ch. Histn V. iii. 25.
Decemberly, like December; win-
terly.
The many bleak and deeemberly nights
of a seven years widowhood. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, v. 208.
Decextish, fair.
Fair sir, you are welcome: do, pray, stop
and dine,
You'll take our potluck, and we've decentish
wine.
Inyoldsby Leaends (Account
of a new play).
Dechristianise, to make unchristian,
to heathenise.
The next step in de-Christianising the poli-
tical life of nations is to establish national
edncation without Christianity. — Disraeli,
Lathair, ch. lxxziv.
Decide, to cut off. The quotation
is from verses spoken by a child when
Queen Elizabeth visited Norwich, 1579 ;
in modern editions of Fuller it is printed
" divides."
Again, our seat denies us traflfak here,
The sea too near decides us from the rest.
Fuller, Holy State, Bk. II. ch. xz.
Decimal, relating to tithes : decimal
arithmetic, is applied by Milton to the
reckoning of tithes by the clergy.
I see them still so loath to unlearn their
decimal arithmetic, and still grasp their tithes
as inseparable from a priest. — Milton, Means
to remove Hirelings.
An offer was also made for regulating the
jurisdiction of Ecclesiastical Courts in causes
testamentary, decimal, and matrimonial. —
Heylin, Hist, of Presbyterians, p. 469.
Decineb, tithing man.
[This hath been spoken] to all from the
highest and greatest to the lowest and least
instrument of justice, from the governor of
the thousand to the centurion, from him to
the tithing man or deciner. — Ward, Sermons,
p. 128.
Decipher, the character given of a
man ; that which shows what he is.
He was a Lord Chancellour of France,
whose decipher agrees exactly with this great
prelate, sometimes Lord Keeper of the Great
Sesd.—Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 220.
Declaim, to cry down.
This banquet then . . . is at once declared
and declaimed, spoken of and forbidden. —
Adams, i. 175.
Declinatory, a refusal, or evasion.
This matter came not to the judges to
give any opinion ; and if it had, they had a
declinatory of course, viz. that matters of
Parliament were too high for them. — JYorth,
Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 10.
Deconcoct, to decompose, or separate.
I doubt not but since these Benedictines
have had their crudities deconcocted, and have
been drawn out into more slender threads of
subdivision. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 267.
Decrescent, waning.
The good Queen,
Repentant of the word she made him swear,
And saddening in her childless castle, sent,
Between the increscent and decrescent moon,
Arms for her son, and loosed him from his
vow. — Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Decuman e, tenth : the decumane
wave or billino = the tenth or largest
wave. •
That same decumane wave that took us
fore and aft somewhat altered my pulse. —
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xxiii.
Out of a vain hope to make many little
skiffs and cock-boats in which to expose
themselves ... to be overwhelmed and quite
sunk by such decumane billowes as those
small vessels have no proportion to resist. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 30.
Decurrence, lapse ; running down.
The errataa which by long decurrence of
time, through many men's hands have befaln
it, are easily corrected. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 536.
Decurtate, to shave.
Hee sends for his barber to depure, decur-
tate, and spunge him. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 144).
Dedalian, varied. See L., s. v. dedal.
From time to time in various sort
Dedalian Nature seems her to disport.
Sylvester, The Arke, 425.
DEDECORATE ( 176 )
DELIGNATE
Dedecorate, to disgrace or disfigure.
Why lctt'st weake Wormes Thy head de-
decorate
With worthlesse briers, and flesh-trans-
piercing thorn es?
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 13.
Deed-doer, perpetrator.
rhe deed-doers Matrevers and Gourney . . .
durst not abide the triall. — Daniel, Hist, of
Eng., p. 185.
Deedy, active or efficient.
In a messenger sent is required celerity,
sincerity, constancy ; that he be speedy, that
he be needy, ana, as we say, that he be
deedy. — Adams, ii. 111.
Who praiseth a horse that feeds well, but
is not deedy for the race or travel, speed or
length ? — Ward, Sermons, p. 165.
The appearance of the little sitting-room
as they entered was tranquillity itself ; Mrs.
Bates deprived of her usual employment,
slumbering on one side of the fire, Frank
Churchill at a table near her most deedily
occupied about her spectacles, and Jane Fair-
fax, standing with her back to them, intent
on her pianoforte. — Miss Austen, Emma, vol.
II. ch. z.
Deep-thoughted, having deep
thoughts.
I am strong in the spirit — deep-thoughted,
clear-eyed. — Mrs. Browning, Rhapsody of
Life's Progress.
Defamator, a slanderer.
We should keep in pay a brigade of hunters
to ferret our defamators, and to clear the
nation of this noxious vermin, as once we
did of wolves. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 66..
Defiantness, defiance.
He answered, not raising his voice, but
speaking with quick defiantness. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. bri.
Defray, to pay : we only speak of
defraying expense or charges, and the
Diets, give no instance of any other
use.
Therefore {defraying the mariners with a
ring bestowea upon them) they took their
journey together. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 6.
Suddenly a dart (none knew to whose hand
the honour of it was due) did wound him in
the thigh, which he (doubtful to whom he
stood debtor) did pay back to many (an
extraordinary interest) ; with the death of
some one striving to defray every drop of
his blood. — Ibid. p. 328.
The Queen had gained the thirds of all
Church Rents . . . upon condition of making
some allowance out of it to defray the minis-
ters.— Heylin, Hist, of Presbyterians, p. 176.
Degenerize, to degenerate. Sylves-
ter says that the idolatrous Israelites —
Degeneric'd, decay'd, and withered quight.
The Vocation, 104.
Deglutinate, to unstick.
See, see, my Soule (ah, harke how It doth
cracke!)
The Hand of Outrage that deglutinates
His Vesture, glu'd with gore-blood to His
backe. — Davies, Holy Roode, p. 10.
Degree, to advance step by step.
An example of this verb is fpven from
Hey wood by R., who says it rests on
that authority. The subjoined passnges
show that this is a mistake.
Thus is the soul's death degreed up. Sin
gathers strength by custom, and creeps like
some contagious disease in the body from
joint to joint. — Adams, i. 230.
I will degree this noxious neutrality one
peg higher. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 189.
Degust, to taste. The Diets, quote
Bp. Hall for degiistaiian.
A soupe au vin, madam, I will digvst, and
gratefully. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. ii.
Dejectly, dejectedly; the adj. de-
ject is in N.
I rose dejectly, curtsied, and withdrew
without reply. — //. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
ii. 237.
Dejeration, protestation; misprint
or error for dejuralion (?).
Doubtless with many vows and tears and
dejeraiions he labours to clear his intentions
to her person. — Bp. Hall, Works, ii. 258.
Delayable, capable of delay, or of
being delayed.
Law thus divisible, debateable, and delay-
able, is become a greater grievance than all
that it was intended to redress. — H. Brooke,
Fool of Quality, i. 250.
Delayed, mixed ; alloyed.
Wine delayed with water, as we read in
Athenus, the Oaules called Dercoma.— Hot'
land's Camden, p. 20.
The eye, for the upper halfe of it of a
darke browne, for the nether somewhat yel-
lowish, like delayed gold. — Ibid. p. 476.
Delegatory, holding a delegated or
dependent position.
Some politique delegatory Scipio . . they
would single forth, if it might bee, whom
they might depose when they list, if he
should begin to tyranize. — Nashe, Lenten
Stvffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 170).
Delignate, to deprive of wood.
It moves me much, his accusation of covet-
ousness, dilapidating, or rather delignating
his bishoprick, cutting down the woods
thereof, for which he fell into the Queen's
displeasure. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. iii. 34.
DELINE
( 177 ) DENDRANTHOPOLOGY
Delink, to mark out.
A certain plan had been delined out for a
farther proceeding to retrieve all with help
of the Parliameut.— JVortA, Examen, p. 523.
Delitescency, retirement
1069 and 1670 I sold all my estate in
Wilts. From 1670 to this very day (I thank
God) I have enjoyed a happy delitescency. —
Aubrey, Life, p. 13.
If I am asked farther reasons for the con-
dart I have long observed, I can only resort
to the explanation supplied by a critic as
friendly as he is intelligent; namely, that
the mental organization of the Novelist must
be characterized, to speak craniologically, by
an extraordinary development of the passion
fop delitescency. — Scott, General Pre/, to
WaverUy Novels, p. 26.
Deluce flower, fleur de lis.
Kyng cuppe and lillies so beloude of all men,
And the deluce Jlowre.
Webbe, Eng. Poetrie, p. 84.
Demagogical, factious ; exciting the
rabble.
There is a set of demagogical fellows who
keep calling out, " Farmer this is an oppress-
or, and Squire that is a vampyre/ — Lytton.
My Novel, Bk. XI. ch. ii.
Demagogism, the work of dema-
gogues ; stirring up the mob.
The last five years, moreover, have cer-
tainly been years of progress for the good
cause. The great drag upon it — namely,
demagogism — has crumbled to pieces of its
own accord.— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, Pre-
face (1854).
Demandate, to delegate or com-
mission. Bp. Hall {Works, x. 186)
contends for a Bishop "exercising
spiritual jurisdiction out of his own
peculiarly demandated authority/ '
Dematerialisation, destruction or
evaporation of matter.
Miss Jemima's dowry . . . would suffice to
prevent that gradual process of dematerialisa-
tion which the lengthened diet upon min-
nows and sticklebacks had already made
apparent in the fine and slow-evanishing
form of the philosopher.— Lytton, My Novel,
B«- III. ch. xvii.
Demilass, a woman of doubtful
character (?) a demirep (?).
At this hole then this pair of demilasses
planted themselves.— Jarvis's Don Quixote,
«. I. Bk. IV. ch. xvi.
Demilune, a crescent.
It is an immense mass of stone of the
■nape of a demilune, with a bar in the middle
of the concave.— North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, 1. 228.
These stately figures were planted in a
demilune about an huge fire.— Ibid., Examen*
p. 578.
He laid his hand, as Drayton might have
said, on that stout bastion, horn-work, rave-
lin, or demilune which formed the outworks
to the citadel of his purple isle of man. —
Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. viii.
Demise, to free.
The Atheniens he commaunded to be laied
fast in shaccles and fetters . . . but the The-,
banes he demised and let go at their libertee.
—UdaPs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 215.
Democritical. There were some
writings of Democritus on the lan-
guage of birds, &c. ; hence Btories
connected with natural history that
were incredible were called Fabulce
Democriticce. It is observable that
Bailey spells it with a small d.
Not to mention democritical stories, do we
not find by experience that there is a mighty
disagreement between an oak and an olive-
tree 'i— Bailey's Erasmus's Colloq., p. 394.
Demolitionist, demolishes
Lafayette has saved Vincennes, and is
marching homewards with some dozen of
arrested demolitionists. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. v.
Demount, fall down.
Beautiful invention; mounting heaven-
ward so beautifully, so unguidably ! . . . Well
if it do not PilAtre-like explode, and demount
all the more tragically !— Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. I. Bk. II. ch. vi.
Demurity, demureness. L. has the
word, with extract from Charles Lamb,
but it had been used before.
They pretend to such demurity as to form
a society for the Regulation of Manners. —
T. Brown, Works, ii. 182.
Demy, a close-fitting garment.
He . . stript him out of his golden demy
or mandillion, and flead him. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 166).
Demy-cannon, a cannon of four
inches bore.
Presently does the demy-cannon and cul-
verin strive to drown that noise. — J. Rey-
nards Deliverance {Harl. Misc., i. 188).
Dendranthopology, study based on
the theory that man had sprung from
trees.
Although the Doctor traced many of his
acquaintance to their prior allotments in the
vegetable creation, he did not discover swh
symptoms in any of them as led him to infer
that the object of his speculations had existed
in the form of a tree. ... He formed, there*
N
DENE
( 178 )
DERAY
fore, no system of dendranthopology. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. ccxv.
Dene, a sandy tract near the sea.
Mrs. Leigh . . went to the rocky knoll out-
side the churchyard wall, and watched the
ship glide out between the yellow denes, and
lessen slowly hour by hour into the bound-
less west. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho,ch. xvi.
Denning, place where beasts make
their lair.
Where God hath raised up zealous preach-
ers, in such towns this serpent hath no nest-
ling, no stabling, or denning. — Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 158.
Denounce, to proclaim (in a good
sense). Cf. Fr. accuser.
In Spaine, under the leading and name of
his sonne Oonstans, whom of a Monk he had
denounced Augustus or Emperor, he warred
with fortunate successe. — Holland's Camden,
p. 86.
Denovement, a revolution.
I intend now to present a denovement of
affairs, a new turn which happened upon
certain rectifications brought about in the
City of London in the year 1682.— North,
Examen, p. 595.
Dentistical, having to do with the
teeth or dentistry.
Even the crocodile likes to have his teeth
cleaned ; insects get into them, and, horrible
reptile though he be, he opens his jaws in-
offensively to a faithful dentistical bird, who
volunteers his beak for a toothpick. — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. IV. ch. i.
To know that he is always keeping a secret
from her; that he has, under all circum-
stances, to conceal and hold fast a tender
double tooth, which her sharpness is ever
ready to twist out of his head, gives Mr.
Snagsby, in her dentistical presence, much of
the air of a dog who has a reservation from
his master. — Dickens, Bleak House, ch. uv.
Denunciant, denouncing.
Of all which things a poor Legislative
Assembly and Patriot France is informed,
by denunciant friend, by triumphant foe. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. v.
Deodate, a gift from God. L. has the
word, with a quotation from Hooker,
but it means there a gift to God.
He observed that the Dr. was born of
New-Tear's Day, and that it was then pre-
saged he would be a deodate, a fit new-year's
gift for God to bestow on the world. — Letter
from H. Paman, 1653 (D'Oyly's Life of San-
croft, ch. ii.).
DErABOCHiATE, to leave the parish.
The culture of our lands will sustain an
infinite injury if such a number of peasants
were to deparochiate. — Foote, The Orators
ActL
Deportator, one who carries away
or banishes others.
This island of ours, within these late days,
hath bred a great number of these field-
briers, . . . oppressors, enclosers, depopulat-
ors, deportators, depravators. — Adams, ii. 481.
Depoulsour, expeller.
Hercules was in olde time worshipped
vnder the name of dAa£i*ajrof, that is. the
depoulsour and driuer awaye of all euills. —
VdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 190.
Depravate, to malign, disparage.
Whereat the rest, in depth of scorne and
hate,
His Diuine Truth with taunts doe depravate.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 7.
Deprecatory, deprecation.
There the author strutted like an Hector,
now he is passive, full of deprecatories and
apologetics. — North, Examen, p. 343.
Depbe8SIVene88, depression.
To all his ever -varying, ever -recurring
troubles, moreover, must be added this con-
tinual one of ill-health, and its concomitant
depressiveness. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 88.
De put able, fit to be deputed.
All these fitted Baillie to be a leader in
General Assemblies and conclaves, a man
dejmtable to the London Parliament and
elsewhither. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 224.
Deputation, authority to shoot game.
The squire declared if she would give
t'other bout of old Sir Simon, he would give
the game-keeper his deputation the next
morning. . . In the morning Sophia did not
fail to remind him of his engagement, and
his attorney was immediately sent for, and
ordered to stop any further proceedings in
the action, and to make out the deputation.
— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. IV. ch. v.
He . . had inquired about the manor;
would be glad of the deputation, certainly,
but made no great point of it ; said he some-
times took out a gun, but never killed. —
Miss Austen, Persuasion, ch. iii.
Deputize, to act as deputy. This
strange word appears in an advertise-
ment in the Church Times, April 18,
1879: "Organist An amateur wishes
to deputize in return for practice/'
Debangeable, liable to derangement ;
delicate.
The real impediment to making visits is
that derangeable health which belongs to old
age. — Sydney Smith, Letters, 1843.
Derat, disorder. See quotation s. v.
High tide.
DERBY
( 179 ) DETESTAB1LITY
So amid glitter of iUuminated streets and
Champs Blysees, and crackle of fireworks,
and glad deray has the first National Assem-
bly vanished. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Bk. V. ch. i.
Derby. N. has Derby-ale, and says
that it seems to have been a popular
drink in the time of Elizabeth. It con-
tinued so long after. Tom Brown
repeatedly refers to it, often using
Derby or Darby by itself as a syno-
nym for ale.
Can't their Darby go down but with a
tone, nor their tobacco smoak without the
harmony of a Cremona fiddle? — Works, ii.
162.
Derisionaby, derisive. There was a
club that ate a calf 8 head on January
30 in ridicule of the commemoration
of Charles I.'s death. This is spoken
of as "that deririonary festival" (T.
Brown, Works, ii. 215).
Derivate, derived.
Ye swear! If peril of your lands or life
Should stand between, ye swear of life and
land
To take no count ; but putting trust in Him
From whom the rights of kings are derivate,
In its own blood to trample treason out.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, i. 7.
Dern, a door or gate-post.
I jnst put my eye between the wall and
the dern of the gate, and I saw him come up
to the back-door. — C. Kingsley, Westward
Ho, ch. xiv.
Dernier, last ; as in many otber
cases, tliis French word is used by
North as though it were English.
After the dernier proof of him in this
manner ... he was dismissed. — North,
Etamen, p. 620.
Dkrogant, derogatory, disrespectful.
The other is both arrogant in man, and
deroyant to God.— Adams, i. 12.
Derogate to, derogate from.
All this fell into a harsh construction,
derogating much to the Archbishop's credit.
-Haeket, Life of Williams, ii. 218.
Derrick, a piece of timber to sustain
a pulley for raising weights.
I chanced to see a year ago men at work
on the substructure of a house in Bowdoin
Square, in Boston, swinging a block of
granite of the sixe of the largest of the
Stonehenge columns with an ordinary der-
rick.—Emer sen, Eng. Traits, ch. xvi.
Descendentalism, lowering, depre-
ciation.
With all this Descendentalism, he continues
a Transcendentalism no less superlative;
whereby if on the one hand he degrade
man below most animals, except those
Jacketed Gouda cows, he on the other
exalts him beyond the visible heavens, al-
most to an equality with the gods. — Carlyle f
Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. x.
Deserveless, undeserving.
lake to a bride, come forth, my book, at last,
With all thy richest jewels overcast ;
Say, if there be 'mongst many gems here one
Deserveless of the name of Paragon.
Herrick, Hesperide*, p. 79.
Desirous, desirable. H. 0. v. says,
" It sometimes seems to be used for
desirable," but gives no example.
Bo desirous were the terrible torments
unto Vincent, as a most pleasant banquet. —
Bale, Select Works, p. 586.
Despicability, despicableness.
Such courage we indeed esteem an exceed-
ing small matter, capable of co-existing
with a life full of falsehood, feebleness, pol-
troonery, and despicability. — Carlyle, Misc.,
in. 94.
Despotist, supporter of despotism.
I must become as thorough a despotist and
imperialist as Strafford himself. — C. Kingsley
{Life, ii. M).
Despotocracy, the rule of despots.
Despotocracy, the worst institution of the
middle ages — the leprosy of society — came
over the water ; the slave survived the priest,
the noble the king. — Theod. Parker, Works,
v. 262.
Destate, to divest of state or gran-
deur.
The king of eternal glory, to the world's
eye destatiny himself (though indeed not by
putting off what he had, but by putting on
what he had not) was cast down for us that
we might rise up by him. — Adams, i. 430.
Detergkncy, cleansing or purifying
power.
Bath water . . . possesses that milkines*,
detergency, and middling heat, so friendly
adapted to weakened animal constitutions. —
Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, ii. 290.
Determinateness, resolvedness.
His determinateness and his power seemed
to make allies unnecessary. — Miss Austen,
Mansfield Park, cb. xiv.
Detestability, odiousnes8.
As young ladies are to mankind precisely
the most delightful in those years [19 — 25],
so young gentlemen do then attain their
maximum of detestalnlity. — Carlyle, Sartor
Resartus, Bk. ii. ch. iv. '
N 7
DETESTANT ( 180 )
DEVILDOMS
Detkstant, a detester.
The Prince and Buckingham were ever
Protestants ; those their opposite* you know
not what to term them, unless Attestants
of the Romish idolatry. — Hacket, life of
Williams, i. 121.
Detiny, detention, holding back what
is due. See L. s. v. detinue.
There are that will restore some, but not
all ; to this they have posse, but no vdle ; let
the creditors be content with one of four.
But this little detiny is great iniquity.—
Adams, i. 145.
Dkvastitation, destruction, laying
waste.
Wherefore followed a pitiful devastation
of Churches and church-buildings in all
parts of the realm. — Heylin, Hist, of the
Presbyterians, p. 164.
De vaunt, to boast The Prior of
Northampton in his surrender to Henry
VIII. confesses that he and his fellows
had done much
Ta the most notable slaunder of Christ's
holy evangely, which in the forme of our
professyon, we did ostentate and openly
devaunt to keep moost exactly. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., vi. p. 320.
Deviate, to turn out of the way, to
mislead.
A wise man ought not so much to give
the reins to human passions as to let them
deviate him from the right path. — Cotton,
Montaigne, ch. xxxv.
Devil, is much used as an expletive.
The devil he is 1 is an exclamation of
surprise or alarm ; the devil of, or the
devil a bit — nothing, or not at all.
The Deuill of the one chare of good werke
they doen. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p.
132.
Mess. My lord, Musgrove is at hand.
K. James. Who ? Musgrove ? the devil he
is ! Come, my horse I — Green, Geo.-A-Greene,
p. 257.
Why then, for fear, the devil a bit for love,
I'll tell you, sir.
Lord Digby, Elvira, iv. 1.
Within. Sir Giles, here's your niece.
Hot. My niece ! the devil she is !
Love will find out the way, Act IV.
We have an English expression, " The Devil
he doth it, the Devil he hath it," where the
addition of Devil amounteth only to a strong
denial, equivalent to, ** He doth it not, he hath
it not." My opinion is, if the phrase took
not the original form, yet it is applyable to
our common and causeless accusing of Satan
with our own faults, charging nim with
thise temptations wherein we ourselves are
always chiefly, and sometimes solely, guilty.
—Fuller, Worthies,' Gloucestershire.
Devil. To play the devil. L. gives
this phrase, but no example.
Thus far, my lords, we trained have our camp
For to encounter haughty Arragon,
Who with a mighty power of straggling
mates
Hath traitorously assailed this our land,
And burning towns, and sacking cities fair,
Doth play the devil wheresome'er he comes.
Greene, Alphonsus, Act I.
Whether, sir, you did not state upon the
hustings, that it was your firm and deter-
mined intention to oppose everything pro-
posed, . . . and, in short, in your own memor-
able words, to play the very devil with
everything and everybody ?— Dickens, Nicho-
las Nickleby, oh. xvi.
Devil. Scott, in a note to the first
extract, says, " The villanous character
given by history to the celebrated
Goodwin, Earl of Kent, in the time of
Edward the Confessor, occasioned this
proverb." Great of course = intimate.
I was well satisfy 'd, gave him his sword,
and we became as great friends as the Devil
and the Earl of Kent.—T. Brown, Works, ii.
194.
Lady 8m. Miss, I hear that you and Lady
Couplers are as great as cup and can.
Lady Ans. Ay, as great as the Devil and
the Earl of Kent.— Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. iii.).
Devil. When the devil is blind =
never.
They will bring it [abolition of beggars]
when the devil is blind (id fiet ad Calendas
Gracas). — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 216.
Nev. Fll make you a fine present one of
these days.
Miss. Ay» when the Devil is blind, and his
eyes are not sore yet.
Nev. No, Miss, 111 send it you to-morrow.
Miss. Well, well, to-morrow's a new day,
but I suppose you mean to-morrow come
never. — 'Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Devil and nine-pence. See extract.
The devil and nine-pence go with her, that's
money and company, according to the laud-
able adage of the sage mobility. — T. Brown,
Works, iii. 245.
Devil-dodger, a ranting preacher.
These devil-dodgers happened to be so very
Powerful (that is, noisy) that they soon sent
ohn home, crying out, ne should be damn'd.
— Life of J. Lacktngton, Letter vi.
Devildoms, dealings with the devil.
Ill defy you to name us a man half so
famous
For devildoms — Sir, it's the great Nostra-
damus.
Jngoldsby Legends (Lord of Thoulouse).
DE VI LESS
( i«i )
DEVILTRY
Deviless, she devil.
There was not angel, man, devil, nor
deviless upon the place. — Urquharfs Rabelais,
Bk. III. ch. xxvii.
Though we should abominate each other
ten times worse than so many devils and
dtvilesses, we should nevertheless, my dear
creatures, be all courtesy and kindness. —
Sterne, TV. Shandy, ii. 188.
Devilet, imp ; little devil.
And pray now what were these devilet s call'd?
These three little fiends so gay?
Ingoldsby Legends (The Truants).
Devilkin, little devil.
No wonder that a Beelzebub has his devil-
Hw to attend his call. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, vi. 14.
Blue Artillery men, little powder-tfevt'/Jbin*,
plying their hell-trade there through the not
ambrosial night. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. IIL
Bk. IV. ch. v.
Devil looking over Lincoln. See
quotation from Fuller, the first part of
which is from the Oxfordshire Proverbs,
and the latter, beginning "The Devil
b the map," &c, from those of Lin-
colnshire.
Than wold ye looke ouer me with stomoke
swolne
Like as the diuel lookt ouer Lincoln*.
Heywood, Dial., Pt. II. ch. ix.
(Spenser Soc., p. 75).
Some filch the original of this proverb
from a stone picture of the Devil, which
doth (or lately did) overlook Lincoln College.
Sorely the architect intended it no further
than for an ordinary antick, though behold-
ers have since applied those ugly looks to
envious persons, repining at the prosperity
of their neighbours, and jealous to be over-
topt by their vicinity. . . It is conceived of
more antiquity than the fore - mentioned
College, though the secondary sense thereof
lighted not unhappily, and that it related
originally to the Cathedral Church in Lin-
cob. . . . The Devil is the map of malice,
sad his envy (as God's mercy) is over all his
works. It gneves him whatever is given to
God, crying out with that flesh devil, Ut quid
A*' perditw ? what needs this waste ? On
which account he is supposed to have over-
looked this church when first finished with a
torve and tetrick countenance, as maligning
men's costly devotion. — Fuller, Worthies.
Heatbcote himself, and such large-acred men,
Lord* of fat Kv'sham, or of Lincoln fen,
Buy every stick of wood that lends them
heat,
Bny every pullet they afford to eat;
Yet these are wights who fondly call their
own
Half that the Devil overlooks from Lincoln
torn.
rope, Imit. of Horace, Epist. II. ii. 246.
Lord Sp. Has your ladyship seen the
dutchess since your falling out?
Lady Sm. Never, my lord, but once at a
visit; and she looked at me as the Devil
looked over Lincoln. — Swift, Polite Conversa-
tion (Conv. i.).
Devil-may-care, reckless. Lord Lyt-
ton always writes it devil - me - care,
which comes to the same meaning by a
different road.
Toby Crackit, seeming to abandon as
hopeless any further effort to maintain his
usual devil - may - care swagger, turned to
Chitling and said, "When was Fagin took
then? "— Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. 1.
He had blue eyes, a blonde peruke, a care-
less profligate smile, and looked altogether
as devil-me-care, rakehelly, handsome, good-
for-nought as ever swore at a drawer. —
Lytton, What will he do with it? Bk. II.
ch. ii.
Devil's books, cards. Bailey, in his
translation of Erasmus 8 Colloquies, p.
181, calls dice "the devil's bones/'
There is no corresponding expression
in the original.
The ladies there must needs be rooks,
For cards we know are Pluto's books.
Swift, Death and Daphne.
The ladies and Tom Gosling were propos-
ing a narty at quadrille, but he refused to
make one. Damn your cards, said he, they
are the DeviVs hooks. — Ibid., Polite Conversa-
tion (Conv. iii.).
Devil's DD8T. The teazing machine
through which cotton or wool is passed
to prepare it for carding is called a
devil. The refuse thus torn out is
worked sometimes into cheap cloth,
hence called deviCs dust.
Does it beseem thee to weave cloth of
devil's dust instead of true wool, and cut and
sew it as if thou wert not a tailor, but the
fraction of a very tailor? — Carlyle, Jfisc, iv.
239.
Devil's coach-horse. Mr. Black-
more (note in loc.) says, "The cock-
tailed beetle has earned this name in
England." H. has " Devil's cow, a kind
of beetle (Somerset)."
As this atrocious tale of his turned up
joint by joint before her, like a devil's coach-
horse, mother was too much amazed to do
any more than look at him, as if the earth
must open. — Blackmore, Loma Doone, ch. iv.
Deviltry, diabolical act; devilry,
which is the more usual form.
The rustics beholding crossed themselves
and suspected deviltries. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. xcv.
DEVIL UPON DUN ( 182 )
DEWLE
Devil upon Dcn, an expression signi-
fying that matters are worse and worse.
Dun was a common name for a horse ;
hence the devil on horseback = the
devil or mischief with increased powers
of activity. The phrase in the extract
is one of Urquhart1 s many enlargements
on the original.
Poor Panurge began to cry and howl worse
than ever. " Babillebabou, said he, shrug-
ging up his shoulders, quivering all over with
fear, " there will be the devil upon dun. This
is a worse business than that the other day."
— Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xxxui.
Devise, to imagine, suppose.
He deviseth first that this Brutus
was a Consul of Rome. — Holland's Camden,
p. 8.
Devitation, a warning off ; the oppo-
site of invitation.
If there be any here that . . . will venture
himself a guest at the devil's banquet,
raaugre all devitation, let him stay and hear
the reckoning. — Adams, i. 177.
Devocate, to call away from, and so,
to rob.
The Commons of you doo complain,
From them you devocate.
Preston, K. Gambises (Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., i. 209).
Devonshire, To Devonshire land.
See extract.
To Devonshire land is to pare off the sur-
face or top-turffe thereof, then lay it together
in heaps and burn it, which ashes are a
marvaifous improvement to battle barren
ground . . . An husbandry which, wherever
used, retains the name of the place where it
was first invented, it being usual to Devon-
shire land in Dorsetshire, and in other
counties. — Fuller, Worthies, Devon (i. 278).
Devoterer, adulterer. In some edi-
tions of Becon advouterer is the word
used.
He that breaketh wedlock with his neigh-
bour's wife let him be slain, both the devoterer
and the advouteress. — Becon, i. 450.
Devotionair, a devotee.
The Lord Chief Justice Hales, a profound
common lawyer, and both devotionair and
moralist,affected natural philosophy. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 264.
Devotionals, forms of devotion.
Nor have they had either more cause for,
or better success in, their disputing* against
the devotionals of the Church of England. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 87.
Devotions, objects of devotion. Cf.
Acts xvii. 23, uAs I passed by and
beheld your devotions" (etpdouara) (see
Trench on Auth. Ver. of N. T., p. 41).
Dametas began to speak his loud voice, to
look big, . . . swearing by no mean devotions
that the walls should not keep the coward
from him. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 277.
Devour, to overcome: a Gallicism.
So perhaps the phrase devour distance
= to make little of it ; to be intrusive
or familiar.
He that setteth forth for the goal, if he
will obtain, must resolve to devour all diffi-
culties, and to run it out. — Sanderson,i. 413.
Wat was woundly angry with Sir John
Newton, Knight (Sword-bearer to the King
then in presence), for devouring his distance,
and not making his approaches mannerly
enough unto him. — Fuller, Worthies, Suffolk
(ii. 346).
Devout. L. has this as meaning-
devotee; here, however, it signifies
devotion.
This is the substance of his first section
till we come to the devout of it, modelled
into the form of a private psalter. — Milton,
Eikonoklastes, ch. i.
Dewbeaters, according to H. oiled
shoes, but in Hacket early walkers.
It is not equity at lust and pleasure that is
moved for, but equity according to decrees
ind precedents foregoing, as the dew-beaters
have trod their way for those that come
after them. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 57.
De-Witt, to lynch. John De Witt,
Grand Pensionary of Holland, and his
brother Cornelius, were massacred by
the mob at Amsterdam in 1672.
It is a wonder the English nation . . have
not in their fury De-Witted some of these
men who have brought all this upon us.
And I must tell them that the crimes of the
two unhappy brothers in Holland (which
gave rise to that word) were not fully so
great as some of theirs. — Modest Enquiry
into the Present Disasters, 1690 (Life of Ken,
p. 561).
He barbarously endeavours to raise in the
whole English nation such a fury as may end
in De- Witting us (a bloody word but too well
understood).— Declaration of Bps. in answer
to Modest Enquiry, 1690 (Ibid. p. 566).
To her I leave thee, gloomy peer,
Think on thy crimes committed ;
Repent, and be for once sincere,
Thou ne'er wilt be De- Witted.
Prior, The Viceroy.
Dewle, lamentation.
But when I saw no end that could apart
The deadly dewle which she so sore did
make,
DEW-RAKE
( 183 )
DICKINS
With doleful voice then thus to her I
* SackvilU, The Induction, st. 14.
Dew-bake, rake used for the surface
of a lawn, on which of course the dew
lies, to take off the daisies, &c. (?).
like deto-rakes and harrowes armed with
so many teeth, that none great or small
should escape them. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 381.
Dewtrt, the Datura plant, which has
narcotic qualities.
Make leeches and their punks with dewtry
Commit phantastical advowtry.
Hudibras, III. i. 319.
Dey- woman, farm or dairy woman.
The dey or farm-woman entered with her
pitchers to deliver the milk for the family. —
Scott, Fair Maid of Perth, ii. 288.
Diabolabch, ruler of devils.
Supposing, however, this Satan to he meant
of a real angel, there will he no need to ex-
pound it of the Diabolarch. — J. Oxlee, Con-
futation of the Diabolarchy, p. 9.
Diabolarch y, rule of the devil.
The final and concluding argument . . .
against the received dogma of the DiaboU
archy. — J. Oxlee, Confutation of the DiaboU
archy, p. 30.
Dialect, to speak a dialect
By corruption of speech they false dialect
and misse-sound it.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 166).
Dial of Alexander. The conquests
of Alexander the Great always tended
eastward ; hence, perhaps, the expres-
sion in the extract.
I conclude it [the morning"! is in itselfe a
blessed season, a dispensing of the first dark-
nesse, and the diall of Alexander. — Breton,
Fantastickes (Morning).
Diamantiferous, diamond-bearing or
producing. Diamondiferous, it would
seem, has been hazarded. The Aca-
demy is quoting from the North China
Herald.
Men with thick straw shoes go on walking
about in the diamantiferous sands of the
valleys. — Academy, Sept. 14, 1878.
One of the latest creations of pretentious
sciolism which I have noticed is diamondifer-
ous, a term applied to certain tracts of coun-
try in South Africa. Adamantiferous, ety-
mological ly correct, would never answer;
but all except pedants or affectatiooists would
be satisfied with diamond-producing. — Dr.
Hall, Modern Eng., p. 177.
Diaphanal, transparent : diaphanous
is more common.
If in a three-square glasse as thicke, as cleere,
(Being but dark earth, though made <tfa-
phanall)
Beauties diuine that rauish sence appeare,
Making the soule with joy in trance to fall,
What then, my soule, shalt thou in Heau'n
behold,
In that cleare mirror of the Trinity ?
Davits, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 21.
To thee my whole man is dyaphanall,
The raies of whose witt's eyes pierce through
mee quite. — Ibid. p. 38.
Diapry, variegated.
The diapry mansions where man-kinde doth
trade
Were built in six dayes.
Sylvester, The Handy Crafts, 654.
They ly neerer the diapry verges
Of tear-bridge Tigris swallow-swifter surges.
Ibid., The Colonies, 428.
Diavolarias, devilries ; North applies
it to the effigy-burnings of Jesuits by
the mob.
Thus ended these diavolarias never to ap-
pear again till like mischiefs are hatching.—
North, Examen, p. 580.
Dicacity, licence in speech. R. says
the word was coined by Byrom, and L.'s
quotation from Sp. Quixote does not
necessarily contradict this, but the sub-
joined passage is earlier by a good
many years than Byrom, and the word
is in Cockeram's Eng. Did., 1632, and
is defined " much babbling or scolding,
scoffing or prating."
Lucilius, a centurion in Tacitus Annal.,lib.
i., had a scornful name given him by the
military dicacity of his own company. —
Hacket, Life of 'Williams, ii. 133.
Dickey. If 8 all dickey with him =
it's all over with him (slang).
"Rs all dickey with poor Father Dick ; he's
no more.
Ingoldsby Legends {Brothers of Birchington).
Dickky-birds, little birds.
'Twas, I know, in the spring-time when Na-
ture looks gay,
As the poet observes, and on tree-top and
spray
The dear little dickey-birds carol away.
Ingoldsby Legends (Knight awl Lady.)
Gladly would I throw up history to think
of nothing but dickey-birds, but it must not
be yet. — C. Kingsley (Life, ii. 41).
DlCKlNS. See quotation.
Cook. What for the bride-cake, Gnotho ?
Gnotho. Let it be mouldy now 'tis out of
season,
Let it grow out of date, currant, and reason ;
Let it be chipt and chopt, and giveu to
chickens,
DICK'S HATBAND ( 184 ) DIFFRACTION
No more is got by that than William Dickins
Got by his wooden dishes.
Massinger, Old Law, Act V.
Who was William Dickins, whose wooden
dishes were sold so badly, that when any one
lost by the sale of his wares, the said Dickins
and his dishes were brought up in scornful
comparison ?—Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxv.
Dick's hatband. See quotation.
Who was that other Dick who wore so
queer a hatband that it has ever since served
as a standing comparison for all queer
things? . . . Nothing, said the Doctor, is
remembered of him now, except that he was
familiarly called Dick, and that his queer
hatband went nine times round, and would
not tie. — Souther/, The Doctor, ch. cxxv.
Dicky, a donkey.
But now, as at some nobler places,
Amongst the leaders 'twas decreed
Time to begin the Dicky races,
More famed for laughter than for speed.
Bloomfield, Richard and Kate,
DlCT, saying, report.
What, the old diet was true after all ? —
Meade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxxti.
Dictery, a saying.
I did heap up all the dicteries I could
against women, but now recant. — Burton,
Anatomy, 584.
Dictorial, dictatorial. I should have
thought this a misprint, but it occurs
twice in Clarissa narlowe, though I
have not the reference to the first pas-
sage, as I supposed it to be only a
printer's error.
Sally was laying out the law, and prating
in her usual dictorial manner. — Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, vi. 107.
Didder, to shake. See H.
He did cast a squinting look upon Goats-
nose diddering and shivering his chaps. —
Urauhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xx.
Diddle - daddle, nonsense, fiddle-
faddle.
Mrs. Thrale. Oh, apropos, now you have a
new edition coming out, why should you not
put your name to it?
Miss Burney. O, ma'am, I would not for
the world.
Mrs. T. And why not ? come let us have
done now with all this diddle-daddle. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, i. 108.
Diddledomks, trifles, kickshaws ?
When thou find est a goose for thy diet
feede him with a dish of diddledomes, for I
have done with thee. — Breton, Dreamt of
Strange Effects, p. 17.
Didle, to dredge.
I should despair of patience to didle in
their mud for pearl-muscles. — W. Taylor,
1803 (Robberdfs Memoirs, i. 471).
Die-away, languishing.
As a girl she had been ... so romantic,
with such a soft, sweet, die-away voice. — Miss
Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xix.
Pray do not give us any more of those die-
away Italian airs. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. xiv.
Diet. See quotation.
I din'd at the Comptroller's [of the House-
hold! with the Earle of Oxford and Mr. Ash-
burnham ; it was said it should be the last of
the public diets or tables at Court, it being
determined to put down the old hospitality,
at which was great murmuring, considering
his Majesties vast revenue and the plenty of
the nation. — Evelyn, Diary, Aug. 20, 1663.
Dietic, a system of diet.
All sudden skinning over or closing of the
orifices, by which those sharp humours are
obstructed, but not purged, is very dangerous
and diffusive of the mischief, making the
source of the malignity to flow higher, if it
be not drawn away by . . . gentle dietics or
healing applications. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 397.
Died-gard, the oath, " So help me
God : " at least this I suppose to be the
meaning. " Beck " perhups signifies
tacit assent notified by an inclination of
the head.
His master Harding could not produce so
much as a probability of any vow anciently
required or undertaken, whether by beck or
Dieu-gard.—Bp. Hall, Works, ix. 278.
Diffamously, injuriously ; defama-
torily. The speaker in the extract is
Ralph Allerton when on his trial before
Bonner, 1557.
Whereupon should your lordship gather or
say of me so diffamously ? — 3 fait /and on Re-
formation, p. 556.
Difference, a part or division.
There bee of times three differences : the
first from the creation of man to the Floud
or Deluge, . . . the second from the Floud to
the first Olympias. . . . — Holland's Camden,
p. 34.
Diffraction, a breaking in pieces:
the word is applied to the modifications
which light undergoes when turned
from its straight course by passing by
the edge of an opaque body.
It was the ring of Necessity whereby we
are all begirt ; happy he for whom a kind
heavenly Sun brightens it into a ring of Duty,
and plays round it with beautiful prismatic
diffractions, yet ever, as basis and as bourne
DIGGINGS
( i*5 )
DIMMERING
for oar whole being, it is there. — Carlyle,
Sat-tor Resartus, Bk. II. ch. ii.
Diggings, used for any place, from a
continent to a man's lodgings. The
slung Diet, says, " probably imported
'from California or Australia with refer-
ence to the gold diggings ; " but gold
was discovered in the first of these
places in 1847, and in the second in
1851, while the date of the extract is
1843. The expression, however, very
likely came from some mines, or per-
haps from settlers digging and excavat-
ing in a new country. It seems to be
of American origin, and an American
is supposed to be the speaker in the
extract.
She won't be taken with a cold chill when
she realises what is being done in these dig-
<pags ? — Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit, ch. xxL
Dightly, handsomely.
Though yon depart with grief from or-
chards full of fruits, grounds full stocked,
houses dightly furnished, purses richly stuffed,
from mnsic, wine, junkets, sports, yet go, you
must go, every man to his own home. —
Adams, i. 27.
Digital, a finger.
Nor, be it here observed, was Mr. Losely
one of those beauish brigands who wear
tawdry scarfs over soiled linen, and paste
riugs upon unwashed digitals. — Lytton, What
will he do with it ? Bk. IV. ch. ix.
Digitize, to finger.
None but the devil, besides yourself, could
have digitized a pen after so scurrilous a
manner. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 211.
Digress, a digression.
Nor let any censure this a digress from my
history.— Fuller, Ch. Hist^ XI. x. 43.
Dilaniation, a tearing in pieces.
Blessed Ignatius could profess to challenge
and provoke the furious lions to his dilania-
tion.—Pp. Hall, Works, vi. 341.
Dilatory, delay.
Criminals of that sort should not have any
assistance in matters of fact, but defend
upon plain truth which they know beet,
without any dilatories, arts, or evasions. —
North, Life of Lord Gvilford, i. 285.
Causes of this nature are brought before
them by juries or informers, and (bating some
dilatories in form, and for reasons to be given)
they have no means to connive or stop pro-
ceedings at all. — lhid.,Examen, p. 444.
Dilkmmakd, placed in a dilemma.
Like a novel-hero dilemma? d, I made up my
mind to be •• guided by circumstances."— &
A. Pot, Marginalia, Introd.
Dilettantish. One fond of art, &c. ,
or practising it, but not following it as
a profession, is called a dilettante (Ital.).
Dilettantish therefore meuns very much
the same as the word with which it is
coupled in the extract.
You are dilettantish and amateurish. — G.
Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xix.
Diligence, a sort of stage coach: the
name is common in France, but seems
to have obtained in England also at one
time.
If it were possible to send me a line by the
diliuence to Brighton, how grateful I should
be for such an indulgence \—Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, i. 401 (1780).
Now Madam says (and what she says must
still
Deserve attention, say she what she will)
That what we call the diligence, be-case
It goes to Londou with a swifter pace.
Would better suit the carriage of your gift,
Beturning downward with a pace as swift.
Cowper, To Mrs. Newton.
The driver of the diligence from Darlir gton
to Durham happened to be much inebriated.
— Life of J. Lackington, Letter xliv.
Dilly-dally, to hesitate; also hesi-
tating.
What you do, sir, do ; don't stand dilly-
dallying.— Richardson, Pamela, i. 275.
If I had suffered her to stand shilly-shally,
dilly-dally, you might not have had that
honour yet awhile; I was forced to use a
little fatherly authority to bring her to. —
Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. XVIII. ch. xii.
I knew it could not last— knew she'd dilly-
dally with Clary till he would turn upon bis
heel and leave her there. — Miss Edgeworth,
Belinda, ch. xvii.
Dilogical, having a double meaning.
Some of the subtler have delivered their
opinions in such spurious, enigmatical, dilo-
gical terms as the devil gave his oracles. —
Adams, i. 10.
Dimension, to measure or space out.
I propose to break and enliven it by com-
partments in colours, according to the en-
closed sketch, which you must adjust and
dimension. — Walpole, Letters, i. 335 (1754).
Dimensions. A death of dimensions
= a protracted death.
In pain we know the only comfort of gravis
is brevis; if we be in it, to be quickly out of
it. This the Cross hath not, but is wors pro-
lira, a death of dimensions, a death long in
dying. — Andrewes, Sermons, ii. 170.
Dimmering, growing dimmer.
He takes an affecting farewell of the sur-
rounding scenery of nature, on which his
DIMMY
( 186 )
DISALTERN
dimmer iw eyes are preparing to close for
ever. — Jr. Taylor ', Survey of Germ. Poetry, i.
901.
Dim my, dim.
You ditnmy clouds, which well employ your
staining
This chearful Air with your obscured chear,
Witness your woful tears with daily raining.
/Sidney, Arcadia, p. 441.
Dimplement, dimpling.
Thou sitting alone at the glass,
Remarking the bloom gone away,
Where the smile in its dimplement was.
Mrs. Browning, A Foist Step.
Ding, to beat into a person ; to con*
stantly reiterate.
If I'm to have any {rood, let it come of
itself; not to keep dinging it, dinging it into
one so.— -Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer,
Act II.
Ding-dong, to ring.
First dinner bell rang out its euphonious
clang
At five — folks kept early hours then— and
the last
Ding-donged, as it ever was wont, at half -past.
Ingoldsby Legends {Knight and Lady).
Dingily, forcibly, as one that dings a
thing down.
These be so manifest, so plain, and do con-
fute so dingily the sentence and saying of
Floribell.— Philpot, p. 370.
Dinging, ringing (of a bell).
The din of carta, and the accursed dinaina
of the dustman's bell. — Irving, Sketch Book
(Boar's Head Tavern).
Dinnery, pertaining to dinner.
I . . . disliked the dinnery atmosphere of
the salle a manger. — Mrs. Gaskell, Curious if
True.
Diocesans, people in a diocese: its
usual meaning is the bishop of a dio-
cese.
The bishops sold to the curates, and other
ecclesiastics their diocesans, this liberty [to
keep concubines], which indeed had hitherto
been granted them by the first council of
Toledo. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch.vii.,
note.
Middleton is said to bear his mitre high in
India, where the regni novitas (I dare say)
sufficiently justifies the bearing. A humility
quite as primitive as that of Jewel or Hooker
might not be exactly fitted to impress the
minds of those Anglo- Asiatic diocesans with
a reverence for home institutions.— Lamb,
Essays of Elia (Christ's Hospital).
Faithful lovers who . . . are content to
rank themselves humble diocesans of old
Bishop Valentine. — J bid. (Valentine's Day).
Diogenically, cynically; after the
manner of Diogenes.
Their other qualities are to despise riches,
not Diogenically, but indolently, to be sober,
&c. — Misson, Travels in Eng., p. 154.
Diphbelatic, chariot -driving (Gr.
tifpoc, IXairvv).
Under this eminent man, whom in Greek
I cognominated Cyclops diphrelates (Cyclops
the charioteer), I, and others known to me,
studied the diphrelatic art. — De Quincey, Eng.
Mail Coach.
Direct, direction.
" Behold ! " is like John Baptist in Holy
Writ, evermore the avant-courier of some
excellent thing It is a direct, a refer-
ence, a dash of the Holy Ghost's pen. —
Adams, ii. 110.
Dibectorizb, to bring under the
Presbyterian Directory for Public
Worship.
These were to do the Journey-work of
Presbytery, . . . undertaking to Directorize,
to Unliturgize, to Catechize, and to Disci-
plinize their Brethren.— Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 009.
Dirgeful, moaning ; lamenting.
And there, soothed sadly by the dirgeful
wind,
Muse on the sore ills I had left behi d.
Coleridge, Monody on Chatterton.
Disableness, impotence.
When his life's sun is ready to set, he
marries, and is then knocked with his own
weapon ; his own disaJhlcness and his wife's
youthfulness, like bells, ringing all in. —
Adams, i. 493.
Disaccompaniep, unaccompanied.
To dismisse his forces he was content, or
any thing else the King would command
him, so it were with the safety of his life
and honour ; but to come disaccompanied
was for neither. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 10.
Disagreeability, unpleasantness.
He, long-sighted and observant, had seen
through it sufficiently to read all the depres-
sion of countenance which some immediate
disagreeability had brought on. — Mad. D'Ar-
May, Diary, ui 334.
Disagreeables (used as a subst.),
annoyances.
I had all the merit of a temperance mar-
tyr without any of its disagreeables. — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xiv.
Disaltern, to change for the worse.
But must I ever grind ? and must I earn
Nothing but stripes? O wilt Thou disaltern
The rest Thou gav'st ?
Quarles, Emblems, iii 4.
DIS APRONED ( 187 )
DISCIPLINE
Disapbonbd, without an apron.
I entered the main street of the place, and
saw . . . the aproned or disaprotud Burghers
moving-in to breakfast. — Carlyle, Sartor
Besartus, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Disabch bishop, to deprive of the
status of archbishop.
So after that
We had to disarchbishop and unlord,
And make you simple Granmer once again.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, iv. 2.
Disasinated, deprived of the asinine
nature.
I saw yon somewhat earnest in banding
arguments with that asse, but how have you
sped? doth he desire to be disasinated and
become man again ? — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 28.
Disassent, disagree from; deny:
the Diets, have the word as a Bubst.
I disassent that this example and the like
ought to bee drawen in consequence. — Hud-
son's Judith (To the Header).
Disattune, to put out of harmony.
Thus ever bringing before the mind of the
harassed debtor images at war with love and
with the poetry of life, he disattuned it, so
to speak, for the reception of Nora's letters,
all musical as they were with such thoughts
as the most delicate fancy inspires to the
most earnest love. — Lytton, My Novel, Bk.
XI. ch. zvi.
Disaugment, to decrease.
There should I find that everlasting treasure,
Which force deprives not, fortune disaug-
ments not. — Quarles, Emblems, v. 13.
D isa vail, to be of no service.
Avail you ! dear Miss Byron ! I have pride,
madam, . . . but give me leave to say (and
he reddened with anger) that, my fortune,
my descent, and my ardent affection for you
considered, it may not disavail you. — Rich-
ardson, Grandison, i. 124.
u I am an Englishman, gentlemen,'* said I,
judging, if Austrians, as I supposed they
were, that plea would not disavail me. — Ibid.
ii. 54.
Disavail, loss.
If subjects' peace and glorie be the King's,
And their disgrace and strife his disavaile,
Then O let my weake words strongly prevail©.
Davits, Microcosmos, p. 11.
Disbase, to debase, for which Mr.
Dyce thinks it may be meant.
First will I die in thickest of my foe,
Before I will disbase mine honour so.
Greene, Alphonsus, Act V.
Disburse, payment
Gome, there is
Some odd disburse, some bribe, some gratu-
lance,
Which makes you lock up leisure.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act V.
The annual rent to be received for all
those lands, after 20 years would abundantly
?ny the public for the first disburses. — Defoe,
our thro9 G. Britain, i. 842.
Discaged, uncaged.
In me put force
To weary her ears with one continuous
prayer,
Until she let me fly diseased to sweep
In ever-highering eagle-circles up
To the great Sun of Glory.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Discard. In the extracts discard is
used in a peculiar construction.
I only discard myself of those things that
are noxious to mv body, and scandalous to
my nature. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 293.
The old man's avarice discarded him of all
the sentiments of a parent. — Ibid. p. 492.
Discask, to turn out of a cask.
No Tunny is suffered to be sold at Venice,
vnlesse first discaskt, and searcht to the bot-
tom©.— Sandys, Travels, p. 239.
Discede, to depart.
I dare not discede from my copy a tittle. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. iv. 16.
I doe highly approve that there should be
a certain form of prayer and ecclesiasticall
rites, from which it should not be lawf ull for
the pastors themselves to discede. — Ibid.
VII. ii. 18.
Discentine, lineal ; in regular descent.
[I will] also acquaint you with the notable
immunities, franchises, and privileges she is
endowed with, beyond all her confiners, by
the discentine line of Kings from the Con-
quest.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi.
149).
Disciplinate, to discipline. The
word is put in the mouth of a pedantic
schoolmaster.
A pedagogue, one not a little versed in the
disciplinatinq of the juvenal frie. — Sidney,
Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Discipline. The name given by the
Puritans to their regimen. See extract
from Heylin *. v. Dissent.
This heat of his may turn into a zeal,
And stand up for the beauteous discipline
Against the menstruous cloth and rag of
Borne. — Jonson, Alchemist, iii. 1.
Now the blaze of the beauteous discipline
fright away this evil from our house. — Ibid.,
Bart. Fair, i. 1.
DISC1PLINIZE ( 1 88 ) DISEMBRUTE
Disciflinize, to bring under dis-
cipline. See extract *. v. Dirkctorize.
Discloistered, released from the
cloister, or from monastic vows: the
extract refers to nuns.
They fell a murmuring and a humming at
the solitude and hardships of that holy pro-
fession, and to think too often on man with
inordinat desires to be discloysterd, and lead
a more dissolut and free unbridled life. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 134.
Discolorisation, discoloration ; stain.
The shadow of the archway, the discolorisa-
tions of time on all the walls, . . . made St.
Q'len tin's Castle a wonderful and awful
fabric in the imagination of a child— Car-
lyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. iii.
Discolourate, to discolour.
The least mixture of civil concernment in
religious matters so discolourated the Chris-
tian candor and purity hereof, that they ap-
peared in a temporal hue. — Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
III. iii. 31.
Disconcert, disturbance = discon-
certion is in the Diets.
The waltzers perforce ceased their evolu-
tions, and there was a brief disconcert of the
whole grave company. — E. A. Poe, Masque
of the Bed Death.
Disconforh, to differ from.
Judge more charitably than to think that
they do it only out of crossness to disconform
to your practise. — Hackel, Life of Williams,
i. 212.
Discontentee, a discontented person.
The priests and Jesuits, especially the
latter, traded much in conventicles and
among the discontentees, the very party his
Lordship headed. — Xorth, Examen, p. 55.
Discorporate, disembodied.
Instead of the 6even corporate selfish
spirits, we have the four and twenty millions
of discorporate selfish. — Carlyle, Misc., iii.
198.
Discourage, to lose courage.
Because that poore Ghurche shulde not
utterly discouraae, in her extreme adversitees,
the Sonne of God hath taken her to His
spowse. — Vocacyon of Johan Bale, 1553
(Harl. Misc., vi. 464).
Discourt, to dismiss from Court or
Court favour. R. gives a quotation
from Speedy to whom he seems to think
the word is peculiar.
It behoves his Maiesty to uphold the
Duke against them, who, if he be but dis-
court ed, it will be the corner-stone on which
the demolishing of his monarchy will be
buildcd. — Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 151.
DiscRBATK, to uncreate, reduce to
chaos.
But both vniting their diuided seals,
Took up the matter, and appeas'd the brail,
Which doubtless else had discreated all.
Sylvester, second day, first toeeke, 318.
Discreet, separate.
What the Halls in Cambridge wanted of
Oxford in number, they had in greatness ; so
that what was lost in discrete was found in
continued quantity. — Fuller, Hist, of Camb.
ii. 22.
Discrete, apparently an official title.
Though they have no worldly honours,
Yet nether kynges ne emperours,
Nor wother states of the teniperalte.
Have soche stryfe in their provision
As observauntes in their religion,
With dedly hatred and enmyte
To be made confessors and preachers,
Wardens, discretes, and ministers,
And wother offices of prelacy.
Roy and Barlow, Sede me and be
nott wroth, p. 90.
DiscretiuN. To yield or surrender
at discretion is a common phrase ; to
be at discretion is not so usual, though
of course it means the same thing, L c.
to be at the disposal of the conqueror,
as he may think fit
If she stays to receive the attack, she is in
danger of being at discretion. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 154.
Discrimination, a quarrel (a Latin-
ism).
Reproaches and all sorts of unkind dis-
criminations succeeded. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 16.
Discruciate, to torture.
Sorrowes divided amongst many, lease
Discruciate a man in deep distrease.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 257.
Discuss, to shake off, and so, to finish.
I make no doubt but that in a day or two
this troublesome business may be discussed ;
and in this hope we are preparing for our
journey. — Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, i. 177.
Discustomed, unaccustomed.
If now no more my sacred rimes distil
With artless ease from my discustom'd quill :
If now the laurel 1 that but lately shaded
My heating temples, be disleav'd and vaded ;
Blame these sad times.
Sylvester, The Arke, 2.
Disembrute, to humanise.
Friend. According to your notion of hero-
ism, that boor aud barbarian, Peter Alexio-
DISENCOURAGE ( 189 ) DJSHERBAGE.
witas of Russia, was the greatest hero that
ever lived.
Author. True, my friend, for of a numerous
people he disemlnruted every one except him-
self.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 71.
Disencourage, to discourage ; R. has
di&encouragement.
Come on then, poor Fan ! the world has
acknowledged you my offspring, and I will
disencourage you no more. — Mad. D'Arblay's
Diary, vi. 243.
Disfamk, ill reputation.
And what is Fame in life but half disfame,
And oounterchanged with darkness ?
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Disfkrtile, to make barren.
O chastisement most deadly-wonderf ull !
Th' Heaven-cindred cities a broad standing
pool
Ore-flowes (yet flowes not) whose infectious
breath
Corrupts the age, and earth disfertileth.
Sylvester, The I ocation, 1347.
DisrxowsRED, stript of flowers. Cf.
DlSLEAVE.
Our disfiowred trees, our fields hail-torn,
Our empty ears, our light and blasted corn,
Presage us famine.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1238.
Deforestation, clearing forest-
ground of trees, and throwing it into
open country or cultivation. The word
occurs again in Daniels Hist., p. 118,
margin.
The allowance of what disforrestation had
heretofore been made was earnestly urged. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 167.
D18FRAUGHT, to unfreight, discharge.
Having disfraughted and unloaded his lug-
gage, to snpper he sets himself downe like a
lorde. — Nashe, Lenten Stuff (Hari. Misc., vi.
179).
Disfurnishment, bareness, stripping.
And so the State (having all the best
strength exhausted, and none, or small sup-
plies from the Romans) lay open to the
rapine and spoyle of their northern enemies,
who taking the advantage of this disfurnish-
ment, never left till they had reduced them
to extreme miseries. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng.f
p. 5.
Disgouted, released from gout.
Lord M. looked horribly glum ; his fingers
claspt, and turning round and round, under
and over, his but just disgouted thumb. —
Richardson, CI. Harlove, vi. 227.
Disqown, to throw off a gown, and
so to renounce Holy Orders.
Then, desiring to be a convert, he was
reconciled to the Church of Rome; so he
disgowned and put on a sword. — North, Ex*
atneny p. 222.
Disgrace, to put out of countenance,
to cause another to appear inferior.
In thee [Countess of Pembroke] the Les-
bian Sappho with her lyric harpe is disgraced.
—Nashe, 1591 (Eng. Garner, i. 600).
Disgraciately, disgracefully.
All this he would most disgraciately ob-
trude.— North, Examen, p. 28.
Dishabitablb, uninhabitable.
I know I can expresse my duty in nothing
more then iutreating your lordship not to
beleeve those false reports, which do as much
make London dishabitable as the plague wont
to do. — Ld. Falkland to Earl of Cumberland,
1642, p. 5.
Dishallow, to make unholy, to pro-
fane.
As the altar cannot sanctify the priest, so
nor can the unholiness of the priest dishallow
the altar. — Adams, ii. 289.
Ye that so dishallow the holy sleep,
Your sleep is death.
Tennyson, Pelleas and Ettare.
DlSHAUNT, to shun.
So wisely she dishaunted the resort
Of such as were suspect of light report.
Hudson, Judith, iv. 125.
Disheart, to dishearten.
When, therefore, divine justice sinne wil
scurge,
He doth dishart their harts in whom it
raignes. — Davies, Microcosmos, p. 42.
Dished, done for (slang).
He was completely dished — he could never
have appeared again — the rest of his days
must probably have been passed in the
King's Bench.— Nares, Thinks I to Myself, i.
208.
I would advise her blackaviced suitor to
look out ; if another comes with a longer or
clearer rent-roll, he's dished. — C. Bronte, Jane.
Eyre, ch. xix.
D18HERBAGE, to deprive of grass or
herbage. The first part of the quota-
tion is portion of an inflated speech
made by a rhetorician to Antigonus,
who turned it into ridicule. Perhaps
Udal uses disherbage as a strange term,
representing the affectedness of the
original.
" The snowe casting season nowe coming
in place hath made this climate vtterly desti-
tute of herbage, or hath brought this climate
to clene dtsherbageing." . . . These wordes,
XtnrofioTavtli/ iiroinat, that is, "hath brought
D1SHER0
( 190 ) DISMEMBER
this climate to clene disherbageing,1* smellen
all of the inkehorae. — UaaTs Erasmus' $
Apophth., p. 243.
D18HERO, to make unheroie.
Thtre is a hypothesis now current, due
probably to some man of name, for its own
force would not carry it far, that Mr. Lock-
hart at heart has a dislike to Scott, and has
done his best in an underhand, treacherous
manner, to disherit him. — Carlyle, Misc., IV.
143.
Dishwash, dishwater.
Their fathers, their grandfathers, and their
great-grandfathers . . . were scullions, dish-
irash, and durty draff e. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 180).
Disimprison, to set at liberty.
French Revolution means here the open,
violent rebellion and victory of disimprisoned
anarchy against corrupt, worn-out authority.
—Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VI. ch. i.
Probably there is much light waiting us in
these notes of his, were they once disim-
prisoned into general legibility.— J bid., Misc.,
1?. 312.
Disindividualize, to deprive of in-
dividuality, to divest of character.
He was answered by Miss de Bassompierre
in quite womauly sort; with intelligence,
with a manner not indeed wholly disindividu-
alized : a tone, a glance, a gesture . . . still
recalled little Polly.— Mist Bronte, Villette,
ch. xxv.
Disinvigoratb, to weaken or relax.
This soft, and warm, and disinviyorativg
climate.— Sydney Smith, Letters, 1844.
" Disjune, breakfast = a corruption of
the French dejeuner. See extract from
Naske's Lenten Stuffe s. v. Orbngk.
I remember his sacred Majesty King
Charles when he took his disjune at Tillie-
tudlem. — Scott, Old Mortality, ch. iii.
Disknow, to disown, fail to recognize.
And when He shall (to light thy sinf ull load)
Put manhood on, disknow him not for God.
Sylvester, The Laxce, 851.
Dislawyer, to deprive of the status
of a lawyer; to deny a man's legal
ability.
In the meantime vilifications plenty ; those
were at their tongue's end. He was neither
courtier nor lawyer ; which his lordship hear-
ing, he smiled saying, That they might well
make him a whore master when they had
dislawyered him. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, ii. 237.
Disleave, to strip of leaves. See
quotation 8 v. Discustomed.
There Anster never roars, nor hail disleaues
Th' immortal groue, nor any branch bereaues.
Sylvester, The Maynijicence, 666.
Dislike, unlike.
Two states then there be after death, and
these two disjoined in place, dislike in con-
dition.— Andrewes, Sermons, ii. 82.
Dislink, to disjoin, to separate.
And there a group of girls
In circle waited, whom the electric shock
Dislink* d with shrieks and laughter.
Tennyson, Princess, Prologue,
Disloke, to dislocate.
His bones and joints from whence they
whilome stood
With rackings quite dislokcd and distracted.
Davits, Holy Roode, p. 20.
Dismal, to feel dismal or melancholy.
Miss L. sung various old elegies of Jack-
son, Dr. Harrington, and Iinley,and O ! how
I dismalled in hearing them. — Mad. D'Ar-
blay, Diary, i. 344.
Dibmality, a melancholy thing.
Hang dismality, leave that to parsons. —
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 164.
What signifies dwelling upon such di natal-
ities ? If I think upon my ruin beforehand,
I am no nearer to enjoymeut now than then.
— Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. VI. ch. xiv.
DlSM ALNESS, gloom.
Oelia thought with some dismalness of the
time she should have to spend as bridesmaid
at Lowick.— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. ix.
Dismals. In the first two extracts =
mourning garments; in the other =
.melancholy.
What a charming widow would she have
made! how would she have adorned the
weeds ! . . . Such pretty employment in new
dismals, when she had hardly worn round
her blazing joyfuls. — Richardson, CI. Har-
&me,vit. 171.
As my lady is decked out in her dismals,
perhaps she may take a fancy to faint. —
Foote, Trip to Calais, Act HI.
He comes, and seems entirely wrapt up in
the dismals : what can be the matter now ? —
Ibid., The Liar, Act II.
Dismember, to deprive of a seat in
Parliament. The word is used pun-
ningly in the first extract
O House of Commons, House of Lords,
Amend before September :
For 'tis decreed your souldiers1 swords
Shall then you all dismember.
Needham, Ena. Rebellion, 1661 {Harl.
Misc., ii. 522).
The parliament met, and at the very first
the new members were attacked; for one
stood up and recommended it to their
DISMINISTERED ( 191 ) DISPENSATIVE.
modesty to withdraw while the state of
their election was under debate ; as they did,
and were soon dismembered by vote of the
house. — North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 163.
Since I have dismembered myself, it is
incredible how cool I am to all politics. —
WalpoU, Letters, iii. 290 (1769).
Disministkbed, freed from the habits
of a minister.
Can you think . . . him [Lord Orford] so
totally disministered as to leave all thoughts
of what he has been, and ramble like a boy
after pictures and statues? — Walpole to
Mann, i. 280 (1743).
Disnaturalise, to make strange or
foreign.
There is this to be said in favour of retain-
ing the usual form and pronunciation of this
well-known name [Job], that if it were dis-
naturalised and put out of use, an etymology
in our language would be lost sight of. For
a job in the working or operative sense of
the word is evidently something which it
requires patience to perform ; in the physical
and moral sense, as when, for example, in
the language of the vulgar, a personal hurt
or misfortune is called a bad job, it is some-
thing which it requires patience to support ;
and in the political sense it is something
which it requires patience in the public to
endure ; and in all these senses the origin of
the word must be traced to Job, who is the
proverbial exemplar of this virtue. This
derivation has escaped Johnson; nor has
that lexicographer noticed the substantives
joking and jobation, and the verb to jobe, all
from the same root, and familiar in the
mouths of the people. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. cxv.
Disnounce, to tell thoroughly : prob-
ably meant for a blunder = announce,
the speaker being an old shepherd.
Here is a substantial school-master can
better disnounce the whole foundation of the
matter. — Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Disobedientiary, a rebel.
I pray God amend them, or else I fear
they be . . . sly, wily disobedientiaries to all
good orders. — Latimer, ii. 389.
Disoffice, to turn out of office.
O very wise Parliament! can you teach
one how to piece liberty and this covenant
together? for all that refuse it must be
sequestred, imprisoned, disofRctd. — Socket,
Life of mUiam$,&.20O.
Dispack, to open or unpack.
Whether when God the mingled lump di *■
packt,
From fiery element did light extract.
Sylvester, first day, first weeke, 518.
DiSPANGLE, to spangle (distribu-
tive))'). The extract is from an edi-
tion of the poem published with the
thirteenth edition of the Arcadia,
1674. But in the edition of 1598,
reprinted in Arber's Eng. Garner,
vol. i., the last line begins, " But for
to spangle."
Though dusky wits dare scorn Astrologie,
And fools can think those Lamps of purest
light,
Whose numbers, waies, greatness, eternity,
Promising wonders, wonders do inuite ;
To have for no cause birthright in the skie,
But to dispangle the black weeds of night.
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella, st. 26.
Disparent, variable ; of diverse ap-
pearance.
Nor useth our most inimitable imitator of
nature this cross and deformed mixture of
his parts more to colour and avoid too broad
a taxation of so eminent a person, than to
follow the true life of nature, being often or
always expressed so disparent in her crea-
tures.— Chapman, Iliad, 6k. II., Comment.
Dispaeple, to disperse. H. gives the
word as occurring in Lydgate, but
without further reference. K. has dis-
perpled.
Her wav'ring hair disparpling flew apart
In seemly shed.
Hudson, Judith, iv. 339.
.Disfathy, difference of feeling ; the
reverse of sympathy, but not so strong
a word as antipathy.
He was a cruel experimentalist, and the
dtspathy which this must have excited in our
friend, whose love of science, ardent as it
was, never overcame the sense of humanity,
would have counteracted the attraction of
any intellectual powers, however brilliant. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxxxv.
It is excluded from our reasonings by our
dispathies. — Palgrave, Hist, of Norm, and
Eng. (1857), ii. 110.
Dispence, to make use of, as one who
dispenses abroad what he has ac-
Suired (?) ; or, dispense with (?) ; but
lis last nardly seems the meaning.
Excellent devices being used to make even
their sports profitable ; images of battels and
fortifications being then delivered to their
memory, which after, their stronger judge-
ments might dispence. — Sidney, Arcadia, p.
122.
Dispend with, to dispense with.
If a present punishment be suspended, the
future shall never be dispended with. — Adams,
i. 185.
Dispensative, a preservative. The
Diets, only have it as an adj., but
Fuller (Worthies, Norfolk, ii. 140)
DISPERSED
( 192 ) DISSATISFACTORY
mentions a book by Henry Howard,
afterwards E. of North nmpton, called,
" A Despcnsative against the Poyson of
supposed Prophesies."
Dispersed, dishevelled.
Come, mournful dames, lay off your broid-
er'd locks,
And on your shoulders spread dispersed hairs.
Greene, Looking Glass for Eng., p. 142.
Dispirit, to disperse ; cause to per-
vade.
Proportion an houres meditation to an
houres reading of a staple authour. This
makes a man master of his learning, and
dispirits the book into the Scholar.— Fuller,
Holy State, III. xviii. 5.
Dispiritment, despondency.
Ah! what faiut broken quaver is that in
the shout; as of a man that shouted with
the throat only, and inwardly was bowed
down with dispiritment. — Carlyle, Misc., iii.
219.
Dispope, to deprive of popedom.
Dost thou scorn me,
Because I had my Canterbury pallium
From one whom they disponed ?
Tennyson, Harold, III. i.
Disposn ioned, disposed.
Lord Clinton was indeed sweetly disposi-
tioned by nature.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
ii. 150.
Disposoriks, espousal.
The Princess also had begun to draw the
letters which she intended to have written
the day of her disposories to the prince her
husband, and the King her father in law. —
Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 115.
Dispost, to drive from a post or
position.
Now, thinke thou see'st this Soule of sacred
sceale,
This kindling Cole of flaming Charitie
Disposted all in post.
Dairies, Holy Roode, p. 12.
Dispraisable, blamable ; illaudable.
It is dispraisable either to be senseless or
fenceless. — Adams, ii. 462.
Disprinced, deprived of princely
honour or appearance.
For I was drenched with ooze, and torn with
briers,
More crumpled than a poppy from the sheath,
And all one rag, disprinced from head to heel.
Tennyson, Princess, v.
Dispulverate, scatter in dust
Confusion shall dispulverate
All that this round Orbiculer doth beare.
. Davies, Holy Roode, p. 13.
Dispute, contest in warfare.
Chichester . . . had received some soldiers
of His Majesty's party, who either were too
few to keep it, or found it not tenable enough
to make any resistance. Waller presents
himself before it, and without any great dis-
pute, becomes master of it.— Heylin, Hist, of
the Presbyterians, p. 451.
The four men of war made sail for the
forts, against which we anchored about one
in the afternoon ; and after four hours' dis-
pute went to the westward.— Retaking of St.
Helena, 1673 (Arber, Eng. Garner, i. 61).
Disquisition, search ; usually only
applied to mental investigation.
On their return from a disquisition as fruit-
less as solicitous, nurse declared her appre-
hensions that Harry had gone off with a
little favourite boy whom he had taken into
service.— If. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 82.
Disrange, throw out of rank.
The Norman horsmen . . . retired. . . . The
Englishmen, supposing them to flie, presently
disranged themselves, and in disray pressed
hard upon the enemies. — Holland's Camden,
p. 317.
Disraie, to. throw into confusion.
The Euglish men, supposing now that they
turned backe and fled, . . . display their ranks,
and being thus <2*#r<n erf,presse hard upon their
enemies. . . . The Normans casting them-
selves suddenly againe into array, charge the
English afresh, and thus setting upon them
being scattered, and out of order, . . . made
an exceeding great slaughter of them. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 151.
Have these so yong and weak
Disrayed their ranks.
Sylvester, The Decay, 1124.
Disrelish able, distasteful.
That the match with the Spanish princess
should be intended no more was disretishable,
because he esteemed her nation above any
other to be full of honour in their friendship.
—Racket, Life of Williams, i. 78.
Disrespect ability, that which is dis-
reputable; blackguardism.
Her taste for disrespectability grew more
and more remarkable. — Thackeray, Vanity
Fair, ch. Ixiv.
Disrespectable, a mild word for con-
temptible.
It requires a man to be some disrespectable,
ridiculous Boswell before he can write a
tolerable life.— Carlyle, Diamond Necklace,
ch. i.
Dissatisfactory, unsatisfactory.
She then a little embarrassed me by an
iuquiry, ** why Major Phillips went to Ire-
DISSAVAGE
( *93 )
DISTRAIT
land ? " for my answer . . . seemed dissatisfac-
tory.—Mad. UArblay, Diary, vi. 146.
DissAYAGK, to civilize.
Those wilde kingdomes
Subdued to Rome by my vnwearied toyles ;
Which I dissavag'd and made nobly ciuili.
Chapman, Casar and Pompey, Act I.
Disseason, to spoil the flavour of
something.
That sea was found to be higher then
Egypt, which made them misdoubt that it
would either drowne the countrey, or else by
mixing with the Nilus disseason his waters.—
Sandys, Travels, p. 106.
Dissection, dissected portion, seg-
ment
All his kindnesses are not only in their
united form*, bat in their several dissections
fully commendable. — Sidney, Defence of
Poesie, p. 554.
Dissrlf, to put one beside oneself, to
stupefy.
Whence comes
This shivering winter that my soule benums,
Freezes my senses, and disselfs me so
With drousie poppy, not myself to knowe ?
Sylvester, The Trophies, 1116.
Dissembleable, having a deceptive
appearance.
As he that said by himselfe and his wife, I
thanke God in fortie winters that we haue
liued together, neuer any of our neighbours
set as at one, meaning that they neuer fell
out in all that space, which had bene the
oirecter speech and more apart, and yet by
intendment amounts all to one, being neuer-
thelesse dissembleable, and in effect contrary.
-Puttenham, Arte of Ena. Potsie, Bk. III.
ch. rix.
Dissent, to differ in opinion from ;
possibly the omission of the preposition
may be a printer's error.
Which makes it seem the greater wonder
in our English Puritans, that following him
«o closely in pursuit of the discipliue, . . . and
pertinaciously adhering to his doctrine of
predestination, they should so visibly dissent
mm in the point of the Sabbath,— Beylin,
tf'rf. of the Presbyterians, p. 27.
Dissenterism, nonconformity.
He . . . tried to lay plans for his campaign
«ad heroic desperate attempts to resuscitate
the shop-keeping Dissenterism of Oarlingford
into a lofty Nonconformist ideal.— Mrs. OH-
fhavt, Salem Chapel, ch. iii.
Dissbverment, sundering.
He who is taken out to pass through a fair
•oene to the scaffold, thinks not of the flowers
that smile on his road, but of the block and
•»-edge, of the disseverment of bone and
vein.— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxvii.
Disshiver, to break in pieces.
And shieldes disshyuering cracke.
Webbe, Eng. Poetrie, p. 60.
Dissimulate, to dissemble, conceal.
Public feeling required the meagreness of
nature to be dissimulated by tall barricades of
frizzed curls and bows.— G. Eliot, Middle-
march, ch. iii.
Dissimulator, dissembler.
Dissimulator as I was to others, I was like
a guilty child before the woman I loved—
Zytton, Pelhatn, ch. lxvii.
Dissite, distant.
Britaine . . .
Far dissite from this world'of ours, wherein
we ever dwelt.— Holland's Camden, p. 46.
Dissocial, divisive ; one who breaks
up sociality.
A dissocial man? Dissocial enough; a
natural terror and horror to all phantasms
being himself of the genus reality.— Carlvle\
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. VII. ch. ii. *
Dissolve, to kill ; to produce dissolu-
tion.
His death came from a sudden catarrh
which caused a squinancy by the inflamma-
tion of the interiour muscles, and a shortness
of breath followed which dissolved him in the
*$%?' °f »Woo? hoU™' "~ Hacket> Life of
Williams, n. 227.
Distanceless, dull ; without any dis-
tant prospect.
The weather that day . . was truly national ;
a silent, dim, distanceless, rotting day in March.
— C. KinysUy, Yeast, ch. i.
Distillation, cold in the head (?),
from the running that accompanies it.
It [exercise injudiciously used] bredeth
Bheumes, Catarrhs and distillations,^ maketh
heavye, and bringeth oppilation to the lyeuer.
— Touchstone of Complexions, p. 104.
Distinctly, to make distinct. The
passage is quoted by W. Proctor from
"an American pamphlet."
So could the same artificial light, passed
through the faintest focal object of a tele-
scope, both distinctify (to coin a new word
for an extraordinary occasion) and magnify
its feeblest component members. — Proctor,
Myths and Marvels of Astronomy, p. 247.
Distrain, restraint.
The King's highness (God save his grace !)
did decree that all admitted of universities
should preach throughout all his realm as
long as they preached well, without distrain
of any man.— Latimer, ii. 329.
Distrait, absent; distracted in
thought : a French word that may be
0
DISTRIBUTIONIST ( 194 ) DIVISION ATE
considered naturalized, and is so used
in the extract.
And then she got Grace supper, and tried
to make her talk ; but she was distrait, re-
served.— C. Kingsley, Two Year* A go, ch.xxvi.
Distribution 1ST, one employed in
distribution.
The distributionisU trembled, for their
popularity was at stake. . . The popularity
of the distribution society among the ladies
of our parish is unprecedented. — Sketches by
Boz (Ladies* Societies).
Distroubance, disturbance.
They that come to the Church for to pray
devoutly to the Lord God, may in their in-
ward wits be the more fervent, that all tbeir
outward wits be closed from all outward see-
ing and hearing, and from all distroubance
and letting.— Eram. of W. Thorpe (Bale,
Select Works, p. 96).
Distroubler, troubler ; disturber.
After thy knowledge and power thou shalt
enforce thee to withstand all such distroublers
of Holy Church.— £x«m. of William Thorpe
(Bale, Select Works, p. 75).
Disvelope, disclose, unwrap.
Which bloody resolution, since the time
wherein those black thoughts disveloved
themselves by action, she hath under ner
hand confirmed. — The Unhappy Marksman,
1659 (Harl. Misc., iv. 3).
Disventurous, disastrous.
The whole mischief comes upon us to-
gether, like kicks to a cur; and would to
God this disventurous adventure that threat-
ens us may end in no worse. — JarvWs Bon
Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. xvi.
Diswhipped, deprived of a whip.
Is it peace of a father restored to his
children, or of a taskmaster who has lost his
whip? . . . Or, alas! is it neither restored
father, nor diswhipped taskmaster that walks
there, but an anomalous complex of both
these?— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. i.
Diswindowed, with the windows de-
stroyed.
Ghastly chdteaus stare on you by the way-
side, disroofed, diswindoieed. — Carlyle, Ir.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. ch. vii.
Diswinged, deprived of wings.
But indeed what of Du Barry? A foul
worm, hatched by royal heat, on foul com-
posts, into a flaunting butterfly; now dis-
winged, and again a worm. — Carlyle, Diamond
Necklace, ch. ill.
Dite, saying.
Which dite Paul seemeth to have taken
out of the prophecies of Daniel. — Phil pot, p.
938.
DiTTON, ditty.
Pantagruel for an eternal memorial wrote
this Victoria! ditton. — Urquharfs Rabelais,
Bk. II. ch. xxvii.
Dittos, a suit of the same colour
throughout.
A sober suit of brown or snuff-coloured
dittos such as beseemed his profession. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. lvi.
Dive-doppel, the dive-dapper or dab-
chick.
Then once again kneel ye down, and up
again like dive-doppel 9. — Becon, iii. 276.
Divellicate, to tear or lacerate.
The speaker is Colonel Bath, of whom
it is said (Bk. III. ch. viii.) " all his
words are not to be found in a dic-
tionary."
My brother told me you had used him
dishonestly, and had divellicated his character
behind his back.— Fielding, Amelia, Bk. V.
ch. vi.
Diverberate, to strike through.
These cries for blamelesse blood diuerberate
The high resounding Heau'n's convexitie.
Davies, Holy Roods, p. 14.
Divertment, avocation.
The prosequution of a full establishment
thereof was neither by him or his successors
(hauing other diuertments) euer throughly
accomplished.— Daniel, Hist, of Eny., p. 83.
Divested, vested. The word, of
course, has usually the opposite mean-
ing ; it may be a misprint, or it may
refer to God transferring part of His
authority to kings as His vicegerents.
Insurrections against that authority which
was divested by God in His Majesty's person.
— Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 333.
Divestiture, putting off; depriva-
tion.
He is sent away without remedy, with a
divestiture from his pretended Orders. — Bp.
Hall, Works, x. 226.
Divexity.
His haire, gold's quintessence, ten times re-
fin'd,
(In substance far more subtill than the wind)
Doth glorifie that Heau'n's Divexity,
His head, where Wit doth raigne inuincibly.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 30.
Divisionate, to divide: a pedantic
schoolmaster is the speaker.
First, you must divisionate your point [of
argument], quasi you should cut a chees into
two particles, . . . which must also be sub-
divisionated into three equal species. — Sidney,
Wanstead Play, p. 622.
DIVISIVENESS ( 195 ) DOCTRINARITY
Divisivbness, tendency to division.
So invincible is man's tendency to unite,
with all the invincible divisiveness he has. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. i.
Dizain, a poem of ten stanzas, each
of ten lines.
Strephon again began this dizain. — Sidney,
Arcadia, p. 217.
Do, a cheat or fraud (slang).
I thought it was a do to get me out of the
house. — Sketches by Boz (Broker's Man).
Do, trouble; fuss. Ado is not un-
common.
Lord, what is man, either Adam or Abra-
ham, that Thou shouldest be thus mindful of
him, or the seed or sons of either, that Thou
shouldest make this da about him? — An-
drews, Sermons, i. 14.
What a deal a do was here to bring one
innocent man to his grave \— Fuller, Fisgah
Sight, IV. ii. 27.
To my accounts, but Lord ! what a deal of
do I have to understand any part of them. —
Pepy*, March 31, 1666.
To Gresham College, where a great deal of
do and formality in choosing of the Council
and officers.— /Wd. April 11, 1666.
Doable, possible; capable of being
done.
^ John Holies indignantly called it political
simony, this selling of honours; which in-
deed it was ; but what then ? It was doable,
it was done for others. — Carlyle, Misc., iv.
316.
Doatino-piecs, a darling.
" Pride and perverseness," said he, " with a
vengeance ! yet this is your doating-piece.n —
Richardson, Pamela, i. 68.
Dock, properly the stump left when
a tail has been docked, and so the seat
of honour.
A breech close unto his dock,
HandsomM with a long stock.
Greene, Description of Gower, p. 320.
Their crupper is a stick of a yard's length
put across their docks. — Modern, Description
of Scotland, 1670 (Harl. Misc., vi. 137).
Doctor, to adulterate.
She doctor' d the punch, and she doctor' d the
negus,
Taking care not to put in sufficient to
flavour it.
Ingoldsby Legends (Housewtrming).
The Cross Keys . . . had doctored ale, an
odour of bad tobacco, and remarkably strong
cheese. — G. Eliot, Felix Holt, ch. xxviii.
Doctor, to call or make a doctor.
Honor. He never was a raal counshilior,
sure, — nor jantleman at all.
Phil. Ob, counshilior by courtesy — he was
an attorney once — just as we doctor the
apotecary. — Miss Edgeworth, Love and Law,
i. 1.
I am taking it into serious deliberation
whether I shall or shall not be made a
Doctor, and ... I begin to think that no
man who deliberates is likely to be Doctored.
—Southey, Letters, 1820 (iii. 196).
Doctor. To put the doctor on an-
other = to cheat him. The allusion,
perhaps, is to false dice, which are
called doctors.
Perhaps ways and means may be found to
put the doctor upon the old prig. — T. Brovm,
Works, i. 236.
Doctors. The three doctors in the
extracts were proverbially famous.
After those two, Doctor Diet and Doctor
Quiet, Doctor Merriman is requisit to pre-
serve health. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 23.
Col. Well, after all, kitchen physick is the
best physick.
Lord Sm. And the best doctors in the
world are Doctor Diet, Doctor Quiet, and
Doctor Merriman. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
Doctors, false dice.
Now, Sir, here is your true dice, a man
seldom gets anything by them ; here is your
false, Sir; hey, how they run! Now, Sir,
those* we generally call doctors. — Centlivre,
Gamester, Act -I.
Here, said he, taking some dice out of his
pocket, here's the stuff ; here are the imple-
ments ; here an the little doctors which cure
the distempers of the purse. — Fielding, Tom
Jones, Bk. VIII. ch. xii.
Doctor's stpfj, medicine : in the
extract from Barb am, poison.
The man said, "-Then it must be as it
pleased God, for he could not take Doctor* s
stuff, if he died for- it." — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. X. ch. xvii
I know not what she heard or saw, but fury
fill'd her eye,
She bought some nasty .doctor9 s-stuff, and put
it in a pie.
Jngoldsby Legends (Nell Cook).
He always remembers when I've got to
take my doctor's stuff, and I'm taking three
sorts now. — G. Eliot, Mill on the Floss, Bk. I.
ch. ix.
Doctrinarity, stiff pedantry or dog-
matism. Littie* says that doctrinaire
was "terme politique introduit sous
la Restauratton (lol4 — 30). Homme
politique dont Its id&es subordonnSes a
un ensemble de doctrines Stoient semi-
liberates et semi-conservatives. Guizot
is cited as an example of a doctrinaire.
0 2
DOCUMENTATION ( 196 )
DOG-MAN
The word is now always used disparag-
ingly.
Excess in doctrinarity and excess in ear-
nestness are threatening to set their mark
on the new political generation. — Lord
Strangford, Letters and Papers, p. 235
Documentation, instruction ; advice.
" I am to be closeted, and to be document-
ixed," proceeded he; "not another word of
your documentation*^ dame Selby, I am not in
a humour to bear them ; I will take my own
way." — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 157.
Documentise, to instruct. See ex-
tract 8. v. Documentation.
The Attorney General . . . desired the wife
would not be so very busy, being as he said
well documentised, meaning by this White-
acre.— North, Examen, p. 294.
Dod, see extract.
Our husbandmen in Middlesex make a dis-
tinction between dodding and threshing of
wheat, the former being only the beating out
of the fullest and fairest grain, leaving what
is lean and lank to be threshed out after-
wards. Our comment may be said to have
dodded the Sheriffes of several Counties, in-
sisting only on their most memorable actions.
— Fuller, Worthies, ch. xv.
Dod, see extract.
Robert Dodford was born in a Village so
called in this County, ... so named, as I
take.it, from a Ford over the river Avon, and
Dods, Water-weeds (commonly called by
children Cats-Tails), growing thereabouts. —
Fuller, Worthies, Northampton (ii. 170).
Doddle, to shake.
He got up on an old mnle which had served
nine Kings, and so, mumbling with his mouth,
nodding and doddlxng his head, would go see
a coney ferreted. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. I.
ch. xxii.
Doo, to furnish with dogs. Cf.
Fuller's use of boy*
Surely had Brittain been then known to
the ancient Romans, when first (instead of
manning) they dogged their Capitol, they
would have furnished themselves with Mas-
tiff es fetched hence for that purpose. —
Fuller, Worthies, Somerset (ii. 276).
Doo, cock, as of a gun, from a sup-
posed resemblance to a dog with its
head raised.
This was a contrivance ... for producing
fire by the friction of the grooved edges of a
steel wheel . . . against a piece of iron
pyrites . . . held in a cock or dog which
pressed upon it. — Arch., xxxi. 492 (1846).
Doobolt. An iron hook or bar with
a sharp fang is called a dog or dogbolt.
Dogbolt is a term of reproach in Ben
Jonson and'other old writers, though why
this should be so is not clear. See N.
The beams are . . . fastened to the sides
with bolts not unlike our dog-holts. — Arch.,
. 555 (1824).
Dog-cook, a man -cook (?).
A cellar admirably stocked, a first-rate dog-
cook and assistants, a set of horses for town,
huuters at Melton, and racers at Newmarket,
practically sounded his merits and virtues. —
Th. Hook, Man of many Friends.
Doggess, a bitch.
Pretty dogs and dogg esses to quarrel and
bark at me, and yet, whenever I appear, afraid
to pop out of their kennels. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, vii. 131.
Doggrel. The verb is unusual, and
should mean to write doggrel verses;
here it seems to refer to an argument
constantly repeated. The freethinker
boasts that his religion is practised by
the world ; Eusebius replies —
If general practice hits right with the pre-
cepts of your religion, they are fly-blown,
and were I disposed to doggrel it, I would
only gloss upon that text. . . Wben the
question is about good and evil, practice
stands on the wrong aide. — Gtnt'cman In-
structed, p. 43.
Doggy, like dogs : a reproachf ul epi-
thet.
Pack hence, doggye rakhels! — Stanyhurst,
JEn., i. 145.
Dog-logic, a word formed in imita-
tion of dog-latin. The quotation occurs
in Swift's lines " upon the horrid plot
discovered by Harlequin, the B — p of
R— ch — r's French dog."
I own it was a dangerous project,
And you have prov'd it by dog-logick.
Dog-looked, disreputable - looking ;
hang-dog.
We saw a wretched kind of a dog-looked
fellow with a tippet about his neck. — I/Fs-
trange, Visions of Quevedo, ch. i.
Dog-mad, quite mad ; rabid.
He was troubled with a disease reverse to
that called the stinging of the tarantula, and
would run dog-mad at the noise of music,
especially a pair of bagpipes. — Swift, Tale
of Tub, sect. 11.
Dog-man, a man having to do with
dogs.
You think he could barter and cheat,
And filch the dog-man's meat
To feed the offspring of God.
Mrs. Browning, Napoleon III. t a Italy.
DOGMAOLATRY ( 197 ) DOMESTICATE
Dogmaolatrt, worship of dogma.
How has the " religious world " fallen into
the notion that no one believes in Christ
who does not call Him by the same appella-
tion as themselves? 1. From the dogma-
olatry of the last two centuries (Popish and
Protestant).— C. Kingsley, 1852 (Life, i.268).
Dogs. To go to the dogs is to be
ruined or destroyed ; the reference is
to a worn-out horse sent to the knack-
er's. See quotation from Dickens s. v.
Bow-wow.
Writs are out for me to apprehend me for
my plays, and now I am bound for the isle
of dogs. — Return, from Parnassus, v. 3 (1606).
I should soon hope to see that accom-
plished, if that mischievous Ate that has en-
gaged the two most mighty monarchs in the
world in a bloody war were sent to her place,
i.e. to the dogs (ic Kopaicat). — Bailey's Eras-
mus, p. 266.
Dog-shores, pieces of timber used to
prevent a vessel from starting while the
keel-blocks are being taken out, pre-
p iratory to launching.
Go over the side again, and down among
the ooze and wet to the bottom of the dock,
in the depths of the subterranean forest of
dry-shores and stays that hold her up.—
Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, zziv.
Dog-sleep. L. defines this "pre-
tended sleep," and gives an extract
from Addison in which it bears this
meaning; but it usually signifies, I
think, a light, fitful sleep disturbed by
the slightest sound.
My sleep was never more than what is
called dog-sleep ; so that I could hear myself
moaning, and was often, as it seemed to me,
wakened suddenly by my own voice. — Be
Quincey, Opium-eater, p. 35.
DogVtonque, a plant ; cynoglossum
officinale,
I think he killed nobody, for his remedies
were "womanish and weak." Sage and
wormwood, sion, hyssop, borage, spikenard,
dog's-tomgue, our Lady's mantle, feverfew, and
Faith, and all in small quantities except the
last. — Beade, Cloister ana Hearth, ch. xciv.
Dog-tired, tired as a dog. Shake-
speare (Taming of Shrew, IV. ii.) has
dog-weary.
Tom is carried away by old Benjy, dog-
tired and surfeited with pleasure. — Hughes,
Tom Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I. ch. ii.
Dog to the bow, a dog used in shoot-
ing : such dogs, being well trained and
obedient, were taken to typify humble
or subservient people.
And eke to January he goth as lowe,
As ever did a doggefor the bo we.
Chaucer, Cant. Tales, 9888.
He . . with lacke of vitailles brought those
choploges or greate pratlers as lowe as dogge
to the bow. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 250.
Do-little, idle. L. has the word as
a substantive.
What woman would be content with such
a do-little husband? — Rennet's Erasmus's
Praise of Folly, p. 45.
Dollarless, poor ; without dollars.
The Korrises, deceived by gentlemanly
manners and appearances, had, falling from
their high estate, received a dollarless and
unknown man. — Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit, ch.
xvii.
Dollop, a lump.
The great blunderbuss, moreover, was
choked with a dollop of slough-cake. — Black-
more, Lorna Doone, ch. ii.
Dollship, a contemptuous title given
to women, implying that they are pup-
pets to be fondled and played with.
Tet I am so true to the freemasonry my-
self, that I would think the man who should
dare to say half I have written of our doll-
ships ought not to go away with his life. —
Richardson, Grandison, vi. 102.
Dolly, a doxy, or mistress.
Drink, and dance, and pipe, and play,
Kisse our dollies night and day.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 38.
Dolphinate, Dauphiny.
One Bruno first founded them [Carthu-
sians] in the Dolphinate in France, anno 1080.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. 269.
Doltefy, to make dull and stupid.
Such as women be of the warst sort, fond,
f olish, wanton, . . . and in euerye wise doltefied
with the dregges of the Demi's dounge hill.
— Aylmer, Harborough for Faithful Subjects,
1559, sig. G. III.
Doly, gloomy. H. gives doley, with
this meaning, as a Northumberland
word.
This dolye chaunce gald us. — Stanyhurst,
^En., ii. 431.
Domesticate, to live at home : usu-
ally an active verb = to tame, render
familiar. One of Coleridge's poems is
addressed "To a young friend, on his
proposing to domesticate with the
author."
I would rather, I say, see her married to
some honest and tender-hearted man, whose
love might induce him to domesticate with
her, and to live peaceably and pleasingly
DOMESTICISE ( 198 )
DOR- HA WK
within his family circle, than to see her mated
with a prince ci the blood. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, i. 305.
DoMEhTiciSE, to render domestic.
I have some observations to make concern*
ing both the tea and the tea-service, which
will clear the Doctor from any imputation
of intemperance in his use of that most
pleasant, salutiferous, and domesticising be-
verage.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. xxix.
Dominical. Dominical letter = usu-
ally Sunday letter, but in the first ex-
tract " the dominicall or great letters "
refer to the memorials of events in our
Saviour's life, such as Christmas, Easter,
&c. In the second extract as a noun it
seems = the Lord's house.
The wisdome and piety of the Church
having in all ages written in Dominicall or
great letters those most remarkable Histories
of our Saviour's transactions on earth in order
to our redemption. —Gauden, Tear* of the
Church, p. 111.
Then began Christian Churches, Oratories,
or Dominical s to outshine the Temples of the
Heathen Gods. — Ibid. p. 351.
Donakeb, a cattle-stealer: mentioned
among other names for thieves of va-
rious sorts in The Nicker Nicked, 1669
(JIarl. Misc., ii. 108).
Done, exhausted. Sometimes done
for is used in the same sense.
Not so the Holland fleet, who, tired and done,
Stretch'd on their decks like weary oxen
lie. — Dryderiy Ann. Mir., st. 70.
She is rather done for this morning, and
must not go so far without help. — Miss
Austen, Persuasion, ch. xxiii.
Done, done to death.
The Lord Cobham said, I believe that in
the sacrament of the altar is Christ's very
Body in form of bread, the same that was
born of the Virgin Mary, done on the Cross,
dead, and buried. — Dale, Select Works, p. 30.
Donkky, an ass. The word is modern.
Grose says, " Perhaps from the Spanish
or dan-like gravity of the animal, en-
titled also the King of Spain's trump-
eter." L., who cites no example, con-
nects it with German dichhopf, thick
head. Prof. Skeat says that the root
of the word is dun, a common name
for horse or aps, and that the affix is
a diminutive, quasi dunnakie (see his
EtymoL Diet). It will be seen that
Wolcot gives it as a London word.
Pegge cites it as an Essex provincial-
ism.
Thou think'st thyself on Pegasus so steady,
But, Peter, thou art mounted on a Neddy ;
Or in the London phrase, thou Devonshire
monkey,
Thy Pegasus is nothing but a donkey.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. lie.
Donkeydrome, course for a donkey-
race : an imitation of hippodrome. To
avoid hybridism it should be onodrome.
The long-eared beasts were named after
the horses of the sun. This aspiring enter-
prise naturally ended in the two charioteers
being left sprawling in the dust of the
donkeydrome. — Savage, R. Mcdlicott, Bk. I.
ch. v.
Donnish, pertaining to a don. Uni-
versity tutors, heads of houses, &c.
are called done, and donnish is gener-
ally used in reference to this.
Unless a man can get the prestige and in-
come of a don, and write donnish books, it's
hardly worth while for him to make a Greek
and Latin machine of himself. — G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda, ch. xvi.
Do-nothing, idle ; also a substantive.
Why haven't yon a right to aspire to a
college education as any do-nothing canon
there at the abbey, lad? — (X Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. iv.
Curse them, sleek, hard-hearted, impotent
do-nothings. — Ibid. ch. xxxii.
Do-nothing-ne88, indolence.
A situation of similar affluence and do-
nothing-ness would have been much more
suited to her capacity than the exertions
and self-denials of the one which her im-
prudent marriage had placed her in. — Miss
Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. xxxviii.
Doobless, without a door.
Through the doorless stone archway he
could see a long vista of the plain below. —
C. Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xiii.
Dorado, a rich man (Spanish).
As in casting account three or four men
together come short in account of one man
placed by himself below them, so neither are
a troop of these ignorant Doradoes of that
true esteem and value as many a forlorn
person whose condition doth place him be-
neath their feet. — Drown, Religio Medici,
Pt. II. sect. 1.
Dorfly, cockchafer.
This forest was most horribly fertile and
copious in dorfies, hornets, and wasps. —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xvi.
Dor-hawk, night-hawk.
The dor-hawk, solitary bird,
Bound the dim crags on heavy pinions wheel-
ing,
With untired voice sings an unvaried time ;
DORME
( *99 )
DOULCURE
Those burring notes are all that can be heard
In silence deeper far than that of deepest
noon. — Wordsworth, The Waggoner, c. i.
Dorme, a doze.
Not a calm and soft sleep like that which
oar God giveth His beloved ones, but as the
slumbering dormes of a sick man, very short,
and those also interrupted with a medley of
cross and confused fancies. — Sanderson, i.
146.
Dormeb, demurrer (?).
These lawyers have such delatory and
forren pleas, such dormers, such quibs
[quips ?] and quiddits. — Greene, Quip for
Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 407).
Dobmient, dormant.
Books were not published then so soon as
they were written, but lay most commonly
dormient many years. — Bramhall, ii. 142.
Dobmition, si umber.
Wert thou disposed ... to plead, not so
much for the utter extinction as for the dor-
vutione of the soul. — Bp. Hall, Works,vii. 295.
Dotel, dotard.
For so false a doctrine so foolish unlearned
a drunken dotel is a meet schoolmaster. —
Pilkington, p. 586.
Dotes, endowments. Sidney himself
puts the word into the mouth of a pe-
dantic schoolmaster.
Corydon. Sing then, and shew these goodly
dotes in thee,
With which thy brainless youth can equal
me.
sienalcat. .....
The dotes, old dotard, I can bring to prove
My self deserv's that choice, are onely love.
R. B.'s Continuation of Sidney's
Arcadia, p. 516.
Now the thunder-thumping Jove trans-
fund his dotes into your excellent formositie.
Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Dottle, "the refuse of a pipe of
tobacco which is left at the bottom of
the pipe*' (Jamieson). This meaning
scarcely seems to suit the second ex-
tract.
A snuffer-tray containing scraps of half-
smoked tobacco, «* pipe dottles" as he called.
them, which were carefully resmoked over
and over again, till nothing but ash was left.
— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Just when you wake from a dreamless
sleep beneath the forest boughs, as the east
begins to blaze, and the magpie gets musical,
you dash to the embers of last night's fire,
and after blowing many firesticks, find one
which is alight, and proceed to send abroad
on the morning breeze the scene of last
night's dottle. — //. Kingdcy, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. xix.
Double. To double ears =* to close
them (as with wearisome talk).
This that I tell you is rather to solace your
eares with pretie conceits after a sort of long
scholasticall preceptes which may happen
have doubled them, rather then for any other
purpose. — Puttenham, Eng. Potsie, Bk. III.
ch. xxiv.
Double-Joe. The Portuguese coin
Joannes is worth about 36*. A double-
Joe would = in value a Spanish doub-
loon.
Haply he deems no eye can see
The shining store of glittering ore,
The fair rose-noble, the bright moidore,
And the broad Double- Joe from ayont the sea.
Jngoldshy Let/ends (Hand of Glory).
Doublet, a false jewel. See Hudi-
bras, IL i. 601, with note in Grey's
edition.
You may have a brass ring gilt with a
doublet (gemmd farticid) for a small matter.
— Baileys Erasmus, p. 330.
Doubt, redoubt.
Forward be all vour hands,
Urge one another. This doubt down that
now betwixt us stands,
Jove will go with us to their walls.
Chapman, Iliad, xii. 286.
Douceness, sweetness.
Some luscious delight, yea, a kind of ravish-
ing douceness there is in studying good books.
— Ward, Sermons, p. 166.
Dough-baked, imperfectly baked, nnd
so, deficient in intellect. Cf. Half-
baked.
[Love can] make these dough-baked, sense
less, indocile animals, women, too hard for
us their politic lords and rulers. — fVycherley,
Country Wife, iv. 4.
The devil take thee for an insensible
dough-baked varlet !— Richardson, CI. Har-
lowe, vii. 131.
As to your milksops, your dough-baked
lovers, who stay at home and strut among
the women, when glory is to be gained in
the martial field, I despise them with all my
heart. — Ibid., Grandison, i. 89.
Douke. * ' The yellow dovke or carot "
is Holland's parenthetical explanation
of the plant which " the Latines name
the French parsnip, but the Greek es
Daucus" {Pliny, xix. 5).
Doulcure, sweetness, gentleness. L.
has dulcour as a rare word, with ex-
ample from Addison.
I have given special order to the judges
for sweetness and doulcure to the English
Catholicks.— J/«cA<*, Life of Williams,\. 116.
DO UP
( 200 )
DOWSEPER
Doup, bottom, or broad end (Scotch).
The word iii the original is coque, or
shell.
Was not Minerva born of the brain, even
through the ear of Jove? Adonis of the
bark of a myrrh tree, and Castor and Pollux
of the doupe of that egg which was laid and
hatched by Led*?— Urjuhart's Rabelais, Bk.
I. vi.
Dove-monger, a seller of doves.
We first fix our eyes on this purging of
the temple from dove-mongers, money-chang*
ers, and such as sold sheep and oxen therein.
—Fuller, Pisgah Sight, III. ix. 9.
Dover Court. N., after quoting
from Ray the proverb, "Dover-court,
all speakers and no hearers," doubts
whether the reference is to Dovercourt
in Essex, or to some court at Dover
rendered tumultuous by the numerous
resort of seamen. North certainly un-
derstood it of Dover.
They were at variance before the sheriff,
as in the proverbial court at Dover, all speak-
ers and no hearers. — North, Examen, p. 517.
I thought the whole room was a very per-
fect resemblance of Dover-court, where all
speak, but nobody heard or answered. — T.
Brown, Works, III. 66.
Dowde, a slatternly woman.
Except Phosbus (which is the sonne) had
oughed Voconius a 6hame, he would neuer
haue suffreed him to begette soche foule
babies and oule faced doudes as all the worlde
should afterward wondre at.— UdaVs Eras-
mush Apophth., p. 344.
Doest thou, being f aire, murmur© at the
preferment of a foule one, and in thy rage
calle her foule dowde?— Breton, A Murmurer,
p. 9.
Dowgate. The devil of Dowgate.
In Dekker's Satiromastix (Hawkins,
iii. 140), Tucca, addressing a woman
by various names out of old story-
books, calls her, among the rest, " My
little devil 0' Dowgate."
He does so ruffle before my mistress with
his barbarian eloquence, and strut before her
in a pair of Polonian legs, as if he were a
gentleman-usher to the Great Turk, or the
devil of Dowgate. — Wily Beguiled (Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., iii. 342).
Dowl. See extract. H. gives " doul,
a wooden pin or plug to fasten planks
with." "
These boards are glued together and dowled
(fastened to each other by plugs like the
head of a cask) to prevent warping. — Arch.,
xxxvi. 458.
Dowl, a great blotch. Jamieson
gives, " Dowl, a large piece, as dowles
of cheese."
His hat (though blacke) lookes like a medley
hat,
For black's the ground, which sparingly ap-
peares,
Then heer's a dowle, and there a dabb of fat,
Which as vnhansom hangs about bis earea.
Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 19.
Down, to be down upon ones luck
= to despond.
Mr. Eden, on the contrary, wore a sombre
air. Hawes noticed it, mistook it, and pointed
it out to Fry. ** He is down upon his luck ;
he knows he is coming to an end." — Reade,
Never too late to mend, ch. xxiii.
Down beard, the winged seed of the
thistle or sow-thistle.
It is frightful to think how every idle
volume flies abroad like an idle globular
downbeard, embryo of new millions; every
word of it a potential seed of infinite new
downbeards and volumes. — Carlyle, Misc., iv.
263.
Downcome, heavy fall ; often used
colloquially of a pouring rain.
Whenever the pope shall fall, if his ruin
be not like the sudden downcome of a tower,
the bishops, when they see him tottering,
will leave him. — Milton, Reformation in Eng^
Bk. I.
Down-set, nadir or lowest point.
The rebels . . . thought it their best and
safest course straightly to besiege it : for the
Earle supposed it was the most important
place to offend and annoy them, as that both
his honour and his fortunes were for ever at
their down-set if he might not recover it. —
Holland's Camden, vol. ii. p. 128.
Down-weight, full weight.
For every ounce of vanity they shall receive
downweight a pound of sorrow. — Adams, i.
310.
It was not possible that one should be more
liberal than Dean Williams was in attributing
due and down-weight to every man's gifts.—
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 69.
Downy, having downs; the word
usually = soft as down.
Halldown . . . seems to be the same vein
of land of which the Forest of Dartmore,
and the downy part of Ashburton, Islington,
Bridford, &c, consist. — Defoe, Tour thro* Gt.
Britain, i. 382.
Do WORD, to tell.
Assure thyself that when we come to the
King, we will do him tcorrf of this thy be-
haviour.— Bunyan, Pilgrim's Progress, i. 176.
Dowseper, one of the douzenairs of
Charlemagne. H. has examples of it
DO WSING
( 201 ) DRAMATURGIST
i n this literal meaning, s. v. dozeper.
Bale uses it contemptuously for a
champion.
No wise man will think that Christ will
dwell in a mouse, nor yet that a mouse can
dwell in Christ, though it be the doctrine of
these doughty dowsepers.— Bale, Select Works,
p. 155.
Dowsing, a thrashing. The word
is more often applied to putting out a
candle ; " dowse the glim " is slang or
thieves' cant for this. Some of the
quotations in R., s. v. dowse, show that
the word was in use before Mr. Dows-
ing's time (Ang. Sax., dwcesean, to
extinguish).
A certain William Dowsing, who during
the Great Rebellion was one of the Parlia-
mentary visitors for demolishing superstitions
pictures and ornaments of churches, is sup-
posed by a learned critic to have given use to
an expression in common use among school-
boys and blackguards. For this worshipful
commissioner broke so many *' mighty great
angels " in glass, knocked so many apostles
and cherubims to pieces, demolished so mauy
pictures and stone crosses, and boasted with
such puritanical rancour of what he had done,
that it is conjectured the threat of giving
any one a dowsing preserves his rascally name.
— SotUhey, The Doctor, ch. cxxv.
Dozzled, dazed, bewildered.
In such a perplexity every man asks his
fellow, What's best to be done ? and, being
dozzled with fear, thinks every man wiser
than himself .—Racket, Life of Williams, ii.
142.
Drabble. H. has drabble, to draggle
in the mire ; the noun probably means
much the same as rabble.
He thought some Presbyterian rabble
In test-repealing spite were come to flout
him,
Or some fierce Methodistic drabble.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 54.
Drabled, draggled, limp with moist-
ure.
The next day following, if it were faire,
they would cloud the whole skie with can-
vas by spreading their drabled sailes in the
full cine abroad a-drying. — Nasiie, Lenten
Stuffe iHarl. Misc., vi. 149).
Dbaconically, severely, after the
manner of Draco.
They were also in their judicial courts
equally tyrannous ; the one in the Chancery,
the other in the High Commission ; both of
them at the Council-board and in the Star-
chamber alike draconically supercilious. —
— WoUey and Laud, 1641 (Harl. Misc.,'vr.
509).
Draffle-sacked, filled with draff, or
hogswash.
Wo be to that glutton which, en farcing his
own stinking and draffiesacked belly with all
kind of pleasant and dainty dishes, suffer-
eth his poor needy neighbour to perish for
hunger.— Btcon, ii. 691.
Draffsack, a sack full of hog's wash,
so a gross, greedy fellow. See H. s. v.
I bade menne to approche, and not dounge-
hylles or draffesackes. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 93.
Drafty, pertaining to a draught or
jakes.
Are there not diuerse skauingers of draftye
poetrye iu this oure age?— Stany hurst, Virgil,
Dedic.
Dragsman, driver of a drag or coach.
He had a word for the hostler about " that
grey mare," a nod for the shooter or guard,
ana a bow for the dragsman. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. i.
Draostaff, a brake or scotcher.
The coach wauting a dragstaff, it ran back
in spite of all the coachman's skill. — Defoe,
Tour thro' G. Brit., ii. 297. |
Drain, a drink (slang).
Those two old men who came in u just to
have a drain *' finished their third quartern
a few seconds ago. — Sketches by Boz (Gin-
shops).
Dram, to indulge in or ply with
drams.
It is loving melancholy till it is not strong
enough, and he grows to dram with horror. —
Walpole, Letters, Aug. 28, 1752.
Matron of matrons, Martha Haras !
Dram your poor newsman clad m rags,
Warton, Neicsman's Verses for 1770.
He will soon sink ; I foresaw what would
come of his dramming. — Foote, The Bankrupt,
iii. 2.
The parents in that fine house are getting
ready their daughter for sale, . . . praying
her, and imploring her, aud dramming her,
and coaxing her. — Thackeray, The Newcomes,
ch. xxviii.
Dramaturgic, histrionic, and so un-
real.
Our Assembly of Divines sitting earnestly
deliberative ever since June last will direct
us what form of worship we are to adopt ;
some form, it is to be hoped, not grown
dramaturgic to us, but still awfully symbol*
ical for us. — Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 145.
Dramaturgist, contriver of a drama.
How silent now ; all departed, clean gone !
The World- Dramaturgist has written, Exeunt.
— Carlyle, Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. ii.
DRAMATURGY ( 202 )
DRICKS1E
Dramaturgy, histrionism ; theatri-
cal ness.
The Millenary petition . . . and various
other petitions to his Majesty by persons of
pious straitened consciences had been pre-
sented; craving relief in some ceremonial
points, which, as they found no warrant for
them in the Bible, they suspected, with a
very natural shudder in that case, to savour
of idol-worship and mimetic dramaturgy. —
Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 29.
Drash. to thrash. H. gives it as a
Somerset word, but the extract is in the
dialect of the next county, Devon.
Now Hawtry took a world of pain,
He did so drash about his brain,
That was not over-stored.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 157.
Drattle, a mild imprecation. H.
suggests that it may be a corruption of
throttle ; perhaps, however, it is a fre-
quentative form of drat.
Drattle 'em ; thaay be mwore trouble than
they be wuth. — Hughe*, Tom Brown at Ox-
ford, ch. xxiii.
Draughts, draught-cattle (?).
The officers and soldiers . . . shall be
accomodate with draughts in their march. —
Rushworth, Hist. Coll. (1644), v. 649.
Draw, a feeler ; something designed
to draw on a person to show or reveal
what otherwise might be hidden.
This was what in modern days is called a
draw. It was a guess put boldly forth as
fact, to elicit by the young man's answer
whether he had been there lately or not. —
Beade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. v.
Drawglove. Drawgloves was a
game something like talking on the
fingers : it is frequently referred to by
Heriick. See N. The subjoined is a
late instance, even if we take, not the
date of the book, but the time in which
the scene is laid, viz. , subsequent to the
devolution of 1688. The singular
form is also noticeable.
After dinner the children were set to
questions and commands ; but here our hero
was beaten hollow, as be was afterward at
drawglove and shuffle the slipper. — H. Brooke,
Fool of Quality, i. 21.
Drawing, being drawn. For a similar
use of the participle by Miss Austen,
see Bringing, Carrying.
Precedents are searching and plans drawing
up for that purpose. — Walpole, Letters, i. 94
(1741).
Drawlatch. This word as a substan-
tive = thief is in the Dicta. ; but it is
used by Nashe as a verb = to creep in
furtively. See extract «. v. Bawwaw.
Dreadnought, see quotation.
Look at him in a great-coat of the closest
texture that the looms of Leeds could fur-
nish—one of those dreadnoughts the utility
of which seta fashion at defiance.— Southey,
The Doctor, ch. lvii.
Her pleasant face peeped over the collar
and capes of a stout dreadnought. — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. I. ch. xi.
Drearysome, dreary.
Who roams the old ruins this drearysome
night?
Ingoldsby Legends ( Witches9 Frolic).
Dredgerman, one engaged in dredg-
ing.
In these courts they appoint . . . the quan-
tity [of oysters] each Dredgerman shall take
in a day, which is usually called Setting the
Stint.— Defoe, Tour thro* G. Brit., i. 160.
Dresser, a hospital student or attend-
ant who dresses wounds.
The magistrate and clerk were bowed in
by the house-surgeon and a couple of young
men who smelt very strong of tobacco-
smoke ; they were introduced as M dressers."
—Sketches by Boz (The Hospital Patient).
Dressing, scolding ; chastisement.
If ever I meet him again, I will give him
such a dressing as he has not had this many
a fay.— Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility, ch.
XXX.
Dribbet, driblet.
Their poor pittances are injuriously com-
pounded, and slowly payd by dribbets, and
with infinite delayes.— Gauden, Tears of th*
Church,?. 143.
Dribblement, a trifle.
To shun spight I smothered these dribMe-
ments.—Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi.
153).
Dribbler, one who weakly maun-
ders ; a driveller.
The aspirants and wranglers at the bar,
the dribblers and the spit-fires (these are of
both sorts), . . . what opinion will they pro-
nounce in their utter ignorance of the author?
— Southey, The Doctor, Interchapter vii.
Dribleting, coming drop by drop,
and so meagre, scanty.
That biting poverty or tennity of their
worldly condition . . . hardly to be relieved
by those dribfitinq pittances. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 276.
Dricksie, dwarfish ; stunted (?).
Dreich or Droich is a Scotch word for
dwarf. See Jamieson.
DRIGE
( 203 ) DROWNDED
We liken a yotrag childe to a greene
twigge which ye may easiiie bende euery
way ye list: or an old man who laboureth
with con tin u all iufirmities to a drie and
dricksie oke. — Puttenham, Eng, Poesie, Bk.
III. ch. zlx.
DrigB, drag (?).
Suppose the gentleman wants pence, he
[the sergeant] will eyther have a pawne, or
else drige him to the counter. — Greene, Quip
for Upstart Courtier (Karl. Misc., v. 408).
Dringle. John Dringle seems to
belong to the same family as Tom
Noddy. To dringte is to dawdle.
O bnt fsayth another John. Dringle) there
is a booke of the Bed Herring's Taile printed
four terms since, that made this stale. —
Nash*, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 145).
Dririmancy.
There learned I dririmancy, scatomancy,
pathology, therapeasis, and, greater than all,
anatomy. — Read*, Cloister and Hearth, ch.
xx vi.
Drizzle, light, small rain.
Besides — why could you not for drizzle pray ?
Why force it down in buckets on the hay ?
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 160.
Droit, a due.
The pilfering* of the orchard and garden
I confiscated as droits. — Marryat, Fr. Mild-
may, ch. i.
Drollic, pertaining to a droll or
puppet-show.
Wild . . took forth . . . one of those
beautiful necklaces with which at the fair of
Bartholomew they deck the well-whitened
neck of Thalestris, Queen of the Amazons,
Anna Bullen, Queen Elizabeth, or some
other high princess in drollic story. — Field-
ing, Jonathan Wild, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Drone, drone-pipe or bagpipe.
The harmony of them that pipe in record-
ers, flutes, and drones, and the shrill shout
of trumpets, waites, and shawms, shall no
more be heard in thee to the delight of men.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 536.
Drool, to drivel. H. gives it as a
Somersetshire word.
There the slave-holder finds the chief
argument for his ownership of men, and in
Africa or New England kidnaps the weak,
his mouth drooling with texts. — Theod. Parker
{Life by Dean, p. 159).
Drop. A foal is technically said to
be dropped when it is born.
I will allow my aunt to be the most polite,
intellectual, delicate - minded old lady in
creation, my dearest father, if you wish it ;
only, not having been born (I beg her par-
don, dropped) in a racing-stable as she was
herself, I can hardly appreciate her conversa-
tion always. — H. Kingstey, Ravenshoe, ch. v.
Who but Tom could have lit the old man's
face up with a smile with the history of a
new colt that my lord's mare Thetis had
dropped last week Y—Ibid., Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. xvii.
Drop. To have a drop in the eye =
to be drunk.
Nev. O faith, Colonel, you must own you
had a drop in your eye, for when I left you
you were half seas over.— Swift, Polite Con-
versation (Conv. i.).
Dropless, seems applied in the ex-
tract to damp which comes insensibly
in the air, as distinguished from that
caused by rain.
You, O ye wingless Airs, that creep between
The rigid stems of heath and bitten furze,
Within whose scanty shade, at summer-noon,
The mother-sheep hath worn a hollow bed —
Ye that now cool her fleece with dropless
damp,
Now pant and murmur with her feeding
lamb.— Coleridge, The Picture,
Droning, little drop.
Bightly to speak, what Man we call and
count,
It is a beamling of Diuinity,
It is a dropling of th' EternaU Fount
It is a moatling hatcht of th' Vnity.
Sylvester, Quadrains ofPibrac, st. 13.
Drop-ripe, so ripe as to be ready to
drop off the tree.
The fruit was now drop-ripe we may say,
and fell by a shake.— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 274.
Dropsy-dry, thirsty through dropsy.
Many dropsy-drie forbeare to drinke
Because they know their ill 'twould aggra-
vate.— Davies, Microcosmos, p. 25.
Drowl, to utter in a mournful man-
ner ; perhaps connected with drawl.
O sons and daughters of Jerusalem, drowl
out an elegy for good King Josias l—Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 224.
Drownage, submersion.
An example to us all, not of lamed misery,
helpless spiritual bewilderment, and sprawl-
ing despair, or any kind of drownage m the
foul water of our so called religious or other
controversies and confusions, but of a swift
and valiant vanquisher of all these.— Carlyle.
Life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. i.
Drownded, a common vulgarism for
drowned.
In my own Thames may I be drownded,
If e'er I stoop beneath a crown *d head.
Surift, Pastoral Dialogue.
BROWNER
( 204 )
DUCK
Take pity upon poor Miss; don't throw
water on a drownded rat. — Ibid., Polite Con,"
vcrsation (Oonv. i.).
" My brother Joe was his father," said Mr.
Peggotty. "Dead, Mr. Peggotty?" I hinted,
after a respectful pause. " Drotendead" said
Mr. Peggotty. — Dickens, David Copper field,
ch. iii.
Drowner. See extract.
In June last a further discovery was made
by Robert Wallan, the drowner or person in
charge of the water meadows, — Archaol.,
xxriv. 259 (1851).
Drowse, a slumber.
On a sudden many a voice along the street,
And heel against the pavement echoing,
broke
Their drowse, — Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
Drowsy-evil, lethargy.
If a man or woman be brought to extreme
oblivion, as they be that have the disease
called Letbargus or the drowsy e-evill. — Touch'
stone of Complexions, p. 126.
Droy, to labour; usually written
droit*
He which can in office drudge and droy.
Gascoigne, Steele Glasse, p. 68.
D RODGER, a drageoir or bonbon box
in which comfits (dragSes) were kept.
See Lord Braybrooke's note in loc.
To London, and there among other things
did look over some pictures at Cade's for my
house, and did carry home a silver drudger
for my cupboard of plate. — Pepys, Feb. 2,
1665-6.
Druggel, a term of reproach.
Slapsauce fellows, alabberdegullion drug-
gels, lubbardly louts. — Urquharfs Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. zrv.
Drum, a drummer.
I was brought from prison into the town
of Xeres by two drums and a hundred shot.
— Peake, Thru to Onet 1625 {Arber, Eng.
Gamer, i. 633).
Drum. Drunk as a drum = very
dr ink ; for similar comparisons see s. v.
Drunk. We say tight as a drum, re-
ferring to the tension of the skin:
tight is also slang for drunk, but per-
haps there is no connection between
the two phrases. See extract from
Cotton, 8. v. Wheelbarbow.
Ton must know that the fellow got pre-
sently as drunk as a drum; so I had him
tumbled into a chair, and ordered the fellows
to carry him home. — Farquhar, Sir Henry
Wildair, iv. 2.
1) rumble-drone, a drone.
Oh, Mr. Gary, we have all known your
pleasant ways, ever since you used to put
d rumble - drones into my desk to Bideford
school. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xviii.
Drum-room, ball-room.
_ The bonny housemaid begins to repair the
disordered drum-room. — Fielding, Tom Jones,
Bk. XI. ch. ix.
Drunk, see s. w. David's sow, Drum,
Fish, Lord, Piper, Rat, Wheelbarrow.
Dry, bloodless. The extract refers
to a war carried on by excommunica-
tions and the like.
Thus are both sides busied in this drie
warre, wherein, though there were no sword,
yet it gave vexation ynough. — Daniel, Hist,
of Eng., p. 75.
Dry-ditch, to labour without result,
as those who vainly dig for water.
There would be no end to repeat with how
many quarrels this unfortunate Bishop was
provok'd, yet his adversaries did but dty-
ditch their matters, and digged in vain,
though they still cast up earth. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 98.
How many offers of accordance did he
make in that very instant ! how many mes-
sengers were posted to London ! which was
no better than to dry-diteh the business, for
every offer of grace made his enemies
haughty.-/***., ii. 188.
Dualist, one who holds two offices.
He was a Duallist in that Convent (and if
a Pluralist no ingenious person would have
envied him) being Canter of that Church,
and Library-Keeper therein. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Wilts (ii. 448).
Duarchy, the rule of two persons.
Cf . Triarchy.
A duarchie in the Church (viz. two Arch-
bishops equal in power) being inconsistent
with a monarchie in the state, they have
ever countenanced the superiority of Canter-
bury.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. ii. 3.
Dubitate, to doubt.
What dubitating, what circumambulating !
These *vbole six noisy months (for it began
with Brienne in July) has not Report fol-
lowed Report, and one proclamation flown in
the teeth of the other? — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. I. Bk. IV. ch. i.
Much in these two hours depends on Bou-
ille ; as it shall now fare with him, the whole
future may be this way or be that. If, for
example, he were to loiter dulntating and not
come; if he were to come and fail. — Ibid.,
Pt. II. Bk. II. ch. vi.
Duck. A lame duck is Stock Ex-
change slang- for a defaulter. The two
first quotations belong to the same
year.
DUCK AND DRAKE ( 205 ) DULCETNESS
I may be lame, but I shall never be a duck,
nor deal in the garbage of the alley. — Wal-
pole, Letters, iii. 377 (1771).
The gaming fools are doves, the knaves are
rooks,
Change-alley bankrupts waddle out lame
ducks.
Garrick, Prologue to Footers Maid of Bath.
Unless I see Amelia's ten thousand down
you don't marry her. Ill have no lame
duck's daughter in my family. — Thackeray,
Vanity Fair, ch. ziii.
Duck and drake, to waste idly ; to
throw away anything, as children do
the stones in the game of that name.
I would neither fawn on money for
money's sake, nor duck and drake it away
for a frolick. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 18.
Is it then no harm to saunter away our
lives, and like children, duck and drake away
a treasure able to buy Paradise ? — Ibid. p.
116.
Duck's- meat, a term of reproach,
ducks not being clean feeders.
Here's your first weapon, ducksmeat! —
Massinger, Old Law, III. ii.
Duddle. H. says "to make luke-
warm," it may therefore in the extract
= to check or repulse, but perhaps it
is meant for dudder, to shake. See R.,
who, however, has it only as a neuter
verb. Patton says that the Scots were
provided with rattles to frighten the
horses of the English cavalry ;
Howbeit because the riders were no babies,
nor their horses any colts, they could neither
duddle the one nor affray the other. — Expcd.
to Scotl., 1547 (Eng. Garner, iii. 129).
Duddle, nipple (of the breast).
Then to his lips Madge held the bottle,
On which he suckt as child at duddle.
Ward, England's Reformation, p. 242.
Duddles, rags.
So good men now, searching the festered
cankers, and ripping the stinking duddles of
popery for a time, smell evil in the noses of
the wicked.— Pilkington, p. 212.
Duelsome, given to duelling.
Incorrigibly duelsome on his own account,
he is for others the most acute and peaceable
counsellor in the world. — Thackeray, Paris
Sketchbook, ch. ii.
Due-timely, in good time.
I have for both been caref ull to provide ;
Their extreme thirst due-timely to refresh,
Conducting them vnto a fountaine fresh.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 1002.
Duffer, a fool or blunderer: pro-
perly a pedlar; then, a hawker of
sham jewellery, watches without
works, &c. The Slang Diet, says, " It
is mentioned in the Frauds of London
(1760) as a word in frequent use in the
last century to express cheats of all
kinds." An example of its use in this
last sense by Dickens will be found s. v.
Cannibalio.
"And do you get £800 for a small pic-
ture?" Mackenzie asked severely. "Well,
no," Johnny said, with a laugh, "but then I
am a duffer"— Black, Princess of Thule, ch.
xxv.
Dukeb. The Diet. Rusticum (1704)
says " Ditcher or Doucker is a kind of
cock that in fighting will run about the
clod [i. e. pit] almost at every blow he
gives." This term seems in the ex-
tract to be transferred to a fidgetty,
restless horse.
Do you love a spurr'd horse better than a
duker that neighs and scrapes. — Killigrew,
Parson's Wedding, V. iv.
Dukery, duchy. R. has diichery,
with a quotation from Fabyan. A
certain district in Nottinghamshire is
called the Dukery from having had
several ducal residences in the vicinity.
See second extract.
The Albertine line, electoral though it now
was, made apanages, subdivisions, unintel-
ligible little dukes and dukeries of a similar
kind. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 369.
The Dukeries still exist, but they are little
more than a geographical expression. Wel-
beck Abbey is the last of those palaces for
which this part of England was formerly
famous. Thoresby, indeed, remains, but it
is not the Thoresby of old. Nor has it now
a ducal occupant, and the successor of their
Graces of Kingston is Earl Manvers. Clum-
ber continues under the shadow of a domestic
eclipse. Worksop Manor has changed hands
more than once in the last fifty years, and is
now the property of a Commoner. Of Kive-
ton Hall, where once the Duke of Leeds
dwelt, not one stone is left standing upon
another.— Standard, Dec. 8, 1879.
Dulce, to soothe.
Severus, . . . (because he would not leave
an enemie behind at his backe) . . . wisely
with good foresight dulceth and kindly in-
treateth the men. — Holland's Camden, p. 68.
Dulcet, sweet-bread.
Thee stagg upbreaking they slit to the
dulcet or inchepyn. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 218.
Dulcetnes8, sweetness.
Be it so that there were no discommodities
mingled with the commodities ; yet as I be-
fore have said, the brevity and short time
DULLER Y
( 206 )
DUNG-FARMER
that we have to use them should assuage
their dulcetness. — Bradford, \. 338.
Dullery, dulnees ; stupidity.
Master Antitus of Oresseplots was lieen-
tiated, and had passed his degrees in all
dullery and blockishness. — Urquhart'* Babe"
lais, Bk. II. ch. zi.
Dullish, rather dull or phlegmatic.
They are somewhat heavy in motion and
dullish, which must be imputed to the quality
of the clime. — Ho well ', Parly of Beasts , p. 12.
Dully, dull.
Far off she seem'd to hear the dully sound
Of human footsteps fall.
Tennyson, Palace of Art.
Dumbledore, humble bee.
Betsey called it [monk's-hood] the dumble-
dore's delight, and was not aware that the
plant in whose helmet — rather than cowl —
shaped flowers that busy and best-natured of
all insects appears to revel more than in any
other is the deadly aconite of which we read
in poetry. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. cviii.
' Dumb waiter, a revolving tray on
which various articles are placed.
A number of servants then vanished on
the instant, leaving a dumb waiter of silver
behind them.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii.
260.
Dump, to grieve ; to sulk.
With choloricque fretting I dumpt and
ranckled in anguish. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii.
103.
Dumping, dulness.
Diogenes had more phansy to note the
brutish grossenesse and dumping of the
minde. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 128.
Dumps, money (slang).
May I venture to say when a gentleman
jumps
In the river at midnight for want of the
dumps,
He rarely puts on his knee-breeches and
pumps. — ingoldsby Legends (Sir Rupert).
Dumps, marbles. The second sense
of low spirits or surliness on which
Hood's pun is founded is very common.
Thy taws are brave, thy tops are rare,
Our tops are spun with coils of care,
Our dumps are no delight.
Hood, Ode on Prospect of Clapham
Academy.
Dumps. Gay's third Pastoral is en-
titled " Wednesday, or the Dumps,11 on
which he has the jocose note which
forms the extract.
Dumps or Dumbs, made use of to express a
fit of the Sullens. Some have pretended
that it is derived from Dumops, a Kiug of
Egypt that built a Pyramid, and dy'd of
Melancholy. So Mopes after the same
manner is thought to have come from
Merope, another Egyptian King that dy'd
of the same distemper; but our English
Antiquaries have conjectured that Dumps,
which is a grievous heaviness of spirits,
comes from the word Dumplin, the heaviest
kind of pudding that is eaten in this coun-
try, much used in Norfolk, and other
counties of England.
Dumpty, short and thick. Dumpy
is more usual.
Mary comes in ; a little dumpty body with
a yellow face aud a red nose. — C. Kingsley,
Two Years Ago, ch. xxv.
Duncical, stupid. See Dunsly.
Many godly-minded persons ... by the
persuasions of certain discreet and modest
brothers have been made of Romish idolaters
and diligent students of duncical dregs, dis-
ciples of great hope in the sincere and true
evangelic doctrine. — Coverdale, i. 426.
This neck-question as I may term it, the
most dull and duncicall Commissioner was
able to aske.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VIII. ii. 26.
I have no patience with the foolish dun-
cical dog. — Rtchardson, CI. Harlowe, viii. 100.
Dundebbolt, a celt or fossil belexn-
nite.
For " the reumatis " boiled dunderboU is
the sovereign remedy, at least in the West of
Cornwall. I knew an old woman who used
to boil a celt (vulgarly a dunderboU or thun-
derbolt) for some hours, and then dispense
her water to the diseased. — Polwhele, Tradi-
tions and Recollections, ii. 007 (1826).
Dune, ridge ; mound. See R. s. v.
down, and L. s. v. dun.
The Spaniards neared and neared the fatal
dunes which fringed the shore for many a
dreary mile. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch.
xxxi.
Out beyond them flush'd
The long low dune, and lazy-plunging sea.
Tennyson, Last Tournament.
Dungeoner, gaoler.
Where shall I learn to get my peace again ?
To banish thoughts of that most hateful land
Dungeoner of my friends, that wicked strand
Where they are wrecked, and live a wrecked
life.— Keats, To .
D unq- farmer, one who has to do
with dirt or dung. The lady referred
to is S. Helena, who was said to he a
stabularia, or ostleress. See quotation,
s. v. Ostleress. The allusion in the
extract is to Phil. iii. 8.
They say that this lady was at first an in-
holder or hostesse. . . . This good hostesse
chose to be reputed a dung- farmer that she
DUJSIG-WET
( 207 )
DUST
might thereby gaine Christ. — Holland's
Camden, p. 74.
It's the stinkingest dung-farmer, foh upon
him! — Dekker, Satiromastix (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 168).
Dung-wbt, thoroughly wet, having
been out in dirty weather. Dung in
this compound seems merely intensa-
tive.
Plautus in his Rudens bringeth in fishermen
eowthring and quaking, dung-wet after a
storme. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 180).
Dunnock, hedge-sparrow. See H.
Hareton has been cast out like an unfledged
dunnock. — Miss E. Bronte, ch. iv.
Dunsly. A man dunsly learned is
one read in the scholastic theology of
which Duns Scotus was a great doctor.
Latimer also no doubt means a play on
the word, and would insinuate that this
man was a learned dunce, which last is
derived from Duns Scotus, as the school-
men discouraged classical study.
He is wilfully witted, Dunsly learned,
Moorly affected, bold not a little, zealous
more than enough. — Latimer, ii. 374.
Dunstable, plain, downright. See
N. and H.
Your uncle is an odd, but a very honest,
Dunstable soul. — Richardson, Grandison, vi.
177.
Dunstable, plain Dunstable is illus-
trated in N., but in the following it
appears as a place to which women of
bad character might be sent against
their will.
I am so glad you are so pleasant, Kate ;
yon were not so merry when you went to
Dunstable. — Greene, Thieves falling out, 1615
(//ar/.Jf^viii.389).
Dunsteby, stupidity. See Dunsly.
Let every indignation make thee zealous,
as the dunsteru of the monks made Erasmus
studious. — Ward, Sermons, p. 83.
Duntlk, to dint.
His cap is duntled in ; his back bears fresh
stains of peat. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
in trod.
Duopolizb, to engross between two.
Some rigid Presbyterians and popular In-
dependents affect with great magistery to
duopolize aM Church power.— Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 440.
Dupeable, gullible.
Man is a dupeable nnimal.-r-Southey, The
Doctor, ch. lxxxvii.
Duplab, duple. See quotation.
( Whether their armatures [= cavalry sol-
diers] were duplar or simplar it is doubtful 1.
Duptar or duple armature they were called
in those daies who bad double allowances of
corue ; simplar, that had but single. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 783.
Duplicate, a pawn-broker's ticket.
This elegantly attired individual is iu the
act of entering the duplicate he has just
made out, in a thick book.— -Sketches by Boz
(Pawnbroker's shop).
Duretta, a coarse kind of stuff, so
called from its wearing well.
I never durst be seen
Before my father out of duretta and serge :
But if he catch me in such paltry stuffs,
To make me look like one that lets out
money,
Let him say, Timothy was born a fool.
Maine, City Match, i. 5.
Duroy, a species of stuff, corduroy ?
q. v.
Western Goods had their share here also,
and several booths were filled with Serges,
Duroys, Druggets, Shalloons, Cantaloons,
Devonshire Kersies, &c. — Defoe, Tour thro'
G. Britain, i. 94.
Dust, a dead body, or one of the
atoms that compose it.
The bodies of the saints, what part of the
earth or sea soever holds their dusts, shall
not be detained in prison when Christ calls
for them. . . . Not a dust, not a bone can be
denied. — Adams, ii. 106.
Dust, disturbance.
The Bishop saw there was small reason to
raise such a dust out of a few indiscreet
words. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 61.
Such a dust was raised about the bill of
tonnage, &c, that the way could not be seen
for that cloud, to come to a quiet end. —
Ibid. ii. 83.
Our lay and ecclesiastical champions for
arbitrary power . . . have raised such a dust,
and kept such a coil about the divine, here-
ditary, and indefeasible right of kings. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 41.
Not expect me ! that's a good one ! And
what a dust you would have made if I had
not come. — Miss Austen, Northanger Abbey,
ch. ix.
Dust. Down with the dust = down
with the money. L. gives this with
an example from a farce by O'Keefe,
but the two first extracts are older.
My lord, quoth the king, presently deposit
your hundred pounds in gold, or else no
going hence all the daies of your life. . . .
The abbot down with his dust, and glad he
DUTCH COURAGE ( 208 )
DYSPYCION
escaped bo, returned to Beading. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist, vi. 299.
Amongst the collectors for the Holy Club
there most be one fellow that eat King
William's bread . . . one of his arts was to
persuade silly old women to tell down their
dust for carrying on so pious a work. — Modest
Enquiry into Present Disasters, 1090 {Life of
Ken, p. 500).
Ti8 horrible to die
And come down with our little all of dust,
That dun of all the duns to satisfy.
Hood, Bianco** Dream,
Dutch courage, courage inspired by
drink.
A true Dutchman never fights without his
head full of brandy. — T. Brown, Works,)!.
311.
He added further insult by saying that he
supposed his antagonist wanted Dutch cour-
age, and that if he did not get wine enough
in the cabin, he would not fight at all. —
Marry at, Fr. Mild may, ch. iv.
PuU away at the usquebaugh, man, and
swallow Dutch courage, since thiue English is
oozed away. — C. Kinysley, Westward Ho,
ch. zi.
Dutch-defence, a sham defence,
" mate pertinaci."
I am afraid Mr. Jones maintained a kind
of Dutch defence, and treacherously delivered
up the garrison without duly weighing his
allegiance to the fair Sophia, — Fielding, Tom
Jones, Bk. ix. ch. v.
Dutch gold, a baser metal having
the appearance of gold ; it is mentioned
by Repton (1832) in ArchceoL xxiv. 175.
Cf. German silver.
Duty, when applied to money due
now always means the custom-house
duties. It once had a wider significa-
tion. The mention of the " duty to the
priest and clerk'1 first appears in the
Prayer-book of 1552.
They neither regarded to sette him to
schole, nor while he was at schoole to paie
his schoolemaister's duetie — UdaTs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 309.
The man shall give unto the woman a ring,
laying the same upon the book, with the
accustomed duty to the Priest and Clerk. —
Rubric in Marriage Service.
Duty, the performance of the services
of the Church by a clergyman.
Edmund might, in the common phrase, do
the duty of Thornton, that is, he might read
prayers and preach, without giving up Mans-
field Park.— Miss Austen, Mansfield Fork, ch.
Duumviracy, union of two in author-
ity.
A cunning complicating of Presbyterian
and Independent principles and interests
together, that they may rule in their Duum-
viracy.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 438.
Dwindlement, dwindling, coming
down.
It was with a sensation of dreadful dwindle'
ment that poor Vincent crossed the street
again to his lonely abode. — Mrs. Oliphant,
Salem Chapel, ch. i.
Dyingnr68, languishing, as though
dying : a die-away air.
Tenderness becomes me best, a sort of
dyingness. — Congreve, Way of the World,ui.5.
Dyke. Burke applies this word to
the Eng. Channel between Dover and
Calais.
I have often been astonished, considering
that we are divided from you but by a slen-
der dyke of about twenty-four miles ... to
find how little you seem to know of us. —
Reflections on Fr. Revolution, p. 68.
Dyslogy, dispraise.
In the way of eulogy and dyslogy, and
summing up of character, there may doubtless
be a great many things set forth concerning
this Mirabeau. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 117.
Dyspepsy, indigestion ; more common
in its Latin form, dyspepsia.
u Confound Sowerbrowst," thought the
Doctor, " if I had guessed he was to come
across me thus, he should not have got the
better of his dyspepsy so early." — Scott, St.
Ronan's Well, ii. 11.
His friends asked him what the Doctor
had said. Why, said the squire, he told me
that I've got a dyspepsy. I don't know what
it is, but it's some aamn'd thing or other, I
suppose. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. xciii.
DYsrNEUMONY, difficulty of breathing.
I have — rather I think from dyspepsia
than dyspneumony — been often and for days
disabled from doing anything but read. — ^/.
Sterling, 1839 (CarlyUs Life, Pt. III. ch. i.).
Dyspycion, disputation.
Great dyspycyons were among the Jewes
at Rome concerning Paule. — Vocacyon of
Johan Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc^ vi. 440).
EAR
( 209 )
EARSHRIFT
E
Ear. At first ear = at first hear-
ing; immediately.
A third cause of common errors is the
credulity of men, that is, an easie assent to
what is obtruded, or a believing at Jirst ear
what is delivered by others. — Brown, Vulgar
Errors, Bk. I. ch. v.
Ear. Wine of one ear = good wine.
One of the annotators of Rabelais says,
" I have introduced the same with good
success in some parts of Leicestershire,
and elsewhere, speaking of good ale,
ale of one ear ; bad ale, ale of two ears,
Because when it is good we give a nod
with one ear; if bad, we shake our
head, that is, give a sign with both ears
that we do not like it." Another sug-
gests, " Wine which a man will drink
without need of persuasion, it draws
him on only by one ear." Scott, it
will be seen, makes the two ears =
good ; but Chambaud's Fr.-Entj. Diet.
gives, "Dm vin dune or exile (vm excel-
lent), Good wine. Du vin de deux
oreUles (mauvais vin out fait secouer
les oreilles), Bad wine.
0 the fine white wine! upon my con-
science it is a kind of tsffatas wine; hiu,
hin, it is 0/ one ear {il est a une oreille).—
Urauhart's Rabelais, 8k. I. ch. v.
1 trust ye will applaud my Bordeaux ; c*est
des deux oreilles, as Captain Vinsauf used to
•ay.— Waver ley, i. 97.
Ear- confession, private or auricular
confession.
Peter of Milan, with other of the pope's
martyrs, . . . died for the pope's power,
pardons, pilgrimages, ear - confession, and
other popish matters.— Bale, Select Works,
p. 57.
Ear-deep, reaching the ear only.
I should ill deserve
Thy noblest gift, the gift divine of song,
If so content with ear-deep melodies
To please all profit-less, I did not pour
Severer strains.
Southey, Triumph of Woman, 870.
Ear-drofpkr, eaves-dropper.
It is possible an ear-dropper might hear
such things talk'd at cock-pits and dancing
*hoo\n.-Hacket< Life of Williams, ii. 81.
Earish, auricular.
His [Antichrist's] idolatrous altars, his
earish confession, his housel in one kind for
the lay, . . . and all his petting pedlary is
utterly banished and driven out of this land.
— Beam, iii. 4.
Earn, a Scottish eagle.
They gleamed on many a dusky tarn,
Haunted by the lonely earn.
Scott, Lay of Last Minstrel, c. iii.
Ear-reach, hearing ; earshot
Some invisible eare might be in ambush
within the ear-reach of his words. — Fuller,
Holy State, V. xviii.
The Bishop's chief care herein was the
setting up of oompleat Boods, commonly
called (but when without his ear - reach)
Bonner's Block-Almightie. — Ibid., Waltham
Abbey, p. 18.
Ears. To hang ears «• to incline
ear ; to listen.
Hang your ears
This way, and hearluB praises.
Jonson, Majestic Lady, L i.
Ears. To shake the ears = to nod
or shake the head, and so, as Walpole
seem 8 to use it, to chuckle. Howell
refers to the gesture, as indicating dis-
comfiture.
But I my self e
• •••••
Broke fleame some twice or thrice, then
shooke mine eares
And lickt my lipps, as if I begg'd attention.
Chapman, Mons. Dy Olive, Act II.
They shut their gates against him, and
made him to shake his ears, and to shift for
his lodging. — Howell, Letters, I. i. 21.
How merry my ghost will be, and shake its
ears, to hear itself quoted as a person of
consummate prudence. — Walpole, Letters, i.
168 (1747).
Ears. To deep upon both ears = to
sleep soundly. The proverb is a Latin
one. See Terence. Ileaut., II. iii. 100.
Let him set his heart at rest ; I will re-
move this scruple out of his mind that he
may sleep securely upon both ears. — Bramhall,
iii. 518.
Earshrift, private or auricular con-
fession.
And upon this either contempt or super-
stitious fear drawn from the papists lenten
S reparation of forty days, earshrift, displing,
«., it oometh to pass that men receiving the
Supper of the Lord but seldom, when they
P
EARSORE
( **o )
ECONOMY
fall tick mutt have the Sapper ministered
unto them in their houses. — Cartwright's
Admonition, quoted in Whitgift, ii. 556.
Tour eareshrift (one part of your penance)
it to no purpose. — Calf hill, Answer to Mar-
trail, p. 243.
EAR80RE, an annoyance to the ear.
Eyesore is common.
The perpetual jangling of the chimes too
in all the great towns of Flanders is no small
ear-tore to ua.— T. Brotcn, Work*, i. 306.
Earwig, a secret counsellor. A
favourite word with Hacket: in addi-
tion to the subjoined, see ii. 152, 195.
O hearken not to Rehoboam's earwigs. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 50.
If all counsels offer'd to princes were
spread out before many witnesses, ear-vigas
that buss what they think fit in the retird
closet, durst not infect the royal audience
with pernicious glosing. — Ibid. i. 85.
Ear-worm, a secret counsellor.
There is nothing in the oath to protect
such an ear-worm, but he may be appeached.
—Hacket, Life of Williams, if. 152.
Easement, a legal term for an accom-
modation, such as a right of way, Ac,
which one man has of another ; also, a
house of office: hence the equivoque
in the following.
They [the Scotch] should not go for to
impose upon foreigners ; for the bills in their
houses say they have different easements to
let ; and behold there is nurro geaks in the
whole kingdom.— AnoOett, Humphrey Clinker,
ii. 48.
Easterling. L. defines this " a na-
tive of any country Eastward of an-
other," but the word had also a nar-
rower signification. See extracts.
Then shall the easterlinges (vpon hope to
recover their olde and greater priuileges)
aide him with men, money, and shippes. —
Bp. Ponet (Maitland on Reformation, p. 170).
The merchants of the East-Land parts of
Almain or High Germany (well known in
former times by the name of Easterlings). —
Heylin, Reformation, i. 230.
a The High-Dutch of the Hans Towns an-
tiently much conversed in our Land (known
by the name of Easterlings). — Fuller, Wor-
thies, ch. xxiv.
Easy, indifferent : perhaps as being
easy to get, not recherche. H. has, as
provincialisms, easy-beef =•• lean cattle,
easy-end = cheap.
The maister of the feast had set vpon the
table wine that was but easie and so-so. —
Udal's Erasmus's Apophth., p. 348.
Eaton, see extract
The common sort of people doe plainly
say, these Roman Workes were made by
Giants, whom in the North parts they use
to call in their vulgar tongue Eatons, for
Heathens (if I be not deceived) or Ethnicks.
—Holland's Camden, p. 63.
Eave, to shelter, as under eaves.
His hat shap't almost like a cone,
Taper at top, the wide end down ;
With narrow rim scarce wide enough
To eave from rain the staring ruff.
Ward, England's Reformation, c. i.
p. 102.
Eaver. H. gives it, s. v. Ever, as a
Devonshire word for rye-grass, and
Devonshire is the county referred to
in the extract.
Neither doth it fall behind in meadow-
ground and pasturage, elover, eaver, and
trefoil grass, and turneps. — Defoe, Tour thro'
G. Brit., i. 362.
Ebaptization, cutting off from the
benefits of baptism (?).
Presbytery began to hasten its march in
its might, furiously enough, . . . trying the
metal and temper of its Censures by Ebap-
tizations, Corrections, Abstentions, Excom-
munications.— Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 16.
Ebriety, is used in the extract for
sobriety, its real meaning being drunk-
enness. Hook's mistake probably arose
from the fact that ineoriety also ==
drunkenness, and so, regarding the in
as privative, he supposed ebriety to
mean the reverse.
This amiable abstemiousness was joked
upon in various ways by the rest of the
party, but the Colonel, who was quite aware
of his meu, set their ebriety down to the
right cause. — Th. Hook, Man of many friends.
Ebuccinator, trumpeter.
The ebuccinator, shewer, and declarer of
these news, I have made Gabriel, the angel
and ambassador of God. — Becon, i. 43.
Ecliptical, elliptical.
He conceives this word, On mine honour,
wraps up a great deal in it, which unfolded
and then measured, will be found to be a
large attestation, and no less than an eclip-
tical oath.— Fuller, Holy State, IV. xii. 10.
Economy, management of a house-
hold. The word is now so often used
for frugality, that the following quota-
tion seems worth noting.
Fain. He keeps open house for all comers.
Wid. He ought to be very rich, whose
awonomy is so profuse. — Centlivre, 7ne Arti-
fice, Act IV.
»SH
m
ECSTATIC
( 211 )
EFFORT
Ecstatic, enthusiast.
Old Hereticks and idle Ecstatic**, such as
tte very primitive times were infinitely pes-
tered withal.— Gauden, Tears of the Churcfcp.
Edacious, voracious.
.^1U« ^noe • • • wto that ancient manse
of Kilwinning ; all vanished now to the last
stone of it long since ; swallowed in the
depths of edacious Tune.-Carlyle, Misc., iv.
Edentate, toothless creature.
I tried to call to him to move, bat how
wn^V VFlfl"?" ^ "J™* articulate a
word *>-.<,. Ktngsley, Alton Locke, ch. xrxvi.
Edge. Out of edge = on edge.
Pentium stupor. A bluntness of the teeth,
when with eating soure and sharpe thiugs!
1585 fe 428) °f ^-X***'* *<»nenclator\
Edgingly, gingerly. To edge in =
w slide in, is a common expression.
Jtf^f ^J™016 • • • while the new beau
awkwardly followed, but more edgingly, as I
may say, setting his feet mincingly, to avoid
t"^.? grrUp?n "? leader,8 heela.-JfroWrf-
»», CI. Harlowe, ii. 220.
Edibilatoby, having to do with edi-
bles or eating.
Edibilatory Epicurism holds the key to all
morality.— Lytton, Pelham, ch. lviii.
Edifie, to rise in the estimation of.
Nor did he edifie better with the Queen,
than he did with the Bixbjects.-Hey lift, Hist.
of the Presbyterians, p. 191.
But little did this edifie with the Leading-
gn m the House of Commons.— /Aid. p.
Education, publishing.
w°?L of *his Doctor's posthume-books
w^L- n h*PRie in their education, I mean
r.w g/Te!l!TOO«ilt forth mt0 fche world.-
**llcr, Ch. Hist., XI. i. M.
Eelskins. These not being very
valuable, a merchant of eelsHns =
one who has nothing left him worth
He that wyU at all aduentures vse the
was, knowinge no more what is to be done
W?.?111^ thftn in a caulme, shall soone
52?f * "^A"* •/ "le >*innes.-Ascham,
JOfophilus, p. 151. '
Eehie, wild.
It's like those eerie stories nurses tell.
Browning, Bp. BlougranCs Apology.
Eerily, in a strange, unearthly way.
an? ?** lhe voice of a human being . . .
u?lnfiSp0k^i,J V™1 and woe 5 "Mly, eerily,
^gently. -c. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. mv. *
Eeriness, weirdness.
We all know what a sensation of loneliness
or " eeriness " (to use an expressive term of
the ballad poetry) arises to any small party
assembling in a single room of a vast deso-
late mansion.— De Quincey, Modem Supersti-
tion.
Effectress, female worker or cause.
They haue ... a Chappel dedicated to the
Virgin Mary called Madonna del Scopo, re-
puted effectresse of miracles, and much inuo-
cated by sea-faring men.— Sandys, Travels,
p. 8.
Effectually, actually ; in fact ; en
effet.
Although his charter can not be produced
with the formalities used at his creation . . .
yet that he was effectually Earle of Cam-
bridge by the ensuing evidence doth suffi-
ciently appear.— Fuller, Hist, of Camb. Univ.,
1. JtL.
Nor would any thing check me from going
the greatest lengths with your sister, whom
I think effectually, though perhaps not mali-
ciously, a most wicked thing. — Walpole to
Mann, iii. 157 (1756).
I perceived that something darkened the
passage more than myself, as I stepped along
it to my room ; it was effectually Mons.
Dessin, the master of the hotel.— Sterne,
Sentimental Journey (Calais).
Efficace, efficacy.
Yet 'tis not he with whom I mean to knit
Mine inward covenant ; th* outward seal of it
Ismael may bear, but not the efficace,
(Thy son, but after flesh, not after grace).
Sylvester, The Vocation, 1026.
[Angels] by the touch of their Hue efficace,
Containing bodies which they seem t' em-
brace.— Ibid. 1116.
Efficiat, efficient ; causative.
The poniard that did end their fatal lives
Shall break the cause efficiat of their woes
(breaks the glass).
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 175.
Effigiation, image.
No such effigiation was therein discovered,
which some nineteen weeks after became
visible.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. ii. 53.
Effloresce, to blossom forth.
Cities, especially cities in revolution, are
subject to these alternations; the secret
course of civic business and existence effer-
vescing and efflorescing in this manner as a
concrete phenomenon to the eye.—Carlvle*
Fr. Rev., K III. Bk. III. ch. i.
Effort, to stimulate.
He effbrted his spirits with the remem-
brance and relation of what formerly he had
been, and what he had done.— Fuller, Wor-
thies, Cheshire (i. 189).
P2
EFFORTLESS
( al* )
ELBOW
Effortless, without an effort.
Bat idly to remain
Were yielding effortless, and waiting death.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. IV.
Self-abandoned, relaxed, and effortless, I
seemed to have laid me down in the dried-
np bed of a great river. — C. Bronte, Jans
Eyre, eh. xxvi.
Effbontuously, impudently.
He moat effrontuously affirms the slander.
— North, Examen, p. 23.
If these other clergy bad carried it unduly,
effrontuously, or authoritatively only towards
the Dissenters without any reasons alledged
or pious invitations, had not all the kingdom
rang of the matter? — Ibid., p. 326.
Effulmination, denunciation.
The Popes medled so far beyond their
own bounds, attempting to send out effulminr
ations against Christian kings in all countries.
—Hacket, Life of William*, i. 82.
Efrret, an imp or devil. It is the
Arabic word for the devil.
"Wadna ye prefer a meeracle or twa?"
asked Sandy, after a long pull at the whisky-
toddy. u Or a few efreets?" added I.— C.
Kingsley, Alton Lock*, ch. xxi.
Egelidate, to thaw.
Then should my teares egelidate His Gore,
That from His Blood-founts for me flowtt
before. — Davies, Holy Boode, p. 20.
Eoo. To break the egg in the pocket
= to spoil the plan.
This very circumstance of so many and
considerable persons ranking themselves
among the Tones, broke the egg, as they say,
in the pockets of the Whigs, and soon re-
duced them to the terms of compounding to
be rid of the distinction. — North, Examen,
p. 824.
Ego-bald, completely bald ; smooth
as an egg.
His chin was as smooth as a new-laid egg
or a scraped Dutch cheese. — Dickens, Martin
Chutzlewit, ch. xxix.
If thou blurt thy curse among our folk,
I know not — I may give that egg-bald head
The tap that silences.
Tennyson, Harold, v. 1.
Eggs. To come in with five eggs ■=
to make a foolish remark or suggestion.
The second and third extracts are taken
from Mr. Roberts's notes on the first.
I do not, however, think that his ex-
planation of the " five eggs "as a silly
rumour or mare's-nest is quite correct,
for it does not suit the passages. Sylla
had really resigned the dictatorship ; it
was no invention or error of the egg-
merchants.
To certain persons comyng in with their
Jlue egges, how that Sylla had geuen ouer his
office of Dictature, as he shuld do, wher as
Caesar kept it still ... he aunswered, ko. —
Udal's Erasmus's Apophth., p. 303.
Whiles another gyueth counsell to make
peace wyth the Kvnge of Arragone . . .
Another cummeth in wyth hys v. eggs, and
aduyseth to howke in the Kynge of Castell.
Robinson's More'* Utopia (1551), trig. E. vi.
One sayd, a well favoured olde woman she is ;
The diuell she is, saide another ; and to this
In came the third with his Jive egges, and
sayde,
Fiftie yere a goe I knew her a trym mayde.
Heywood, Proverbs, Pt. II. cap. i.
Egos. To tread upon eggs = to
walk warily, as on delicate ground.
A prince's Qanimede, with every day new
suits, as the fashion varies, going as if he
trod upon egges. — Burton, Anatomy, p. 531.
This gave him occasion to ruminate all the
whole proceeding, to find if any slip had been
made (for he all along trod upon eggs), and
he could find nothing possible to be cavilled
upon.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 245.
Eggs. Sure as egqs is eggs, an ele-
gant asseveration, perhaps derived from
the proverbial likeness of one egg to
another (see next entry); but Prof.
De Morgan (N. and Q., III. vi. 203)
suggests that this is a corruption of the
logician's announcement of identity,
x is x, and hence the ungrammatical
form in which the proverb appears.
If she lives to Lammas-day next 6he will
be but fourteen years old, as sure as eggs is
*<J9S- — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. VII.
ch. xi.
And the bishop said, " Sure as eggs is eggs
This here's the bold Turpin."
Dickens, Pickwick, ch. xliii.
Eggs. The likeness of one egg to
another was proverbial.
Lod. What am I fitted, gallants? am I
fitted?
Jasp. To the life ; able to cheat suspicion,
and so like
Father Antony the confessor, that I protest
There's not more semblance in a pair of eggs.
Davenport, City Night-Cap, Act III.
Eke-name. See extract.
We have thousands of instances . . of
such eke - names or epithet - names being
adopted by the person concerned. — Archeeol.,
xliii. 110 (1871).
Elabour, to elaborate ; work out.
The marrow . . is a nourishment most
perfectly elalnmred by nature. — UrquharCs
Rabelais, Author's Prologue.
Elbow. To shake the elbow = to
ELBOW-POLISH ( 213 )
EL1GENT
gamble. Tom Brown (Works, ii. 46)
uses "Knight oftfie elbow " = gamester.
He's always shaking his heels with the
ladies and his elbows with the lords. — Van-
brugh, Confederacy , Act I.
There's yet a gang to whom our spark sub-
mits.
Tour elbow-shaking fool that lives by 's wits.
Prologue by a friend to Farquhar's
Constant Couple.
Elbow - polish, polish on furniture
produced by rubbing.
Nowhere else could an oak clock-case and
an oak table have got to such a polish by the
hand; genuine elbow-polish, as Mrs. Poyscr
called it, for she thanked God she never had
any of jour varnished rubbish in her house.
—G. Eliot, Adam Bede, Bk. I. ch. vi.
Elbows. The saying in the extract
is a mode of expressing that there is no
traceable relationship ; as we sometimes
say, They are both descended from
Adam.
Ld. 8p. Pray, my Lady Smart, what kin
are you to Lord Pozz ?
Lady Sm. Why, his grandmother and mine
had four elbows.— Swift, Polite Conversation
(Con v. i.).
Elbows. Out at elbows = poor, in
difficulties. L. has the phrase in its
literal sense, applied to dress: in at
elbows = comfortable, or respectable ;
a less common phrase than the other.
Fellow in arms, quoth he? he may well
call him fellow in arms ; I am sure they are
both out at elbows. — MiddUton. Mayor of
Quinborough, Act V.
It is a fervour not very frequent ... to
embrace Religion in rags, and virtue when it
is vagrant and mendicant, out at heels and
elbows. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 257.
Sneak into a corner, . . . down at heels and
out at elbows.— Gentleman Instructed, p. 212.
I don't suppose you could get a high style
of man . . . f orpay that hardly keeps him in
at elbows. — G. Eliot, Middlemarch, en. xxxviii
Eldern, of the elder tree.
Weeds are counted herbs in the beginning
of the spring; nettles are put in pottage,
and sallats are made of eldern-buds.-- Fuller,
Holy State, I. ▼. 2.
Electioneer, to canvass, or to be busy
in an election.
He . . . took care to engage in his interest
all those underlings who delight in galloping
round the country to electioneer. — Miss Edye-
worth, Bosanna, ch. Hi.
Election be reb, a person busy in an
election ; an agent or canvasser.
Her urgent entreaties were now joined to
those of Lord Glistonbury, and of many
loud-tongued electioneer ers^ who proved to
Vivian, by everything but calculation, that
he must be returned if he would but stand.
— Miss Edgeworth, Vivian, ch. ii.
Elegize, to lament as in an elegy.
I had written thus far, and perhaps should
have elegized on for a page or two farther,
when Harry, who has no idea of the dignity
of grief, blundered in. — Walpole, Letters, l.
329 (1754).
Element, the air.
And sodenly he loked npe into the elyment
and said, God sane hir grace! — Petition
circa 1553 (Archaol., rriii. 31).
Eleutheromania, madness for free-
dom.
Our peers have in too many cases laid aside
their frogs, laces, bag-wigs ; and go about in
English costume, or ride rising in the stirrups
in the most headlong manner ; nothing but
insubordination, eleutheromania, confused, un-
limited opposition in their heads. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. iv.
Eleutheromaniac, mad for freedom.
Eleutheromaniac philosophedom grows ever
more clamorous. — Carlyie, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk.
11. ch. v.
Elevated, intoxicated.
I went and was very plentifully entertained
. . . with a capacious vessel of this most noble
Diapente, insomuch that we were all elevated
above the use of our legs as well as our
reason. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 194.
His depth of feeling is misunderstood ; he
is supposed to be a little elevated, and no-
body heeds him. — Dickens, Martin Chuzzle-
wit, ch. ix.
Elevation. See quotation.
" They as dinnot tak' spirits down thor,
tak' their pennord of elevation then — women-
folk especial." "What's elevation ?n . . .
"Opium, bor* alive, opium." — C, Kingsley,
•Alton Locke <, ch. xii.
Elfish, intractable, like an elf;
generally applied to human beings, or
else to fairies, Ac.
The Cypres tree ... is elfishe and frowarde
to spring vp. — UdaVs Erasmus* s Apophth., p.
329.
Elf-locked, having elf-locks or
tangled hair.
The elfe-lockt fury all her snakes had shed.
Stapylton, Juvenal, vii. 83.
Eligbnt, an elector.
The eligents, who make the king by their
vote, are tyed fast by their own oaths and
faith to their own *ct. — Hacketi Life of
Williams, ii. 201.
ELIGHT
( 214 )
EMBOSS
Elight, to alight.
As sone as he had brought the hone backe
again and had elighted down, his father moste
louingly kissing his cheeke, said, O my dere
sonne, go serche out some other kingdom
meete for thee, for Macedonia is already all
too litle for thee. — UdaPs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 225.
Elingcate, to deprive of the tongue.
The damned Doomes-man hath Him judg'd
to death,
The Diu'll that Diull elinguate for his doome.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 14.
Eloper, one who elopes.
Nothing less, believe me, shall ever urge
my consent to wound the chaste propriety
of your character, by making you an eloper
with a duellist. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia,ch.u.
Eloquious, eloquent
Eloquious boarie beard, father Nestor, you
were one of them ; and you, M. Ulisses, the
prudent dwarfe of Pallas, another ; of whom
it is Illiadized that your very nose dropt
sugarcandie. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 16*2).
Elritch, strange, weird.
The little man laughed a little laugh,
sharp and elritch, at the strange cowardice of
the stalwart daredevil. — Lytton, What will he
do with it? Bk. VI. ch. v.
Elucidative, explanatory.
Such a set of documents may hope to be
elucidative in various respects. — Carlyle,
Cromwell, i. 10.
Eluctate, to struggle out.
They did eluctate out of their injuries
with credit to themselves. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 36.
Elveb-cake. See extract ; and L.
b. v. elver.
Cainsham Eiver is noted for producing
multitudes of little eels in the spring of the
year ; these the people catch when they are.
about two inches long ; and, having boiled
them, they make them into small cakes for
sale. These elver-cakes they dispose of at
Bath and Bristol ; and when they are fried
and eaten with butter, nothing can be more
delicious. — Defoe, Tour thro* O. Britain, ii.
806.
Emandenbis, one who writes from
the dictation of another; it may be
only a misprint for amanuensis.
All their clerks, emanuenses, notaries, ad-
vocates, proctors, secretaries, . . . would all
lose their several employments. — Kentiefs
Erasmus, Praise of Folly, p. 129.
Embarged, in a barge. R has em-
barge = to lay an embargo on.
Triumphall musick from the floud arose,
As when the 8oueraigne we embarg'd doe see,
And by faire London for his pleasure rowes.
Drayton, Robert of Normandy.
Embarrel, to pack in a barrel.
Our cmbarreld white-herrings . . . last in
long voyages. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl.
Misc., vi. 179).
Embassatobial, pertaining to an am-
bassador.
Why should an ambassador desire that his
embassatorial letters to his master should be
burnt before witness? — North, Examen, p.
581.
Embassatrix, ambassadress.
Here was not only a message by word of
mouth from the King of France by a great
princess sent on that errand, but an embassa-
trix resident to pursue the point of raising
the grandeur of France. — North, Examen, p.
479.
Embenched, banked up.
Gerdicus . . . was the first May-lord or
captaine of the Morris-daunce that on those
embenched shelves stampt his footing. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 150).
Embered, strewn with embers or
ashes.
On the vrhite-ember'd hearth
Heapt up fresh fuel.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. II.
Emblanch, to whiten.
It was impossible that a spot of so deep a
dye should be emblanched. — Heylin, Life of
Laud, p. 260.
Embloodt, to make bloody or san-
guinary.
Oh the unmatchable cruelty that some
men's religion (if I may so call it) hath em-
bloodied them to ! — Adams, ii. 146.
Embogged, plunged in a bog.
General Murray . . . got into a mistake
and a morass, attacked two bodies that were
joined when he hoped to come up with one
of them before the junction, was enclosed,
embogged, and defeated. — Walpole to Mann,
iii. 3*92 (1760).
Ehbolismic, intercalated. They who
used the lunar year of 354 days ad-
justed it to the solar year by the occa-
sional intercalation of a year of thirteen
months.
The signs and symbols of the thirteen
months of the Anglo-Saxon embolismic year.
—Arch., xliv. 146 (1871).
Emboss, boss ; protuberance.
In this is a fountaine out of which gushes
EMBRACIVE
( 21$)
ENARM
a river rather than a streeme, which ascend-
ing a good height breakes upon a round
embosse of marble into millions of pearles.—
Evelyn, Diary, Nov. 17, 1644.
Estbracive, caressing in a demon-
strative way.
Not less kind in her way, though less
expansive and embracive, was Madame de
Montcontour to my wife.— Thackeray, The
Neweomes, ch. lvii.
Embrake, entangle. See E kb rake.
Revenged hee would bee by one chimera
of imagination or other, and hamper and
embrake her in those mortal straights for hir
disdaine.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffie (Hart. Misc.,
▼i. 176).
Embrawn, to harden. The extract is
given at greater length s. v. Itinerate.
It will embrawne and iron-crust his flesh. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuge (Harl. Misc., vi. 165).
Embrixo Days, Ember Days.
They introduced, by little and little, a
Seneral neglect of the Weekly Fasts, the
oly time of Lent, and the Embring-days. —
Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 389.
Embroil, disturbance.
It was well for him that the Parliament
was dissolved, else they had pursued .their
impeachment against him, ana what an em-
broil it had made in Parliament is not easy
to conjecture. — North, Examen, p. 568.
Evbrtologically, according to the
rules of embryology, which science
studies the fetal development of crea-
tures.
Is the hyppolais a warbler embryologically,
or is he a yellow finch, connected with serins
and canaries, who has taken to singing? — C.
KingsUy, 1867 (Life, ii. 203).
Embryotic, pertaining to an embryo.
See extract $. v. Un mechanize.
Emergement, an unexpected occur-
rence.
Go it would, as fast as one man could con-
vey it in speech to another all the town over ;
it being usnally observed that such emerge'
ments disperse in rumor unaccountably. —
Norths Examen, p. 401.
Emergencies, casual profits: wind-
falls.
And now he is actually possessed not only
of the jurisdiction, but of the rents, profits,
and emeraencies belonging to a Bishop of
Bath and Wells. — Heylin, Life of Laud, p.
159.
Eicon VENBS8, susceptibility to emo-
tion. The adj. emotive is given by R.
with a quotation from Brooke ; it is of
frequent occurrence in Daniel Deronda.
The more exquisite quality of Deronda's
nature — that keenly perceptive, sympathetic
emotivenesB which ran along with bis specu-
lative tendency — was never more thoroughly
tested. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xL
Empanoplied, fully armed.
The lists were ready. Empanoplied and
plumed
"We entered in, and waited, fifty there
Opposed to fifty. — Tennyson, Princess, v.
Empiem, an imposthume in the breast.
The spawling empiem, ruthless as the rest,
With foul impostumes fils his hollow chest.
Sylvester, The Fairies, 402.
Empire, to assume authority over.
They should not empire over Presbyteries,
but be subject to the same. — Heylin, Hist,
of the Presbyterians, p. 217.
Emplumed, adorned as with feathers.
R. has implumed = featherless, with
extracts from Drayton.
Angli angeli (resumed
From the medieval story)
Such rose angelhoods, emplumed
In such ringlets of pore glory.
Mrs. Browning, Sony for Ragged Schools*
Emportment, passion; indignation:
a French word used by North as though
it were English.
His lordship, being provoked would warm,
as I could discern by the air of his counten-
ance, but few less acquainted with him could
perceive anything of it; and he was the
more silent as he discerned any such emport-
ment in himself. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, ii. 53.
To lay aside emportments so justly pro-
voked, and come to the two papers which I
had almost forgot. — Ibid., Examen, p. 663.
Emprise, to undertake.
In secret drifts I lingered day and night,
All how I might depose this cruel king,
That seem'd to all so much desired a thing,
As thereto trusting I emprised the same.
SackviUe, The Duke of Buckingham, st. 58.
Enair, to air or employ. It in the
extract is the lady's tongue.
Who, when she lists (with balm-breath's
ambrosie)
Shee it enatres in prose and poesy.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 31.
Enarch, to arch in.
God . . . caused the blacke cloudes to poure
down vpon them store of funerall teares,
enarching the ayre with a spatious rainebow.
— Speed, History, Bk. IX. ch. xii.
Enarm, to arm.
While shepherds they enarme vnus'd to din-
ger.—Hudson's Judith, i. 371.
ENBASTE
( "6 )
ENDAMJStlFY
Enbastk, to steep or embue.
It is not agreeable for the Holy Ghost,
which may not suffer the Church to err in
interpreting the Scriptures, to permit the
same notwithstanding to be oppressed with
superstition, and to be enbasted with vain
opinions. — Fhilpot, p. 375.
Enbrake, to ensnare, entangle. See
Em BRAKE,
Being enbraked and hampered in the middes
of those mortalle streightes, he might even
in his life time begin to lacke the vse of all
the elementes. — UdaTs Erasmus' $ Apophth.,
p. 286.
Encaptivk, to take captive.
She sent all her Jewells to the Jewish
Lumbarde to pawn, to buy and encaptive him
to her trenchour, but her purvey our came a
day after the faire. — Nashe, Lenten Stuff*
{Harl. Jtfwc., vi. 174).
Encarnalize, to make gross or
fleshly.
We shudder bat to dream our maids should
ape
Those monstrous males that carve the living
hound,
And cram him with the fragments of the
grave,
Or in the dark, dissolving human heart,
And holy secrets of this microcosm,
Dabbling a shameless hand with shameful
jest,
Encarnalize their spirits.
Tennyson, Princess, iii.
Enchaired, seated in the chair, pre-
siding.
But thou, Sir Lancelot, sitting in my place
Enchair*d to-morrow, arbitrate the field.
Tennyson, The Last Tournament.
Enchequer, to checker, to arrange in
chequered pattern.
For to pave
The excellency of this cave,
Squirrels1 and children's teeth late shed
Are neatly here encheguered.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 177.
Enclarited, mixed with claret.
Lips she has all rubie red,
Cheeks like creame enclarited.
Herricky Hesperides, p. 140.
Enclasp, to clasp round.
O Union, that enclaspest in thyne armes
All that in Heau*n and Earth is great or good.
Davits, Bien Venu,p.S.
Enclitical. An enclitical is a par-
ticle which throws back the accent,
on the foregoing syllable ; hence in the
quotation it is used of a lean-to.
The barrel . . . stood in a little shed or
enclitical penthouse. — Graves, Spiritual Quix-
ote, Bk. II. ch. vii.
Encoached, borne in a coach.
Great Tamburlaine
(Like Phaeton) drawne, encoacht in burnisht
gold. — Davies, JPittes9 Pilgrimage, p. 22.
Encolure. This is a French word,
meaning the neck of an animal, applied
also to the way in which the neck is
set on the shoulders; a "crisped en-
colure " would be a neck with a short,
cropped mane, or perhaps a curly-haired
neck.
Hair in heaps lay heavily
Over a pale brow spirit-pure,
Carved like the heart of the coal-black tree,
Crisped like a war-steed's encolure.
Browning, The Statue and the Bust.
Encomionize, to praise.
Tou would prefer him before tart and
galingale which Chaucer preheminentest en-
comionizeth above all junquetries or confec-
tioneries whatsoever.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffs
{Harl. Jfisc^ vi. 158).
Encomy, praise ; encomium.
Many popish parasites and men-pleasing
flatterers have written large commendations
and encomies of those.
Bale, Select Works, p. 7.
Encourage, to strengthen: used
quaintly in the extract.
Erasmus had his Lagena or flagon of wine
(recruited weekly from his friends at London)
which he drank sometimes singly by it selfe,
and sometimes encouraged his faint Ale with
the mixture thereof. — Fuller, Hist, of Catnb^
v. 48.
Encumbrous, troublesome. The ex-
tract is from a letter of Bp. Gardiner to
the Protector Somerset, 1547.
To avoid many encumbrous arguments,
which wit can devise against the truth, I
send to your grace the copy of mine answer.
— Strype, Cranmer, Bk. II. ch. iii. (note).
Encdrled, twisted ; interlaced.
Implye
Like streames which flow
Encurlld together, and noe difference show
In their siluer waters.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 450.
End. To get the better end of = to
get the better of. We speak of having
hold of the right or wrong end of the
stick.
By all which it should seem we have rather
cheated the devil than he us, and have gotten
the better end of him.— Sanderson, i. 183.
Endamnify, to injure.
ENDEARANCE ( 217 ) ENGASTROMITH
Those who hired the fishing of that lake
adjoining, were endamnified much by the
violent breaking in of the seas. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 276.
Endearance, affection.
But my person and figure you'll best under-
stand
From the picture I've sent by an eminent
hand;
Show it young Lady Betty, by way of en-
dearance,
And to give her a spice of my mien and
Anstey, New Bath Guide, Letter 10.
Exdiablee, possess, as with a devil.
Such an one as might best endiablee the
rabble, and . set them a bawling against
popery. — North, Examen, p. 571.
Endiablemsnt, diabolical possession.
There was a terrible rage of faces made at
him, as if an endiablement had possessed them
all.— North, Examen, p. 008.
En di bons, andirons. Ezek. xl. 43,
margin, "endirons or the two hearth-
stones ; " the text has hooks. Perhaps
this form of the word arose from the
iron supports at each end of the fire-
place on which the logs rested. End-
iron has, however, nothing to do ety-
mologically with end or iron. See
Wedgewood.
Endomr, to cover as with a dome.
And here among the English tombs,
In Tuscan ground we lay her ;
While the blue Tuscan sky endomes
Our English words of prayer.
Mrs. Browning, Child's Grave
at Florence.
Endotb, to endow.
Their own heirs do men disherit to endote
them.— Tyndale, i. 249.
Ends. To make both ends meet = to
live within one's income.
Worldly wealth he cared not for, desiring
onely to make both ends meet ; and as for that
little that lapped over, he gave it to pious
uses. — Fuller, Worthies, Cumberland.
If I can but make both ends meet, that's all
I ask for.
Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. iii.
Endunobon, to imprison.
It, being a sweaty loggerhead, greasie
sowter, endungeoned in his pocket a twelve-
month, stunk so over the pope's palace, that
not a scullion but cried, "Fob!" — Nashe,
Lenten Stujk (Harl. Misc., vi. 172).
Were we endungeoned from our birtb, yet wee
Would weene there were a sunne.
Dairies, Mirum in Modum, p. 26.
Enemy, a synonym for time, as that
which is constantly enfeebling us, and
bringing us to our end; it is also an
enemy which many people try to kill.
" How goes the enemy, Snobb ? " asked Sir
Mulberry Hawk. "Four minutes gone." —
Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. xiz.
En farce, to stuff.
Therefore have I now prepared for you a
godly potation worthy this time, that you
may go home again from me, not with
mouths, but with minds, not with bellies,
but with souls, replenished and enforced with
celestial meat. — Becon, Potation for Lent, i.
91. J
Enfavour, favour.
a If any shall enfavour me so far as to con-
vince me of any error therein, I shall in the
second edition (God lending me life to set it
out) return him both my thanks and amend-
ment.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, V. i.
Enfear, to frighten.
But now a woman's look his hart enfeares.
Hudson, Judith, v. S3.
En fertile, to fertilize.
From the sea ... it swelleth up with
mountaines, unless it bee where the rivers
Dee . . . and Done make way for themselves
and enfertile the fields. — Holland's Camden,
ii. 46.
Enfester, to fester in.
His Vesture glu'd with gore-blood to His
Backe,
Which His enfettered sores exulcerates.
Davies, Holy Boode, p. 10.
Enframe, to enclose.
But all the powers of the house of Godwin
• Are not enframed in thee.
Tennyson, Harold, i. 1.
Enfbenzibd, maddened.
With an enfrenzied grasp he tore the jasey
from his head. — IngoTdsby Legends {Jarvis's
Wig).
Enfume, to blind or obscure with
smoke. Davies says that "perturba-
tions"
Gainst their Guides doe fight,
And so enfume them that they cannot see.
Mierocosmos, p. 38.
Engage, engagement, bargain.
No man can*say it's his by heritage,
Nor by lepade or testatour's device,
Nor that it came by purchase or engage,
Nor from his Prince for any good service.
Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. zix.
Engastromith, ventriloquist, and so
magician. CI Isaiah xliv. 25 (Sep-
tuagint), and my. Bible English^ p. 24.
ENGINE
(218)
ENORME
So all inoenst the pale enaastromith
(Rul'd by the furious spirit he's haunted with)
Speakes in his womb.
Sylvester, The Imposture, p. 280.
Engine, gin or trap.
The hidden engines, and the snares that lie
So undiscovered, bo obscure to th* eye.
Quarles, Emblems, iii. 9.
Engine, to assault.
We fear not Taurus, the bull, that shoots
his horns from Rome, nor Scorpio that sends
his venomous sting from Spain, nor the un-
christened Aries of infidels, profane and pro-
fessed enemies to engine and natter our walls.
— Adams, i. 29.
Engore. The Diets, give this word
= to pierce, but in the extract it = to
make bloody, and also at xii. 212. Cf.
Ingore.
A most unmanly noise was made with those
he put to sword,
Of groans and outcries. The flood blush'd
to be so much sugar1 d
With such base souls.
Chapman, Iliad, xxi. 22.
Engrand, to make great, aggrandize.
The Duke ... by all means endeavoured
to engrand his posterity. — Fuller, Hist, of
Comb., vii. 42.
Engraven, to engrave.
As our Maker has stamp'd His image in
our foreheads, so He has also engraven'd the
knowledge of Himself in our souls. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 250.
Enhavacino, destruction.
The earth hath not scanted her fruits, but
our concealing* have been close, our enhavac-
ings ravenous, our transportations lavish. —
Adams, i. 87.
Enhearten, to encourage.
When their agents came to him to feel his
pulse, they found it beat so calm and even,
that he sent them messages to enhearten
them.—Hacket, Life of Williams, II. 141.
Enhuile, to anoint.
Then they used ... to kill, and offer their
sacrifices; yea, and their manner was to
enhuile or anoint their very altars all over. —
Holland's Camden, p. 771.
Enjoy, joy, happiness.
As true love is content with his enjoy.
And asketh no witnesse nor no record.
Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. cb. zix.
En kennelled, shut in a kennel.
Davies speaks of Diogenes as " the
That alwaies in a tub enkennelTd lies.
Microcosmos, p. 84.
Enkernelled, enclosed in a kernel.
When I muse
Upon the aches, anxieties, and fears
The Maggot knows not, Nicholas, xnethinks
It were a happy metamorphosis
To be enkernelVd thus.
Southey, Nondescripts, vi
Enl aw belled, crowned with laurels.
For Swaines that con no skill of holy rage
Bene foe-men to faire skil's enlawreWd
Queen. — Davies, Eclogue, p. 20.
Enluring, enticement
They know not the detractions of slander,
underminings of envy, provocations, heats,
enlurings of lusts. — Adams, i. 311.
Enmingle, to immingle.
Love embitter' d with tears
Suits but ill with my years,
When sweets bloom enminaled around,
Burgoyne, Lord of the Manor, I. i.
Enmontery.
He was shot through the enmontery of the
left arm, and the arrow dividing those grand
auxiliary vessels, he died of the flux of blood
immediatly. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. v. 12.
Enneal.
In those to shew himselfe rather artificial!
then naturall were no lesse to be laughed at
than for one that can Bee well inough to vse
a paire of spectacles, or not to heare but by
a trunke put to his eare, nor feele without
a paire of ennealed glooues, which things in
deed helpe an infirme sence, but annoy the
perfit.— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. oh.
xxv.
Ennealogue. See quotation.
In the aforesaid ten commandments as
exemplified in the council of Alfred, the
second commandment is wholly expunged.
. . . The worst is, when this was wanting
the Decalogue was but an Ennealogue. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. iv. 42.
Enniche, to place in a niche or con-
spicuous position.
Slawkenbergius, . . . indeed, in many re-
spects, deserves to be ennich'd as a prototype
for all writers, of voluminous works at least,
to model their books by. — Sterne, TV. Shandy ,
III. 29.
Enorme, to make monstrous: this
verb is often used by Davies, who also
spells it with an %.
Then lets hee friends the fantacie enorme
With strong delusion* and with passions dire.
Davies, Mirum iu Modum, p. 9.
They stand still falling whom He doth vphold.
And who goes carelesse, ourelesse He enormes.
Ibid., Mane's Sacrifice, p. 50.
ENOUGH
( 219 ) ENTER-KNOW
Thy Hands that form'd, reform 'd, and me
conformed,
Were to a Crosse transfixed for my sake,
To help my hate fall hands that sinue inorm'd.
Ibid., p. 12.
Enough and enough, more than
enough. The second quotation is from
a letter of "Daddy Cripps" to Miss
Burney.
Every one of us, from the bare sway of his
own inherent corruption, carrying enough and
enough about him to assure his final doom. —
South, Sermons* vi. 126.
The play has wit enough and enough, but
the story and the incidents don't appear to
me interesting enough to seize and keep hold
of the attention and eager expectations of
the generality of audiences. — Mad. DfArblay,
Diary, i. 300.
Enpovbr, impoverish.
Lest they should theym selves enpover
And be brought into decaye,
Pover cilly shepperdis they gett,
Whome into their farmes they sett
Itfvynge on mylke, whyg, and whey.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
bt nott wrothe, p. 100.
Enrage, to rage: usually an active
verb.
My father, I am certain by his letter, will
now hear neither petition nor defence; on
the contrary, he will only enrage at the
temerity of offering to conf nte him. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. IX. cb. vii.
Ensaint, to canonize.
For his ensainting, looke the almanack in
the beginning of Aprill, and see if you can
finde out such a saint as Saint Gildarde,
which in honour of this gilded fish, the pope
so ensainted. — Nashe, Lenten Stvjffe (Harl.
Miic., vi. 174).
ENsnoRE, to enharbour.
Then Death (the end of ill unto the good)
Enshore my soule neer drownd in flesh and
blood. — Davits, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 40.
Enshored, received on shore. De-
venere locos, in original.
Tbeare they were enshoared, wheare thow
shalt shortlye see townwals. — Stanyhurst,
jEn^ i. 850.
Ensindok, to wrap in a sindon or
linen cloth, aivdovi is the word in
Matt zxvii. 59.
Now doth this loving sacred Synaxie
(With diuine orizons and deuout teares)
Ensindon Him with choicest draperie.
Davits, Holy Roode, p. 28.
Eksorcell.
Not any one of all these honor'd parts
Tour princely happes and habites that do
moue,
And as it were ensoreell all the hearts
Of Christen kiugs to quarrel for your loue.
Sir T. Wyai, quoted in Puttenham,
Bk. III. ch. xix.
Ensp angle, to cover with spangles.
One more by thee, love and desert have Bent
T' enspangle this expansive firmament.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 204.
Entask, to lay a task upon.
Tet sith the Heav'ns haue thus entaskt my
layea,
It is enough, if heer-by I invite
Som happier spirit to do thy Muse more right.
Sylvester, 4 day, 1st noeeke, 56.
Extempest, to visit with storm.
Such punishment I said were due
To natures deepliest stained with sin —
For aye entempesting anew
The unfathomable hell within ;
The horror of their deeds to view,
To know and loathe, yet wish and do.
Coleridge, Pains of Sleep.
Enter, to set on game.
No sooner had the northern carles begun
their hunts-up but the Presbyterians flock'd
to London from all quarters, and were like
hounds ready to be entred. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, ii. 143.
Enterbathe, to bathe mutually ; to
intermingle tears.
Lo at thy presence, how who late were prest
To spur their steeds, and couch their staues
in rest
For fierce incounter, cast awav their spears,
And rapt with joy, them enterbathe with tears.
Sylvester, Handicrafts, 21.
Enterbraid, to lace together.
Their shady boughs first bow they tenderly,
Then enterbraid, aud bind them curiously.
Sylvester, Handicrafts, 209.
Enterflow, channel. Holland also
uses the verb interflow^ q. v.
These Hands .... are severed one from
another by a narrow enter/low of the Sea
betweene. — Holland's Camden, ii. 215.
Enterkiss, to kiss mutually ; to come
in contact.
And water 'nointing with cold-moist the
brims
Of th' enter-kissing turning globes extreams,
Tempers the heat.
Sylvester, 2nd day, 1st weeke, 1050.
Enter - know, to be mutually ac-
quainted.
I have desired ... to enter-know my good
God, and his blessed Angels and Saints. —
Bp. Hall, Inv. World, Pref .
ENTERMEWER ( 220 ) ENVIRONMENT
Entermewer. H., who gives no
quotation, defines it " a hawk that
changes the colour of its wings.'1
Nor must you expect from high antiquity
the distinctions of Eyass and Bamage Hawks,
of Sores and Entermewers.—Sir T. Brown,
Tractb.
Ent ermine, an intervening mine, or
entrance of a mine (?).
While hotlv thus they skirmish in the vault,
Quick Ebedmelech closely hither brought,
A dry-fat sheath'd in latton plates without,
Within with feathers filPd, and round about
Bortt full of holes (with hollow pipea of
brass)
Save at one end, where nothing out should
paw;
Which (having first his Jewish troops retir'd)
Just in the mouth of th' enterminene fir'd.
Sylvester, The Decay, 049.
ENTER8PLIT, to Split in two.
There's not a shaft but hath a man for
white,
Nor stone but lightly in warm bloud doth
light;
Or if that any fail their foes to hit
In fall, in flight themselves they enter-split.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 301.
Enthwite, to chide. See Entwite.
By that word he means to enthwite them,
and, as 1 may say, to cry them down. — An-
drews, Sermons, v. 20.
Entiltment, shed ; tent.
The best houses and walls there were of
mudde, or canvas, or poldavies entiltment s. —
JVajfo, Lenten Stuffs (Harl. Misc* vi. 171).
Entire, used as a subst. for entirety.
I am narrating as it were the Warrington
manuscript, which is too long to print in
entire. — Thackeraq, Virginians, ch. lzni.
Entire horse, a stallion.
One of these old soldiers was what the
Spaniards, with the gravity peculiar to their
language, call a Caballo Padre, or what some
of our own writers, with a decorum not leas
becoming, appellate an entire horse. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. cxxxvi.
Entohologi8E, to pursue the study of
insects, or to collect specimens.
It is too rough for trawling to-day, and too
wet for entomologising.—C. Kingsley, 1849
(Life, i. 171).
Entbadas (Spanish), revenues; in-
come. See Entrates.
His own revenues of a large extent,
But in the expectation of his uncle1
And guardian's entradas, by the course
Of nature to descend on him, a match
For the best subject's blood.
Jiassinger, Guardian, V. ill.
Entrain, to draw on.
The Mutiueers were grown so weak,
They found 'twas more than time to squeak:
They call for work, but 'twas too late :
The Stomach (like an aged maid,
Shrunk up for want of human aid)
The common debt of nature paid,
And with its destiny entrained their fate.
Vanbrugh, JEsop, Act II.
Entrates, revenues. See Entradas.
The Lord Treasurer Cranfeild,a good hue-
band of the entrates of the Exchequer, com-
plain'd against him to the Bong. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, i. 83.
Entrelice, trellis work (?).
I observed that the appearing timber
punchions, entrelices, &c., were all so cover'd
with scales of slate, that it seemed carv'd in
the wood and painted, the slate fastened on
the timber in pretty figures that has, like a
coate of armour, preseiVd it from rotting. —
Evelyn, Diary, Jan. 3, 1666.
Entwite, twit; blame. See En-
thwite.
Thou doest naught to entwite me thus,
And with soche wordes opprobrious
To vpbraid the giftes amorous
Of the glittreyng Goddesse Venus.
UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth^ p. 165.
Enumerate is used in the extract for
innumerable. " Things creeping innu-
merable" is the reading both in the
Bible and Prayer-Book versions.
And as Thy wealth the Earth do's bound,
So wondrous is the spacious Sea,
Where fish enumerate are found,
And small and great depend on Thee.
D'Urfey, Poem on Psalm CIl\
Enunciator, declarer.
The inquisitive servants . . . were all
questioning her about the news of which she
wast he first, and not very intelligible enunci-
ator.— Miss Edyeworth, Ennui, oh. xv.
Enunied, united.
Neither can any man at all be made clean
. . . except by faith they be enunied and
joined together in the body of Him which
without any carnal enticement and morti-
ferous delectation was conceived. —Becon, i.
79.
Envapour, to surround with vapour.
On a still-rocking couch lies blear-ey'd Sleep*
Snorting alowd, and with his panting breath
Blowes a black fume, that all envajxmreth.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 555.
Environment, surrounding. This
word is now not uncommon. The
EN WRITE
( 221 )
EPISCOPIZE
second extract is from a letter from
Sterling to Carlyle about the Sartor
Jtoartus of the latter (1835). R.,
however, quotes Philemon Holland for
the word.
Man's whole life and environment have
been laid open and elucidated. — Carlyle,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. i.
First aa to the language. A good deal of
thia is positively barbarous. '* Environment?
u vcstura]," u stertorous," u visualised," "com-
plected," and others, to be found, I think, in
the first twenty pages, are words, so far as I
know, without any authority ; some of them
contrary to analogy ; and none repaying by
their value the disadvantage of novelty. —
Ibidn Life of Sterling, Pt. II. ch. ii.
A shape hitherto unnoticed, stirred, rose,
came forward; a shape inharmonious with
the environment, serving only to complicate
the riddle further. — Miss Bronte, VUlette, ch.
xvi.
Exwrite, to inscribe.
What wild heart histories seemed to be en-
urritten
Upon those crystalline celestial spheres.
E. A. Foe, To Helen (ii. 18).
Eoan, eastern; pertaining to the
dawn.
Armenian girls
Gall him the Mithra of the middle world,
That sheds Eoan radiance on the West.
Taylor, Isaac Comnenus, iii. 5.
Eparch, a commander.
The prefects and the eparchs will resort1
To the Bucoleon with what speed they may.
Taylor, Isaac Comnenus, ii. 3.
Ephkmebalities, transient trifles.
This lively companion .... chattered
epkemeralities white Gerard wrote the im-
mortal lives. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch.
Lri
Epichorial, belonging to the country.
Local or epichorial superstitions from
every district of Europe come forward by
thousands. — De Quincey; Modern Supersti-
tion.
Epicure, to live like an epicure ; to
epicurize.
They did Epicure it in daily exceedings, as
indeed where should men fare well, if not in
a King's HiJl?— Fuller, Hist, of Comb., ii.48.
Epicurbly, delicately ; luxuriously.
His horses (quatenus horses) are proven-
dered as em'curely. — Nashe, Lenten Stuff e
(Harl. Misc., vi. 179).
Epigrammatarian, epigrammatist.
Onr epigrammatarians, old and late,
Were wont be blamed for too licentiate.
Hall, Satires, I. ix. 29.
Epigrammatism, epigrammatic al
character.
The latter [derivation] would be greedily
seized by nine philologists out of ten, for no
better cause than its epigrammatism. — E. A.
Toe, Marginalia, lxvii.
Epigraph, an inscription. L. (who
gives no example) quotes from Todd :
" Dr. Johnson gives the Greek angli-
cised in epigraphe, a word of four syl-
lables, as he places the accent on the
second. But I take epigraph to be an
old English word, merely with the
superfluous final c, as was formerly
common, and intended like paragraph
or autograph to be pronounced in
three syllables. "
Dr. Meret, a learned man and library
Keeper shew*d me . . . the statue and epi-
<rraj>h under it of that renowned physitian
Dr. Harvey, discoverer of the circulation of
the blood.— Evelyn, Diary, Oct. 3, 1662.
Epikt (IxuUita) "expresses exactly
that moderation which recognises the
impossibility cleaving to formal law of
anticipating and providing for all cases
that will emerge, and present them-
selves to it for decision; which, with
this, recognises the danger that ever
waits upon the assertion of legal rights
lest they should be pushed into moral
wrongs, lest the summumjus should in
fact prove the gumma injuria ; which,
therefore, pushes not its own rights to
the uttermost, but going back in part
or in the whole from these, rectifies
and redresses the injustices of justice "
(Trench^ New Test. Synonyms, sect. 43).
I am provoked of some to condemn this
law, but I am not able, so it be but for a
time, and upon weighty considerations; so
that it be used rarely, seldomly : for avoiding
disturbance in the commonwealth, such an
epikv and moderation may be used in it.—
Latimer, i. 182.
Epiphoneme, an exclamation. This
Anglicised form is not common.
[The wise man] in th' ende cryed out with
this Epyphoneme, Vanitas vanitatum et omnia
vanitas. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch.
hi.
Episcopant, a bishop.
The intercession of all these apostolic
fathers could not prevail with them to alter
their resolved decree of reducing into order
their usurping and over-provendered episco-
pants. — Milton, Prelatical Episcopacy.
Episcopize, to consecrate to the epis-
EPISTAL
( 222 )
ESCRITOIRE
copal office. The word usually signifies
to exercise that office.
They alleged that he had even pressed the
Greek to consecrate him a bishop also. . . .
There seems reason to believe that Wesley
was willing to have been episcopized upon
this occasion. — Southey, Life of Wesley, ch.
xjcvi.
Epistal, epistyle or architrave. R.
gives epistyle, but his only extract is
from Evelyn, who uses the Latin epis-
tylium.
The walls and pauement of polished mar-
ble, circled with a great Corinthian wreath,
with pillars and Epistals of like workman-
ship.—Sandys, Travels, p. 287.
Epitaph eb, a writer of epitaphs.
Epitaphers . . . swarme like Crowes to a
dead carcas. — Nashe, Pref. to Greene's Mena-
phon, p. 14.
Epitaphio, epitaph.
An epitaphic is the writings that is sette on
deade mennes toumbes or graues in memory
or common dacion of the parties there buried.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 221.
Epopceist, a writer of epics.
It is not long since two of our best-known
epopceist s, or, to use the more common term,
of our novel-writers, have concluded each a
work published by instalments. — Phillips,
Essays from the Times, ii. 321.
Eposculation, kissing.
L pass over your . . . incurvations and
eposculations, your benedictions and humilia-
tions.— Beeon, iii. 283.
Equestrial, equestrian: for which
it may be a misprint.
There are two others of the same King,
one equestrial, and most furiously ugly, in
Stocks-market, and the other in Soho-square.
— Misson, Travels in Eny., p. 309.
Equinoctia, equinoxes. Shakespeare
had already used the English form
equinox {Othello, ii. 3).
Shepherds of people had need know the
calenders of tempests in state, which are
commonly greatest when things grow to
equality, as natural tempests about the equi-
noctia.— Bacon, Essays {Seditions).
Equipage, equality. This sense, as
Bp. Jacobson observes, clears up the
passage in the Merry Wive* of Wind-
sor, which has perplexed commentators.
See N. , s. v. The expression only oc-
curs in the quarto, and is not found in
the best modern editions.
Falsi. I will not lend thee a penny.
Pist. I will retort the sum in equijtaae.
ii.2.
Nor doth it sound well that the examples
of men, though never so godly, should, as to
the effect of warranting our actions, stand in
so near equipage with the commands of God,
as they are here placed jointly together,
without any character of difference so much
as in degree. — Sanderson, Preface, 1855, ii. 10.
EQUITAL, requital.
[A besieged general] rather used the spade
than the sword, . . . referring the revenge
rather to the end, than to a present equital.
— Sidney, Arcadia, p. 266.
Equi value, to put on a par.
He has the fault of all our antiquaries,
to equivalue the noble and the rabble of
authorities. — W. Taylor, 1803 (Robberds'
Memoir, i. 470.)
Eremital, belonging to a hermit ;
eremitish, or eremitical, are the more
usual adjectives.
Would or would not this godfather general
have been happier in a convent or hermitage
than he was in thus following his own hu-
mour ? It was Dr. Dove's opinion that upon
the whole he would ; not that a conventual,
and still less an eremital way of life would
have been more rational. — Southey, Ths
Doctor, ch. lxviii.
Eristic, a controversialist. See ex-
tract from Gauden, s. v. Enchiie. L.
has the word as an adjective, with a
quotation from a work published in
1698 ; Gauden's book appeared nearly
forty years earlier.
Erradund, wandering.
"While I have listened and looked on . . .
have you with your errabund guesses, veering
to all points of the literary compass, amused
the many-humoured vet single-minded Pan-
tagruelist, the quotationipotent mottocrat. —
Southey, The Doctor, Interchapter ziii.
Esclandre, disturbance ; this French
word is ulmost naturalised. Mr. Kings-
ley does not italicise it nor apparently
mark it as foreign.
Scoutbush, to avoid esclandre and misery,
thought it as well to waive the proviso, and
paid her her dividends as usual.— C. Kinysley,
Two Years Ago, ch. xi.
Escript, writing.
Te have silenced almost all her able guides,
and daily burn their escripts. — British Bell-
man, 1648 {Harl. Misc., vn. 625).
Escritoire, a desk or bureau.
A hundred guineas will buy you a rich
escritoir for your billets-doux. — Farquhar*
Constant Couple, v. 1.
Sir Charles . . . broke the seals that had
ESMA YLE
( 223 )
EUNUCH
been affixed to the cabinet* and eseritores. —
Richardson, Grandison, ii, 223.
Esmayle, or Em A yle, enamel. The
second extract is from N. and Q., I. v.
467.
Set rich rubie to red esmayle,
The raven's plume to peacock's tail.
Lay me the farkes to lizard's eyes.
The duakie cloud to azure skies ;
There shall no lease an ods be seene
In mine from euery other Queen.
Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xix.
It is reported that the Pope long since
gaoe them [Icelanders] a dispensation to
receine the Sacrament in ale, insomuch as
for their vncessant frosts there, no wine but
was turned to red emayle as soon as euer it
came amongst them. — ATashe, Terrors of the
Night (1594), D. iii.
Espinette. L. defines spinet (the
more usual form), a small harpsichord,
but Pepys distinguishes between the
two.
Called upon one Hayward, that makes
virginalls, and there did like of a little espi-
nette, and will have him finish it for me ; for
I had a mind to a small harpaichon, but this
takes up less room. — Pepys, Ap. 4, 1068.
At noon is brought home the espinette I
bought the other day of Hayward ; cost me
£5.-1 hid., July 15.
To buy a rest for my espinette at the iron-
monger's.— Ibid., July 20.
Espousage, marriage.
Such one as the King can find in his heart
to love, and lead his life in pure and chaste
espousage, — Latimer, i. 94.
ESQUIXRES8B, female esquire. The
extract is of the date 1596.
The principal mourneress apparelled as an
esquieresse. — Fosbroke, Smyth's Lives of the
Berkeley*, p. 211.
Estbait, to narrow or confine.
80 that at this day the Turk hath estrayted
us very nere, and brought it within a right
narrow compass, and narrower shall do, say
thay, as long as we go about to defend
Crrafandome by the sword. — Sir T. More,
Dialog*, p. 145.
Estbangfull, foreign.
And over these (being on horse backe) they
drew greanes or buskins embrodered with
gould, and euterlac't with rewes of fethers ;
altogether estrangfull and Indian like. —
Chapman, Masque of Mid. Temple.
Estrange to, estrange from.
' Mr. Meekly had long estranged himself to
Enfield.— #. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 152.
Etch, to eke, augment. H. gives it
as a Kentish word.
Where the lion's skin is too short, we must
etch it out with the fox's case. — Cotton* s
Montaigne, ch. v.
Etkrne, to eternise or render im-
mortal.
Then thus I spake, O spirits diuine and
learned,
Whose happy labours haue your lands
eterned. — Sylvester, Babylon, 697.
O idiot's shame, and envy of the learned !
O verse right-worthy to be ay eterned.
Ibid^ The Trophies, 977.
Ethereality, airiness; spirituality.
Fire, energy, ethereality have departed. I
am the soil without the sun, the cask with-
out the wine, the garments without the man.
— Lytton, Pelham, ch. lxxiii.
Etiolated, debilitated.
I bad the pleasure of encountering him ;
left a bullet in one of his poor etiolated arms,
feeble as the wing of a chicken in the pip,
and then thought I had done with the whole
crew. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xv.
Ettle, a nettle. In the Chwardens'
Accounts of Minchinghamptoii. 1688,
one shilling appears as paid "for
cutting ettles" {ArchceoL, xxxv. 451).
Euchite, one who prays.
Fanatick Brrour and Levity would seem
an Euchite as well as an Eristick, Prayant
as well as predicant, a Devotionist as well as
a Disputant, insinuating itself with no less
cunning under a Votary's Cowle than in a
Doctor's Chair, in Prayers, Sacraments, and
Euchologies as well as in Preachings, Dis-
putations, and Writings. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 93.
Euclionism, stinginess: from Euclio,
a miser, im.the Anlularia of Plautus.
See quotation more at length, s. v.
Hdddle-duddle.
Their miserable euclionisme and snudgery.
— Nashe, Lenten Stujfe (Harl. Misc., vi. 147).
EudjEMON, a good angel. See quota-
tion more at length, s. v. Cacodemonise.
The simple appendage of a tail will caco-
demonise the Eudemon. — Southey, The Doctor,
Fragm. on Beards.
EudjEMonism, a system which attri-
butes happiness to good luck or destiny.
Ethics, braced up into stoical vigour by
renouncing all effeminate dallyings with Eu~
damonism, would indirectly have co-operated
with the sublime ideals of Christianity. — De
Quincey, Last Bays of Kant.
Eunuch, as an adj., = unproductive.
He had a mind wholly eunuch and un-
EUNUCHISE
( 224 )
EVICKE
generative in matter* of literature and taste.
— Godwin, MandevUU, Hi. 90.
Eunuchise, to emasculate.
Never thinking them or their Religion
sufficiently circumcised, till they are quite
excoriated, exsected, eunuehised, that is, made
so poor and dispirited. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 821.
Eupeptic, having a good digestion ;
healthful. 8ee quotation «. v. Eu-
PRACTIC.
The eupeptic right-thinking nature of the
man, his sanguineous temper with its vivacity
and sociality, .... all these fitted Baillie to
he a leader in General Assemblies and con-
claves, a man deputable to the London Par-
liament and elsewhither. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 224.
Eupbactic, acting well.
An easy laconic gentleman of grave polite-
ness ; apt to lose temper at play, yet on the
whole good-humoured, eupeptic, and «m-
practic. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 215.
Euthanasia The Diets, give this
word with a quotation from Sp. Hall,
but it does not seem to have been quite
naturalized in 1678, when Abp. San-
croft, writing to Bp. Morley, says —
There is no man, I think, who, observing
you to make to land, and ready to put into
port, did not follow you with his good wishes
that your anchors and cable might hold ; that
you might ride safe there from all harms,
and enjoy a long and an easy old age, and
at last find that happy tvdavaata that always
attends a life led according to the rules of
our great and common Master. — D'Oyley's
Life of Sancroft, ch. iv.
Evacuatory, a purge.
An imposthume calls for a lance, and op-
pletion for unpalatable evacuatories. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 809.
E vacuity, a vacancy.
Fit it was, therefore, so many evacuitie*
should be filled up, to mount the meeting to
a competent number. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI.
ix. 7.
Evanesce, to vanish in a subtle or
imperceptible way.
I believe him to have evanesced or evapor-
ated.— De Quincey, Conf. of an Opium-eater,
p. 79.
Evangelicalism, the teaching and
habits of those who styled themselves
Evangelical ; low-Church ism.
Evangelicalism had cast a certain suspicion
as of plague-infection over the few amuse-
ments which survived in the provinces. — G.
Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xvi.
Evapor, to evaporate. The word
occurs again in Sandys, p. 268.
JStna here thunders with an horrid noise ;
Sometimes blacke clouds euaporeth to skies.
Sandys, Travels, p. 243.
Evasive, an evasion.
The party took courage, and fallowed their
game full cry, like hounds in view, without
much trouble about precautions and evasive* :
they stuck at nothing. — North, Examen, p.
90.
But what may not be said and wrote, if
this author's evasive* may pass? — Ibid. p.
899.
Eve-droppbb, a thief ; one who loiters
about a house for an unlawful purpose.
It is usually applied to a spy or listener,
and spelt eaves or eves-dropper; eaves
is both sing, and plural.
Soldiers may come within the statute of
murder, as well as pads on the highway, and
may be as guilty of thefts as eve-droppers or
cut-purses.— Gentleman Instructed, p. 181.
Eveish, curious, like Eve.
I saw it was a long letter; I felt very
Eveish, my dear ; Lacy said afterwards that
I did so leer at it ; an ugly word, importing
slyness. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 210.
Even-down, downright, plain, simple.
The rain, which had hitherto fallen at
intervals, in an undecided manner, now bunt
forth in what in Scotland is emphatically
called an even-down pour. — Miss Ferrier, In-
heritance, vol. II. ch. xvi.
Oh what a moody moralist yon grow !
Tet in the even-down letter you are right.
Taylor, Ph. van AH., Pt. I. i. 10.
Everlasting, a strong sort of cloth.
H. says u formerly much worn by serv-
ants.
From the quickset hedge aforesaid he now
raised, with all due delicacy, a well-worn and
somewhat dilapidated jacket, of a stuff by-
drapers most pseudonymouslv termed " ever-
lasting"— Ingoldsby Legends (Jarvifs Wig).
Evebsive, destructive, subversive,
which is the commoner word.
No man or nations of men can possibly be
bound by any consents or contracts eversive
of the laws of God and of their own nature.
—H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 39.
Such a strange medley of fighting incon-
sistencies and self-evident absurdities . . . are
wholly eversive of every principle of right,
reason, and common sense. — Ibid. ii. 133.
Evicke, ibex.
The evicke skipping from a rock into the
breast he smote,
And headlong feU'd him from his cliff.
Chapman, Iliad, iv. 122.
EVIDENCER
( 225 ) EXCURSIONER
Evidences, a witness.
Oatea wrought, as it seems, for bis good,
to bring him into the preferment of an
etidencer's place.— Nort h, Examen, p. 238.
Means were made that he should have an
allowance and his pardon, to capacitate him
for swearing all this, and no body knows
what more. The King granted the former
for some time, but would not cany the latter
so far as to restore him to the state of an
evidencer. — Ibid. p. 259.
Evidible, capable of giving evidence.
Every of which particulars will be justif yd,
if need should require, by the othes of divers
evidible witnesses. — Yorkshire Diaries, 1647
{Surtees Soc.), p. 21.
EvULGE, to publish.
I made this recueil meerly for mine own
entertainment, and not with any intention
to evulge it. — Pre/, to A nnot. on Sir T. Browne* $
Beligio Medici.
Ewe-necked, having a hollow in the
neck.
The animal he bestrode was a broken-down
plough-horse . . . gaunt and shagged, with a
ewe-neck, and a head like a hammer. — Irving,
Sketch Book {Sleepy Hollow).
Such a courser ! all blood and bone, short-
backed, broad-chested, and, but that he was
a little ewe-necked, faultless in form and
figure. — Ingoldtby Legends {Grey Dolphin).
Ewrie, the place where the ewers for
washing the hands before and after
meals were kept. See H., s. v. ewery.
u No," says the King, w shew me the way,
111 go to Sir Richard's chamber,** which he
immediately did, walking along the entries
after me, as far as the ewrie, till he came up
into the roome where I also lay.— Evelyn,
Diary, March 1, 1671.
Exaggerative, hyperbolical.
Hear Vicars, a poor human soul sealously
prophesying as if through the organs of an
ass, in a not mendacious, yet loud-spoken,
exaggerative, more or less asinine manner.—-
Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 142.
Exam, examination (a common ab-
breviation).
Things may be altered since the writer of
this novelette went through his exam. —
Driven to Borne (1877), p. 67.
Exasperate, to increase in severity ;
usually an active verb.
The distemper exasperated, till it was mani-
fest she could not last many weeks. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, i. 158.
Excath borate, to condemn authori-
tatively or ex cathedra.
Whom sho'd I feare to write to, if I can
Stand before you, my learn'd diocesan ?
And never shew blood-guiltinesse or feare
To see my lines excathedrated here.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 66.
Excelbitudb, height.
"Bouse thy spirites out of this drowse
lethargie of mellancholly they are drencht
in, and wrest them up to the most out-
stretched ayry straine of elevation, to chauut
and carroll forth the alteza and excelsitude of
this monarchal! fludy induperator. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffs {Harl. Misc., vi. 157).
Excerebrate, to cast out from the
brain.
Hath it [faith] not sovereign virtue in it to
excerebrate all cares, expectorate all fears and
griefs ?— Ward, Sermons, p. 25.
Excise, duty on certain articles con-
sumed at home. Howell fixes the
Great Rebellion as the time when this
word became familiar. The only in-
stance supplied by the Diets, of an
earlier date is one from Sir J. Hay ward.
We have brought those exotic words plun-
dering and storming, and that once abomin-
able word excise, to be now familiar among
them. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 37.
Exciseman, the extract shows that
this word was not in literary use at the
time.
A certain number of Gangers, called by
the Vulgar, Excise-men.— Defoe, Tour thro9
G. Britain, ii. 108.
Excrdciament, anguish.
To this wild of sorrowes and excruciament
she was confined. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs
{Harl. Misc., vi. 177).
Excurse, to digress : excur is in the
Diets.
But how I excurse! Yet thou usedst to
say thou likedst my excursions. — Biehardson,
CI. Harlowe, iii. 71.
Excursion, projecting addition to a
building.
Sure I am that small excursion out of
gentlemen's halls in Dorcetshire (respect it
Bast or West) is commonly called an orial.—
Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 285.
Let the model of countrey Churches be well
observed, wherein such excursions of building
as present themselves beyond the old fabric*
(from which ofttimes they differ, as neater
and newer) were since erected, and added, as
intended and used for chanteries. — Ibid. p.
354.
Excursioner, one who goes on nn
excursion. Excursionist is more usual
Q
EXCURSIVENESS ( 226 ) EXPECTORATE
now, and is marked "recent" by L.,
who gives no example.
The royal excur si oners did not return till
between six and seven o'clock. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, III. 111.
Exoursiveness, a running out. The
extract seems to imply that the word
was a new one. The only example in
the Diets, is of the date 1798.
Remember that your excursiveness (allow
me the word, I had a rasher in my head)
upon old maids and your lord, can only please
yourself. — Richardson, Grandison, v. 313.
Excutikidian, one who believes that
saving faith or grace can be wholly
lost or shaken off.
I am sorry that any of onr new Excutijidi-
ans should pester your Suffolk. — Bp. Halt,
Works, x. 499.
Execrations, cursing.
Off went his hat to one corner of the
room, his wig to the other. D — n — n seize
the world ! and a whole volley of such like
execrations wishes. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
viii. 99.
Execrative, vilifying, cursing.
Foul old Rome screamed execratively her
loudest, so that the true shape of many
things is lost for us. . . . Into the body of
the poor Taters, execrative Roman history
intercalated an alphabetic letter; and so
they continue Tartars of fell Tartarean
nature to this day. — Carlyle, Pr, Rev., Pt.
III. Bk. i. ch. i.
Execratory, abusive, denunciatory.
I shall take the liberty of narrating Lance-
lot's fanatical conduct without execratory
comment, certain that he will still receive
his just reward of condemnation. — C. Kings-
ley, Yeast, ch. xiv.
Executant, one who executes or
performs.
Rosamond, with the executants instinct,
had seized his manner of playing. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. xvi.
Exeltered, furnished with an axle-
tree. In his catalogue of " husbandlie
furniture " Tusser reckons,
Strong exeltered cart that is clouted and shod.
Husbandries p. 36.
Exemit, taken out of the common
herd, excellent.
Of whose fair sex we come to offer seven,
The most exempt for excellence.
Chapman, Iliad, ix. 004.
Exhilaraxt, that which exhilarates.
To Leonard it was an exhilarant and a
cordial which rejoiced and strengthened
him.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxxvii.
Exigent, requiring, standing in need
of ; the word is not uncommon a* a
substantive = necessity, and L. has
one instance of it as an adjective from
Burke, but rather in the sense of press-
ing or critical, " this exigent moment."
But now this body, exigent of rest,
"Will needs put in a claim.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. i. 2.
This age
Shall aptly choose as answering best its own,
A love that dims not, nor is exigent,
Encumbers not the active purposes,
Nor drains their source.
Ibid., Edtcin the Fair, ii. 2.
Exioenter, " an officer of the Com-
mon Pleas who makes out exigents and
proclamations in all actions in which
process of outlawry lies " (Bailey).
The cursitors are by counties; these are
the Lord Chancellor's. The philizers. and
exigenters are by counties also, and are of the
Common Pleas.— North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 186.
Exoculation, putting out eyes.
The history of Europe during the dark
ages abounds with examples of exoculation%
as it was called by those writers who endea-
voured, towards the middle of the seven-
teenth century, to introduce the style-ornate
into our prose, after it had been banished
from poetry. — Southey, Roderick, ii. note.
Expansivity, expansiveness.
In a word offences (of elasticity or expans-
ivity) have accumulated to such height in
the lad's fifteenth year, that there is a deter-
mination taken on the part of Rhadaman-
thus-Scriblerus to pack him out of doors. —
Carlyle, Misc., iv. 87.
Expectedly, in conformity with ex-
pectation.
Lord Mansfield . . . unexpectedly is sup-
ported by the late Chancellor, the' Duke of
Newcastle, and that part of the Ministry,
and very expectedly by Mr. Fox. — Walpolt to
Mann, iii. 277 (1768).
Expectless, unexpected.
But when hee saw mee enter so expectlesse,
To heare his base exclaimes of mnrther, mur-
ther,
Made mee thinke noblesse lost, in him quicke
buried.
Chapman, Revenge of Bussy DyAmbois,
Act II.
Expectorate, to clear the breast,
and so to confide. Now only used of
spitting. See quotation s. v. Excere-
BRATE.
Sir George came hither yesterday to ex-
pectorate with me, as he called it. Think
EXPEDIENCY ( 227 )
EXSCRIPT
bow I pricked up my ears, as high as King
Midas, to hear a Lyttelton vent his griev-
ances against a Pitt and Qrenvilles. — Wal-
pole, Letters, i. 370 (1754).
Expediency, expedient.
The Doctor was chosen by the college of
Westminster their clerk to sit in convoca-
tion, where he proposed a most excellent
expediency (which would be of happy use if
still continued), for the satisfaction of some
scrupulous members in the House of Com-
mons, about the ceremonies of our Church.
— Barnard, Life of Heylxn, p. cxvii.
Expedientially, for the Bake of ex-
pediency.
"Whenever we deviate — though we should
never deviate save expedientially — from
accepted usage, a strict observance of ana-
logy, and of aualogy taken in its most com-
prehensive acceptation, is invariably indis-
pensable.— Hall, Modern English, p. 39.
Expenditrix, a woman who dis-
burses money.
Mrs. Celier was the go-between and ex-
penditrix in affair*, which lay much in
relieving of Catholics, and takiug them out
of prisons. — North, Examen, p. 257.
Expeboefaction, awaking ; arous-
ing.
Having, after such a long noctivagation
and variety of horrid visions, returned to my
perfect experyefaction, I began, by a serious
recollection of myself, to recall to my
thoughts by way of reminiscence those dis-
mal! and dreadfull objects that had appeared
unto me. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 45.
Expert, one who has had special
experience in some branch of study.
This noun is now in frequent use, but
is not in the Diets.
How bountifully have Providence and the
wisdom of .our ancestors provided us with
popes, priests, philologists, and other pro-
curators, specialists, and experts. — Hall,
Modem English, p. 38.
Expiscatory, fishing out
By innumerable confrontations and expis-
catory questions, through entanglements,
doublings, and windings that fatigue eye
and soul, this most involute of lies is finally
winded off. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch.
xvi.
Expleat, satisfy.
Nothing under an Infinite can expleat and
satiate the immortal minde of man. — Fuller^
Pisgah Sight, IV. vii. 2.
Expletive. In ordinary use, and in
all the quotations given in the Diets.,
this substantive has reference to words
which fill up a line or speech, but are
in themselves superfluous : perbops its
most frequent application at present is
to on the, but in the extract it means
diddledomes (q. v.) or kickshaws.
There were three fine grown pullets, an
excellent Yorkshire ham, a loin of veal, and
the custard-pudding which Mrs. Quick had
tossed up, adorned with currant-jelly, a
gooseberry tart, with other ornamental ex-
pletives of the same kind. — Grates, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. IX. ch. xv.
Expression al, belonging to expres-
sions ; phraseological.
To enumerate and criticize all the verbal
and expressional solecisms which disfigure
our literature would be an undertaking of
enormous labour. — Hall, Modern English,
p. 36.
Expressionless, devoid of expression.
For their depth of expressionless calm, of
passionless peace, a polar snow-field could
alone offer a type. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch.
xx.
He was a small man, with an impenetrable,
expressionless face, who never was known to
unbend himself to a human being. — H.
Kinusley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xiii.
Tne hard, glittering, expressionless eyea
were watching her. — Black, Princess of Thule,
ch. xvi.
Expressless, inexpressible.
I may pour forth my soul into thine arms,
With words of love, whose moaning inter*
course
Hath hitherto been stayed with wrath and
hate
Of our expressless bann'd inflictions.
Marlowe, 1 Tamburlaine, V. ii.
Expuqnance, capture.
If he that dreadful JSgia bears, and Pallas,
grant to me
Th* expug nance of well-builded T*oy, I first
will honour thee
Next to myself with some rich gift.
Chapman, Iliad, viii. 247.
Exquiritiveness, exquisiteneBS.
If this specimen of Slawkenbergius*s tales,
and the exquisitiveness of his moral, should
please the world, translated shall a couple of
volumes be.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iii. 118.
Exrcript, extracted writing. Davies
describes our Lord's Passion as the poll-
deed by which we are discharged trom
our liabilities. "The speare the pen,
His pretious blood the inke." lie does
not insert the s when it follows ex.
There are two examples of this in the
extract. See also Exstercorate.
Ah, might it please Thy dread Exuperanoe
To write th'excript thereof in humble hearts.
Davies, Holy Roods, p. 13.
Q 2
EXSIBILATION ( aa8 )
EYE
Exsibilation, hissing off ; condemn-
ation.
Who can choose hut blush to hear those
who would go for Orthodox Christians, now,
at the latter end of the day, after so many
ages of exsibilation, to take upon them the
defence of a noted heretic? — Bp. Hall,
Works, x. 237.
Exstercorats, to dung out For the
spelling see Exscript.
Shall fleshlesse frailtie, O shall euer flesh
Extercorate her filth Thee to annoy?
Davies, Holy Roods, p. 20.
Exsuffle, to breathe upon.
At Easter and Whitsontide .... they
which were to be baptized were attired in
white garments, exorcised, and exsuffied, with
sundrie ceremonies, which I leave to the
learned in Christian antiquities. — Holland's
Camden, p. 768.
Extenuative, extenuating plea or
circumstance.
The Author brings in the matter by way
of enormity, one of those that is to extenuate
the intended rebellion and massacre at the
Bye, where we shall arrive as soon as these
extenuatives are dismissed. — North, Examen,
p. 320.
Enter then a concise character of the
times, which he puts forward as another
extenuative of the intended rebellion. — Ibid.
p. 370.
Exteriall, external.
Fyrst beware in especiall
Of the outwarde man exteriall,
Though he shewe a fayre aperaunce.
Boy and Barlow, Read me and
be nott wroth, p. 123.
Extebminion, extermination. See
H. 8. v.
To whom she werketh vtter confusion and
exterminion, the same persones she doeth
firste laughe upon and flatre with some vn-
quod prosperitee of things. — UdaTs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 182.
Externity, outwardness.
The internity of His ever-living light
kindled up an externity of corporeal irradi-
ation.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 249.
Extractable, able to be extracted.
No more money was extractable from his
pocket. — Dickens. Uncommercial Traveller,
• • • ™
XXV1U.
Extravaoanzi8T, extravagant or
eccentric person.
Cornelius Webbe is one of the best of
that numerous school of extravaganzists who
spraup from the ruins of Lamb.— £. A. Foe,
Marginalia, exv.
Extbumperb, extempore: a jocose
perversion of the word.
Sir Thomas More in lyke case gybeth at
one that made vaunt of certeyn pild verses
clowted vp extrumpere. — Stanyhurst, Virgil,
Dedic.
Extrinsecals, outward accidents or
circumstances; things not pertaining
to the substance.
Knox and Whittingham were as much
bent against the substance of the book as
against any of the circumstantials and «r-
trinsecals which belonged unto it. — Hcylin,
Reformation, ii. 179.
Exul, exile. The Latin word pro-
bably got into the text inadvertently.
Seeing his soldiers somewhat distressed, he
sendeth for the regiment of the Roman exuls.
— Holland, Livy, p. 46.
Exustible, capable of being burnt up.
Contention is like fire, for both burn so
long as there is any exustible matter to con-
tend with. — Adams, ii. 149.
Eye, a window.
All the nobility had contracted themselves
to live in coops of a dining-room, a dark
back-room with one eye in a corner, and a
closet.— WalpoU to Mann, i. 318 (1743).
Eye. At eye = at a glance, very
plainly.
We trust that He whose cause it is, and
who hath begun this notable work in you,
shall perform it to the glory of God, . . . and
to the comfort of the whole Christian world,
which, as may appear daily at eye, laboareth
universally to be disburdened from that old
tyrannical yoke. — Abo. Parker to Q. Eliz,
(Correspondence, p. 130).
Eye. All my eye = nonsense ; un-
true. Sometimes, "all my eye and
Betty Martin ; " the explanation that it
whs the beginning of a prayer, M O
mxki beate Martine" will not hold
water. Dr. Butler, when head-master
of Shrewsbury (he became Bp. of Lich-
field in 1836), told his boys that it arose
from a gipsy woman in Shrewsbury
named Betty Martin giving a black eye
to a constable, who was chaffed by the
boys accordingly. The expression must
have been common in 1837, as Dickens
give 8 one of the Brick-lane Temperance
testimonials as from "Betty Martin,
widow, one child, and one eye n (Pick-
wick, ch. xxxiii.) ; it occurs also in St.
Ronari* Well, ch. xxxi. All my eye
may have come from the phrase us^d
by Bramhall and Brown, which Fuller
EYE
( 229 )
E YE- WAITER
soys was used proverbially of him who
made a bargain detrimental to himself
( Worthies, Anglesey, ii. 671).
You have had conferences and conferences
again at Poissy and other places, and gained
by them just as much as you might put in
your eye, and see never the worse, — Bram-
hall, i. 68.
Bating Namure,he might have put all the
glorious harvests he yearly reap'd there into
his eye, and not have prejudice! his royal
sight in the least.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 329.
The tenderness of spring is all my eye,
And that is blighted. — Hood, Spring.
Eye. To have by the eye, i. e. in
abundance, so that it should satisfy the
eye as well as the stomach.
Ith. Troth, master, I'm loth such a pot of
pottage should be spoiled.
Bar. Peace, Ithamore, 'tis better so than
spared;
Assure thyself thou shalt have broth by the
eye;
My purse, my coffer, and myself is thine.
Marlowe, Jew of Malta, iii. 4.
Here's money and gold by tji* eye, my boy.
Beaum. and Fl., Knt. of B. Pestle, ii. 2.
Eye-bbkis, eye-lashes (?).
They die their eye-breis and eye-browes:
(the latter by art made high, halfe circular,
and to meete, if naturally they do not.) —
Sandys, Travel*, p. 67.
Eye-brine, tears.
The Judge that would be lik'st Him, when
he giues
His doome on the delinquent most that
grieues
Powders his words in Eye-brine.
Davies, Sir T. Overbury, p. 13.
Eyebbowlks8, without eyebrows.
In those four male personages, although
compleadonless and eyebrowless, I beheld four
subjects of the Family P. Salcy. — Dickens,
Uncommercial Traveller, xxv.
Eye-retorting, looking backward.
And a third rode upon a rounded rack,
As on the eye-retorting dolphin's back,
That let Anon ride him for the pleasure
Of his touched harp.
Leigh Hunt, Foliage, p. 28.
Eyes. " To cry one's eyes out," to
weep excessively. Fuller puns on this
expression.
The face of the Church was so blubber'd
with teares, that she may seem almost to
have wept her eyes out, having lost her Beers
and principall pastours. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., I.
▼.22.
Eye-sorrow, eye-sore ; a grievance
to the eight.
Saint Antoine turns out, as it has now
often done, and, apparently with little super-
fluous tumult, moves eastward to that eye-
sorrow of Vincennes. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
II. Bk. III. ch. v. <i
These hungry magnificent individuals, of
whom Sardanapalus Hay is one, and supreme
Oar another, are an eye-sorrow to English
subjects. — Ibid., Misc., Iv. 319.
Eye-spot, a kind of lily of a violet
or black colour, with a red spot in the
midst of each leaf. See note in loc.
And here amid her sable cup
Shines the red eye-spot, like one brightest star
The solitary twinkler of the night.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. VI.
Eye-star, the centre of the eye-spot,
q. v. (?).
The episodes and digressions fringe [the
story] like so many featherlets leading up to
that catastrophe, the gem or eye-star, for
which the whole was formed, and in which
all terminate. — Southey, The Doctor, Preface.
Eye - wages, specious but unsub-
stantial payment.
If sometimes He temporally reward hypo-
crites, is it not either for their own or for
their work's sake, as if He either accepted
their persons or approved their obedience?
.No ; it is but lex talionis, He dealeth with
them as they deal with Him. They do Him
but eye-service, and He giveth them but eye-
wages. — Sanderson, iii. 28.
Eye -waiter, an eye -servant; one
who is only careful while the master's
eye is on him.
His lordship's indulgence to servants cost
him very dear ; for most of them were but
eye-waiters, and diligent only for fear of los-
ing their places, otherwise negligent and
wasteful.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii.
316.
FAB UL ATE
( J3° )
FAIE
F
Tabulate, to fable.
[The tongue is] w> guarded ... as if it
were with giauts in an enchanted tower, as
they fabulate, that no man may tame it.—
Adams, i. 10.
Fac, faith ; a word that appears in
oaths in slightly varied forms as below.
Dap. rtac I do not, you are mistaken.
Face. How ! swear by your fac, and in a
thing so known unto the doctor ? . . .
Dap. r foe's no oath.
Jonson, Alchemist, I. i.
E. Know. No, no, you shall not protest, cox.
Step. By my fackings but I will, by your
leave. — Ibid., Lv. Man in his Hum., i. 2.
I suppose he has left me mourning ; but
ifackins if that be all, the devil shall wear
it for him for me. — Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk.
V. ch. viii.
Vfags the gentleman has oanght a Tartar,
says Mr. Towwousa.— Ibid., Joseph Andrews,
Bk. I. oh. ziv.
Facer, a braggadocio ; one who pos-
sesses cheek.
Shall the adversaries of the truth be dumb ?
Nay, there be no greater talkers, nor boasters,
and facers than they be. — Latimer, i. 268.
Facer, a blow in the face. See
another extract from Barhain, 8. v. Fib.
As the knife gleam'd on high, bright and
sharp as a razor,
Blogg, starting upright, tipped the fellow a
facer. — Ingoldsby Legends (Bagman's Dog)%
I should have been a stercoraceous mendi-
cant if I had hollowed when I got a facer. —
C. Kingsley, Letter, May 1856.
Faciate, front, facade (Ital. facci-
at a).
The faciate of this Cathedral is remarkable
for its historical carving. — Evelyn, Diary,
June 27, 1654.
Facsimile, an exact copy ; this word
does not seem to have been common in
North's time.
He took a paper, and made what they call
a fac simile of the marks and distances of
those small specks, as were not scraped out.
— North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 109.
Factor, to trade or act as agents.
Send your prayers and good works to factor
there for you, and have a stock employed in
God's banks to pauperous and pious uses. —
Ward, Sermons, p. 173.
Factorage, agent's commission.
He put £1000 into Dudley's hands to trade
for him, to the end that his brother Montague
might have the benefit of the factorage, —
North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 292.
Fad, whim, fancy.
" It is your favourite fad to draw plans. w
" Fad to draw plans ! Do you think I only
care about my fellow-creatures' houses in
that childish way ? »—G. Eliot, Middlemarch,
ch. iv.
Fadoodles, trifles, nonsense.
And when all the stuff in the letters are
scann'd what fadoodles are brought to light.
—Hacket, Ufeof Williams,ii. 131.
Fag, to work hard, to labour. R.,
who gives this sense with no example,
says, '• The verb and noun, though
common in speech (especially at our
public schools), are not so in writing."
I am sure I faa more for fear of disgrace
than for hope of profit. — Mad. D'Arbtay,
Diary, i. 235.
When Mr. Minns had fogaed up the shady
side of Fleet-street, Oheapcdde, and Thread-
needle-street, he had become pretty warm. —
Sketches by Boz (Mr. Minns).
Fag, a boy in the lower part of the
school who has to perform various
offices for a senior laa who is said to
fag him.
Oh for that small, small beer anew,
And (heaven's own type) that mild sky-blue
That wash'd my sweet meals down ;
The master even ! and that small Turk
Thkt fagu'd me ! worse is now my work.
A fag for all the town.
Hood, Retrospective Review.
Fag, fatigue.
Mr. Allen says it is nine, measured nine,
but 1 am sure it can not be more than eight,
and it is such a fag, I come back tired
to death. — Miss Austen, Northanger Abbey,
ch. iii.
Faggery, the syBtem of fagging at
public schools.
Faggery was an abuse too venerable and
sacred to be touched by profane hands. — De
Quincey, Autob. Sketches, l. 210.
Fair, to prosper. Hcec turn successit,
olid oggrediendum est vid ; that is,
This waie it will ne frame ne foie,
Therefore must we proue an other waie.
UdoVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 373.
FAILER
( 231 )
FALLTRAP
Faileb, failure.
Granting that Philip wan the younger;
yet on the fader or other legal interruption
of the Line of Margaret, . . . the Queen of
England might put in for the next Succession.
— Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 131.
Faineance, sloth, indolence.
The mask of sneering faineance was gone ;
imploring tenderness and earnestness beamed
from his whole countenance. — C. Kingsley,
Hypatia, ch. xxvii.
Faixtfull, faint, languishing.
Gather all in one
Those fluent springs of your lamenting tears,
And let them stream along my faintfuH
looks. — Greene, Orl. Fur., p. 98.
Fair. After the fair = too late.
The subjoined, which is of the date
1597, shows the origin of this expres-
sion. See another early instance from
Nashe, s. v. Encaptive.
A ballad, be it neuer so good, it goes a
begging after the faire. — Breton, Wifs
Trenehmour, p. 9.
Fairwkather, delicate. See quota-
tion from Smollett, 8. v. Wishy-washy.
No, master, I would not hurt you ; me-
thinks I could throw a dozen of such fair-
weather gentlemen as you are.— if. Brooke,
Fool of Quality, ii. 165.
Fairyism, that which resembles or is
suggestive of fairies.
The duchess of Grafton, who had never
happened to be here before . . . perfectly
entered into the air of enchantment and
fairyism which is the tone of the place. —
Walpole, Letters, ii. 431 (1763).
Fairy-money, money given by the
fairies was said after a time to change
into withered leaves or rubbish. H.
gives fairy-money = found treasure.
In one day Scott's high-heaped money-
wages became fairy-money and nonentity. —
Carlyle, Misc. fv. 181.
Pisistratus draws the bills warily from his
Kcket, half-suspecting they must already
ve turned into withered leaves like fairy*
money. — Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XVII. ch. vi.
Fairy pavements, cubes used in
Roman pavements. The country people
referred to in the extract are those of
Nottinghamshire.
Some small stone cubes about an inch
square, which the country people called
fairy pavements. — Archetol., viii. 364 (1787).
Faithful, a trusty-adherent. See
extract from the same paper, %. v.
Purse-leech.
"We likewise call to mind your other bill
for his majesty's referring the choice of his
privy-couucil unto jou, coloured by your
outcries against those his old faithfuls. —
British Bellman, 1648 (Harl. Misc., vii. 626).
Faithfdllist, a believer.
Ton have not long ago seen, read, and
understood the great and inestimable Chron-
icles of the huge and mighty giant Gargan-
tua,and like upright faithful lists (fdeles),
have firmly believed all to be true that is
contained in them. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
II. (Prologue).
Fake, to rob (thieves' cant).
All who in Blois entertain honest views
Have long been in bed, and enjoying a snooze,
Nought is waking save Mischief and Faking
And a few who are sitting up brewing or
baking. — Ingoldsby Legends (S. Aloys).
There the folk are music-bitten, and they
molest not beggars, unless they fake to boot,
and then they drown us out of hand. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. lv.
Fakement, any dishonest practice
(thieves' cant).
I cultivated his acquaintance, examined his
affairs, and put him up to the neatest little
fakement in the world ; just showed him how
to raise two hundred pounds and clear him-
self with everybody, just by signing his
father's name. — H. Kingsley, Oeqffry Hamlyn,
ch. v.
Fal-lal, finicking.
The family-plate too in such quantities, of
two or three years1 standing, must not be
changed, because his precious child, humour-
ing his old fal-lal taste, admired it, to make
it all her own. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i.
322.
Fallalishly. I suppose the word
= sentimentally ; the old maid referred
to had had a love disappointment in
former years.
Some excuse lies good for an old soul whose
whole life has been but one dream a little
fallalishly varied. — Richardson, Grandison, v.
300.
Fallals, showy dress or ornaments.
Mrs. Prim. And thou dost really think
those fallals become thee ?
Mrs. Lov. I do indeed. — Centlivre, Bold
Stroke for a Wife, Act II.
He found his child's nurse, and his wife,
and his wife's mother, busily engaged with a
multiplicity of boxes, with flounces, feathers,
fallals, and finery. — Thackeray , Nticcomes,
ch. lxxi.
Falltrap, a trap to lead to a fall, or
perhaps a trap that falls from under one.
We walk in a world of plots ; strings uni-
versally spread of deadly gins and falltrap s
FAMEFUL
( 232 ) FARCE AND LADLE
baited by the gold of Pitt.— CarlyU, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. IU. Bk. VI. ch. i.
Fameful, famous.
Whose foaming stream strives proudly to
compare
(Even in the birth) with fame-fulTst floods
that are.
Sylvester, third day, first veeke, 377.
If many worlds ye seek, or ages line,
Perhaps ye should not find occasion such
As now rich Opportunity doth giue
To make you fame full, though it empt
your pouche. — Davies, Bien Venu, p. 6.
Famili8tic, pertaining to the sect
called the Family of Love.
And such are, for onght that ever I could
discern, those Seraphick, Anabaptistick, and
Familistick Hyperboles, those proud swelling
words of vanity and novelty with which those
men use to deceive the simple and credulous
sort of people.— Gauden, Team of the Church,
p. 195
Fan is used very curiously in the
subjoined ; probably it is a mistake for
fantasy. There is a marginal reference
to Acts xzv. 23, where Agrippa and
Bernice are described as comtng ptra.
woXX^fc pavracriaz. Even then the use of
fantasy for pomp or show is, in Eng-
lish, remarkable.
All the power of all the princes on the
earth have not power over one silly soul to
destroy it. All the glory of them is called *
but a great big fan or pomp. — Andrews, Ser-
mons, v. 553.
Fanaticise, to act as a fanatic.
A man once committed headlong to re-
publican or any other transcendentalism,
and fighting and fanaticising amid a nation
of his like, becomes as it were enveloped in
an ambient atmosphere of transcendentalism
and delirium.— CarlyU, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk.
III. ch. ii.
Fancical, fanciful. The extract is
quoted in Southeys Doctor, ch. xciv.
After they have completed their tuning,
they will (if they be masters) fall into some
kind of voluntary or fancical play more in-
telligible.—?'. Mace, 1676.
Fancify, to fancy— for which it is
perhaps a misprint.
The good she ever delighted to do, and
fancified she was born to do. — Richardson.
CI. Harlowe, vi. 344.
Fancy, the prize rinff, or pugilism.
See quotation from Southey, *. v. Fib.
They hurried to be present at the ex-
pected scene with the alacrity of gentlemen
of the fancy hastening to a set-to.— Scott, St.
Jtomnsi mil, ii. 211.
The clients were proud of their lawyers'
unscrupulousness, as the natrons of the fancy
are proud of their champion's condition. — G.
Eliot, Janet's Repentance, ch. ii.
Fanfaronadino, flourishing; display.
The Diets, have fanfaron and fan-
faronade.
There, with ceremonial evolution and ma-
noeuvre, with fanfaronadino, musketry sal-
voes, and what else the Patriot genius could
devise, they made oath and obtestation to
stand faithfully by one another under law
and king.— CarlyU, Fr. Revn Pt. II. Bk. I.
ch. viii.
Fanfaroon, a flourish, or show.
To Sir G. Carteret; and, among other
things, he told me that he was not for the
fanfaroone, to make a show with a great title,
as he might have had long since, but the main
thing to get an estate. — Fepys, Aug. 14, 1665.
e -
Fangle, to fashion. The participle
is not uncommon with " new " prefixed.
He that thinks it the part of a well-learned
man to have read diligently the ancient
stories of the Church, and to be no stranger
in the volumes of the Fathers, shall have all
iudicious men consenting with him ; not
tereby to control aud new fangle the Scrip-
ture, God forbid ! but to mark how corrup-
tion and apostasy crept in by degrees. —
Milton, Of Frelattcal Episcopacy.
Fantailed. The hat usually worn
by coalheavers, dustmen, &c. is so
called from having a flap at the back,
spreading out like a fan.
Amazed she stands,
Then opes the door with cinder-sabled hands,
And " Matches " calls. The dustman,bubbled
flat,
Thinks 'tis for him, and doffs his fan-taiVd
hat.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 142.
Fantast, a fanciful person.
Somewhat too little of a fantast, this Votes
of ours! — CarlyU, Misc., iv. 159.
It is not easy for me to write, without a
strong sense of loathing, the name of this
acrid fantast, and idoliser of brute force. —
Hall, Modern English, p. 19.
Fantasticality, fantasticalness.
No affectation, fantasticality, or distortion
dwelt in him! no shadow of cant. — CarlyU,
Misc., iv. 146.
Fab, to remove to a distance.
I'm sure I wish the man was farred who
plagues his brains wi? striking out new words.
— Mrs. GaskeU, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. x.
Fabce and ladle, a nonsensical
story. The writer quoted by Swift
FARCICAL
( 233 )
FASTISH
(W. Wotton) refers to the story of the
Ladle versified by Prior.
It is grievous to see him in some of his
writings going oat of his way to be waggish,
to tell ns of u a cow that pricked up her tail ; "
and in his answer to this discourse, he says,
"it U all a farce and ladle."— Swift, Tale of
a Tub ; Apdl. for Author.
A ladle for our silver dish
Is what I want, is what I wish.
A ladle, cries the man, a ladle!
'Odzooks. Corisca, you have prayed ill :
What should be great you turn to farce.
Prior, The Ladle.
Farcical. The farcy is a disease in
horses which Sterne imprecates on the
li imilatorum servum pecus," and so
farcical house is one to receive such
people; perhaps there is some sort of
allusion to the more ordinary meaning
of farcical,
I scorn to be as abusive as Horace upon
the occasion, but if there is no catachresis in
the wish, and no sin in it, I wish from my
soul that every imitator in Great Britain,
France, and Ireland, had the farcy for his
pains; and that there was a good farcical
house large enough to hold, aye, and sub-
limate them shag-rag and bobtail, male and
female, all together. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
iv. 4.
Farewell, to bid farewell to.
Till she brake from their arms
And fare-welling the flock did homeward
wend. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 91.
Farfalla, a fire-fly; an attempt to
introduce an Italian word into the
language.
Lord giue her me ; alas ! I pine, I die ;
Or if I line, I line her flame-bred flie ;
And (new Farfalla) in her radiant shine
Too bold I borne these tender wings of mine.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 362.
Far-fetcht, well-stored, with many
things fetched from far ?
. . . Nature making her beauty and shape
but the most fair Cabinet of a far-fetcht
minde. — Sidney's Arcadia, p. 506..
Farmage, the management of farms.
They do by farmage
Brynge the londe into a rearage,
Contempnynge the state temporall.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott wroth, p. 102.
But now their ambitious suttlete
Maketh one f earme of two or thre,
Ye some tyme they bringe vi. to one,
"VThich to gentillmen they let in farmage,
Or elies to ryche marchauntes for avauntage,
To the vndoynge of husbande man ech one.
Dyaloge betwene a Gentillman and
a husbandman, p. 139.
Farmstead, farm house or place.
fle takes possession of the farmstead
(Ingles, the place is called) ; barricades him-
self there.— Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. I.
ch. xni.
I . . . then went wandering away far along
chausees, through fields, beyond cemeteries,
Catholic and Protestant, beyond farmsteads,
to lanes and little woods. — miss Bronte,
Villette, ch. xv.
Fashion, a corruption of farcy, a
disease in horses.
If he have outward diseases as the spavin,
splent, ring-bone, wind-gall, or fashion, or,
sir, a galled back, we let him blood. — Greene,
Looking Glass for London, p. 120.
His gouty hocks with fleshy Sashoons,
Like horses lookt that has the Fashions.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 34.
Fashionables, people of fashion. L.
notices this substantival use, but gives
no example.
Here was a full account of the marriage,
and a list of all the fashionables who attended
the fair bride to the hymeneal altar. — Miss
Edgeworth, Helen, ch. ii.
Fast. Calfhill uses the word as
signifying a holy time, and applies it
to the Easter feast.
To begin with that which bred in the
Church a miserable schism for many years
together, the Easter fast ; was it always and
in every place uniformly observed ? — Calfhill,
Answer to Martially p. 269.
Fabt-fancikd, bound by love; the
opposite to fancy-free.
Thou com'st in post from merry Fressingfield,
Fast-fancied to the keeper's bonny lass.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 160.
Fasting-spittle, was supposed to be
Specially efficacious, whether for good
or evil. Adams uses the term in a sort
of punning way, to signify fasting.
Delicate* to excite lust are spurs to post a
man to hell. It is fasting spittle that must
kill his tetter.— Adams, i. 494.
Let him but fasting spit upon a toad,
And presently it bursts and dies.
Massinger, Very Woman, in. 1.
They have their cups and chalices,
Their pardons and indulgences ;
Their beads of nits, bels, books, and wax
Candles forsooth, and other knacks ;
Their holy oyle, their fasting-spittle,
Their sacred salt here not a little.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 98.
Fasti8H, rather fast or dissipated.
The intercourse has commenced under the
auspices of Harry Foker, son of Foker's
Entire, an old school-fellow, a short, stout,
FAT
( 234 )
FAVOUROUS
empty, good-natured, and over-dressed — in
other words a ufastish " young man. — Phil'
lips, Essays from the Times, ii. 330.
Fat. The fat is in the fire = all is in
confusion, or has failed. The speaker
in the first extract is a pedantic school-
master.
O face, tact, or all the fat will be ignified. —
Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 623.
Ger. Here's a woman wanting.
Count. We may go whistle; all the fat's
t' the fire. — Two Noble Kinsmen, iii. 5.
One would have thought that the examina-
tion failing, and no vote passed tending that
way, all this fat had been in the fire. — North,
Examen, p. 023.
Fat, now spelt vat, and applied to a
tub or vessel of large size, but formerly
= any case.
A London alderman . . . sold a Jew five
fatts of right-handed gloves without any
fellows to them.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 23.
Fatamorgana, an optical illusion
which presents a vision of men, palaces,
&c, seen sometimes in the water, some-
times in the air, and most frequently
visible in the Strait of Messina. See
extract from Miss Edge worth,*, v. Beau-
ideal.
He [Coleridge] says once he had skirted
the howling deserts of Infidelity ; this was
evident enough ; but he had not had the
courage, in defiance of pain and terror, to
press resolutely across said deserts to the new
firm lands of Faith beyond ; he preferred to
create logical fatamoryanas for himself on
this hither side, and laboriously solace him-
self with these. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling,
ch. viii.
Father-in-law, the father of one's
husband or wife ; but sometimes used
(though it is a vulgarism) as meaning
step-father. It has this sense in the
extracts, yet the speaker in the first is
Mrs. Howe, who is represented as in a
fair social position, and in the second
is Mrs. Grandcourt, a lady of birth and
education. Cf. Mother-in-law.
I know Nancy could not bear a father-in-
law : she would fly at the very thought of
my being in earnest to give her one. — Rich*
orison, Ul. Harlowe, iv. 186.
I did not like my father-in-law to come
home. — G. Eliot, Darnel Deronda, ch. lvi.
Father-bick, pining after a father.
Cf. Motherbick, Home-sick.
An angel in some things, but a baby in
other*; so father-sick, so family-fond. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii. 316.
Fathom, to engulf.
Instead of his lascivious Delilahs that
fathomed him in the arms of lust, behold
adders, toads, serpents, crawling on his
bosom. — Adams, L 241.
Fatidicency, divination.
Let us make trial of this kind of fatidi-
cency.— Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk. HI. ch. six.
Fatiguesohe, fatiguing, laborious.
The Attorney-General's place is very nice
and fatiguesome. — North, Examen, p. 515.
• Fatiloqdent, fate - speaking, pro-
phetic.
In such like discourses of fatiloquent sooth-
sayers interpret all things to the best. —
Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xxii.
Fatlino, diminutive of fat ; unusual
as an adjective.
The babe . . .
tJncared for, spied its mother and began
A blind and babbling laughter, and to dance
Its body, and reach its failing innocent arms
And lazy, lingering fingers.
Tennyson, Princess, vi.
Fauterer, favourer.
Be assured thy life is sought, as thou ait
the fauterer of all wickedness. — Seylin, Life
of Laud, p. 198.
Fauxety, a play on the word falsity.
In Nut tail's edition the word in the first
extract is given faiusetSs ; in the second,
falsities.
I cannot therefore but sadly bemoan that
the Lives of these Saints are so darkened
with Popish Illustrations, and farced with
Fauxeties to their dishonour. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, ch. iii. (i. 8).
God forbid that this author's faurities
should make us undervalue this worthy King
and Martyr.— Ibid. Suffolk (ii. 327).
Favourites, short curls on the top
of the head : they came in in the reign
of Charles II.
The favourites hang loose upon the temples,
with a languishing lock in the middle. — Far-
quhar, Sir H. Wudair, I. L
What's here? all sorts of dresses painted
to the life; ha! ha! ha! head-cloaths to
shorten the face, favourites to raise the fore-
head.— Centlivre, Platonick Lady, iii. 1.
Sooner I would bedeck my brow with lace,
And with immodest fav'rites shade my face.
Cray, The Espousals.
Favodrous, apt to win favour.
When women were wont to be kindharted,
conceits in men were verie favourous. — Bre-
ton, Wifs Irenchmour, p. 9.
FAIVNINGNESS ( 235 )
FEE-FARMER
Fawninqness, smoothness, syco-
phancy.
I'm for peace, and quietness, and fawning'
net*. — De Quincey, Murder as a Fine Art.
Fax, hair.
The Englishmen dwelling beyond Trent
called the baire of the head Fax. Whence
also there is a family . . . named Faire-fax,
of the faire bush of their haire. — Holland's
Camden, p. 692.
Feanser, fernshaw ? q. v.
The lady is a hunting gone
Over f earner that is so high.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 352.
Feasb, to sneeze. Robin Goodfellow
is the speaker in the extract.
Tet now and then the maids to please,
I card at midnight up their wool :
And while they sleep, snort f — t and /ease,
With wheele to shreds their flax I pull.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 380.
Feasible, probable.
" As yon say, James,** cried Mr. Fenton,
" this account seems pretty feasible. — 27.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 2.
Feat, employment.
The feat of merchandizing is nowhere
condemned throughout the holy Scriptures.
. — BuUinger, Dec. III. Serm. i. (ii. 31).
Featherbed, used adjectivally =
effeminate.
Each featherbed warrior who rides from
Knightsbridge to Whitehall and from White-
hall to Knightsbridffe is gifted with the
glorious traditions of great armies and in-
numerable campaigns. — Black, Adventures
of a Phaeton, ch. xxiii.
Feather-brained, giddy.
To a feather-brained school-girl nothing is
sacred. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. 20.
Feather-glory, light and transitory
glory.
And it is no light matter, bat, as St. Paul
calleth it, alminov fidpot, "an everlasting
weight of glory." Glory, not like ours here,
feither-glory, but true, that hath weight and
substance in it. — Andrews, Sermons, i. 31.
Feathebhead, a light frivolous per-
son.
Show the dullest olodpole, show the
haughtiest featherhead that a soul higher
than himself is actually here; were his
knees stiffened into brass, he must down
aud worship.— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 136.
Philip. Courtney, belike.
Mary. A tool and featherhead!
Tennyson, Q. Mary, V. i.
Feather-headed, giddy ; foolish.
Cf. Feather-pated.
Ah thou hast miss'd a man (but that he
is so bewitch 'd to his study, and knows no
other mistress than his mind) so far above
Has feather-headed puppy. — Cibber, Love
makes a man, Act II.
Tou're too feather-headed to mind if any-
body was dead, so as you could stay upstairs
a-dressing yourself for two hours by the
clock. — G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. viii.
Featheblet, small feather.
The episodes and digressions fringe [the
story] like so many featherlet s. — Sovihey, The
Doctor (Preface).
Feather-monger. Birds are so called
in the extract.
Some fowler with his nets, as this host
of feather-mongers were getting up to ride
double, involved or in tangled them.— N*she,
Lenten Stuff* {Harl. Misc., vi. 170).
Feather-pated, giddy; fickle. CI
Feather-headed.
« The villains," he said, •< the base treach-
erous villains, to desert me at this pinoh ! "
" Nay, say rather the feather-pated, giddy
madmen,** said Waldemar, "who must be
toying with follies, when such business was
in hand.*' — Scott, Ivanhoe, ii. 196.
Feature, to resemble.
Mrs. Yincy in her declining years, and in the
diminished lustre of her housekeeping, was
much comforted by her perception that two at
least of Fred's boys were real Vincys, and
did not " feature " the Garths. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. last.
Fee, a gratuitous treat
Take my purse, fetch me
A stand of ale, and set it in the market-place,
That all may drink that are athirst this day ;
For this is for a fee to welcome Robin Hood
To Bradford town.
Greene, Geo-a-Greene, p. 267.
Feeder, often means servant (see
N. $. v.), but in the first of the subjoined
passages it signifies master or em-
ployer, in the second parasite; cf.
"feeder of my riots " (//. Hen. IV.
v. 5).
His feeders still not thinking this enough,
have, of late, put him upon another jobb.—
The Loyal Observator, 1683 (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 70).
Mr. Thornhill came with a couple of
friends, his chaplain and feeder. — Vicar of
Wakefield, ch. vii.
Fee-farmer, one who holds land
from a superior lord in fee-simple.
tEELER
( *3* )
FENOUILLET
As when bright Phebtu (Landlord of the
light)
And his fee-farmer Luna most are parted,
fie sets no sooner but shee comes in sight.
Davits, Holy Rood*, p. 13.
Feeler, something tentative.
After potting forth his right leg now and
then as a feeler, the victim who dropped the
money ventures to make one or two distinct
dives after it. — Dickens, Sketches by Box, ch. i.
Fegue, to discomfit or injure.
No treat, sweet words, good mien, bat sly
intrigue,
That must at length the jilting widow fegue.
Wycherley, Love in a Wood, 1. 1.
For Man of war as wanton was
At fifty, as a colt at grass ;
And had not th' times his honour fegxCd
As often now had been iutriug'd.
D' TJrfey, Collin's Walk, cant. i.
When Oataline a league
Had made, the Senators to feaue.
Ibid. cant. ii.
Fell, earnest ; intent
I am bo fell to my business, that I, though
against my inclination, will not go.—Pepys,
Jan. 15, 1666-67.
Fell, to hem down a joined piece of
work.
Bach taking one end of the shirt on her knee,
Again began working with hearty good-will,
Felling the seams, and whipping the frill.
Jngoldsby Legends (Aunt Fanny).
Fellowess, contemptuous for a
woman.
Who can have patience with such fellows
and fellowesses? — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
in. 117.
Tour bachelor uncles and maiden aunts are
the most tantalizing fellows and fellowesses
in the creation. — Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla,
Bk. iz. ch. v.
Felon, stolen.
Thus hee that conquered men, and beast
most cruell,
(Whose greedy pawes with fellon goods were
found)
Answer'd Goliah's challenge in a duell.
Fuller, David's Hainovs 9inne, st. 19.
Feloness, female felon.
And what was the pitch of his mother's
yellowness ?
How she turned as a shark to snap the
spare-rib
Clem off, sailors say, from a pearl-diving
Carib,
When she heard what she called the flight
of the feloness.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Femalitt, female nature ; applied
disparagingly. Sir. T. Browne has
feminality. Femality is also used
adjectivally in Granaison. See s. v.
Infanglehent.
No doubt but he thought he was obliging
me, and that my objection was all owing to
femality as he calls it ; a word I don't like ;
I never heard it from Sir Charles. — Richard-
son, Grandison, vi. 154.
Feminile, feminine.
Perhaps it might have been well if I had
resolved upon a further designation of chap-
ters, and distributed them into masculine
and feminine ; or into the threefold arrange-
ment of virile, feminile, and puerile. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. xiz.
Feminineity, womanliness; that
which is characteristic of a woman : the
Dicta, have feminality and feminity.
Margaret made excuses all so reasonable
that Catherine rejected them with calm con-
tempt ; to her mind they lacked feminineity.
Beaae, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lxviii.
Fence, a receiver of stolen goods.
CI Fender.
"What have you got to say for yourself,
yon withered old fence, eh ? " '• I was away
from London a week and more, my dear, on
a plant," replied the Jew. — Dickens, Oliver
Twist, ch. zxxiz.
Fender, defender. Cf. Fence. R.,
who gives no example, says, " A com-
mon word in speech, though not in
writing." L. has it in two senses, viz.,
the ordinary one of an iron plate laid
before the fire to prevent the coals from
falling into the room, and the pieces of
cable, &c. which are hung over a ship's
side to act as buffers to prevent her
from rubbiug against the wharf or
other ships.
He is the treasurer of the thieves' ex-
chequer, the common fender of all bulkers
and shop-lifts in the town. — FourforaPenny,
1678 {Marl. Misc., iv. 147).
Fenlander, inhabitant of the fens.
Laurence Holebeck was born, saith my
Author, apud Girvios; that is, amongst the
Fenlanders. — Fuller, Worthies, Lincoln (ii.
12).
Fen-man, an inhabitant of the fens.
If you ask how you should rid them, I will
not point you to the fen-men, who, to make
quick dispatch of their annoyances, set fire
on their fens. — Adams, ii. 480.
Fenouillet (Fr.fenouillette), fennel-
water.
Dined with Lord P 1. He's a silly
fellow. Went home to take some fenouillet
FENSIVE
( 237 )
FETE
I was so sick of him. Resolved never to be
a Lord.— Dr. Swift's Seal Diary, p. 5 (1715).
Fknsive, defensive. The spirit of
Hector speaks of his hand " that fensiue
seruice had eended " (Stanyhurst, JSn.,
ii. 301).
Fenugreek, a plant, the Trigonella.
See quotation from Sterne more at
length, *. v. Sweet Cecily.
To preserne nauewes, it is a singular medi-
cine for them to hAuefent-greek sowed among,
as also for beets to do the like with cich
pease. — Holland, Pliny, xix. 10.
Poultices of marsh-mallows, mallows, bonus
Henrietta, white lilies, and fenugreek — Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, v. 111.
Feoffee, a trustee.
He and his patrimonie was committed to
certain execntours or f coffers. — UdaVs Eras-
mus'* Apophth., p. 369.
Fee (?). In Gibson's translation
"sea-commodities" ia the correspond-
ing expression.
Hantshire . . . is . . . rich in plenteous
pasture, and for all commodities of fer most
wealthy and happie. — Holland's Camden, p.
259.
Ferling, ward [in a borough].
In King Edward the Confessor's time (that
I may note so much out of domesday booke),
there were in this Borough foure Ferlings,
that is, Quarters or Wards. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 497.
Fermentate, to leaven.
The largest part of the Lords were fer~
meniated with an anti-episcopal sourness.—
Socket, Life of Williams, ii. 179.
Fernshaw, fern-brake or fern-thicket.
He bade me take the Gipsy mother,
And set her telling some story or other
Of hill or dale, oakwood or fernshaw.
Drowning, Flight of the Duchess.
Ferociekt, ferocious.
Nothing so soon tames the madnesse of
people as their own fierceness and extrava-
gancy ; which at length, as S. Cyprian ob-
serves, tires them by taking *w*y their
breath, and vainly exhausting their ferocient
spirits. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 142.
Ferrandin, a stuff made of silk
mixed with some other material, like
what is now called poplin. See Lord
Braybrooke's note on the first quotation
for further particulars.
My wife came home, and seeming to cry ;
for bringing home in a coach her new fer~
randin waistcoate, in Cheapside, a man asked
her whether that was the way to the Tower,
and while she was answering him, another
on the other side snatched away her bundle
out of her lap.— Pepys, Jan. 28, 1662-3.
After long resolution of having nothing
but black, I did buy a coloured silk fer-
randin. — Ibid. June 8, 1665.
I know a great lady that cannot follow her
husband abroad to his haunts because her
ftrrandine is so ragged and greasy whilst his
mistress is as fine as fi 'pence in embroidered
satins. — Wycherley, Love in a Wood, v. 2.
Ferrivorous, iron eating.
The idiot at Ostend . . died at last in con-
sequence of his appetite for iron. . . . This
poor creature was rea\\j ferrivorous. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. exxvih.
Fertily, plenteously; in a fertile
manner.
Who, being grown to man's age, as our
own eyes may judge, could not but fertily
requite his Father's Fatherly education. —
Sidney, Arcadia, Bk. ii. p. 155.
Ferule, to strike with the ferule or
cane.
I shoulde tel tales out of the schoole, and
bee ferruled for my faults or hyssed at for a
blab, yf I layde al the orders open before
your eyes. — Gossan, Schoole of Abuse, p. 24.
Festrawe, a festue or fescue, a
pointer used in teaching children their
letters, &c.
Then to the fourth, the Westerne world she
came,
And there with her eyes festrawe paints a
stone
Stranger then strange, more glorified then
glorie.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir
R. Grinuile, p. 49.
I had past out of Crosse-rowe, speld and
put together, read without Kf est raw. — Breton,
Chrimello's Fortunes, p. 6.
Fetchlife, a prognostication of
death ; perhaps a misprint for fetc/i*
light, q. v. in N.
Also on thee turrets the skrich howle, lyke
fetchliefe ysetled,
Her burial roundel doth ruck.
Stanyhurst, jEn., iv. 486.
Fetch-wateb, a drawer of water.
But spin the Greek wives' webs of task,
and their fetch-water be. — Chapman, IliadL
vi. 495.
Fete, to entertain at a feast. L.
notes the word as naturalized, but only
gives example of the substantive.
The murder thus out, Hermann's fSted and
thanked,
While his rascally rival gets tossed in a
blanket. — Ingoldshy Legends {Hermann).
1
FETICHISM
( «3»)
FIDDLE
Feticbism, degraded superstition.
The negroes of West Africa make fetish
of any object that strikes their fancy,
as a stone, or tree, and the like, and
worship it.
[They] descended deeper and deeper, one
after the other, into the realms of confusion,
. . . craving after signs and wonders, dabbling
in magic, astrology, and barbarian /eft cAifffM.
— C. Kingsley, Hypatia, ch.
Fetich istic, belonging to or con-
nected with fetish worship.
Oar resuscitated Spirit was not a pagan
philosopher, nor a philosophizing pagan poet,
bat a man of the fifteenth century, inherit-
ing its strange web of belief and unbelief,
of Epicurean levity and fetiehistic dread. —
0. Eliot, Bomola (Proem).
Fetish. See Fetichism.
Tou are always against superstitions, and
yet you make work a fetish. You do with
work just as women do with duty ; they carry
about with them a convenient little god, and
they are always worshipping it with small
sacrifices. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. x.
Fettle, good condition.
It's a fine thing ... to have the chance of
getting a bit of the country into good fettle,
as they say, and putting men into the right
way with their farming. — G. Eliot, Middle-
march, oh. xl.
Fkture, birth, or offspring.
Some of them engendered one, some other
such fetures, and every one in that he was
delivered of was excellent politic, wise. —
Latimer, i. 50.
Feuage, a tax on every hearth or
chimney. See Fowage.
The Prince of Wales . . . imposing a new
taxation upon the Gascoignes, of Feuage or
Ohymney mony, so discontented the people,
as they exclaime against the government of
the English. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 214.
Few. A few (*. e. some) broth or
I>ottage is an expression used in Scot-
and and the north of England ; also
in Devonshire.
They be content with a penny piece of
beef among four, having a /etc pottage made
of the broth of the same beef. — Lever, Ser-
mons, 1550.
They had sold their birthright ... to the
Pope for a few pottage. — Adams, i. 6.
There are some excellent family broth
making below, and 1*11 desire Tibby to bring
a fete. — Miss Ferrier, Marriage, ch. iii.
Here's a rahm, . . . it's weel enengb to ate
a few porridge in. — Miss E.Bronte, Wuthering
Heights, ch. xiii.
Few, a few, used ironically for "a
good deal."
I trembled a few, for I thought ten to one
but he'd say, "He? not he, I promise you."
—Mad.D'Arblay, Diary, i. 28.
If one man in a town has pluck and money,
he may do it ; it'll cost him a few ; I've had
to pay the main part myself. — C. KingsUy,
Two Years Ago, ch. xxv.
Fewsty, mouldy ; fusty.
Tf a feaste beynge neuer so great lacked
bread, or had fewsty and noughty bread, all
the other daynties shulde be vnsauery and
litle regarded. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 76.
Fewtrils, trifles ; little things.
I ha' paid to keep her awa' fra* me ; these
five year I ha' paid her ; I ha' gotten decent
fewtrils about me agen. — Dickens, Hard
Times, ch. xi.
Fib, to Lit repeatedly when the
adversary's Lead is "in chancery"
(pugilistic slang).
I have been taking part in the controversy
about M Bell and the Dragon," as you will see
in the Quarterly, where I have fibbed the
Edinburgh (as the fancy say) most com-
pletely.—Southey, Letters, 1811 (ii. 236).
There would come on
A sort of fear his spouse might knock his
head off,
Demolish half his teeth, or drive a rib in,
She shone so much in facers and in fibbing.
Ingoldsby Legends {The Ghost).
Fibber, petty liar. L. has fibster,
with quotation from Thackeray.
Your royal grandsire (trust roe, I'm no fibber)
Was vastly fond of Colley Cibber.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 137.
Fiction, fashioning.
The long having made positive laws and
decrees, . . . disdains that a groom should
contradict and annul those to dignify and
advance other of his own fiction. — Adams,
U. 90.
We have never dreamt that parliaments
had any right whatever to violate property,
to overrule prescription, or to force a currency
of their own fiction in the place of that which
is real, and recognised by the law of nations.
—Burke, Reflections on Fr. Revolution,^. 124.
Fiddle. To play first or second
fiddle is to take the chief or subordinate
part respectively.
To say that Tom had no idea of playing
first fiddle in any social orchestra, but was
always quite satisfied to be set down for the
hundred and fiftieth violin in the band, or
thereabouts, is to express his modesty in
very inadequate terms. — Dickens, Martin
Chuzzlewit, ch. xii.
HDDLE
( 239>
•FIGURELESS
It wy evident that since John Marston's
arrival he had been playing, with regard to
Matt, second fiddle, if yon can possibly be
induced to pardon the extreme coarseness of
the expression. — H. Kingsley, Bavenshoe, ch.
1 »•• Sr «r
Inn.
Fiddle, a fool or trifler.
He that walkes wanton with his head aside,
And knowes not well how he may see his
feete,
And she that mineeth like a maiden bride,
And like a shadow slideth through the
streete;
Howeuer so their mindes in money meete,
Measure their humours justly by the
middle,
He may be but a foole, and she * fiddle.
Breton, PasquiVs Madcappe, p. 9.
As his rank and station often find him in
the best company, his easy humour, whenever
he is called to it, can still make himself the
fiddle of it. — Cihber, Apology, ch. i.
Fiddle. The quotation from Fuller
may perhaps explain the phrase in
Smollett
This man could not fidle, could not tune
himself to be pleasant and plausible to all
Companies. — Fuller, Worthies, Lancashire.
Tour honour's face is made of a fiddle ;
everv one that looks on you loves you. —
Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. viii
Fiddlecome, nonsensical.
Do you think such a fine proper gentleman
as he cares for a fiddlecome tale of a draggle-
tailed prM—Vanbrugh, The Relapse, iv. 1.
Fiddle-headed. The handles of
forks and spoons are sometimes made
after a pattern which bears some re-
semblance to a fiddle ; these are called
fiddle-headed, or fiddle-patterned.
Try him wherever you will, you find
His miud in his legs, and his legs in his mind,
All prongs and folly, in short a kind
Of fork that is fiddle-headed.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
I could not see my table-spoons, I looked,
but could not see
The little JddU-pattern'd ones I use when
I'm at tea.
Ingoldsby Legends {Misadventures at
Margate).
Fiddler's fare. See quotations from
Howell and Swift.
Let the world know you have bad more
thin Jidler'i fare, for you have meat, money,
and cloth.— Machin, Dumb Knight, Act IV.
He was dismissed Jidler-like, with meat,
drink, and money. — Howell, Party of Beasts,
p. 128. J * J
Miss. Did your ladyship play ?
Lady Sm. Yes, and won; so I came off
with fidler's fare, meat, drink, and money. —
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. iii.). .
Fiddlestick. See quotation. Fiddle-
sticks taper away to a point; hence
used of nonsense which ends in nothing.
This is Grose's explanation.
At such an assertion he would have ex-
claimed, A fiddlestick! Why and how that
word has become an interjection of contempt
I must leave those to explain who can. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. clxxxix.
She wanted to marry her cousin, Tom
Povntx, when they were both very young,
and proposed to die of a broken heart when I
arranged her match with Mr. Newcome. A
broken fiddlestick! she would have rained
Tom Poynta in a year.— Thackeray, Nexccomes,
ch. x.
Fierize, to burn or kindle.
But aire turn water, earth may fierite,
Because in one part they do symbolize.
Sylvester, second day, first veeke, 264.
Fifty- weight, half a hundred-
weight.
Packing on my back about fifty-weight of
iron bolts.— Mayo, Kaloolah (1840), p. 140.
Fight, bulwark ; propugnaculum.
N. has several examples of the word,
but only as belonging to ships.
They fiercely set upon
The parapets, and pulTd them down, raa'd
every foremost fight,
And all the buttresses of stone that held
their towers upright
They tore away with crows of iron, and
hoped to ruin all.
The Greeks yet stood, and still repaired the
tote-fights of their wall.
Chapman, Uiad, xii. 271.
Fightless, without fighting.
Say that the God of Warre, Father of
Chinalrie,
The Worthies, Heroes, all famed Conquer-
ours,
Centaurs, Gyants, victorious Victorie,
Were all this Grinuil's hart-sworne para-
mours,
Yet should we fightlesse let our sbyp's force
flie?
G. Markham, Trag. of Sir B. Grinvile,
p. 69.
FIGLE88, without figs.
The fioless fig-tree, the graceless Christian,
is good for nothing. — Adams, ii. 184.
Figurelbbs, shapeless.
I write (detested) on the tender skins
Of time-lee infants, and abortive twins,
(Torn from the wombe) these figures figure*
les.— Sylvester, The Trophies, 682.
FIGURIE - ( 240 )
FJREBOOTE
Figubik, embroidery.
That worthy Emperour
Which rulde the world, and had all welth
atwil,
Gould be content to tire his wearie wife,
His daughters, and his niepces euerychone,
To spin and worke the clothes that he shuld
weare,
And neaer carde for silks or sumptuous cost.
For oloth of gold, or tinsel figurte.
Gascoigne, Steel Glas, p. 71.
Figurist. See extract.
The Symbolists, Fiaurists, and Significatists
. . . are of opinion that the faithful at the
Lord's Supper do receive nothing but naked
and bare signs. — Rogers on 39 Articles, p. 289.
Fil, a filly or foal.
A kind of a second NagVhead fable, a fil
of the same race, both sire and dam, begotten
by the father of lies upon a slanderous
tongue, and so sent post about the world to
tell false tidings of the English. — Sancroft,
Consecration Sermon, 1660 (p'Oyly's Life, p.
845).
File, a pickpocket (thieves1 cant).
The greatest character among them was
that of a pickpocket, or, in their language, a
file. — Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. IV. ch.
zui.
Filiate, to connect aa by descent.
Affiliate is the usual form. Filiation
will be found in R. and L., but it ap-
pears to be only a technical term in
theology.
Master Rabelais says that the Bishop called
the mother of the Three Kings St. Typhaine ;
it is certain that such a Saint was made out
of La Sainte Epiphanie, and that the three
kings of Cologne were filiated upon her. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. xci.
Many parts indeed authenticate them-
selves, bearing so strong a likeness that no
one can hesitate at filiating them upon the
ipsissimus Luther. — Ibid. ch. ccxxxi.
Filing- lay, picking pockets (thieves*
cant).
I am committed for the filing-lav, man,
and we shall be both nubbed together. I'
faith, my dear, it almost makes me amends
for being nubbed myself, to have the pleasure
of seeing thee nubbed too. — Fielding, Jona-
than Wild, Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Findable, discoverable.
Such persons . . have nothing more to be
said of them findable by all my endevours.
— Fuller, Worthies, ch. xxv.
A man's ideal
Is high in heaven, and lodged with Plato's
Not findable here.— Tennyson, The Sisters.
Fine. Fine as fivepence == very
smart. Cf. Clean as a penny, s. v.
Penny.
Be not, Jug, as a man would say, finer
than fivepence, or more proud than a peacock.
—Grim the Collier, Act II.
His mistress is as fine as JC pence in em-
broidered satins. — WycherUy, Love in a
Wood, v. 2.
Miss. Pray, how was she drest?
Lady Sin. Why, she was as fine as five-
pence; but truly I thought there was more
cost than worship.— Swift, Polite Conversa-
tion (Conv. iii.).
Fineeb, to veneer.
The Italians call it [marquetry] pietre eom-
messe, a sort of inlaying with stones, analo-
gous to the fineering of cabinets in wood. —
Smollett, France and Italy, Letter xxviii.
Fine-nosed, delicate ; fastidious.
The monks themselves were too fine-nosed
to dabble in tan-fatts.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI.
u. I.
Fingent, forming ; fashioning.
Ours is a most fictile world, and man is
the most fingent, plastic of creatures. — Car-
lyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. I. ch. ii.
Fingers' ends. To arrive at one's
fingers! ends = to be brought to great
poverty, when one gnaws one's fingers'
ends ; to live by one's fingers1 ends =
by industry or manual labour.
If any parte of Musick haue suffred ship-
wrack, and armed by fortune at their fingers
endes, with shewe of gentilitie they take vp
faire houses, receiue lusty lasses at a price
for boorders, and pipe from morning to
euening for wood and coale. — Gossan, School*
of Abuse, p. 36.
How many goodly cities could I reckon up
that thrive wholl v by trade, where thousands
of inhabitants live singular well by their
fingers* ends. — Burton, Democ. to Reader, p.
55.
Finkle, fennel. The heading of
ch. ix. in Bk. XX. of Hollands Pliny
is, " Of Finkle or Fennell, and Hempe."
Fireboote, " fuel for necessary occa-
sions, which by common law any tenant
may take out of the lands granted to
him" (Bailees Did.).
There are a great number of pollard trees
standing and growing upon the commons
aforesaid, the crops whereof as they grow
are usually cut by the copiehoulders of the
sayd maner, and taken and converted by
them for fireboote according to the custom
thereof ; but the bulkes and bodies of those
pollards belonging to the lords of the sayd
maner.— Survey of Maner of Wimbledon, 16 19
(Arehaol., x. 443).
FIRE EATER
<*4i )
FISH
Fire-kateb, a fierce fellow: gener-
ally used rather contemptuously. See
quotation from Tennyson *. v. Dare-
devil, and from Carlyle *. v. Bulk.
Barnes need not get up in the morning to
punch Jack Belsize's head. I'm sorry for
your disappointment, you Feochnrch-street
fire-eater. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xxix.
Fire-hook, a hook used for pulling
down burning houses. See N., whose
only quotation is from the- Nomenclator.
God will plague thee, and those teeth that
tare my harnilesse face will the divel teare
out with a hot fire-hooke. — Breton, Miseries
of Mcndllia, p. 51.
The engines thunder'd through the sheet,
Fire-hook, pipe, bucket, all complete.
J. and H. Smith, Refected
Addresses, p. 80.
Firehou8E, hearth.
The constant rent he settled were the
Peter-pences to the Pope of Borne to be
paid out of every firehouse in England. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. iii. 13.
Fireship, prostitute, especially one
who is diseased.
Xev. Well, bat, Sir John, are you ac-
quainted with any of our fine ladies yet, any
of our famous toasts ?
Sir John. No, damn your Jlreships ; I have
• wife of my own. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
This wit advised him to keep clear of me,
for I was a fireship. ** A Jireship ! (replied
the sailor) more like a poor galley in distress
that has been boarded by such a fireshig as
you.n— Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. zxiii.
Firework, work wrought in the fire :
not, as now, pyrotechnics.
His heart the aniiile wheron the denill
frames his fireworke. — Breton, A Murmurer,
p. 10.
Firework, a display of fireworks.
We have not yet done diverting ourselves :
the night before last the Duke of Richmond
gave a firework ; a codicil to the peace. —
Wdpole to Mann, ii. 297 (1749).
Firmament, strength ; confirmation.
By surveying over hastily he did quite
oversee all our principal evidence, and the
Attest firmaments of our CAuee.— Bramhall,
ii. 24.
Firmless, unsteady ; shifting.
It [Astronomy] leaues swift Tigris, and to
Nile retires,
And, waxen rich, in Egypt it erects
A famous School, yet firmless in affects,
It falls in lone with subtle Grecian wits.
Sylvester, The Columnes, 607.
Past the Bed Sea, heer vp and down we float
On firmless sands of this vast desert here.
Ibid., The Lave, 926.
Firmorie, infirmary.
J nfirmarium, or the Firmorie (the Ouratour
whereof Infirmarius), wherein persons down-
right sick (trouble to others, and troubled by
others, if lodging in the dormitorie) had the
benefit of physick, and attendance private to
themselves. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 286.
Firret, to ferret, " nearer to the
Latin viverra and the Italian fierretto
than the more modern form, ferret"
(Jacobson, note in loc.).
If Israel turn their backs upon their
enemies, up, Joshua, and make search for the
troubler of Israel, firret out the thief, and
do execution upon him. — Sanderson, in. 88.
Firry, of the fir-tree.
And oft I heard the tender dove
In firry woodlands making moan,
Tennyson, Millerfs Daughter,
First. At first = immediately.
He bids them put the matter in adventure
and then but whistle for an angel, and they
will come at first. — Andrews, Sermons, v. 523.
Firstly, in the first place. R. has
no example of this word, and De
Quincey (Spanish Nun, sect. 6) writes,
" First (for 1 detest your ridiculous and
most pedantic neologism of firstly) —
first the shilling for which I have given
a receipt ; secondly two skeins of suit-
able thread." L. quotes from Sylves-
ter's Du Bartas, *' the wound the old
serpent firstly gave us."
F1R8TSHIP, beginning.
Two Firstships met in this man, for he
handselled the House-Convent. . . . Secondly,
he was the first Carmelite who in Cambridge
took the degree of Doctor in Divinity. — Ful-
ler, Worthies, Suffolk (ii. 840).
Fisc, exchequer. L. marks this word
as rare, and gives a single example from
Burke ; an earlier and later instance are
subjoined. Daniel also, Hist, of Eng.,
p. 169, speaks of informers as " fruitful!
agents for the fiske."
Peru, they say (supposing Ophir so),
By yeerly fleets into his fisk doth now.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 609.
The streams were perennial which fed his
fisc. When new supplies became necessary,
the first person that had the felicity to fall
in with him, friend or stranger, was sure to
contribute to the deficiency. — Lamb, Essays
of Elia (Two Races of Men).
Fish. Drunk as a fish = very drunk
R
FISHABLE
( *4* )
FIZZ
'Gad, my head begins to whim it about.
Why dost thon not speak ? thou art both as
drunk and as mute as a fish. — Congreve, Way
of the World* iv. 9.
Fishable, capable of being fished.
There was only a small piece of fishable
water in Englebourn.— Hughes, Tom Brown
at Oxford, ch. zlvii.
Fish-broth, water.
The churlish frampold waves gave him his
belly-full of flsh-broath.—Nashe, Lenten Stuffs
(Harl. Misc., vi. 108).
Fishkr'8 knot, a slip-knot, the ends
of which lie horizontally, and will not
become untied.
Then end to end, as f alleth to their lot,
Let all your links, in order as tbey lie,
Be knit together with t\isX fisher's knot
That will not slip, nor with the wet untie ;
And at the lowest end, forget it not,
To leave a bout or compass like an eye,
The link that holds your hook to hang
upon,
When you think good to take it off and on.
Dennis, Secrets of Angling (Arbert
Eng. Garner, 1. 150.)
Fish- fag, a disparaging name for a
female tish-hawker.
Who deemed himself of much too high a
rank,
With vulgar fish-fags to be forced to chat.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 106.
Fishmongers' fair, Lent. In Mars-
tan* 8 Malcontent one of the characters
says, "Then we agree?" the other
replies, "As Lent and fishmongers."
And Nashe in his Lenten Stuffe {Harl.
Misc., vi. 161^ says that if it were not
for the herring "fishmongers might
keepe Christmasse all the yeere," t. e.
would have no trade.
It was at a time when it is the fishmongers*
fair (tempus quo regnant piseatores) and the
Dutcherr time to be starved.— Bailey's Eras*
mus, p. 219.
Fistic, pugilistic.
In fistic phraseology, he had a genius for
coming up to the scratch, wherever and what-
ever it was, and proving himself an ugly
customer.— ifefca*, Hard Times, ch. ii.
Fitchy, pointed. In heraldry a cross
is said to be fticMe when the lower part
ends in a point.
• Bach board had two tenons fastned in
their silver sockets, which sockets some con-
ceive made fitchy or picked, to he put into
the earth.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, IV. iv. 14.
Fittt, subject to fits.
They . . . turned out so sickly and Jltty that
there was no rearing them anyhow. — JS'ans,
Thinks I to Myself, 11. 168.
Fitty, suitable.
Oicero, Varro, Quintilian, and others
strained themselues to giue the Greek wordes
Latin names, and yet nothing so apt mdjitty.
— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. ix.
Five-finger, also called the crow-
fish, a species of Asterias or star-fish.
There are great penalties by the Admiralty-
Court laid upon those that ... do not tread
under their feet, or throw upon the shore, a
fish which they [people of Colchester] call a
Five-Jinger, resembling the rowel of a spur,
because that fish gets into the Oysters when
they gape, and sucks them out. — Defoe, lour
thro' G. Britain, i. 10.
Fiver, a five-pound note (slang). Cf .
Tenner.
I'll trot him . . . against any horse you can
bring for a fiver. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. vi.
Fives, fist, as being formed of the
five fingers : a slang term.
Whereby, altho' as yet they have not took to
use their Jives,
Or, according as the fashion is, to sticking
with their knives,
I'm bound there'll be some milling yet, and
shakings by the collars,
Afore they choose a chairman for the Glori-
ous Apollers.
Hood, Row at the Oxford Arms.
Then let's act like Count Otto, and while one
survives,
Succumb to our she-saints, videlicet wives ;
That is, if one has not a good bunch of fives.
Ingoldsby Legends (S. OdiUe).
Fives, a game something like tennis,
but the ball is played by the hand ;
hence its name. See preceding entry.
Or as you may see in the Fleet or the Bench,
(Many folks do in the course of their lives)
The well-struck ball rebound from the wall,
When the gentlemen jail-birds are playing
ht fives. — Ingoldsby Legends (8. Medard).
The little man was playing at fives against
the bare wall. . . . He had no ball to play
with, but he played with a brass button. — ht.
Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xxxv.
Fix, a difficulty (slang).
It's " a pretty particular Fix"
Bloudie Jacke,
She is caught like a mouse in a trap.
Ingoldsby Legends {Bloudie JaeJce).
We were now placed in an uncommonly
awkward./br. — Blacky Adventures of a Phaetony
ch. zxv.
Fizz, to make a hissing or sputtering
sound.
FIZZLE
( *43 )
FLANNEL
Thou oft hast made thy fiery dart
Fizz in the hollow of his heart.
Cotton, Burlesque upon. Burlesque, p. 249.
Fizzle, an onomatopoeous word, sig-
nifying the sound of singeing hair, or of
hot iron plunged into water, or the like.
Whose bearda — this a black, that inclining
to grizzle —
Are smoking, and curling, and all in a fizzle.
Ingoldslty Legends (Auto-da-Fe).
Flabell, to fan.
It is continually flabelled, blown upon, and
aired by the north winds. — Urquh art's Ra-
belais, Bk. I. ch. xxxii.
Flag, a pinion.
The haggard cloister'd in her mew
To scour her downy robes, and to renew
Her broken flays* preparing to overlook
The tim'rous mallard at the sliding brook,
Jets oft from perch to perch.
Quarks, Emblems, III. i.
Flagged. The admiral in the quota-
tion is the ship which carries the ad-
miral's flag. See L. «. v. Admiral.
At thy firmest age
Thou hadst within thy bole solid contents
That might have ribb'd the sides and plank'd
the deck
Of some flagged admiral.
Cowper, Yardley Oak.
Flagman, an admiral. Cf. Flagged.
To Mr. Lilly's the painter's, and there saw
the heads, some finished, and all begun, of
the Flagamen in the late great fight with the
Duke of York against the Dutch.— Pepys,
April 18, 1666.
He was a kind of Flagman, a Vice-Admiral,
ia all those expeditions of good fellowship.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 535.
Flagon et, small flagon.
And in a burnisht./fagroRt/ stood by
Beere small as comfort, dead as charity.
Herrick, Uesperides, p. 281.
Flagre.
Tarre, mlstrease (quoth shee), we commonly
«se when the wound is not deepe ; but, ber-
l&dy, for tliis I can tell you what we will doo,
* little fiaare, and the white of a new laid
egge mingled with a little honey, you shall
■ee I will make a medicine for him. — Breton,
Miseries of Mauillia, p. 40.
Flail, to strike as with a flail.
And in an od corner for Mars they be stern-
tu\ye flayling
Hudge spoaks and chariots.
St any hunt, Conceites, p. 138.
Flam, humbugging. The word is
given in the Diets, as verb and sub-
stantive, but in the extract it is used
adjectivully.
To amuse him the more in his search, she
addeth a flam story that she had got his
hand by corrupting one of the letter-carriers
in London. — Sprat, Relation of Young1* Con-
trivance, 1692 {Harl. Misc., vi. 224).
Flam an, a flamingo (the description
of the bird is not in the original).
Others grew in the legs, and to see them
you would have said they had been cranes,
pr the reddUh-long-billed-storklike-scrank-
legged sea-fowls, called flamans, or else men
walking upon stilts or scatches. — UrquharVs
Rabelais, IX i.
Flamboyant. This French word, as
an architectural term, may be considered
naturalized among us.
Mods, de Caumont's name is Flamboyant,
alluding to the waving of a flame, and the
tracery of the windows of this style . . gives
very forcibly the idea of this waving in its
dividing lines. — Archaol., xxiv. 179 (1834).
Flame, sweetheart.
How will she outshine all our Caermarthen
ladies : and yet we have charming girls in
Caermarthen. Am I, or am I not right, Mr.
Beeves, as to my nephew's flame, as they
call it? — Richardson, Grandison, i. 46.
I suppose she waa an old flame of the
Colonel's, for their meeting was uncom-
monly ceremonious and tender. — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. xxii.
Flameful, burning.
Pale phlegm, or saffron-coloured choler,
In feeble stomacks belch with divers dolor,
And print vpon our vnderstanding's tables,
That water - wracks, this other flamefull
fables.— Sylvester, Eden, 401.
Flamfews, kickshaws ; trifles.
Voyd ye fro these flamfews, quoa the God.
—Stanyhurst, Conceites, p. 138.
Flanker, pavement at the side of
a road.
In July and August was the high way from
near the end of St. Clement's Church to the
way leading to Marston pitched with pebbles,
and the paths or flankers with hard white
atones.— Zf/<s of A. Wood, 1682.
Flannel, soft or warm. In the
second extract it seems *=* flaccid.
About this time of year I have little fevers
every night, which bid me repair to a more
flannel climate. — H'alpole, Letters, iii. 9
(17*4).
Some old duchess, as a badger gray,
(Her suags by Time, sure deutist, snatched
away)
With long, \taik, flannel cheeks.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 152.
R 3
FLANTADOE ( 244 )
FLA UNT
Flantadoe, a word coined, I sup-
pose, by Stany hurst: the original is
spumas salts are ruebant.
Tward Sicil Isle soantiy thee Trojan nauye
dyd enter,
And the sea salte foaming wyth braue/an-
tadoe dyd harrow.
St any hurst, Mn., i. 44.
Flapdoodle. See extracts. H. gives
it, without example, as a West country
expression.
" It's my opinion, Peter, that the gentle-
man has eaten no small quantity of flap-
doodle in his lifetime." "What's that,
O'Brien Y n replied I ; M I never heard of it."
"Why, Peter," rejoined he, "it's the stuff
they feed fools on." — Marry at, Peter Simple,
ch. xxviii.
"I shall talk to our regimental doctors
about it, and get put through a course of
f ool's-diet before we start for India." " Flap-
doodle, they call it, what fools are fed on."
—Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xli.
Flapper, a young wild duck.
Iightbody happened to be gone out to
shoot flappers. — Miss Edgeworth, Manoeu-
vring, ch. xiv.
Flappet, a flap or ledge.
What brave spirit could be content to sit
in his shop with a flappet of wood, and a
blue apron before him, . . that might pursue
feats of arms? — B. and Fl., Knight of Burn-
ing Pestle, L 3.
Flappish, careless or untidy, as
having things loose and flapping about.
I see your keys ! see a fool's head of your
own : had I kept them I warrant they had
been forthcoming : you are so flappish, you
throw 'em up and down at your tail. — The
Committee, Act IV.
Flappits, finery ; fallals.
The sign of the Golden Ball, it's gold all
over, where they sell ribbands, and flappits,
and other sort of geer for gentlewomen. —
Cibber, Provoked Husband, Act I.
Flash, flashy; showy but unsub-
stantial.
Loath I am to mingle philosophical cor-
dials with Divine, as water with wine, lest
my consolations should be flash and dilute. —
Ward, Sermons, p. 63.
Flash. H. says, " A common word
for a pool/' In the extract it seems to
mean a sufficient depth of water.
I was gone down with the barge to London ;
and for want of a flash, we lay ten weeks
before we came again.— Dialogue on Oxford
Parliament, 1081 (Harl. Misc., ii. 116).
Flash, slang.
14 His checks no longer drew the cash,
Because, as his comrades explain 'd in flash,
He had overdrawn his badger."
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Flashes, a showy or fashionable
person.
They are reckoned the flashers of the place,
yet everybody laughs at them for their airs,
affectations, and tonish graces and imper-
tinences.— Mad. IfArblav, Diary, i. 260.
Dr. Harrington, I find, is descended in a
right line from the celebrated Sir John Har-
rington, who was godson of Queen Elizabeth,
and one of the gayest writers and flashers of
her reign. — Ibid. i. 333.
Flashman, rogue.
"You're playing a dangerous game, my
flashman, whoever you are," said Lee, rising
savagely ; " I've shot a man down for less
than that."— H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. ▼.
Flat, a fool ; opposite of sharp.
Why your face is as black as your hat !
Your fine Holland shirt is all over dirt,
And so is your point-lace cravat.
What a Flat,
To seek such an asylum as that.
Ingoldsby Legends (Bloudie Jaclce).
" You did not seek a partner in the peerage,
Mr. Newcome." " No, no, not such a con-
founded flat as that," cries Mr. Newcome. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xvi.
Flatchet, an instrument of some
kind : the original is cuspide. The word
occurs again (J?n., iii. 241) where
Virgil has ernes.
This sayd, with pojuted flatchet thee moun-
tan he broached,
Bush do the winds forward through perst
chinck narrolie whirling.
Stanyhurst, JEn,, i. 91.
Flats, some kind of false dice.
What false dise vse they ! as dise stopped
with quicksiluer and heares, dise of a vaunt-
age, flattes, gourdes to chop and chat id ge
whan they lyste to lette^the trew dise fall
vnder the table, and so take vp the false. —
Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 54.
Flatterable, open to flattery.
He was the most flatterable creature that
ever was known. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 118.
Flat-tiring, downright fatigue (?).
Having already past over the greatest part
of Arcadia, ... his Horse (nothhig guilty of
his inquisitiveness) with flat-tiring taught
him that discreet stays make speedy journies.
— Sidney, Arcadia, Bk. i. p. 42.
Flaunt a flaunt, streaming.
FLA Y-FLINT
( 245 )
FLE YKE
TTbat be they? women masking in men's
weedes,
With dntchkin dublets and with jerkins
jaggde,
With Spanish spangs, and ruffes set out of
France,
With high eopt hattes, and fethers flaunt a
flaunt ?~Gascoigne, Steel Glas (Epilog us).
Thy fethers flaunt a flaunte
Are blowne awaie with winde.
Breton, Floorish vpon Fancie, p. 18.
Flay-flint, a miser ; one who would
skin a flint.
There lived & flay-flint near, we stole his fruit.
Tennyson, Walking to the Mail,
Flatsome, frightful ; terrifying : a
North country word.
Shoo! not oppen't an ye mak jexflaysome
dins till neeght. — Miss E. Bronte, Wutkering
Heights, ch. ii.
Fleak, a hurdle. Cf . Fleyke ; and
see Peacock's Manley and Corringkam
Glossary (E. D. S.).
The painful pioners wrought against their
With fleak* and fagots ditches yp to fill.
Hudson's Judith, iii. 116.
Damagikg Fleaxs. E. W— and O. W —
-were charged . . . with damaging a fleak, the
property of Lord Foley. . . . Police-sergeant
Hind . . . found they had broken the fence.
He matched the pieces, and they fitted to-
gether.— Gainsburgh News, June 27, 1868.
Fleawobt, inula conyza* Sylvester
reckons among " pernicious plants ; "
The (hwpsie-breeding, sorrow-bringing psylly,
Heer called Flea-wurt.
Sylvester, The Furies, 177.
Flebile, lachrymose.
Alackaday! a flebile style this upon a
mournful occasion. — North, Examen, p. 49.
His voice falters, and he is let down from
bis touring tragics, and takes to the more
calm and moderate style, not without a tanct
of the flebile, as under some mortification, or
rather utter despair. — Ibid. p. 374.
Fleckless, spotless.
O hard when love and duty clash ! I fear
My conscience will not count me fleckless.
Tennyson, Princess, ii
Children demand that their heroes should
be fleckless, and easily believe them so. — G.
Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xvi.
Fledgy, newly fledged; also, fea-
thery.
Lyke bees
When they do foorth carry theyre young
swarme fledggie to gat bring. — Stanyhurst,
AZn., i. 415.
"Where a fledgy sea-bird choir
Soars for ever. — Keats, FingaTs Cave,
The swan soft leaning on hex fledgy breast.
Ibid., Otho the Great, ii. 2.
Fleece, a snatch ; an endeavour to
fleece.
There's scarce a match-maker in the whole
town, but has had a fleece at his purse. —
Centlivre, The Beau's Duel, ii. 2.
Flemish, to wave ; flourish.
Here on this alder stump, not an hour old ;
I thought they beauties starns weren't flem-
ishing for nowt. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. iv.
Flemish bond, a method of laying
bricks.
Workmen began to use what they call the
Flemish bond, which is the strongest as well
as the oldest regular bond used in building.
—Archaol., iv. 106 (1777).
Flesh, to clothe with flesh.
This bare sceleton of time, place, and per-
son must be fleshed with some pleasant pas-
sages.— Fuller, Worthies, ch. i.
Flesh-bird, a carrion bird, as the
vulture, &c.
O'er his uncoffined limbs
The Hocking flesh-birds screamed.
Coleridge, To a Young Man of Fortune.
Fleshhold, flesh enough for teeth to
seize on.
There was fleshhold enough for the rhym-
ing Satirists and the wits of those times,
whereon to fasten the sorest and the strong-
est teeth they had. — Sanderson, iii. 106.
FLE8H-SPADE8, nail8.
My landlady, highly resenting the injury
done to the beauty of her husband by the
flesh-spades of Bin. Honour, called aloud for
revenge and justice. — Tom Jones, Bk. XI.
ch. viii.
Fletcher. " Jack Fletcher and his
bolt " seems a proverbial expression for
things dissimilar. Fletcher ■■ arrow-
maker; hence the reference is to the
distinction between the intelligent work-
man and the dead product of his skill.
We are as like in conditions as Jack Fletcher
and his bowlt,
I brought up in learning, but he is a very dolt.
Edwards, Damon and Pithias (Dodsley,
O. PI., i. 232).
Fleyke, a gate, or paling, or part of
a stall. See H. s. v. Flake, and cf.
Fleak.
FLICT
( 246 )
FLOCKERS
To discuss divinity they nought adread,
More meet it were for them to milk kye at
tfleyke.
Song of John Nobody (Strype, Cranmer,
Vol. II. App., p. 636).
Flict, to afflict. Stanyhurst spells
the word two different ways in the
same line, unless /lighted =» forced to
fly.
My self erst flighted to reliue thee flirted I
learned. — Stanyhurst, Mn., i. 615.
Fudge, to become fledged.
They every day build their nests, every
houre flidge, and in tearme-time especially
flutter they abroad in flocks. — Greene, Theeves
falling out, 1615 (Harl. Misc., viii. 383).
Flight, to scold.
Then pardon me for these uncourteons words
The which I in my rage did utter forth,
Prick'd by the duty of a loyal mind ;
Pardon, Alphonsus, this my first offence.
And let me die if e'er I flight again.
Greene, Aiphonsus, Act II.
Flimp, to hustle ; to rob. See quota-
tion more at length, s. v. Cross.
Flimping is a style of theft which I have
never practised, and consequently of which
I know nothing. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe,
ch. x.
Flimsy, bank-notes or other paper-
money (slang).
In English Exchequer-bills full half a million,
Not kites manufactured to cheat and inveigle,
But the right sort of flimsy, all signed by
Monteagle.
Ingoldsby Legends {Met. of Venice).
Fling, a dance.
So he stept right up before my gate,
And danced me a saucy fling.
Hood, The Last Man.
Fling. Full fling = headlong, vio-
lently.
A man that hath taken his career, and
runs full fling to a place, cannot recoil him-
self, or recall his strength on the sudden. —
Adams, i. 237.
Fling away, or out, or from, to
leave hastily (in anger). Holland uses
it = escape. Udal (see quotation *. v.
Shuttle-brained) has the word in this
sense without any preposition attached.
His towne was not far off, . . . which as he
assaulted in two severall places, the Britons
flung out at a back way : but many of them
in their flight were taken. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 37.
With tliis he flings away in discontentment,
as if he meant with speed to quit the king-
dom.— Hist, of Edv. 11., p. 153.
He flung from her and went ont of the
room. — Richardson, Grandison, iv. 209.
Flingbrand, quarrelsome ; polemical.
I would to God some amongst as had one
dram of this grace [discretion] mingled with
their whole handfuls of zeal. It would a
little cool the preternatural heat of the fling-
brand fraternity, as one wittily calleth them.
— Adams, i. 125.
Flint. The common phrase to skin
a flint assumes in the extract a some-
what different shape.
For their fare, it was course in the quality,
and yet slender in the quantity thereof ; in-
somuch that they would in a manner make
pottage of a flint.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. vi. 37.
Flinted, hardened ; cruel.
Also we the byrthplace detest of flinted
VUsses. — Stanyhurst, Mn., iii. 279.
Flipflap, a flighty person.
The light airy flipflap, she kills him with
her motions. — Vanbrugh, False Friend, I. i.
Flipper, the finlike arm and deterior-
ated hand of the seal, and so applied
(in slang) to a man's fist.
Thus limb from limb they dismembered him
So entirely, that e'en when they came to
his wrists,
With those great sugar-nippers they cat off
his flippers,
A* the Clerk very flippantly termed his
fists. — Ingoldsby Legends (Gengulphus).
A fist like a seal's flipper proclaimed
him the prize-fighter. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry
Hamlyn, ch. ziv.
Flitch, buttock: usually applied
only to a beast, especially a pig.
Although he has no riches,
But walks with dangling breeches,
And skirts that want their stiohes,
And shewes his naked fitches,
Tet he'll be thought or seen
So good as Oeorge-a-Green.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 278.
Floccinaucities, worthless things.
He did not suppose that trifles and/orrt-
noueities, of which neither the causes nor
consequences were of the slightest import,
were predestined. — Southty, The Doctor, ch.
clxxz.
Flock, to hold in scorn (flocei ?)
We do hym loute and Jfocke,
And make him among vs our common sport-
ing-stocke.— Udal, Roister Doister, iii. 3.
Flockers, those who flock or crowd
to a place.
The earth was overlaid
With flockers to them.
Chapman, Iliad, ii. 71.
FLOCKLESS
( 247 )
FLOWER
Flookless, without a flock.
Yon mast remove the flockless pastors, or
the payment of the priesthood will be use-
legs. — Sydney Smith, Letters, 1843.
Flock -pated, silly. Cf. Feather-
headed.
And he that would be a poet
Must in no ways bejlock-pated :
His ignorance, if he show it,
He shall of all scftollers be hated.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 496.
Flog -master, one who wields the
lash.
Busby was never a greater terror to a
blockhead, or the Bridewell Jlog-master to a
night- walking strumpet. — T. Brown, Works,
fi.205.
FL00DLE88, arid.
A fruit-lea, Jlood-les, yea, a land-les land.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 1107.
Flooke, a flounder.
Nor would I be a byrd within a cage,
Nor dogge in kennell, nor a bore in stye ;
Nor crab-tree-staffe to leane vpon for age,
Nor wicked line to leade a youth awrye ;
Nor like a Jtooke that floates but with the
flndde,
Nor like an eele that Hues but in the mudde.
Breton, I mould and I would not, st. 122.
Floorcloth, a cloth made of hemp
and flax, prepared in a particular way :
usually employed for backstairs, pas-
sages, &c.
I've heard our front that faces Drury Lane
Much criticised ; they say 'tis vulgar brick-
work,
A mimic manufactory of floor-cloth.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected
Addresses, p. 121.
It was a neat, dull little house on the shady
aide of the way, with new narrow floorcloth
in the passage. — Sketches by Boz (Our Next*
Door Neighbour).
Floor-cloth, to cover with floor-
cloth.
The drawing-room at Todgers's was out of
the common style ; ... it was floor-clothed
all over, and the ceiling, including a great
beam in the middle, was papered. — Dickens,
Martin Chuetlewit, ch. ix.
Floppy, loose ; flapping about.
In those days even fashionable caps were
large and floppy. — G. Eliot, Amos Barton,
ch. ii.
Florence, a wine or liqueur.
The chest of Florence which puzzled James
and me so much proves to be Lord Hert-
ford's drams. — Walpole to Mann, iii. 255
(1757).
I told Mr. Fox of the wine that is coming,
and he told me what I had totally forgot,
that he has left off Florence, and chooses to
have no more. — Ibid. iii. 329 (1758).
Florent, flourishing.
Sinopa (o long) was ... a jlorent citee,
and of greate power. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 77.
Scandal has our Jlorent glory spoil'd. —
D'Urfey, Two Queens of Brentford, Act II.
Florishes, flowers (in women).
As childe-great women, or green maids (that
miss
Their terms appointed for their florishes)
Pine at a princely feast, preferring far
Red herrings, rashers, and (som) sops in tar.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 897.
Flosotjlet, a bud. Herrick, writing
on a lady who died in childbed, leaving
a daughter, says,
But when your own faire print was set
Once in a virgin fosculet
Sweet as yourself, and newly blown,
To give that life resign'd your own.
Hesperides, p. 133.
Flotes8, scum.
If thou burnest blood and fat together to
please God, what other thing dost thou make
of God, than one that had lust to smell to
burnt flotess?—Tyndale, ii. 215.
Flotter, to flutter or falter.
Ah ! how sick am I ! my strength is gone,
my sight faHeth me, my tongue fottereth in
my mouth. — Becon, iii. 94.
Flourishable, blooming ; attractive.
The devil doth but cozen the wicked with
his cates : as before in the promise of deli-
cacy, so here of perpetuity. He sets the
countenance of continuance on them, which
indeed are more fallible in their certainty
than flourishable in their bravery.— A dams,
i. 217.
Flouting-stock, a butt. In the
second extract it seems rather = jests,
hoaxes.
This is well ; he has made us his vlouting-
stog. — Mery Wives of Windsor, III. i.
You are wise and full of gibes and vlouting-
stocks, and 'tis not convenient you should be
cozened. — Ibid. IV. v.
I was treated as nothing, a Jloutina-stock
and a make-game, a monstrous and abortive
birth, created for no other end than to be
the scoff of my fellows.— Godwin, Mandeville,
i. 263.
Flower. " The flower of youth " is
a common expression, but flower by
itself = prime. It will be seen that
the two elder writers quoted use the
plural.
FLOWER AGE
( 248 )
FL UNKY
Fyrst whan englonde was in his floures,
Ordred by the temporall gouernoures,
Knowenge no spiritual! jurisdiction;
T.iau waa ther in eohe state and degre
Uaboundance and plentnous prosperity,
Peaceable welthe without amiooion.
Dyaloge between a Gentillman
and a husbandman, p. 138.
If he be young and lusty, the devil will put
in his heart, and say to him, What ! thou art
in thy flowers, man; take thy pleasure. —
Latimer, i. 431.
The virgin in her flowr,
The fresh young youth, the sucking children
small,
And hoary head dead to the ground shall fall.
Sylvester, The Laioe, 1449.
Dr. Playfere departed out of this world,
in the 46 year of his life, in his flower, and
prime. — Racket, Life of Williams, i. 18.
" Being formed for society, and beiug cut
off in your flower, you know." M I say," in-
terposed the other quickly, " what are you
talking of ? Dou't ! Who's a going to be
c it off in their flowers? " — Dickens, Barnaby
Jiu Ige, ch. lxxiv.
Flowerage, flowers ; blossoms.
O, as that evening Sun fell over the Champ-
de-Mars . . . saw he on his wide zodiac road
other such sight ? A living garden spotted
and dotted with such flowerage ; all colours
of the prism, the beautif ullest blent friendly
with the usefullest. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
II. Bk. I. ch. zi.
St. Edmund's shrine glitters now with
diamond flowerages, with a plating of wrought
gold. — Ibid., Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Flowretry, decoration in imitation
of flowers.
The cedar wa« so curiously carved with
imagery of flowers, palms, and Cherubims,
that the walls of the house seemed at the
same time a garden of flowers, a grove of
trees, yea, and a paradise of angels. Nor
was all this flowretry, and other celature on
the cedar, lost labour. — Fuller, Pisgah Sight,
III. v. 4.
Fluctuancy, fluctuation ; wavering.
They may have their storms and tossings
sometime, partly by innate fluctuancy, as the
rollings and tidings of the sea, and partly by
outward winds and tempests. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 222.
Fluctuate, to unsettle: usually a
verb neuter.
The younger sisters are bred rebels too, but
the thought of guiding their mother, when
such royal distinction was intended her, flat-
tered and fluctuated them. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, iv. 204.
Fluctuous, flowing ; pertaining to
the waves. See quotation more at
length s. v. Imbristle.
Madona Amphitsite' a fluctuous demeans. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 151).
Fludy, pertaining to the sea or flood.
Nashe calls the herring " this monarch-
uWfludy induperator." See quotation
s. v. Excelsitude.
Flue, influenza.
I have had a pretty fair share of the flue,
and believe I am now well rid of it at last. —
Southey, Letters, 1839 (iv. 574).
Fluence, stream. The Diets, only
give the word = fluency.
That he first did cleanse
With sulphur, then with fluences of sweetest
water reuse. — Chapman, Iliad, xvi. 224.
Fluke, a hydatid, or parasitical in-
testinal worm, so called from its like-
ness to a flounder.
like sheep-boys stuffing themselves with
blackberries, while the sheep are licking up
flukes in every ditch. — Kingsley, Sainfs Tra-
gedy, ii. 8.
Fluke, something unexpected ; a
chance (slang).
These conditions are not often fulfilled, I
can tell you ; it is a happy fluke when they
are. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. six.
Flummox, to confound.
My 'pinion is, Sammy, that if tout governor
don't prove a alleybi, hell be what the
Italians call reg'larly flummoxed. — Pickwick
Papers, ch. xxxiii.
Flump, to put down with violence.
Bellows went skimming across the room,
chairs were flumped down on the floor, and
poor Gambouge's oil and varnish-pots went
clattering through the windows.— Thackeray,
Paris Sketch-Book, ch. v.
Flunkeydom, the domain of flunkeys
or servile people. See quotation 8. v.
Obscurantism.
Can von deny that you've been off and on
lately between flunkeydom and the Cause,
like a donkey between two bundles of hay ?
— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xxvii.
Flunky, a livery servant ; hence ap-
plied to a servile person. L. has the
word with quotations from Thackeray.
I add the following as showing that
Carlyle in 1838 regarded the term as a
Scotticism. The word occurs two or
three times in Miss Ferrier's Inheritance
(1824).
In all this who sees not sensuality, preten-
sion, boisterous imbecility enough; much
that could not have been ornamental in the
temper of a great man's over-fed great man
(what the Scotch name flunky), though it had
FLUSH
( 249 )
FLY
been more natural there ?— Car lyle, Mite,
iii. 55.
Flush, a term at primero, when the
cards were of a suit ; also at cribbage.
Gilford says that five and fifty was tne
highest number to stand on at primero,
and if a flush accompanied this, the
hand was irresistible.
I bring you
No cheating Glim o' the doughs, or Claribels,
That look as big as five and fifty and flush. ^
Janson, Alchemist, I. i.
There was nothing silly in it [whist], like
the nob in cribbage — nothing superfluous.
No flushes, that most irrational of all pleas
that a reasonable being can set up ; that any
one should claim four by virtue of holding
cards of the same mark and colour, without
reference to the playing of the game, or
the individual worth or pretensions of the
cards themselves. — Lamb, Essays of Elia
{Mrs. Battle).
Flushenize, to make like the men of
Flushing ; to adopt the drinking habits
of the Dutch.
0 that these healthes that makes so many
ricke,
Were buried in the lake of Leathe quicke !
For since our English (ah!) were Flushenit'd,
Against good manners and good men tbey
iricke. — Danes, Mirum in Modum, p. 10.
Flushing, a woollen material, so
called from the place where it is manu-
factured.
He walked his battlements under fire, as
some stout skipper paces his deck in a suit of
Flushing, calmly oblivious of the April drops
that fall on his woollen armour. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xliii.
Fluctuated, tipsy. Flustered is more
common.
We were coming down Essex Street one
night a little frustrated, and I was giving him
the word to alarm the watch. — Spectator, No.
493.
Fluctuation, confusion ; flurry.
* Bless me," said she, '* how soon these fine
yonng ladies will be put into flusterations*—
Richardson, d. Harlowe, ii. 204.
A fine gentleman with a pig's tail and a
golden sord by his side came to comfit me.
... My fellow survant Umphry Klinker bid
him be sivil, and he gave tne young man a
dowse in the chops, but I fackms Mr. Klin-
ker wa'nt long in his debt; with a good
raken sapling he dusted his doublet for all
his golden chease-toaster, and fipping me
nnder his arm, carried me huom, I nose not
how, being I was in such a fiustration*—
Humphrey Clinker, i. 126.
He felt, all over him, a mix'd sensation,
A kind of shocking, pleasing, queer fust rat ion.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 140.
Flustrdm, agitation.
We may take the thing quietly without
being in a jluslrum. — Miss Edgeworth, Ab-
sentee, ch. v.
Flutch, adjective, a reproachful
term.
Jobbinol goose-caps, foolish loggerheads,
pitch calf -lollies. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk.
"I. ch. xxv.
Flute, to sound as a flute. See
quotation *. v. Lute.
So said he, and the barge with oar and sail
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted
swan,
Th&t, Jlutirxg a wild carol ere her death,
Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the
flood
With swarthy webs.
Tennyson, Passing of Arthur.
Flute-doux, a species of flute : the
latter part of the word intimating its
sweetness.
Trick. There's five-and-twenty couple of
bears are to dance a dance in Paris-garden
before the king; and four-and-twentv couple
of French apes play to them upon the fute-
doux.
Dash. . . . Four-and-twenty bears dance to
flute-douxes I
Revenge, or A Match in Newgate, Act II.
Flutenist, flute-player.
These village-known cheeks that in country
listes
Were fencers' men, these sometimes futenists
Beare office now. — Stapylton, Juvenal, iii. 42.
Fly, to travel by a fly. Coach was
employed as a verb in the same way.
See also Litter.
We then JLied to Stogursey just to see the
Church. . . . Tuesday, Poole fied us all the
way to Sir T. Ackland's Somersetshire seat.
—Southey, Letters, 1836 (iii. 478).
Fly, wide awake ; sharp. See quota-
tion *. v. Clyfakino.
" Do what I want, and I will pay you well."
..."lam /fy,"says Joe ; " but fen larks, you
know: stow hooking it." — Dickens, Bleak
House, ch. xvi.
Fly, a carriage for hire : it seems at
first to have been applied to carriages
drawn by men.
A nouvelle kind of four-wheel vehicles
drawn by a man and an assistant are very
accommodating to visitors and the inhabit-
ants; they are denominated jfys, a name
given by a gentleman at the Pavilion upon
their first introduction in 1816 ; and as they
FOB US
( 250 )
FOLLY
have superseded the sedan chairs, we hare
given a list of fares for the use of those
vehicles at the end of the work. — WrighVs
Brighton Ambulator, 1818.
Legs the tightest that ever were seen,
The tightest, the lightest that danced on the
green,
Cutting capers to sweet Kitty Clover.
Shatter'd, scattered, cut, and bowl'd down,
Off they go, worse off for renown,
A line in the Times or a talk about town,
Than the leg that a fly runs over.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Fobus, a terra of reproach.
Ay, you old fobus, and you would have
been my guardian, would you, to have taken
care of my estate, that half of 't should
never come to me, by letting long leases at
pepper-corn rents? — Wycher 'ley, Plain Dealer,
II. 1.
Fcedifragous, covenant-breaking.
We see it [adultery] plagued to teach us
that the sin is of a greater latitude than some
imagine it ; unclean, fcedifragous, perjured.
— Adams, i. 260.
Fog, gross; bloated. Foggy is the
usual adjective.
A fowle fog monster, great swad, depriued
of eyesight. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 672.
Fogle, slang for a silk handkerchief ;
/ogle-hunter is a stealer of such.
" What's the matter now ? " said the man
carelessly. " A young fogle-kunter" replied
the man who had Oliver in charge. "Are
you the party that's been robbed, sir? " en-
quired the man with the keys. " Yes, I am,"
replied the old gentleman, " but I am i ot
sure that this boy actually took the hand-
kerchief."— Dickens, Oliver Tidst, ch. xi.
"If you don't take fogies and tickers — "
u What's the good of talking in that way ? "
interposed Master Bates ; " he don't know
what you mean." " If you don't take pocket
handkechers and watches," said the Dodger,
reducing his conversation to the level of
Oliver's capacity, *' some other cove will." —
Ibid. ch. xviii.
Fugramitt, stupidity. See Fogrum.
Nobody's civil now, yon know ; 'tis a fo-
S 'amity quite out. — Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla,
k. II. ch. v.
Fogrum, fogeyish ; stupid. L. has
fogrum as a substantive = fogy, in
which sense also it occurs elsewhere in
Camilla.
Father and mother are but a couple of
fogrum old fools. — Foote, Trip to Calais,
Act I.
Do you think I come hither for such
fay rum stuff as that?— Mad. D'Arblay, C«-
milla, Bk. II. ch. v.
Foil. To give foil = to discomfit ;
to take a foil = to accept discomfiture.
Lose, gentle lords, but not by good King
Edward ;
A baser man shall give you all the foil,
Greene, Geo-a-Greene, p. 261.
Bestir thee, Jaques, take not now the foil.
Lest thou didst lose what foretime thou
didst gain. — Ibid., Friar Bacon, p. 168.
[The devil] is not only content to take a
foil, but even out of the same thing wherein
he was foiled maketh he matter of a new
temptation, a new ball of fire. — Andrewes,
Sermons, v. 513.
Foil, the track of an animal. To
run foil is to run over the same track,
to double; to take foil (see extract
*. v. Foote saunte) seems to have the
same meaning.
No hare when hardly put to it by the
hounds, and running foil, makes more doub-
lings and redoublings than the fetcht com-
pass, circuits, turns, and returns in this their
intricate peregrination.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight,
IV. iii. 6.
I think I was hard run enough by your
mother for one man ; but after giving her a
dodge, here's another—; follows me upon the
foil. — Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VII. ch. iv.
Safe from the fury of the critic hounds,
O Bruce, thou treadest Abyssinian grounds,
Nor can our British noses hunt thy foil.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 187.
Foldedlt, in folds.
The habite of her Priest was ... a pentacle
of siluered stnffe about her shoulders, hang-
ing foldedly down. — Chapman, Masque of
Mid. Temple.
Folly. See quotations.
They saw an object amidst the woods on
the edge of the hill, which upon enquiry they
were told was called Shenstone's/otfy. This
is a name which, with some sort of propriety,
the common people give to any work of
taste, the utility of which exceeds the level
of their comprehension. — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. IX. ch. vii.
There is nothing in this world which so
provokes scorn as the utterly wasted ex-
penditure on some proud building which,
after a vast outlay, he who planned it, having
totally miscalculated his means, is compelled
to leave unfinished. . . . We know indeed how
this scorn will often embody itself in a name
given to the unfinished structure. It is called
this roan's or that man's "folly ; " and the
name of the foolish builder is thus kept alive
for long after-years on the lips of men. — Abp.
Trench, Westminster Abbey Sermons, p. 130.
Folly, to* fool.
Let me shun
Such follying before thee.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. i.
FONTAL
( *5i )
FOOTY
Fontal, belonging to the font.
This day among the faithful placed,
And fed with fontal manna,
O with maternal title graced —
Dear Anna's dearest Anna.
Coleridge, Christening of a Friend's Child,
Fontakge, a head-dress introduced
at the Court of Louis XIV. about 1680
by Mademoiselle Fontange. L. says
" rare, obsolete, if ever naturalised/'
and quotes Spectator, No. 98.
Now bad the goddess of the year
Long nourish'd in her summer geer,
And envious autumn in revenge
With dust had spoil'd her green fountange.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, canto 2.
The Duchess of Burgundy immediately
undressed, and appeared in a fontange of the
new standard. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 105.
It edifies, I am sure, and would become
Quality, and fits as genteely on ladies as
French fontanges. — Ibid. p. 152.
Font- name, Christian name.
Some presume Boston to be his Christian,
of Bury his Sirname. But . . Boston is no
Font-name. — Fuller, Worthies, Lincoln (ii.
20).
Fool- fat, to the full, and more (?).
Or is it a substantive = bloated folly ?
Nay, we must now have nothing brought on
stages,
But puppetry, and pide ridiculous antickes;
Hen thither come to laugh, and feede fool'
fat.
Chapman, Revenge of Bussy D'Ambots,
Act I.
Foolocracy, rule of fools : a hybrid
word ; morocracy would be more cor-
rect.
Yet this is better than the old infamous
jobbing, and the foolocracy under which it
has so long laboured. — Sydney Smith, Letters,
1832.
Foolosopheb, a contemptuous cor-
ruption of philosopher. Cf. Crazy-
olooist, Futilitarian.
Some of your philosophers (or foolosophers
more properly) have had the faces to affirm
that we [women] were not of the name
species with men. — Howell, Parly of Beasts,
p. 54.
Foot seems to mean "trip" in the
extract.
Harry, giving him a slight foot, laid him
on the broad of his back. — a. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, ii. 166.
Foot.
Now trust me not, readers, if I be not
already weary of pluming and footing this
sea-gull, so open he lies to strokes. — Milton,
Apot.for Smectymnuus, p. 125.
Foot. To put one's best foot forward
or foremost = to make haste.
But put your best foot forward, or I fear
That we shall miss the mail.
Tennyson, Walking to the Mail.
Footback. N. gives an extract from
Taylor, who speaks of "footback trot-
ting travellers, ' and observes that it is
singularly used ; it is not, however,
peculiar to Taylor ; it refers, of couree,
to pedestrians carrying a bundle or
knapsack on their backs.
Tolossa hath forgot that it was sometime
sackt, and beggars that euer they caried their
fardles on footback. — Nashe, Pref. to Greene's
Menaphon.
Foote Saunt. Hnlliwell says, "A
game at cards mentioned in the School
of Abtise." Saunt or cent (q. v. in N.)
was a game at cards ; but in the sub-
joined there seems to me some double
entendre, though I know not what ; for
how could people play a game at cards
without cards? moreover, is foote joined
with saunt or cent anywhere else ?
In our assemblies at plaves in London you
shall see . . . euche playing at foote Saunt
without cardes,snch ticking, such toying, such
smiling, such winking, and such manning
them home when the sportes are ended, that
it is a right comedie to marke their be-
hauiour, to watch their conceites, as the
catte for the mouse, and as good as a course
at the game itselfe to dogge them a little or
followe aloofe by the print of their feete,
and so discouer by slotte where the deare
taketh foyle. — Gosson, Schoole of Abuse, p. 35
Foot- folk, infantry.
A favourite book of his grandfather had
been the life of old George Frundsberg of
Mindelheim, a colonel of foot-folk in the Im-
perial service at Pa via fight. — Thackeray, The
Virginians, ch. lziii.
Footman, lazy tonrgs?
They were to me like a dumb waiter, or
the instrument constructed by the smith,
and by courtesy called a "footman ; " they
did what I required, and I was no further
concerned with them. — Godwin, MandevilU,
iii. 67.
Foott, poor ; mean.
I think it would be a very pretty bit of
practice to the ship's company to take her
out from under that footy battery. — Marryat,
Peter Simple, ch. zxxiii.
Nobody wants you to shoot crooked ; take
good iron to it, and not footy paving-stones.
— C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. ix.
FOPPERL V
( *5* )
FOREDELE
FoPPBRLY, foppish ; foolish.
Ill set my foot to his, and fight it out
with him, that their fopperly god is not so
good as a Red-herring. — Nashe, Lenten Stvffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 167).
Fop's alley, a passage up the centre
of the pit in the old Opera House,
where dandies congregated.
Daring the last dance she was discovered
by Sir Robert Floyer, who, sauntering down
fop's alley, stationed himself by her side. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. II. ch. iv.
Foranize, to speak or act as a
foreigner. Fuller, remarking that Pits
called a certain private gentleman no-
bUis, says that the word out of England
does not imply more than gentle birth,
and adds in the margin, " Our country-
man, Pits, did foramze with long living
beyond the seas." — Worthies, Warwick
(ii. 417).
Forbearant, patient ; forbearing.
Whosoever had preferred sincerity, earnest-
ness, depth of practical rather than theoretic
insight, . . . must have come over to London,
and with forbearant submissiveness listened
to our Johnson. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 237.
Forbid, to defy, or challenge.
To them whom the mist of envy hath so
blinded that they can see no good at all done
but by themselves, 1 forbid them, the best of
them, to show me in Rheims or in Rome, or
any popish city Christian, such a show as we
have seen here these last two days. — An-
dreses, Sermons, v. 36.
Forbiddingnkss, that which repels.
If she has near her a person to whom she
might communicate her whole mind without
doubt of her fidelity, yet there may be a/or-
biddingness in the person, a difference in
years, in degree. — Richardson, Grandison, iii.
264.
Forcelet, a linen cloth (?).
Our doctrine taketh no authority of private
folk, of women, of forcelets, of napkins
[linteis atque lineis]. — Jewel, i. 260.
Fore. To the fore = in a prominent
position ; ready at hand. According to
Barham this is an Irish phrase, but it
is now common in England.
Two or three score
Of magnificent structures around, perhaps
more,
As our Irish friends have it, are there to the
fore. — Ingoldsby Legends {Auto-da- Fe).
Foreacquaint, to get knowledge be-
fore li and.
Walk every day a turn or two with death
in thy garden, and well foreacquaint thyself
therewithal. — Ward, Sermons, p. 53.
Even foxes, and hares, and other such
vermin, foreacquaint themselves with muses,
thickets, and burrows, into which, when they
are chased and hunted, they may repair for
safety.— Ibid. p. 67.
Fore-ages, time past.
In fore-aqes men of great titles would
patronise tne writing of good studies. —
Breton, Wit's Private Wealth (Dedic).
Fore-backwardly, preposterously ;
putting cart before horse.
Exercise indeed we do, but that very fore-
backwardly; for where we should exercise to
know, we exercise as having known. — Sidney,
Defence of Poesie, p. 561.
Fore-buttock, breast.
Now with a modern matron's careful air,
Now herf ore-buttocks to the navel bare.
Mtsc. by Swift, Pope, and Arbuthnot,
iv. 222 (ed. 1733).
Forechace, the hunt forwards. The
Trojans were in pursuit of the Greeks
that they might seize the body of
Patroclus —
But when th' Ajaoes turn'd on them, and
made their stand, their hearts
Drunk from their faces all their bloods, and
not a man sustain 'd
The forechace nor the after-fight.
Chapman, Iliad, xvii. 637.
Foreconclude, to conclude previ-
ously.
They held the same confederation fore-
concluded by Alfred. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng.,
p. 12.
Forecondemn, to condemn before-
hand.
What can equally savour of injustice and
plain arrogance as to prejudice and forecon-
demn his adversary in the title for " slander-
ous and scurrilous " ? — Milton, Apol. for
Smectymnuus, p. 103.
Fore court, front court
Englishmen in ancient time called in their
language an Entry, and fore Court or Gate-
house, Inbopou. — Holland's Camden, p. 815.
Foredecreb, to preordain.
God had fore-decreed to make it His owne
worke by a cleaner way. — Daniel, Hist, of
Eng., p. 162.
Foredeem, to presage.
Of a frende it was more standing with
humanitee and gentlenesse to hope the best
then to foredeme the worste. — Udal's Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 320.
Foreoele, advantage. See H. *. v.
To one demaunding what auantage he had
FOREDONE
( 353 ) FOREIMAGINATION
by his philosophic, " Though nothing els,"
aaied he, w yet at lestwise tYasforedele I haue,
that I am readie prepared to al maner for-
tune, good or badde." — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apopkth., p. 157.
Foredone, previous.
And then behoveth us to take upon us
sharp penance, continuing therein, for to
obtain of the Lord forgivness of our fort'
done sins, and grace to abstain us hereafter
from sin. — Exam, of W. Thorpe (Bale, Select
Works, p. 67).
Fore-door, front door. See extract
S. V. SUBTBRRESTRIAL.
The tiger-hearted man . . by force carried
me through a long entry to the fore-door. —
Bichardson, Grandison, i. 248.
Fork faint, very languishing.
And with that word of sorrow, sXLforefaint
She looked up.
Sackville, Induction, st. 15.
Fork patch e, forethought or sub-
tlety. Fetch is a common word for
contrivance.
I thought that a forrener and a straunger
bad bene all one. But bylike it includeth
soffl great mistery knowne only to his Lord-
smyppes politicke wisdome that they be here
reckned two, as he is a man of a great fore
fatche.— Bale, Declaration of Bonner's Articles,
1554 (Art. zi.).
Fore feel, to feel beforehand.
With unwieldy waves the great sea
forefeels winds
That both ways murmur.
Chapman, Iliad, xiv. 13.
Forefit, to prepare.
Mark such as, sentenced by judges and
physicians, foreknow their death, yet with-
out special grace forefit themselves never the
more carefully. — Ward, Sermons, p. 54.
Foreform, to prepare.
They will have no reserve upon them,
no foref armed evasions or contrivances for
ipe.—iT. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 176.
Foregate, entrance gate.
The nether towne . . . fensed with a wall,
with a castle also thereto, and a foregate at
the entrance into it. — Hollands Camden,
ii. 81.
Beare vp the Crosse ; and euer looke vpon't
As on the only key of Heav'n'a \ foregate.
Davits, Muse's Teares, p. 15.
Some postern or back-door for a gift to
come in when the broad fore-gates are shut
against it. — Adams, ii. 259.
Foregather, to hold close inter-
course with.
And he waggled his tail, as much as to say,
"Mr. Blogg, we've foregathered before to-
day."— Ingoldsby Legends {Bagman's Dog).
"I am ... a man of my word." "Ay,
and a man who is better than his word,"
cried Catherine; "the only one I ever did
foregather." — Reads, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. Uv.
Instead of foregathering with an old friend,
you discover that you have to make a new ac-
quaintance.— H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. vii.
Foregrown, overgrown.
To be quiet from the inward, violent,
injurious oppressors, the fat and forearown
rams within our own fold, is a special bless-
ing.— Andrews, v. 137.
Forehead. Forehead of the morning
is Chapman's rendering olfipi pa\a, very
early. Cf. "top of the morning," though
that rather refers to the best part of the
morning.
I'll launch my fleet, and all my men
remove ;
Which (if thou wilt use so thy sight, or
think'st it worth respect)
In forehead of the morn thine eyes shall see,
with sails erect
Amidst the fishy Hellespont.
Chapman, Iliad, ix. 847.
Fjoreheaded, headstrong"; tender-
foreheaded = gentle, meek.
The Gnosticks, Valentinians, Cataphry-
gians, . . . were tender-foreheaded and simple-
spirited people compared to those high-
crested and Seraphick Sophisters. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 47.
Our zeal to Qod's glory (saith he), our love
to His Church, and the due planting of the
same in this For-headed age, should be so
warm Hey litis Hist, of the Presbyterians,
p. 278.
Foeeheadless, brazen ; impudent.
•If Jethro called for courage in those
modest, primitive times, and among a people
newly tamed with Egyptian yokes, what do
our audacious and foreheadless swaggerers
require? — Ward, Sermons, p. 121.
Forehearse (?). Love is the
wounder referred to.
Ay me poore man, with many a trampling
teare
I feele him wound the forehearse of my heart.
Greene, Menaphon, p. 87.
Foreimagination, anticipation.
If any of us had but half the strength of
Paul's faith, or life of his hope, or cheerful
foreim aginations, which he had of this feli-
city, we could not but have the same desires
and longings for our dissolution, and fruition
of them. — Ward, Sermons, p. 68.
FOREKING
( 254 )
FORESHAPE
Fore kin a, a predecessor on the
throne.
Why didst thou let so many horsemen hence ?
Thy fierce forekings had ciench'd their pirate
hides
To the bleak church doors, like kites upon a
barn. — Tennyson, Harold, iv. 3.
Forelittbb, to litter or bring forth
prematurely. Cf. extract from Greer e,
*. v. Puppy.
As forelittring bitches whelp blvnd pup-
pies, so I may bee perhaps entwighted of
more haste then good speede. — Stany hurst,
Virgil, Dedic.
Foremelt, to melt beforehand.
Loue's vshering fire
Foremelting beautie, and loue's flame itselfe.
Chapman, Gentleman Vsher, Act IV.
Fobemind, to intend.
Neauer I foremynded (let not mee falslye be
threpped)
For toe slip in secret by flight.
Stany hurst, £n., iv. 354.
Fore-name, Christian name.
His soune, carrying the same fort-name,
not degenerating from his father, lived in
high honour. — Holland's Camden, p. 320.
Forenioht, previous night. Cf.
After-morn in Tennyson.
And I that in forenight was with no weapon
agasted,
And litel esteemed thee swarms of Greekish
assemblye,
Now shiuer at shaddows.
Stanyhursi, JEn., ii. 753.
Forensive, legal.
One thing remains that is purely of epis-
copal discharge, which I will salute and go
by, before I look upon his forensive or poli-
tical transactions. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
i. 97.
Forepayment, prepayment.
I had £100 of him in forepayment for the
first edition of Espriella, or rather in part of
forepayment. — Southey, Letters, 1807 (11. 9).
Foreplan, to prearrange.
She had learnt very little more than what
had been already foreseen and foreplanned in
her own mind. — Miss Austen, Sense and Sens-
ibility, ch. xxxviii.
Forepoint, to predestine ; foreshow.
These three (as distressed wrackes), pre-
sented by some further forepoynting fate,
coueted to clime the mountaine. — Greene,
Menaphon, p. 27.
This (as forepointing to a storme that was
gathering on that coast) began the first dif-
ference with the French nation. — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng.y p. 10.
Forequote, to cite beforehand.
As publik and autentik rowles for equoting
Confused thf events most worthy noting
In His deer Church, His darling and delight.
Sylvester, The Columnes, 454.
Fore-report, to declare beforehand.
Fame falls most short in those transcend-
ents which are above her predicaments, . . .
but chiefly in fore-reporting the happinesse
in heaven.— Fuller, Holy State, Bk. III. ch.
xxiii.
Fore-request, to ask beforehand.
Whereas Papists plead that Offa had fore-
requested the granting of these priviledgea
from the Pope, no mention at all thereof
appears in the charter of his foundation
(here too large to insert), but that all was
done by his own absolute authority. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. iii. 38.
Fore resemble, to prefigure.
He . . . stiffly argues that Christ being as
well king as priest was as well fore-resembled
by the kings then as by the high priest ; so
that if his coming take away the one type, it
must also the other.— Milton, Reason of Ch.
Government, Bk. I. ch. v.
Fore-resolution, previous resolve.
Men that want this fore-resolution are like
a secure city, that spends all her wealth in
furnishing her chambers and furbishing her
streets, but lets her bulwarks fall to the
ground. — Adams, iii. 26.
Foresend, to send beforehand.
Claudius . . . fore sends Publius Ostorius
Scapula, a great warrior, propraetor into
Britaine. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 4.
Foresentence, prophetic doom.
When wine had wrought, this good old man
awook,
Agniz'd his crime, ashamed, wonder-strook
At strength of wine, and toucht with true
repentance,
With prophet mouth 'gan thus his son's
fore-sentence. — Sylvester, The Arke, p. 599.
Foreshadow, a shadowing before ; an
anticipatory sketch. The verb is com-
mon.
It is only in local glimpses and by signifl-
cant fragments . . . that we can hope to
impart some outline or foreshadow of this
doctrine. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I.
ch. viii.
Dubious on the distracted patriot imagin-
ation wavers, as a last deliverance, some
foreshadow of a National Guard. — Ibid., Fr.
Rev., Pt. I. Bk. V. ch. iii.
Foreshape, to prepare; to mould
beforehand.
But let it be propounded on his part,
Or by the seculars before the Synod,
F0RESL1P
( 25s)
FORKED
And we shall eoforeskape the minds of men
Thai by the acclaim of most, if not of all,
It shall be hailed acceptable.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iii. 3.
Fobeslip, to lose previously.
You shall hare them burnish, and grow
thicke, yea, and then make hast for amends
of the former timeforeslipt. — Holland, Pliny,
xix. 6.
Foresnaffle, to restrain by anti-
cipation.
Had not Iforeenaffied my mynde by votary e
promise
Not toe yoke in wedlock ?
Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 17.
Forespeak, to bewitch, and so to
invoke evil. Cf. Bespeak, and see H.
The sly Enchanter, when to work his will
And secret wrong on some forespoktn wight,
Frames wax in form to represent aright
The poor unwitting wretch he meaus to kill ;
And pricks the image, framed by magic's skill,
Whereby to vex the party day and night.
Daniel, Sonnet X. (Arber't
Eng. Garner, i. 535).
I doe not forespeak or imprecate a further
evil day upon any. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 337.
Forespeaker, an introducer; one who
prepares the way for another.
Wee must get him . . . gloues, scarfes,
and fannes to bee sent for presents, which
might be as it were forespeakers for his
entertainment. — Breton, Grimello's Fortunes,
p. 10.
Forest. The Antiquary referred to
for this curious derivation is stated in
a note to be " Sir Robert Cotton (under
the name of Mr. Speed) in Huntingdon-
shire."
Now was the South-west of this County
made a Forest indeed, if, as an Antiquary
hath observed, a Forest be so called, quia
foris est, because it is set open and abroad. —
fuller, Worthies, Hants (i. 399).
Foreteam, front shaft or pole (Latin
Umn).
Their chariots in their foreteams broke.
Chapman, Iliad, xvi. 352.
Forethreaten, to threaten before-
hand.
Druina's monarch himself, when all his
peat sages were at a stand, hit right upon
it ; for it being forethreatned, and advertise-
ment being fortunately lighted upon, that a
sudden blow should he given, which should
be no sooner doing than a piece of paper
burning, His Majesty . . . positively avouched
that it must be some project of nitre.—
Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 44.
Foreweep, to weep before ; to usher
in with weeping.
The sky in sullen drops of rain
Forewept the morn.
Churchill, The Duellist, i. 155.
Fobewithered, withered away.
Her body small, forewither'd, and forespent,
As is the stalk that summer's drought
oppress 'd. — Sackville, Induction, st. 12.
Fore- world, the antediluvian world.
It were as wise to bring from Ararat
The fore-world's wood to build the magic pile.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. be.
Forfeitment, penalty.
Then many a Lollard would in forfeitment
Bear paper-faggots o'er the pavement.
Hall, Sat., II. i. 17.
Foroalded, thoroughly gsilled.
But sure that horse which tyreth like a roile,
And lothes the grief e of his foryalded sides,
Is better much than is the harbrainde colte.
Gascoigne, Complaint of Philomene, p. 117.
Forgettable, obscure ; unremark-
able.
Of the numerous and now mostly forget'
table cousinry we spe ify farther only the
Mashams of Otes in Essex. — Carlyle, Crom-
well, i. 21.
Forgivingness, placability.
Sir Charles . . was always happy in making
by his equanimity, generosity, and forgiving-
ness, fast friends of inveterate enemies.—
Richardson, Grandison, vi. 115.
Fortsfamiliation, the establishment
of a son away from the father's house,
with a certain sum, beyond which he is
to expect nothing. R. has the verb,
g. v. ; it is a legal term.
My father could not be serious in the
sentence of for is-f ami liation which he had so
unhesitatingly pronounced. — Scott, Sob Roy,
i. 37.
Foristell, breach of the forest
laws (?)
The inhabitants, as we read in King
William the Conqueror's booke, were . . .
?[uitte and quiet from all custome, beside
or robbery, peace-breach, and Foristell. —
Holland's Camden, p. 350.
Forked. To fork out « to give
money is a common slang phrase. See
quotations, v. CoTTON.but query whether
this is the meaning in the first extract.
Sooner the inside of thy hand shall grow
Hisped and hairie, ere thy palm shall know
A postern-bribe took, or a/orAr«Z-fee
To fetter Justice, when she might be free.
Herrick, Hesperidis, p. 216.
FORLORN
( 256)
FORRELL
If I am willing to fork out a sum of money,
he may be willing to give up his chance of
Diplow.— G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. zxviii.
Forlorn, a forlorn hope.
The squadron nearest to your eye
Is his Forlorn of infantry.
The Forlorn now halts for the van,
The Rearguard draws up to the main.
Cotton, Winter, 1689 (Eng. Garner,
i. 219).
Formable, shapely. In the second
extract it = plastic.
Thys profit is gott by trauelling, that what-
soeuer he wryteth he may so express© and
order it, that hys narrative may be formable.
— Wehbe, English Poetrie, p. 90.
The Papists . . . call that sacred writ a
nose of war, formable to any construction. —
Adams, ii. 338.
Formaliser, formalist; a man of
routine.
It was notorious that after this secretary
retired the king's affairs went backwards;
wheels within wheels took place ; the minis-
ters turned formalisers, and the court mys-
terious.—-North, Life of Lord Guilford,\\. 144.
Formalities, special dress. In the
subjoined quotations it is applied to
academical, municipal, sacerdotal, and
Quaker's garb; also, as by Earle, to
what would now be called the get up
of an affected man.
You find him in his slippers, and a pen in
his eare, in which formality he was asleep.
— Earle, Microcosmographie {Pretender to
Learning).
She took her leave of the University, . . .
the Doctours attending her in their formali-
ties as far as Shotover. — Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
IX. i. 73.
Egg -Saturday, Edward Bagshaw, MJL,
and student of Ch. Ch., presented his bache-
laurs ad deter mi nandum, without having on
him any formalities, whereas every deaue
besides had formalities on. — Life of A . Wood,
Feb. 12, 1668-9.
Requiring . . . the several companies in
the City to attend solemnly in their formali-
ties as she went along. — Heylin, Life of
Laud, Bk. III. p. 241.
The priests went before in their formali-
ties.— Aubrey, Misc., p. 218.
Mrs. Lov. I hopM to have been quiet,
when once I had put on your odious for-
mality here.
Cot. Then thou wearest it out of compul-
sion, not choice, friend.
Mrs. Lov. Thou art in the right of it,
friend.
Centlivre, Bold Stroke for a Wife, Act V.
Former, a predecessor.
We must be content in common speech to
use the terms of our formers devised. — W.
Patten, Erped. to Scotland, 1547 (Arber, Eng.
Garner, iii. 59).
Formic, pertaining to formica or
ants. In the extract the word is em-
ployed generally. In ordinary use it
only occurs in the phrase formic acid,
a pungent acid supplied by, or similar
to that supplied by, ants.
When we are told to go to the ant and
the bee, and consider their ways, it is not
that we should borrow from them formic
laws or apiarian policy. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. xcvi.
Formidabilitt, power of causing
fear.
A Mackintosh has been taken who reduces
their formidability bv being sent to raise two
clans, and with orders, if they would not
rise, at least to give out they had risen, for
that three clans would leave the Pretender
unless joined by these two. — Walpole to
Mann, ii. 98 (1745).
Formositie, beauty. The speaker is
a pedantic schoolmaster.
The thunder-thumping Jove transfused his
dotes into your excellent formositie. — Sidney,
Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Formulary, formal.
An English workman should have been,
called in to assist to have here mended the
formulary part, which is grossly mistaken,
and shows plainly the romance of a foreigner.
— North, Reflections on Le Clerc, p. 675.
There is . .in the incorruptible Sea-green
himself, though otherwise so lean Bud formu-
lary, a heartfelt knowledge of this latter fact.
—Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. ii.
Forne, former.
Gangameli is as much as to save the
Camel's hous; whiche it is saied that a
certain king in forne yeares, when he had on
a dromedarie camele escaped the handes of
his enemies, builded there.— UdaTs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 210.
Fornesse, foreland.
Whiles I looked round . . . Fornesse the
other part of this shire appeared in sight,
which the sea hath after a sort violently
rent apart from the rest. ... So much, that
thereupon it tooke the name. For with us
in our language, For-nesse and Foreland is all
one with the Latine Promontorium anterius
(that is, a Fore-promontory). — Holland's
Camden, p. 754.
Forrell, to bind. The cover of a
book is still called in Devonshire the
farrol (cf. Fr. fourrcau). At present
book-binders call an inferior kind of
FOFS AND AGAJNSTS ( 257 ) FOUR-IN-HAND
vellum forrel, probably because used
in covering" books.
As for Joaephua his conceit, that the
second edition of the temple by Zorobabel,
as it was new forrelled and filletted with
gold by Herod, was a statelier volume then
the first of Solomon ; it is too weak a sur-
mise to have a confutation fastned to it. —
Fuller, Holy State, Bk. ILL ch. xxiv.
Fobs and Againsts, advantages and
disadvantages. The Anglo-Latin pros
and cons is more usual.
I knew all about it at the time ; I was
privy to all the fors and againsts. — Miss
Austen, Persuasion, ch. ui.
Forslip, suffer to escape.
Hee . . . shifted off and dallied with them
"till, untill they hsdforslipt the opportunity
of pursuing him.— Holland's Camden, ii. 127.
Fort, brave ; strong. In the second
extract it perhaps = tipsy, fortified
with liquor.
O goodly man at arms,
la fight a Paris, why should fame make thee
fort 'gainst our arms,
Being such a fugitive ?
Chapman, Iliad, xvii. 112,
But if he come home fort to bed,
te ra la tal da ral de ra do,
I will not strive to wrong his head,
ThoJ by the foretop he is led.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 422.
Fobthdeal, step in advance; pro-
gress. Udal says that to begin well is
As good mforthdeale and auantage towards
thende of the werke as if a good portion of
the same wer alredie finished. — Erasmus.
Apophth^ p. 41, note.
Forth-fabe, passing-bell.
Item, that from henceforth there be no
knells or forth-fares rung for the death of
*ny man.— Hooper, Injunctions, 1561.
Fortitudinous, endowed with forti-
tude. The term is used by Colonel
Bath, of whom it is said (Bk. III. ch.
Jin.), "All his words are not to be
found in a dictionary."
He rose immediately, and having heartily
embraced Booth, presented him to his friend,
■aymg he had the honour to introduce to
mm as hrave and aa fortitudinous a man
m any in the king's dominions. — Fielding,
Amelia, Bk. V. ch. vi. v'
Fortune, to provide witb a fortune •
to dower. '
I must go to him and to his as an obliged
to* half-fortuned venon. — jRickardson, a.
narlowe. l. 299.
?,® j*.*° /«*«« ber out to a young lover.
—Ibid. u. 160.
Fossicking. H. gives this as a
Warwickshire word = troublesome. In
the extract it seems to mean persistent,
and persistency is often troublesome.
Is this word connected with Fussock, a
provincial name for the ass ?
They [the Chinese] are more suited by
habit, characteristics, and physique to plod-
ding, fossicking, persevering industry than
for hard work.— Eraser's Mag., Oct. 1878,
p. 449.
Foster, a fosterer or cherisher.
He plays the serpent right, described in
Esop's tale,
That sought the fosters death, that lately
gave him life.
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p. 131.
Fount aineeb, manager or director of
a fountain.
On one of these walks, within a square of
tall trees, is a basilisc of copper, which,
managed by the fountainere, casts water
neere 00 feet high. . . . The fountaineere
represented a showre of raine from the topp.
—Evelyn, Diary, Feb. 27, 1644.
Fount ainlet, a little fountain.
In the aforesaid Village there be two
Fountainelets, which are not farre asunder. —
Fuller, Worthies, Huntingdon (i. 468).
Fourb, to cheat ; also a swindler. It
is a frequent word in North's Examen.
I ask then how those who fourbed others
become dupes to their own contrivances. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 370.
If a lawyer ... has the foresight to lay
in a provision for age and accidents, he must
be dubb'd a cheat, and posted up for a fourb
and impostor.— Ibid. p. 525.
The referring these fourbs to the secre-
tary's office to be examined always frustrated
their designs. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, ii. 40.
Fourbery, cheat; deception. See
FURBERT.
A child will scream out at its nurse under
the disguise of a vizard, but take it off. and
he turns the very object of fear into play and
diversion ; you have unmask'd the fourbety,
Sou have discovered the imposture; why
ave you less assurance than a child? —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 373.
Four- eared, ass ; a double ass.
I would I were the gallant Courtizan
That euer put a four-ear'd asse to schoole.
Breton, I would and I would not, st. 82.
Four - in - hand, with four horses
driven from the box.
It is excessively pleasant to hear a couple
of these four-in-hand gentlemen retail their
exploits over a bottle.— Irving, Salmagundi,
No. iii.
S
FOUR-LANE-END ( 258 )
FRANKIFY
Thus off they went, %n<L, four-in-hand,
Dash'd briskly tow'rds the promis'd land.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. zx.
Fodr-lane-end, a place where four
roads meet.
He being also anathematized, was interred
at a. four-lane-end without the city. — Archaol.,
viii. 203 (1787).
Four-poster, a large bed with four
posts to it.
a Will you allow me to in-quire why you
make up your bed under that 'ere deal
table?" said Sam. "'Cause I was always
used to a four-poster afore I came here, and
I find the legs of the table answer rust as
well," replied the cobbler. — Pickwick Papers,
ch. xliv.
Nobody mistook their pew for their four-
poster during the sermon. — Reade, Never too
late to mend, ch. vii.
Fourteenth night,- fortnight.
It was agreed that there shuld be a truce :
.... yet so as it might be free for both
sides, after fourteen daies waring given
aforehand, to begin warre afresh
The queen was highly
offended .... that hee had agreed upon
such a cessation as might every fourteenth
night be broken. — Holland's Camden, ii. 131.
Four-wheeler, a four-wheeled cab,
as distinguished from a hansom.
He, having sent on all their luggage by a
respectable old four-wheeler, got into the
hansom beside her,
Black, Princess of Thule, ch. x.
Fowaqe, hearth-money. See Feu-
age.
Bethink ye, Sirs,
What were the fowage and the subsidies
When bread was but four mites that's now a
groat?— Taylor, Ph. van AH., Pt. I. ii. 6.
Fox, to make tipsy, is plentifully
illustrated by N. ; but he does not give
the phrase flay the fox = be sick after
drinking (escorcher U regnard) ; either,
says Cotgrave, because in spewing one
makes a noise like a fox that barks, or
else (from the subject to the effect)
because the flaying of so unsavoury a
beast will make any one spew. See
quotation t. v. Comb- feat.
Which made all these good people there
to lay up their gorges, and vomit what was
upon their stomachs before all the world, as
if they had flayed the fox. — Urquhart's Rabe-
lais, Bk. II. ch. xvi.
Fox and Gerse, a game played with
pegs or draughtsmen.
" Can you play at no kind of game, Master
Harry? ,r a A little at/or and geese, madam."
— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 367.
Fox whelp, a liquor. See quotation
more at length s. v. Stire.
Fox whelp, a beverage as much better than
champagne as it is honester, wholesomer,
and cheaper. — Southey, The Doctor, Inter-
chapter xvi.
For, some sort of cheat or swindler.
Though you be crossbites,/oy«, and nips,
yet you are not good lifts. — Greene, Theeves
falling out, 1615 (Harl. Misc., viii. 389).
Frab, to harass ; scold.
I was not kind to you ; I frahbed you and
plagued you from the first, my lamb. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Ruth, ch.
Fragmentariness, brokenness;
want of continuity.
This stupendous fragmentariness height-
ened the dream-like strangeness of her bridal
life. — G. Eliot, MiddUmarch, ch. xx.
Frag Rous, fragrant, which is the
reading in other copies.
Oh doe not fall
Fowle in these noble pastimes, least you call
Discord in, and so divide
The gentle bridegroome and the fragrous
bride. — Herrick, Appendix, p. 453.
Frame, to move (N. country).
Frame upstairs, and make little din. — Miss
E. Bronte, Wuthering Heights, ch. v.
An oath, and a threat to set Throttler on
me if I did not frame off, rewarded my per-
severance.— Ibid. ch. xiii.
Frame, a raft.
Out, people, out vppon them, follow fast
with fires and flames,
Set sayles aloft, make out with oares, in
ships, in boates, in frames.
Phaer's JEneid, Bk. iv.
Frame-house, a place in which things
are framed or fashioned. Bradford
uses the word again, pp. 54, 86.
The cross . . is the frame-house in which
God frameth His children like to His Son
Ohnst.— Bradford, ii. 78.
Francised, Frenchified.
He was an Englishman Francised, who,
going over into France a young man, spent
the rest of his life there. — Fuller, Worthies
{Hertford), i. 435.
Frankift, to give a Frank dress to.
CI Frenchify.
As for Frankifying their own names, the
Greeks do it worse than we do. — Lord Strang-
ford, Letters and Papers, p. 150.
FRANSICAL
( 259 ) FRENCH LEA VE
Fransical, frantic.
A certain fransical maladie they call Love.
—Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Frantic, a roadman.
Fantastik frantiks that would innovate,
And every moment change your form of
state.— Sylvester, The Captaines, 1194.
So madly do these frantics spend their
time and strengths by doing and undoing,
tying hard knots and untying them. — Adams,
L275.
[The hypocrite] is a frantic too, for he
incurs the world's displeasure in making a
shew of godliness, God's double displeasure
in making bat a shew. — Ibid. i. 280.
Frantic, to act like a madman.
The Arctic needle that doth guide
The wand 'ring shade by his magnetic pow'r,
And leaves his silken gnomon to decide
The question of the controverted hour,
First frantics up and down from side to side.
Quarles, Emblems, v. 4.
Fraxzy, cross.
I dare say ye warna franzy, for ye look as
if ye'd ne'er been angered i' your life. — G.
Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. x.
Frapping, fretting; chafing. Cf.
Hor. Ep.> L i. 9.
The hone ... is sometimes spurred on to
battle so long till he draw his gats after him
for frapping, and at last falls down, and bites
the ground instead of grass. — Kennefs Eras-
mus, Praise of Folly, p. 53.
Fratch, a quarrel.
I ha* never had no fratch afore sin ever I
were born wi' any o' my like ; Gonnows I
b*' none now that s o' my makin'. — Dickens,
Hard Times, ch. xx.
Fraudsman, cheat
Yon shall not easily discern between ... a
tradesman and & fraudsman. — Adams,\x. 240.
Fray, a rubbing, so as to make bare
or shabby : the verb is common.
Tis like a lawnie firmament, as yet
Quite dispossest of either fray or fret.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 86.
Freak ixo, eccentric ; fantastic.
Visited Sir J. Minnes, who continues ill*
bat he told me what a mad freaking fellow
Sir Ellis Layton hath been, and is, and once
at Antwerp was really mad. — Pepys, Jan. 25,
1664-65.
Fream, to roar, or cry out. H. gives
*' Freaming, the noise made by the
boar at rutting-time. " Cf. Froam. It
is possible that Stanyhurst formed the
word from the Latin fremere, and that
in the extracts it means to rage. The
person referred to in the first quotation
is Laocoon in the folds of the serpent.
Hee freams, and skrawling to the skye
brays terribil hoyseth. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii.
234.
Hudffe fluds lowdlye/reamtiw from moun-
tains loftye be trowlling. — Ibid., J2n., iv.
169.
Frechon, freckles.
Wrinkles, pimples, redde streekes, frech-
ons, haires, warts, neves, inequalities. — Bur-
ton, Anatomy, p. 558.
Freckly, freckled.
Thus on tobacco does he hourly feed,
And plumps his freckly cheeks with stinking
weed. — T. Brown, Works, i. 117.
Frederize, to take the part of the
Emperor Frederick.
But upon the Pope's . . . dispising the
king's message (who, he said, began to
Frederize), it was absolutely here ordayned,
vnder great penalty, that no contribution of
money should be given to the Pope by any
subject of England. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng.,
p. 138.
Free-boot, robbery.
Julius Tutor, who robbed his fellow-
theeves, for he pillaged the Cilicians, that
lived themselves upon free boote. — Stapylton,
Juvenal, viii. 124, note.
Freedstool, a stool or chair placed
near the altar to which offenders fled
for sanctuary. See H. The Freed-
Stool of Beverley is described in Defoe 8
Tour thro1 G. Brit., iii. 189.
Athelstan his son succeeded King Edward*
being much devoted to St. John of Beverley,
on whose church he bestowed a f reed-stool
with large priviledges belonging thereunto.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. v. 9.
Fremescent, raging. Cf. Fream.
Carlyle has the noun &\bo, fremescence,
in the fourth chapter of the same book,
but this is given in Latham.
Thuriot shows himself from some pin-
nacle, to comfort the multitude becoming
suspicious, fremescent. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
I. Bk. V. ch. vi.
French leave. A person who dis-
appears without leave or notice, or who
helps himself to something unasked, is
said to take French leave* The expres-
sion has been repeatedly canvassed in
N. and Q.y but nothing quite satisfac-
tory arrived at.
I felt myself extremely awkward about
going away, not choosing, as it was my
first visit, to take French leave, and hardly
knowing how to lead the way alone among
S 2
FRENETICALLY ( 260 )
FR1TILLAR Y
so many strangers. — Mad. D*Arblay, Diary.
ii. 199.
Tou are going to quit me without warning
— French leave — is that British conduct? —
Lytton, What will he do with it? Bk. I.ch.x.
Frenetically, madly.
All mobs are properly f renaies, and work
frenetically with mad fits of hot and cold. —
Carlyle, Fr. Bev., Pt. II. Bk. II. ch. ii
Frenzie, mad.
That /route merchant that would make
and strike up matches of hundreds and
thousands with parties absent, as if they
were present. — Ward, Sermons, p. 54.
All these sharpers have but * frenzy man's
sleep.— IHd. p. 100.
Frequently, populously.
The place became frequently inhabited on
every side : as approved both healthfull and
delightf ull.— Sandys, Travels, p. 279.
Fresh. Fresh as butter, or painty a
punning simile.
There are the marks cut by the old fellows
— horse-hoofs, hatchets, initials, &c. — as fresh
as print.— C. Kingsley, 1864 (Life, ii. 177).
Brewer says to his driver, "Now is your
horse pretty fresh ? " . . . Driver says he's as
fresh as butter.— Dickens, Mutual Friend, Bk.
XI. ch. iii.
Fresh, excited with wine (slang).
Drinking was not among my vices. I
could get "fresh," as we call it, when in
good company and excited by wit and mirth ;
but I never went to the length of being
drunk. — Marryat, FY. Mildmay, ch. ziii.
Freshish, rather fresh or new.
If the mould should look a little freshish,
it won't be so much suspected. — Richardson,
Pamsla, i. 174.
Frettation, annoyance ; discom-
posure.
I never knew how much in earnest and in
sincerity she was my friend till she heard of
my infinite frettation upon occasion of being
pamphleted.— Mad. D'ArUay, Diary, i 144.
Frettished, numbed.
Some other trifles ... I durst not let come
abroad in the chill criticall aire, lest hap they
mought have been frettisht for want of
learning's true cloathing.— Optick Glasse of
Humors, To the Reader (1039).
Fretty, with fret-work.
But, Oxford, O I praise thy situation,
Passing Pernassus, Mnses' habitation !
Thy bough-deckt dainty walkes, with brooks
beset,
Fretty, like Ghristall knots, in mould of jet.
Doxies, Sonnet to Oxford Univ.
Friary, the institution of friars ; it
commonly means the house in which
friars live. Of. the same author's use
of Nunnery.
When John Milverton his successour began
(in favour of Friery) furiously to engage
against bishops and the secular clergy, the
Carmelites' good masters and dames began
to forsake them.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 272.
Friday- faced, mortified ; melancholy-
looking.
Marry, out upon him ! what ufriday-fac'd
slave it is! I think in my conscience his
face never keeps holiday. — Wily Beguiled
(Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 356).
Fridge, to fray or fret L. has it
as meaning to move quickly. There
seem to have been two words ; one
fridge from A. S. frican to dance ; the
other frig, from Latin fricare, Italian
fregare to rub. Fridge is still used in
Lincolnshire : " he has fridged hi*
clothes ; " " this collar fridges my
neck."
All pretended that their jerkins were made
after this fashion ; you might have rumpled
and crumpled, and doubled and creased, and
fretted mad fridged the outside of them all
to pieces. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, ii. 116.
Friggling, wriggling; rubbing to
and fro.
How was the head of the beast cut off at
the first in this nation ? Is it harder for us
to cut off Hie friggling tail of that hydra of
Borne ? — Ward, Sermons, p. 173.
Friuot, (?) Erasmus has been speak-
ing of a contented cuckold.
And indeed it is much better to be such
a hen-pecked friaot (sic errare), than always
to be racked and tortured with the grating
surmises of suspicion and jealousy, — Ken-
nel's Erasm., Praise of Folly, p. 26.
Frimbed, strange; usually written
fremd, q. v. in H.
But of a stranger mutual help doth take :
As perjur'd cowards in adversitie
With sight of fear from friends to frimb'd
do flie.— -Sidney, Arcadia, p. 88.
Friskin, a gay frisky person.
Sir Q. I gave thee this chain, manly Tucca.
Tuc. Ay, say'st thou so, friskin ?
Dekker, Satiromastix
(Hawkins Eng. Dr., iii. 138).
Fritillary, a species of butterfly ;
it also is the name of a plant. See
quotation s. v. Lady's Slipper: the
name in both cases comes from the
marking on the plant or insect being
like those on the boards for chess,
FRIVALL
( *6i )
FRUBBER
backgammon, &c. (fritillus, a dice-
box).
The white admirals and silver-washed
fritillarits flit round every bramble-bed. — C
KingsUy, Two Years Ago, ch. ixiii.
Fbivall, shortened form of frivolous.
Cf. Scurril, Scurrilous, Futile,
Fctilous.
"Sfoote, hee's not ashamde besides to charge
mee
With a late promise ; I most yeeld indeed.
I did (to shift him with some contentment)
Make such ifrivall promise.
Chapman, All Fooles, II. i.
Frixe, frisky.
Fain would she seem all frixe and frolic
still.— Hall, Sat. VI. i. 294.
Friz, hair curled or roughed up ;
usually a verb.
Before— the carls are well confin'd,
The tails fall gracefully behind ;
While a full wilderness of friz
Became the lawyers cunning phis.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour, II. c. 2.
Frizado, to border irregularly.
While on a day by a clear brook they trauell,
Whose gurgling streams frizadoed on the
gravell.
He thus bespake.
Sylvester, The Handy-Crafts, 691.
Frizure, hair-dressing.
His hair was of a dark brown, and though
it had not received the fashionable/m«r*,
it was grown thick enough to shade his face,
and long enough to curl. — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. V. ch. vi.
Frizzt, rough.
Mr. Lush's prominent eyes, fat though
not clnmsy figure, and strong black grey-
besprinkled hair of frizzy thickness . . .
created one of the strongest of her anti-
pathies.— O. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. zi.
Fro am, to growl, or grunt ; /ream,
q. v., is according to H. the proper verb
to use of the noise made by a boar at
rutting-time. The extract refers to a
boar who had once been a man.
He did in a manner grind his racers and
tusks, and eztreamly froam at his own coun-
trymen, taxing them of divers vices. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 113.
Frog, part of a horse's foot.
His hoofs black, solid, and shining; his
instep high, his quarters round, the heel
broad, the frog thin and small, the sole tbin
and concave. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. rxliii.
Frog-clock, frog-hopper (?) of the
tribe Cicadiadce.
The flood washing down worms, flies*
frog-clocks, &c.—Lauson, Comments on Secrets
of Angling, 1653 (Eng. Garner, i. 100),
Frogling, little frog, tadpole.
He does not fail the gnats of the air, the
wormlings of the earth, nor the froglings of
the water.— Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk.
III. ch. iv.
Frolic, a plaything or ornament.
Cf. Toy.
The name [Rimmon] signifieth a pome*
granate, as one will have it, who thereupon
concludes it to be Venus, because apples
were dedicated unto her, and her image
commonly made with such fruit as nfrolich
in her hand.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, IV. vii.
40.
Frolicky, merry, frolicking.
There is nothing striking in any of these
characters, yet may we, at a pinch, make a
good frolicky half -day with them. — Rich-
ardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 348.
Frondent, leafy. See quotation
s. v. Parasol.
Near before us is Versailles, New and
Old; with that broad, frondent Avenue de
Versailles between, — stately — frondent,
broad, three hundred feet as men reckon,
with its four rows of elms. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VH. ch. vi.
Frost, to rough a horse's shoes in
frosty weather by turning up the end.
Smollett (France and Italy, Letter 38)
speaks of his mules being frost- shod.
Up before day to dress myself to go toward
Erith, which I would do by land, it being a
horrible cold frost to go by water ; so bor-
rowed two horses of Mr. Howell and his
friend, and with much ado set out, after my
horses being frosted, which I know not what
it means to this day. — Pepys, Nov. 26, 1606.
Froyter, fratry or refectory of a
monastery. H. , s. v. frater-hovse, says,
that it is ll spelt froyter in Bale's Kynge
Jokan, p. 27. Another instance is
subjoined.
Ooncernynge the fare of their froyter
I did tell the afore partly.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott wroth, p. 83.
Frubber, a rubber. In the annexed
quotation it is a term of reproach ad-
dressed to a waiting-woman, whom the
speaker suspects of aiding his sister-
in-law in an intrigue. It is perhaps
applied to an unprincipled attendant in
the same way that a flatterer was some-
times called a stroker or a claicback.
FRUCTIFIABLE ( 262 ) FULIGINOSITY
"Well said, frublter, was there no souldier
here lately 'i — Chapman, fViddow*s Teares,
v. ii.
Fructifiable, capable of bearing
fruit.
Say the fig-tree does not bear so soon as it
is planted . . . but now it is grown fructi-
JiabU. — Adams, n. 178.
Fructual, fruitful.
It is fructual ; let it be so in operation.
It gives us the fruit of life ; let us return it
the fruits of obedience. — A dams, i. 362.
Fruitrn, to make fruitful.
Thou usest the influence of heaven to
fruiten the earth.— -Bp. Hall, Works, ii. 006.
Frumpery, reproach ; abuse.
Tyndarus attempting too kiss a fayre lasse
with a long nose
Would needs bee finish, with bitter frumpery e
taunting. — Stanyhurst, Conceites, p. 145.
That which he doeth is only to conskite,
spoil, and defile all, which is the cause where-
fore he hath of men mocks, frumperies and
bastonadoes. — UrquharVs Kabelais, Bk. I.
ch. xl.
FRUMPI8H, CT08R.
Methought she looked very frumpish and
jealous. — Foote, The Author, Act II.
Frundle, two pecks.
A frundle of lyme.— Leverton Chtoardens
Accts. 1557 (Archaol. xli. 362).
Frushb. " Frushe and leauings " is
the rendering of one word in the origi-
nal (reliquiae). H. gives /rush as a N.
country word for wood that is apt to
break or splinter ; so it seems here to
be used contemptuously for something
rotten or refuse. The wandering Tro-
jans are spoken of as
Al the frushe and leauings of Greeke, of
wrathful Achilles. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 38.
Frust, a section or portion, though
in the subjoined it seems to adhere
more closely to the meaning of the
Latin, and to signify a crumb.
There is a soft sera in every gentle mortal's
life when such a story affords more pabulum
than all the trusts, and crusts, and rusts of
antiquity, which travellers can cook up for
it.— Trist. Shandy, V. 150.
Frustre, to frustrate. Cf . Illustre.
Haue these that yet doo craul
Vpon all fowre, and cannot stand at all,
Withstood your fury, and repulst your powrs,
Frustred your rams, fiered your flying towrs?
Sylvester, The Decay, 1127.
Fruz-tower, a high frizzed head-
dress.
The father bought a powder-horn, and an
almanac, and a comb-case ; the mother a
great fruz-tower, and a fat amber necklace. —
Co/tgreve, Old Bachelor, iv. 8.
Fucago, perhaps a misprint for
farrago.
He that would see more, it is his best
course to confer with their council, and look
over the large impertinencies of litigious
courts, than to expect them in this piece,
whose small bulk . . . when stuffed with
their fucagoes of tautologies, would be swelled
beyond its intended growth. — The Unhappy
Marksman, 1659 (Hart. Misc., iv. 4).
Fuddle, drink.
Don't go away ; they have had their dose
of fuddle (jam perpotarunt). — Bailey's Eras-
mus, p. 125.
Fuddle-cap, a drunkard or boon
companion.
Having overnight carry'd my Indian friend
to the Tavern. ... I introdue'd his pagan
worship into a Christian society of true
protestant fuddle-caps. — T. Brown, Works,
lii. 93.
Fudge in, to thrust in. See H., who
has it as a Suffolk word = to poke with
a stick, and cites an instance of fud'je
up used metaphorically.
Now let us see your supposes . . . That
last suppose is fudged in, why would you
cram these upon me for a couple? — Foote,
The Bankrupt, iii. 2.
Fuellage. H. gives fuel as a Here-
fordshire word for garden-stuff, and
this seems to be the meaning of fuel-
lage.
There is not an hearbe throughout the
garden that taketh vp greater compasse with
fuellage than doth the beet. — Holland, Pliny,
xix. 8.
Fugle, to act as guide or director.
See L., s. v. fugleman.
He has scaffolding set up, has posts driven
in ; wooden arms with elbow joints are jerk-
ing and fugling in the air, in the most rapid
mysterious manner. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
III. Bk. V. ch. vii.
Fulourous, flashing like lightning.
He heard him talk one day in nightgown
and slippers for the space of two hours con-
cerning earth, sea, and air, with a fulgurous
impetuosity almost beyond human. — GarlyU*
Misc., iii. 194.
Fuliginosity, smokiness ; the allu-
sion in the quotation is to smouldering
passions.
In the old Marquis there dwells withal a
crabbedness, stiff cross-grained humour, a
FULKER
( 263 )
FUNERALS
latent fury and fuliginosity very perverting.
— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 79.
- Fclkbb, a pawn-broker.
Cle. I lay thee my faith and honesty in
pawn.
Du. A pretty pawn; the fulkers will not
lend yon a farthing upon it. — Gascoigne,
Supposes, ii. 3.
Fcll mouth, a mouth full of words ;
a chatterer.
Whosoeuer, Samela, descanted of that
lone, tolde you a Canterbury tale; some
propheticall full mouth that, as he were a
Cooler's eldest sonne, would by the laste
tell where another's shooe wrings. — Greene,
Jfenapkon, p. 54.
Fcll mouth, eagerly ; in full cry.
She was coming full mouth upon me with
her contract. — Farquhar, The Inconstant,
Act II.
Full mouthed, having the mouth
full of food, and so festive. L. has
the word in its more usual meaning of
u loud-sounding."
Cheer up, my soul, call home thy sp'rits,
and bear
One bad Good-Friday ; full-mouth'd Easter's
near. — Quarles, Emblems, v. 7 (Epigram).
Full out, quite ; altogether.
Sacrilege the Apostle ranks with idolatry,
as being full out as evil, if not worse than it.
— Andrewes, ii. 351.
Fulminant, fulminating.
Twas then the Devotee his journey trod
In darkness and in terror, tow'rd his God,
While the drear Clergy, fulminant in ire,
Flash 'd, through his bigot Midnight, threat-
'ning fire.
Colman, Vagaries Vindicated, p. 194.
Fulsamick, fulsome ; disgusting.
Oh filthy, Mr. Sneer! he's a nauseous
figure, a most fulsamick fop. — Congreve,
Double Dealer, iii. 10.
Fumado. See extracts.
Cornish pilchards, otherwise called fw
mados, taken on the shore of Cornewall from
July to November. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs
{Harl. Misc., vi. 165).
They . . . invent new tricks as sawsages,
ancboves, tobacco, caveare, pickled oysters,
herrings, fumados, kc, innumerable salt
meats to increase their appetite. — Burton,
Anatomy, p. 74.
Their [pilchards] numbers are incredible,
imploying a power of poor people in polling
(that is, beheading), gutting, splitting, pow-
dering, and drying them, and then (by the
name of Fumadoes) with oyle and a lemon,
they are meat for the mightiest Don in
Spain. — Fuller, Worthies {Cornwall).
Fume, to flatter.
Thus by degrees self-cheated of their sound
And sober judgement, that he is but man,
They demi-deify and fume him so,
That in due season he forgets it too.
Cowper, Winter Morning Walk, 206.
Fumb, the incense of praise.
Pardon, great prelate, sith I thus presume
To sence perfection with imperfect fume.
Davies, To worthy persons, p. 52.
How would our Democritus have been
affected to see a wicked caitiffe or foole, a
very idiot, a f unge, a golden asse, a monster
of men to have many good men ... to smo-
ther him with fumes and eulogies . . . because
he is rich. — Burton, Democ. to Reader, p. 34.
Fume, a passionate person ; one apt
to get in a fume.
The notary's wife was a little fume of a
woman, and the notary thought it well to
avoid a hurricane by a mild reply. — Sterne,
Sent. Journey, The Fragment.
Fumify, to impregnate with smoke.
We had everyone ramm'd a full charge of
sot-weed into our infernal guns, in order to
fumify ova immortalities. — T.Brown, Works,
ii. 190.
Fumitory, smoking-room.
You ... sot away your time in Mongo's
fumitory among a parcel of old smoak-dry'd
cadators.— J. Brown, Works, ii. 179.
Fund. The first three quotations
offer examples of two Gallicisms in the
use of this word. In the fund = at
bottom (an fond) ; on his own fund =
on his own account (sur son jrrapre
fond). In the fourth extract the sense
resembles that in the first, and == main
body or aggregate.
I know madam does fret you a little now
and then, that's true ; but in the fund she is
the softest, sweetest, gentlest lady breathing.
— Vanbrugh, Confederacy, Act IV.
The translating most of the French letters
gave me as much trouble as if I had written
them out of my own fund. — T. Brown, Works,
i. 171.
Your brother Gal. is extremely a favourite
with me ; I took to him for his resemblance
to you, but am grown to love him upon his
own fund. — Walpole to Mann, ii. 260 (1748).
pfhe people] are as a perpetual fountain,
from whence the three estates arise; or
rather as a sea of waters, in which three
exalted waves should claim pre-eminence,
which yet shall not be able to depart from
their fund, but in relation are dissoluble and
resolvable therein. — H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, ii. 38.
Funebals, funeral sermon. In the
third extract the word is in the singular
FUNGOID
( 264)
FUSS
We are almost at the end of books; these
paper-works are now preaching their own
funerals.— Goad, Preface to DelVs Work*.
In the absence of Dr. Humfreys designed
for that service, Mr. Giles Laurence preached
his funerals.— Fuller, Ch. Hist^ IX. iii. 2.
I could learn little from the minister which
preached his funeral. — Ibid., Worthies, Here*
ford (i. 454).
Fungoid, fungus-like.
"The seed of immortality has sprouted
within me." " Only & fungoid growth I dare
say— a crowing disease in the lungs," said
Deronda. — O. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, eh.
xxxvii.
Funk, fright
If they And no brandy to get drunk
Their souls are in a miserable funk.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 58.
Nothing sobers a man so completely as
funk. — Ingoldsby Legends (Bagman* Dog).
Funky, frightened. Dickens calls
the nervous junior counsel for the
defendant in Bardell v. Pickwick, Mr.
Phunky. See also quotation s. v. Mon-
key.
I do feel somewhat funky. — Naylor, Bey*
nard the Fox, 46.
Funny bone, that part of the elbow
over which the ulnar nerve passes ;
any blow on this gives a person a sort
of electric shock ; hence the name.
They smack and they thwack,
Till your funny bones crack,
As if you were stretched on the rack.
Ingoldsby Legends (Bloudie Jacke).
His arm was not broken ; he had merely
received a blow on that part which anatom-
ists call the funny-bone ; a severe blow which
sent the pistol spinning into the air, and
caused the gentleman to scream with pain.
— Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, cb. ix,
Furbkry, cheat. Cf. Fourbery.
In the perambulation of Italy young tra-
vellers must be cautious, among diuers others
to avoyd one kind of furbery or cheat where-
unto many are subject. — Howell, Instructions
for Forratne Travail.
Furibund, raging ; furious.
The brawny, not yet furibund figure, we
say, is Jacques Dan ton. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. I. Bk. IV. ch. iv.
Poor Louison Ohabray . . . has a garter
round her neck, and furibund Amazons at
each end.— Ibid. Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. vii.
Furicano, a jocular corruption of
hurricano.
They were altogether in a plumpe on
Chrifltmasse eve was two yere, when the
great flood was, and there stird up such ter-
nados and furicanos of tempests. — Xashc,
Lenten Stufe (Harl. Misc., vi. 164).
Furioso, a violent impetuous man.
A violent man and a furioso was deaf to
all this.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 218.
You would have thought this one-and-
twenty came in a direct line from Hercules,
he played the Furioso so lively. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 19. .
Furnish, equipage; provision. L.
has the noun = sample, with extract
from Greene s Groatsworih of Wit.
Hee sends him a whole Furnish of all
vessels for his chamber of cleane gold. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng, p. 168.
Furnishmknt, supply. Spenser (F.
Q., IV. iii. 38) has furniment = furni-
ture. In the second extract Hacket has
been speaking of many qualifications
for the post of Speaker possessed by
Sir T. Crew.
No other thing was thought or talked on,
but onely preparations and furnishments for
this businesse. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 93.
Yet with all this furnishment, out of a
custom which modesty had observ'd, Sir
Thomas deprecated the burthen. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, i. 176.
Furr, far.
As Venus Bird, the white, swift, lovely Dove,
Doth on her wings her utmost swiftness
prove,
Finding the gripe of Falcon fierce not furr.
Sidney, Arcadia, p.* 90.
Furt, theft.
Break not the sacred league
By raising civil theft ; turn not your fvrt
'Gainst your own bowels. — Albumazar, V. i.
Furthersome, advantageous.
In enterprises of pith a touch of stratagem
often proves furthersome. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev^
Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. vi.
Fuse, the track of a buck in the grass.
There wants a scholar like an hound of a
sure nose, that would not miss a true scent,
nor run upon a false one, to trace those old
Bishops in their fuse.— Hacket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 14.
Fusillade, to shoot with guns or
fusils.
Military execution on the instant: give
them shriving if they want it ; that done,
fusillade them all. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling,
Pt. I. ch. xiii.
Fuss, a term of reproach. Diana in
the Fuss spoken of.
FUSTY
( **5 )
GAD-FL Y
B it that great ramping Fuss, thy Daughter,
A Mankind-Trull inur'd to slaughter,
To the soft sex's foul disgrace,
Rambles about from place to place.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 233.
Fusty, moping.
At nooa home to dinner, where my wife
still in a melancholy, /tetfy humour, and cry-
ing, and do not tell me plainly what it is. —
Pepys, June 18, 1668.
Pdttlitarian, one who pursues what
is worthless ; a skit on utilitarians. See
quotation j. v. Giomanity, where the
word is an adjective. Cf. Crazyolo-
gist, Foolosopher.
A* for the whole race of Political Econo-
mists, oar Malthusites, Benthamites, Utili-
tarians, or Futilitarians, they are to the
Gjvernment of this country such counsellors
as the magicians were to Fhanoh.—Soutkey,
The Doctor, ch. xxxv.
Futiuze, to make futile ; to fritter
away.
Her whole soul and essence is J 'utilized and
extracted into show and superflcials.— H
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 218.
Futurable. See quotation.
What the issue of this conference con-
cluded would have been, is only known to
Him who knew what the men of Keilah
would doe, and whose prescience extends not
only to things future, but futurable, having
the certain cognizance of contingents which
might, yet never actually shall, come to passe.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. iii. 51. ^^
Fuzd, fuddled ; probably an abbrevi-
ation of fuzded.
Tne University troop dined with the B. of
Ab.at Bicot, and came home well fuzd —
Lift of A. Wood, July 14, 1685.
G
Gab. Gift of the gab = power of
talking.
I always knew you had the gift of the gah
of course, but I never believed you were half
the man yon are. — Dickens, Martin Chuzzle-
vit, ch. xxvii.
Gabblement, chattering.
They rush to the attack thousands strong,
with brandished cutlasses and fusils, with
caperings, shoutings, and vociferation, which,
if the Volunteer Company stands firm, dwin-
dle into staggerings, into quick gabblement,
into panic flight at the first volley, perhaps
before it— CarlyU, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V.
ch. iv.
Gabelleman, a tax-collector.
He flung gabellemen and excisemen into
the river Durance (though otherwise a most
dignified, methodic man) when their claims
were not clear.— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 76.
Gabebt, " a kind of lighter used in
the river Clyde, probably from the
French gabare." (Note by Scott on
second extract.) The first quotation is
from the Buckinghamshire Herald,
June 1, 1793, and is cited by Cowper
in a note to his poem, The Birds Nest.
Glasgow, May 23. In a block or pulley
near the head of the mast of a gabert, now
lying at the Broomielaw, there is a chaffinch's
nest and four eggs.
I swung and bobbit yonder as safe as a
gabbart that's moored by a three-pUe cable
at the Broomielaw.— Scott, Rob Roy, ii. 219.
Gaby, a fool.
Now dont stand laughing there like a
great gaby, but come and shake hands.— if
Kxngsley, Geaffry Hamlyn, ch. ix.
Gad. Shakespeare {Lear, I. ii.) has
upon the gadn — upon the sudden.
In the extract it means restless, eoine
about. ' 6 8
I have no very good opinion of Mrs.
Charles's nursery -maid. I hear strange
stones of her ; she is always upon the gad.—
Mtss Austen, Persuasion, ch. vi.
Gadabout, a rambler; also as an
adjective.
Mr. Binnie woke up briskly when the
Colonel entered. " It is yon, you gadabout,
is it? " cried the civilian.— Thackeray, New-
comes, ch. viii.
Why should I after all abuse the gadabout
propensities of my countrymen? — Hughes
Tom Brown's School-Days, ch. i. '
Gadbee, gadfly.
You see an ass with a brizze or a gadbee
under bis tail, or fly that stings him, run
hither and thither without keeping any path
or way.— UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xliv.
Gad-fly, one who is constantly going
about ; a seeker after gaiety.
Your Harriet may turn gad-fly, and never
be easy but when she is forming parties.
Richardson, Grandison, i. 135.
You have a few good qualities ; are not a
GAG
( 266 )
GALL1 WASP
modern woman ; have neither wings to your
shoulders, nor gad-Jly in your cap. — Ibid. v.
S3.
Gag. In theatrical slang an actor is
said to gag when he says more than is
set down for him in his part.
Little Swills in what are professionally
known as " patter " allusions to the subject
is received with loud applause ; and the same
vocalist ** gaas " in the regular business like
a man inspired. — Dickens, Bleak House, ch.
xxx ix.
Gag, usually applied to that which
keeps the mouth open : here to the eye.
The eyelid is set open with the gags of
lust and envy. — Adams, i. 73.
Gage, cant term for a quart pot. See
II.
I bowse no lage, but a whole gage
Of this I bowse to you.
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
G aixish, volatile (?). Gain = quick :
usually in a good sense.
This orator is not like others of his rank,
Who from their gainish and fantastick
humours
Go through the streets, spotted with pea-
cocks' plumes,
Wearing all colours, laces, broideries.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act V.
Gainsay, contradiction.
He . . was the umpire in all disputes,
setting his hat on one side, and giving his
decisions with an air and tone admitting of
no gainsay or appeal. — Irving, Sketch Book
(Sleepy ifollow).
Gain some, well-favoured or fascinat-
ing ; opposite of ungainly.
Thou whom oft I have seen
To personate a gentleman, noble, wise,
Faithful, and gainsome, and what virtues else
The poet pleases to adorn you with.
Massinger, Roman Actor, iv. 2.
Galactite, a fossil substance which,
when immersed in water, makes it the
colour of milk.
And as base morter serveth to unite
Red, white, gray marble, jasper, galactite :
So, to connex my queint discourse, sometimes
I mix loose, limping, and ill-polisht rimes.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 51.
Galenite, a physician, or disciple of
Galen.
Not much unlike a skilfull Galenite,
Who (when the crisis comes) dares even
fortell
Whether the patient shall do ill or well.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 793.
Galimatias. L. defines this "non-
sense, talk without meaning;" and
such is the signification of the word in
French, but it is sometimes used for
mixture or hodge-podge, as in the sub-
joined.
Lady Mary Wortley is arrived. . . . Her
dress, like her languages, is a galimatias of
several countries ; the groundwork rags, and
the embroidery nastiness. — Walpole, Letters,
ii. 332 (1762).
Gallegalaghes, Galloglaghes,
Gallowglasses (q. v. in N.)f heavy-
armed Irish foot-soldiers.
Item, on the second day before the Ides
of November, the Lord Richard Glare slew
fiue hundred of Gallegalaghes. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 167.
Also in the same yeere Fennynghir
O'Coughir slew Cale-Rotte, and with him of
Galloglaghes and others about three hundred.
— Ibid. p. 172.
Gallerian, galley slave (Fr. gale-
ricri).
The prerogative of a private centinel above
a slave lies only in the name, and the ad-
vantage, if any, stands for the gallerian. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 183.
Gallicised, Frenchified, which latter
is an old word, and is used by Beau-
mont and Fletcher.
Being, since my travels, very much gal-
licised in my character, I ordered a pint of
claret. — Sydney Smith, Letters, 1835.
Gallipot, a contemptuous name for
an apothecary. Cf . Clystebpipe.
" One may ask one's medical man to one's
table certainly ; but his family, my dear Mr.
Snob ! " " Half a dozen little gallipots,11 inter-
posed Miss Wirt, the governess. — Thackeray,
Book of Snobs, ch. xxvii.
" It's Vidler the apothecary ! By heavens,
Lady Ann, I told you it would be so. Why
didn't you ask the Miss Vidlers to your
ball ?"...." Barnes scratched their names,'*
cried Ethel, " out of the list, mamma. Ton
know you did, Barnes; you said you had
gallipots enough." — Ibid., Newcomes, ch. xiv.
Gallivant, to roam about pleasure-
seeking.
You were out all day yesterday, and galli-
vanting somewhere, I know. — Dickens, A'ich.
Nickleby, ch. Lriv.
While we find God's signet
Fresh on English ground,
Why go gallivanting
With the nations round ?
C.Kingsley (Life, ii. 24).
Galliwasp, Celestns occiduu*, a
poisonous reptile of the W. Indies.
Then all, sitting on the sandy turf, defiant
of galliicasps and jack-spaniaros, and all the
GALLOWS
( 267 )
GAME
weapons of the insect host, partook of the
equal banquet. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. xvii.
Gallows, braces. H. has gallaces as
a Yorkshire word.
The Reverend John Bowie, Vicar of Id-
miston, Wiltshire, was a thick-set man in gar-
ments which, though originally black, had
been tanned by many a summer's sun into a
russet brown ; his underclothes were unsup-
ported by those indispensable articles of
decent attire denominated gallows, and his
wig was a counterpart of Dr. Parr's. —
Warner's Literary Recollections, i. 100.
Gallows, very.
The pleece come in, and got g alters well
kicked about the head. — H. Kingsley, Ravens-
hoe, ch. xli.
Gallows-bird, a criminal ; one who
has suffered on the gallows, or deserves
to do so.
It is ill to check sleep or sweat in a sick
man, said he; I know that far, though I
n**er minced ape nor gallows-bird. — Readef
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxviii.
G allows - faced, rascally - looking.
So Goldsmith (Good-natured Man, Act
V.), " Hold him fast, he has the gallows
in his face." CI gallows-looking in
extract from Ingoldsby Legends, s. v.
Carpet-swab. Irving in the Sketch
Book describes Rip van Winkle's dog
as sneaking about " with a gallows air,"
L e. a hang-dog air.
Art thou there, thou rogue, thou hang-
dog, thou gallows-faced vagabond ? — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 16.
Gallowsness, badness.
Spinning indeed ! It isn't spinning as you'd
be at, 111 be bound, and let you have your
own way ; I never knew your equals for
gallowsness. — G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. vi.
Gallows-ripe, ready for hanging.
Jourdan himself remains unhanged ; gets
loose again as one not yet gallows-ripe. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. in.
Gallows-strings, a term of reproach.
Cf. Crack-rope, Hang-string.
Ay, hang him, little Gallows-strings,
He does a thousand of these things.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 214.
Gally, to frighten or bewilder. See
N. s. v. gallow.
The next day being Sunday, call'd by the
natives of this country [Devonshire] Maze-
Snnday (and indeed not without some rea-
son, for the people looked as if they were
gal lied), I was wak'd by the tremendous sound
of a horse-trumpet. — T. Brown, Works,u\.205.
Galooned, trimmed with galoon lace.
Those enormous habiliments . . were not
only slashed and galooned, but artificially
swollen-out on the broader parts of the body
by introduction of bran. — Carlyle, Sartor
Resartus, Bk. I. ch. vii.
Galopin, a street boy. Scott has
not marked the word aB a foreign one,
(1. e. it is not in italics), though it is of
course French.
" He gave me half-a-crown vince, and for-
bade me to play it awa' at pitch and toss."
u And you disobeyed him, of course ? n ** Na,
I didna disobeyed him : I played it awa' at
neevie-neevie-nick-nack." "Well, there is
sixpence for thee ; lose it to the devil in any
way thou think'st proper." So saying he
gave the little galopin his donation. — Scott,
St. Ro nan's Well, ii. 197.
Galra verging, wandering about ;
gallivanting.
The elderly women . . . had their plays in
out-houses and by-places, just as the witches
lang syne had their sinful possets and galra-
vitchings. — Gait, Annals of Parish, ch. ii.
She thinks as because she's gone galra-
verging, I maun ha' missed her, and be
ailing. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. vi.
Galy halfpenny. Venetian mer-
chants who traded to England in their
gal lies brought their own money, called
galley-halfpence, to trade with, to the
injury of our countrymen. They were
repeatedly forbidden by our sove-
reigns, Hen. IV., V., VI., and VIII. ;
and the holders of them were required to
send them to the Tower, to be changed
into English money. See N. and Q.,
IV. ii. 344, 501, whence the first quot-
ation is taken.
1521-22. Resaved for ij voces of galy-
halfepenys sold this yere vi" iiij4. — Church-
wardens* Account-Book.
He himself hath thousands lying by him
in store unoccupied, and will neither help
his poor neighbour, nor scarcely give a galy
halfpenny to a needy creature in extreme
necessity. — Barlow's Dialoge, 1553 (Jfait-
land's Ref, p. 307).
Gambalocke. The word is explained
in the margin as " a kind of riding
gowne."
Clothed he [an Arab sheik] was in a
Gambalocke of scarlet ; battened vnder the
chin with a bosse of gold. — Sandys, Travels,
p. 153.
Game, of good courage ; game for =
up to, ready for.
Hold up your head, and show 'em your
face ; I an't jealous, but I'm blessed if I an 't
game. — Sketches by Boz (Prisoners7 Van).
GAME
( 26S)
GANNYNG
If you don't stop your jaw about him,
you'll have to fight me ; and tbat> a little
more than you're game for, I'm thinking. —
H. Kingsley, Geoff ry Hamlyn, ch. xxvi.
Game, lame or crooked : a corruption
of cam or kam.
It was converted into an inn, and marked
by a huge sign representing on the one side
St. Bonan catching hold of the devil's gam*
leg with his episcopal crook, as the story
may be read in his veracious legend, and on
the other the Mowbray Arms. — Scott, St.
Bonan* i Welly i. 11.
The chair, which Bacon was requested to
take on entering, broke down with the pub-
lisher. Warrington burst out laughing, said
that Bacon had got the game chair, and
bawled out to Pen to fetch a sound one from
his bedroom. — Thackeray, Pendennis, ch. xli.
Gamefull, adj. = full of game.
Thy long discourse
Of gamefull parks, of meadowes fresh, ay-
spring-like pleasant fields.
Holland's Camden, p. 290.
Gameness, pluck ; spirit
Whatever else you might think of Blake,
there was no doubt about his gameness. —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxiv.
Gamester. See extract The Vale
referred to is the Vale of White Horse.
I must tell you, as shortly as I can, how
the noble old game of back-sword is played ;
for it is sadly gone out of late, even in the
Vale, and may be you have never seen it.
The weapon is a good stout ash-stick with a
large basket-handle, heavier and somewhat
shorter than a common single-stick. The
players are called " old gamesters " — why, I
can't tell you — and their object is simply to
break one another's heads : for the moment
that blood runs an inch anywhere above the
eyebrow, the old gamester to whom it belongs
is beaten, and has to stop. — Hughes, Tom
Brown's School-Days, ch. ii.
Gamestress, female gambler.
To two characters, hitherto thought the
most contradictory, the sentimental and the
flirting, she writes yet a third, till now be-
lieved incompatible with the pleasures and
pursuits of either ; this, I need not tell you,
is that of a gamestress. — Mad. D'ArUay,
Camilla, Bk. X. ch. v.
Gamey, brave (slang).
** Youll be shot, I see," observed Mercy.
"Well,ncriedMr.Baile;r,Mwotff lam; there's
something gamey in it, young ladies, ain't
there?" — Dickens, Martin Chuzslewit, ch. xi.
Gammon, to wheedle with flattery ; to
deceive ; also as a substantive.
So then they pours him out a glass of wine,
and gammons him about his driving, and gets
him into a reg'lar good humour. — Dickens,
Pickw'ck Papers, ch. riii.
Lord bless their little hearts, they thinks
it's all right, and don't know no better, but
they're the wictims o' gammon, Samivel,
they're the wictims o' gammon. — Ibid. ch.
zxvii.
In short the Pedler so beset her,
Lord Bacon couldn't have gammoned her
better .—Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Gamner, a gambler.
Thoughe these verses be very ernestlie
wrytten, yet they do not halfe so griaely
sette oat the horyblenes of blasphemy which
sue he gamners vse, as it is indede, and as I
have hearde my seU.—Ascham, Toxophilus,
p. 56.
Gamming, gambling.
When the nyghte and lurking corners
giueth lease occasion to vnthriftinesse than
lyghte daye and opennes, then shal shotynge
and such gamninge be in summe comparison
lyke. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 53.
Finding his conscience deepelye gauld
with thee owtragious oathes hee vsed too
thunder owt in gamening, hee made a few
verses as yt were his cygnea oratio. — Stany-
hurst, Epitaphes, p. 153.
Gan, cant term for a mouth.
This bowse is better than rom-bowse,
It sets the gan a giggling.
Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act II.
Gander, to ramble, gad.
Then she had remembered the message
about any one calling being shown up to
the drawing-room, and had gandertd down
to the hall to give it to the porter; after
which she gandertd upstairs to the dressing-
room again. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch.
zlvn.
Who knows but what Nell might come
gandering back in one of her tantrums and
ril everything? — Ibid., Geoffry Hamlyn,
x.
Ganders' wool, feathers. Cf.
Feather-headed.
Such braines belined with gander1 's-tcooll. —
Breton, PasqviVs FooVs-cappe, p. 23.
Ganger, foreman of a gang of
navvies.
On Saturday evening a man named Charles
Frost, a ganger in the employ of the Midland
Bailway Company, was run over, about half
a mile from the Matlock Bridge Station, by
a special fish train from Manchester. — Leeds
Mercury, May 8th, 1871.
Gannyng, giving ?
Augustus . . after gannyng hym thanks,
commaunded a thousande pieces of money
to be genen him in reward. — UdaTs Eras-
mus1s Apophth., p. 277.
GAOLBIRD
( **9)
GARGANET
Gaol-bird, a criminal. L. has jail-
bird, but with quotation from no earlier
source than T. Moore. Jail-bird occurs
in Davies's Sonnet to Lady Rich, and is
used adjectivally, " a jail-bird heauenly
nightingale/1
It is the piety and the true valour of an
army, which gives them heart and victory ;
which how it can be expected out of ruffians
mdgaolJrirds, I leave to your consideration.
—Hist, of Edward II., p. 146.
The poor innocent man had been in danger
of being hanged for a traitor to King James,
by the perjury of these two gaol-bird*. —
Sprat, Relation of Young's Contrivance, 1692
(Harl. Misc., vi 254).
A battle shall be more successfully fought
by serving men, posters, bailiffs, padders,
rognea, jail-birds, aod such like tag-rags of
mankind than by the most accomplished
philosophers. — Keimefs Erasmus, Praise of
Folly, p. 31.
Gaolebess, female gaoler.
My saucy gaoleress assured me that all my
oppositions would not signify that pinch of
snuff. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, ii. 72.
Gapes. The gapes = a fit of yawn-
ing.
Another hour of music was to give delight
or the gapes, as real or affected taste for it
prevailed. — Miss Austen, Persuasion, ch. xx.
Gaping stock, object of open-mouthed
wonder.
I was to be a gaping stock and a scorn to
the young volunteers. — Godwin, Mandeville,
ii. 40.
Gapped, a slang term for getting the
worst of it. The second quotation
where the word = jigged, illustrates
the first. In the third extract it refers
to the thinning of the ranks of troops
under fire.
I will never meet at hard-edge with her ;
if I did (and yet I have been thought to carry
a good one) I should be confoundedly gappea,
I can see that (alluding to two knives, I
suppose, gapping each other). — Richardson,
Grandison, l. 120.
My uncle Toby knew little of the world ;
and therefore when he felt he was in love
with widow Wadman, he had no conception
that the thing was any more to be made a
mystery of than if Mrs. Wadman had given
him a cut with a gap'd knife. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, vi. 66
Beady! take aim at their leader — their
masses are gapp'd with our grape.— Tennyson,
Defence of Lucknow.
Gabb, to clothe.
These black dog-Dons
Garb themselves bravely.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, III. i.
Garbage, to gut, or clean (fish, &c).
His cooke founde the same ring in the
bealy of a fyshe which he garbaiged to
dresse for his Lordes diner. — UdaVs Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 182.
The cob had maunged the gobets foule
garbaged haulfe quick. — Stanyhurst, j&n.,
lii. 639.
Pilchards . . . are then taken, garbaged,
salted, hanged in the smoake. — Holland's
Camden, p. 186.
Garcion. See quotation and extract
s. v. Gromet.
It seemeth some of these Anti-Boreals
were men of Gentile extraction, especially
the two first (styled in the pardon Masters),
importing, I believe, more than the bare
umversitie title ; as also Bartholomew de
Walton and William his brother, because
waited on by William de Merton, their gar-
cion, that is, their servant. For it cometh
from the French Garcon, or the Italian, Gar-
zone, and is used even by the barbarous
Grecians of the middle ages, yap£ovviov
ir a pa AaTtvoi* rd irai&lov. — Fuller, Camb.
Univ., i 48.
Garden age, horticulture, also garden-
stuff. R. gives this word s. v. garden,
and quotes another passage from Hol-
land's Pliny, in which it occurs, but by
a misprint gardeninge is given in the
extract.
Since they be grown into so great request,
I must not ouer-passe the gardtnage to them
belonging. — Holland, Pliny, zix. 8.
He [Evelyn] read to me very much also of
his discourse ne hath been many years and
now is about, about Gardenage, which will
be a most noble and pleasant piece. — Pepys,
Nov. 5, 1666.
The street was also appropriated to the sale
of fish and gardenage. — Man, Hist, of Reading
(1816), p. 147.
Garden-gout. See extract. Garden-
houses had a bad reputation, and in
Peel e' s Jests garden-whore = a very
common prostitute.
When young men by whoring, as it com-
monly falls out, get the pox, which, by way
of extenuation, they call the common garden-
gout {Neapolitanam scabiem) ... do they not
epicurize gloriously ? — Bailey's Erasmus, p.
405.
Gardenhood, the idea or aspect of a
garden.
Except some thousand more lamps and a
covered passage all round the garden which
took off from the gardenhood, there was
nothing better than on a common night. —
Walpole, Utters, iii 279 (1769).
Garganet, jewelled collar; usually
written carcanet.
GARGARISM
( *7o )
GAUDY
Thee Pearle and gould crowns too bring
with yaryanet heauye. — St any hurst, JEn.,
i. 630.
Gargarism, a gargle. In the extract
(which see more at length *. v. Bur)
it is used figuratively for something
that sticks in the throat.
They . . . cracked their voices for ever with
metaphysical gargarisms. — Milton, Reason of
Ch. Government, Conclusion.
Garget, a swelling in the throat
(Fr. gar gate, the windpipe) ; yet this
does not seem to be the meaning in the
two last extracts.
The drunkard is without a head, the
swearer hath a yaryet in his throat. — Adams,
i. 123.
If it were granted that the covetous were
mad, the world itself would run of a yaryet;
for who 18 not bitten with this mad dog ? —
Ibid. i. 280.
The proud man is bitten of the mad dog,
the flatterer, and so runs on a yaryet. — Ibid.
i. 486.
Garlandry, filleting.
The lavished yarlandry of woven brown
hair amazed me. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch.
xiv.
Garnish- mo net, commission for
trouble taken ; garnish usually =
prisoner's fees.
You are content with the ten thousand pound,
Defalking the four hundred garnish-money ?
Jonsont Maynetic Lady, v. 6.
Garstun. See extract.
A small paddock or yarstun, called from a
former owner of the land, Purbrick's Close.
— Arch., xxxvii. 140 (1857).
Garth, a small enclosure.
Few people are here buried in their kirks,
except of their nobility, but in the Idrk-yarths.
—Modern Account of Scotland, 1670 {Harl.
Misc., vi. 138).
The Cross made in the infant's forehead,
(All godly Protestants abhor it),
Is Superstition, so are Crosses
In Kirk-Garths, and in market-places.
Ward, England's Reformation, ch. iii. p. 200.
Then calling down a blessing on his head,
Caught at his hand, and wrung it passion-
ately,
And passed into the little garth beyond.
Tennyson, Enoch Arden.
Gaselier, a pendent lamp lighted by
gas.
As we both entered the drawing-room, we
found Bell standing right under the central
gaselier, which was pouring its rays down
on her wealth of golden-brown hair. — Black,
Adventures of a Phffton, ch. iii.
Gashly, ghastly ; now a vulgarism.
Their warm and wanton embraces of living
bodies ill agreed with their offerings I>iis
manibus to gashly ghosts. — Fuller, Pisyah
Siyht, IV. vii. 27.
By all that is hirsute and yashly! I cry,
taking off my furr'd cap, and twisting it
round my finger, I would not give sixpence
for a dozen such. — Tr. Shandy, v. 215.
Gassampine, cotton cloth (?) ; gos-
sampine (Cotgrave) and gossamptno
(Florio) = the cotton plant
And on his altar's fume these Turkey cloths.
This gassampine and gold I'll sacrifice.
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p. 135.
Gastfulness, ghastliness.
... A aolitarie darkness : which as natur-
ally it breeds a kinde of irksome yastfulnt .<«,
so it was to him a most present terror. —
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 406.
Gastrolater, one whose god is his
belly.
Pantagruel observed two sorts of trouble-
some and too officious apparitors, whom he
very much detested. The first were called
Engastrimythes, the others Gastrolaters. —
Vrquharfs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. lviii.
Gastrolatrous, belly- worshipping.
The variety we perceived in the dresses of
the gastrolatrous coquillons was not less. —
Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. lviii.
Gate, to confine to college, t. e . within
the gates : a penalty sometimes inflict-
ed at the Universities.
The dean gave him a book of Virgil to
write out, and gated him for a fortnight after
hall. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xii.
Gate, to go. H. says, " the track of
an animal was called his gate.11
Three stags sturdye were vnder
Neere the seacost yatiny, theym slot thee
clusterus heerdflock
In greene frith browsing.
Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 190.
Gateless, without a gate or approach ;
inaccessible.
Some say that gold hath power
To enter without force a gateless tower.
Machin, Dumb Knight, V. i.
Gatetrip, footstep ; mode of walk-
ing.
Too moothers counsayl thee fyrye Cupid o
doth barcken,
Of puts he his feathers, fauoring with gaie-
trip lulus. — Stanyhurst, jEn., i. 675.
Gaudy, gaiety.
Balls set off with all the glittering gavdy
GAUM
(271 )
GEESE
of silk and silver are far more transporting
than country wakes. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 553.
Gaum, sensible.
She were a poor friendless wench, a parish
prentice, but honest and gaum~\ike, till a lad
as nobody knowed come o'er the hills one
sheep-shearing fra' Whitehaven. — Mrs. Gas-
Jcdly Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xv.
Gaum, to paw about.
Don't be mauming and gauming a body so.
Can't you keep your filthy hands to your-
self ?— Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. ii.).
Gaumless, vacant; half silly: a
North country word. Gaum (connect-
ed with Gumption, q. v.) = to under-
stand. A. S. gyman% to perceive. See
Robinson1 s Whitby Glossary (E. D. S.).
Did I ever look so stupid : so " gaumless "
as Joseph calls it? — E. Bronte, Wuthering
Heights, ch. xxi.
Gaunch, impalement on a hook; a
Turkish punishment : the verb is in the
Diets.
I swear by our prophet and the God of our
prophet, that I would rather suffer the gaunch
than put the smallest constraint on your
person or inclinations. — H. Brooke, Fool of
(polity, ii. 289.
Gaunt, to make lean.
Lyke rauening woolfdams vpsoackt and
(jaunted in hunter. — Stanyhurst, jSh., ii. 366.
Gaufub, a gaby. H. has " gaups, a
simpleton. South."
The great qaupus never seed that I were
pipeclaying the same places twice over. —
Mrs. Gaskell, Ruth, ch. xvi.
Gaur, a large animal of the ox
species.
The Major [has stuck many a pig, shot
many a gaur, rhinoceros, and elephant. — C.
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xviii.
Gawish. H. gives, " Gawish, gay :
it occurs in Wright's Display of Dutie,
4to, Lond., 1589 ; " but in the subjoined
it seems = foolish.
A oawish traveller that came to Sparta . . .
standing in the presence of Lacon a long time
upon one leg, that he might be observed
and admired, cried at the last, " O Lacon,
thou canst not stand so long upon one leg."
" True," said Lacon, " but every goose can."
—Adams, i. 502.
Gawk, an awkward lounging fellow.
A certain gawk, named Chevalier de Gas-
**ud, accustomed to visit in the bouse at
Manosque, sees good to commence a kind of
theoretic flirtation with the little brown wife.
—CarlyU, Misc., iv. 98.
A Duke of Weissenfels for instance : fool-
ish old gawk, whom Wilhelmina Princess
Boyal recollects for his distracted notions. —
Ibid. iv. 359.
Gawky, is only given as an adjective
in the Diets. The extract is quoted in
Archceol. xxiv. 188.
Some wear their hats on, pointed into the
air ; those are the Gawkies. — London Chron-
icle, xi. 167 (1762).
Gawne (apparently), to long after
or reach after.
I take not I, as some do take,
To gape and gawne for honours hye,
But Court and Cayser to forsake,
And lyue at home full quyetlye.
Googe, Sonnette to H. Cobham.
Gayitby, finery.
A bride (though never so mean a person
or silly servant) is decked and dressea in all
gayitry lent unto her by her neighbours. —
Fuller, Pisgah Sight, IV. vi. 5.
Gays, usually means pictures (see L.
and N.), but here = gaiety or showy
things generally. Breton has it in the
singular.
And though perhaps most commonly each
youth
Is giuen in deede to follow euery gaye ;
And some of these are touched with vn truth,
Yet some there be that take a better waye.
Breton, Toyes of an Idle Head, p. 28.
O how I grieue deer Earth, that (given to
g*y*)
Most of best wits contemn thee now a days :
And noblest hearts proudly abandon quight
Study of hearbs, and country life's delight."
Sylvester, 3rd day, 1st weeke, 1040.
Gazke, person gazed at.
Such a group would relieve both parties —
gazer and gazee — from too distressing a con-
sciousness.— De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i.
157.
Gazeless, unseeing ; not looking.
Desire lies dead upon the gazeless eye.
Wolcot , P. Pindar, p. 98.
Gee-ho. See first extract A gee-
ho-coach seems to be a heavy coach
from the country.
They drew all their heavy goods here
[Bristol] on sleds or sledges, which they call
Gee-hoes, without wheels. — Defoe, Tour thro*
G. Britain, ii. 814.
Ply close at inns upon the coming in of
waggons and gee-JuMsoachn. — T. Brown,
Works, ii. 262.
Geese. A man who thinks his own
geese swans is one who over-estimates
what belongs to him. It will be seen
GELASTIC
( 272 ) GENSDARMERY
that Bailey | in substituting an English
proverb for the Latin, has somewhat
spoilt the appropriateness of the re-
joinder.
Ga. Every man's own geese are swans (sua
cut que sponsa videtur pulcherrima).
Al. If that proverb held good, we should
not have so many adulteries. — Bailey's Eras-
mus, p. 316.
Tygh high, tygh high, and sweet delight !
He tickles this age who can
Call Tullia's ape a marmasite,
And Leda's goose a swan.
British Bibliographer, quoted in Southey's
Doctor, Interchapter vii.
And now as to Dr. Whately, I owe him a
great deal. He was a man of generous and
warm heart, fie was particularly loyal to
his friends, and, to use the common phrase,
" all his geese were swans" — Newman, Apolo-
gia, p. 60.
Gelastic, something risible : both a
substantive and adjective.
My friendly pill . . causes all com-
plexions to laugh or smile, even in the very
time of taking it, which it effects by dilating
and expanding the gelastic muscles. — T.
Brown, Works, ii. 140.
Happy man would be his dole who, when
he had made up hi* mind in dismal resolu-
tion to a dreadful course of drastics, should
find that gelastics had been substituted, not
of the Sardonian kind. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. extraordinary.
Gelt, tax.
All these the king granted unto them
cum Sacha tt Socha, Tol and Teum, &c., free
from all gelts and payments. — Fuller, Wal-
tham Abbey j p. 7.
Gemmary, knowledge of gems. Sir
T. Browne has gemmary as an adjec-
tive.
In painting and gemmary Fortunato, like
his countrymen, was a quack. — E. A. Poe,
Cask of Amontillado.
Gemmen, vulgar abbreviation of
gentlemen.
At home our Bow-street gemmen keep the
laws. — Byron, Beppo, st. 86.
Here the new maid chimed in, " Ma'am, salts
of lemon
Will make it in no time quite fit for the
gemman."
Ingoldsby Legends (Aunt Fanny).
Genealogy, offspring; generation.
The family consisted of an old grey-headed
man and his wife, with five or six sons and
sons-in-law, and their several wives, and a
joyous genealogy out of them. — Sterne, Sent.
Journey, The Slipper.
General ess, female general.
He hastily nominates or sanctions gensr-
alesses, captains of tens and fifties. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. v.
Genethliac, a nativity caster.
Oommend me here to all genethliacs, casters
of nativities, star- worshippers, by this token,
that they are all impostors, and here proved
fools. — Adams, i. 9.
Do not the hist'ries of all ages
Relate miraculous presages
Of strange turns in the world's affairs
Foreseen by astrologers, soothsayers,
Ghaldseans, learn 'd genethliacks,
And some that have writ almanacks ?
Hudibras, II. iii. 689.
Genetic, pertaining to the genesis
or origin of things.
All revolutions, articles, and achievements
whatsoever, the greatest and the smallest
which this world ever beheld, have not once,
but often, in their course of genesis depended
on the veriest trifles. ... So inscrutable is
genetic history ; impracticable the theory of
causation, and transcends all calculus of
man's devising. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 78.
Genetical, having relation to the
genesis or origin.
A complete picture and Genetical History
of the Man and his spiritual Endeavour lies
before you. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I.
ch. xi.
Geneva print, sometimes applied to
drink (see quotation from Massinger in
L.), and this is also the meaning, I
suppose, of a passage in Chapman's
Moris. D' Olive, Act II., where a puri-
tanical weaver, whose " face was like
the ten of diamonds, pointed each-
where with pushes," is said to be
"purblind with the Geneva print;11
there being an equivoque intended
between his spiritual and spirituous
studies. In the subjoined, however, it
signifies a puritanical fashion in dress.
Shee is a nonconformist in a close sto-
macher and ruffle of Geneua print, and her
puritie consists much in her linen. — Earfe,
Microcosmographie (Shee precise Hypocrite).
Gensdarmery, a corps or army.
Had the gensdarmery of our great writers
no other enemy to fight with ? — Hacket, Uf'e
of WiUiams, i.*102.
The greater part of the gentry now dis-
persed ; the whimsical misfortune which had
befallen the gens oVarnverie of Tillietndlem
furnishing them with huge entertainment. —
Scott, Old Mortality, ch. iii.
GENS HARMES ( 273 )
GERR1NG
Gens d'armes, soldiers.
We come not here, my lord, said they, with
armes
For to resist the chok of thy Gens d'armes.
Hudson, Judith, v. 538.
Genteelize, to become or make gen-
teel. See Gentilize.
A man cannot dress but his ideas get
cloth 'd at the same time ; and if he dresses
like a gentleman, every one of them stands
presented to his imagination genteelized along
with him.— ^r/w, Trist. Shandy, vi. 138.
Gentilize, to raise to the rank of
gentleman. Milton, as quoted by R.
and L., has the participle = adopting
Gentile habits. See Genteelize.
Dissembling broakers, made of all deceipts,
Who falsine your measures and your weights
T* inrich yonr seines, and your vnthrif ty Sons
To gentilize with proud possessions.
Sylvester, third day, first weeke, 527.
Gentle- heart, a plant
Strip her of spring-time, tender whimpring
maids,
Now antumne's come, when all those flowrie
aids
Of her delayes must end ; dispose
That lady-smock, that pansie, and that rose
Neatly apart ;
But for prick-madam, and for gentle-heart
And soft maiden's-blush, the bride
Makes holy these ; all others lay aside.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 121.
Gentlemanhood, qualities or con-
dition of a gentleman. L. has gentle-
tnanship.
In his family, gentle, generous, good-
humoured, affectionate, self - denying ; in
society, a delightful example of complete
gentUmanhood. — Thackeray, Roundabout Pa-
pers, xx.
Geognosis, knowledge of the earth.
He has no bent towards exploration, or
the enlargement of our geognosis. — G. Eliot,
Middtemarch, ch. ix.
Geognost, a person having know-
ledge of the earth's crust, &c.
The travellers, except to the volcano dis-
trict of Sinai, have been such bad geognosis,
that I cannot get enough from them. — C.
KingsUy, 1863 (Life, ii. 141).
Geography. The earliest example
of this word given in the Dicta, is
from Hackluyt (1589). Udal, in 1542,
thought the word needed explanation.
Strabo, in his werke of geographie, that is
to saie, of the description of the earth,
wryteth, &c. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p.
317.
Geolatry, earth-worship.
To this succeeded astrolatry in the Eaxt,
and geolatry in the West. — Cox, MythoL of
Aryan Nations, i. 95.
Geometer, a gauger.
Instead of a quart-pot of pewter
I fill small jugs, and need no tutor ;
I quartridge give to the geometer
Most duly ;
And he will see, and yet be blind.
Robin Conscience, 1683 (Harl.
Misc., i. 52).
Geometry. To hang by geometry =
angularly, out of shape, in confusion.
Cf. Jommetry. In the extract one of
the characters, who has been living
under the disguise of a servant by the
name of Jar vis, " enters like a gentle-
man very brave, with Jarvia's cloaths
in *s hand," and sa3's —
Look you, here's Jarvis hangs by geometry,
and here's the gentleman. — Rowley, Match
at Midnight, Act. III.
I am a pander, a rogue that hangs together,
like a beggar's rags, by geometry. — Davenport,
City Myht-Cap, Act IV.
George noble, a gold coin worth
6j. Sd. current in Henry VIII. 's time ;
but can this be the coin referred to by
Cotton ?
Nor full nor fasting can the carle take rest.
Whiles his George-nobles rusten in his chebt,
He sleeps but once, and dreams of burglary.
Hall, Satires, IV. vi. 31.
When having twelve ounces he bound up
my arm,
And I gave him two Georges which did him no
harm. — Cotton, Voyage to Ireland, canto 2.
Geremumble, a comic word, having,
I suppose, no very definite meaning,
but = prepare in some way or other
for food.
He . . delivered him the king of fishes,
teaching hym how to geremumble it, sawce
it, and dresse it. — Nashe, Lenten Stvjffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 172).
German. See quotation.
German is by his very name Guerre-man,
or man that wars and gars. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. ii.
Germanise, to translate into German.
The Dutch hath him who Germanised the
story
Of Sleidan.— Sylvester, Babylon, 624.
G erring. N. has " Gerre, quarrelling,
evidently from the French guerre."
He quotes from R. Paynell, which is,
he says, the only passage where he has
found it, and he therefore considers it
T
GERSUME
( 274 )
GIBBET
" only as an affectation of the author."
It is possible that gerring in the extract
is connected with this substantive.
With the musicians also he found fault, for
that about their harpes and other musicall
instrumentes thei would bestowe great©
labour and diligence to set the strynges in
right tune, and had manen gerring quite and
clene out of al good accord or frame. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 85.
Gersume, a fine : at least in the mar-
gin is put "fine, as some take it."
Norwich, ... as wee reade in that Domes-
day Booke, . . . paide unto the king twenty
pounds ; . . . but now it paieth seventy
pounds by weight to the king, and an
hundred shillings for a gersume to the
queene. — Holland's Camden, p. 474.
Gerund-grinder, a schoolmaster.
Here is the glass for pedagogue*} pre-
ceptors, tutors, governours, gerund-grinders,
and bear-leaders to view themselves in. —
Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iv. 112.
Gerund-grinding, teaching or learn-
ing of grammar technically.
Other departments of schooling had been
infinitely more productive for our young
friend than the gerund-grinding one. — Car*
lyU, life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. iv.
Olassicafity . . . greatly distinguishable
from mere gerunds-grinding, and death in
longs and shorts.— Ibid.
Gesticular, full of action.
Electricity ... is pasting, glancing, ges-
ticular.— Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. xiii.
Gestion, order ; good bearing.
Is she a woman that objects this sight,
able to worke the chaos of the world into
gestion? — Chapman, Humerous Dayes Mirth,
p. 79.
Gesturement, gesture.
Meanwhile our poets in high parliament
Sit watching every word and gesturement.
Hall, Satires, I. iii- 46.
Gesturer, actor.
[The poet] may likewise exercise the part
of gesturer, as though he seemed to meddle
in rude and common matters, and yet not so
deale in them as it were for variety sake,
nor as though he had laboured them
' thoroughly, but tryfled with them, nor as
though he had sweat for them, but practised
a little.— Webbe, Discourse of Eng. Poetrie,
p. 95.
GK8TUROD8, full of gesture.
Some be as toyinge, gesturous, and counter-
feicting of anything by ymitation, as Apes.
— Touchstone of Complexions, p. 97.
Getable, procurable.
I do not mean to plunder you of any more
prints, but shall employ a little collector to
get me all that are getable.— Walpole, Letters,
ui. 283 (1709).
Get -nothing, an idler who earns
nothing.
Every get-nothing is a thief, and lariness is
a stolen water. — Adams, i. 192.
Get-up, dress ; appearance.
There is an air of pastoral simplicity about
their whole get-up.— H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe,
ch. xliii.
Ghast, ghastly ; awful.
1st Lady. How ghast a train !
2nd Lady. Sure this should be some
splendid burial.
Keats, Otho the Great, v. 5.
Ghaut. See extract.
I wrote this, remembering in long, long
distant days such a ghaut or river-stair at
Calcutta.—- Thackeray, Roundabout Papers,
• ••
ZVUl.
Ghostess, female ghost.
In the mean time that she,
The said Ghostess, or Ghost, as the matter
may be,
From impediment, hindrance, and let shall
be free
To sleep in her grave.
Ingoldsby Legends. (Old Woman in Grey).
Ghtll, "in the dialect of Cumber-
land and Westmoreland is a short and,
for the most part, a steep narrow valley,
with a stream running through it"
( Wordsworth, The Idle Shepherd Boys,
or Dungeon-Ohyll Farce, note). See
L. s. v. gill.
I wandered where the huddling rill
Brightens with water-breaks the sombrous
gkyll.— Wordsworth, Evening Walk.
Giantish, over tall.
Their stature neither dwarf nor giantish,
But in a comely well-dispos'd proportion.
Randolph, Muses Looking-Glass, ▼. L
Giantry, hugeness.
The flimsy giantry of Ossian has introduced
mountainous horrors. — Walpole, Letters, iv.
880 (1784).
Gibbet, shoulder (gigot). Among
the false or blasphemous opinions com-
plained of by the Lower House of Con-
vocation in 1536 is the following —
That the holy water is more savoury to
make sauce with than the other, because it
is mixt with salt ; which is also a very good
medicine for a horse with a gall'd back, yea,
if there be put an onyon thereunto, it is a
good sauce for a gibbet of mutton.— Fuller,
Ch. Hist., V. iv. 28.
GIFT
( *75 )
GIPSY
Gift, to give. This verb is in the
Diets., but the examples are only of
the use of the past participle.
He wu just the sort of wild, fierce, bandit
hero whom I could have consented to gift
with my hand.— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch.
xvii.
For the world must love and fear him
Whom I gift wih heart and hand.
Mrs. Browning, Swan's Nest.
The Regent Murray gifted all the Church
property to Lord Sempill.-V. Cameron Lees,
Abbey of Paisley, p. 201 (1868).
GlFTLING, little gift.
The kindly Christmas tree may
you hare plucked pretty giftlingt from it.—
Thackeray, Roundabout Papers, x.
Gig, flighty person. See N. s. v.
giglet.
Charlotte L. called, and the little gig told
all the qnarrels and all Its malheurs of the
domestic life she led in her family, and made
them all ridiculous without meaning to make
herself bo.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 390.
GIOANTE8QUE, giant-like.
In the neighbourhood of a river-system so
awful — of a mountain-system so unheard of
in Europe, there would probably, by blind,
unconscious sympathy, grow up a tendency
to lawless and gigantesque ideals of adventur-
ous life.— 2fe Quincey, Spanish Nun, Post-
script.
Giganticide, giant-killer.
The exoteric person mingles, as usual, in
society, while the esoteric is like John the
Giganticide in his coat of darkness.— Southey,
The Doctor, Interchapter, xii.
Gigantomachy, battle of the Giants.
They looked more like that Gigantomachy,
the Giants assaulting Heaven and the Gods,
than that Good fight of faith.— Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. MA.
Gigmanity, a word coined by Carlyle
to signify a Philistine respectability.
See quotation *. v. Squibelet, where
the following note is subjoined. " Q.
What do you mean by respectable ? A.
He always kept a gig " (Thurtell's trial).
The word international introduced by the
immortal Bentham, and Mr. Carlyle ?s gig-
manity— to coin which by the way it was
necessary to invent facts — are significantly
characteristic of the utilitarian philanthro-
pist and of the futilitarian misanthropist
respectively.— Hall, Modern English, p. 19.
Gignitive, productive of something
else.
There are at the commencement of the
third volume four Interchapters in succes-
sion, and relating to each other, the first
gignitive hut' not generated, the second and
third both generated and gignitive, the
fourth generated but not gignitive. — Sou they,
The Doctor, Interchapter ziv.
Gim, fine ; spruce. See Jim.
He's as fine as a prince, and as gim as the
best of them. — Vanbrugh, The Confederacy,
Act I.
Gimmon, a double ring : usually
written gimmal, q. v. in N.
A ring of a rush would tye as much Loue
together as a Gimmon of golde. — Greene,
Menaphon, p. 88.
Gin, squaw, or wife of an Indian or
Australian native, and so an old woman
generally. See quotation s. v. Myall-
bough.
An Australian settler's wife bestows on
some poor slaving gin a cast-off French
bonnet; before she has gone a hundred
yards, her husband snatches it off, puts it
on his own mop, quiets her for its loss with
a tap of the waddle, and struts on in glory.
— C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xiii.
Gingerbread, used adjectivally and
in a disparaging sense of showy adorn-
ment.
The rooms are too small, and too much
decorated with carving and gilding, which is
a kind of gingerbread work. — Smollett, France
and Italy, Letter zxz.
G INGLE-BO Y8, coins.
Aug. Yon are hid in gold
O'er head and ears.
Hir. We thank our fates, the sign of the
gingle-boys hangs at the door of our pockets.
— Massinger, Virgin Martyr, ii. 2.
G ingles, shingles.
It is observed of the gingles, or St. Anthony
his fire, that it is mortall if it come once
to clip and encompasse the whole body. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. i. 60.
Gipsous, clayey.
Others looked for it [cause of sweating
sickness] from the earth, as arising from an
exhalation in moist weather out of gipsous
or plaisterly ground.— Fuller, Camb. Univ.,
vii. 86.
Gipsy, as a term of reproach is gener-
ally applied to a woman, and usually
in a playful way; the gipsy in the
extract is Spenser, Edw. 1 1, 's favourite.
This overture being come to the Queen's
ear, and withal the knowledge how this
Gipsie had marshal I'd his cunniug practice,
and had prescrib'd the way for her escape,
. . . she seemed wondrously well-pleas'd. —
Hist, of Edw. II., p. 88.
t2
GIRD
( *7* )
GLED
Gird, a spurt N. gives an instance
from North's Plutarch of gird as a
verb = to leap or bound.
like a haggard, you know not where to
take him. He hunts well for a gird, but is
soon at a loss. — Adams, i. 475.
Gibding-hook, cutting or reaping-
hook.
The oats, oh the oats, 'tis the ripening of
the oats !
All the day they have been dancing with
their flakes of white,
Waiting for the girding-hook to be the nag's
delight.
Exmoor Harvest Song (Lama
Doone, ch. nixT* l
Girdle. ^ To have under one's girdle
= to have in subjection.
Such a wicked brotbell
Which sayth vnder his girthell
He holdeth Kyngs and Princes.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be not wroth, p. 114.
Let the magnanimous junto be heard, who
would try the hazard of war to the last, and
had rather lose their heads than put them
under the girdle of a presbyterian conventicle.
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 215.
Girl. See first extract : in the
second the speaker is supposed to be
a hind.
The roebuck is the first year a kid, the
second year a girl, the third year a hemuse.
—Return from Parnassus, ii. 5 (1606).
Those pretty fawns, prickets, sorrells,
hemuses and girls, whereof some are mine,
which I brought into the world without any
paio or help of midwife.— Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 62.
Girsb. N. has "girse, a girth?"
with a quotation from Taylor, 1630.
Subjoined is a somewhat earlier in-
stance : there can be no doubt that the
meaning is as conjectured.
One day, as the king was alone on the
shores, there sallies out of the fort a com-
pany of horse, whereof three ranne at him so
violently, and all strooke his hone together
with their launces as they brake pectorall,
airses, and all, that the horse slips away, and
leaues the king and the saddle on the ground.
— Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 46.
Givbn-way, allowed.
Is this the price of all thy pains ? Is this
the reward of thy given-way liberty? — Sid-
ney, Arcadia, p. 360.
Glaciaridm, a place where ice is
kept for skating purposes: a word
formed like aquarium.
The real ice at the Chelsea glaeiarium
was obtained by the use of liquid sulphurous
acid. — Nineteenth Century, March, 1878, p.
555.
Glade. To go to glade, evidently
= to set — is it from the sun sinking
behind the trees ?
Likening her Majestie to the Sunne for
his brightness©, but not to him for bis pas-
sion, which is ordinarily to go to glade, and
sometime to suffer eclypse. — Puttenham,
Eng. Poesie, p. 116.
Phoebus now goes to glade ; then now goe wee
Vnto our sheddes to rest vs till he rise.
Davies, Eglogue, 255.
Gladift, rejoice ; become glad.
Have you Mr. Twining still ? oh that he
would come and mortify upon our bread
and cheese, while he would gladify upon
our pleasure in his sight. — Mad, JjAruay,
Diary, vi. 193.
Glaringness, floridness.
Among them all none pleased him so much
as those composed by the famous Feliciano
de Silva: for the glaringness of his prose,
and the intricacy of his style, seemed to him
so many pearls. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. I.
Bk. I. ch. i.
Glass, applied by rather a violent
metonymy to a stream " splendidior
vitro.1
Out of the stone a plentious stream doth
gush,
Which murmurs through the plain, proud
that his glass,
Gliding so swift, so soon reyoungs the grass.
Sylvester, The Lawe, p. 954.
Glasstness, glazed appearance. R.
gives the word without example. Smol-
lett seems to think it requires an apo-
logy, though perhaps this only refers
to the application of it in this passage.
The alassyness (if I may be allowed the
expression) of the surface, throws, in my
opinion, a false light on some parts of the
picture. — Smollett, France and Italy, Letter
zxxi.
Glaziers, gipsy cant for eyes. The
extract means, Look out with all your
eyes, I Bwear by the devil, a magis-
trate is coming.
Tonre out with your glaziers, I swear by the
ruffin,
That we are assaulted by a queer cuffin.
Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act II.
Gled.
Come, knave, it were a good deed to gled
thee, by cockes bones,
Seest not thy handiwarke? sir Bat, can you
forbear him.
Gammer Gurton's Needle {Hawkins'
Eng. Dr., i. 235).
GLIB
( 277 )
GLORRE
Glib, slippery.
Or colour, like their own
The parted lips of shells that are upthrown,
With which, and coral, and the glib sea
flowers,
They furnish their faint bowers.
Leigh Hunt, Foliage, p. 20.
Guddery, slippery* See quotation $.v.
Popweed, and W edgewood, s. v. glidder.
Two men led my mother down a steep
and gUddery stair-way. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. iv.
Glim, a light or candle : also an eye.
u Let's have a glim" said Sikes, "or we
shall go breaking ournecks." — Dickens, Oliver
Trist, ch. xvi.
It is not a farthing glim in a bedroom, or
we should have seen it lighted. It is some
one ap; we mast wait till they roost. — Reade,
Nerer too late to mend, ch: xlviii.
Harold escaped with the loss of a glim. —
Jngddiby Legends (Housewarming).
Glim flashy, angry; flaring up
(slang).
Don't be glim/ashy ; why you'd cry beef
on a Water. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. lxxxii.
Glimmer-gowk, an owl.
T5 sit like a graat glimmer-gowk wi' 'is
glasses athnrt 'is noase. — Tennyson, The Vil-
lage Wife.
Gummeby, glimmering.
Shal wee, father heunlye, be careless©
Of thy claps thundring ? or when fiers glim-
rye be listed
In clowds grim gloomming?
Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 216.
Glint, to glean ; also as a subst.
The sight of the stars glinting fitfully
through the trees, as we rolled along the
avenue. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xx.
The few persevering gnats, who were still
dancing about in the slanting glints of sun-
shine, that struck here aud there across the
lanes, had left off humming. — Hughes, Tom
Brown at Oxford, ch. xlvii.
Glisten, a gleam : usually, a verb.
The sight of a piece of gold would bring
into her eyes a green glisten, singular to
witness. — Mist Bronte, I illette, ch. xiv.
Glitterance, glitter.
From the glitterance of the sunny main
He tnrn'd his aching eyes.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. XII.
Gloam, twilight ; usually written
gloaming.
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill's side.
Keats, La Belle Dame sans merci.
Globist, one who understands the use
of the globes.
Before my traveller puts himself to such
peregrinations, 'tis requisit he should know
the use of the globe beforehand . . . Being
a good globist hee will quickly find the senitb,
the distances, the climes, and the parallels.
— Howell, Instructions for Forraine Travel
(Appendix).
Gloomish, gloomy.
With toole sharp poincted wee boarde and
peroed his owne light
That stood in his lowring front gloommish
malleted onlye.
Stanyhurst, ^x?n., iii. 649.
Gloomth, gloom.
One has a satisfaction in imprinting the
gloomth of abbeys and cathedrals on one's
house. — Walpole to Mann, iii. 40 (1753).
Strawberry, with all its painted glass and
gloomth, looked as gay when I came home as
Mrs. Cornelia's ball room. — Walpole, Letters,
iii. 331 (1770).
Glork, to stare. See H., who has
two instances of it, but the subjoined
is a comparatively late example.
Sometimes it hap't, a greedy gull
Would get his gullet cram'd so full
As t' make him glore and gasp for wind.
Ward, England's Reformation,
o. ii. p. 222.
Gloriosee, a boaster : Anglicized
form of, or perhaps misprint for, glo-
rioso.
Emptie vessells haue the highest sounds,
hollowe rockes the loudest ecchoes, and
prattling gloriosers the smallest performance
of courage. — Greene, Menaphon, p. 82.
Glorioso, a boaster : cf. Fdrioso,
Gratioso, Ac.
Some wise men thought his Holinesse did
forfeit a parcel of his infallibility in giving
credit to such a Glorioso, vaunting that with
three thousand Souldiers he would beat all
the English out of Ireland.— Fuller, Worthies,
Devon (i. 284).
Glorre. In Nuttall's edition the
word is printed glare. Any slimy or
ropy substance was called glere (see
N.). Fr. glaire: perhaps this is what
is meant, and = fat.
Nothing but fulness stinteth their [hogs]
feeding on the Mast falling from the Trees,
where also they lodge at liberty (not pent
up, as in other places, to stacks of Pease)
which some assign the reason of the fineness
of their flesh ; which though not all glone
(where no bancks of lean can be seen for the
deluge of fat) is no less delicious to the
taste, and more wholesome for tffe stomack.
—Fuller, Worthies, Hants, (i. 400).
GLORY
( *73 )
GO
Glory, to make glorious, or glorify.
Her attendant train may pass the troop
That gloried Veuus on her wedding day.
Greene, Looking glass for England, p. 118.
See
How he that glories Heaven with an honour
Covets to glorify himself with honesty.
Davenport, City NighUcap, Act I.
Globylbss, bereft of glory.
He on whose glory all thy joy should stay
Is soulless, glory fas, and desperate.
Peele, Battle of Alcazar, ii. 3.
Glossem, gloss. I suppose meant
for gloss 'em.
The Ohurch of Rome shall vie strange
glossems and oeremonious observations with
them.—£p. Hall, Work$, v. 13.
Gloucester. See extract.
The old proverb, As sure as God's at
Gloucester, certainly alluded to the vast
number of churches and religious founda-
tions here.— Defoe, Tour thro* Great Britain,
ii. 322.
Glout, to sulk, to look heavily. R.
says it is found as late as Milton and
Garth : the subjoined are more recent.
Jenny (turning away and glowting). "I
declare it, I won't bear it." — Cibber, Pro-
voked Husband, Act IV.
When the fray was over, I took my friend
aside, and asked him, how he came to be so
earnestly against me. To which with some
glouting confusion he replied, " Because you
are always jeering and making a jest of me
to every boy in the school."— Ibid., Apology,
ch. i.
When we came to the top behold the
mows fallen ! and such quantities, and con-
ducted by such heavy clouds that hung
alouting, that I thought we could never
nave waded through them. — Walpole, Let-
ters, i. 35 (1739).
She had been greatly therefore disap-
pointed in the morning . . . and had been
in what is vulgarly called a glouting humour
ever since.— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VII.
ch. via.
If I find his aspect very solemn, u Gome,
come, no glouting, friend,1* I will say, and
perhaps smile in his face. — Richardson,
Grandison, iv. 165.
Glout. In the gloiit = in the sulks j
angry.
My mamma was in the glout with her poor
daughter all the vr*y— Richardson, CI. Har-
lotoe, ii. 140.
Gluttoning, gluttony.
Come, honest cook, let me see how thy
imagination- has wrought as well as thy
fingers, and what curiosity thou hast shown
in the preparation of this banquet, for glut-
toning delights to be ingenious.— Marmion,
Antiquary, Act IV.
»»
Glto. H. Bays "glig, a blister,
which, used metaphorically, may be
the meaning in the following quatrain
made by a man whom Peele had swin-
dled.
Peele is no poet, but a gull and a clown,
To take away my clothes and gown ;
I vow by Jove, if I can see him wear it,
I'll give him a glyg, and patiently bear it.
Peele'* Jests, 1627, p. 117.
Gnabble, nibble. Gnibling occurs
in Stanyhurst's Dedic. to his Virgil.
" Take us these little foxes," was wont to
be the suit of the Ohurch, "for they anabbU
our grapes, and hurt our tender hrancne*." —
Ward, Sermons, p. 158.
Gnarl, snarl. The word is used as a
verb by Shakespeare. See N.
My caress provoked a long guttural gnarl.
— Miss E. Bronte, Wuthering Heights, ch. i.
Gnat-snapper, a term of abuse ; per-
haps = a stupid fellow with his mouth
always open. It is also the name of
the beccafico, and is sometimes written
"gnat-snap.'1
Grout -head gnat - snappers, lob-dotterels,
gaping changelings. — Urquhart*s Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. xxv.
Gnombd, haunted by gnomes.
Philosophy will clip an Angel's wings,
Conquer all mysteries by rule and line,
Empty the haunted air and gnomed mine.
Keats, Lamia, Pt. II.
Gnostic, knowing. See quotation
S. V. TOGGBD.
I said you were a d — — d gnostic fellow,
and I laid a bet you have not been always
professional.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, i. 91.
Go, a measure of drink; go-down
was the term in the seventeenth cen-
tury. See N.
And many more whose quality
Forbids their toping openly,
Will privately, on good occasion,
Take six gc-dotcns on reputation.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, canto 4.
So they went on talking politics, puffing
cigars, and sipping whiskey-and- water, an til
the goes, most appropriately so called, were
both gone.— Sketches by Boz (Making a night
of it).
The goes of stout, the Chough and Crow,
the welsh rabbit, the Red Cross Knight, . . .
the song and the cup, in a word, passed
rouud merrily. — Thackeray, JVewcomts, ch. i.
GO
( 279 ) GODDESS-HOOD
V
Go, a proceeding (slang).
Well, this is a pretty go is this here ! an
uncommon pretty go. — Dickens, Nicholas
Kickleby, eh. lvii.
I see a man with his eye poshed out ; that
was a rum go as ever I see. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. vii.
Goad-groom, a carter or ploughman ;
one who uses the goad. In the Divine
Wctkes (Cavtaine*, 710) Sylvester calls
Sangar or Sraamgar a Goad-man, and in
the margin a Plough-swain.
[Thou] by one man, one Goad-groom (silly
Sangar),
Destroy'dst six hundred in religious anger.
Sylvester, Little Bartas, 877.
G0AD8TER, a driver; one who uses
the goad.
Voltaire's hones are by and by to be carried
from their stolen grave in the Abbey of
Scallieree to an eager stealing grave in Paris,
his birth-city: all mortals processioning and
perorating there; cars drawn by eight
white horses, goadsters in classical costume
with fillets and wheat-ears enough ; though
the weather is of the wettest. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. vii.
Go-ahead, forward ; progressive.
Tou would fancv that the go-ahead party
try to restore order and help business on.
Not the least — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. ziv.
Goal, to imprison.
Trounce him, goal him, and bring him upon
his knees, and declare him a reproach and
scandal to his profession. — South, Sermons,
vi.52.
Goar, to scoop or dig ; now usually
spelt gore, and = to pierce with the
horn (as of a bull, Ac.).
I have ever dissented from their opinion
who maintain that the world was created a
levell cbampian, mountains being only the
product of Noah's flood, where the violence
of the waters aggested the earth goared out
of the hollow valleys.— JWfer, Ch. Hist., Bk.
ix^Dedic.
Gob.
If you put into your furnaces a quantity
of stuff in which, for instance, alumina pre-
ponderates and silica preponderates, your
furnaces will not flux, but they gob. — North
Line. Iron Co. v. Winn, Queen's Bench, Nov.
22, 1877.
Gobber-tooth, a projecting tooth.
Burton (Anal, of Mel., p. 515) has
gubber tusked.
Duke Richard was low in stature, crook-
backed, with one shoulder higher than the
other, having a prominent gobber - tooth, a
war-like countenance which well enough be-
came a soldier.— Fuller, Ch. Hist , IV. iii. 8.
That pen that reports her [Anna Boleyn]
lean - visaged, long - sided, gobber - toothed,
yellow - oomplexioned, with a wen in her
neck, both manifests his malice, and dis-
parageth the judgement of King Henry,
whom all knew well read in books, and
better in beauties. — Ibid. V. iv. 20.
Go-by-ground, low. Gauden, argu-
ing in favour of a sufficient provision
for the clergy, asks what would he
thought of making Judges, Mayors, Ac.
of "hungry th red-bare wretches," and
whether anything could be more de-
spicable than " such mushroome magis-
trates, such go-by-ground Governours "
(Tears of the Church, p. 521). N. has
the word as a substantive.
God, to deify; to treat as a God.
The first extract is given by R. and by
L., but it will be seen that it is not quite
peculiar to Shakespeare. See also *. v.
Chbist.
This last old man
Lov'd me above the measure of a father,
Nay, godded me indeed. — Coriolanus, V. iii
Some 'gainst their king attempting open
treason,
Some godding Fortune (idol of ambition).
Sylvester, Miracle of Peace, sonnet 30.
Goddam. It is to be feared that
Flanders was not the only country in
which our armies swore terribly. Lord
Stanhope, in his Essay on Joan of Arc,
quotes the subjoined from a con-
temporary chronicle, and adds that
though he had often heard the name
applied to an Englishman, he had
hitherto believed it to be modem, as
he had previously met with no earlier
instance than in Beaumarchais'ifana^
de Figaro. In the second extract God-
damme = rake.
a Joan, let us eat this shad-fish to dinner
before you set out." " In the name of God,"
said she, " it shall not be eaten till supper,
by which time we will return by wav of the
bridge, and bring back with us a prisoner, a
Goddam, who shall eat his share of it." —
Stanhope's Essays, p. 90.
Others were of the town-cut, young God-
dammes that spoke ill, and lived worse. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 556.
Goddess- hood, status of a goddess.
Should not my beloved, for her own sake,
descend by decrees from goddess-hood into
humanity ? — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 300.
GODDIKIN
( 280)
GOLILIA
Goddikin, a little god.
For one's a little Goddikin,
No bigger than a skittle-pin.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque,
p. 281.
God-pull, inspired.
Homer, Musieus, Ouid, Maro, more
Of those god-full prophets longe before
Uolde there eternall fiers.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 440.
Gods, a name given to those who sit
in the upper gallery of a theatre. The
French call this gallery Paradis*
Each one shilling god within reach of a nod
is,
And plain are the charms of each gallery
goddess.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 128.
G0D6HOUSE, almshouse, which is the
explanation of the term given in the
margin. In Southampton there is
a chapel (now used for the Anglican
Service in French) dedicated to St.
Julien. It has almshouses attached to
it, and is usually called God's House.
Built, they say, it was by Sir Richard de
Abberbury, Knight, who also under it founded
for poore people a godshouse. — Holland's
Camden, p. 284.
Goffer, to crimp.
"What's the matter with your ruff?"
asked Lady Betty ; " it looks very neat, I
think." M Neat ! ... Ill have to get it all
goffered over again." — Miss Ferrier, Inherit'
ance, ch. xxi.
Goggle, to roll about (the eyes).
The Diets, have no example of this as
an active verb.
In temple corners hee gogled his eyesight.
—Stanyhurst, Mn., i. 438.
He goggled his eyes, and groped in his
money - pocket. — Walpole, Letters, iii. 174
(1766).
Goggles, spectacles made of coloured
glass, wire, or gauze, to protect the eyes
from light, dust, &c.
I nearly came down a-top of a little spare
man who sat breaking stones by the road-
side. He stayed his hammer, and said, re-
garding me mysteriously through his dark
goggles of wire, ** Are yon aware, sir, that
you've been trespassing?" — Dickens, Vn-
commercial Traveller, xzii.
GoGMAGOG, a jocose term for a big
or strong pereqn. N. has gogmagogical
= large, with quotation from Taylor,
the water poet.
Be valiant, my little gogmagogs, I'll fence
with all the justices in Hertfordshire. —
Merry Devil of Edmonton (Dodsley, O. PI.,
xi. 140).
Goings on, proceedings. The simple
word ' goings ' is used in this sense,
Job xxxiv. 21.
The family did not, from his usual goings
on, expect him back again for many weeks. —
Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. v.
Golden eye. L. defines it a species
of duck {Anas clangula), but Sylvester
in a marginal note explains it to be
the " Guilt-head,'1 which was a fish,
the Aurata or Aurella* See Fuller,
Holy War, III. xxiii. 4.
The delicate, end-chewing Golden- Eye,
Kept in a weyre, the widest space doth spy.
And, thrusting in his tail, makes th' Osiars
gape
With his oft flapping, and doth so escape.
Sylvester, fifth day, first iceeke, p. 313.
Goldfinch, a gold piece. Cf.
Yellow-hammer.
Sir ff. Don't you love singing-birds,
madam ?
Angel. ( Aside.) That's an odd question for
a lover. (Aloud.) Yes, sir.
Sir. H. Why then, madam, here is a nest
of the prettiest goldfinches that ever chirped
in a cage. — Farquhar, Constant Couple, ii. 2.
Goldny, the fish gilthead.
The oisters of Tarentum, fish of Helops,
The goldny of Cilicia, Chios scallops.
Davies, An Extasie, p. 94.
G0LE8. By Goles, an oath ; a minced
version of By God.
Why then, by Goles ! I will tell you. I
hate you and I can't abide you. — Fielding,
An old man taught wisdom.
Hark, hark ! 'tis the signal by goles !
It sounds like a funeral knell.
Oh, hear it not, Duncan ! it tolls
To call thee to heaven or hell.
J. and H. Smith, 'Rejected Addresses,
p. 173.
Golilia. Spanish golilla, a Mttte
starched band sticking out under the
chin, like a ruff.
Mons. Let me not pot on that Spanish
yoke, but spare me my cravat, for I love
cravat f urieusement.
Don. Off, off, off with it, I say ! Come,
refuse the ornaments principal of the Spanish
habit! (Takes him by the cravat, pulls it
off, and the Black puts on the golilia.)
Mons. Will you have no mercv, no pity ?
alas ! alas ! alas ! Oh, I had rather put on
the English pillory than that Spanish golilia.
— Wycherley, Gent. Dane. Mast., iv. 1.
I cannot well comprehend what those
GOLL-SHEAVES ( 281 ) GOOD-NATURED
pretenders to science would be at who
fasten on the first notions, and will no more
part with them than a Spaniard with his
basket-hilt or golilia. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 254.
He wore about his neck ... a small ruff,
which had serv'd him formerly instead of a
golitte, when he hVd at Madrid. — T. Brown,
Work*, iv. 210.
Goll-sheaves. H. gives u gole, big,
fall, florid, prominent, rank as grass, "
&c. Goll-sheaves perhaps = sheaves of
overgrown corn with empty ears.
The rest of the articles were goll-sheaves
that went ont in a suddain blaze. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 92.
Goloshed, furnished with goloshes,
or, perhaps, made waterproof.
His boots had suffered in the wars : great
pains had been taken for their preservation ;
they had been soled and heeled more than
once; had they been goloshed, their owner
might have defied Fate. — Ingoldsby Legends
(Grey Dolphin).
Gonoph, a fool or lout. See H. *. v.
gnoffe.
I am obliged to take him into custody ;
he's as obstinate a young gonoph as I know ;
he won't move on. — Dickens, Bleak House,
ch. zix.
Good-bodied, having -& good figure.
Saw all my family np, and my father and
sister, who is a pretty good-bodied woman,
and not over thick, as I thought she would
have been, but full of freckles, and not
handsome in face. — Pepys, May 31, 1666.
Goodfellow, a reveller ; it was also
used of a thief. See H.
This they said, because it was well known
that Sir Roger had been a Goodfellow in his
youth. But he answered them very wisely:
*• Indeed," saith he, ** in youth, I was as you
are now, and I had twelve fellows like unto
myself, but not one of them came to a good
end." — Ascham, Schoolmaster, p. 60.
I have been employed
By some the greatest statesmen of the king-
dom
These many years; and in my time conversed
With sundry humours, suiting so myself
To company, as honest men and knaves,
Goodfellows, hypocrites, all sorts of people.
Jonson, Magnetic Lady, I. i.
We must not only avoid sinne itself,
but also the causes and occasions thereof,
amongst which bad compauy (the lime twigs
of the devil) is the chiefest, especially to
catch those natures which, like the uoodfelhw
planet Mercuric, are most swayed by others.
—Fuller, Holy State, III. v. 3.
Good-foe-little, not worth much.
The little words in the republic of letters
are most significant. The trisyllables, and
the ramblers of syllables more than three,
are but the good-for-little magnates. — Rich-
ardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 298.
Good-for-nothing, worthless.
I believe I may put it to your score that I
have not a guest to-day, nor any besides my
own family, and you good-for-nothing ones
(inutiles). — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 187.
He is to be married very soon ; a good-for-
nothing fellow ! I have no patience with him.
— Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility, ch. zxz.
Good - for - nothingness, worthless-
ness.
How do these gentry know that, supposing
they could trace back their ancestry for one,
two, three, or even five hundred years, that
then the original stems of these poor fami-
lies, though they have not kept such elaborate
records of their good-for-nothingness, as it
often proves, were not still deeper rooted. —
Richardson, Pamela, ii. 54.
Goodish, rather good, or large.
I fetched a goodish compass round by the
way of the Cloven Bocks. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. lviii.
Good morrows, compliments or com-
monplaces: the expression refers, I
suppose, to the formal and empty
greetings exchanged when acquaint-
ances meet.
After this saiyng the commenaltie of
Athenes, which had afore condemned him,
were sodainly stricken againe in loue with
hym, and saied that he was an honest man
again and loued the citee, and many gate
good morowes. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.
p. 376.
She spoke of the domesticall kind of cap-
tivities and drudgeries that women are put
unto, with many such good morraics. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 67.
Some might be apt to say, the devil's in a
man that grieves for the loss of a wife;
that a dead wife is the best piece of house-
hold goods a man can have ; that it would be
as preposterous to shed tears at the interring
our left rib as to go into mourning for getting
out of prison, . . . and a thousand such good
morrows.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 245.
Good-natured is used by theological
writers of that goodness which a man
may have without having the grace of
God. The first quotation is borrowed
from Trench's Deficiencies of Hug. Diets.;
in the second the word is not used in
its strict theological sense, and signifies
what we now call well-conditioned, but
conveys much higher eulogy than it
does at present. This inferior use of
GOODY
( ri* )
GOSSAN
the word was, however, current in
Fuller's time, and South (vi. 109) has
some pungent remarks thereon.
Good nature, being the relics and remains
of that shipwreck which Adam made, is the
proper and immediate disposition to holiness.
When good nature is heightened by the grace
of God, that which was natural becomes now
spiritual. — Jeremy Taylor, Sermon at Funeral
of Sir J. Dalstone.
We take our leaves of Tyndal with that
testimony which the Emperour's procurator
or attorney-general (though his adversary)
gave of him, " Homo futt doctus, pius et
bonus:" He was a learned, a godly, and a
good-natured man. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. iv. 41.
Goody, a contemptuous word to
denote what is well intentioned, but
weak and mawkish.
All this may be mere qoody weakness and
twaddle on my part. — Sterling, in Carlyle's
life, Pt. II. ch. v.
One can't help in his presence rather try-
ing to justify his good opinion ; and it does
so tire one to be goody and to talk sense. —
Miss Bronte, VUletts, eh. ix.
Goose, to hiss (theatrical slang).
He was goosed last night, he was goosed the
night before last, he was goosed to-day. He
has lately got in the way of being always
goosed, and he can't stand it. — Dickens, Hard
Times, ch. vi.
Goose-horns. In the Quern's Closet
Opened, p. 77 (1655), there is a receipt
for " A Powder for the Wind in the
Body," which has, among other ingre-
dients, "pillings of goose-horns, of
capons, and pigeons."
Goose-skin, a creeping of the flesh is
so called. Cf. Anserine.
Her teeth chattered in her head, and her
skin began to rise into what is vulgarly
termed goose-skin. — Miss Ferrier, Inheritance,
ch. ii.
Gor-belly, a big belly. See ST. In
all the examples in the Diets, it is used
of a glutton, not of the stomach itself.
The devils of Growland, with their crump
shoulders, side and gor-bellies, crooked ana
hawmed legges. . . — Holland's Camden, p. 530.
Gordian, to knot ; aleo (as an adjec-
tive) knotted.
She had
Indeed locks bright enough to make me mad :
And they were simply gordiarCd up ana
braided. — Keats, Endymxon, Bk. I.
She was a gordian shape of dazzling hue.
Ibid., Lamia.
Gore is used rather peculiarly in
the extract = clotted mass.
From their foreheads to their shoes they
were in one gore of blood.— H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, i. 68.
Gorqonize, to petrify as by the
glance of the Gorgon.
What eies so Gorgoniz*d that can endure
To see the AU-vpholder f ore'd to bow ?
Davies, Holy Boode, p. 15.
Gormaqon. The society of Gorraa-
gons was one similar to that of Free-
masons: it was in existence from 1725-
38, when it was dissolved. See N*
and Q., V. vii. 152, and the extract
from Pope, «. v. Gregorian.
Gosling. To shoe a goose or gosling
= to engage in a foolish or fruitless
task. See next extract, also N. and
Q., III. vii. 457.
As fit a sighte it were to see a goose shodds
or a sadled oowe,
As to hear the pratling of any soehe Jack
Strawe— New Customs, I. i. (1573).
All this while, according to the old proverb,
I have bin shooing of aostinqs ; I have spent
my labour and breath to little purpose. —
— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 132.
"The smith that will meddle with all
things may go shoe the aoslings," an old pro-
verb which, from its mixture of drollery and
good sense, became ever after a favourite of
mine. — Miss Edgeworth, Lams Jervas, ch. iii.
Gosling. The previous entry shows
that to shoe geese = to engage in a
foolish task ; hence perhaps the appli-
cation of the proverb as given by Put-
tenham to a woman's too easily moved
tears. The form of it used by Sir H.
Taylor is given in N., s. v. goose, from
Withafs Diet., 1634 ; it will also be
found in Burtons Anat. of Melancholy,
p. 494.
By the common prouerbe, a woman will
weepe for pitie to see a gosling got barefoot*. —
Futtenham, Arte of Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch.
xxiv.
Pity! As great a pity to see a woman
weep as to see a gosling go barefoot. — Taylor,
Virgin Widow, i. 3.
Gospel-shop, a Methodist chapel.
As soon as I had procured a lodging and
work, my next enquiry was for Mr. Wee-
ley's Gospel-shops. — life of J. Lackington,
Letter xix.
Gossan, yellow earth, just above a
vein of metal.
This gossan (as the Cornish call it) ... I
suspect to be not merely the matrix of the
ore, but also the very crude form and materia
prima of all metals. — Kingsley, Westuard Ho,
ch. xiii.
GOTCH
( **3)
GRAINER
Gotch, a pitcher.
Once, passing by this very tree,
A gotch of milk I'd been to fill,
You ahoulder'd me, then laugh 'd to see
Me and my gotch spin down the hill.
Bloomfield, Richard and Kate,
Gothian, a Goth.
Among their other worthy praises which
they have justly deserved, this had not been
the least, to be counted, among men of
learning and skill, more like unto the Gre-
cians than unto the Gothians in handling of
their verse. — Ascham, Schoolmaster, p. 195.
Gotibb, guitar.
Touch bat thy lire, my Harrie, and I heare
From thee some raptures of the rare gotire.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 296.
Go-to-meeting, a slang expression
for best: usually applied to clothes,
such as people wear on a Sunday.
I want to give you a true picture of what
every-day school life was in my time, and not
a kid-glove and go-to-meetiTig-co&t picture. —
Hughes, Tom Brown's School-Days, Pt. II.
ch. v.
Brave old world she is after all, and right
well made; and looks right well to-day in
her go-to-meeting clothes. — C Kingsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. av.
Gougeb, one who gouges or stabs.
It is true there are gamblers and aouaers
and outlaws. — Flint, Recollections of the Mis-
sissippi, p. 176 (1826).
Gor/L. H. gives this as a substantive
= gum of the eye : in the extract it is
a verb.
There is a kind of earthliness in the best
eye, whereby it is gouled up. — Bp. Hall,
Works, vi. 317.
Goulatrb (Ft. gouliafrc), a greedy-
gut
O howe all the substaunce of your Realme,
forthwith your swerde, power, crowne, dig-
nite, and obedience of your people, rynneth
hedlong ynto the insariabill whyrlepole of
these gredi ooulafres to be swalowed and
devoured. — Simon Fish, Supplication for the
Beggars, p. 10.
Gourdes, a torrent. H. gives from
Elyot, 1569, " Aquilegium, a gourde of
water which commeth of rayne." The
extract is from N. and Q., I. i. 335
(see also pp. 356, 419).
Let the qourders of raine come downe from
you and all other heretikes, let the floudes
of worldly rages thrust, let the windes of
9a than 's temptations bio we their worst, this
house shall not be ouerthrowen. — Harding
ayiitut Jewel (Antw., 1565), p. 189.
Gownesept is Stanyhurat's rendering
of gentem togatam.
[Juno] shal enter
In leage with Romans, ana gownesept charelye
tender.— Stany hurst, Mn., i. 269.
Gotal. See extract.
We were come to a long deep goyal, as they
call it on Exmoor, a word whose fountain and
origin I have nothing to do with. Only I
know that when little boys laughed at me at
Tiverton for talkiug about a goyal, a big boy
clouted them on the head, and said that it
was in Homer, and meant the hollow of the
hand. And another time a Welshman told
me that it must be something like the thing
they call a pant in those parts. Still I know
what it means well enough,— to wit, a long
trough among wild hills, falling towards the
Slain country, rounded at the bottom per-
aps, and stiff more than steep at the sides
of it. Whether it be straight or crooked
makes no difference to it. — Blackmort, Lorna
Doom, ch. iii.
Grace-stroke, finishing touch ; coup
de grace ; originally the merciful stroke
which put a wounded enemy or a tor-
tured prisoner out of his misery : the
dagger which did this was called the
muericorde; hence grace -stroke =
completion generally.
It was not without the greatest surprise in
the world that I heard from my lady your
mother your intentions led you to our neigh-
bouring kingdom of Scotland, to perfect and
give the grace-stroke to that very liberal edu-
cation you have so signally improved in
England. — Scotland characterised, 1701 {Harl.
Misc., vii. 377).
Gracy, full of teaching about grace ;
what would now be called " evangeli-
cal."
In the morning heard Mr. Jacomb at Lad-
gate upon these word*, (< Christ loved you,
and therefore let us love one another," and
made a gracy sermon like a Presbyterian. —
Pepys, April 14, 1661.
Gradionately, gradually.
To recount . . . how he came to be king of
fishes, and gradionately how from white to
red he changed, would require as massie a
toombe [tome] as Hollinshead. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 167).
Graftlinq, a little or tender graft.
In th' orchards at Monoeaux or Blois
The Gardner's care over some Graftlings
choice,
The second year of their adoption there
Makes them as good and goodly fruits to
bear. — Sylvester, St. Lewis, 88.
Grain er, garner. See Granier.
GRAINS OF PARADISE ( 284 )
GRAPH1ES
He wyll brynge the wheat© into hys barne
or grayner. — Jiaie, Enterlude of Jokan Bapt.,
1538 (Uarl. Misc., i. 110).
Grains of Paradise, hot aromatic
seeds gathered on the Guinea coast, of
a cordiul and stimulating quality.
Look at that rough o' a boy gaun out o'
the pawnshop, where he's been pledging the
handkerchief he stole this morning, into the
ginshop, to buy beer poisoned wi' grains o*
paradise and coceulus indicus.— C. Kinysley,
Alton Locke, ch. viii.
G rammer, grandfather. I do not
know whether in the extract this word
is put by a slip of the pen or press for
gramfer, which is the provincial form
of grandfather given in H., and which
I have often heard. Grammer usually
= grandmother.
How different-looking the young ones are
from their fathers, and still more from their
grandfathers ! Look at those three or four
old grammers talking together there. For all
their being shrunk with age and weather,
you wont see such fine-grown men any-
where else in this booth. — C. Kingsley, Yeast.
ch. zui.
Granadier. This word is in the
Diets., but the extract is an earlier
example than any there given, and
marks the introduction of the word.
Now were brought into service a new sort
of soldiers call'd Granadiers, who were
dextrous in flinging hand granados, every
one having a pouch full. — Evelyn, Diary,
June 29, 1678.
Grand, to make great.
But yet His justice to extenuate
To graund His grace is sacrilegious.
Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 6.
Grandeza, greatness ; honour. An
Italian and Spanish word used as Eng-
lish.
I can not denie but her dominions are
very spacious, that the Sunne never forsakes
her auite, perpetually shining in some part
or other above her hemisphere : a grandeza,
I confesse, that none of all the foure
monarchies could vaunt of. — Howell, Do-
dona's Grove, p. 10.
He made semblance to be mightily taken
with it, saying that of all the grandezas he
had received since his coming to his royall
court, this surmounted all the rest. — Ibid.
p. 101.
Grandiose, grand, but rather with
the idea of pomposity connoted. See
extract «. v. Bronzify. "This word is
ro much needed that its being a mal-
formation is the more to be deplored.
We took it from the French, before
whom, however, the Italians had
educed qrandioso from grandis, a-
gainst all law " (Hall, Modern 15ng-
lithy p. 289).
Mr. Urquiza entered first with a strut more
than usually grandiose, — De Quincey, Spanish
Nun, sect. xii.
This attenuated journal had ... an alder-
manic, portly, grandiose, FaUtaffian title. —
Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. X. ch. vi.
Hardly anything could seem more gran-'
diose, or fitter to revive in the breasts of
men the memory of great dispensations by
which new strata had been laid in the history
of mankind. — G. Eliot, Romola, ch. xxi.
Grand-leet, great assembly.
In the grand-letts and solemn elections of
magistrates, every man had not prerogative
alike.— Holland, Livy, p. 25.
Grand-master, chamberlain. See
Great-master.
God is the great Grand-master of the king's
house, and will take account of every one
that beareth rule therein. — Latimer, i. 93.
Grand-panch, a great-bellied fellow ;
a gourmand.
Our grand-panches and riotous persons
haue deuised tor themselues a delicat kind of
meat out of corn and grain. — Holland, Pliny,
xix. 4.
Grane, to strangle.
And off set John, with all his might,
To chase me down the yard,
HU I was nearly granJd outright,
He hugg'd so woundy hard.
BloomJSeld, The Horkey.
Granier, garner. See Grainer.
That other, if be in his Granier stores
What ever hath beene swept from Lybian
flores. — Heath's Horace; Oae I.
Grantland, Greenland.
Vast Grantland, compassed with the
frozen sea. — Marlowe, 2 Tamhurlaine, I. i.
Grapelet, a little grape.
I hold
Thy small head in my hand — with its grape-
lets of gold
Growing bright through my fingers.
Mrs. Broiening, Rhapsody of Life's
Progress,
Grapkry, grape-house.
She led the way to a little conservatory,
and a little pinery, and a little grapery, and
a little aviary. — Miss Edgeicorth, Absentee,
ch. vi.
Graphies, studies such as geography,
biography, chalcography, &c. Cf.
Isms, Ologies.
GEASPINGNESS ( 285 )
GRAVE
Verbe, qrapkies, and, climax of intellectual
misery, the multiplication table. — L. E. Lon-
don (Life by Blanchard, i. 48).
Graspingness, rapacity ; covetous-
neas.
To take all that good-nature, or indulgence,
or good opinion confers shews a want of
moderation, and a graspingness that is un-
worthy of that indulgence. — Richardson, CI.
Marlowe, i. 137.
Grabpless, relaxed ; not grasping.
From my graspless hand
Drop friendship's precious pearls, like hour-
glass sand. — Coleridge, On a Friend.
Grass, to bury in the grass ; also to
land a fish (on the grass).
One arrow mnst be shot after another,
though both be great, and never found again.
Socket, Life of William*, ii. 20.
Well away to Snowdon
For our ten days' sport,
Fish the August evening,
Till the eve is past,
Whoop like boys at pounders
Fairly played and grassed.
C. Kingsley, 1856.
Who amongst you, dear readers, can appre-
ciate the intense delight of grassing your
first big fish after a nine months' fast? —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxvi.
Grass. To give grass = to yield ;
it was an ancient form by which a con-
quered people yielded their soil to the
victor. See Pliny, Nat. Hist., Bk.
XXII. cap. iv.
Speak, ye attentive swains that heard me late,
Needs me give grass unto the conquerors ?
Hall, Defiance to Envy, prefixed to
Satires.
Grass. To let no grass grow under
ones foot = to make haste, not to
loiter.
There hath grown no grasse on my heele
since I went hence. — Udal. Roister bolster ,
in. 3.
Maistresse, since I went no grasse hath grown*
on my hele,
But maister Tristram Trustie here maketh
no speede. — Ibid. iv. 5.
Mr. Tulkinghorn . . is so good as to act as
my solicitor, and grass don't grow under his
feet, I can tell ye. — Dickens, Bleak House,
ch.xiziii.
Grass. To pluck grass. See quot-
ation.
No man could pluck the grass better to
know where the wind sat ; no man could
•pie sooner from whence a mischief did rise.
Socket, Life of Williams, ii. 16.
Grassant, in progress ; in full swing.
Latin, grassari.
Those innovations and mischiefs which
are now arassant in England. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 183.
Prejudices, as epidemical diseases, are
grassant. — North, Examen, p. 131.
Can it be believed that a people ever were
willing or consented that thieves, malefac-
tors, and cheats everywhere arassant should
have liberty to ravage and destroy at their
pleasure ? — Ibid. p. 339.
G rati 080, a favourite ; in Spanish =
a buffoon.
The Lord Marquess of Buckingham, then
a great Gratioso, was put on by the Prince
to ask the King's liking to this amourous
adventure. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 114.
Our excellent Camden shifts in this an-
swer for Queen Elizabeth's sake, whose
affections were so strong to Robert. Earl of
Leicester, that he knew not whether it were
a synastria, a star which reigned at both
their births, that made him a Gratioso to so
brave a lady. — Ibid. ii. 195.
At length the Gracioso presented himself
to open the scene. He was saluted on his
first appearance with a general clap, by which
I perceived that he was one of those spoiled
actors in whom the pit pardons everything. —
Gil Bias, transl. by Smollet, Bk. VII. ch. vi.
Gratulance, pecuniary compliment
or gratification ; a fee or bribe.
Come, there is
Some odd disburse, some bribe, some gratu-
lance,
Which makes you lock up leisure.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act V.
Gratulant, congratulating.
The white-robed multitude of slaughtered
saints
At Heaven's wide-opened portals gratulant
Receive some martyred Patriot.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Gradndcie8. The editor of the
Harl. Misc. suggests that this word is
the same as craunces, used a little lower
down in the same passage. See N. s. v.
Crants.
Such brooches, such bracelets, such ground'
eies ... as hath almost made Englande as
full of proud foppries as Tyre and Sidon
were. — Greene, Quip for Upstart Courtier
(Harl. Misc., v. 419).
Gravaments, representations, grava-
mina*
Mr. Nevell shall deliver to you a bill of
the gravaments of two or three of the fellows
most given to good letters. — Latimer to
Cromwell, 1537 (Remains, p. 378).
Grave "signifieth but an Eirle:
but here it is vsurped for the chief
GRA VE
( *86)
GRECIAN
captain Josuah " (marginal note in
8ylvester). N. has the word, but only
in connection with Maurice of Nassau,
concerning whom, in addition to what
is stated there, see Howell, Letters, I.
iv. 15.
When with the rest of all his boast, the
Grave
Marcheth amain to giue the town a braue,
They straight re-charge him.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 362.
Grave. An involuntary shudder or
shiver without apparent cause is popu-
larly said to be caused by some one's
walking over the grave (t. e\, I suppose,
the ground that will hereafter form the
grave) of the person so affected.
Miss (shuddering). Lord, there's somebody
walking over my grave. — Swift, Polite Con-
versation (Conv. i.).
Sometimes somebody would walk over my
grave, and give me a creeping in the back,
which, as far as I can find out, proceeded
from not having my braces properly buttoned
behind. — H. Kingstey, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch.
Grave- fellow, the sharer of a grave.
In Scripture we only meet with one Post-
hume - Miracle, viz., the Gravt -fellow of
Elisha raised with the touch of his bones. —
Fuller, Worthies, Bucks (i 135).
Gravel. To gravel up = to choke
up with gravel.
O thou, the fountain of whose better part
Is earth'd and gravelVd up with vain desire.
Quaries, Emblems, i. 7.
Gravelled, stranded : now only used
figuratively. See Trench, Select Glos-
sary, s. v.
So long he drinks, till the black caravell
Stands still fast gravelled on the mud of hell.
Hall, Satires, III. vi. 14.
Grave-man, sexton.
The bold grave-man at the meeting
Gave the rude clown so sound a beating,
That he forsook his hop'd-f or bride,
While with bis spade tne conq'ror plied,
Stroke after stroke, the seat of shame,
Which blushing Mases never name.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. 2.
Graveporer, one who pores or medi-
tates on his grave, as having one foot
in it already (?). Stanyhurst ( J2n., iv.
641) calls Anchises JEuea8*8 " bed red
graueporer old syre." The original is
confectum mtate.
Gravet, a grave person ; one of
weight ; pletate gravem.
In this blooddye riot they soom grauet haplye
beholding
Of geason pietee, doo throng and greedelye
listen.— Stanyhurst, JEn^ i. 159.
Gray, to make gray.
Thou hast ploughed
Upon my face, canst thou undo a wrinkle.
Or change bat the complexion of one hair ?
Yet thou hast (jray'd a thousand.
Shirley, Bird in a Cage, Act V.
Grease. To melt his arease = to
perspire, to lose flesh, and so to pine
away. Cotton (Burlesque upon Bur-
Usque, p. 287) has ** melt my suet"
with the same meaning.
The adventurous Earl Henry of Oxford,
seeming to tax the Prince of Orange of
slackness to fight, was set upon a desperate
work, where he melted his grease, and so, being
carry 'd to the Hague, he died also. — Howtll,
Letters, I. iv. 15.
The day was exceedingly hot, and as the
hungry hunters followed the chase with great
ardour, Rubio's horse was overheated, and, as
the phrase was, melted his grease, — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. cxliv.
Great, to aggrandise.
O base ambition ! This false politick,
Plotting to great himself, our deaths doth
seek.— Sylvester, The Lave, 639.
Great 00, the final examination at
the University : the modern term is
" greats."
At school they never flogg'd him,
At college, though not fast,
Tet his little go and great go
He creditably pass d.
Thackeray, King of Brentford* s
Testament.
Great - master, chamberlain. See
Grand-master.
I was very much troubled, even this time
twelvemonth, when I was in commission
with my Lord Great Master and the Earl of
Southampton, for altering the Court of Aug-
mentations.—Gantoier to Duke of Somerset,
1547.
Greats, the final University examin-
ation, or great go (slang). See extract
8. v. Smalls.
Grecian, a gay fellow. " Merry as
a Greek," was a proverb which has
been corrupted into " merry as a grig."
Amongst the horsemen whose curiosity had
drawn them to hear Wildgoose was a well-
booted Grecian in a fustian frock and jockey
cap. — Graves Spiritual Quixote, Bk. XI.
ch. xiv.
GEEJDALJNE
( **7 )
GREGS
Gbkdalihe, some sort of stuff (?).
His love, Lord help us! fades like my
gredaUne petticoat. — KiUigrew, Parson1*
Wedding, ii. 4.
Gree, favour. The word is illustrated
in the Diets., but the following is a
comparatively late instance of its use.
History . . . (after the partial gree of the
late authors) has been to all good purposes
silent of him. — North, life of Lord Guilford,
i. 6.
Greek. R., after noticing what N.
says as to this word = boon companion,
adds, u Latterly a Greekh&a been applied
to a character of less openness ; not to
a bonvivant, but to a gambler." " Lat-
terly " is a vague term, but it was cer-
tainly so used in 1528.
In carde playinge he is a goode greke
And can akyll of post and glyeke,
Abo a payre of dyce to trolle.
Boy and Barlow, Rode mo and be nott
wroth*, p. 117.
He was an adventurer, a pauper, a black-
leg, a regular Greek.— Thackeray. Newcomes,
en. xxxvi.
Greek, to imitate the Greeks ; arm-
txtri (ffor. Sat., II. ii. 11). The
fashion referred to is that of emptying
as many cups of wine as there were
letters in the name of the reveller's
mistress.
Those were prouerbially said to Greeks it
that qnaft in that fashion. — Sandys, Travels,
p. 79.
G been. This epithet is by metonymy
applied to the flame that issues from
green wood.
For this humour beinge enkindled and sette
on heate, maye well bee lykened to areene
flame or as wet woode, which sendetn out
nothing but stoare of thick moyst smoak. —
Touchstone of Complexions, p. 117.
Greenery, foliage ; shrubbery.
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sonny spots of preenery.
Coleridge, Kubla Khan.
Oh, the blessed woods of Sussex ! I can hear
them still around me,
With their leafy tide of greenery still rippling
up the wind.
Mrs. Browning, Lady Qeraldine.
The Archery Hall, with an arcade in front,
showed like a white temple against the
greenery on the northern side. — G. Eliot,
Deronda, ch. x.
GREEN-F18H, cod.
A peece of Greene-fish with sorrell sauce
is no mean seruice in an ale-house. — Breton,
Wife Trenehmour, p. 10.
Greenies, freshmen: the University
spoken of is that of Ley den.
It would not be convenient forme to enter
minutely . . . into the course of our student's
life from the time when he was entered
among the Greenies ol this famous university,
nor to describe the ceremonies which were
used at his ungreening. — Sou they, The Doctor,
ch. 1.
Greenless, not green.
But Beauty Oracelesse is a Saillesse Bark,
Agreenlesse Spring, a goodly lightlesse
Room.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalitie, st. 26.
Green rushes, a salutation to a per-
son whom the speaker had not seen for
a long time. When guests were ex-
pected fresh green rushes were strewed
on the floor, before carpets came into
use. Hence green rushes =» You are
quite a stranger, and must be so treated.
a Indeede, Doron, you saye well, it is long
since wee met ; . . . when you come you shall
haue greene rushes, you are such a straunger.
— Greene, Menaphon, p. 85.
Greene rushes! M. Francisco, it is a won-
der to see you heere in this country. — Breton,
Merry Wonders, p. 5.
Grrenth, greenness. See Blueth.
I found my garden brown and bare, but
these rains nave recovered the gree nth. — ~
Walpole, Letters, i. 304 (1753).
Neatness and areenth are . . . essential in
my opinion to the country.— Ibid. iii. 320
(1769).
Gregary, ordinary ; belonging to the
arex (?), or congregational (?). Hall
is extolling the martyrs, Ac. of the
English Church in comparison with
sectaries.
Men that gave their blood for the Gospel,
and embraced their fagots flaming, which
many gregary professors held enough to
carry cola and painless.— 2?/>. Mall, Works,
x. 270.
Gregorian. The Gregorians were a
society similar to the Freemasons. See
N. and Q., IL vi. 273.
Nor pass'd the meanest unregarded ; one
Bose a Gregorian, one a Oormagon.
Pope, Dunciad, iv. 576.
There is scarce an individual, whether
noble or plebeian, who does not belong to
one of these associations, which may be
compared to the free masons, gregoreans, and
antigallicans of England.— -Smollett, France
and Italy, Letter xxvii.
Greg8, narrow breeches or tights.
H. says "wide, loose breeches," but
GREMIAL
( ^88 )
GRJPOLOUS
the subjoined quotation does not agree
with this.
His breeches . . . were not deep and large
enough, but round strait cannioned aregs,
having in the seat a piece like a keeping's
tail, and therefore in French called de chausses
a queue de melius. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk.
II. ch. vi.
Gremial, one who resides in the
bosom (gremio) of the University.
A great Prelate in the Chnrch did bear
him no great good- will for mutual animosities
betwixt them, whilest Gremials in the Uni-
versity.— Fuller, Worthies, Kent (i. 609).
These things made him always cast a fa-
vourable aspect upon the universities, . . .
which the governors and the rest of the
S'tmials very well knew. — Strype, Cranmer,
k. II. ch. vi.
Grey- hound. The two following
derivations of this word are worth
preserving as curiosities. The first is
from a Treatise on Eng. Dogs} by Dr.
Caius, written in Latin, 1536, and trans-
lated by A. Fleming, 1576.
The Greyhound, called Leporarius, hath
his name of this word Gre, which word
soundeth Gradus in Latin, in English degree.
Because among all dogs they are the most
principal, occupying the chief place; and
being simply and absolutely the best of the
gentle kind of hounds. — Eng. Garner, iii. 264.
I have no more to observe of these Grey-
hounds, save that they are so called (being
otherwise of all colours) because originally
imployed in the hunting of Grays ; that is,
Brocks or Badgers. — Fuller, Worthies (Lin-
coln, ii. 4).
Grief. To come to grief = to fail,
die, meet with misfortune, &c.
As for coming to grief, old boy, we're on a
good errand, I suppose, and the devil him-
self can't harm us. — C. Kingsley, Two Years
Ago, ch. xxi.
Grieffull, grievous ; melancholy.
This word occurs in the Faerie Queen,
VI. viii. 40. N. adds, " Church says,
* This, if I mistake not, is a compound
word of his own.1 He did mistake, for
it is used by other writers as early,"
and he quotes two passages from Sack-
villfs Ferrex and Porrex ; but the sub-
joined is older still by about a quarter
of a century.
Soche pushes in the visages of men are
angrie things and grefful. — UdaPs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 79.
Griefly, indicative of grief.
"With dayly diligence and griefly groans he
wan her affection. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 154.
Grievment, injury : a word perhaps
invented for the rhyme.
His battels won and great atchievmenfcs,
Wounds, bruises, bangs, and other grievments.
Ward, England's Reformation,
cant. i. p. 90.
Griffin, freshman in Indian service.
Pip-sticking is pretty — very pretty, I may
say, if you have two or three of the right
sort with you: all the Griffins ought to
hunt together though. — H. Kingsley, Geojfry
Hamlyn, ch. xxviii.
Griffinish, griffin-like ; fierce.
For me, thro' heathen ignorance perchance,
Not having knelt in Palestine, I feel
None of that griffinish excess of zeal,
Some travellers would blaze with here in
France. — Hood, Ode to Roe Wilson,
Grill, a gridiron.
They have wood so hard that they cleave
it into swords, and make grills of it to broil
their meat. — Cotton's Montaigne, ch. xxiv.
Grillatalpa, mole-cricket.
Bats shrieked, and grillatalpas joined the
sound. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 44.
Grim, to make grim.
Bailly and his Feuillants, long waning like
the moon, had to withdraw then, making
some sorrowful obeisance, into extinction,
or indeed into worse, into lurid half-light,
gritnmed by the shadow of that Bed Flag of
theirs.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V.
ch. viii.
Grind, hard work (slang).
We lost him [the fox] after sunset, after
the fiercest grind I have had this nine years.
— C. Kingsley, 1852 {Life, i. 275).
Grinder, a private tutor ; a coach :
usually applied to one who crams pupils
for a particular examination.
Put him into the hands of a clever grinder
or crammer, and they would soon cram the
necessary portion of Latin and Greek into
him. — Miss Edgeworth, Patronage, ch. iii.
Gripe, a drain. L. has grip in this
sense, with a quotation which speaks
of it as a Scotch word.
Up and down in that meadow for an hour
or more did Tom and the trembling youth
beat like a brace of pointer dogs, stumbling
into gripes and over sleeping cows. — 1\
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xxv.
Gripolous, grasping ; avaricious.
The labourer's hire cries in the gripotous
landlord's hand. — Adams% i. 213.
What cosmopolite ever grasped so much
wealth in his gripulous fist as to sing to him-
self a Sttfficit f—Ihid. i. 434.
GXIPPINGNESS ( 289 )
GROPPLE
Grippingmess, avarice. Bp. Hall has
grippiene&s.
One with an open-handed freedom spends
all he lays his fingers on; another with a
logick- fisted grippingnesa catches at and
grasps all he can come within the reach of.
—Rennet's Erasmus, Praise of Folly, p. 87.
Gkit, an American expression = sub-
stance, pluck, staying-power, or the
like.
What a lovely girl she is ! and a real lady
— Voir noble — the real genuine grit, as Sam
Slick says, and no mistake. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Come and see the fighting, . . . and tell
people what it's all really like. . . Come
and give us the real genuine grit of it, for
if you cant, who can? — H. Kingsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. xxiv.
They came to a rising ground, not sharp,
bat long ; and here youth, and grit, and sober
living told more than ever. — Reade, Cloister
•*d Hearth, ch. xxi.
Grizkl, a meek woman, from the
well-known story of Griselda. The
word in extract is not printed with a
capital letter.
He had married five shrews in succession,
and made grizels of every one of them before
they died. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 15.
Grizzle, a species of wig.
Emerg'd from his grizzle, th' unfortunate
Prig
Seems as if he was hunting all night for his
wig. — Anstey, New Bath Guide, Letter xi.
Kven our clergy when abroad moult their
feathered grizzles, cast off their pndding-
sleeves, and put on white stockings, long
swords, and bag-wigs. — Colman, The Spleen,
Act II.
Groat. Grey groat is used for
something of no value, a brass farthing
as we now say.
Ill not leave him worth a grey groat.
_ Marlowe, Jew of Malta, iv. 4.
" It will be nonsense fining me,'1 said An-
drew, doughtily, "that hasna a grey groat
to pay a fine wi'— it's ill taking the breeks
aff a Hielandman."— Scott, Rob Roy, ii. 140.
Gbobiax, a sloven.
Let them be never so clownish, rude and
torrid, Qrobians and sluts, if once they be in
We, they will be most ueat and spruce. —
Itxrton, Anatomy, p. 530.
Be sure that he who is a Grobian in his
o^n company will sooner or later become a
Grobian in that of his friends. — C. Kingsley,
Westward Ho, ch. ii.
Grocerlt, belonging to the grocery
trade.
Yet never since Scandal drank bohea,
Or sloe, or whatever it happened to be,
For some grocerly thieves
Turn over new leaves,
Without much amending their lives or their
tea;
No, never since cup was fill'd or stirr'd
Were such vile and horrible anecdotes heard.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet,
Grog, to make into grog; to mix
water with spirits.
The Excise authorities found in a vault
135 empty spirit casks and 23 casks contain-
ing weak spirit or grog. It was set forth
for the prosecution that the defendants had
"grogged " the casks by putting in hot water,
and thereby had extracted 15 gallons of proof
spirit on which duty had not been paid. In
defence it was admitted that the casks had
been "grogged," but it was urged that the
defendants were not spirit dealers, and that
when duty was paid upon the whisky as it
left the bonded warehouse, those who bought
it could do with it what they pleased. —
Lincoln, Rutland, and Stamford Mercury,
March 8, 1878.
Groggy, shaky ; unsteady on the
legs ; confused.
He turned and gazed at Dolphin with the
scrutinising eye of a veterinary surgeon.
" I'll be shot if he is not groggy" said tbe
Baron. — Ingoldsby Legends (Grey Dolphin;,
"Since bis last attack," Barnes used to
say, "my poor old governor is exceedingly
shaky, very groggy about the head." — Thack-
eray y Newcomes, ch. xxix.
Gboin, lust.
They set the sign of the Cross over their
outer doors, and sacrifice to their gut and
their groin in their inner closets. — B. Jonson,
Discoveries (Impostura).
Gromet. Those who were employed
in servile offices on board ship, waiting
on the seamen, &c, were called grum-
metts : from Low Latin gromettus, the
original of our groom. In Sussex an
awkward boy is called a grummut.
See Parish's Sussex Dialect; also N. and
Q., I. i. 337, 358, where the following
is quoted from Jeukes' Charters of the
Cinque Ports, under date 1229.
Servicia inde debita domino regi xxi naves,
et in qualibet nave xxi homines, cum uno gar-
done qui dicitur gromet.
G roomless, without a groom.
St. Aldcgonde . . was lounging about on
a rough Scandinavian cob, as dishevelled
as himself, listless and groomless. — Disraeli,
Lothair, ch. xxviii.
Gropple, to grope.
GROSSFULL
( 290 ) GRUB-PEGASUS
The boys . . . bad gone off to tbe brook
to "aropple" in the brook for cray-fish. —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxx,
Grossfull, gross.
Let me beare
My grossest faults as grosse-full as they were.
Chapman, Revenge of Jiussy D'Ambois, i. 2.
G rossi e, gross.
Wild-foule being more dainty and digest-
able than Tame of the same kind, as spend-
ing their grossie humours with their activity
and constant motion in flying. — Fuller,
Worthies, Lincoln (ii. 2).
Groud, troubled (?) See H. s. v.
Grow.
Asses and such like beasts that can not
stale or be groud and wrong in the bellie. —
Holland, Pltny, xx. 6.
Ground. To set on ground = to dis-
comfit, to floor, to gravel.
The Pharisees and Sadducees had no
further end but to set Him on ground, and
so to expose Him to the contempt of the
people. — Andrewes, v. 127.
Ground-fast, sunk in the ground.
In Yorkshire they kneel on a ground-fast
stone and say —
All hail to the moon, all hail to thee,
I prithee, good moon, reveal to me
' This night who my husband shall be. #
Defoe, Duncan Campbell, Introduction.
Groundsill, to put down a thresh-
old.
The milder glances sparkled on the ground,
And groundsilVd every door with diamond.
Quarles, Emblems, v. 14.
Grouplet, little group.
This multitudinous French people, so long
simmering and buzzing in eager expectancy,
begins heaping and shaping itself into or-
ganic groups, which organic groups again
hold smaller organic grouplets. — Carlyle, Fr,
Rev., Pt. I. Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Grouthead. H. says, "stupidly
noisy (Sussex) ; also large or great-
headed, stupid." We associate a large
head with intellect, but perhaps the idea
is not of length, as a long-headed man,
or breadth, as in a broad forehead, but
thickness — blockheaded. The term
occurs in the volley of abuse poured
upon Gargantua's people by the eake-
bakers of Lerne\ It is difficult to say
which of the two meanings given by
H. it bears in that place, nor does the
original help us to determine ; for, in
this as in several other places, Urqu-
hart in his translation has added con-
siderably to the already copious vocabu-
lary of Rabelais. Probably, however,
it means stupidly noisy, being asso-
ciated with gnatsnapper (see quotation
*. v.).
Grouze, devour noisily: still in use
in Lincolnshire.
Like swine under the oaks, we grouze up
the akecorns, and snouk about for more, and
eat them too ; and when we have done, lie
wronting and thrusting our noses in the
earth for more, but never lift up so much as
half an eye to the tree that shed them. —
Sanderson, iii. 187.
Grovecrop, a grove: luciu is the
word in the original.
In town's myd center theare sprouted a
groavecrop. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 424.
Growl seems in the extract = to
crawl. See Crawl.
He died of lice continually growling out of
his fleshe, as Scylla and Herode did. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 178.
Growler, a cant name for a four-
wheel cab. It will be seen that Udul
uses growl = to crawl ; this, however,
is probably not the origin of the name ;
it may perhaps refer to the creaking
noise made by an ill-built vehicle, or to
the murmurs of those inside evoked by
the slowness of their progress.
The London four-wheeled Cab, as actually
existing, is one of the worst public vehicles
in Europe ; and though, by a process of ex-
tremely natural selection, tne so - called
" Growler " is gradually disappearing before
the more genial Hansom, yet there are grave
objections to urge against the Hansom itself.
The four-wheeler, meanwhile, may already
be looked upon as doomed beyond all chance
of redemption. — Standard, Nov. 7, 1879.
Groyl, to growl ; in the second ex-
tract = growler or mutterer. The
Diets, give no example of growl earlier
than Pope and Gay.
His tusk grimlye gnashing, in seas far
waltred he groyleth. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii.
678.
Fame the groyl vngeutil then whom none
swifter is extant. — Ibid., JEn., iv. 179.
Grubby, dirty.
They lookM so ugly in their sable hides ;
So dark, so dingy, like a grubby lot
Of sooty sweeps or colliers.
Hood, A Black Job.
Grub-Pkgasus. Grub Street was the
abode of poor authors, and has become
a recognized word in the language np-
GRUDGMENT
( 29i )
GR YPHE
plied to literary performances of in-
ferior character. Swift, in the Intro-
duction to his Tale of a Tub, coins the
adjective Grubcean.
Nor could I mount my Pad for a Day's
journey, but strait some paultry poet, astride
his Grub-Pegasus, wrote at me, or rode, and
sent his Hue and Cry after me.— Dr. Swiff $
Seal Diary, Dedic. (1715).
Gbudgment, discontent.
This, see, which at my breast I wear,
Ever did (rather to Jacynth's grudgment),
And ever shall, till the Day of Judgment.
Drowning, Flight of the Duchess.
Gruel. One who is killed or other-
wise punished is said to have got his
gruel (slang).
He gathered in general that they expressed
great indignation against some individual.
" He shall have his gruel," said one.— Scott,
Guy Mannering, i. 287.
He refused, and harsh language ensued,
Which ended at length in a duel,
When he that was mildest in mood
Gave the truculent rascal his gruel.
Ingoldsby Legends {Babes in the Wood).
Gruelled, done ; exhausted (slang).
Wadham ran up by the side of that first
Trinity yesterday, and he said that they
were as well gruelled as so many posters
before they got to the stile. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xii.
Grueller, a thing hard to get over;
a floorer or graveller (slang).
This £25 of his is a grueller, and I learnt
with interest that you are inclined to get the
fish's nose out of the weed. I have offered
to lend him £10.— C. Kingsley, Letter, May,
1856.
Gruesome, terrible; also terrified;
shuddering. Awful and fearful have
the same twofold meaning.
What's in the Times? A scold
At the Emperor deep and cold ;
He has taken a bride
To his gruesome side
That's as fair as himself is bold.
Browning, A Lovers' Quarrel.
Nature's equinoctial night-wrath is weird,
grewsome, crushing.— C. Kingsley, Two Tears
Ago, ch. iii.
These trees, and pools, and lonesome rocks,
*&d setting of the sunlight, are making a
9jue*me coward of thee.— Blackmore, Lorna
Doom, ch. vii.
Gruffish, rather gruff. See extract
from Colman *. v. Bakeb-kneed.
"How do you do?" said a short, elderly
gentleman with a qruMsh voice— Sketches by
Koz (Watkins Tottte).
Gruft, to begrime.
An* 'is noase sa grufted wi' snuff es it
couldn't be scroob'd awaay.— Tennyson, Vil-
lage Wife.
Grumbles, grime ; dirt.
When these come once to stirring, and
trouble overtaketh them, as sooner or later
they must look for it, then the grumbles and
mud of their impatience and discontent be-
ginneth to appear, and becometh unsavoury
both to God and man. — Sanderson, I 150.
Grdmbletonian, grumbler ; scolder.
Father-in-law has been calling me whelp
and hound this half year. Now, if I pleased,
I could be so revenged upon the old grumble-
tonian. — Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer,
Act I.
Grumbol, a term of reproach ; grum
= surly.
Come, grumbol, thou shalt mum with us ;
come, dog me, sneaksbill. — Dekker, Satiro-
mastix {Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 174).
Grumness, sourness.
Well, Jack, by thy long absence from the
town, the grumness of thy countenance, and
the slovenliness of thy habit, I should give
thee joy, should I not, of marriage ? — Wych-
erley, Country Wife, I. i.
Grumpish, cross: grumpy is more
common.
If you blubber or look grumpish, HI have
you strapped ten times over. — Mrs. Trollope,
Michael Armstrong, ch. vi.
Grunter, a pig. The first quotation
is part of a song full of gipsy cant
words, but Scott and Tennyson use
ffrunler as an ordinary term for a pig.
Here's grunter and bleater, with tib of the
buttery,
And Margery Prater, all dress'd without
sluttery. — Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act II.
A sort of lurcher, half mastiff, half grey-
hound, . . ran limping about as if with the
purpose of seconding his master in collecting
the refractory grunters. — Scott, Ivanhoe, i. 12.
A draggled mawkin thou,
That tends her bristled grunters in the sludge
Tennyson, Princess, v.
Grutnol, a term of abuse ; a great
noil or head ; a blockhead. See Grout-
head.
Noddy meacocks, blockish orulnols, doddi-
pol-joltheads. — UrquharVs liabelais, Bk. I.
ch. zzv.
Gryphe, hieroglyph (?)
He appeals also to the law6 of the land,
that if such letters had come to him like
Merlin's rhimes and Rosicrucian bumbast,
that no law or practice directs the subject to .
U 2
GRYPHONESQVE ( 292 ) GUILLOTINEMENT
bring such gryphes and oracles, but plain,
literal, grammatical notions of libels, to a
justice of peace, against a known and clearly
decipher \1 magistrate. — Hacket, Life of WiU
Hants, ii. 132.
Gryphonesqub, griffin-like.
Blanche had just one of those faces that
might become very lovely in. youth, and
would yet quite justify the suspicion that
it might become gryphonesque, witch-like, and
grim. — Lytton, Vaxtons, Bk. XVIII. ch. iii.
Guard. De Quincey says in a note,
"I know not whether the word is a
local one in this sense. What I mean
is a sort of fender, four or five feet
high, which locks up the fire from too
near an approach on the part of chil-
dren." The word is, I think, common
all over England, and also designates
the much smaller and slighter protec-
tions used for tires in drawing-rooms,
&c.
My three sisters with myself sat by the
firelight round the guard of our nursery. —
De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. IS.
GUBBAHAWN.
When you can't catch salmon, you catch
trout, and when you can't catch trout, you'll
whip on the shallow for poor little gubba-
haicns. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xiii.
Gubbe, lump ; same as gob, q. v. in L.
A bodie thinketh hymself well emended
in his substaunce and riches to whom hath
happened some good gubbe of money. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apopkth., p. 14.
Gudgeon. See L. *. v. for remarks
on the voracity ascribed to this fish :
the peculiarity in the extracts is the
adjectivul use of the word.
This is a bait they often throw out to such
gudgeon princes as will nibble at it. — T.
Brown, Works, i. 90.
In vain at glory gudgeon Boswell snaps. —
Wolcot, P. Ptndar, p. 107.
Gudgeons, the rings that bear up
the rudder of a ship. The extract is
a portion of a comparison between the
parts of a man's body and the parts of
a ship.
The keel is his back, the planks are his
ribs, the beams his bones, the pintal and
gudgeons are his gristles and cartilages. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 9. •
Guffaw, a loud laugh.
F. B. goes up to the draughtsman, looks
over bis shoulder, makes one or two violent
efforts as of inward convulsion, and finally
explodes in an enormous guffaw. — Thackeray,
Newcomts, ch. lxv.
A smile is allowable, but an intelligent
smile tipped with pity, please, and not the
empty guffaw of the nineteenth century
jackass, burlesquing Bibles, and making
fun of all things except fun. — Reade, Cloister
and Hearth, ch. Iii.
Guggle, to catch in the throat, so as
to impede clear speaking. An onoma-
topceous word.
Something rote in my throat, I know not
what, which made me for a moment avpgle,
as it were, for speech. — Richardson, Ci. Har-
lowe, vi. 305.
All France is ruffled, roughened up (me-
taphorically speaking) into one enormous,
desperate-minded, red, guggling turkey-cock.
—Oarlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. iv.
Dobbin . . fell back in the crowd, crow-
ing and sputtering until he reached a safe
distance, when he exploded among the aston-
ished market-people with shrieks of yelling
laughter. "Hwat's that gawky guggling
about?" said Mrs. ODowd. — Thackeray,
Vanity Fair, oh. xxviii.
Guidelessness, want of guidance.
Hast thou too to fight with poverty and
guidelessness, and the cravings of an unsatis-
fied intellect? — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. u.
Guieeie, deceit (?) Gut (from French
gtieux) = a sharper, and is not peculiar
to Brathwaites Honest Ghost, aa N.
supposed. See H.
This pangue or auierie of loue doth especi-
ally aboue all others innade and possess©
soche persones as been altogether drouned
in idlenesse. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apopkth n
p. 131.
Metellus himself being of his mother's
condicions, was veray light and mutable, and
one that could none other but folowe euery
sodain guerie or pangue that 6hotte in his
braine— Ibid. p. 341.
• Guile. H. gives no example, but
explains it " a guile of liquor, %. e. as
much as is brewed at once."
Thee best befits a lowly 6tyle,
Teach Dennis how to stir the guile ;
With Peggy Dixon thoughtful sit,
Contriving for the pot and spit.
Swift, Panegyric on the Dean.
Guillian, a follower of William III.
Grave bishops, barons, baronets,
The Guillians, and the Jacobites.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 3.
Guillotinkment, death by guillotine.
Phillipe Egalite', . . . before guillotinement,
begat the present King of the French. —
Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. ix.
In this poor National Convention, broken,
bewildered by long terror, perturbations, and
GUINEA-PIG
( *93 )
GUN
gvillotinement, there if no pilot. — Ibid., Fr.
Rev., Pt. HI. Bk. VII. ch. ii.
Guinea-pig, a term of reproach.
A good seaman he is as ever stept upon
forecastle, and a brave fellow as ever crackt
bisket — none of your Guinea-pigs, nor your
fresh- water, wishy-washy, fair-weather fowls.
—Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xxiv.
Guinea-pig, a name jocosely given
to those whose fee is a guinea. The
guinea-pig in the first extract was a
veterinary surgeon.
u Ob, oh," cried Pat, " how my hand itches,
Thou guinea nig, in boots and breeches.
To trounce thee well."
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. iv.
Guinea-piqs. — There is an order in the
Anglican Church which bears a certain ana-
logy to the mendicant friars of the middle
ages. Hie members thereof are styled
"guinea-pigs" and they are, for the most
part, unattached or roving parsons, who will
take any brother cleric's duty for the moder-
ate remuneration of one guinea. — Chicago
Ch. Paper, quoted in Ch. Review, Jan. 2, 1880.
Guire Cove, queer cove (?), i. e. a
rogue. To nip a bounge is to cut a
parse.
You can lift, or nip a bounge, like a Guire
Cote, if you want pence. — Greene, Quip for
Up*tart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 418).
Guise, to disguise, or dress up.
To guise ourselues (like counter-faiting ape)
To th* guise of men that are but men in
shape.— Sylvester, Th* Vocation, p. 192.
Abbe Maury did not pull ; but the char-
coal men brought a mummer guised like him,
and he had to pull in effigy. — Carlyle, Fr.
&NPt.II.Bk.I.ch.xi.
Gule, gullet. H . has it = gluttony.
There are many throats so wide and gules
v> gluttonous in England that they can swal-
low down goodly Cathedral*. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 323.
Gcllery, a pond for gulls.
Two other instances of such inland gulleries
exist in England.— E. Trollope, Sleaford
(1872), p. 68. ^ J
Gully. See quotation.
" Can you tell me with what instruments
they did it?" "With fair gullies (gouets),
which are little haulch-backed denii-knives,
the iron tool whereof is two inches long, and
the wooden handle one inch thick, and three
inches in length."— Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
Ich. xxvii.
The poor simple bairn himsell . . . had
p*e mair knowledge of the wickedness of
human nature than a calf has of a fiesher's
9*'ty.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, i. 242.
Gult, red : gules (Fr. gueules) is an
heraldic term for that colour.
Such poor drifts to make a national war
of a surplice brabble, a tippet scuffle, and
engage the untainted honour of English
knighthood to unfurl the streaming red cross,
or to rear the horrid standard of those fatal
guly dragons for so unworthy a purpose. —
Jfilton, Ref. in Eng., Bk. II.
Gum, chatter, or, as we still say,
jaw.
Pshaw f pshaw! brother, there's no occa-
sion to bowss out so much unnecessary gum ;
if you can't bring your discourse to bear on
the right subject, you had much better clap
a stopper on your tongue. — Smollett, Pert'
grine Pickle, ch. xiv.
Gummed, stiff or starched.
We bate the stiff and gumm'd deportment
of the Italian. — Gentleman Instructed, p.
546.
Gumptious, proud.
" She holds her head higher, I think," said
the landlord, smiling. "She was always —
not exactly proud like, but what I calls
gumptious.
" I never heard that word before," said the
Parson, laying down his knife and fork.
" Bumptious, indeed, though I believe it is
not in the dictionary, has crept into familiar
parlance, especially amongst young folks at
school and college."
" Bumptious is bumptious, and qumpfious
is gumpttous" said the landlord, delighted to
Enzzle a parson. "Now, the town beadle is
umptiou6, and Mrs. Avenel is gumptious."
41 She is a very respectable woman," said
Mr. Dale, somewhat rebukingly.
uIn course, sir; all gumytrms folks are;
they value themselves on their respectability,
and looks down on their neighbours."
Parson (still philologically occupied). —
Gumptious— gumptious. I think I remember
the substantive at school **ot that my master
taught it to me. u Gumption,"— it means
cleverness.
Landlord (doggedly).— There's gumption
and gumptious! Gumption is knowing; but
when I say that sum un is gumptious, I mean
— though that's more vulgar like — sum un
who does not think small beer of hisself. —
Lytton, My Novel, Bk. IV. ch. xii.
Gun. Son of a gnn, a rather dis-
respectful synonym for a " man."
We tucked him in, and had hardly done
When, beneath the window calling.
We heard the rough voice of a son of a gun
Of a watchman, ** One o'clock " bawling.
IngoldsJry Legends (Cynotaph, note).
Gun. Great guns = great people.
What great pieces hath he [the devil] had
of bishops of Borne, which have destroyed
whole cities and countries, and have slain
GUN
( *94 )
GYTRASH
and burnt many! What great guns were
those ! — Latimer j i. 27.
Guy. Sure as a gun = quite sure.
Comers with his dagger a promising
assassin ; the guns and firelocks dead-doing
things ; as sure, they say, as a gun. — North,
Examen, p. 168.
I laid down my basin of tea,
And Betty ceased spreading the toast,
u As sure as a gun, sir," said she,
u That must be the knock of the post.'*
Macaulay, Country Clergyman's
Trip to Cambridge.
Gunneress, female gunner.
The seized cannon are yoked with seized
cart-horses: brown-locked Demoiselle Th6-
roigne, with pike and helmet, sits there as
gunneress. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII.
ch. v.
Gurtie. See extract.
It staies the gurtie or running out of the
belly in 4 footed beasts. — Holland, Pliny,
xx. 5.
Gushet, piece of armour in front of
the arm-pit : the name survives in the
gusset of a shirt.
Then every man amongst them with a fair
joy, and fine little country songs, set up a
huge big post, whereunto they hanged . . .
a horseman's mace, gushet -Armour (gousse ts)
for the armpits, leg-harness, and a gorget. —
Urquharfs Raltclais, Bk. I. ch. xxvii.
Gutless, disembowelled.
The falcon (stooping thunder-like)
With suddain souse her to the soyl shall
strike,
And with the stroak make on the senseless
ground
The gut-les quar once, twice, or thrice re-
bound.— Sylvester, The La we, 643.
Gutling, a glutton. N. has it, but
only refers to Withal' s Diet
The poets wanted no sport the while, who
made themselves bitterly merry with de-
scanting upon the lean skulls and the fat
paunches of these lazy gutlings. — Sanderson,
iii. 106.
Guts. To have guts in the brains
= to have sense.
Quoth Ralpho, Truly that is no
Hard matter for a man to do
That has but any guts in 's brains.
Hudihras, I. iii. 1091.
His brother boars, I presume, will h&ve
more outs in their brains for the future than
to pick a quarrel with such as preserve their
lives. — T. Brown, Works, i. 278.
The fellow's well enough, if he had any
guts in his brains. — Sicift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. i.).
Gut, a figure stuffed with straw
carried about by boys on Nov. 5, to
represent Guy Fawkes : the eflSgy is
afterwards burnt. Any odd-looking,
ugly, or ill-dressed person is sometimes
called a guy.
Once on a fifth of November I found a Guy
trusted to take care of himself there, while
his proprietors had gone to dinner. — Dickens,
Uncommercial Traveller, xxi.
Guzzle, drink. The Diets, give this
substantive as meaning an insatiable
person, also a ditch or drain.
Where [have you] squander'd away the
tiresome minutes of your evening leisure
over seal'd Winchesters of threepenny
guzzle?— T. Broten, Works, ii. 180.
Guzzler, excessive drinker.
Being an eternal guzzler of wine, his
mouth smelt like a vintner's vault. — T.
Brown, Works, iii. 265.
GyNjEceum, the woman's part of the
house ; the harem.
Women up till this
Cramp'd under worse than South-Sea isle
taboo,
Dwarfs of the gynecaum, fail so far
In high desire. — Tennyson, Princess, iii.
Gynethusia, sacrifice of women.
The traces of a kind of Suttee — aynethusia,
as it has been termed — may be looked for
in the earlier tombs of the ancient Britons.
—Archaol., xlii. 188 (1868).
Gynophagite, woman-eater.
He is worse than Polyphemus, who was
only an Anthropophagos ; he preys upon the
weaker sex, and is a Gynophagite. — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. III. ch. xxii.
Gyp, the Cambridge term for a college-
servant ; in Oxford called a scout.
Where's your portmanteau? Oh, left it
at the Bull ? Ah, I see ; very well, we'll
send the gyp for it in a minnte. — C. Kings-
ley, Alton Locke, ch. xii.
Gyreful, revolving ; encircling. In
the original, jEn., viii. 432, sequacibus.
Theyre labor hoat they folow; toe the
flame fits gyreful awarding. — Stanyhurst,
Conceites, p. 138.
Gytrash. See extract.
I remembered certain of Bessie's tales,
wherein figured a North-of-Bngland spirit,
called a M Gytrash ; " which, in the form of
horse, mule, or large dog, haunted solitary
ways, and sometimes came upon belated
travellers. — C. Bivnte, Jane Eyre, ch. xii.
HABASSIA
( *9S )
HAG
H
IlABASSlA, Abyssinia.
Thro' all the huge continent of Afric,
which is estimated to be thrice bigger than
Europe, there is not one region entirely
Christian but Habassia or Ethiopia. — Howell,
Letters, ii. 9.
Habassin, an Abyssinian.
Hee made Prester John an African, and
placed him in Ethiopia, in the Habassins
countrey. — Howell, Instructions for Forraine
Travell, sect. zii.
Habkrdashkress, female huckster.
Thalestris the Amazonian ... is here be-
come a haberdasheress of small wares. — T.
Brown, Works, ii. 272.
Habilablb, capable of being clothed.
Teufelsdrockh hastens from the Tower of
Babel to follow the dispersion of mankind
over the whole habitable and habitable globe.
— Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. v.
Habilatort, having to do with
habiliments or garments.
A small French hat . . was set jauntily in
the centre of a system of long black curls,
which my eye, long accustomed to penetrate
the arcana of habilatory art, discovered at
once to be a wig. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. lxxix.
For indeed is not the dandy culottic,
habilatory, by law of existence ; a cloth-
animal ; one that lives, moves, and has his
being in cloth ? — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. HI.
Bk. VII. ch. ii.
Habituary, habitual.
Too well he knew how difficult a thing it
was to invert the course of Nature, especially
being confirmed by continuance of practice,
and made habituary by custom. — Hist, of
Edward II., p. 3.
Hack and Manger = rack and
manger, q. v. Hack or Heck = rack
is used in Lincolnshire, as well ae in
Scotland. See Peacock's Manley and
Corringham Glossary (E. D. S.).
The servants at Lochmarlie must be living
at hack and manger. — Miss Ferrier, Marriage,
ch. xxvi.
Six stout horses . . had been living at heck
and manger. — Ibid., Inheritance, ii. 237.
Hacklet, or Haglet, a sea-bird.
The land -birds are left; gulls, haglets,
petrels, swim, dive, and hover around. —
Emerson, English Traits, ch. ii.
Below them, from the Gall -rock, rose a
thousand birds, and filled the air with sound ;
the choughs cackled, the hacklets wailed, the
great black-backs laughed querulous defiance
at the intruders. — C. King situ, Westward
Ho, ch. xxxii.
Hacklog, a chopping-block.
Out of my own earliest newspaper reading
I can remember the name Vitus as a kind of
editorial hacklog on which able editors were
wont to chop straw now and then. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. iii.
Hackney, a hackney coach.
To dinner by a hackney, my coachman be-
ing this day about breaking of my horses to
the coach. — Pepys, Dec. 14, 1668.
I would more respect a General without
attendance in a hackney, that has obligM a
nation with a peace, than him who rides at
the head of an army in triumph, and plunges
it into an expensive war. — Gentleman In-
structed, p. 195.
Nay, now, from what he saw last night,
The Doctor thought that Pat was right,
Who soon the traveling baggage bore
Straight to the hackney at the door.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. iv.
Hadlakd, a man who has owned
land and lost it. Davies, in a note to
one of his Commendatory Poems, p. 3,
says, "Few Hadlands take pleasure
to behold the land they had."
They dub him " Sir John had Land " before
they leave him, and share, like wolves, the
poore novice's welth betwixt them as a pray.
— Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier, 1592
(Harl. Misc., v. 405).
Haft, to drive up to the haft or hilt.
This mye blade in thye body should bee
with speedines hafted. — Stanyhurst, Conceites,
p. 143.
Hag, hake, or poor John (?).
The hot pebbles at hi^h-tide mark . . . are
beautifully variegated with mackerels' heads,
gurnets' fins, old hag, lob-worm, and mussel-
baits. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. ii.
Hag. See extract.
The brokers of these coals are called
crimps; the vessels they load their ships
with at Newcastle, Keels; and the ships
that bring them, Cats, and Hags or Hag-
boats, Fly-boats, and the like.— Defoe, Tour
thro1 G. Britain, ii. 144.
Hag, now always applied to a female,
but Byron says to Labrosse —
Curst be thy throte and soule, Rauen,
Schriech-owle, hag. — Chapman, Byron's Con-
spiracie, Act HI.
HAG, TAG, AND RAG ( 296 )
HALCYON
And so he stopt, but swelling with such pride,
As if his braine would haue with poison
burst,
To whom the pi 1 grime presently replied,
Avauut, foule fiende, aud monster most
accurst;
Thou hate of heauen, and greatest hagge of
hell,
What wicked tale hast thou presumde to
tell?
Breton, Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 11.
Hag, tag, and rag, rabble. Tag,
rag, and bobtail is the usual expression.
See N. *. v. Tag. H. gives "flag,
idle disorder. Somersetshire."
Than was all the rable of the shippe, hag,
tag, and rag, called to the reckeninge, rushe-
linge together as they had bene the cookes
of helle with their great Cerberus. — Voca-
ct/on of Johan Bale, 1663 (Harl. Misc., vi.
469).
Hagweed, besom-weed, q. v.
For awful coveys of terrible things,
With forked tongues and venomous stings,
On hagxceed, broomsticks, and leathern wings,
Are hovering round the hut.
Hood, The Forge,
Hair, to catch ; to draw as by a hair.
Those who wish for what they have not
forfeit the enjoyment of what they have;
when they desire eagerly they hope too fast,
and are haired by fear. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 218.
Hair. To take a hair of the dog
that bit one = to take a dram when
suffering from the effects of over-
drinking; sometimes applied to other
homoeopathic proceedings. In the Life
of Sister Dora a case is mentioned of
a patient bitten by a dog, who had
literally plastered the sore with some
hairs of the animal. The first extract
is given in Peacock's Manley and Cor-
ringham Glossary (E. D. 8.).
But be sure, over night if this dog do you
bite,
Tou take it henceforth for a warning,
Soon as out of your bed, to settle your head,
Take a hair of his tail in the morning.
Hilton, Catch that Catch can (1652).
Lady Sm But, Sir John, your ale is terribly
strong and heady in Derbyshire, and will
soon make one drunk and sick ; what do you
then ?
Sir J. Why, indeed it is apt to fox one,
but our way is to take a hair of the same dog
next morning. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
Elsley need not be blamed for pitying her
[Italy] ; only for holding with most of our
poets a vague notion that her woes were to
be cured by a hair of the dog tcho bit her;
viz., by homoeopathic doses of that same
" art " which has been all along her morbid
and self-deceiving substitute for virtue and
industry.— Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. x.
Hair. Both of a hair = both alike.
For the pedlar and the tinker, they are two
notable knaves, both of a haire, and both
eosen-germaines to the devill.— Greene, Quip
for Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 417).
Hairbush, head of hair.
A oerteyn lightning on his headtop glistered
harmelesse,
His crisp locks f rixeling, his temples prittelye
streaking,
Heer with al in trembling with speede wee
ruffled his hearebush.
Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 711.
Hairlet, a little hair.
A stronger lens reveals to you certain
tiniest hairlets.—G. Eliot, MiddUmarcK, Bk.
I. ch. vi.
Hairpatch, hair-cloth (?).
They affirm these hyperthetical or super-
lative sort of expressions and illustrations
are too bold and bombasted ; and out of that
word is spun that which they call our fustian,
their plain writing being stuff nothing so
substantial, but such gross sowtege or hair-
patch as every goose may eat oats through.
—Chapman, Iliad, xiv. (Comment.).
Hair- splitter, one who makes very
nice or minute distinctions.
It is not the cavilling hmr-splittcr, but, on
the contrary, the single-eyed servant of
truth, that is most likely to insist upon the
limitation of expressions too wide or too
vague. -De Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 61.
Hake, a weapon of some kind. H.
says " a small hand-gun."
He said we must Paul's swerde now take,
Splay the banner, strike vp the droonie,
Fall to array, pike and halfe hake,
Play now the men, the time is come.
T. E, 1665 (Maitland's Ref^ p. 169).
Hake, a sliding pothook.
On went the boilers, till the hake
Had much ado to bear 'em.
BloomJUld, The Horkey.
Halcyon, calm ; quietude. The word
is often used adjectivally in this sense,
halcyon days, &c, but the substantive
is usually applied to the bird only.
He has been here these two hours, courting
the mother for the daughter, I suppose, yet
she wants no courting neither : 'tis well one
of us does, else the man would have nothing
but halcyon, and be remiss and saucy of
course. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, ii. 4.
All is halcyon and security.— /Wrf. iii. 355.
HALF
( 297 )
HAMMER
Half, a term at school: there are
usually three halfs in the year.
It . . . has completely stopped the boats
for this half. — Sir G. C. Lews, Letters, p. 3.
Half-baked, raw ; inexperienced :
silly. " Ephraira is a cake not turned "
(Hosea vii. 8). Cf. Dough-baked.
He must scheme forsooth, this half-baked
Scotch cake ! He must hold off and on, and
be cautions, and wait the result, and try con-
clusions with me, this lamp of natural dough !
— Scott, St. Ronans WeU, ii. 221.
He treated his cousin as a sort of harmless
lunatic, and, as they say in Devon, half-
baked. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. iii.
•• Clever ? " " A sort of half-baked body,"
said Heale. — Ibid., Two Years Ago, ch. iv.
Half-baptized, applied by the ignor-
ant to a child who has been privately
baptized ; it is also used of a person
deficient in knowledge or acuteness.
In the extract from Southey it means
lialf-Chratian.
Irish kernes,
Ruffians half-clothed, half-human, half -bap-
tized.— Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. ii.
"Can such things be?" exclaimed the
astonished Mr. Pickwick. " Lord bless your
heart, sir," said Sam, u why where was you
half-baptized — that's nothin', that aint." —
Pickwick Papers, ch. xiii.
u And now about business," said the beadle,
taking out a leathern pocket-book: "the
child that was half-bavtized, Oliver Twist, is
nine years old to-day.' —Oliver Ttrist, ch. ii.
u If you please, sir, will you be so good as
to half -baptize the baby ? " " Oh, certainly,
but which half of him am I to baptize ? " —
Parish* Diet, of Sussex Dialect, 1875, s. v.
Halflinq, halfpenny, i, e. a penny
cut in half, for halfpennies were not
coined until the time of Edward L, A.D.
1279.
"I warrant thee store of shekels in thy
Jewish scrip." " Not a shekel, not a silver
penny, not a halfling, so help me the God of
Abraham ! " said the Jew, clasping his hands.
— Scott, Ivanhoe, i. 76.
Half-saved. See quotation.
William Dove's was not a case of fatuity.
Though all was not there, there was a great
deal. He was what is called half-saved.
Some of his faculties were more than ordin-
arily acute, but the power of self-conduct
was entirely wanting in him. — Southey The
Doctor, ch. x.
Half- square, a term in timber-mea-
suring, fully explained in an extract
from Leybourris Complete Surveyor,
1674, given in Lord Braybrooke's note.
Pepys in his Diary wrote by mistake
off square.
Mr. Deane of "Woolwich and I rid into
Waltham Forest, and there we saw many
trees of the King's a-hewing ; and he showed
me the whole mystery of off-square, wherein
the King is abused in the timber that he
buys, which I shall with much pleasure be
able to correct. — Pepys, Aug. 18, 1662.
Half-thick, a sort of stuff.
I followed this Post-road from Liverpool
to Bury, both manufacturing towns in Lan-
cashire, and the last very considerable for a
sort of coarse goods called Half-thicks and
Kersies. — Defoe, Tour thro'G. Britain, iii. 135.
Halifax law, or inquest. See Holy-
fax.
Hall. This word is often used in
the sense of place with some other
prefixed which defines it : thus Liberty
Hall = a place where every one can do
as he likes.
Met you with Ronca? 'tis the cunning'st
nimmer
Of the whole company of culpurse hall.
Albumazar, iii. 7.
Beat down their weapons ! my gate ruffians1
hall!
What insolence is this !
Massinger, City Madam, i. 2.
Gentlemen, pray be under no restraint in
this house ; this is Liberty-hall, gentlemen ;
you may do just as you please here.— Gold-
smith, She Stoops to Conquer, Act II.
«* Bachelors1 Hall, you know, cousin," said
Mr. Jonas to Charity. "I say, the other
one will be having a laugh at this when she
gets home, won't she ? " — Dickens, M. Chuz-
zlewit, ch. xi.
Halo, to surround with a halo.
His grey hairs
Gurl'd, life-like, to the fire,
That haloed round his saintly brow.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. ix.
I wiped my tears and hushed my sobs,
fearful lest any sign of violent grief might
waken a preternatural voice to comfort me,
or elicit from the gloom some haloed face
bending over me with strange pity. — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. ii.
Halter, to haggle (?).
Therenppon they broke off ; the one urg-
ing that he had offered it him so before, and
the other that hee might have tooke him at
his proffer, which since he refused, and now
halperd with him, as he eate up the first, so
would he eate up the second. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 172).
Hammer, German ammer = bunt-
ing ; so yellow - hammer = yellow
HAMMER
( 298 )
HANDJAR
bunting. Does " hammer of the right
feather " = bird of the right feather ?
Slight I euer tooke thee to be a hammer
of the right feather, but I durst haue layed
my life no man could euer haue . . . eramd
such a gudgeon as this downe the throate of
thee. — Chapman, Mons. D] 'Olive, Act IV.
Hammer and tongs, violently.
The noise you ladies have been making,
Mrs. Gamp! Why these two gentlemen
have been standing on the stairs outside the
door, nearly all the time, trying to make you
hear, while you were pelting away hammer
and tongs. — Martin Chuzzlewit, ch. xlix.
Mr. Malone, howling like a demon, and
horribly drunk, followed by thirty or forty
worse than himself, dashed out of a doorway
close by, and, before they had time to form
line of battle, fell upon them hammer and
tongs. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. lx.
Hammer - cloth, cloth (originally a
skin, A.S. hama, a skin) thrown over
a coach-box. See L. s. v. The sub-
joined is given as an early instance of
the word.
Hamer clothes, with our arms and badges of
our colours, and all other things apperteininge
unto the same wagon. — Document temp. Q.
Mary, i. {Archaol., xvi. 91).
Hampered, loaded with hampers. Cf .
PANNIERED.
One ass will carry at least three thousand
such books, and I am persuaded you would
be able to carry as many yourself, if you
were well hampered. — Bailey's Erasmus, p.
325.
Hamper up, to conclude; put the
finish to ; pack up.
Well, Lord of Lincoln, if your loves be knit,
And that your tongues and thoughts do
both agree,
To avoid ensuing jars, I'll hamper up the
match.
I'll take my portace forth, and wed you here.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 162.
Hanckle, to fasten tightly.
A third sort . . . walk not soberly, and
uprightly, and orderly in their calling, like
an unruly colt that will over hedge and
ditch; no ground will hold him, no fence
turn him. These would be well fettered
and side-hanckled for leaping. — Sanderson,
ui. 93.
Hand. See quotation.
Flitches of bacon and hands (i. e. shoulders)
of pork, the legs or hams oeing sold, as
fetching a better price) abounded. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. iv.
Hand. To stand in hand = to con-
cern.
Let their enemies know then that they
have to deal with God, not with them ; it is
His cause rather than theirs ; they but His
agents. It standeth Him in hand, it toucheth
Him in honour. — Andrewes, iv. 14.
Handbook, a manual (Germ, hatid-
buck). This word, now so common,
does not seem to be as old as the cen-
tury. A writer in N. and Q. mentions
" A Handbook for modelling wax
flowers/1 published in 1814. Sir H.
Nicolas, however, in 1833, thought
the word too exotic to appear in the
title of his work.
No labour has been spared to render the
volume what the Germans would term, and
which, if our language admitted of the ex-
pression, would have been the fittest title for
it, The Hand-Book of History. — Nicolas,
Chronol. of Hist. (Preface).
Handfast, close-fisted.
Some will say women are covetous: are
not men as handfast? — Breton, Praise of
Vertuous Ladies, p. 57.
Hand- fast-maker, marriage-maker ;
in extract, translation ofjjronuba.
Britona, hand-fast-maker shee,
All clad in Laurell greene.
Holland: s Camden, p. 388.
Hand-gripe, seizure by the hand ;
close struggle. H. and L. have handy-
gripes. See quotation s. v. Quarter-
stroke.
Hee that both globes in His own hand-gripe
holds. — Sylvester, Panaretus, 1258.
The last man of France, who could have
swayed these coming troubles, lay there at
hand-grips with the unearthly power. — Car-
lyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. vii.
Hand-gyve, to manacle.
A poor Legislative, so hard was fate, had
let itself be hand-gyved. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. III. Bk. I. ch. i.
Handicap, a game, which is described
at length in N. and Q., 1st S., xi. 491.
Here some of us fell to handicap, a sport
that I never knew before, which was very
good.— Pepys, Sept. 18, 1600.
Handjar, a dagger: it would be
more correctly written khan-djar:
the word is used in Arabic, Turkish,
Persian, and Hindustani.
A vast crowd of men in small caps and
jackets and huge white breeches, and armed
with all the weapons of Palikari, handjars and
yataghans, and silver - sheathed muskets of
uncommon length, and almost as old as the
battle of Lepanto, always rallied round his
standard. — Disraeli, Lot hair, ch. lxxiii.
HANDKERCHIEF ( 299 )
HANGING
Handkerchief, to wipe the eyes ; to
use a handkerchief.
The servants entering with the dinner, we
hemmed, handkerchief w, twinkled, took up
our knives and forks.— Richardson, Grand t-
ton, ii. 180.
Handle. A person of title is said to
have a handle to his name.
Lord Highgate had turned to me : " There
was no rudeness, you understand, intended,
Mr. Pendennis; but I am down here on
some business, and don't care to wear the
handle to my name. Fellows work it so,
don't you understand? Never leave it at
rest in a country town." — The Newcotnes, ch.
lvii.
Handmaid, to act as an attendant.
Intolerable is the pride of natural philoso-
phy, which, should handmaid it to Divinity,
when once offering to rule over it. — Fuller,
Hist, of Camb. Univ., Ep. Ded.
Hands. To hold up hands = to
give in; either from holding up the
hands in supplication, or to show that
there is no weapon in them, and no
further resistance intended.
I yield vnto you this noble victorie, and
hold vp my handes. — Traheron, Aunstoere to a
privie Papiste, 1558, Sig. B. iii.
Handsaw. All the world to a hand-
saw = a thousand to one ; almost cer-
tain.
Tis all the world to a handsaw but these
barbarous Rascals would be so ill-manner'd
as to laugh at us as confidently as we do at
them. — Cotton, Scarronides, Preface.
Hand-smooth, quite fiat, so that the
hand could pass over it without en-
countering any obstacle.
His soldiours (although it were then a
greate raine to leat theim) sodainly with all
their might assailing the canine of their
enemies, wonne it, and beate it downe hande
smootiu. — XJdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 313.
Handsomeish, rather handsome.
He is a fine, jolly, hearty, handsomeish man.
— Bichardson, Grandison, vi. 334.
Handspeab, a short spear.
There was another manner of striking the
boll in the face with short spears, to the
which went divers lords and gentlemen very
well mounted, their pages following them
with divers hand-spears for that purpose. —
Journey of E. of Nottingham, 1605 (Harl.
Misc., iii. 441).
Hand to fist, heartily or continu-
ously.
His landlord did once persuade him to
drink his ague away; and thereupon going
to the alehouse an hour or two before it was
come, they set hand to fist and drunk very
desperatly. — Life of A. Wood, March 4,
1652.
Honest Frank ! many, many a dry bottle
have we crack'd hand to fst. — Farquhar, Re-
cruiting Officer, Act III.
Handy combat, hand-to-hand fight.
Her foes from handle combats cleane desist ;
Yet still incirkling her within their powers
From farre sent shot, as thick as winter's
showers.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R.
Grinuile, p. 76.
Handy-cuffs, blows.
His rhetoric and conduct were at perpetual
handy-cuffs.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, ii. 206.
Handylabour, manual labour.
Robert Abbat of Molisime per-
swaded his owne disciples to live with their
handylabour, to leave Tithes and Oblations
unto the Priests that served in the Diocese.
— Holland's Camden, ii. 110.
Hane. N. gives this word with a
quotation from Sandys s Travels^ and
adds, " I presume inns or caravanserais ;
perhaps a Turkish word." The follow-
ing passage puts the meaning assigned
out of doubt.
They [Turks] are great founders of hospi-
talls, of Hants to entertain travellers, of
bridges, &c. — Howell, Instructions for For-
raine Travell (Appendix).
Hang, a clump of weeds hanging
together (?).
It might be a hassock of rushes ; a tuft of
the great water-dock; a dead dog; one of
the u hangs " with which the club-water was
studded, torn up and stranded; but yet to
Tom it had not a canny look. — Kingsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. zxv.
Hang able, liable to be hung.
By Acts of Parliament and Statutes made
in the reign of Henry VIII. and his two
daughters, all those people calling them-
selves Bohemians or Egyptians are hangable
as felons at the age of 14 years, a month
after their arrival in England, or after their
first disguising themselves. — Misson, Travels
in Eng., p. 122.
Hanger, handle.
On pulling the hanger of a bell, the great
door opened. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii.
225.
Hanging, unfixed ; shifting.
Some of the Inhabitants are of opinion
that the land there is hollow and hanging ;
yea, and that, as the waters rise, the same
also is heaved up.— Holland's Camden, p. 690
HANGING-SLEEVES ( 300 )
IIARA TEEN
Hanging-sleeves, strips of the same
piece as the dress or gown hanging
down behind, like the leading - strings
on an undergraduate's gown. In the
extract it = bachtring, q. v., which
Cowper associates with the bib.
Bellarmine and others do [excuse] the
Popes pristine submission to the Emperours
by reason of their minority, being then in
their bibs and hanging-sleeves. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 580.
Hang out, to reside (slang).
u I say, old boy, where do you hang out?"
Mr. Pickwick replied that he was at present
suspended at the George and Vulture. —
Pickwick Papers, ch. xxx.
I've found two rooms at Chelsea, not many
hundred yards from my mother and sisters,
and I shall soon be ready to hang out there.
— G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, cb. xxxvii.
Hang -string, a term of reproach
implying that the person to whom it is
applied is likely to hang on a string
from the gallows. Cf. Crackropb,
Gallows - string. In the extract
Japhet is not the son of Noah, but
lapetus.
A child, thou little Rakehell thou !
A pretty child thou art, I trow ;
Older than Japhet, little Hang-string,
Tho' one might wear thee in his Band-string.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, 179.
Hakgum tuum. This phrase evi-
dently = punishment by hanging.
Probably there is some story belonging
to it.
Tom. They shall not come and rob him by
a strong hand.
Will. They durst hardly do that ; for then
it had come to hangum-tuum.
Dialogue on Oxford Parliament
(Harl. Misc., ii. 127).
Hang- worthy, worthy to be hung.
Rebels, whose naughtier minds could not
trust so much to the goodness of their
prince, as to lay their hang-worthy necks
upon the constancie of his promised pardon.
— Sidney, Arcadia, p. 426.
Hank for hank, on equal terms?
knot for knot? Hanks are wooden
rings fixed on the ship's stays, but I
do not suppose there is any reference
to these.
I thought it best to take a bargain in this
stout ship, which I knew to be as good a
sea-boat as ever turned to windward, and
able to go hank for hank with anything that
swims the ***.— -Johnston, Chrysal., ii. 189.
Hansom, a two-wheeled cab, so called
from the inventor, open in front j the
driver's seat is behind the cab, the reins
being pawed over the roof. See extract
s. v. Growler.
He hailed a cruising hansom, which he had
previously observed was well horsed ; " TSa
the gondola of London," said Lothair, as he
sprang in. — Disraeli, Lothair, ch. xxvi.
She did indeed glance somewhat nervously
at the hansom into which Lavender put her,
apparently asking how such a tall aua narrow
two-wheeled vehicle could be prevented
toppling over. — Black, Princess of ThvU,
ch. x.
Happify, to make happy.
This Prince unpeerd for Clemency and
Courage,
Justly surnam'd the Great, the Good, the
Wise,
Mirour of Future, Miracle of Fore- Age,
One short mishap for ever hanpifies.
Sylvester, Henry the Great, 642.
Happy, to make happy.
By th* one hee happied his own soule with rest,
By th' other also, hee his People blest.
Sylvester, St. Lewis, 75.
They happy That that is insensible.—
Davies, Humour's Heauen on Earth, p. 48.
Happy-go-lucky, casual, unpremedit-
ated, careless. See quotation *. v.
ne'er-do-weel. In the first extract it is
an exclamation = all right.
If I get into Mrs. Martha's quarters you
have a hundred more: if into the widow's
fifty: — happy-go-lucky. — Wycherley, Love in
a Wood, 1. 1.%
The first thing was to make Carter think
and talk, which he did in the happy-go-lucky
way of his class, uttering nine mighty simple
remarks, and then a bit of superlative
wisdom, or something that sounded like it.
— Reade, Never too late to mend, ch. iv.
Harassment, worry.
Little harassment* ... do occasionally
molest the most fortunate. — Lytton, Pelham9
ch. lxiii.
I have known little else than privation,
disappointment, unkindness, and harassment.
—L. E. Landon (Life of Blanchard, i. 56).
Harateen, a sort of stuff. Sympson
in his edition of Beaumont and Fletcher
(1760), says that Philip and Cheyney,
q. v. , is " a sort of stuff at present in
common use, but goes now by the
appellation of harrateen"
You never saw such a wretched hovel,
lean, nnpainted, and half its nakedness
barely shaded with harateen stretched till it
cracks. — Walpole, Letters^ ii. 4 (1756).
Thick harateen curtains were close drawn
round the bed. — Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch.
xvi.
HARBOUR
( 301 ) HARLEQUINADE
Harbour, to trace home, to earth.
I have in this short time made a great
progress
Towards your redress ; I come from harbour-
ing
The villains who have done you this affront.
Tuke, Adventures of Five Hours, Act III.
Hardbeam, hornbeam. See H.
Birche, hardbeme, some ooke, and some
asshe, beynge bothe stronge ynoughe to
stande in a bowe, and also lyght ynoughe to
flye far, are best for a meane. — Ascham,
Toxophilus, p. 125.
Hard-bitten, weather-beaten.
Tardrew . . . was a shrewd, hard-bitten
choleric old fellow, of the shape, colour, and
consistence of a red brick. — Kinysley, Two
Years Ago, oh. ii.
Hard -edge, at hard edge = with
naked weapons or in serious conflict ;
without the gloves, as the boxer might
aay.
By all that's good, I must myself sing
■mail in her company ; I will never meet at
hard-edge with her ; if I did (and vet I have
been thought to carry a good one) I should
be confoundedly gapped. — Richardson, Gran-
dison, i. 120.
Harden, inferior flax. Cf. Hards,
Herden.
A shirt he had made of coarse harden,
A collar-band not worth a farthing.
Ward, England's Reformation,
c. ii. p. 235.
Hard-headed, sensible; matter-of-
fact.
Mrs. Dickens is, in Mrs. Thrale's phrase, a
sensible hard-headed woman. — Mad. D Ar-
blay, Diary, i. 261.
Hardish, hard ; the word now means
rather hard, as in the second quotation,
but not so in the first.
And for my pillow stuffed with down,
The hardish hillocks have sufficed my turn.
Greene, Alphonsus, Act IV.
**You are a cruel hard-hearted woman,"
sobbed Margaret. "Them as take in hand
to guide the weak Deed be hardish" — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. lxxix.
Hards, the refuse of flax.
No snch yron-fisted Ciclops to hew it out
of the flint, and run thorow any thing, as these
frost-bitten crab-tree fac't lads spunne out
of the hards of the towe, which are donsel
Herring's lackeys at Tarmout every fishing.
— Xashe's Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 161).
What seems to you so easy and certain is
to me as difficult as it would be to work a
steel hauberk out of hards of flax. — Scott,
Fair Maid of Perth, i. 97.
Hard up, poor ; at the end of one's
resources.
He returned, and being hard up, as we say,
took it into his head to break a shop-window
at Liverpool, and take out some trumpery
trinket stuff.— Th. Hook, The Sut her lands.
[He] produced a specimen of his hand-
writing, and gave her to understand that he
was in want of copying work to do, and was,
not to put too fine a point upon it, hard up.
— Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xi.
Hare. To hunt for hares with a
tabor = to engage in a hopeless task —
the noise of the tabor of course giving
the hare good warning.
The poore man that gives but his bare fee,
or perhaps pleads in forma pauperis he hunt-
ethfor hares with a taber, and gropeth in the
darke to find a needle in a botle of hay. —
Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier {Harl.
Misc., v. 407).
Harebrain, a silly or flighty person.
See extract 8. v. Niddipol ; the adjective
is not uncommon.
Ah foolish harebraine.
This is not she.
Udal, Roister Doister, i. 4.
She is mad by inheritance, and so are all
the kinred, an hare-braine, with many other
secret infirmities. — Burton, Anatomy, p. 549.
No honest man shall be the better for a
Scotch reformation ; wherein the hare-brains
among us are engaged with them. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 137.
Hare-foot. I give the extract as
recording a proverb which I have not
elsewhere met with. I suppose that
hare-foot might = coward, one swift
to run away, and that the proverb is
equivalent to the well-known " He that
fights and runs away, may live to fight
another day."
And hence a third proverb, Betty, since
you are an admirer of proverbs, Better a
hare-foot than none at all ; that is to say,
than not to be able to walk. — Richardson, CI.
Harlawe, ii. 118.
Hark back, to draw back ; a person
who recurs to some subject that had
been previously mentioned is also said
to hark back to it; the metaphor is
taken from the hunting-field.
There is but one that harks me back. —
Taylor, Ph. van AH., Pt. I. i. 9.
Harlequinade, extravaganza.
The Female Quixote is no exception. That
work has undoubtedly great merit, when
considered as a wild satirical harlequinade;
but if we consider it as a picture of life and
manners, we must pronounce it more absurd
HARLEQUINERY ( 302 )
HASH
than any of the romances which it was
designed to ridicule. — Maeaulay, Essays
{Mad. VArblay).
Harlequin ery, style of play or act-
ing in which Harlequin plays a promi-
nent part ; harlequinade.
The French taste is comedy and harlequin'
ery. — Richardson, Pamela, iv. 80.
Harman-beck, thieves1 cant for con-
stable. See extract in H. s. v. pannam.
Here safe in our skipper let's cly off oar
pecKf
And bowse in defiance o' tV Harmon-heck.
Browne, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Harnessemrnt, equipment ; the mar-
gin gives complements.
To every knight he allowed or gave 100
shillings for his harnessements. — Holland's
Camden, p. 174.
Harp and harrow. The meaning of
this saying is obvious from the extracts,
but its origin is to me unknown.
The Lord's Sapper and yonr peevish,
popish, private mass do agree together like
God and the devil, Christ and Belial, light
and darkness, truth and falsehood, and, as
the common proverb is, like harrt and harrmc,
or like the hare and the houna. — Becon, iii.
283.
Bedlem . . . admits of two amusing queries,
whether the persons that ordered the build-
ing of it or those that inhabit it were the mad-
dest ? And whether the name and thing be
not as disagreeable as harp and harrow/ —
Tom Brown, Works, iii. 29.
Harquebus, used as a plural, and
for harquebussiers.
He marcheth in the middle, guarded about
With full five hundred harquelntse on foot.
Peele, Battle of Alcazar, IV. i.
Eight thousand harquebuze that served on
foot. — Ibid. V. i.
Harrage, to harass or harrow.
R. gives the word with a quotation
from the Worthies, and suggests that
it was perhaps meant for harass. The
following quotations show that it was a
regular word, at all events with Fuller;
not a misprint.
God therefore thought it fit that other
dioceses should now take their turnes, that
this of Lincoln, harraged out before, should
now lie fallow. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., VUI.
ii. 16.
Of late the Danes . . . had harraged all
this countrey.— Ibid., Hist of Camb. Univ.,
I. i.
^ Most miserable at this time was the con-
dition of Cambridge, for the Barons, to de-
spight King John, with their forces /wr-
raged and destroyed the Town and County
thereof. — Ibid. i. 28.
Harry-ruffian, swaggerer.
When I past Paules, and travelTd in that
walke
Where all oure Brittaine-sinners swear and
talk;
Ould Harry-ruffians, bankerupts, soothsayers,
And youth whose coasenage is as old as
theirs. — Bp. Corbet, Elegy on Bp. Ravis.
Harsh, to sound harshly ; to crack.
Stanyhurst also uses harsliing&s a sub-
stantive ; see extract *. v. BErouNCE.
In the quotation a tree is spoken of
which wood-cutters strike again and
again.
At length with rounsefal from stock vn-
truncked yt harssheth. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii.
055.
Harshen, to harden, or make harsh.
Three years of prison might be some ex-
cuse for a soured and harshened spirit. — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xxxii.
His brow was wrinkled now ; his features
harshened. — Ibid., Westward Ho, ch. xi.
Hartfordshire kindness. See first
extract, which, however, seems to offer
an insufficient explanation, for such an
act of courtesy could not have been
peculiar to this county.
This is generally taken in a good and
grateful sense for the mutual return of
Favours received ; it being (belike) observed
that the people in this county at entertain-
ments drink back to them who drank to
them. — Fuller, Worthies {Hartfordshire).
Lord Sm. Tom, my service to you.
Nev. My Lord, this moment I did myself
the honour to drink to your lordship.
Lord Sm. Why, then, that's Hartfordshire
kindness. — Swift,' Polite Conversation (Conv.
ii.).
Harum-scarum, wild ; thoughtless.
Mad. D'Arblay spells the word pecu-
liarly.
He seemed a mighty rattling harem-
scarem gentleman. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary,
i. 358 (1780).
She was one of the first who brought what
I call harum-scarum manners into fashion. —
Miss Edgeworth, Belinda, ch. iii.
They had a quarrel with Sir Thomas New-
come's own son, a harum scarum lad, who
ran away, and then was sent to India. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. v.
Harvestless, barren.
These judgments on the land,
Harvestless autumns, horrible agues, plague.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, v. 1 .
Hash. To make a hash = to make
HASKERDL Y
( 3°3 )
HAY
a mess, to destroy: a metaphor, of
course, taken from the kitchen.
A flourish trumpets ! — sound again !
He comes, bold Drake, the chief who made a
Fine hash of all the pow'rs of Spain.
Ingoldsby Legends (Housewarming)*
Haskerdly, rough. H. has haskerde,
a rough fellow.
Some 'haskerdly peizaunts, & rascall per-
sons, havinge such coloured beards, be prat-
lers and praters. — Touchstone of Complexions,
p. 130.
Hatband. A gold hatband = a
nobleman at the University ; a tuft.
His companion is ordinarily some stale
fellow that has beene notorious for an ingle
to gold hatbands, whom bee admires at first,
afterwards scomes. — Earle, Mxcrocosmogra*
phit {Young Gentleman of the UniversiUe).
Hate able, capable of being hated.
Loveable is common.
Really a most notable, questionable, hate-
able, lovable old Marquis. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 78.
Hate spot, very pure; shrinking
from pollution. It was supposed that
the ermine died if its skin were soiled.
Her shoulders be like two white Doves,
Pearching within square royal rooves
Which leaded are with silver skin,
Passing the hate spot Emerlin.
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 141.
Hatless, without a hat.
So much for shoeless, hatless Masaniello !
—Leigh Hunt, High and Low.
The whole mob rushed tumultously, just
in time to see an old man on horseback
dart out and gallop hatless up the park. — C,
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xxviii.
Haulch-backed (?)
" Can you tell me with what instruments
they did it?" "With fair gullies, which
are little haulch-backed demi-knives." — Urqu-
harfs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxvii.
Haum, to lounge, which is the ex-
planation given by Mr. Tennyson in a
note to the extract. " Ilawm, to move
about awkwardly," occurs in Peacock's
Maidey and Corringliam Glossary
(E.D. S.). Cf. Hawmed.
Guzzlin' an' soakin' an' smoakin' an'
hamun9 about i* the laanes. — Tennyson,
Northern Cobbler.
Haunce, to raise or advance. This
word is in R., with two extracts from
Chaucer. I should not therefore have
inserted it here were it not that L. and
Halliwell and Wright in their addi-
tions to N. give "hanced = (apparently)
intoxicated," with extract from Taylor.
The word is no doubt the same as that
usejj by Chaucer and Stanyhurst, and
applied figuratively to intoxication, as
" elevated " now is.
Yeet the tre stands sturdy: for as yt toe
the skytyp is haunced,
So far is y t crampornd with roote deepe dibled
at helgat's.— Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 468.
Hausture, draught.
It is just matter of lamentation when
souls . . . fall to such apostacy as with
Demas to embrace the dunghill of this
world, and with an hausture to lick up the
mud of corruption. — Adams, ii. 199.
Haut, to raise on high (?)
Chief e stay s vpbearing crochea high from the
antlier hauted
On trees stronglye fraying.
Stanyhurst, JSn., i. 193.
Having, covetous.
The apostles that wanted money are not
so having : Judas hath the bag, and yet he
must have more, or he will filch it.— Adams,
ii. 249.
Jane, the elder sister, held that Martha's
children ought not to expect so much as
the young Waules ; and Martha, more lax on
the subject of primogeniture, was sorry to
think that Jane was so " having*1 — G. Eliot,
Middlcmarch, ch. xxxv.
Hawbuck, a clown.
Away, away ! down the dusty lane
They pull her, and haul her, with might and
main;
And happy the hawbuck, Tom or Harry,
Dandy or Sandy, Jerry or Larry,
Who happens to get a leg to carry.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Bless my heart ! excuse me, Sir Bfohard —
to sit down and leave you standing! 'Slife,
sir, sorrow is making a hawbuck of me. — C.
Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. v.
Hawkish, pertaining to a hawk. See
quotation from Carlyle 8. v. Accipitral.
She must have been very beautiful as a
young girl, but was 'now too fierce and
fiawkish looking. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Ham-
lyn, ch. vi.
Hawmed, bandy. N. has "Haume-
legged, bandy-legged," with WithaVs
Diet, as an authority. Peacock {Man-
ley and Corringliam Glossary) gives
"'hawm, to move about awkwardly."
Cf . Haum.
The Devils of Crowland with their crimp
shoulders, side and gor-bellies, crooked and
hawmed legges. — Holland's Camden, p. 530.
Hay. To carry hay on the horn = to
be dangerous or aggressive. Oxen that
HAY
( 304 )
HEADLONG
were fierce had hay wrapped round their
horns. The proverb was a Latin one.
14 Fotnum habet in cornu " (Horace, Sat.,
I. i. 34).
Last has no eares ; he's sharpe as thorn,
And fretf ull carries hay in '# home.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 176.
Hay. To make hay is to throw
everything into confusion.
Mist G. O, father, how you are making hay
of my things !
Christy. Then I wish I could make hay
of them, for hay is much wanting for the
horses. — Miss Edgeworth, Rose, Thistle, and
Shamrock, i. 2.
Every moveable article in the room — fur-
niture, crockery, fender, fire-irons — lay in one
vast heap of broken confusion in the corner
of the room. . . "What a devil that Welter
is when he gets drink into him, and Marlowe
is not much better. The fellows were mad
with fighting too. I wish they hadn't come
here and made hay afterward*."— if. Kings-
ley, Ravenshoe, ch. vii.
Hay- asthma, usually now called hay-
fever.
I escaped from the hay-asthma with a visit
of one month. — Southey, Letters (1827).
Hay-crome, hay-rake.
They fell downe on their mary-bones, and
lift up their hay-cromes unto him. — J\ashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 166).
Hayn, a covetous man or a miser.
See another instance from Udal s. v.
Paunched. Jamieson has Haiti as a
verb = to be penurious.
He signified that . . . who were soch a
niggarde or hayn that he coulde not finde in
his harte afore that daye to departe with an
halfpeny to any creature liuing, for soche
a feloe to be hyghe tyme ones in bis life
to begin to departe with somewhat to the
poore. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 129.
Sparing, pinching, and plaiyng the
nygardes or naynes belonged to cookes and
not to kinges. — Ibid. p. 241.
Head. A man whose intellects are
bewildered or disordered is said to be
off his head.
At present he is off his head : he does not
know wbat he says, or rather he is incapable
of controlling his utterances. — Black, Adven-
tures of a Phaeton, ch. xiii.
Head. To lose one'8 head is a com-
mon expression, though Poe (comment-
ing on Lady G. Fullerton's Ellen
Middleton) censures it as a Gallicism :
it usually, however, = to become con-
fused, to lose presence of mind, rather
than to be crazy.
But the chief merit after all is that of the
style, . . . although it has now and then an
odd Gallicism — such as " she lost her head,"
meaning she grew crazy. — E. A. Poe, Mar-
ginalia, lxxiv.
Head. To put one in the head of it
= to put it into one* s head, to suggest
an idea.
The Bishops, vpon the permission of build-
ing castles, so outwent the Lords in magnifi-
cence, strength, and number of their erec-
tions, and especially the Bishop of Salisbury,
that their greatnesse was much maligned by
them, putting the king in head that all these
great castles . . . were onely to entertaine the
partie of Maude. — Daniel, Hist, of Ena.,
p. 60.
" Nay, nay, like enough," says Partridge,
"and now yon put me in the head of it, I
verily and sincerely believe it was the devil,
though I could not perceive his cloven foot."
— Tom Jones, Bk. IA. ch. vi.
Head-cloth, a covering for the head.
^What's here? all sorts of dresses painted
to the life ; ha ! ha ! ha ! head-cloaths to
shorten the face, favourites to raise the fore-
head.— Centlivre, Platonic Lady, iii. 1.
He gave me two suits of fine Flanders
laced head-clothes. — Richardson, Pamela, i. 12.
Header, a plunge head foremost.
See extract from Dickens, *. v. Bobby,
where header is used (by a street-boy)
as a verb.
No time to go down and bathe ; 111 get
my header somewhere up the stream. — C.
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xviii.
Headfast, the rope at the head of a
ship by which it is fastened to wharfs,
&c.
The Ships ride here so close, as it were,
keeping up one another with their Head-fasts
on shore. — Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, 1. 64.
Headhung, despondent.
Gentlemen, be not head-hung ; droop not.
— Shirley, Bird in a Cage, Act III.
Headlinos, headlong: wrongly ex-
plained by editor of Parker Soc. ed. as
neadlong persons. N. has this udverb,
but without the final 8.
The foolish multitude everywhere, . . . ns a
raging flood (the banks broken down), run-
neth headlings into all blasphemy and devil-
ishness. — Bale, Select Works, p. 608.
Headlong, to precipitate.
If a stranger be setting his pace and face
towards some deep pit or steep rock — such a
precipice as the cliffs of Dover — how do we
cry aloud to have him return ! yet in mean
time forget the course of our own sinful
HEADLONGLY ( 3°5 ) HEARTHSTEAD
ignorance that headlong s us to confusion. —
Adams, iii. 93.
Headlong ly, in a headlong way.
So snatchingly or headlongly driven, flew
Juno. — Chapman, Iliad, xv. (Comment.).
Head nor foot. We say now " head
nor tail.11
Is it possible that this gear appertain any
thing to my cause ? I find neither head nor
foot in it. — Gascoigne, Supposes, ii. 1.
Hearing-time, hooking time ; catch-
ing time (?). Herring fishing is spoken
of.
Now it is high keaking-time, and bee the
windes never so easterly adverse, and the
tjde fled from us, wee must violently towe
and hale in our redoubtable sophy of the
floating kingdom of Pisces. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 156).
Heap. A person much embarrassed
or surprised is said to be struck all of a
heap.
Now was I again struck all of a heap.
However, soon recollecting myself, "Sir,"
said I, " I have not the presumption to hope
such an honour." — Richardson, Pamela, i. 297.
I am very glad this passed before I came
down, for else I think 1 should have struck
htm all of a heap. — Mad. 1/Arblay, Diary,
i. 234.
The interrogatory seemed to strike the
honest magistrate, to use the vulgar phrase,
all of a heap. — Scott, Rob Roy, ii. 100.
Heapeflood, a heavy sea.
One ship that Lycius dyd shrowd with faith-
ful Orontes
In sight of captayne was swasht wyth a
roysterus heapefud.
Stanyhurst, Ma., i. 124.
Heape-meale, confusedly.
They got together spices and odours of all
sorts, . . . and thereon pour the same forth by
heape-meale. — Holland's Camden, p. 71.
Heart. With a heart and a half =
very readily or heartily.
Coz. Do you drink thus often, lady ?
Pet. Still when I am thirsty, and eat when
I am hungry ;
Such junkets come not every day ; once more
to you,
With a heart and a half, i' faith.
Massinger, Grand Duke of Florence,
iv. 3.
Heart. Next tlte heart = fasting,
and is usually applied to drink taken
b"fore breakfast ; wine, having greater
effect then, was supposed to go direct
to the heart. See N. and Q., V. vols.
vii.f viii. The phrase occurs also in
Holland's Pliny, xx. 4, and Queen's
Closet Opened, p. 73. Stapylton's
note is on a passage where Juvenal
speaks of an iEthiop " nunquam tibi
mane videndus.11
In his time was brought up a newe founde
diete, to drink wine in the morning nexte the
harte. — UdaPs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 359.
This was staying at Kingston with our
unlucky hostess that must be dandled, and
made drunk next her heart : she made us slip
the very cream o' th' morning. — Rowley,
Match at Midnight, Act I.
The Romans held it ominous to see a
Blackamoore next their hearts in a morning.
— Stapylton, Juvenal, vi. 637.
Queen Artemisia, . . . living chast ever
after her husband Mausolus his death, got
his ashes all put in wines, whereof she would
take down a dramm every morning, fastiug
and next her heart. — Howell, Parly of Beasts,
p. 60.
Heart. To have the heart in the
mouth *= to be frightened.
My heart is in my mouth ; my mouth is in
my hand. — Grim the Collier, Act II.
As I was walking from the stable t'other
night without my lanthorn, I fell across a
beam that lay in the way, and faith my heart
icas in my mouth ; I thought I had stumbled
over a spirit. — Addison, The Drummer, I. i.
I'm a watching for my master ; my heart's
in my mouth; if he was to catch me away
from home, he'd pretty near murder me. —
Dickens, Bleak House, ch. viii.
Heart-bound, hard-hearted ; stingy.
The most laxative prodigals, that are lavish
and letting fly to their lusts, are yet heart-
bound to the poor. — Adams, i. 109.
Heart-certain, thoroughly certain.
One felt heart-certain that he could not miss
His quick-gone love.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. i.
Heartening, encouragement.
The call
Of Mars to fight was terrible, he cried out
like a storm,
Set on the city's pinnacles; and there he
would inform
Sometimes his heart'nings.
Chapman, Iliad, xx. 53.
H earthen. Wolcot in a note says,
li Hearthen means a small bundle of
firewood ; it is now almost obsolete,
and seldom found but in old law-
books."
He told them that his master had mistook
A word in ancient Modus for a half hen,
Which meant a faggot — that's to say, a
Hearthen. — P. Pindar, p. 64.
Hearthstead, place of the hearth.
HEART IN HOSE ( $ot )
HEDERATED
Cf. Girdle-stead, Knee-stead, Mar-
ket-stead, Noon-stead.
The most sacred spot upon earth to him
was his father's hearth-stead. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. xxxiv.
Heart in hose. The heart is said
to sink in one who is afraid or dis-
couraged ; hence it was spoken of as
going into some nether garment, as
boots or hose. Breton (Good and Bad,
p. 9) describes the untrained soldier as
'* hanging downe his head, as if his
heart were in his hose,11
Hearty, eminent.
Bsay, that hearty prophet, coofirmeth the
same. — Latimer, i. 356.
We read how that Judas Machabeus, that
hearty captain, sendeth certain money to
Jerusalem, to make a sacrifice for the dead.
— Ibid. i. 515.
Heathendom, heathenism.
He trims his paletots, and adorns his legs,
with the flesh of men and the skins of
women, with degradation, pestilence, heathen-
dom, and despair. — C. Kingsley, Cheap Clothe*
and Nasty.
Heathenry, heathenism.
Are jou so besotted with your philosophy,
and your heathenry, and your laziness, and
your contempt for God and man, that you
will see your nation given up for a prey, and
your wealth plundered by heathen dogs ? —
C. Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. vi.
Heathery, heathy ; of the nature of
heather.
I found the house amid desolate heathery
hills. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. i.
He . . . threw himself on the heathery scrub
which met the shingle. — Hughes, Tom Brown's
School-Days, Pt. II. ch. ix.
Heave at, to oppose ; to murmur
against. See quotation from Bale, *. v.
Mammetrous.
They did not wish government auite taken
away ; only the king's person they heaved
at ; him, for some purpose, they must needs
have out of the way. — Andrewes, iv. 12.
In vain have some heaved at this office,
which is fastned to the state with so con-
siderable a revenue. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., V.
iv. 8.
The Bishops' places of which they were so
anciently possest in Parliament were heaved
at—Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 167.
Heaven, to place in heaven, and so
to make happy. See quotation from
Adams, *. v. Hell.
He heavens himself on earth, and for a
little pelf cozens himself of bliss. — Adams,
i. 194.
Heaven-high, very lofty. Cf. Sky-
high.
Their Heav'n-high roofes shal be embattelled
With adamant in gold enuelloped.
Davies, An Extasie, p. 93.
H eave-shouldered, high-shouldered.
Oaptaines that wore a whole antient in a
scarf e, which made them goe heave-shouldered.
—Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 157).
Heavy, beer and porter mixed
(slang).
Here comes the heavy; hand it here to
take the taste of that fellow's talk out of my
mouth. — C. Kinysley, Alton Locke, ch. ii.
Heavyish, rather heavy, whether
physically or mentally.
I solemnly assure you I am only heavyish,
not ill.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, ii. 300.
Halloo! halloo!
They have done for two,
But a heavyish job remains to do.
Hood, The Forge.
Hecatontarchy, rule of a hundred.
What would come to pass if the choice of
a governor or governors were referred to the
thousands and millions of England ? Beware
a Heptarchy again, beware a Hecatontarchy.
—Hachet, Life of Williams, ii. 202.
Hecatontomes, hundreds of volumes.
Hypocrites ! the gospel faithfully preached
to the poor, the desolate parishes visited and
duly fed, loiterers thrown out, wolves driven
from the fold, had been a better confutation
of the pope and mass than whole hecaton-
tomes of controversies. — Milton, Ammadv. on
Remonst. (to the Postscript).
Heckinq, wearing ; hacking.
He took himself to be no mean doctor,
who, being guilty of no Greek, and being
demanded why it was called an hective fever ;
because, saith he, of an necking cough which
ever attendeth this disease. — Fuller, Holy
State, Bk. I. ch. ii.
Hectastyle, having six pillars.
One of the largest and most correct hecta-
style porticoes in the kingdom.— Defoe, Tour
thro1 G. Britain, ii. 301.
Hectic, a blush or high colour.
The poor Franciscan made no reply: a
hectic of a moment passed across his cheek,
but could not tarry — Nature seemed to have
done with her resentments in him. — Sterne,
Sent. Journey, The Monk.
Hederated, crowned or adorned with
ivy.
He appeareth there neither laureated nor
hederated Poet (except the leaves of the
Bayes and Ivy be withered to nothing siuce
the erection of the Tomb), but only rotated,
HEDGE
( 307 )
HEEL-TAPS
having a Chaplet of four Roses about his
he*d.— Fuller, Worthier Yorkshire (ii. 513).
Hedge. To hang in the hedge = to
be at a stand-still. In the old Play or
Morality called Hycke-Scorner (Haw-
kins, Eng. Dr., I 95) the reprobate,
offended at the reproof of Pity, says,
" Whan my soule hangeth on thehedqe,
cast stones," and then orders Pity to be
put in the stocks. Here the meaning
seems to be, When I am dead you may
cast stones at me, if you will, but now
you shall be punished.
They presently voted that the king be
desired to pat all Catholiques out of employ-
ment, and other high things; while the
business of money hangs in the hedge, — Pepys,
Oct. 27, 1066.
Hedgeless, without hedges.
As they paced along the dreary hedgeless
stubbles, they both started. — C. Kingsley,
Yeast, ch. xiii.
There was a dreamy sunny stillness over
the hedgeless fields. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. hriv.
Hedge wine, poor, cheap wine : wine
perhaps made of flowers or herbs, as
cowslip wine, &c. ; but hedge is often
used as a disparaging prefix— hedge-
' priest, hedge-tavern, &c.
Your wines be small hedge vines, or haue
taken salt water. — Breton, Wonders worth
Hearing, p. 10.
Holds her to homely cates and harsh hedge-
vine
That should drink Poesy's nectar.
Chapman, Iliad, Ep. Ded., 111.
Heels. Dawn at heels = slovenly,
like one who shuffles about in slippers
or old shoes. See quotation s. v.
Elbows.
Heels. To throw up a man's heels
= to floor or conquer him.
Though Great-grace is excellent good at
his weapons, and has and can, so long as he
keeps them at sword's point, do well enough
with them ; yet if they get within him, even
Faint-heart, Mistrust, or the other, it shall
go hard but they will throw up his heels. —
Pilgrim's Progress, Pt. i. p. 208.
Heels. To turn up or topple up the
heels = to die ; toes up = dead, in
modern slang. Cf. Topple up tail.
The backewinter, the frostebiting, the
eclipse or shade, and sickness© of Yarmouth,
was a great sicknesse or plague in it 1348, of
which in one yeare seaven thousand and
fifty people toppled up their heeles there.—
Xashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 152).
The bove was somewhat sickly with fruite,
berries, plummes, and such geare that he had
eaten abroade, that when he came to good
lodging and good dyet, he even turned up his
heeles. — Breton, Miseries of Mauillia, p. 42.
His heels he'll kick up,
Slain by an onslaught fierce of hiccup.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Heels. To take his heels = to run
away. We say take to his heels. As
Puttenham remarks, it is a colloquial
expression, not adapted for heroic sub-
jects. To get the heels of another =
to outstrip.
If an historiographer shall write of an
emperor or king, how such a day hee joyned
battel with his enemie, and being ouer-laide
ranne out of the fields, and took his heeles, or
put spurre to his horse and fled as fast as hee
could, the termes be not decent, but of a
meane souldier or captains it were not un-
decently spoken. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie,
Bk. III. ch. xxiii.
If ye had seen him take his heeles, and run
away from you into the wildernesse, what
could ye haue said or done more? — Hall,
Contemplations (Golden Calfe).
" What ! (cried I, astonished) a matrimo-
nial scheme ? O rare Strap, thou bast got
the heels of me at last." — Roderick Random,
ch. xlvii.
Heels. To cool or kick one's heels
= to wait ; to cool heels is noticed in N.
I suppose this is a spice of foreign breed-
ing, to let your uncle kick his heels in your
heXL—Foote, The Minor, Act II.
In this parlour Amelia cooled her heels, as
the phrase is, near a quarter of an hour. —
Fielding, Amelia, Bk. VI. ch. ix.
My Lord, the Jews
Have been these three hours in the outer hall,
Much kicking of their heels, and cursing
Meroz. — Taylor, Virgin Widow, i. 2.
Heels in neck, headlong.
One Oerdicus, a plashing Saxon, . . . leapt
aground like a sturoie bruite, and his yeomen
bolde cast their heels in their necke, and friskt
it after him.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 150).
Heel -taps, the small remains of
liquor left in a glass, or the fag end of
a t>ottle. Different attempts to explain
this phrase may be seen in N. and Q.,
5th S., vol. xii.
As there was a proper objection to drink-
ing her in heel-taps, said the voice, we'll give
her the first glass in the new magnum. —
Nicholas Nickleby, ch. xxzii.
Kick took off his heel-taps, bow'd, smiled
with an air
Most graciously grim, and vacated the chair.
Ingoldsby Legends (St. Cuthbert).
X 2
HEIGH-HO
( 3o8)
HEM USE
II El a H -HO, to sigh for ; an interjec-
tion turned into a verb. Cf. Pish,
pshaw, &c.
It was just the sort of house which youth-
ful couples, newly united by Holy Church,
htiyh-ho'd for as they passed. — Savage, R.
MedlieoU, Bk. I. ch. i.
Height, to exalt.
If He bore affection to us in our rags, His
love will not leave us when we are heiyhted
with His righteousness, and shining with His
jewels.— Adams, i. 400.
Imagine .... numbers of people that
not many hours before had their several
chambers delicately heiyhted, now confusedly
thrust together into one close room. — Ibid.
i. 421.
Hell, to place in hell. The passage
from Spenser is quoted by N., who
says that hell has been supposed to be
another form of hele, to cover, but that
this is not satisfactory. Spenser, I
think, uses the verb in the same sense
as Adams (" lands " being the anteced-
ent to " them "). Cf. Heaven.
Else would the waters overflow the lands,
And fire devoure the ayre, and hell them
quight.— F. Queene, TV. x. 35.
The dead to sin are heavened in this world,
the dead in sin are helled here by the tor-
menting anguish of an unappeasable con-
science.— Adams, i. 231.
Hellness, hellishness, with an allu-
sion to the title, Highness.
There's not a king among ten thousand kings,
But gildeth those that glorifie his folly,
That sooth and smooth, and call his HelUness
holy.— Sylvester, The Capiaines, 1007.
Hell- wain. H., who gives no ex-
ample, says, "A supernatural waggon,
seen in the sky at night." The extract
is quoted by Irving in a note to the
article in his Sketch-Book on Stratford-
on-Avon.
They have so fraid us with bull-beggars,
spirits, witches, urchins, . . . the man m the
oke, the hell-waine, the fierdrake, the puckle,
Tom Thombe, hobgoblins, Tom Tumbler,
boneless, and such other bugs, that we were
afraid of our own shadowes. — Scot, Bis-
eoverie of Witchcraft.
Helmless, rudderless.
Tour National Assembly, like a ship water-
logged, helmless, lies tumbling. — Catiyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. VI. ch. v.
Help-tire, a curious compound : the
meaning is that a horse is a help to
those wbo are tired, but the speaker
was still fresh. There is no corre-
sponding word in the original.
My pow'rs are yet entire,
And scorn the help-tire of a horse.
Chapman, Iliad, v. 252.
Helter-skelteriness, hastiness ; im-
petuosity.
While the picturesqueness of the numerous
pencil-scratches arrested my attention, their
helter-skelteriness of commentary amused me.
— E. A. Foe, Marginalia, Introduction.
Helve. To throw tlu helve after the
hatchet = to go all lengths ; when part
has been lost, to throw away the rest.
The metaphor may be taken from
2 Kings vi. 5, 6.
If shee should reduce the Spaniard to that
desperate passe in the Netherlands, as to
make him throw the helve after the hatchet,
and to relinquish those provinces altogether,
it would much alter the case. — Howell, In-
structions for Forraine Travell, sect. 9.
Hemerobaptist. See extract. The
sect was of Jewish origin.
In the Word of God . . . one Baptisme i*
mentioned (which place the Hemerobaptist s
or daily dippers slighted). — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 296.
Hemerocallis, the day-lily.
The hemerocallis is the least esteemed, be-
cause one day ends its beauty. — Bp. Hall,
Works, viii. 183.
Hemi-circle, half-circle. Ben Jon-
son (quoted by L.) has the more cor-
rect hemi-cycle.
Her browes two hemi-circles did enclose,*
Of rubies ranged in artificiall roes.
Davies, An Extasie, p. 89.
Hempstring, a term of reproach, like
crackhemp, or crackrope, implying that
the person so called deserves or is likely
to be hung.
If I come near you, hempstring, I will teach1
you to sing sol fa. — Gascoigney Supposes, iv. 3.
Vau. A perfect young hempstring /
Van. Peace, least he overheare you. —
Chapman, Mans. 1? Olive, v. 1.
1
Hemusb. See first extract; in the
second the speaker is supposed to be aj
hind. ,
The roebuck is the first year a kid, the
second year a girl, the third year a hem use*
— Return from Parnassus, ii. 5 (1(100). j
Those pretty fawns, prickets, eorrells, he*
muses, ana girls, whereof som are mine, which
I brought into the world without any pain
or help of midwife. — Howell, Parly of Bta>t*%
p. 62.
HE NA TRICE
( 309 ) HERITANCE
Hen at rice, jocularly for female
cockatrice.
It is affirmed that there is no female basil-
isk, that is, no henatrice, the cock laying only
male eggs. — Southey, The Doctor ', ch. cc.
Hence, to send or go away. N.
gives the second extract, and says,
"Sylvester has unwarrantably made a
verb of to hence, in the sense of to go
away. I am not aware of any other
instance."
60, bawling Cor, thy hungry maw go fill
On yon foul flock, belonging not to me.
With that his dog he henc'd, his flock he
cursed. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 93.
Herewith the Angell henc't, and bent his
flight
Tow Yds our sad Citie.
Sylvester, Panaretus, 128J.
Henoe. See extract.
The present name [Stonehenge] is Saxon,
though the work is, beyond all comparison,
older, signifying an hanging rod or pole, t. e.
a Gallows, from the hanging parts, archi-
traves, or rather imposts; ana pendulous
rocks are still in Yorkshire called Henges. —
Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, i. 305.
Henpeck, undue rule by a wife. Cf.
Chickex-pecked.
Consider the . . . Saumaises now bully-
fighting for a hundred gold Jacobuses, now
closeted with Queen Christinas, . . . anon
cast forth (being scouted and confuted), and
dying of heartbreak coupled with henpeck. —
Curly It, Misc., iii. 208.
Hex-peckery, state of subjection to
a wife by a husband.
He had fallen from all the heieht and
pomp of beadleship, to the lowest depth of
the most snubbed nen-peckery. — Oliver Twist,
ch. xxxvii.
Heraldry. See quotation.
Nothing sat heavier upon his spirits than
a great arrear of business, when it happened ;
for he knew well that from thence there
sprang up a trade in the register's office
called heraldry, that is, buying and selling
precedence in the paper of causes, than which
there bath not been a greater abuse in the
sight of the sun. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, ii. 86.
Herb, to graze; to crop herbage.
The speaker in the extract is a boar.
So, sir, I bid you farewell, for I am going
to kerb it among that tuft of trees. — Howell,
Parly of Beast*, p. 113.
Herb-John, some tasteless pot-herb.
Britten and Holland give Hypericum
perforatum as the botanical name of
Herb-John, but do not think that this
is the plant referred to in Gumall.
The thin -leaved mug -wort or clarie,
called by Cotgrave Herbe de Saint
Jean, has been suggested. See N. and
Q., II. vols. vii. — ix.
Balm, with the destitution of God's bless-
ing, doth as much good as a branch of herb-
John in our pottage. — Adams, i. 376.
Herb-John in the pot does neither much
good nor hurt. — Gumall, Christian Armour ,
Pt. ii. p. 12.
Herden, flaxen ; made of hards, q. v.
Ton must haue an herden or wullen cloth
waxed, wherwith euery day you must rubbe
and chafe your bowe, tyll it shyne and glyt-
ter wythall.— Atcham, ToxophUus, p. 118.
They are to be beaten and punned in a
great stone mortar, or vpon a stone floore,
with an hurden mallet or tow-beetle. — Hoi-
land, Pliny, xix. 1.
Hkrdflock, a flock : one of Stany-
huret's words. See extract 8. v. Prede.
Herd-maid, shepherd esB. Herdess
is in the Diets.
I sit and watch a herd-maid gay. — Lyric*,
he, ed. by W. Byrd, 1587 (Eng. Gar., ii. 76).
Herehence, hence. " Written * her-
ence * (says Bp. Jacobson), it is still in
use in the counties of Somerset, Wilts,
and Hereford, as ' therence ' also is for
'thence.'"
* We are herehence resolved that we are not
- to do any evil that good may come of it. —
Sanderson, ii. 52.
The use that we may make herehence is,
that since he fell let us take heed that we
fall not.— Ibid. v. 353.
Hereticate, to class or denounce as
a heretic.
Let no one be minded on the score of my
neoterism to hereticate me as threatening to
abet some new-fangled form of religious
heterodoxy. Jupiter forbid that I should
think of setting up as a theologue. It is
just because I would not be confounded with
the patrons of neologism or neology, that I
prefer to use neotensm and its conjugates.
If human affairs were ruled by prudence,
the term 'innovation' would be strictly
neutral; but in common usage, as Bentley
justly remarks, thereby "expression is given
to the sentiment of displeasure.1* Neoterism,
as being a vocable still unfamiliar, possesses
the advantage of indifference, in not sug-
gesting either praise or dispraise. — Hail,
Modern English, p. 19.
Heritaxce, heritage ; patrimony.
These were my heritance,
O God ! thy gifts were these.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. i.
HERRINALSON ( 310 )
HESTERNAL
Herkinalson, a hermaphrodite.
Thus he thinketh it a great deal the safer
way to make the pope an herkinalson, or by
miracle to turn him from a man into a wo-
man, than simply and plainly to confess that
ever dame Joan was Pope in Borne. — Jewel,
iv. 656.
He rle. H. gives *' Herle, a twist,
fillet, Gawayne" but this scarcely seems
the meaning in the extract
The shell-fly for the middle of July, made
of greenish wool, wrapped about with the
herle of a peacock's tail. — Miss Edgeworth,
Absentee, ch. viii.
Heroic, to celebrate in heroic verse.
Homer of rats and frogs hath heroiqut it.
— Xashe, Lenten Stuffe (Hart. Misc., vi. 158).
Heroine, to play the heroine.
What lessened the honour of it somewhat
in my mother's case was that she could not
heroine it into so violent and hazardous an
eztream as one in her situation might have
wished. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 02.
Herring is a fish that dies as soon
as it is taken out of the water ; hence
the phrase in the quotation.
Bel. Constant ! and in mourning ? Pray,
who's dead ?
Const. One for whom I ought to grieve,
did it not smooth a passage to Belinda's
arms through the hearts of our inexorable
parents.
Bel. Your father, sir ?
Clinch. The same, madam ; he's as dead
as a herring, I promise you.
Centlivre, Maws Bewitched, Act I.
" Dead ! " (says my uncle, looking at the
body) " ay, ay, I'll warrant him as dead as a
herring." — Smollett, Bod. Random, ch. iv.
Herring. Never a barrel the better
herring = just as bad as some one else
to whom reference had been made, i. e,
the herrings in one barrel are of the
same quality as those in another. Cf.
extract*, v. Barrel. In Bailey's Colloq.
of Erasmus, p. 373, Similes habebant
labra lactucas is translated, " The devil
a barrel the better herring," though
the old English proverb, " Like lips,
like lettuce," would have given the
original literally. In the second extract
Gosson is comparing cooks and painters
on the one side, and dramatists on the
other.
Two feloes being like flagicious, and
neither barrel better herring, accused either
other. — VdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,p. 187.
Therefore of both baiTelles I judge Cookes
and Painters the better hearing. — Gosson,
Schoole of Abuse, p. 32.
I lyk not barrel or hearing. — Stanyhurst,
AEn., ii. 56.
M New a barrel the better herring* cries
he ; " noscitur a socio is a true saying. It
must be confessed indeed that the lady in
the fine garments is the civiler of the two ;
bat I suspect neither of them are a bit better
than they should be." — Fielding, T. Jones,
Bk. X. ch. v.
Vive la reine Billingsgate ! the ThaJestris
who has succeeded Louis Quatorse. A com-
mittee of those Amasons stopped the Duke
of Orleans, who, to use their style, I believe
is not a barrel the better herring. — Walpole,
Letters, iv. 480 (1789).
Herring-bone, to work in a zigzag
pattern like herring-bones ; used also
as an architectural term for work of
that fashion.
For there, all the while, with air quite be-
witching,
She sat herring-boning, tambouring, or
stitching.
Ingoldsby Legends (Knight and Lady).
The walls to this room were 3 feet thick,
with herring-bone masonry. — Arch., xxxv. 384
(1863).
Herring er, one who goes herring-
fishing.
He would do anything in his contempt
for "a lot of long-shore merchant-skippers
and herringers, who went about calling them-
selves captains, and fancy themselves. Sir, as
good as if they wore the Queen's uniform."
— C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xiv.
Hersrd, formed like a hearse.
Southey explains in a note that the
bowmen were usually arranged in the
shape of a hearse, about two hundred
in front and but forty in depth. The
hearse referred to is not the carriage
now so called, but a triangular frame
of iron on which a number of lighted
candles were placed at funeral ob-
sequies.
From his hersed bowmen how the arrows
fled \— Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. ii.
Hesitatory, vacillating.
In the mean time his being suspicions,
dubious, cautelous, and not soon determined,
bnt hesitatory at unusual occurrences in his
office, made mm pass for a person timidous,
and of a fickle, irresolute temper. — A'orth,
Examen, p. 596.
Hesternal, belonging to yesterday.
N. has kestem, with quotation from
Holinshed.
I rose by candle-light, and consumed, in
the intensest application, the hours which
every other individual of our party wasted
HETAIRISM
( 3" )
HIGHBO V
in enervating slumbers from the hesUrnal
dissipation or debauch. — Lytton, Pelham,
c)i. Ivii.
H eta I R ism, promiscuous intercourse.
The primitive condition of man socially
was one of pure hetairism. — Sir J. Lubbock,
Orig. of Civilization, p. 67.
Hewt, height (?). H. has hewt, high.
The word in the original is sedes. The
rendezvous spoken of is " tumulus
trmplumque vHustum desertas Cereris"
From diuerse corners to that hewt wee wyl
make asemblye. — St any hurst, JEn., ii. 742.
Hey-day, joyous excitement.
Keep it up, jolly ringers, ding dong and
away with it again. A merry peal puts my
spirits quite in a hey-day. — Burgoyne, Lord of
the Manor, I. i.
Hey-go-mad, without bounds ; as an
adjective, extremely anxious or desirous.
When they are once set a going, whether
right or wrong, 'tis not a halfpenny matter;
away they go cluttering like key-go-mad. —
Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 2.
Tisn't Mr. Bounderby, 'tis his wife ; yo'r
not fearfo' o' her ; yo was hey-go-mad about
her an hour sin. — Dickens, Hard Timet, ch.
xxii.
Hey-passe, a juggler's term : often
joined with repasse.
Ha' you forgotten me ? you think to carry
it away with your hey-passe and repasse. —
Marlowe, Faustus, v. 1.
The poets were triviall that set up Helen's
face for such a top-gallant summer may-
pole for men to gaze at, and strouted it out
so in their buskind braves of her beautie;
whereof the only Circe's heypasse and repasse
was that it drew a thousand ships to Troy
to fetch her back with a pestilence. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 162).
You wanted but hey-pass to have made
your transition like a mystical man of Star-
bridge. But for all your sleight of hand,
our just exceptions against liturgy are not
vanished. — Milton, Animadv. on Bemonst.,
sect. 3.
Hibbrnologist, one learned in mat-
ters relating to Ireland.
We may fairly contrast his Hibernology
with that of the Hibernologists of the present
generation. — Lord Strangford, Letters and
Papers, p. 231.
Hibebnolooy, teaching about Ire-
land : a word formed like ^Egyptology.
See preceding extract.
Hickock, hiccup.
The voice is lost in hickcocks, and the
breath is stifled with right— Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 23.
Go to the stomack, it hatb . . . singultus
or the hi cock. — Ibid. p. 78.
Hidage, a tax levied on every hide
of land.
All the king's supplies made from the
very beginning of his raigne, are particu-
larly againe and opprobriously rehersed, as
. . . Garucage, Hydage, Escuage, Escheates,
Amercements, and such like. — Daniel, Hist,
of Eng., p. 136.
Hide-blown, gorged ; having the
skin stuffed out.
Ye slothful, Hide-blown, gormandizing
niggards. — Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. I. i. 3.
Hide Park on the water. The
Thames, as being a fashionable place
of resort formerly.
I promised to go this evening to Hide
Park on the water, but I protest I'm half
afraid. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Con v. i.).
Hiding, a thrashing.
" La, Susan," said George, with a doleful
whine, " I wasn't going to shed the beggar's
blood ; I was only going to give him a hiding
for his impudence." — Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. l.
HiERAriCRA, aloes and canella bark
made into a powder with honey. In
the quotation from Ward reference is
made to the derivation of the word
ttpoq, sacred, iwcpdc,, bitter.
There is too much of this bitter zeal, of
this Hierapicra in all our books of contro-
versies.— Ward, Sermons, p. 76.
Tugwell began to complain of being very
chill, and of the head-ache, and said "be
was certainly going to have a fit of the ague,
and should not be able to go any further."
He then heavily bemoaned himself, and said,
" If he were at home, . . . Madam Wildgoose
would send him some Higry pigry, which
would stop it at once." — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. VIII. ch. zix.
Higglery goods, such goods as a
higgler or hawker sells.
Bound the circumference is the Butter-
market, with all the sorts of Higglery goods.
—Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, ii. 142.
Highboy, a High Tory and Church-
man, supposed to favour Jacobitism.
North mentions Highmen as used in
this sense. See quotation 8. v. Mob-
bify, and cf. Low-boy.
Sir Bog. I am amaz'd to find you in the
interest of the High-boys, you that are a
clothier! What, can you be for giving up
trade to France, and starving poor weavers ?
Aid. Trade, pish, pish, our parson says
HIGH-COCKALORUM ( 312 )
HINCH
that's only the Whigs' cant. — Centlivre,
Gotham Election.
Rog. Sly. Down with that frenchify'd dog,
Tickup. No High Boy, no High Boy !
Shot. No Worthy, no Worthy; a High
Boy, a High Boy! [Exeunt Jlghting.
Ibid.
High-cook- a-lorum, a game in which
one set of boys stoop down in a row,
and another set jump on their backs,
and then repeat three times '' high-cock-
a-lorum jig, jig, jig.'* If the boys who
give the backs do not break down
under the weight till these words have
been said, they change parts with their
companions.
Prisoner's base, rounders, high- cock -a'
lorum, cricket, football, he was soon initiated
into the delights of them all. — Hughes, lorn
Brown's School-Days, Pt. I. ch. Hi.
High-day, full vigour: hey-day is
more usual.
The bucks of Edinburgh . . . have a cer-
tain shrewdness and self-command that is
not often found among their neighbours in
the high-day of youth and exultation. —
Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, ii. 50.
Restless Bnssot brings up reports, accusa-
tions, endless thin logic ; it is the man's
hitfh-day even now. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
II. Bk.*V. ch. vii.
Highering, ascending.
In me put force
To weary her ears with one continuous
prayer,
Until she let me fly discaged to sweep
In ever-highering eagle-circles up
To the great Sun of Glory.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
HlGHERMOST, highest.
The purest things are placed highermost.
The earth as grossest is put in the lowest
room, the water above the earth, the air
above the water. — Adams, i. 244.
HiQHGATE, highway. In the quota-
tion DunHtable is used disparagingly ;
it usually is coupled with plainness and
downrightnes8.
Then should many worthy spirit* get up
the hiahgate of preferment, and idle drones
should not come nearer than the Dunstable
highway of obscurity. — Adams, i. 46.
High shoes. The extract from
Breton purports to be from a " country-
man's letter to his beloved sweetheart.''
High shoes were part of a rustic's dress
— highlows(?). Cf. Upstart. At p. 262
of Gauden's work he speaks of " hob-
nails and high shoes"
Belccve me I loue thee, and if my hi.jh
shoots come home on Saturday, He see thee
on Sunday. — Breton, Packet of Letters, p. 49.
. Marvel not if a man of so lofty a spirit
could humble himself so far as to sneak so
correctedly in such auditories full of ignoble
sectaries and high-shone clowns. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 165. i
No ingenuous man or woman thought that I
High Shoes and the Scepter of Government
. . . could well agree together. — Gaiuh w, I
Tears of the Church, p. 17.
The high Shoon of the Tenant payes for the I
Spanish-leather Boots of the Landlord. —
Fuller, Worthies, Hai'tford.
Hightipe, great festival.
One may hope it will be annual and peren-
nial ; a Feast of Pikes, FHe des Piques^ not-
ablest among the hightides of the year. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. x.
So have we seen fond weddings (for indi-
viduals, like nations, have their hightid^*
celebrated with an outburst of triumph and
deray at which the elderly shook their heads.
— Ifa'd. ch. xii.
Hilary term. To keep Hilary
term = to be cheerful or merry (Lat.
hilaris). Fuller (Worthies, Yorl'shirr,
ii. 495) has a similar pun, writing,
" Mirth, ... if it doth not trespi^
in time, caiwe, and measure, Heraclitns,
the sad philosopher, may percluuu'o
condemn; but Saint Hilary, the good
father, will surely allow."
When God speaks peace to the soul . . .
it gives end to all jars, and makes a man
keep Hilary term all his life. — Adams, i. 63.
Hildebrandine, pertaining to or like
Hildebrand (Pope Gregory VII.).
They sought by Hildebrandine arts to exalt
themselves above all that is called God in
civil Magistracy. — GauiUn, Tears of tie
Church, p. 566.
Himp, to limp. The first extrnt
occurs in a very free translation of
Iliad, ii. 212 — 219, containing the de-
scription of Tliersites. The original is
simply ^wXoc 3' ertpov iro&i.
Lame of one leg, and himping all his
dayes. — Udal's Erasmus's Apophth., p. 1103.
He toke heauily that the aeformitee and
disfigure of hymfring on the one legge, wh'c'i
had come to' him oy the saied wounde did
still remain. — Ibid. p. 231.
Hinch, to be stingy ; to grudge.
These Komaines of whome I speake, heinp:
stressed and almoste brought to the last cast
by the long and daungerous warres of Hani-
bal and the Frenche, did, lyke louing fathers
to their countrey, briug in their mony ami
goodes, without hinchinj or pinching, to re-
IirND-SHIFTERS ( 313 )
HISN
Heft? the charges of their common welth.—
Aylmer, Har borough for faithful subjects,
lo59, Sig. O. iv.
Hind-shifters, heels.
Marry, for diving into fobs they [kan-
garoos] are rather lamely provided a priori ;
but if the hue and cry were once up, they
would show as fair a pair of kind-shifters as
the expertest loco-motor in the colony. —
Essays of Elia (Distant Correspondents).
Hinge, hinj or hemp; Cannabis
Indica : from this several drugs are
prepared. Cf. Bknj.
I went from Agra to Satagam in Bengal,
in the company of 180 boats laden with salt,
opium, hinge, lead, carpets, and divers other
commodities. — R. Fitch, 1592 (Eng. Garner,
iii. 194).
Hingeless, without a hinge.
Tis a wondrous thing to see that mighty
Mound,
Hintjeless and Axless, turn so swiftly round.
Sylvester, Little Bartas, 264.
Hint, used peculiarly here = after
that hint or example (?) ; or can it
mean condition ?
If you be seers of Christ's flock, do as
Jacob did, that thriving shepherd, look well
to your sheep when they are in conceiving.
What colour and tincture you give them in
that hint, you shall know them by it for
many years after. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
ii. 57.
Hir, to give a cross-buttock in wrest-
ling ; to throw one's adversary over the
hip. See N. on the phrase have on t/ie
hip. The following extract rather
Hiipports Johnson's first explanation of
the passage in the Merchant of Venice.
And a prime wrestler as e'er tript,
E'er gave the Cornish hug or hipt.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque,
p. 202.
Hip, melancholy : abbreviation of
hypochondria,
A little while ago thou wast all hip and
vapour, and now thou dost nothing but
patronise fun. — Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk.
VI. ch. x.
Hippiatry, horse-surgery.
The horse pulled out his foot ; and, which
is a wonderful thine in hipaiatrie, the said
horse was thoroughly curea of a ringbone
which he had in that foot. — Urquhart's Babe'
la is, Bk. I. ch. xxxvi.
Hippogony, pedigree or origin of a
horse.
There was nothing supernatural in Nobs.
His hippoyony, even if it had been as the
Doctor was willing to have it supposed ha
thought probable, would upon his theory
have been in the course of nature, though
not in her nsual course. — Soul hey, The
Doctor, ch. cxliv.
Hipps or Hippo for hypochondria
are among the " abbreviations exqui-
sitely refined " that Swift sneers at in
the introduction to Polite Conversation,
Her ladyship was plaguily bambed ; I war-
rant it put her into the Hipps. — Swift,
Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
Heaven send thou hast not got the Hyps,
How ? Not a word come from thy lips ?
Ibid., Cassinus and Peter.
When his mind is serene, when he is
neither in a passion, nor in the hipps (sol-
licitus), nor in liquor, theu being in private,
you may kindly advise him. — Bailey's Eras-
mus, p. 130.
Hirablk, u alias Gyraffa, alias Ana-
hula ; an Indian sheep or a wilde sheep "
(Sylvester in margin).
Neer th* elephant comes th' horned Hirable,
Stream-troubling Camell, and strong-necked
bull.
Sylvester, sixth day, first iceeke, 104.
Hircine, goatish, and so strong-
smelling.
The landlady saw, calmly put down her
work, and coming up, pulled a hircine man
or two hither, and pushed a hircine man or
two thither, with the impassive countenance
of a housewife moving her furniture. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, en. xxiv.
Hirundinr, pertaining to swallows.
Why mention our Swallows, . . . swashing
to and fro with animated, loud, long-drawn
chirpings, and activity almost super-Atrun-
dine. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. IL ch. ii
Hish, explained by the editor {Par-
ker Soc. edit.) "to make an insulting
objection ; " it is only anothor form of
hiss.
The clear truth so manifestly proved that
they cannot once hish against it.— Tyndale,
i. 432.
Hiske, to open the mouth.
To hiske against them [the Pope, &c] was
counted to cut the coat of Christ that had
never a seam. — Becon, i. 294.
His'n, a vulgarism for his. The
writer in the extract is supposed to be
Mr. Anthony ILirlowe, a gentleman of
family and fortune.
Mr. Solmes will therefore find something
to instruct you in. I will not show him this
letter of yours, though you seem to desire it,
lest it should provoke him to be too severe a
HISPAN1CISM ( 314 )
HOB
schoolmaster when 70a are hiin. — Richard'
son, d. Harlow, i. 242.
Hispanicism, a Spanish idiom.
Temple had . . . gradually formed a style
singularly lucid and melodious, superficially
deformed indeed by gallicisms and hispam-
cisms picked up in travel or in negotiation,
but at the bottom pure English. — Macaulay,
Essays (Sir W. Temple).
Historianess, female historian.
She is a great historianess, a most charm-
ing, delightful woman. — L. E. London (Life
by Blanchard, i. 48).
Historiktte, little history. This
French word is almost or quite natural-
ized now. L. has it, but with no earlier
instance than from Disraeli* s Coningsby.
Tom Brown uses the Italian form.
She thus continued her tragical historietto.
—T. Brown, Works, ii. 268.
It is not amiss to subjoin here an historiette
to shew the value of this minister. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 14a
Historiograph, a writer of history.
One might expect from an historiograph a
plain, honest, and full narration of tne fact
drawn from the authorities. — North, Examen,
p. 397.
Historiography, historical writing.
Haue you not beene a little red in histori-
ographie, or doo you not remember anie
pretty accident that hath fallne out in your
trauaile, which in the discourse of your
kiodnes might doe well to entertaine the
tyme with?— Breton, Wits Trenchtnour, p.
13.
Histrionicism, theatrical or artificial
manner. The Diets, have histrionism.
How could this girl have taught herself,
in the solitude of a savage island, a species of
histrionicism which women in London circles
strove for years to acquire, and rarely ac-
quired in any perfection? — Black, Princess of
Thule, ch. vi.
Hit, thrown : a Berkshire provincial-
ism.
It was as neat a street as one ever sees in
a fishing village, that is to say, rather an un-
tidy one, for of all human employments,
fishing involves more lumber and mess thau
any other. Everything past use was hit, as
they say in Berkshire, out into the street. —
H. Kingsley, Bavenshoe, ch. xlii.
Hitch, to hobble.
When the water began to ascend up to
their refuged hills, and the place of their
hope became an island, lo, now they hitch
up higher to the tops of the tallest trees.—
Adams, iii. 71.
Punishment this day hitches (if she stil
hitch) after Grime with frightful shoes-of-
•wiftness. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt I. Bk. V.
ch. v.
Hitchell, to tease, or heckle.
An hundred women, who sitting round in
a ring, with a food fire in the mids before
them, fell to nitchell and dresse hemp.—
Holland's Camden, p. 819.
Hithermore, nearer.
The . . . part of the Citty that stood on the
hithermore Banke. — Holland's Camden, p. 472.
Hity - tity, bo - peep (?) ; Peacock
(Manley and Corringham Glossary,
E. D. S.; gives " Highty-tighty, a see-
saw ; " also off-hand, hoity-toity.
What wilt thou say now, if Rachel stand
now, and play hity-tity through the keyhole,
to behold the equipage of thy person? —
Jonson, Case is Altered, iv. 4.
You know very well what I mean, sir!
Don't try to turn me off in that highty-tighty
way !— Thackeray, Netocomes, ch. xlii.
Hizlino, whistling or hissing sound :
an onomatopoeous word.
Then a prosperns hiding
Of south blast puffing on sayles doth sum-
mon us onward.
Stanyhurst, JSn., iii. 369.
Hoarse, to become hoarse.
There is some hope of the sinner whiles he
can groan for his wickedness, and complain
against it, and himself for it; but when his
voice iahoarsed — I mean his acknowledgement
gone — his case is almost desperate. — Adams,
i. 355.
Hoarsen, to make or grow hoarse.
I shall be obliged to hoarsen my voice, and
roughen my character. — Richardson, CI. Har-
lotoe, v. 79.
The last words had a perceptible irony in
their hoarsened tone. — G. Eliot, Daniel De~
ronda, ch. xl.
, Hoast, cough.
They were all cracking like pen-guns ; but
I gave them a sign by a loud hoast that Pro-
vidence sees all. — Gait, Annals of the Parish,
ch. ii.
I'll make him a treacle-posset ; it's a famous
thing for keeping off hoasts. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xziv.
Hob. H. (who gives no example)
says, " A -email piece of wood of a
cylindrical form, used by boys to set
up on end to put halfpence on, to
chuck or pitch at with another half-
penny, or piece made on purpose, in
order to strike down the hob, and by
that means throw down the halfpence ;
HOBALL
(3i5 )
IIOBSON
and all that lie with their heads upwards
are the pitcher's, and the rest, or wo-
men, are laid on again to be pitched at."
Sailor. To tell your honour the truth, we
were at hob in the hall, and whilst ray brother
and I were quarrelling about a cast, he sluuk
by us. — Wycherley, Plain Dealer, I. i.
HOBALL, a fool.
Ye are such a calfe, such an asse, such a
blocke,
Such a lilburne, such a hoball, such a lobcocke.
Udal, Roister Doister, iii. 3.
Hobbedyhoyish, approaching the
time of life between boy and man.
When Master Daw full fourteen years had
told,
He grew, as it is term'd, hobbedyhoyish ;
For Cupidons and Fairies much too old,
For Calibans and Devils much too boyish.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 12.
Hobble, to tie an animal's fore or
back lees loosely round, so as to pre-
vent it from straying far.
What tramp children do I see here, attired
in a handful of rags, making a gymnasium
of the shafts of the cart, making a feather-
bed of the flints and brambles, making a toy
of the hobbled old horse, who is not much
more like a horse than any cheap toy would
be ? — Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, zi.
Hobble, a difficulty.
The army of the Spanish kings got out of
a sad hobble' among the mountains at the
Pass of Losa by the help of a shepherd, who
showed them the way. — Lytton, Caxtons, Bk.
XIV. ch. i.
Hobbyhobsical, connected with a
whim or hobby.
One single quetre of three words unseason-
ably popping in full upon him in his hobby'
horsical career. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iii. 46.
He . . . marched back to hide himself in
the manse with his crony, Mr. Cargill, or to
engage in some hobbyhorsical pursuit con-
nected with his neighbours in the Aultoun.
^-Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 137.
Hobgoblin, to frighten by bugbears.
We have been hobgoblin* d too long into
religion, but, God be thank'd ! the vizard is
torn off, and the cheat is unmask'd. — Gen-
tleman Instructed, p. 348.
Hoblob, clown ; lout.
The rustical hoblohs
Of Crete*, of Dryopes,and payncted clowns
Agathyrsi
Dooe fetch theyre gambalds.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 150.
Thence sprouteth that obscene appellation
of Sarding Sandes with the draffe of the
carterly hoblohs thereabouts. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Bart. Misc., vi. 150).
Hobnail, rustic.
Hee thinks nothing to bee vices but pride
and ill husbandrie,for which hee wil grauely
disswade youth, and has some thriftie hob-
nayle prouerbes to clout his discourse. —
Earle, Microcotmographie (Plaine country
fellow).
Hobnail, to tread down roughly, as
by hobnailed shoes.
The Queen of England, or the rabble of
Kent?
The reeking dungf ork master of the mace !
Tour havings wasted by the scythe and spade,
Tour rights and charters hobnaiVd into slush.
Tennyson, Queen Mary% ii. 2.
Hob or nob. N. explains the word,
as now used convivially, to mean " ask-
ing a person whether he will have a
glass of wine or not ; " but it rather
refers to two persons clinking their
glasses together, preparatory to drink-
ing each other's health ; hence it sig-
nihes to be on friendly or intimate
terms. In the first extract an affected
fop is sneering at English dinner-
parties. See extract s. v. Baldicoot.
Then in solemn silence they proceed to
demolish the substantials, with perhaps an
occasional interruption of, M Here's to you,
friends," "Hob or nob? "Tour love and
mine." — Foote, The Author, Act I.
Having drunk hob or nob with a young
lady in whose eyes he wished to appear a
man of consequence, he hurried out into the
summer-house. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. VIII. ch. xxi.
I have . . . seen him and his poor com-
panion hob-and-nobbing together, until they
could scarce hold the noggin out of which
they drank. — Thackeray, Virginians, ch. Ii.
"Have another glass?" "With you;
Hob and nob,n returned the sergeant ; " the
top of mine to the foot of yours; the foot
of yours to the top of mine ; ring once, ring
twice ; the best tune on the musical glasses
— your health ! "—Dickens, Great Expecta-
tions, ch. v.
Hobson, a Cambridge carrier, who
died in 1630-1. He let out horses, and
is said to have insisted on his customers
always taking the horse which hap-
pened to be next the door. Hence
Hobson1 8 choice = no choice at all. If
the phrase was in use among his con-
temporaries, it is curious that Milton,
who wrote two jocose epitaphs on Hob-
son, should make no allusion to it.
Brown refers to some piece of advice
which was current in Hobson's name,
but which, as he states it, does not
seem to be very recondite.
BOB'S POUND ( 316 )
BOGAN
Where to elect there is but one,
Tis Hobson's choice, Take that or none.
Ward, England's Reformation,
c. 4, p. 326.
There was no opposition, which was a dis-
gust to the common people, for they wanted
a competition to make the money fly ; and
they said, Hobson's choice was no choice. —
North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 163.
As for those that are married, the best way
they can take, as I presume, is to live as easy
as they can ; and following the good counsel
of Hobson the carrier, so to manage them-
selves as not to tire before their journey's
end. — T. Brown, Works, iv. 175.
Hob's pound, a fix : another form of,
or perhaps a misprint for, Lob's pound,
q. v. in N.
What ! are you all in Hob's pound ? Well,
they as will may let you out for me. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. IV. ch. iii.
Hock, hocks, deep mire.
Hockly in the Hole, so named of the miry
way in winter time. . . . For the old English-
men our Progeni tours called deepe myre hock
and hocks. — Holland's Camden, p. 402.
Hockley in the Hole, the bear-gar-
den at Clerkenwell, but applied by
Butler to the stocks, " alluding pro-
bably " (says Dr. Grey) "to the two old
ballads entitled, Hockley 1 tK Hole, to
the tune of the Fidler in the Stocks."
For ho no sooner was at large,
But Trulla straight brought on the charge,
And in the self-same limbo put
The Knight and Squire, where he was shut.
Where leaving them at Hockley € th' Hole
Their bangs and durance to condole, &c.
Hudibras, I. iii. 1C03.
Hocus, a conjurer.
Our pamphlet-monger (that sputters out
senseless characters faster than any hocus can
vomit inkle) will needs take upon him to be
dictator of all society. — Coffee-Houses Vindi-
cated, 1675 (Harl. Misc., vi. 473).
Did you never see a little hocus, by sleight
of hand popping a piece several times first
out of one pocket, and then out of another,
persuade folks he was damnable full of
money, when one poor size was all bis stock ?
—Loyal Observator, 1683 (Harl. Misc., vl 67).
Hocus, to drug liquor.
" The opposite party bribed the barmaid
at the Town Arms to hocus the brandy-and-
water of fourteen unpolled electors as was a
stoppin' in the house." "What do you
mean by hocussing brandy-and-watcr ? " in-
quired Mr. Pickwick. " Puttin' laud'num in
it," replied Sam.— Pichcick Papers, ch. xiii.
For once in the palace we find Lady Alice
Again playing tricks with her Majesty's
chalice,
In the way that the jocose in
Our days term hocussing.
Inyoldsby Legends (Housewarming).
Hocus-pocuslt, by stratagem, or as
by a conjuring trick.
Many of their hearers are not only method-
istically convinced or alarmed, but are also
hocus-pocusly converted ; for as some of their
preachers employ all their art and rhetoric
to alarm and terrify, so others of them use
their utmost skill to give them assurance of
their sins being pardoned. — Life of J. Lack-
ington, Letter vii.
Hodded, bearing a hod.
Workmen in olden times would mount a
ladder
With hodded heads.
J. and H. Smith* Rejected Addresses,
p. 120.
Hodge, a peasant or countryman.
These Arcadians are giuen to take the
benefit of euerie Hodge, when they will sacri-
fice their virginitie to Venus, . . . and sure
this boy is but some shepheards bastard. —
Greene, Menaphon, p. 58.
Hodge-razors. See quotation ; so
called because sold to country bump-
kins (?)
Hodge-razors in all conceivable kinds were
openly marketed, which were never meant
to shave, but only to be sold. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 289.
Hoo, a shilling : an old cant term,
not peculiar to Ireland.
" It's only a tester or a hog they want
your honour to give 'em, to drink your
honour's health," said Paddy. " A hog to
drink my health ? " " Ay, that is a thirteen,
plase your honour ; all as one as an English
shilling.*' — Miss Edgeworth, Ennui, ch. vi.
Hog, to scrape a ship's bottom
under water.
A very bad world indeed in some parts —
hogged the moment it was launched — a
number of rotten timbers. — JVolcot, P. Pin-
dar, p. 168.
Hoo. Every hog his own apple =
every one for himself.
I let them have share and share while it
lasted ; howsomever, I should have remem-
bered the old saying, Every hog his own apple ;
for when they found my hold unsto wed, they
went all hands to shoohng and begging ; and
because I would not take a spell at the same
duty, refused to give me the least assistance.
— Smollett, Rod. Random, ch. xti.
Hogan, some sort of liquor. Taylor,
the water poet, speaks of a " high and
mighty drink called Rug," and again
of " Hogen Mogen Rugs/' Perhaps
HOG AN MOGAN ( 317 )
HOLLOW
some liquor was called Hogan from its
high or heady qualities. See N. and Q-,
V. i. 14. \
Those who toast all the family royal
In bumpers of Hogan and Nog,
Have hearts not more true or more loyal,
Than mine is to sweet Molly Mog.
Misc. by Swift, Pope, &c.f iv., 222
(ed. 1733).
For your reputation we keep to ourselves
your not hunting nor drinking hogan, either
of which here would he sufficient to lay your
honour in the dust. — Gray to H. Walpole,
1737.
Hogan Mooan, high and mighty : a
corruption of Hoognwqende, the title
of the States of the Netherlands ; hence
sometimes = Dutch; sometimes used
for any persons who are great, or think
themselves so.
But I have sent him for a token
To your low-country hogen-mogen.
Hudibras, III. i. 1440.
The poor distressed is become Hogan"
Mogan, and the servus servorum, dominus
dominantium. — Character of a Fanatic, 1675
(Ilarl. Misc., vii. 036).
Are . . . oar armies commanded by hogan-
tnogan generals that hate our nation? — T.
Brown, Works, iv. 122.
I perceive that the Temple and Grey's Inn
have declared me a pubhck enemy to the
Hoghen-Moghen learned in the law. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 520.
Hogget, a two-year old sheep.
Two or three of the weakHer hoggets were
dead from want of air. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. xlii.
Hoggish, piggishness ; brutal excess.
At Corrachattachin's, in hogaism sunk,
I got with punch, alas ! confounded drunk.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 108.
Hoghood, the nature of a hog.
The reckless shipwrecked man flung ashore,
... as hungry Parisian pleasure-hunter and
half-pay, on many a Circe island with tempo-
rary enchantment, temporary conversion into
beasthood and hoy hood. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. HI. Bk. I. ch. vii.
Hog in armour, a simile for a person
accoutred very cumbrously.
There were abundant of those silken back,
breast, and potts made and sold that were
pretended to be pistol proof ; in which any
man dressed up was as safe as in a house, for
it was impossible any one could go to strike
him for laughing; so ridiculous was the
figure, as they say of hogs in armour, — North,
Examen, p. 572.
Hog-rubbeb, a clown.
The very rusticks and hog-rubbers, ... if
once they tast of this Loue liquor, are inspired
in an instant. — Burton, Anatomy, p. 536.
Hogs. To drive hogs = to snore.
I'gad he fell asleep, and snored so loud,
that we thought he was driving his hogs to
market. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. ii.).
Hogsteeb, a boar in its third year.
See H. s. v. hoggaster.
Hee scornes theese rascal tame games, but a
sounder of hogsteers,
Or thee brownye lion too stalck fro the
mountain he wissheth.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 163.
Hoicks, to salute or encourage with
the hunting cry.
Our adventurer's speech was drowned in
the acclamations of the fox-hunters, who
now triumphed in their turn, and hoicksed
the speaker, exclaiming, "Well opened,
Jowler; to 'un, to 'un again, Sweetlips." —
Smollett, Sir Z. Greaves, ch. ix.
Hold, holding, land or tenement.
I am the landlord, keeper, of thy holds,
By copy all thy living lies in me.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 170.
Holdfast, firm ; steady.
O Goodnesse, let me (Badnesse) thee em-
brace
With hold-fast armes of euer-lasting loue.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 12.
Hole, a scrape (slang).
I should be in a deadly hole myself if all
my customers should take it into their heads
to drink nothing but water-gruel. — Smollett,
Sir L. Greaves, ch. xvi.
I should take great pleasure in serving
you, and getting you out of this hole, but my
lord, you know, is a great man, and can, in a
manner, do what he pleases with poor people.
— Johnston, Chrysal, i. 132.
Holinight, festal night.
When the dusk holiday or holinight
Of fragrant-curtain'd love begins to weave
The woof of darkness thick for hid delight.
Keats, The Day is Gone.
Hollanderess, woman of Holland.
Being a Hollanderess, she only sent me
most wretched food. — Heine, Prose Misc.,
transl. by Fleishman, p. 101.
Hollow, complete ; out and out, or
easily. L. notices this colloquialism,
but gives no example.
So, my lord, you and I are both distanced >
a hollow thing, damme. — Colman, Jealous
Wife, Act V.
Wildfire reached the post, and Squire
Burton won the match hollow. — Mist Edge-
worth, Patronage, ch. iii
HOLMEN
(3i8)
HONE
Holmen, belonging to the holm tree.
Hee makes a shift to cut an holmen pole.
Sylvester, Maiden's Blush, 541.
The lad here loads the Asse with holmen
sprayes. — Ibid. 1782.
Holus-bolus, all at once. See extract
8. v. Sar.
She appeared to lose all command over
herself, and making a sudden snatch at the
heap of silver, put it back holus-bolus in her
pocket.— Wilkie Collins, The Moonstone, Pt.
I. ch. zv.
Holy, to canonize.
Harp. I hug thee
For drilling thy quick brains in this rich plot
Of tortures 'gainst the Christians; on! I
hug thee.
Theoph. Both hug and holy me.
Massinger, Virgin Martyr, ii. 2.
HOLTFAX LAW or INQUEST, to be hung
first and tried afterwards. It is sug-
gested (N. and Q., V. iv. 179) that this
may be the origin of the phrase, " Go
to Halifax;11 also of the mention of this
town in the thieves1 Litany: "From
Hell, Hull, and Halifax^ Good Lord,
deliver us." The tirst quotation is
from the same vol. of N. and Q , p.
16, and is part of an unpublished letter
from Wentworth, explaining his con-
duct in the matter of Lord Mount-
morris.
Alas! all this comes too late. Hallifax
laws hath been executed in kinde; I am
allready hanged, and now wee cum to ex-
amine and consider of the evidence.
More cruel than the craven satire's ghost,
That bound dead bones unto a burning post;
Or some more straight-laced juror of the rest
Impanel'd of an Holyfax inquest.
Hall, Sat., IV. i. 18.
Home. To bring oneself home = to
recover what had been previously lost.
Her patroness had very different fortune,
having lost every rubber ; and, what was still
worse, several by-bets which she had made to
brinq herself home.— Johnston, Chrysal, i.218.
H*e is a little out of cash just now, as you
may suppose by his appearance, so instead of
buying liooks, he comes to sell them. How-
ever, he has taken a very good road to bring
himself home again, for we pay very hand-
somely.—Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. VIII.
ch. viii.
Homely, rough; rude. The word
might still be so applied to fare, ac-
commodation, &c, but not as in the
extract.
Homely playe it is and a madde pastime
where men by the course of the game go
together by the eares, and many times
murdre one an other.— UdaTs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 218.
Homer, closer; more home.
To put the affront the homer, [Prince
Bupert] resolv'd that very day to march
quite thorow the middle of the Quarters. —
Prince Rupert's late beating up the rebels9
quarters at Post-comb and Chenner, 1943, p. 2.
Home-sickness, a pining for home.
Home-sickness is a wasting pang,
This feel I hourly more and more :
There's healing only in thy wings,
Thou breeze that play'st on Albion's shore!
Coleridge, Home-sick.
I firmly believe in the magnetic effect of
the place where one has been bred, and have
continually the true "heimweh," home-sickness,
of the Swiss and Highlanders. — C. Kingsley
(Life, i. 3).
Homewardly, in the direction of
home.
It was eve
When homewardly I went.
Southey, Hannah.
Homilistical, belonging to or suited
for homilies: homiletical is the usual
word.
These were the grand Divines in all Times
and Places, not superficially armed with
light armour, onelv for the preaching or
Homilisticall flourishes of a Pulpit, but with
the weighty and complete armour of veter-
ane and valiant souldiers. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 621.
Homunculk, mannikin.
The giant saw the homuncule was irascible,
and played upon him. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. vii
Homy, home-like.
I saw . . . plenty of our dear English
"lady's smock" in the wet meadows near
here, which looked very homy. — C. Kingsley,
1864 (Life, ii. 168).
Hone. See extract: the locality
referred to is Yorkshire.
Districts abounding in circular barrows,
or, as they are here called from the Norse
name, hones, and redundantly, hone-hills. —
Arcfueol., xlii. 170 (1868).
Hone, to lament.
Some of the oxen in driving missed their
fellows behind, and honing after them, bel-
lowed, as their nature is. — Holland, Livy,
p. 6.
She brought a servant up with her (said
he), who hones after the country, and is seri-
ally gone, or soon will. — Richardson, Grandi-
son, i. 264.
HONEST WOMAN ( 319 )
HOOK
Thou awakest to hone, and pine, and moan,
as if she had drawn a hot iron across thy
lips.— Scott, Fair Maid of Perth, i. 105.
He lies pitying himself, honing and moan-
ing over himself. — Lamb's Essays (The Con'
valescent).
Honest woman. A woman who is
married after having been seduced is
said to be made an honest woman.
Richardson calls it a Lancashire phrase,
but I fancy it is common in most parts
of England.
"You yourself was brought to bed of
sister there within a week after you was
married." u Yes, hussy,1' answered the en-
raged mother, " so I was, and what was the
mighty matter of that? I was made an
honest woman then ; and if you was to be
made an honest woman I should not be
angry."— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. IV. ch. ix.
The Lord grant, say I, that he may be laid
hold of, and obliged to make a ruined girl an
honest woman, as they phrase it in Lanca-
shire.— Richardson, Grandison, iv. 275.
Honey -bird, bee.
The world have but one God, Heav'n but one
Sun,
Quails but one chief, the Hony-Birds but
one,
One Master-Bee.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 1143.
Honey-blob. See first extract.
As he returned to the Tower, he stopped
the coach at Charing Cross to buy honey-
blobs, as the Scotch call gooseberries. — Wal-
pole, Letters, i. 144 (1746).
Bosey had done eating her pine-apple,
artlessly confessing (to Percy Sibwright's
inquiries) that she preferred it to the rasps
and ninny-blobs in her grandmamma's garden.
— Thackeray j Newcomes, ch. xxiii.
Honeymoon, to spend a honeymoon.
As soon as I can get his discharge, and he
has done honeymooning, we shall start. —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xlvii.
Honey-people, bees.
Nor never did the pretty little king
Of hony-people in a sunshine day
Lead to the field in orderly array
More busie buzzers, when he casteth (witty)
The first foundations of bis waxen city.
Sylvester, The Furies, 336.
Honey-sops, a term of endearment.
Will. Ha, my sweet honey-sops, how dost
thou?
Peg. Well, I thank you, William.
Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 330).
Honorificence, honour; a doing of
honours.
There is honorificentia atatis, the honorifi-
cence of age.^&p. Hall, Works, x. 255.
Honour bright, a colloquial assur-
ance of truth or sincerity.
The phrase of the lowest of the people is
w honour bright," and their vulgar praise,
" His word is as good as his bond."— Emerson,
Eng. Traits, ch. vii.
Honours, obeisance ; reverence.
We observed there a colonel and his agent,
upon whom a pretty brisk youth of about
seventeen attended at three or four yards*
distance in the rear, and made his honours
upon every occasion.— T. Brown, Works, iii.
121.
Caroline arose from her seat, made her
curtsey awkwardly enough, with the air of
a boarding-school miss, her hands before her.
My father let her make her honours, and go
to the door.— Richardson, Grandison, ii. 190.
Hoodwink, disguise; concealment.
N. quotes Drayton for this substantive,
but there it means a game (hoodman-
blind).
No more dooth she laboure too mask her
Phansye with hudwinck. — Stanyhurst, JEn.,
iv. 176.
Hoop. To beat or pad the hoof, or
to be upon the hoof = to walk ; to be
on the move.
A mischance befel the horse which lam'd
him as he went a wat'ring to the Seine, inso-
much that the Secretary was put to beat the
hoof himself, and foot it home. — Howell,
Letters, I. i. 17.
These employments are laborious and
mortifying ; a man that is thus upon the hoof
can scarce find leisure for diversion. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 293.
Charley Bates expressed his opinion that
it was time to pad the hoof. This, it occurred
to Oliver, must be French for going out, for
directly afterwards the Dodger, and Charley,
and the two young ladies went away to-
gether.— Oliver Twist, ch. ix.
Hoofy, belonging to a hoof. Hip-
pocrene, a fountain near Helicon, is
said to have sprung up when the ground
was struck by the hoof of Pegasus.
Then parte in name of peace, and softly on
With numerous feete to Hoofy Helicon.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 441.
Hook. To hook it is slang for to
depart, or run away ; perhaps from the
practice referred to in the next entry.
See quotation 8. v. Fly.
Every school-boy knows that the lion has
a claw at the end of his tail, with which
he lashes himself into fury. When the
HOOK
( 320 )
HORN-MAD
experienced hunter sees him doing that, he,
so to speak, " hooks it" — H.Kingsley, Ravens-
hoe, ch. be.
Hook. Thieves used to steal things
hanging up in shops by dexterously
removing them with a hook.
Is not this braver than sneak all night in
danger,
Picking of locks, or hooking cloths at win-
dows.— Albumazar, iii. 3.
Hooker, a thief ; one who snatched
things from a shop or stall with a hook.
See H. s. v. hoker. Cf. Hook.
A false knaue needs no brokers, but a broker
Needs a false knaue (a hangman or a hooker).
Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 43.
These sly theeues and night-hookers . .
committed such felonious outrages. — Sol-
land, Pliny, xix. 4.
Hooky, hooked.
And then the sordid bargain to close,
With a miniature sketch of his hooky nose,
And his dear dark eves as black as sloes,
And his beard and whiskers as black as those,
The lady's consent he requited.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Hoose, hose (?) ; clothe with hose (?).
Clothe cut ouerthwart and agaynste the.
wnlle can neuer hoose a manne cleane. —
Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 124.
Hop, a dancing party of an unfashion-
able kind, though not always restricted
to such, especially in the present day.
Whilst the people of fashion seized several
places to their own use, such as courts,
assemblies, operas, balls, &c, the people of
no fashion, besides one royal place called his
Majesty's Bear-garden, have been in constant
possession of all hops, fairs, revels, &c. —
Fielding, Jos. Andrews, Bk. IL ch. xiii.
[The vulgar] now thrust themselves into
all assemblies, from a ridotto at St. James's
to a hop at Botherhithe. — Smollett, Hum-
phrey Clinker, i. 134.
I remember last Christmas, at a little liov
at the Park, he danced from eight o'clock
till four. — Miss Austen, Sense and Sensilrility,
ch. ix.
I guess this is a different sort of business
to the hops at old Levison's, where you first
learned the polka, and where we had to pay
a shilling a glass for negus. — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. xxu.
Hop. The absurd etymology in the
extract may be worth preserving.
No commodity starteth so soon and sink-
eth so suddainly in the price, whence some
will have them [hops'] so named from hopping
in a little time betwixt a great distance in
valuation. — Fuller, Worthies, Essex (i. 337).
Hopper, a hop-picker.
Many of these hoppers are Irish, but many
come from London. — Dickens, Uncommercial
Traveller, xi.
Hopper-crow. Hoirper = a seed-
basket, and crows follow the farmer
when he is sowing corn, picking up
what they can, yet this seems hardly
to explain "gather feathers*' in the
extract.
What ! was I born to be the scorn of kin ?
To gather feathers like a hopper-crow,
And lose them iu the height of all my pomp ?
Greene, James IV., v. 2.
Hopper-hipped, lame in the hip.
She is bow-legged, hopper-hipned, and be-
twixt pomatum and Spanish rea has a com-
plexion like Holland cheese. — Wycherley9
Love in a Wood, ii. 1.
Hop -scot, a game, usually called
hopscotcfi. A boy hopping on one
foot pushes therewith a stone from one
square to another in a plan marked on
the ground.
A very common game at every school
called hop-scot. — Archaologia, ix. 18 (1789).
Horkey, harvest-home feast.
Home came the jovial Horkey load,
Last of the whole year's crop ;
And Grace amongst the green boughs rode,
Bight plump upon the top.
Bloomjield, The Horkey.
Hormangorgs, apparently = legs or
feet.
Without those gaiters I know not how my .
poor hormangorgs are to be kept warm. —
Southey, Letters, 1811 (ii. 235).
Horner, adulterer or cuckold-maker.
And many a Lawyer was painstaker
Twixt cuckold and the cuckold-maker ;
Till th' Jury weighing the disgraces.
And that it might be their own cases,
Their favour gave with sense adorn 'd,
Not to the horner, but the horn'd.
D'Urfey, Collins Walk, cant. 3.
Horn-mad, raving mad : generally
with some reference to cuckold om.
All that I speak I mean, yet I'm not mad,
Not horn-mod, see you ? Go to, show yourself
Obedient, and a wife. — Jonson, Fox, iii. 6.
Proud and vainglorious persons are cer-
tainly mad ; and so are lascivious : I can feele
their pulses beat hither, home mad some of
them, to let others lye with their wives and
winke at it. — Burton, Democ. to BeacUr, p. 74.
Death and Furies, will you not hear me ?
Why, by Heaven, she laughs, grins, points to
your back ; she forks out cuckoldom with her
fingers, and you're running horn mad after
HORN-MADDED ( 321 ) HORSE AND FOOT
your fortune. — Congreve, Double Dealer,
Act IV.
Horn-madded, made very mad:
there is probably also a reference to
cuckoldom.
The Houses know not what to think,
The Cits horn-madded be.
Needham, Eng. Rebellion, 1661
(Earl. Misc., ii. 523).
Horn-sheath, scabbard of horn.
Among other customs they have in that
town [Genoa], one is, that none must carry a
grinted knife about him ; which makes the
ollander, who is us'd to snik and snee, to
leave his horn-sheath and knife a shipboard
when he comes ashore. — Howell, Letters, I.
i. 41.
Horrific at ion, something that
causes horror.
As the old woman and her miserable blue
light went on before us, I could almost have
thought of Sir Betrand, or of some German
horrtjteaUons. — Miss Edgeworth, Belinda,
ch. hi.
Horrisonant, terribly sounding.
If it had been necessary to exact implicit
tod profound belief by mysterious and hori-
sonant (sic) terms, he could have amazed the
listener with the Lords of Decanats, the Five
Fortitudes, and the Head and Tail of the
Dragon. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxxxvi.
Horror, awe, without any repug-
nance implied.
That super-oodlestial food in the Lord's
Supper which a Christian ought not once to
think of without a sacred kind of horror and
reverence. — Socket, Life of Williams, ii. 56.
The Abbey of Westminster . . . struck a
sort of sacred horror into us, and inspired an
unsought devotion to the deity it was erected
to.— r. Brown, Works, iii. 126.
Horrors, extreme depression, especi-
ally that which follows on bard drink-
ing, or the terror suffered in delirium
tremens.
As you promise our stay shall be short, if
I don't die of the horrors, I shall certainly
try to make the agreeable. — Miss Ferrier,
Marriage, ch. iii
Give me the keys, dad, and let me get a
drink of brandy; I've been vexed and had
nought to drink all night. I shall be getting
the horrors if I don't have something before
I go to bed. — JET. Kingsley, Geoffry Mamlyn,
ch. vi.
Horse, a stand or framework on
which anything is placed or sup-
ported. Cf. Clothes-horse. The ex-
tract is from a description by a gentle-
man to an English friend of his passage
over M. Cenis.
A kind of horse, as it is called with you,
with two poles like those of chairmen, was
the vehicle; on which is secured a sort of
elbow-chair in which the traveller sits —
Richardson, Qrandison, iv. 299.
Horse, to ride ; also to mount a boy
on another person's back, for the con-
venience of flogging him. L. has an
instance where the word is used of a
man who was carrying a deer on his
back.
Up early, and my father and I alone talked
about our business, and then we all horsed
away to Cambridge. — Pfpys, Sept. 19, 1661.
Here, Jacky, down with his trousers, and
horse him for me directly . — JET. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, i. 104.
Andrew was ordered to horse, and Frank to
flog the criminal.—/^, i 232.
H0R8K, used as a term of reproach :
this I suppose to be the meaning of the
pun in the second extract.
If I tell thee a lie, spit in my face, call me
horse. — 1 Hen. IV., II. iv.
Your mayor (a very horse, and a traitor to
our city) . . . must quarrel with the boys
at their recreations. — British Bellman, 1648
(Harl. Misc., vii. 636).
Tell the old rascal that sent you hither
that I spit in his face, and call him horse. —
Smollett, P. Pickle, ch. xiv.
Horse.
After this we went to a sport called selling
of a horse for a dish of eggs and herrings, and
sat talking there till almost twelve at night.
—Pepys, Feb. 2, 1669-60.
Horse. To ride the high horse = to
take high ground ; to be proud.
She appeared to be on her high horse to-
night; both her words and her air seemed
intended to excite not only the admiration,
but the amazement of her auditors. — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
Booster forsooth must ride the high^ horse
now he is married and lives at Chanticlere,
and give her warning to avoid my company
or his. — Thackeray, The Nevcomes, ch. lvii.
Horse and foot, right and left.
I made a dangerous thrust at him, and
violently overthrew him horse and foot. — >
Grim, The Collier, Act IV.
The house always found out who were
their guardians and sponsors to answer for
them; and such never failed through their
indiscretions, presumptions, importunities,
subterfuges, or tricks, to give advantage
against themselves ; and in a few days com-
monly were routed horse and foot. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, i. 175.
She played at pharaoh two or three times
at Princess Croon's, where she cheats horse
and foot.— Walpole, Letters, i. 87 (1740).
HORSE AND HATTOCK ( 322 )
HORSINESS
Horse and Hattock. See quotation
and H. a. v.
Being in the fields, he heard the noise of
a whirlwind, and of voices crying, Horse and
Hattock (this is the word which the fairies
are said to use when they remove from any
place), whereupon he cried Horse and Hattock
also, and was immediately caught up and
transported through the air by the fairies. —
— Letter to Aubrey, March 25, 16*95 {Misc.,
p. 149).
Away with you, sirs, get your boots and
your beasts— horse and hattock, I say, and let
us meet at the East Port. — Scott, Fair Maid
of Perth, \. 140.
Horse - godmother, a large coarse
woman.
In woman, angel-sweetness let me see,
No galloping horse-godmothers for me.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 14.
Horse-koper, horse-dealer. Cope =
to exchange. The place spoken of is
Penkrige in Staffordshire.
We were told there were not less than an
hundred jockeys or horse-copers, as they call
them there, from London, to buy horses for
sale.— Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, ii. 897.
Horse-meal, food without drink.
Eating never hurt any one who washed
down his victuals with a glass of good wine ;
horse-meals indeed are enough to choak hu-
man creatures. — Johnston, Chrysal, i. 220.
Horse nest, something ridiculous or
unfounded : mares nest is more com-
mon.
Soom grammatical pullet, hacht in Dis-
pater his sachel, would stand clocking agaynst
mee, as though hee had found an horse nest, in
laying that downe for a fait that perhaps I
dooe knowe better then hee. — Stanyhurst,
Virgil (To the Reader).
To laugh at a horse nest,
And whine too like a boy,
If anything do crosse his minde,
Though it be but a toy.
Breton, Schoole of Fancie, p. 6.
Horse night-cap. N., who cites the
first extract, explains it " a bundle of
straw," but it seems to mean a night-
cap used at executions.
Those that clip that they should not, shall
have a horse night-cap for their labour. —
Pennyless Parliament, 1008 {Harl. Misc., i.
181).
He better deserves to go up Holbourn in a
wooden chariot, and have a horse night-cap
put on at the farther end. — Dialogue on Ox-
ford Parliament, 1681 (Ibid. ii. 125).
Horse-play, rough sport. Horse in
composition often means large or coarse :
horse-laugh) horse-godmother, &c.
They served you right enough; will you
never have done with your horse-play? —
Cibber, Prov. Husband, Act II.
Horseponded, ducked in a horsepond.
" Horsewhipt ! Miss Beverley, pray did
you say any such thing?" *' Ay," cried
Moncton again, " and not only horsewhipt,
but horseponded, for she thought when one
had heated, the other might cool you." —
Mad. D'ArUay, Cecilia, Bk. VL ch. x.
If she had ordered me to be horseponded,
I do protest to you I would not have de-
murred.— Ibid., Camilla, Bk. III. ch. x.
Horse running, horse race.
The Forest of Galtres, . . . very notorious
in these daies by reason of a solemne ho rue
running, wherein the horse that outrun net h
the rest hath for his prise a little golden bell.
—Holland's Camden, p. 723.
Horses. To set up horses together =»
to unite or agree. See another extract
from Brown, s. v. Tub-drubber.
If the Spaniards and French set up their
horses no better in your world than they do
with us, 'tis easy to predict that the unna-
tural conjunction of the two kingdoms will
be soon sbatter'd to pieces. — T. Brown,
Works, ii. 288.
Horse's-leo, a species of bassoon.
He was also taught . . . how to play pass-
ably upon several of those numerous instru-
ments which make up a complete country
choir; that called the Horsc's-leg being
Asaph's favourite ; though, to speak the
truth, nearly as much music might have
been brought out of its prototype as he ever
produced from the Bassoon itself. — Legends
of London, ii. 183 (1832).
Horse-trick, a rough practical joke.
Make her leap, caper, jerk, and laugh, and
sing,
And play me horse-tricks.
Merry Devil of Edmonton (Dodsley, O.
PI., xi. 136).
Horsewoman, a woman who rides.
Nor did her attendant do her much good
by his comments on Miss Crawford's great
cleverness as a horsewoman. — Miss Austen,
Mansfield Park, ch. vii.
Horsiness, that which pertains to
horses, as the smell of a stable.
Eliz. Your boots are from the horses.
Bed. Ay, my lady.
"When next there comes a missive from the
Queen,
It shall be all my study for one hour
To rose and lavender my horsiness,
Before I dare to glance upon your Grace.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, iii. 5.
HORSY
( 3«3 )
HOT WATER
Hobst, connected with horses ; sport-
ing.
There was a gentleman with bandy legs
who was horsy. I strongly object to using a
slang adjective, if any other can be got to
supply its place ; but by doing so sometimes
ooe avoids a periphrasis, and does not spoil
one's period. Thus I know of no predicate
for a gentleman with a particular sort of
hair, complexion, dress, whiskers, and legs,
except the one I have used above. — H.
Kinysley, Ravenshoe, ch. zzx.
Hose. The hose are meant for the
feet or legs, hence perhaps a man with
a hose on his head = a fool, one with
the wrong side uppermost.
Well, come, a man's a man if he has but a
h>se on his head. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
IIose, the outer covering of straw or
corn.
The hot San arising sealeth (to use the
Husbandman's phrase) the Mildew upon the
Straw, and so intercepteth the nourishment
betwixt the Root and the Ear, especially if
it falleth not on the Hoase (which is but
another case, and hath another Tunicle under
it), but on the stripped Straw near to the
top of the Stalk.— Fuller, Worthies, Middle-
sex (ii. 48).
The honey-dews . . . close and glew up the
tender hose of the ear. — Ellis, Modem Hus-
handauxn, II. i. 2 (1750).
f Hose and doublet, out and out (?) ;
i or perhaps " hose and dublet stinck-
ard " = one who bewrays his clothes.
0 tis a grave old louer that same Duke,
And chooses minions rarely, if you marke
him:
The noble Medice, that man, that Bobbadilla,
That foolish knaue, that hose and dublet
stinckard. — Chapman, Gentleman rsA*r,v.l.
H06ELESS, without stockings.
, She smiled, and calmly seating herself,
protruded her foot, shod, but noseless and
Kente&.—Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxiv.
Host. To reckon without one's host
== to be disappointed in a plan. Hey-
lin gives the proverb in a fuller fonn.
See also H. *. v.
He that hath to deale with that nation
[Spain] must have good store of phlegme
1 and patience, and both for his staye and sue-
cease of businesse, may often reckon without
h's host upon the businesse went about, and
for any one to prescribe a precise time to
conclude any businesse there, is to reckon
""'thout one's host. — Howell, Forraine Travell,
•wt. 10.
I The old English proverb telleth us that
}uthty that reckon without their host are to
reckon twice ; n and so it fared with this in-
fatuated people. — Heylin, Hist, of Reforma-
tion, i. 93.
Hot-brain, an impetuous, fiery per-
son.
Orators' wives shortly will be known like
images on water-stairs, ever in one weather-
beaten suit, as if none wore hoods but monks
and ladies, . . . nor perriwigs but players and
hot-brains. — Machin, Dumb Knight, Act I.
Hotel. See extract. Ash's Diction-
ary (1775) has " Hostel, an inn, an
hotel ; " Barclay (1792) has " Hostel,
pronounced Hotel ; " and Walker (1817)
gives " Hostel, Hotel, a genteel inn :
this word is now universally pronounced
and written without the «." In the
quotation from Combe the word requires
to be pronounced after the fashion of
Meg Dods.
This Gallic word (hfitel) was first introduced
in Scotland during the author's childhood,
and was so pronounced [hottle] by the lower
class. — Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ch. i., note.
He a convenient sitting shared ;
Pat took his place beside the guard ;
And having safe arriv'd in town,
At Hatchett's Hotel were set down.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. vi.
Hot- foot, quickly ; eagerly : in the
fortnfote-hot it occurs in early writers.
SeeH.
The stream was deep here, but some fifty
yards below was a shallow for which he made
off hot-foot. — Hughes, Tom Brown's School"
Days, Ft. I. ch. iz.
Hot- pot. Grose, quoted by H., defines
it a mixture of ale and spirits made
hot, and it is still used in Sussex in this
sense (Parish's Glossary), but in the
subjoined extract it means some hot
edible.
The Colonel himself was great at making
hash mutton, hot-pot* curry, and pillau. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xvi.
Hottentotism. See extract.
The very name of Hottentots applied to
the Mamaques and other kindred tribes ap-
pears to be . . a rude imitative word coined
by the Dutch to express the clicking " hot en-
tot," and the term Hottentotism has been,
thence adopted as a medical description of
one of the varieties of stammering. — E.
Tyler, Primitive Culture, i. 172.
Hotterino, raging.
Haply, but for her, I should ha' gone
hot ten ng mad. — Dickens, Hard Times, ch. xi.
Hot water, scrape, or state of quar-
relling.
T 2
HOULLIES
( 324 ) HOUSE-TO-HOUSE
M It is our battle he is describing." « Which
of 'em ? we live in hot-water." — Reads, Never
too late to Mend, ch. lxx.
Tom . . . was in everlasting hot water as
the most incorrigible scapegrace for ten
miles round. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. i.
Houllies. See extract.
The occasion why I was mention'd was
from what I had said in my Sylva three
years before about a sort of f uell for a neede
which obstructed a patent of Lord Carling-
ford, who had been seeking for it himselfe.
... In the meantime they had made an
experiment of my receipt of houllies, which I
mention in my booke to be made at Maes-
tricht with a mixture of charcoal dust and
loame, and which was tried with success© at
Gresham Oolledge. — Evelyn, Diary, July 2,
1667.
Hound. The etymology in the text
is cited as curious, rot as correct. The
extract is from a Treatise on English
Dogs, written by Dr. Caius in Latin for
Conrad Gesner, 1536, and translated by
A. Fleming, 1576.
Sound is derived of our English word
"hunt." One letter changed into another,
namely, T into D, as " hunt/' u hund : " whom
if you conjecture to be so named of your
country word Hunde, which signifieth the
general name " Dog," because of the simili-
tude and Jikeness of the words, I will not
stand in contradiction, friend Gesner ! . . . .
As in your language hunde is the common
word, so in our natural tongue dog is the
universal ; but hound is particular, and a
special ; for it signifieth such a dog only as
serveth to hunt, and therefore it is called a
hound. — Eng. Garner, iii. 263.
House. L. illustrates The House =
House of Parliament, also theatre ; but
The House likewise = the Union work-
house.
We've had Larkins the baker coming to
inquire if there's parish pay to look to for
tout bill, Mrs. Armstrong, and I have told
htm No, not a farthing, not the quarter of a
farthing, unless you'll come into the house. —
Mrs. Trollops, Michael Armstrong, ch. iv.
House-dove, a stay-at-home.
Then the home-tarriers and house-doves
that kept Some still began to repent them
that it was not their hap to go with him. —
North's Plutarch, Coriolanus, p. 14 (ed. Skeat).
Tie as daintie to see you abroad as to eate
a messe of sweete milke in Italy ; you are
pronde such a house doue of late, or rather
so good a Huswife, that no man may see you
unaer a couple of Capons. — Greene, Mena-
phon, p. 85.
I . . . was not such a house-dove . . . but
that I had visited some houses in London. —
Ibid., Theeves falling out, 1615 (ffarl. Misc.,
viii. 401).
He had two daughters that knew well how
to order a house : they were his house-doves,
but now they are flown. — Broome, Jovial
Crew, Act IV.
H0U8ELE8SNE88, the condition of
having no house.
In the course of those nights I finished
my education in a f idr amateur experience of
houselessness. — Dickens, Uncommercial Travel-
ler, xiii.
H0U8ELET, little house.
The style of building strikes as being
more roomy and gentlemanlike than the
squeezed cabin-parloured houselets of Dover.
— W. Taylor, 1802 (Robberds, Memoir, i. 410.)
Housemate, one who resides with
another.
A stranger of reverend aspect entered,
and, with grave salutation, stood before the
two rather astonished housemates. — Carlyle,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. II. ch. i.
House-mother, the mistress of a
family: housewife is the more usual
term.
Men know not what the pantry is when it
grows empty ; only house-mothers know. O
women, wives of men that will only calculate,
and not act! PatrollotUm is strong; but
death by starvation and military onfall is
stronger. PatrollotUm represses male pa-
triotism, but female patriotism ? — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. iii.
The house-mother comes down to her family
with a sad face. — Thackeray, Roundabout Pa-
pers, xviii.
House out or windows, a state of
confusion.
We are at home now; where, I warrant
you, you shall find the house Jlung out of the
windows.— Beaum. and Fl., Knt. of B. Pestle,
m • • mm
111. 5.
Who troubles the house? Not unruly,
headstrong, debauched children, that are
ready to throw the house out of windows,
but the austere father. — Bp. Hall, Hrorks,
v. 195.
44 1 rejoice you are come/* savs she ; " did
you not meet the house in the square?"
** What means my Emily ? » u Why, it has
been flung out of windows, as the saying is.
Ah, Madam, we are all to pieces." — Richard-
son, Grandison, iv. 219.
House-to-house, a compound word
used adjectivally, and meaning that
every house in a place is visited or
canvassed or inspected, as the case
may be, in regular order.
I am struck more and more with the
amount of disease and death I see around
HOUSE-WARM ( 325 )
HUDDLE
me in all classes, which no sanitary legisla-
tion whatsoever could touch, unless you had
a complete house-to-house visitation of a
government officer, with powers to enter
every house, to drain and ventilate it, and
not only do that, bat to regulate the clothes
and the diet of every inhabitant, and that
among all ranks. — C. Kingsley, 1859 (Life, ii.
House-warm, to make a feast on
persons going into a new house. The
substantive house-warming is in com-
mon use.
Up, and was presented by Burton, one of
our smiths' wives, with a very noble cake,
which I presently resolved to have my wife
go with to-day, and some wine, and house-
ram my Betty Michell. — Pepys, Nov. 1,
1666.
Housty. See quotation.
Lady Grenvile . . had a great opinion of
Lucy's medical skill, and always sent for her
if one of the children had a housty, i. e. sore-
throat. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xv.
Hovable, suitable. In the edition
of 1555 the reading is behouabU.
Vouchesane to here our wretchednes, and
proayde a convenyent and houable remedy
for the same. — Bp. Fisher, p. 51.
How and about, full particulars.
Be good, and write me everything how
and about it ; and write to the moment ; you
cannot be too minute. — Richardson, Grandi-
am, vi. 63.
Howry, filthy. See Glossary to the
Exmoor Scolding (E. D. S.), s. v. horry.
I 'ears es Vd gie fur a howry owd book
thatty pound an' moor. — Tennyson, Village
Howsomdeveb, a common vulgarism
for however. Howsomever occurs in
a quotation from Smollett, s. v. Hoo.
The countrymen referred to in the
second extract are Berkshire men.
I didn't like my burth tbo', howsomdever,
Because the yarn, you see, kept getting
tauter.
Hood, Sailor's Apology for Bow-legs.
Hotcsufndever, as vour countrymen say, I
shall have a shy at him. — Hughes, Tom Brown
at Oxford, ch. xliv.
Hoydenish, romping.
She is very handsome, and mighty gay and
giddy, half tonish and half hoydenish. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, i. 306.
She would be the better for a little polish-
ing, wouldn't she, eh? Too hoydenish and
forward, I ain afraid ; too fond of speaking
the truth. — H. Kingsley, Qeoffry Hamlyn,
ch. xxviii.
Hub, abbreviation of husband.
Tell me the prattle of our town,
Of all that's passing and has past,
Since your dear Hub beheld it last.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. ix.
Hubber-bubber, in a state of rage or
excitement.
But as the staircase he descended,
He found the passage well defended ;
There the hag stood, all hubber-bubber,
A haif-dress'd form of living blubber.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. iv.
Hubbubish, noisy.
Better remain by rubbish guarded,
Than thus hubbubish groan placarded.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 58.
Huck, hip.
Once of a frosty night I slithered and
hurted my huck. — Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Huckaback, a stout, coarse material ;
hence used by Walpole for permanent,
something that will stand wear and tear.
Campbell - goodness no more wears out
than Campbell-beauty ; all their good quali-
ties are huckaback. — Walpole, Letters, ii. 121
(1750). "
Madame Dunois in the Fairy Tales used
to tapestry them with jonquils, but as that
furniture will not last above a fortnight in
the year, I shall prefer something more
huckaback.— Ibid. iii. 24 (1765).
Huckle-bone, according to the Diets,
hip-bone, and in some places it means
this, but see extract.
' AirrpdyaXot is in Latin talus, and it is
the little square huccle bone in the ancle place
of the hinder legge in all beastes, sauing man,
and soche beastes as haue fingers, as for ex-
ample, apes and mounkeis, except also beastes
that haue the houfe of the fote not clouen,
but whole. — TJdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p.
185.
Huckson, hock or ankle.
Orr sweet lady, reach to me
The abdomen of a bee ;
Or commend a cricket's hip,
Or his huckson to my scrip.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 239.
Hudde, a husk; and so a term of
reproach : an empty fellow.
What, ye brain-sick fools, ye hoddy-pecks,
ye doddy-pouls, ye huddes, do ye believe
Him ? are ye seduced also ? — Latimer, i. 136.
Huddle, confusedly.
It is impossible to set forth either all that
was (God knoweth!) tumultuously spoken,
and like as of mad men objected of so many,
which spake oftentimes huddle, so that one
couldn't well hear another. — Ridley, p. 304.
HUDDLE
( 326 )
HVGMA TEE
Hcjddlk, a term at shovel-board.
The Earl of Kildare, seeing his writ of
death brought in, when he was at shnffle-
board, throws his cast with this in his month,
44 Whatsoever that is, this is for a huddle." —
Ward, Sermons, p. 58.
Huddle and kettle. Huddle =
an old person, is in N., but I do not
know what kettle means in this con-
nection.
Stro. O noble Crone,
Now such a huddle and kettle neuer was.
Chapman, Gentleman Vsher, ii. 1.
Huddle - duddle, an old decrepit
person.
Those gray -beard huddle - duddles and
crusty cum-twaugs were strooke with such
stinging remorse of their miserable euclion-
isme and snudgery that bee was not yet cold
in his grave but they challenged him to be
borne amongst them. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Marl. Misc., vi. 147).
Huddle upon huddle, all in a heap.
Randal's fortunes come tumbling in like
lawyers' fees, huddle upon huddle. — Rowley,
Match at Midnight, Act IV.
Hue, beauty.
Nor do I come, as Jupiter did erst
Unto the palace of Amphitryon,
For any fond or foul concupiscence
Which I do bear to Alcumena's hue .
Greene, Alphonsus, Act III.
As thus I sat disdaining, of proud Love,
M Have over, ferryman," there cried a boy ;
And with him was a paragon for hue,
A lovely damsel beauteous and coy.
Ibid. p. 300 (from Never too late).
Hue and cry, to hunt.
But what is become of the rest of our
minor plots of the Sham ? We may hue and
cry all over his book, and hear no tidings of
them. — North, Examen, p. 233.
Hueless, colourless.
The wild expression of intense anguish
. . . dwelt on those hueless and sunken fea-
tures.— Lytton, Pelham, ch. vi.
His face flushed ; olive cheek and hueless
forehead received a glow.— C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre* ch. xxvi.
Huff, a swaggerer.
There are many men in the world who,
without the least arrogance or self-conceit,
have yet so just a value both for themselves
and others, as to scorn to flatter and gloss,
to fall down and worship, to lick the spittle
and kiss the feet of any proud, swelling,
overgrown, domineering huff whatsoever. —
South, vi. 107.
I was acquainted with a captain ; he was a
man of punctilio and ceremony, better at his
tongue than at his weapon ; he swore better
than he fought, and was more famous for
caning his company than for storming half-
moons. This young huff commanded a ser-
geant to pay him respect. — Gentleman lit'
structed, p. 185.
Huffcap, as meaning strong ale, is
given in N., but in the extract it is
used as an adjective.
In what towne there is the signe of the
three mariners, the huffe-cappest drink in that
house you shall be sure of alwayes. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Marl. Misc., vi. 180).
Huffiness, readiness to take of-
fence. The writer of a letter in The
Guardian newspaper, March 17, 1880,
speaks of " huffiness (if I may coin the
word)."
It would be time well spent that should
join professional studies with that degree of
polite culture which gives dignity and cures
huffiness. — Lytton, What will he do with it ?
Bk. IV. ch. xi.
Huffle. H. gives this as a West-
country word = to blow unsteadily or
rough. Juno addresses iEolus, as em-
powered by Jove,
Too swage seas surging, or raise by blus-
terus huffing. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 75.
Huff-puffed, swollen ; bloated.
Hvff-pufft Ambition, tinder-box of war,
Down-fall of angels, Adam's murderer !
Sylvester, The Decay, 12.
Huffy, ready to take offence. L.
has both huffy and huffiness, but in a
somewhat different sense.
Huffy! decidedly huffy! and of all causes
that disturb regiments and induce courts-
martial, the commonest cause is a huffy lad.
—Lytton, What will he do with it? Bk. IV.
ch. xi.
Huge, used as a substantive for bulk.
The Arke of God which wisedom more did
holde
In Tables two, then all the Greeks haue
tolde;
And more than euer Rome could comprehend
In huge of learned books that they ypend.
Hudson's Judith, i. 102.
Hugger, to wrap up ; conceal. Cf.
Hugger-mugger.
Goe, Muse, abroade, and beate the world
about,
Tell trueth for shame and hugger vp no ill.
Breton, PasquiVs Madcappe, p. 11.
Hugmatee, apparently some sort of
drink.
No hugmateenoT flip my grief can smother,
I lov'd thee, Dobbin, better than my brother.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 218.
HULCHY
( 327 )
HUMBLING
Hulchy, humpy.
What can be the signification of the uneven
shrugging of her hulchy shoulders ?
Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xvii.
Hulder, alder (?).
Hulder, black thorne, semes tree, beche*
elder, aspe, and ealowe, eyther for theyr
wekenes or lyghtenesse make holow, starting,
studding, gaddynge shaftes. — Ascham, Toxo-
philus, p. 125.
Hulking, huge ; unwieldy. Hulk is
a big ship, and is applied by Shake-
speare to Fal staff.
Why, Tom, you are grown a huge hulking
fellow since I saw you last. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, ii. 165.
Hulky, big ; loutish.
I want to go first and have a round with
that hulky fellow who turned to challenge
me. — G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. lvi.
Hull, holly.
Oft did a left hand crow foretell these
things in her hull tree.— Webbe, Discourse of
Eng. Poetrie, p. 74.
Hullabaloo, noise ; outcry.
Because some half-a-dozen farmers sent
me a round-robin to the effect that their
rents were too high, and I wrote them word
that the rents should be lowered, there was
such a hullabaloo, — you would have thought
heaven and earth were coming together. —
Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XIV. ch. v.
Hulve, pipe (?).
The trunk or hulve that should convey the
water. — Giles Jacob, Complete Court-Keeper
(1781), p. 114.
Humber, hummer (?). The river
according to some is so called from its
noise. " Well may the Humber take
its name from the noise it makes, for
in an high wind it is incredibly great
and terrible" (Defoe, Tour thro' G.
Britain, iii. 11). though at p. 60 of the
same volume another derivation is
given, viz., from Humber, a piratical
Northern chief.
The Nightingale, pearcht on the tender
spring
Of sweetest hawthorn, hangs her drowsie
wing,
The Swallow's silent, and the lowdest
Humber,
leaning upon the earth, now seems to
slumber. — Sylvester, The Vocation, 606.
Hum, to humbug or deceive.
I don't mean to cajole you hither with the
expectation of amusement or entertainment ;
you and I know better than to hum or be
hummed in that manner. — Mad. D'ArUay,
Diary, ii. 153i
"Come, gentle Spring, ethereal mildness,
come ! "
Oh, Thomson, void of rhyme as well as
reason,
How could 'st thou thus poor human nature
hum ?
There's no such season.
Hood, Spring.
Hum and haw, to hesitate ; to beat
about the bush ; used also (in the first
quotation) as a substantive.
Peters more scurvily said the business was
so long doubtful, that God was brought to
his hums and hatces, which way he should
fling the victory. — Paman to Sancroft, March
5, 1652 (D'Oyley's Life of Sancroft, p. 49).
" Well, you fellow," says my lord, " what
have you to say ? Don't stand humming
and hatring, but speak out." — Tom Jones, Bk.
VIII. ch. xi.
Humanify, to make man.
I will not dispute whether He could not
have received us again to favour by some
nearer and easier way than for His own Son
to be humanified, and being man to be cruci-
fied.— Adams, iii. 211.
Humbled, galled (?).
If one lav them very hot to kibed or
humbled heeles, they will cure them. — Hol-
land, Pliny, xx. 3.
Humblefication, humility.
The Prospectus . . . has about it a sort of
unmanly humblejication which is not sincere.
—Southey, Letters, 1809 (ii. 120).
Humble-pie. To eat humble-pie =
to submit or apologize. It is a pun on
umble-pU, a pie made of the umoles of
an animal. See L.
" You drank too much wine last ni^ht, and
disgraced yourself, sir," the old soldier said.
"You must get up and eat humble-pie this
morning, my boy. — Thackeray, Newcomes,
ch. xiv.
Humblesso, an obeisance ; a jocular
form of humblesse.
He kissed his hand thrice and made as
many humblessos ere he would finger it. —
Naihe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 172).
Humbling. N., s. v. humble-bee, says
that Todd has produced from Chaucer
an instance of humbling in the sense
of humming or rumbling. An example
from a later writer is subjoined, and
another still later, i. e. from Stanyhurst,
will be found, a. v. Mutterous.
It is better to say it sententious^ one
time, than to run it over an hundred times
HUM-BOX
(328 )
HURL
with humbling and rambling. — Latimer, i.
344
Hum -box, a pulpit (slang). See
extract «. v. Jackey.
Humbuggable, gullible.
My charity does not extend so far as to
believe that any reasonable man {humbuggable
as the animal is) can have been so humbugged.
— Southey, Letters, 1825 (iii. 488).
Humbugs. See extract
He had provided himself with a paper of
humbugs for the child; humbugs being the
north-country term for certain lumps of toffy
well flavoured with peppermint. — Mrs. Gas-
hell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. ziiii.
Humdrum, a stupid fellow ; also pros-
ing, common-place talk : the word is
usually an adjective.
By gads-lid I scorn it, I, so I do, to be a
consort for every hum-drum. — Jonson, Every
Man in his Humour, i. 1.
I am frequently forced to go to my harp-
sichord to keep me awake, and to silence his
humdrum. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii. 191.
Humdurgeon, nervous illness ; hypo-
chondria (slang).
His ravings and humdurgeon will unman all
our youngsters. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. lux.
Humgbuffin, a terrible or repulsive
person.
All shrunk from the glance of that keen-
flashing eye.
Save one horrid Humgruffin, who seem'd by
his talk,
And the airs he assumed, to be cock of the
walk. — Ingoldsby Legends (St. Cuthbert).
Humorologt, the study of humour.
Oh men ignorant of humorology! more
ignorant of psychology ! and most ignorant
of Pantagruelism !— Sout hey, The Doctor, In-
terchapter xiii.
Humorsombness, caprice.
I never blame a lady for her humor someness
so much as, in my mind, 1 blame her mother.
— Richardson, Grandison, iv. 25.
Humph, to mutter an interjectional
sound like humph. Cf. to pish, to
PSHAW, tO TUT.
Fanny was first roused by his calling out
to her, after humphing and considering over a
particular paragraph, " What's the name of
your great cousin in town, Fan ? " — Miss
Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. adv.
Hundreds in Essex. See extracts.
From hence [Tilbury Fort] there is nothing
for many miles together remarkable but a
continued level of unhealthy marshes called
The Three Hundreds, till we come before
Leigh.— Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, i. 7.
Some airs have been observed by natural-
ists to breed agues as the hundreds in Essex.
—T. Brown, Works, i. 212.
The shadow of the theatre is starving, and
the air of it as naturally produces poverty as
that of the hundreds in Essex begets agues. —
Ibid. iv. 198.
Hunfyshskin, skin of the hound-fish
or dog-fish.
Many archers vse to haue summe place
made in theyr cote fitte for a lytle fyle, a
stone, a Hunfyshskin, and a cloth to dresse
the shaft fit agayne at all nedes.— Ascham,
Toxophilus, p. 161.
Hungerland, connected with him-
gerlin (?); perhaps rather Hungarian,
as the ruffs are described as Spanish.
Your Hungerland bands, and Spanish quel-
lio ruffs. — Massinger, City Madam, iv. 4.
Hungerworm, insatiable hunger.
Hath any gentleman the hunger-worm of
covetousness? here is cheer for his diet. —
Adams, i. 161.
Hunkers, hams ; haunches. H. gives
it as a North-country word, but the
speaker in the extract is an Irishwoman.
Hunkering is sometimes now used to
describe the practice of those who in
church bob their heads against the
bookboard, or sit upon their haunches
instead of kneeling properly.
My anshestors sat on a throne, when the
McBrides had only their hunkers to sit upon.
— Miss Edgeworth, Love and Law, i. 4.
Hunt the whistle, a romping game
in which a blinded person has a whistle
fastened to him : the other players blow
this from time to time, and the blinded
one tries to catch the blower.
What pastimes be they ? we bent enough
for hunt the whistle nor blind-man's buff. —
Foote, The Author, ii. 1.
Hurdle seems to = heap in the
quotation, unless it be a misprint for
huddle.
Hard by was Absalom's tomb, consisting of
a great pit to hold, and a great heap of
stones to hide a great traitor under it. . . .
No methodicall monument but this hurdle of
stones was fittest for such a causer of confu-
sion.—Fuller, Pisgah Sight, H. ii. 15.
Hurl, to throw : the idea of great
force and violence, always associated
with the word now, is not conveyed in
the extracts.
A heavenly veil she hurls
On her white shoulders.
Chapman, Iliad, xiv. 150.
HURLEMElSiT ' ( 329 )
HYPER
Since I wan hurVd among these walls [the
Fleet prison] I had divers fits of melancholy.
— Howell, Letters, ii. 30.
HURLEMENT, C0nfu810n.
King Edward, . . . discouering both this
accident and the hurlement made by the
change of place, slacks not to take aduantage
thereof. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 200.
Hurry. See extract.
The wrongful heir comes in to two bars of
qnick music (technically called a hurry), and
goes on in the most shocking manner. —
Sketches by Box {Greenwich Fair).
Hurry-durry, rough ; hasty (?).
*Tis a hurry-durry blade: dost thou re-
member after we had tugged hard the old
leaky long-boat to save his life, when I wel-
comed him ashore, he gave me a box on the
ear, and called me fawning water-dog. — Wy*
ckerley, Plain Dealer, i. 1.
Hurted, hurt. See extract s. v.
Huck.
I am afraid he is hurted very sadly. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 273.
Randal. He's but little hurted.
Honor. Hurted ! and by who ? by yon, is it ?
Miss Edgeworth, Love and Law, ii. 2.
Hurtlessness, innocence.
The maids .... hoping that the goodness
of their intention, and the hurtlessness of
their sex, shall excuse the breach of the
commandment. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 235.
Husband. The etymology in the
extracts is now exploded, but yet is
worth recording.
The name of a husband what is it to saie ?
Of wife and the houshold the band and the
staie. — Tusser, p. 16.
See my guardian, her husband. Unfashion-
able as the word is, it is a pretty word : the
house-band that ties all together : is not that
the meaning? — Richardson, Grandison, vi.
375.
Husbandly, frugally.
The noble client reviewed his bill over and
over, for however moderately and husbandly
the cause was managed, he thought the sum
total a great deal too much for the lawyers.
— North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 36.
Hussy, hussif , q. v. in L.
I went towards the pond, the maid follow-
ing me, and dropt purposely my hussy ; and
when I came near the tiles I said, "Mrs.
Anne, I have dropt my hussy" — Richardson,
Pamela, i. 162.
Huzza. This word is in the Diets. ;
but the extract from North is given as
seeming to show that huzza, as a com-
mon cheer, came in in Charles II. f s
reign ; nor do any of the quotations in
R. or L. contradict this. The last extract
supplies an absurd etymology. In the
quotations from Wycherley huzza is used
as a substantive and adjective = rake
or rakish.
We are not so much afraid to be taken up
by the watch as by the tearing midnight
ramblers or huzza women. — Wycherley,
Gentleman Dancing Master, i. 2.
You begin to be something too old for us ;
we are for the brisk huzzas of seventeen or
eighteen. — Ibid.
It is not to be denied but at many meet-
ings good fellowship in way of healths ran
into some extravagance and noise, as that
which they call huzzaing, an usage then at its
perfection. It was derived from the marine,
and the shouts the seamen make when friends
come aboard or go off. . . So at all the Tory
healths, as they were called, the cry was
reared of Huzza ! which at great and solemn
feasts made a little noise. — North, Examen,
p. 617.
This most learned monk [Ooronelli] informs
us in his account of England that the Huzza,
which is the cry of the London mob when
they are pleas'd, comes from the Hebrew
word Hosanah. What a charming thing it is
to understand etymology. — Misson, Travels
in Eng., p. 43.
Hydrargire, quicksilver.
For th' hidden loue that now-a-dayes doth
holde
The steel and loadstone, hydrargire and
golde,
Th' amber and straw.
Sylvester, The Furies, 67.
Hydroptic, dropsical; thirsty: hy-
dropic is the usual form.
He, soul- hydroptic with a sacred thirst,
Sucked at the flagon.
Browning, Grammarian1 s Funeral.
Hymnish, of the nature of a hymn.
Sonnets are carroled hymnish
By lads and maydens.
Stanyhurst, Mn., ii. 248.
Hyper. See second quotation ; in the
first extract it of course stands for
hypercritic.
Critics I read on other men,
And hypers upon them apain ;
From whose remarks I give opinion
On twenty books, yet ne'er look in one.
Prior, Ep. to Fleetwood Shepherd, 168.
I call you then Mr. Hyper not for the sake
of giving you a nickname, but for the sake of
distinguishing you from other religionists to
whom you do not belong. You know that
the term is simple enough, meaning nothing
more than beyond, and that it is the well-
known designation of those who go beyond
HYPERDOLIN ( 330 )
IGNOMIO US
Calvin.-— Cater, Punch in the Pulpit (1863),
p. 110.
Hyperdolin, misprint for Knippkb-
dollin, q. v. (?).
And now he makes his doctrine suitable to
his text, and owns aboveboard .... that him-
self and his hyperdolins are the only Israelites,
and all the rest Egyptians. — Character of a
Fanatick, 1675 {Hart. Misc., vii. 636).
Hypernatural, beyond nature ; a
caricature.
By way of contrast there is Heep, articled
clerk, articled ont of charity, whom to de-
scribe description fails ; . . . him, too, we axe
inclined to put in the category of the hyper-
naturals. — Phillips, Essays from the Times, ii.
324.
Hypocon, an abbreviation of hypo-
chondria : the first syllable only is the
more usual abbreviation.
You have droop' d within a few years into
such a dispirited condition that 'tis as much
as a plentiful dose of the best canary can do
to remove the hypocon for a few minutes. —
T. Brown, Works, ii. 233.
Iambical, connected with or belong-
ing to iambics.
Amongst us I name but two Iambical
poets: Gabriel Harvey and Richard Stany-
nurst, because I have seen no more in this
kind. — Meres, Eng. literature, 1598 (Eng.
Garner, ii. 100).
Ichthyophagous, fish-eating.
A wretched ichthyophagous people must
make shocking soldiers, weak as water. — De
Quincey, Autob. Sketches, i. 78.
Icre. " An icre is ten Bars " (Gibson's
Camden, margin, in loc.).
As we find in the Survey booke of Eng-
land, the king demanded in manner no other
tribute than certain lores of Iron, and Iron
barres. — Holland's Camden, p. 361.
Idknticalness, sameness.
She has an high opinion of her sex, to
think they can charm so long a man so well
acquainted with their identicalness. — Richard-
son, CI. Harlowe, iv. 201.
Idle, indolence.
And knowing Good becomes more good the
more
It is encommon'd, he applies therefore
T' instruct her in the faith, and (enuious-
idle)
His brains rich talent buries not in idle.
Sylvester, Magnijictnce, 1319.
Idol, to idolize.
O happy people, where good princes raign,
Who idol not their pearly scepter's glory,
But know themselves set on a lofty story,
For all the world to see and censure too.
Sylvester, Babylon, 20.
Idolant, an idolater.
A countlesse boast of craking Idol ants
By Esay's faith is here confounded all.
Sylvester, Triumph of Faith, st. 3.
Idolastre, idolatrous.
Her yv'ry neck and brest of alabastre.
Made heathen men of her more idolastre.
Hudson, Judith, iv. 359.
Idolify, to make an idol of.
If it had been the fate of Nobs thus to be
idolifed, and the Itzacx had been acquainted
with his character, they would have com-
pounded a name for him. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. cxliv.
Idolism, idohitry. The only instance
of this word in the Diets, is from
Paradise Regained, iv. 234, where,
however, "it means 'vain opinions,*
4 fancies,' from tUuikov, a ' phantom ' of
the mind" (Jerram's edit., Longman's
London Series).
Much less permits he thorough all his land
One rag, one relique, or one signe to stand
Of idolism, or idle superstition
Blindely brought in without the Word's
commission. — Sylvester, The Decay, 502.
A people wholly drown'd
In idolism, and all rebellious sins.
Ibid. 518.
Idolographical, writing about
idols.
I should have looked at some of the Lisbon
idols with more satisfaction if I had been
acquainted with their adventures, as recorded
in this extraordinary idolographical work. —
Southey, Letters, 1826 (ui. 639).
Ignomious, ignominious. Ignomy is
used by Shakespeare and others for
ignominy, but the Diets, have no
instance of the adjective.
As lately lifting up the leaves of worthy
writers' works,
IGNOTE
(331 )
IMBRISTLE
Wherein, as well as famous facts, ignomious
placed are,
Wherein the just reward of both is mani-
festly shown.
Peele, Prologue to Sir Clyomon,
Ignote, an unknown person. The
Diets, have the word as an adjective.
Their judgement was, the girts of peace
were slack, but not broken. This is couched
in the admonitions of an ignote unto King
James. — Racket, life of Williams, i. 169.
Such ignote* were not courted, but passed
over as a pawn at chess that stood out all of
[of all ?] play.— Ibid. ii. 144.
Iliadized, related or celebrated in
the Iliad.
Ulysses, ... of whom it is ffliadized that
your very nose dropt sugarcandie. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Marl. Misc., vi. 162).
Illecebbation, allurement.
Modesty . . . restrains the too great free-
dom that youth usurps, the great familiarity
of pleasant illecebrations, the great continual
frequentations of balls and feasts. — T. Brown,
Works, iv. 292.
Illect, to allure.
Theyre superfluous rychesse illeeted theym
to vnclene lust and ydelnesse. — Simon Fish,
Supplication for the Beggars.
Ill faringly, improperly ; awkwardly.
Another of our vulgar makers spake as
illfaringly in this verse. — Puttenham, Eng.
Poesie, Bk. III. ch. zxiii.
Illiquefact, to moisten.
See how the sweat fals from His bloodlesse
browes,
Which doth illiquefact the clotted gore.
Davits, Holy Roode, p. 15.
Illish, indisposed.
If I find myself illish at any time, which
is seldom, I eat a little of the gumm of that
pine-tree, and it cures me. — Howell, Parly
of Beasts, p. 100.
Ill-tempered, in a bad state of
health or blood.
Put on a half shirt first this summer, it
being very hot ; and yet so ill-tempered I am
grown, that I am afraid I shall catch cold,
while all the world is afraid to melt away. —
Pepys, June 28, 1664.
Illuminer, illuminator ; one who
illuminates books, MSS., &c.
He became the best Illuminer or Limner
of our age. — Fuller, Worthies, Cambridge
(i. 167).
Illtjminous, bright ; clear.
This life, and all that it contains, to him
Is but a tissue of illuminous dreams
Filled with book-wisdom, pictured thought,
and love
That on its own creations spends itself.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, ii. 2.
Illusionable, liable to illusions.
One who had been in the maturity of his
powers and reputation when those illusionable
youths were in their cradles. — The Academy,
Sept. 6, 1879, p. 167.
Illustbe, to make bright or glorious.
See quotation s. v. Passe-man.
No sooner said He, Be there light, but lo
The formless lump to perfect form gan
growe;
And all illustred with light's radiant shine,
Dof t mourning weeds, and deckt it passing
fine. — Sylvester, first day, first weeke, 534.
A husband's nobless doth illustre
A mean-born wife.
Ibid., fourth day, first weeke, 728.
Imaoilet, a small image.
Italy affords finer Alabaster, whereof those
Imagilets wrought at Ligorn are made. —
Fuller, Worthies, Stafford (ii. 301).
Imbeb, ember.
O gracious God, remove my great incumbers,
Kindle again my faith's ne'er-dying imbers.
Sylvester, The Arke, 29.
Imbolish, abolish, or infringe upon ;
perhaps it is meant as a specimen of
a cutpurse's English, yet there is no
other solecism in his short speech. A
female foist is the speaker in the second
quotation, and there imbollish seems =
embezzle.
Tush, (saves another cutpurse) though the
man were so simple of himselfe, yet shall
he not offer the Church so much wrong as,
by yeelding to the mace, to imbolish Paul's
libertie, and therefore I will take his part. —
Greene, Theeves falling out, 1615 (Harl. Misc.,
viii. 387).
You poore theeves doe only steale and pur-
loyne from men, and the harme you doe is
to imbollish men's goods, and bring them to
poverty. — Ibid. (lb. p. 391).
Imbrake, to entangle as in a brake.
John .... imbraked the state and him-
selfe in those miserable iucombrances thorow
his violences and oppression as produced
desperat effects. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p.
108.
Imbrier, to entangle in a thicket.
Why should a gracious prince imbrier him-
self any longer in thorns and do no good,
but leave his woo 11 behind him? — Socket,
Life of Williams, ii. 192.
Imbristle, to make rough. I give
the extract as printed and punctuated
IMITANCY
( 33* )
IMPATRON
in the Hart. Misc., but I suppose it
should be " Madona Amphitrite s," the
commas after each of those words be-
ing deleted.
All the fennie Lerna betwixt, that with
reede is so imbristled, being (as I have fore-
spoke or spoken tofore) Madona, Amphitrite,
fluctuous demeans or fee-simple. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 151).
Imitancy, tending to imitate.
The servile imitancy, and yet also a nobler
relationship and mysterious union to one
another which lies in such imitancy, of man-
kind might be illustrated under the different
figure, itself nothing original, of a flock of
sheep. — Carlyle, Misc., ill. 67.
Immatchless, incomparable.
Thou great Soveraigne of the earth,
Onelie immatchlesse Monarchesse of hearts.
G. Markham, Iraaedie of Sir R. Grinuile
{Dedic. to the Fairest).
Immensible, immeasurable.
For should I touch thy rainde (intangible,
Fraught with whateuer makes or good or
great,
As learning, language, artes immensihle%
Witt, courage, courtesie, and all compleat ;)
I should bat straine my skill to do thee
wrong. — Davits, To Worthy Persons, p. 52.
Immensive, huge.
Then this immensive cup
Of aromatike wine,
Catullus, I quaffe up
To that terce muse of thine.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 84.
Immerd, to cover with dung.
Let daws delight to immerd themselves in
dung, whilst eagles scorn so poor a game as
flies. — Quarles, Dedic. to Emblems.
Immetbical, unmetrical ; unrhythm-
ical.
French and Italian most immetrical,
Their many syllables in harsh collision
Fall as they break their necks.
Chapman, Iliad, To the Reader, 154.
Immortal. The use of the word in
the quotation is noticeable ; mortal
enemy being the common phrase.
This I was glad of, and so were all the
rest of us, though I know I have made my-
self an immortal enemy by it. — Pepys, Jan.
29, 1668-9.
Immound, to dam in.
The straight and narrow streamed fennes,
And inland seas which many a mount m-
mounds.
Sylvester, third day, first tceeke, 218.
Immoveables, fixtures ; property that
cannot be moved : moveables is com-
mon to express the reverse of this.
The Jewes . . . stayed till this time, which
brought him a greater benefit by confiscatuig
all their Immovables, with their Tallies and
Obligations. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 160.
The Judges consulted of the matter, and
in the end adjudged Segraue guilty of death,
and all his moueables and immovables forfeited
to the king. — Ibid. p. 168.
Immure, to fortify ; its usual mean-
ing is to shut up within walls.
With stones soon gathered on the neighbour
strand.
And clayie morter ready there at hand.
Well trode and tempered, he immures his
fort. — Sylvester, Handi-Crafts, 375.
For in the Heav'ns above all reach of ours
He dwels immured in diamantioe towers.
Ibid., The Arke, 237.
These [walls] appcare to haue immured
but a part of the citie. — Sandys, Travels, p.
114.
iMrANE, to embody with bread.
We must believe that He cometh down
again at the will of the priests to be impaned
or inbreaded for their belly's commonwealth,
like as He afore came down at the will of His
Heavenly Father to be incarnated or infleshed
for our universal soul's health. — Bale, Select
Works, p. 206.
Imparleance, colloquy. R. has im-
parlance as a legal term, signifying'
permission given to suitors to arrange
a matter before the court by private
conference between themselves. In
the extract, however, the word is used
generally.
She will have no imparleance, no discours-
ing ; if they desir'd their own peace, and her
assured favour, they then must entertain
and follow her conditions No more
imparleance is allow'd or will be heard, no
second motion. — Hist, of Edw. 11^ p. 124.
Impassivity, impassiveness.
We have cold aristocratic impassivity, faith-
ful to itself even in Tartarus. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. IV. ch. vii.
Have thy eye-glasses, opera -glasses, thy
Long-Acre cabs with white-breeched tiger,
thy yawning impassivities, pococurantisms. — >
Ibid., Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. xvii.
Impasture, to set to feed ; to turn
out to graze.
Adultery . . . sets paleness on his cheek
and impostures grief in his heart. — Adams, i.
184.
I mp at ron, to furnish: impatronize
is more usual.
IMPEACH WITH ( 333 ) IMPOSSIBILITATE
He . . . impatroned himselfe with three
peeces of ordinance which he caused to be
haled into the Tower. — Remarkable Occur-
rence* in the Northern Paris (1642), p. 10.
Impeach with, to accuse or impeach
of.
I doubt not of tout generosity, but people
unacquainted with your temper impeach you
with avarice. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 535.
Imperatorian, imperial.
He did so little bear up with an impera-
torian resolution against the method of their
ways who thrust his counsel out of doors, that
the flies suck'd him where he was gall'd, and
he never rub'd them off. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 167.*
He professed not to meddle by any Im-
peratorian or Senatorial power with matters
of Beligion. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
Imperatorious, imperial ; befitting a
ruler.
You have heard his Majesty's speech,
though short, yet full and princely, and
rightly imperatorious, as Tacitus said of
Galba's.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 9.
Imperial, a large travelling trunk
made to lit the top of the carriage.
Imperiale in French is defined as It
desxus de carrasse, and the term is ap-
plied to the top of other things.
The trunks were fastened upon the car-
riages, the imperial was carrying out. — Miss
JSdgeworth, Belinda, ch. zzv.
Couriers and ladies'-maids, imperials and
travelling carriages, are an abomination to
me. — Hughes, Tom Brown's School-Days, Pfc.
L ch. i.
Imperible, contracted form of im-
perishable.
O is there not another life imperible,
Sweet to the guiltlesse, to the guilty terrible ?
Sylvester, Little Bartas, 761.
Impersuadableness, inflexibility.
You break my heart, indeed you do, by
your impersuadableness. — T. Brown, Works,
1.3.
Impertinence, to treat with imper-
tinence.
I do not wonder that you are impertinenced
by Richcourt. — Walpole to Mann, in. 155
(175(5).
Impetrable, compliant; easy to be
entreated.
How impetrable hee was in mollifying the
adamantinest tiranny of mankinde. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 157).
Impleadable, not to be pleaded
against or evaded.
An impenetrable judge, an impleadable in-
dictment, an intolerable anguish shall seize
upon them. — Adams, i. 196.
Impledge, to pledge ; to entrust.
The Lower Lis
They to the utmost will dispute, for there .
Their Chief, who lacks not capability,
Will justly deem their all to be impledged.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. v. 2.
The Earl inclines, but ere he shall impledge
Or the Lord Heretoch or himself, be looks
To be assured the synod, late convened
For other ends, will wisdom learn from you.
Ibid., Edwin the Fair, iii. 3.
Impliable, unaccommodating; un-
fitting.
All matters rugged and impliable to the
design must be suppressed or corrupted. —
Worth, Examen, p. 32.
Implicit, obedient ; submissive. We
often speak of implicit obedience =
complete obedience, but the word is
not usually employed by itself in this
sense.
When a parcel of silly implicit fools had
done the business for him, then forsooth he
must appear at the head of his court-harlots
and minstrels, and make a magnificent entry
thro' the breach. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 30.
Cecilia was peremptory, and Mary became
implicit. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. X.
ch. vni.
Imploratory, imploring.
On the 21st of March goes off that long
exculpatory imploratory letter. — Carlyle,
Diamond Necklace, ch. vii.
Importance, matter of importance.
Quoth Ralph, Not far from hence doth dwell
A cunning man, hight Sidrophel,
That deals in destiny's dark counsels,
And sage opinions of the moon sells ;
To whom all people, far and near,
On deep importances repair.
Hudibras, II. iii. 110.
Importune, an importunate person.
In Spaine it is thought very vndecent for
a courtier to craue, supposing that it is the
part of an importune. — Puttenham, Eng.
Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xxiv.
If justice must stay till such importunes
are satisfied, there's a ne plus ultra of all
law. — North, Examen, p. 644.
Imposable, gullible. See quotation
s.v. Prattique.
If he had been a dissolute ranting man,
as some were, or a weak imposable wretch,
they had liked him much better. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 54.
Impossibilitatb, to render impos-
sible.
IMPOSSIBILITY (334 )
IN AMOR ATE
How many accidents might for ever have
impossibilitated the existence of this incom-
parable work! — Southey, The Doctor, Inter-
chapter vi.
Impossibility, helplessness.
When we say, Lead us not into temptation ,
we learn to know oar own impossibility and
infirmity ; namely, that we be not able of our
own selves to withstand this great and mighty
enemy the devil. — Latimer, i. 432.
Impostrix, impostress.
I am heartily sorry that the gravity of
John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, should be
so light, and the sharp sight of Sir Thomas
More so blinde, as to give credit to so notori-
ous an impostrix, — Fuller, Ch. Hist.,V. ii. 47.
Impostury, imposture.
All con joyne (the Latins excepted) in cele-
bration of that impostury of fetching fire
from the Sepulcher upon Easter eue. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 173.
Impregnate in the extract is used
for impregnable, or rather invulnerable.
Bring me the caitiff here before my face,
Tho' made impregnate as Achilles was.
D'Urfey, Two Queens of Brentford, Act II.
Imprompt, unready.
Nothing I think in nature can be supposed
more terrible than such a rencounter, so
impromptu so ill-prepared to stand the shock
of it as Dr. Slop was. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
i. 219.
Improper, to appropriate, make over.
R., in reference to an extract which he
gives from Milton's A vol. for Smectym-
nuus, says, " One of Milton's antagon-
ists appears to have used improper as a
verb." The subjoined show that the
word was not so strange as R. and
apparently also Milton thought it.
Man is impropred to God for two causes.
— Bi>. Fisher, p. 267.
That childe so impronreed to a wrong
mother may proprely in latin be called par-
tus suppositious. — UdaTt Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 157.
The word of God being so universal, meet
for all diseases, for all wits, and for all
capacities, for M. Harding to improper the
same only unto a few, it is both far greater
dishonour unto God, and also far greater
injury unto God's faithful people, than if he
would in like manner improper and inclose
the sunbeams to comfort tne rich and not the
poor. — Jewel, ii. 671.
Improperacion, impropriation.
Jef. Thou knowest nott, Watkyn felowe,
How they have brought to sorowe
In lykwyse the spritualte.
Wat. By what manner cavillacion ?
Jef. Surly through improperacion
Of innumerable benefices.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and be nott
terothe, p. 100.
Impropery seems to be used in the
sense of chiding or scoffing.
Sara, the daughter of Raguel, desiring to
be delivered from the impropery and im-
braiding, as it would appear, of a certain
default wherewith one of her father's hand-
maidens did irabraid her and cast her in the
teeth, forsook all company. — Becon, i. 131.
Improvisation, an impromptu.
This speech . . . was not indeed entirely an
improvisation, but had taken shape in inward
colloquy. — G. Eliot, Middlemarcn, ch.
Improvisatory, impromptu; unpre-
meditated.
Write with or without rime, as happens to
accommodate best your improvisatory method
of composition. — W. Taylor of Norwich, 1806
(Memoir, ii. 133).
Impulse, to impel.
I leave these prophetesses to God, that
knows the heart, . . . whether they were im-
pulsed like Balaam, Saul, and Caiaphas, to
vent that which they could not keep in, or
whether they were inspired like Esaias and
the prophets of the Lord. — Racket, Life of
Williams, ii. 49.
Impqne, unpunished.
The breach of our national statutes can
not go immtne by the plea of ignorance. —
Adams, i. 235.
Impure, to grow impure. R. and L.
have an extract from Bp. Hall with
this verb, where, however, it = to make
impure.
The more the Body dures, Soule more
in d tires ;
Never too soon can shee from thence exile ;
Pure in shee came; there living, shee im-
pures ;
And suffers there a thousand woes the while.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalitie, st. 70.
Inaccessible, unapproachable, and
so excelling in power. The word in
the original is aa-rrrovc. The same
translation occurs xx. 450. Chapman
also renders it tough, desperate, too hot
to touch.
Curb your tongue in time, lest all the Gods
in heav'n
Too few be and too weak to help thy punish'd
insolence,
When my inaccessible hands shall fall on thee.
Chapman, Iliad, i. 550.
Inamorate, enamoured.
INAMORATELY ( 335 ) INCINDERMENT
His blood was framde for euerie shade of
vertue
To rauish into true inamourate fire.
Chapman, Mons. Dy Olive, iv. 1.
Inamorately, lovingly. Naslie also
has enamorately. See quotation a. v.
Calino.
Of the neyboring sands, ... it is so inamor-
ately protected and patronized, that they
stand as a trench or guarde about in the
night to keep off their enemies. — Nashe,
Lenten Stvffe (Harl. Misc,vi. 149).
In an im advertence, inadvertence.
The like spirit did possess Optatus, who in
the treatise cited by R. 0. doth continually
call the Donatists " brethren," not by chance
or inanimadvertence, but upon premeditation.
— Bramhall, ii. 31.
Inapostate, attentive ; not standing
away from.
The man that will but lav his eares
As inapostate to the thing he heares,
Shall be [by ?] bis hearing quickly come to see
The truth of travails lesse in bookes then thee.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 354.
Inarked, placed in the ark.
Greater and better then inarked he,
"Which iu the world's huge deluge did snruiue.
G. Markham, Tray, of Sir R. Grinuile,
p. 59.
Inauthoritativeness, want of com-
mission or authority.
I furnished them not with precarious
praters, ... in whom ignorance and impu-
dence, inability and inauthoritativeness, con-
tend which shall be greatest. — Gauden, Tears
cf the Churchy p. 53.
Inbread, to embody with bread.
We must believe that He cometh down
again at the will of the priests to be impaned
or inbreaded for their bellies' commonwealth.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 206.
Inbreak, irruption : outbreak is com-
mon. Cf. Inburst.
Deshnttes and Varigny, massacred at the
first inbreak, have been beheaded in the
Marble Court.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk.
VII. ch. x.
Inburst, irruption : outburst is suffi-
ciently common. Cf . Inbreak.
Boundless chaos of insurrection presses
slumbering round* the palace, like ocean
round a diving-bell, and may penetrate at
any crevice. Let but that accumulated in-
surrectionary mass find entrance, like the
infinite inburst of water. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. ix.
Incaressino, cold; harsh.
This incaressing humour
Hath taught my soul a new philosophy.
Machin, Dumb Kniyht, Act III.
Incarnate, in the flesh, but is used
in the extract as though the in were
privative, and the word meant " not in
the flesh."
I fear nothing . . . that devil carnate or
incarnate can fairly do against a virtue so
established. — Richardson, CI. Harlotce, v. 46.
Incautelods, incautious.
All advantage of cavil at the expressions
of the Judges, if any had been incautelous,
was lost to the faction. — North, Examen, p.
288.
Incave, to shut up in a cave. Dray-
ton, quoted by R., has incavem.
The bristled Bore and Bear©
Incaued rage. — Sandys, Travels, p. 307.
Incedingly, progressingly.
Even in the uttermost frenzy of energy is
each moonad movement royally, imperially,
indecinffly upborne. — Miss Bronte, rillette,
ch. xxiii.
Incense, to flatter. Cf. Fume.
He is dipp'd in treason and overhead in
mischief, and now must be bought off and
incensed by his Sovereign, as the Devil is by
the Indians, that he may do no more harm.—
Gentleman Instructed, p. 212.
Incensory, altar of incense.
A cup of gold, crown'd with red wine, he
held
On th* holy incensory pour'd.
Chapman, Iliad, xi. 686.
Incentre, to centre.
Nor is your love incentred to me only in
your own breast, but full of operation. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 135.
Inchaste, unchaste.
Now you that were my father's concubines,
Liquor to his inchaste and lustful fire,
Have seen his honour shaken in his house.
Feele, David and Bethsabe, p. 476.
Incidentary, incidental ; occasional.
He had been near fifty years from the
county of Carnarvon and the town of Con-
way, unless by incidentary visits. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 208.
Incidentless, uneventful.
My journey was incidentless, but the
moment I came into Brighthelmstone I was
met by Mrs. Thrale. — Mad. Dy Arblay, Diary,
ii. 158.
Incinderment, reduction to ashes:
incineration is the usual word.
1NCITATIVE
( 336 ) INCULCATE TO
Hee, like the glorious rare Arabian bird,
Will soon result from His incinderment.
Davies, Holy Roods, p. 26.
Incitative, a provocative or stimu-
lant.
They all carried wallets, which, as appeared
afterwards, were well provided with incita-
fives, and such as provoke to thirst at two
leagues' distance.— Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt.
II. Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Incoqnoscibility, the state of being
unknown.
If . . . the imperial philosopher should
censure the still incognoscible author for still
continuing in incognoscibility for the same
reason that he blamed the Ancient of the
Deep, I should remind him of the Eleusinian
Mysteries.— Souther/, The Doctor, Interchapter
six.
Incognoscible, unknowable. See
Incoqnoscibility.
Incognito I am and wish to be, and incog-
noscible it is in my power to remain.— Southey,
The Doctor, Interchapter xz.
Incompletion, incompleteness.
I have lost the dream of Doing,
And the other dream of Done,
The first spring in the pursuing,
The first pride in the Begun, —
First recoil from incompletion, in the face of
what is won.
Mrs. Browning, The Lost Dower.
Incomportable, intolerable.
It was no new device to shove men out of
their places by contriving incomportable hard-
ships to be put upon them. — Norths Examen,
p. 39.
He took another course, and carried his
point by setting up what was called the
Country Party to an incomportable height. —
Ibid. p. 57.
Inconcrete, abstract.
There is not in all the world a more pure,
simple, inconcrete procreation than that
whereby the mind conoeiveth the word
within it. — A ndrewes, Sermons, i. 88.
Inconform, disagreeing with.
A way mos£ charitable, most comfortable,
and no way inconform to the will of God in
His Word. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 291.
Inconsequential, of no consequence ;
usually = illogical.
As my time is not wholly inconsequential, 1
should not be sorry to have an early oppor-
tunity of being heard. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Cecilia, Bk. IX. ch. ill.
Inconsiderate, a thoughtless person.
I was as willing as the gay inconsiderate to
call another cause, as he termed it — Richard-
son, d. Harlowe, iii. 168.
Inconsistents, inconsistencies.
As for other inconsistents with truth, which
depend as retainers on this relation of King
Lucius, they prove not that this whole story
should be refused, but refined. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., I. ii. 4.
Inconsistible, variable ; unable to
agree.
It hath a ridiculous phis, like the fable of
the old man, his ass, and a boy, before the
inconsistible vulgar. — North, Examen, p. 029.
Inconvertibleness, unchangeable-
ness.
The fixity or inconvertibleness of races, as
we see them, is a weak argument for the
eternity of these frail boundaries. — Emerson,
Eng. Traits, ch. iv.
Incorporino, joining in a body.
O where is then the Holy Flock,
Galled in one Hope, built on one Rock,
Into one Faith incorporina ?
Sylvester, All is not gold that glitters,
st. 10.
Incrasion, immingling (Gr. cpacric).
Sylvester inveighs against tobacco.
By whose incrasion
The Vitall Spirits in an unwonted fashion
Are bay'd and barred of their passage due
Through all the veins.
Tobacco Battered, 454.
Increditable, discreditable.
Hypocrisy and dissimulation are always
increditable, but in matters of religion mon-
strous to a sacrilege. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 145.
Incredited, unbelieved.
He [Hazael] was brought to this self-
incredited mischief, as impossible as at first he
judged it, at last he performed it. — Adams,
ii. 354.
Increscent, waxing.
The good Queen,
Repentant of the word she made him swear,
And saddening in her childless castle, sent,
Between the increscent and decrescent moon,
Arms for her son.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Incubation. See extract.
This place was celebrated for the worship
of JSsculapius, in whose temple incubation,
i. e. sleeping for oracular dreams, was prac-
tised.— E. Tylor, Primittoe Culture, ii. 121.
Inculcate to, to inculcate on.
Some Leading-men, who . . . spared not to
inculcate to them the apparent dangers in
which Religion stood. — Heylin, Hist, of the
Presbyterians, p. 226.
INCUMBENTESS ( 337 ) INDIFFERENCED
Incumbentess, female incumbent or
possessor.
Yoa may make your court to my Lady
Orford by announcing the ancient barony of
Clinton, which is fallen to her by the death
of the last incumbentess. — Walpole to Mann,
ill 371 (1700).
Incumbition, incubation.
The souls of connoisseurs themselves bv
long friction and incumbition have the happi-
ness at length to get all be-virtued, be-pictured,
be-butterflied, and be-fiddled.— £fcrn*, Trist.
Shandy, i. 181.
Incurrence, incursion.
We should no more think of the Blessed
Deity without the conceit of an infinite re-
splendence, than we can open our eyes at
noon-day without an incurrence and admis-
sion of an outward light.— Bp. Hall. Works,
v. 421.
Incurtained, shaded by curtains.
Bright day is darkned by incurtained light.
G, Markham, Tragedie of Sir R. Grinuile,
p. 66.
Incusse, to strike in. See quotation
more at length *. v. Daungtingnesse.
The first events are those which incusse a
dauntingnesse or daring. — Daniel, Hist, of
E*9* P- 4-
Incute, to strike in.
This doth incute and beat into our hearts
the fear of God.— Becon, i. 63.
Indbfinity, vagueness : indefiniteness
or indefinUude are the more usual
forms.
He can insinuate the vilest falsehoods in
the world, and upon trial come off upon the
ambiguity or indemnity of his expressions. —
North, Examen, p. 144.
Indelectable, unpleasant.
Then stiffened and starched (let me add)
into dry and indelectable affectation, one sort
of these scholars assume a style as rough
as frequently are their manners.— Richardson,
a. Harlowe, viii. 327.
Indelicate, a coarse or indelicate
person.
What strange inddicates do these writers
of tragedy often make of our sex !— Richard-
son, Pamela, iv. 59.
Indent, a covenant : the verb is not
uncommon.
In negotiating with princes we ought to
seeke their fauour by humilitie, and not by
sternnesse, nor to trafficke with them by way
of indent or condition, but frankly. — Putten-
ham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xxiv.
Independence. See quotation. The
earliest example in the Diets, is from
Pope, except that in the translation
of Milton's Defence of the People of
England' we read of "the independency
of a king."
Every one who is conversant with the
Middle Ages, and with the literature of the
reigns of Elizabeth, James, and Charles I.,
must have perceived in how much kindlier
relations the different classes of society
existed toward each other in those days than
they have since done. The very word in-'
dependence had hardly found a place in the
English language, or was known only as de-
noting a mischievous heresy. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. excii.
Independented, made independent,
or on the independent model.
The new titles or style of bodyed and con-
gregated, associated or independented and
new-fangled Churches. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 43.
Independentism, Independency.
Anabaptisme or Presbyterisme or Inde-
pendentisme . . . rudely justled Episcopacy
out of the Church of England.— Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 564.
Indepravate, pure.
O let these Wounds, these Woundes in-
deprauate,
Be holy Sanctuaries for my whole Man.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 28.
Indescribabler, a euphemism for
trousers. Cf. Continuations, Inex-
plicable, Inexpressibles, Unmention-
ables.
As a giant is not so easily moved, a pair of
indescribables of most capacious dimensions,
and a huge shoe, are usually brought out,
into which two or three stout men get all at
once, to the enthusiastic delight of the crowd,
who are quite satisfied with the solemn as-
surance that these habiliments form part of
the giant's e very-day costume.— Sketches by
Box {Greenwich Fair).
Indical, connected with an index.
The extract recalls Pope's lines —
How index-learning turns no student pale,
Tet holds the eel of Science by the tail.
Dunciad, i. 279.
I confess there is a lazy kind of Learning
which is onely indical ; when Scholars (like
Adders, which onely bite the Horse heels)
nible but at the Tables, which are calces
librorum, neglecting the body of the Book. —
Fuller, Worthies, Norfolk (ii. 135).
Indifferenced, having an appear-
ance of indifference.
I again turned to her, all as indifferenced
over as a girl at the first long-expected ques-
z
INDIGESTIVE ( 338 ) INESCAPABLE
tion, who waits for two more. — Richardson,
a. Harlowe, iii. 186.
Indigestive, dyspeptic.
She was a cousin, an indigestive single
woman, who called her rigidity religion, and
her liver love. — Dickens, Great Expectations,
ch. xxv.
Indiqnancy, indignation. Spenser
(F. Q.j III. xi. 13) has malignance.
Engrossed by the pride of self-defence,
and the indignancy of unmerited unlrind-
ness, the disturbed mind of Camilla had not
yet formed one separate reflection. — Mad.
D'ArMay, Camilla, Bk. III. ch. i.
Individuitt. See quotation.
Zorobabel's temple, acquiring by Herod's
bounty more beauty and bigness, continued
the same temple, God's unintermitted service
(the life and soul thereof) preserving the
tndividuity or oneness of this temple with
the former. — Fuller, Pisgah Sight, III. (pt. ii.)
vi. 9.
Indivine, unholy. Milton (quoted
by R.) has undivine = unlike a divine ;
in which sense also Daniel uses it, say-
ing that the Bishop of Hereford, from
the text, My head acheth, " concludes
most undevinely" that the head of a
kingdom might be removed (Ilist. of
Eng., p. 182).
His brother Clarence (o crime capitall !)
He did rebaptize in a outt of wine,
Being jelous of him (how soere loiall) :
A Turkish providence most indivine.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 57.
Indread, to fear.
So Isaak's sonnes indreading for to feel
This tyrant, who pursued mm at the heel,
Dissundring fled. — Hudson, Judith, i. 57.
Inductile, stiff.
After all, he is no inductile material in
some hands. — Miss Bronte, ch. xxxv.
Indulgiate, to indulge.
Sergius Oratus was the first that made pits
for them about his house here; more for
profit than to indulgiate his gluttony. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 293.
Indult, grant ; indulgence.
If the Bishops of Borne could have con-
tented themselves to enjoy these temporali-
ties, .... and to have acknowledged them,
as many of their fellow-bishops do, to have
issued not at all by necessary derivation
from their spiritual power, but merely and
altogether from the free and voluntary indult
of temporal princes, the Christian Church
had not so just cause of complaint. — Sander-
son, ii. 240.
Induperator. This archaic form
of imperator is used by Nashe, not
apparently as a Latin word. See quota-
tion s. v. Excelsitudb, where he speaks
of the herring as "this monarchall
fludy indupcrator."
Industrialism, industry.
Has he not seen the Scottish Brassmith's
Idea . . . preparing us, by indirect but sure
methods, Industrialism, and the Government
of the Wisest? — Carlyle, Sartor Besartus,
Bk. II. ch. iv.
Industry. Of industry = on pur-
pose : a Latinism.
When Homer made Achilles passionate,
Wrathf ull, reuengef ull, and insatiate
In his affections, what man will denie
He did compose it all of Industrie,
To let men see that, &c.
Chapman, Revenge of Bussy
D'Ambois, Act III.
Inearth, to bury in the earth.
The Ethiop, keen of scent,
Detects the ebony,
That deep-inearth'd, and hating light,
A leafless tree, and barren of all fruit,
With flM»lrnA— feeds her boughs of raven
grain. — Southey, Thalaba, Bk. i.
Inebrious, intoxicating.
Whilst thou art mixing fatal wines below,
Such that with scorching fever fill our veins,
And with inebrious fumes distract our brains.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 331.
Ineffectuality, something power-
less.
Lope do Vega .... plays at best, in the
eyes of some few, as a vague aurora-borealis,
and brilliant ineffectuality. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 144.
Ineloquence. See quotation. Mil-
ton has indoquent.
To us, as already hinted, the Abbot's elo-
quence is less admirable than his indoquence,
his great invaluable talent of silence. — Car-
lyle, Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. xi.
Inertion, sluggishness : inertness, or
the Latin inertia, are more common.
Inaction, bodily and intellectual, pervading
the same character, cannot but fix disgust
upon every stage and every state of life.
Vice alone is worse than such double iner-
tion. — Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. I. ch. v.
Inescapable, inevitable ; not to be
eluded.
The limit of resistance was reached, and
she had sunk back helpless within the clutch
of inescapable anguish. — G. Eliot, Middle-
march, ch. lxxx.
She was looking along an inescapable path
of repulsive monotony. — Ibid., Daniel De-
ronda, ch. xxvi.
INEXCELLENCE ( 339 )
INFESTED
Inexcellence, dishonour.
Blush, Heaven, to lose the honour of thy
nune!
To see thy footstool set upon thy head !
Aiid let no baseness in thy haughty breast
Sustain a shame of such inexcellence.
Marlowe, 2 Tamburlaine, v. 3.
IxexecutablEj that cannot be car-
ried out.
The king has accepted this constitution,
knowing beforehand that it will not serve : he
studies it, and executes it in the hope mainly
that it will be found inexecutable. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. v.
L\ expectable, not to be looked for.
What loud cries did beat on all sides at the
gates of heaven ! and with what inexpectable,
unconceivable mercy were they answered ! —
Bp. Hall, Works, v. 223.
Inexpectant, not expecting. See
lTN EXPECTANT.
Loverless and inexpectant of love, I was as
safe from spies in my heart-poverty as the
beggar from thieves in his destitution of
purse. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xiii.
Inexpectly, unexpectedly.
I startled to meet so inexpectly with the
name of Bishop Hall disgracefully ranked
with Priests and Jesuits. — Bp. Hall, Works,
riii.503.
Inkxperiencedness, inexperience.
The damsel has three things to plead in
her excuse: the authority of her parents,
the persuasion of her friends, and the inex-
periencedness of her age. — Bailey's Erasmus,
p. 318.
Inexplicables, a euphemism for
trousers. Cf. Inexpressibles, Inde-
SCMBABLES, UNMENTIONABLES.
He usually wore a brown frock-coat with-
out a wrinkle, light inexplicables without a
spot, a neat neckerchief with a remarkably
neat tie, and boots without a fault. — Sketches
by Boz {Mr. Minns).
Inexposable, not to be exposed ;
secure.
Those whom nature or art, strength or
sleight, have made inexposable to easy ruin,
may pass unmolested. — Adams, i. 83.
In fall, incursion.
Lincolnshire, infested with in/alls of Cam-
deners, has its own malignancies too. —
Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 115.
In fame, infamous.
I believe it is the first time that a scan-
dalous infame state libel was honoured with
a direct encomium in a solemn History that
titles itself compleat. — North, Examen, p.
142.
Infamize, to dishonour.
With Bcornfull ^laughter (graceless) thus
began
To infamize the poor old drunken man.
Sylvester, The Arke, 577.
Infancy, inexpressiveness ; silence :
used with strict etymological propriety.
"Where canst thou show any word or deed
of thine which might have hastened her
peace? Whatever thou dost now talk, or
write, or look is the alms of other men's
active prudence and zeal. Dare not now to
say or do anything better than thy former
sloth and infancy. — Milton, Reason of Ch.
Government, Bk. li.
So darklv do the Saxon Annals deliver
their meaning with more than wonted in-
fancy.— Ibid., Hist, of Enij., Bk. v.
Infanglement, scheme.
Neither you nor your niece know ^iow,
with your fine souls and fine sense, to go
out of the common femalitv path, when you
get a man into your gin, however superior
he is to common infanylements, ana low
chicanery, and dull and cold forms. — Rich-
ardson, Grandison, vi. 150.
Infaust, unlucky.
It was an infaust and sinister augury for
Austin Caxton. — Lytton, The Caxtons, Bk.
VII. ch. i.
In feasibility, impracticability.
The infeacibility of the thing they peti-
tioned for to be done with justice gave the
denyall to their petition. — fuller, Ch. Hist.,
IH. v. 42.
Infect, to infest.
A ruler .... whose office was .... to
represse the depredations and robberies of
Barbarians, but of Saxons especially, who
grievously infected Britaine. — Holland's
Camden, p. 325.
Infectible, capable of being infected.
Such was the purity and perfection of this
thy glorious guest, that it was not possibly
infectible, nor any way obnoxious to the
danger of others' sin. — Bp. Hall, Works, ii.
600.
Infelonious, not felonious ; not liable
to legal punishment.
The thought of that infelonious murder
had always made her wince. — G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda, ch. iii.
Infested, become habitual.
Their vitious living shamefully increaseth
and augmenteth, and by a cursed custome so
grown and infested that a great multitude of
the religious persons in such small houses do
rather choose to rove abroad in apostasie than
to conform themselves to the observation of
good religion. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 310.
z 2
INFESTIVE
( 34o )
INHVRL
Infestivb, annoying. N. gives tho
word as not uncommon, but offers no
example ; the other Diets, do not
notice it.
For I will all their ships inflame, with whose
infestivf smoke,
Fear-shrunk, and hidden near their keels,
the oonquer'd Greeks shall choke.
Chapman, Iliad, viii. 151.
Infilling, that which is used to fill
up a hole or hollow.
The fragments [of pottery], not having
been deemed of any value by the workmen,
were wheeled away, and buried with the
infilling.— Arch., xliu. 122 (1871).
Infinition, infinitude ; boundless-
ness. Davies is speaking of the horror
caused by the thought of annihilation.
For what joy is so great, but the conceipt
Of falling to his Inanition
Of blacke Non-essence, will confound it
straight ?
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 23.
Infinitives, endless quantities.
Great Lord, to whom infinitiues of fame
Flock like night starres about the siluer
moooe.
G. Markham (Dedic. to Earl of Sussex),
Tragedie of Sir R. Grinuile.
He, that the spvrit of a single man
Should contradict innumerable wills,
Fie, that infinitiues of forces can
Nor may effect what one conceit fulfills.
Ibid. p. 69.
Influino, influence.
Canst thon restrain the pleasant influing
Of Pleiades (the Ushers of the Spring)?
Silvester, Job Triumphant, iv. 461.
Inforkst, to turn into forest.
Twelve knights or legall men are chosen in
euery shire, vpon their oath, to disparte the
old forests from the new ; and all such as
were found to haue been inforested since
the first coronation of Henry the second to
be disafforested.— Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p.
X28.
The South-West part of this County is
called the New Forrest . . . because the Junior
of all Forrests in England ; many having
been dis- none in-forrested since the Con-
quest.—Fuller, Worthies, Hants.
Inform, allege.
Whatsoever hath been done, hath been
my only attempt, which, notwithstanding,
was never intended against her chastity. But
whatsoever hath been informed, was my fault.
—Sidney, Arcadia, Bk. V. p. 461.
Infringible, unbreakable : the word,
if used now, would rather mean capable
of being broken or infringed.
Hauing betwixt themselues sealed wit]
their hands the infringible band of faith am
troth in the heart, . . . hee tooke leaue of hi
faire lady. — Breton, An olde man's Usioi
P 13.
Infructuou8, fruitless ; unprofitable
The wolf living is like Rumney Marsh
hyeme malus, mstate moUstus, nunguam bonm
. . Thus every way is this wolf infructuous-
Adams, ii. 120.
Infund, to pour in.
They are . . . only the ministers of Hii
which infundeth and poureth into all me
grace.— Becon, ii. 562.
Ingore, to clot Cf. Engore.
Cut out this arrow, and the blood, that i
ingor'd and dry,
Wash with warm water from the wound.
Chapman, Iliad, xL 74]
Ingratttity, ingratitude.
Did Curtius more for Rome than I for thee
That willingly fto saue thee from annoy
Of dire dislike tor ingratuitee)
Do take vpon me to expresse thy joy,
And so my Muse in boundlesse seas destroie
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 19.
Ingredient, a person entering.
If sin open her shop of delicacies, Solomo
shews the trap-door and the vault ; . . . i
she discovers the green and gay flowers c
delice, he cries to the ingredients, Latet ampu
in herbd, — The serpent lurks there. — A da mi
i. 159.
Inhaunt, to frequent or keep about
This creeke with running passadge the
channel inhaunteth. — Stanykurst, jEn.y i. 1$
Inheritant, inherent.
By the light of grace wee feel© in ow
selues an apprehension or participation o
those graces that essentially doe onely dwej
and are inheritant in the Diuine Nature.-
Breton, Divine Considerations, p. 8.
Inhiate, to gape upon ; to open th(
mouth (with desire to seize). Bp. Hal
uses inkiation.
How like gaping wolves do many of then
inhiate and gape after wicked Mammon ! —
Becon, i. 25a
Inhoused, housed.
They follow her to hell.
And there, inhoused with their mother Night
All foure deuise how heauen and earth tc
spight.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R. Grinuil^
p. 51.
Inhurl, to drive or cast in.
"Would God your captayn with sootherne
blastpuf inhurled
Heere made his arriual.
Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 559.
TNIMICITIOUS ( 34i ) INOBLIGALITY
Inimicitious, hostile.
Tia wrote ... to drive the gall and other
bitter juices from the gall-bladder, liver, and
sweet-bread of his majesty's subjects, with
ill the inimicitious passions which belong to
them, down into their duodenums. — Stern*,
Trist. Shandy, iii. 178.
LVIQUITABLE, Unjust.
Who ever pretended to gainsay or resist
in Act of Parliament, although, by natural
possibility, it may be as inimitable as any
sction of a single person can be? — North,
Esatnen, p. 333.
His lordship was sensible of the prodigious
injustice and iniquitable torment inflicted
upon suitors by vexations and false advers-
iries.— Ibid., Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 73.
Iniquitably, unjustly.
He used to exaggerate the monstrous im-
pudence of counsel that insisted so iniquit"
eHy.—Xorth, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 68.
Ix jealous, to make jealous.
They lined together in that amitie as on[e]
bed and boord is sayd to haue serued them
both, which so iniealosed the olde king as he
called home his sonne. — Daniel, Hist, of
Eny.* p. 93.
Ixjelly, to bury in jelly.
A pasty costly-made,
Where quail and pigeon, lark and leveret lay,
Like fossils of the rock, with golden yolks
Imbedded and injellied.
Tennyson, Audley Court.
Inkle, to guess : inkling as a sub-
stantive is not uncommon.
tt John," cried my mother, " you are mad ! "
And yet she turned as pale as death, for
women are so quick at turning, and she
inkled what it waa.—Blackmore, Lorna Doone,
ch. Iii.
Inkle-beggar, a beggar that sells
cheap tape, &c.
From the courtier to the carter, from the
kdy to the inkle-beggar, there is this excess.
—Adams, ii. 437.
Inkle- we aver, a weaver of inkle, a
sort of inferior tape. R. notices the
Baying " as thick as inkle-weavers " as
being common in the North, but gives
no example. The manufacture of
inkle was introduced by foreign weav-
ers (refugees for religion in sixteenth
century) ; these of course consorted
much together ; hence the phrase.
• Why, she and you were as great as two
i>tkle- weavers ; I am sure I have seen her hug
you as the devil hugged the witch.— Swift,
Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
The clerk called the banes of marriage
betwixt Opaniah Lashmeheygo and Tapitha
Brample, spinster ; he mought as well have
called her inkle- weaver, for she never spun an
hank of yarn in her life. — Smollett, Humphrey
Clinker, ii. 184.
Inleck, hole where water leaks in.
Graunt plancks from forrest too clowt oure
battered inlecks. — Stanyhurst, Mn., iii. 538.
Inmeats, entrails. The word is given
in Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary (E. D. S.) as meaning "the
edible viscera of pigs, fowls, &c."
Get thee gone,
Or I shall try six inches of my knife
On thine own inmeats first.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. in. 1.
Inmore, inner.
Of these Angles, some part having passed
forward into the inmore quarters of Ger-
manic, . . . went as farre as Italic. — Holland's
Camden, p. 131.
Innascibility, incapability of being
born or begotten ; an attribute of God
the Father.
Innascibility we must admitt
The Father.
Davies, Minim in Modum, p. 17.
Innect, to join together.
He . . . gave (in allusion of his two Bishop-
ricks, which he successively enjoyed) two
annulets innected in his paternal coat. —
Fuller, Worthies, Durham (i. 329).
Innodate, to knot up ; to implicate.
Her subjects are declared absolved from
the oath of allegiance, and every other thing
due unto her whatsoever. And those which
from henceforth obey her are innodated with
the anathema. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., IX. ii. 24.
Innominables, trousers ; inexpress-
ibles, q. v.
The lower part of his dress represented
innominables and hose in one. — Southey, The
Doctor, p. 688.
Innovative, making changes, or in-
troducing novelties.
Some writers are, as to manner and diction,
conservative, while others are innovative. —
Hall, Modern English, p. 27.
Innoxiousness, harmle8snes8.
I should hold it wrong to make over to
any other judgement than my own the dan-
ger or the innoxiousness of any and every
manuscript that has been cast into my power.
—Mad. D'Arblay, Diary,vu. 373:
Inobligality, unbindingness.
So apparent is the repugnancy of the mat-
ter of this vow with the precepts of Christian
charily and mercy, that if all I have hitherto
said were of no force, this repugnancy alone
IN01L
( 342 ) INSEPARIZED
were enough, without other evidence, to
prove the unlawfulness, and consequently
the invalidity or inobliyality thereof. — San-
derson, v. 67.
Inoil, to anoint The extract is from
a speech of Crantner's at the coronation
of Edward VI., 1646.
The oil, if added, is hut a ceremony : if it
he wanting, that king is yet a perfect mon-
arch notwithstanding, and God's anointed, as
well as if he was inoiled.—Strype, Cranmer,
Bk. II. ch. i.
Inopinable, inconceivable.
These eight miles or days' journeys may
be called paradoxa, that is to say, inopinable,
incredible, and unbelievable sayings; for if
Christ had not spoken it Himself, who should
have believed it? — Latimer, i. 476.
Inordinancy, extravagance ; excess*
The Diets, give inordinacy.
In order to reform this inordinancy of his
desires, his patron addressed him in the fol-
lowing manner. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i. 12.
I scarce remember to have experienced the
smallest discontent, save what arose from the
inordinancy of my wife's affection for me. —
Ibid. i. 328.
Inpath, an intricate way ; via invia,
Italy is hence parted by long crosse dan-
gerous inpaths. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 396.
Inpravable, incorruptible.
He ... set before his eyes alwav the eve
of the everlasting judge and the inpravable
judging-place. — Becon, i. 105.
Inquirist, inquirer.
But the inquirist keeping himself on the
reserve as to his employers, the girl refused
to tell the day or to give him other particu-
lars.— Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 321.
Inquisite, to inquire into.
He inquisited with justice and decorum,
and determined with as much lenity towards
his enemies as ever prince did. — North, Life
of Lord Guilford, ii. 40.
It is a transcendent justification to be thus
inquisited, and in every respect acquitted. —
Ibid., Exarnen, p. 621.
Inquisitress, female inquisitor.
The innocent intrigue, abetted by the
poetic Julia, is brought to light by that
black-haired inquisitress. — Phillips, Essays
from the Times, ii. 326.
Little Jesuit inquisitress as she was, she
could see things in a true light. — Miss Bronte,
Villeite, ch. xxvi
Inroder, invader.
The Danes never acquired in this land a
long and peaceable possession thereof, living
here rather as inroders than inhabitants. —
Fuller, Worthies, ch. xxiv.
Inrush, to rush in.
As the land draweth backward, the sea . . .
inrusheth upon a little region called Keimcs.
—Holland's Camden, p. 654.
Inrush, irruption.
A long and lonely voyage, with its mono-
tonous days and sleepless nights, its sickness 1
and heart-loneliness, has given me oppor-
tunities for analysing my past history which
were impossible then amid the ceaseless in-
rush of new images, the ceaseless ferment of
their recombination in which my life was
passed from sixteen to twenty-five. — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. vii.
In asking Deronda if he knew Hebrew,
Mordecai was so possessed by the new inrush
of belief, that he had forgotten the absence
of any other condition to the fulfilment of
his hopes. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch.
xxxviii.
Ins and outs, windings; various
turns.
Follow their whimsies and their ins and
outs at the consulto when the Prince was
among them. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i.
152.
Ixsea, to surround by the sea.
The sun cast many a glorious beam
On our bright armours, horse and foot insca'd
together there. — Chapman, Iliad, xi. 637.
Insensible, a thoroughly apathetic or
hard-hearted person.
Nay, would'st thou believe it? those
brawny insensibles the chairmen take it to
heart, and threaten to renounce flip and all
fours since thou hast decreed to leave Eng-
land.— T. Brown, Works, iv. 193.
His reason and the force of his resolutions
enabled him on all occasions to contain him-
self, and to curb the very first risings of pas-
sion, and that in such a degree that he was
taken almost for an insensible. — North, Life
of Lord Guilford, ii. 53.
What an insensible must have been my
cousin, had she not been proud of being
Lady Grandison. — Richardson, Grandison, vi.
405.
Insensiblist, an apathetic man ; in
the extract = one who affects apathy.
Mr. Meadows, . . . since he commenced
insensiblist, has never once dared to be
pleased, nor ventured for a moment to look
in good humour. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia,
Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Inseparizkd, inseparable. Sylvester
says that Diocletian
Knew well the Cares from Crowns tn-
separizd. — Memorials of Mortalitie, st. 43.
INSEQUENT
( 343 )
INSURANCE
Insequent, subsequent.
The debt was not cancell'd to that rigid
and hard servant, for if he had his Apocha
or quietance, to speak after the manner of
men, he were free from all insequent
demands. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 25.
The storm will gather, and burst out into
a greater tempest in all insequent meetings.
— Ibid. i. 50.
Lnserene, to disturb.
Death stood by,
Whose gastly presence inserenes my face.
Dairies, Holy Roods, p. 18.
Inseverable, not to be severed.
We had suffered so much together, and
the filaments connecting them with my
heart were ... so inseverable. — Dt Quineey,
Antob. Sketches, i. 88.
Insidiation, guile.
Though heaven be sure and secure from
violent robbers, yet these by a wily insidia-
tion enter into it, and rob God of His honour.
— Adams, i. 131.
Ixsighted, possessed of insight.
Justus Lipeius, deepely insighted in under-
standing old authors. — Hollands Camden,
p. 687.
Insolent, an insolent person.
When the insolent saw that I did not dress
as he would have had me, he drew out his
face glouting to half the length of my arm.
— Richardson, Grandison, iv. 284.
Insolid, light.
The second defect in the eye is an insolid
levity.— Adams, ii. 881.
Insomxolence, sleeplessness.
Twelve by the kitchen clock ! still restless !
One ! O, Doctor, for one of thy comfortable
composing draughts ! Two ! here's a case of
insomnolence ! — Southey, The Doctor, ch. vi.
A. 1.
Ambition's fever, envy's jaundiced eye.
Detraction that exulcerates, aguish fear,
Suspicion's wasting pale insomnolenee,
With hatred's canker.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, i. 2.
Inspect into, to inspect ; examine :
inspicere in is sometimes used in Latin.
He had not more vigilantly inspected into
her sentiments than he had guarded his own
from a similar scrutiny. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Cecilia, Bk. I. ch. i.
Inspectress, female inspector or
overlooker.
Inspectress General of the royal geer.—
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 36.
Instant, to urge.
Pilate would shed no innocent blood, but
laboured to mitigate the bishops' fury, and
instanted them, as they were religious, to
shew godly favour. — Bale, Select Works,
p. 242.
Instant, instance; pressing appli-
cation.
Upon her instant unto the Romanes for
aide, Garisons were set, Cohorts and wings of
foot and horse were sent, which after sundry
skirmishes with variable event, delivered her
person out of perill. — Holland's Camden,
p. 687.
Instanter, instantly.
Ay, Beauty the Girl and Love the Boy,
Bright as they are with hope and joy,
How their souls would sadden instanter,
To remember that one of those wedding bells
Which ring so merrily through the dells
Is the same that knells
Our last farewells,
Only broken into a canter.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Institution. " The institution " was
a common euphemism for slavery in
America.
I am not going into the slavery question,
I am not an advocate for " the institution."
— Thackeray, Roundabout Papers, xvii.
Institutionary, pertaining to insti-
tution to a preferment.
Dr. Grant had brought on apoplexy and
death by three great institutionary dinners
in one week. — Miss Austen, Mansfield Park,
ch. zlvii.
Institutress, foundress.
The queen was then lying in state in this
coffin at the convent at Ch ail lot, near Paris,
of which she had been the institutress and
patroness. — Archaol., nri. 549 (1827).
Instreaming, access ; flowing in.
He put out his ungloved hand. Mordecai,
clasping it eagerly, seemed to feel a new
instreaming of confidence. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. zl.
In8tbumentalisr, to make or build
up.
In the making of the first man, God first
instrumentalised a perfect body, and then
infused a living soul. — Adams, iii. 147.
Insulphured, impregnated with
sulphur.
Meere heate
Of aire insulphur'd makes the Patient sweate.
Sandys, Travels, p. 265.
Insurance, engagement ; betrothal.
And dyd not I knowe afore of the insurance
Betweene Gawyn Goodlucke and Christian
Custance? — Udal, Roister Doister, iv. 6.
INSURGENCE ( 344 ) INTERFRICTION
Insurgence, rising on or against
There was a moral insurgence in the mind*
of grave men against the Court of Home. —
G. Eliot, liomola, ch. lxri.
Insurrection er, a rebel.
What had the people got if the Parlia-
ment, instead of guarding the Grown, had
colleagued with Venner and other insur-
rectioners ? — North, Examen, p. 418.
Insurrector, insurgent; rebel.
They not onely sided with his Gherionian
insurrectors against him, but . . . they most
basely for a sum of mouy delivered him
over to the plesure of his Gherionian
enemies. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 129.
Inswathe, to infold.
Hay
Pent in a roofless close of ragged stones ;
Inswathed sometimes in wandering mist.
Tennyson, St. Simeon Stylites
Intake, enclosure of land from a
common. See Peacock's Manley and
Corringham Glossary (E. D. S.).
After the Norman Conquest, when a great
part of the first City was turn'd into a
Castle by King William I., it is probable
they added the last intake southward in the
angle of the Witham. — Defoe, Tour thro1 G.
Britain, iii. 4.
Intemperant, intemperate.
Soche as be intemperaunt, that is, foloers
of their naughtie appetites and lustes, doe in
this poinct erre, that thei tbinke those
thynges to be sweete and honest whiche are
nothyng so. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p.
15.
Intenbate, to strengthen or in-
tensify.
Poor Jean Jacques ! . . . with all misform-
ations of Nature intensated to the verge of
madness by unfavourable fortune. — Carlyle,
Misc., iii. 211.
As if to intensate the influences that are
not of race, what we think of when we talk
of English traits really narrows itself to a
small district. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. iv.
Intensation, stretch; ascending
climax.
There are cooks too, we know, who boast
of their diabolic ability to cause the patient,
by successive intensations of their art, to eat
with new and ever new appetite, till he
explode on the spot. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 221.
Interact, to act reciprocally, one on
another.
The two complexions, or two styles of
mind — the perceptive class, and the practical
finality class — are ever in counterpoise, inter-
acting mutually. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch.
xiv.
Intercomplexity, entanglement.
IntercompUxities had arisen between all
complications and interweaving* of descent
from three original strands. — De Quincey,
Spanish Nun, sect. 20.
- Interconnection, mutual connection.
There have been, and there are cases
where two stars dissemble an interconnection
which they really have, and other cases
where they simulate an interconnection which
they have not. — De Quincey, System of the
Heavens.
Intercurled, enlaced.
Queen Helen, whose Jacinth-hair curled
by nature, but intercurled by art (like a fine
brook through golden sands), had a rope of
fair pearl. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 69.
Intercut, to intersect.
There was another reson which induced
me to this transmutation, for it related to
the quality of the countrey whence he
sprung, which is so inlayed and every where
so intercutt and indented with the sea or
fresh navigable rivers that one cannot tell
what to call it, either water or land. — Howell,
Parly of feasts, p. 5.
Interdestructiveness, mutual de-
8tructiveness.
There are antipathies and properties inter-
changeably irreconcilable and destructive to
each other, that fit one human being to be
the source of another's misery. Beyond
doubt I bad found this true opposition and
interdestructiveness in Clifford. — Godtein,
Mandeville, ii. 103.
Interessado, an interested person.
Should not then these interessados resolve
upon some desperate fact, costa che cost a y to
sustain the credit of Oates, which was
notoriously sinking? — North, Exavun, p.
198.
Interbstedness, a regard for one's
own private views or profit. Dis-
interestedness, to express the reverse of
this, is common.
I might give them what degree of credit I
pleased, and take them with abatement for
Mr. Solmes*s interestedness, if I thought fit. —
Richardson, Of. Harlow, ii. 243.
Interflow, to flow in. Holland also
uses the substantive enter/low, q. v.
What way the current cold
Of Northern Ocean with strong tides doth
interflow and swell.
Holland's Camden, p. 12.
Interfriotion, rubbing together.
Kindling a fire by interfriction of dry
sticks was a secret almost exclusively Indian.
— De Quincey, Spanish Nun, sect. 16.
1NTERGERN
( 345 ) INT0LERAB1LITY
Intergkbx, to interchange grins or
snarls.
The eager dogs are cheer 'd with claps and
cryes,
The angry beast to his best chamber flies,
And (angled there) sits grimly inter-geming,
And all the earth rings with the terryes
yearning. — Sylvester, The Decay \ 938.
Interlardment, intermixture. Jn
the extract it means insertion of di-
gressions, reflections, &c.
I know thou cheerest the hearts of all thy
acquaintance with such detached parts of
mine [letters] as tend not to dishonour
characters or reveal names ; and this gives
me an appetite to oblige thee by interlard-
ment. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, ill. 89.
Interlock, to lock or clasp together.
I felt my fingers work and my hands inter'
lock. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxvii.
Interlocutrice, a woman con-
versing.
Have the goodness to serve her as audi-
tress and interlocutriee. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. ziv.
Intermingledom, mixture.
The case is filled with bits and ends to
ribbons, patterns, and so forth, of all manner
of colours, faded and fresh ; with intermingle'
dome of gold-beaters' skin plasters for a cut
finger. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 184.
Iktebmiss, respite ; interval.
They think not fit to trust the care to
others, but do become themselves the super-
visors, which, for a time, of force enforced
their absence ; in which short inter miss the
king relapseth to his former errour. — Hist,
of Edward II., p. 94.
Intermission, intervention.
It was provided .... that such Contro-
versies . . . should be decided by the ordin-
ary course of Justice, or by some amicable
and friendly Composition amongst them-
selves ; and that no other . . . towns, whom
those Countries did no way concern, shall in
any part meddle by way of friendly inter-
mission tending to an accord. — Hey tins Hist,
of the Presbyterians, p. 126.
Intebnity, inwardness; interior
presence.
The internity of His ever-living light kin-
dled up an externity of corporeal irradiation.
—H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 249.
Internunciess, female envoy.
Iris, that had place
Of internunciess from the Gods.
Chapman, Iliad, zv. 140.
Internuncioship, agency as a mes-
senger.
Several billets passed between us before I
went out, by the internuncioship of Dorcas.
— Richardson, CI. Harlow*, v. 6.
Interpasb, to pass between.
Many skirmishes interpassed, with surprise-
ments of castles, but m the end a treaty
of peace was propounded. — Daniel, Hist, of
Eng., p. 47.
Interpoler.
Tour ladies, after they have travelled
thither with some liberal interpoler, carry
home with them more than their husbands
are worth. — T. Brown, Works, in. 64.
Interpolity, exchange of citizenship.
You whose whole theory is an absolute
sermon upon emigration, and the transplant-
ing and interpolity of our species, you, sir,
should be the last man to chain your son,
your elder son, to the soil. — Lytton, Caxtons,
Bk. XIII. ch. i.
Intertraffic, to trade together.
Through peace and perfect government this
land
May in her rich commodities abound ;
Which may confirm the neighbour-friend-
ship's band,
And intertrafficke with them tonne for
pound. — Davies, Microcosmos, p. 61.
Intertwine, interweaving ; mixture.
Ill
Such intertwine beseems triumphal wreaths
Strewed before thy advancing.
Coleridge, To Wordsworth.
Intervisit, to exchange visits.
Here we trifled, and bathed, and inter'
visited with the company who frequent the
place for health. — Evelyn, Diary, June 27,
1664.
Interwound, to exchange wounds ;
to wound mutually.
The Captain chooses but three hundred out,
And arminp each but with a trump and torch,
About a mighty pagan hoast doth march,
Making the same, through their dead sodain
sound,
With their owne arms themselves to inter'
wound. — Sylvester, The Captaines, 823.
Intext, contents.
Besides rare sweets, I had a book which none
Co'd reade the intext but my selfe alone.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 243.
Intimado, confidant ; close friend.
Did not I say he was the Earl's Intimado ?
— North, Examen, p. 23.
There is a gentleman of no good character
(an intimado of Mr. Lovelace) who is a con-
stant visitor of her. — Richardson, CI. Hav
lowe, vii. 359.
Intolerability, unbearableness ; ex-
cessive badness.
INTOXICABLE , ( 346 )
INVICT
The goodness of yoar true pun is in the
direct ratio of its intoler ability. — E. A . Poe,
Marginalia, Introd.
Intoxicable, capable of being in-
toxicated.
If the powers they were to lean on were
not willing friends, and the people not so
intoxicable as to fall in with their brutal
assistance, no good could come of any false
plot. — North, Examen, p. 314.
Intoxicate, to poison.
What is to be looked for in a dispenser?
This, surely : . . . that he give meat in time ;
give it, I say, and not sell it ; meat, I say,
and not poison. For the one doth intoxicate
and slay the eater, the other feedeth and
nourisheth him. — Latimer, i. 35.
Because the poyson of this opinion does so
easily enter, and so strangely intoxicate, I
shall presume to give an antidote against it.
— South, Sermons, iii. 144.
Intracted, drawn in.
For cruell thirst came out of Cvren land,
Where she was fostred on that burning sand,
With bote intracted tongue, and sonken een.
Hudson, Judith, iii. 299.
Intrado, income. See Entrado and
Entratas. In the third extract the
word = entry.
The Pope's income ran the highest in
England under King Henry the third and
King Edward the first, before the statute of
Mortmaine, and after it that of Premunire
was made, for these much abated his intrado.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. iii. 35.
The royal intrado was so much increased
in the late King's time, that for the better
managing of it the King erected first the
court of Augmentation, and afterwards the
court of Surveyors. — Heylin, Hist, of Ref, i.
286.
And now my lady makes her intrado, and
begins the great work of the day. — Gentle*
man Instructed, p. 117.
Intrain, to draw on; to beguile.
See s. v. Entrain.
Th' Hebrew Captain then
Flies as affeard, and with him all his men
Disorderly retire, still faining so
Till (politik) be hath intrayn'd the foe
Bight to his ambush.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 379.
Intrico, intricacy.
The potions of school divinity wrought
easily with him, so that he was not lost a
whit in their intricoes. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 12.
Intriguess, a scheming woman.
His family was very ill qualified for that
place, his lady being a most violent intriguess
in business. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
i. 168.
The wife for her part . . . was a compleat
intriguess. — Ibid., Era men, p. 197.
It is to be regretted that a word used in
the days of Charles II., and still intelligible
in our times, should have become obsolete ;
viz., the feminine for intriguer — an intrigues*.
See the Life of Lord Keeper North. — Miss
Edgetcorth, Manoeuvring, ch. i.
Intriguish, connected with plot or
intrigue.
Considering the assurance and application
of women, especially to affairs that are in-
triguish, we must conclude that the chief
address was to Mrs. Wall.— North, Examen,
p. 193.
Intboduct, to introduce.
The Chaplain's full and absolute parts did
introduct him to this love and liking. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 29.
Inturn, a term in wrestling. See
Halliwell $. v.
When th' hardy Major, skilled in wars,
To make quick end of fight prepares,
By strength o'er buttock cross to hawl him,
Aid with a trip i' th* inturn mawl him.
Wrfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 2.
Inusitate, unusual.
I find some inusitate expressions about
some mysteries which are scarcely intelligible
or explicable. — Bramhall, ii. 61.
Inustion, burning.
A kingdom brought him to tyranny,
tyranny to . . . inustion of other countries,
among which Israel felt the smart in the
burning of her cities and massacring her
inhabitants.— Adams, ii. S54.
Invectiveness, abusiveness.
Some wonder at his invectiveness ; I wonder
more that he inveigheth so little. — Fuller,
Worthies, Hants (i. 414).
Inveigh on, to attack with re-
proaches. R. gives one example of
inveigh at; otherwise all the extracts
in the Diets, give the word with the
usual preposition, against.
I can hardly inhold from inveighing on his
memory. — Fuller, Hist, of Camb., viii. 16.
Investion, investiture.
We knew, my lord, before we brought the
crown,
Intending your investion so near
The residence of your despised brother,
The lords would not be too exasperate
To injury or suppress your worthy title.
Marlowe, 1 Tamburlaine, i. 1.
Invict, unconquered.
Who weens to vanquish him makes him
invict. — Sylvester, Trophies of Hen. the
Great, 151.
IN VINA TE
( 347 ) IRREFRAGABILITY
Invinate, incorporated with wine.
Christ should be impanate and invinate. —
Cranmer, i. 305.
Invite, invitation.
The Lamprey swims to his Lord's invites.
— Sandys, Travels, p. 305.
Everybody bowed and accepted the invite
but me, and I thought fitting not to hear it,
for I have no intention of snapping at invites
from the eminent. — Mad. DyArblay, Diary ,
i. 105.
Adepts in every little meanness or contriv-
ance likely to bring about an invitation (or,
as they call it with equal good taste, an
invite). — Th. Hook, Man of Many Friends.
Guest after guest arrived : the invites had
been excellently arranged. — Sketches by Boz
{Steam Excursion).
Involuble, immovable. Sylvester
speaks of God as
Infallible, involuble, insensible. — Little
Bartas, 161.
Involute, involved : also used sub-
stantival ly.
The style is so involute that one cannot
help fancying it must be falsely constructed.
— E. A. Poe, Marginalia, oxvii.
Far more of our deepest thoughts and
feelings pass to us through perplexed com-
binations of concrete objects, pass to us as
involutes (if I may coin that word) in com-
pound experiences incapable of being disen-
tangled, than ever reach us directly, and in
their own abstract shapes. — De Quincey,
Autob. Sketches, ch. i.
Inwall, inner wall.
The hinges piecemeal flew, and through the
fervent little rock
Tb under 'd a passage; with his weight thf
inwall his breast did knock.
Chapman, Iliad, xii. 448.
In-yoat, to pour in. See L. *. v.
yoU.
O that my words (the words I now assever)
Were writ, were printed, and (to last for
ever)
Were grav'n in Marble with an yron pen
With Lead in-yoated (to fill up a?en).
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, ii. 271.
I 0 U, a promise to pay.
Hee teacheth od f ellowes play tricks with
their creditors, who instead of payments
write I O V, and so scoffe many an honest
man out of his goods. — Breton, Courtier and
Countryman, p. 9.
Ieacund, passionate.
A spirit cross-grained, fantastic, iracund,
incompatible. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 87.
Iracundiously, angrily.
He, . . . drawing oat his knife most iracun-
diously, at one whiske lopt off his head. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Harl. Misc., vi. 166).
Ibid, the circle round the pupil of
the eye : iris is more usual.
Brown eyes with a benignant light in their
irids, and a fine pencilling of long lashes
round, relieved the whiteness of her large
front. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. v.
Many a sudden ray levelled from the irid
under his well-charactered brow. — Ibid.,
Villette, ch. xvi.
Irons. To have many irons in the
fire = to have many plans or occupa-
tions. To pat every iron in the fire =
to try every means.
Elaiana . . . hath divers nurseries to supplie,
many irons perpetually in the fire. — Howell,
Dodonas Grove, p. 38.
They held it hot agreeable to the rules of
prudence to have too many irons in the Jire.
— Heylin, Reformation, i. 261.
You'll find that I hare more irons V th1
Jire than one ; I doan't come of a fool's errand.
— Gibber, Provoked Husband, Act III.
Anthony Darnel bad begun to canvass, and
was putting every iron in the Jire. — Smollett,
Sir L. Greaves, ch. Hi.
Irrealizable, that cannot be realized
or defined.
It may be that the constancy of one true
heart, the truth and faith of one mind ac-
cording to the light He has appointed, import
as much to Him as the just motion of satel-
lites about their planets, of planets about
their suns, of suns around that mighty, un-
seen centre, incomprehensible, irrealizable,
with strange mental effort only divined. —
Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxxvi.
Irreclaimableness, incorrigible state.
Enormities . . . which are out of his power
to atone for, by reason of the death of some
of the injured parties, and the irreclaimable-
ness of others. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, viii.
407.
Irreconcilable is often used now
as a substantive of any who will admit
no compromise on the point in which
they are interested.
Sleep and I have quarrelled ; and although
I court it, it will not be friends. I hope its
fellow-irreconcilables at Harlowe-place enjoy
its balmy comforts. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
iii. 178.
Irreflective, thoughtless.
From this day I was an altered creature,
never again relapsing into the careless, irre-
Jlective mind of childhood. — De Quincey,
Autob. Sketches, i. 362.
Irrefragability, unbendingness ;
obstinacy.
A solemn, high-stalking man, with such a
1R RELATION ( 348 )
ITEM
fund of indignation in him, or of latent
indignation ; of contmnacity, irrefragability.
— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 80.
Irrelation, want of relation.
The utter irrelation, in both cases, of the
audience to the scene . . . threw upon each
a ridicule not to be effaced. — De Quincty,
Autob. Sketches, i. 190.
Irrkpassable, that cannot be re-
passed.
He had past already (miserable)
Of Styx so black the flood irrepassaMe.
Hudson, Judith, vi. 250.
Irresuscitably, in a completely dead
way; incapable of revival.
The inner man . . . sleeps now irresusciU
ably at the bottom of his stomach. — Carlyle,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. II. ch. ii.
Irretention, want of retaining
power.
From irretention of memory he could not
recollect the letters which composed his
name. — De Quincey, Last Days of Kant,
Irbevitable, not to be evaded.
To conclude, for their force it is irreuitable,
for were they not irreuitable, then might
eyther propernesse of person secure a man, or
wisedome preuent am. — Chapman, All Fooles,
ActV.
Irrite, vain ; useless.
These irrite, forceless, bugbear excommuni-
cations, the ridiculous affordments of a mer-
cenary power, are not unlike those old night-
spells which blind people had from mongrel
witches.— Adams, ii. 180.
Iby, angry.
Fcr to be angery and not to sinne
Is an obligatorie heast divine ;
For whiles we are that holy anger in
(Not wholly angery), it is a signe
We flame with that which doth our soules
refine:
For in our Soules the try pow'r it is
That makes vs at vnhallowed thoughts repine.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 74.
Island, to insulate.
She distinguished ... a belt of trees, such
as we see in the lovely parks of England,
but islanded by a screen of thick bushy under-
growth.— Be Quincey, Spanish Nun, sect. 18.
Islandish, insular. Dr. Dee, Petty
Navey Royal, 1576 (Ena. Garner, ii.
65), speakB of "our Islandish Mon-
archy.
Isle, to insulate ; to make an island ;
also to dwell on an isle.
And isled in sud'len seas of light
My heart, piere'd thro' with fierce delight,
Bursts into blossom in his sight.
Tennyson, Fatima.
Lion and stoat have isled together, knave,
In time of flood. — Ibid., Gareth and Lynette.
Ism, being the termination of many
words denoting forms of religious belief,
is used as a generic term for sects or
dogmas.
It has nothing to do with Calvinism nor
Arminianism nor any of the other isms. —
Southey, Letters, 1809 (ii. 182).
This is Abbot Samson's Catholicism of the
twelfth century — something like the Ism of
all true men in all true centuries, I fancy.
Alas, compared with any of the Isms current
in these poor days, what a thing! — Carlyle,
Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. xv.
Isthim, isthmus.
Logh Nesse, . . . from which, by a verie
small Isthim or partition of hils, the Logh
Lutea or Louthia ... is divided. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 60.
ITALI8H, Italian.
All this is true, though the feat handling
thereof be altogether Italish. — Bale, Select
Works, p. 9.
The book of conformities of Frances to
Christ written by an Italish friar called Bar-
tholomew Pisanus. — Ibid. p. 205.
Itchless, incorruptible ; not having
an itching palm (?).
But thon art just and itchlesse.snd dost please
Thy genius with two strengthening buttresses.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 270.
Item, a hint; admonition, or re-
minder.
Our neighbours' harms are items to the
wise. — Whetstone, Life of Gascoigne, st. 13.
Every infirmity in our brother, which
should rather be an item to us of our frailty,
serveth as fuel to nourish this vanity. — San-
derson, iii. 262.
A secret item was given to some of the
bishops by some of their well-wishers to
absent themselves in this licentious time of
Christmas.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. iv. 15.
He that lives in such a place as this is, and
that has to do with such as we have, has need
of an item to caution him to take heed every
moment of the day. — Pilgrim's Progress, Pt.
II. p. 150.
By many terrible items did the vengeance
of God remind them of it for many suc-
ceeding generations. — South, Sermons, vi. 222.
My uncle took notice that Sir Charles had
said he guessed at the writer of the note.
He wished he would give him an item, as
he called it, whom he thought of. — Richard-
son, Grandison, vi. 292.
ITENERATE
( 349 ) JACK IN THE CELLAR
Itknerate, tender (?).
But to tbinke on a red-herring, such a hot
stirring meat© it is, is enough to make the
oravenest dastard proclaime fire and sword
against Spaine ; the most itenerate virgine-wax
phisnomy that taints histhroate with the least
ribbe of it, it will embrawne and iron-crust his
&eAh.-XasheyLentenStuffe {ffarl. Mise.,vi. 165).
Izzaed, Z. " As crooked as an izzart,
deformed in person, perverse in dis-
position. An oddity." — Robinson's
Whitby Glossary (E. D. S.).
He ran . . . through the A's and B's and
C's, quite down to lizard.— Nans. Thinks I to
Myself, ii. 87.
Jabkll. H. says, "A term of con-
tempt more usually applied to a woman
than a man." It is, however, addressed
to the latter in the following.
What, thn jabell, canst not have do?
Thu and thi cumpany shall not depart
Tyll of our distavys ye have take part.
Candlemas Day, 1512 (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., i. 18).
Jacatoo, cockatoo.
The Physick or Anatomie Schole adorn M
with some rarities of natural things, but
nothing extraordinary save the skin of a
jaccall, a rarely coloured jacatoo, or pro-
digious huge parrot. — Evelyn, Diary, July
11, 1654.
Jack, explained in a note in loc. to
be " a cant word for a Jacobite. n
With every wind he sail'd, and well cou'd
tack,
Had many pendents, but abhorr'd a Jack.
Swift, Elegy on Judge Boat.
Jack, knave.
If you were not resolved to play the Jacks,
what need you study for new subjects, pur-
posely to abuse your betters? — Beaum. and
Fl., Knight of Burning Pestle, Induction.
Going back again, Sir R. Brookes overtook
us coming to town; who played the jacke
with us all, and is a fellow that I must trust
no more.— Pevys, Feb. 23, 1667-68.
Well, Mr. Neverout, take it as you please ;
but I swear you're a saucy Jack for using
such expressions. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. i.).
"He calls the knaves Jacks, this boy,"
said Eatella with disdain, before our first
game was out. — Dickens, Great Expectations,
cb. vui.
Jack-adams, a fool.
All the reward truly of my great services
was to be made Lucifer's jester, or fool in
ordinary to the devil ; a pretty post, thought
I, for a man of my principles, that from a
Quaker in the other world, I should be me-
tamorphosed into a jack-adams in the lower
one.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 220.
Jackanapes coat, dandy coat (?).
Cf. Jessimt.
This morning my brother Tom brought
me my jackanapes coat with silver buttons.
—Pepys, July 5, 1660.
Jackasrism, stupidity.
Gently, gently, Miss Muse! mind your Ps
and vour Qs ;
Don't be malapert — laugh, Miss, but never
abuse !
Calling names, whether done to attack or to
back a schism,
Is, Miss, believe me, a great piece of jackass-
ism. — Ingoldsby Legends ( Wedding-Day).
Jack Cap, a helmet.
The several Insurance Offices . . have each
of them a certain set of men whom they
keep in constant pay, and furnish with tools
proper for their work, and to whom they give
Jack Caps of leather, able to keep them from
hurt, if brick or timber, or anything not of
too great a bulk, should fall upon them. —
Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, ii. 148.
Jackey, gin (slang). Cf . Old Tom.
The extract is translated in a note,
"Well, you parson thief, are you for
drinking gin or talking in the pulpit ? "
Well, you parish bull prig, are you for
lushing jackey or pattering in the hum-box ?
— Lytton, Pefham, ch. lxxx.
Jack-in-office, a consequential petty
official : used also adjectivally.
Some folks are Jacks -in -office, fond of
power. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 52.
I hate a Jack-in-office martinet. — Ibid. p.
181.
tt You're a Jack-in-office, sir." " A what ? "
ejaculated he of the boots. " A Jack-in-office,
sir, and a very insolent fellow." — Sketches liy
Boz (Parliamentary Sketch).
Jack in the cellar, a child in the
womb ; a translation of Hans en Kel-
der, q. v. in N.
When his companions drank to the Hans
en Kelder, or' Jack in the low cellar, he could
not help displaying an extraordinary com-
placence of countenance, and signified his
intention of sending the young dog to sea. —
Smollett, Peregrine Pickle, ch. x.
JACK NASTY
( 350 )
J AG HI RE
Jack Nasty, a term of reproach for
a sneak or a sloven.
Tom and his younger brothers, as they grew
up, went on nlaying with the village boys,
without the idea of equality or inequality
(except in wrestling, running, and climbing)
ever entering their heads, as it doesn't till
it's put there by Jack Nastys or fine ladies'
maids. — Hughes, Tom Brawn1 1 School-Days,
Pt. I. ch. iii.
Jack of all trades, one who can
put his hand to anything: often used
contemptuously of a smatterer — " Jack
of all trades, and master of none." Cf.
John of all trades.
They [Jesuits] are Jacks-of-all-trades, and
creep into all sects, partly to conceal them-
selves, and partly to foment and stir up
division. — Misson, Travels in Ena., p. 143.
He is a bit of a Jack of ail trades, or,
to use his own words, a regular Robinson
Crusoe.— Sketches by Boz, ch. li.
Jack of lanthorn. This name of
the ignis faiuus is given to watchmen
in the extract, a lanthorn being part of
their equipment.
Who should come by before I could get
up again, but the constable going his rounds,
who quickly made me centre of a circle of
Jack of lanthoms. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 195.
Jackonet, usually spelt jaconet. L.
says, "[Fr. jaconas] kind of muslin so
called, of close texture (in opposition
to the book muslins, which are open or
clear) ; for example see muslin" where,
however, no instance of the word jaco-
net is to be found.
It would be mortifying to the feelings of
many ladies could they oe made to under-
stand how little the heart of man is affected
by what is costly or new in their attire ; how
little it is biassed by the texture of their
muslin, and how unsusceptible of peculiar
tenderness towards the spotted, the sprigged,
the mull, or the jackonet. — Miss Austen,
Northanger Abbey, ch. x.
Jack-puddinghood, buffoonery.
Grossatesta, the Modenese minister, a very
low fellow, with all the jack-puddinyhood of
an Italian.— Walpole to Mann, ii. 295 (1749).
Jack-sauce, an impudent fellow. H.
says, "It occurs in How to choose a
good wife, 1634." The first extract is
not later than 1582.
Heere is a gay world ! boyes now set old men
to scoole:
I sayd wel inough ; what, Jack sawce, think'st
cham a fool ?
Edwards, Damon and Pitheas (Dodsley,
0. PL, i. 271).
If I wotted it would have made him such
a Jack-sauce as to have more wit than his
vore-fathers, he should have learn'd nothing
for old Agroicus, but to keep a talley. — Ran-
dolph, Muses* Looking-Glass, iv. 4.
JACK-8PANIARD, 8COrpion.
Then all, sitting on the sandy turf, defiant
of galliwasps and jack- Spaniards % and all the
weapons of the insect host, partook of the
equal banquet. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. xvii.
Jackstraw, a light fellow; a cox-
comb ; also, as an adjective, unregarded
or unsubstantial, like an effigy stuffed
with straw. Cf. man of straw, s. v.
Straw.
You are a saucy Jack-straw to question
me, faith and troth. — Wycherley, Love in a
Wood, i. 2.
How now, madam! refuse me! I com-
mand you on your obedience to accept of
this ; I will not be a jackstraw father. —
Richardson, Grandison, vii. 63.
Jackstraws, a game like spillikins.
One evening Belinda was playing with
little Charles Percival at jackstraws. . . .
" You moved, Miss Portman," cried Charles.
u Oh, indeed the king's head stirred the very
instant papa spoke. I knew it was impos-
sible that you could get that knave clear off
without shaking the king. Now, papa, only
look how they were balanced." — Miss EJye-
worth, Belinda, ch. xix.
Jade as a term of reproach is usually
applied to a woman.
And thus the villaine would the world per-
swade
To prowde attemptes that may presume
too high,
But earthly joies will make him prove a
jade,
When vertue speakes of loue's diuinity.
Breton, Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 10.
Jaoger, a pedler. The word is in use
in Cheshire for one who sells coal in
small cartloads.
I would take the lad for tkjagaer, but he
has rather ower good havings, ana he has no
pack. — Scott, The Pirate, ch. v.
Jaghire. "In the East Indies an
assignment of the government share of
the produce of a portion of land to an
individual, either personal, or for the
support of a public establishment, par-
ticularly of a military nature" (Imp,
Diet.) ; but see second extract.
I say, madam, I know nothing of books;
and yet, I believe, upon a land carriage
fishery, a stamp act or & jag-hire, I can talk
my two hours without feeling the want of
them. — Goldsmith, Good-Natured Man, Act II.
JAIL
• < 351 )
JAUL
Thomas. Sir Matthew will settle upon Sir
John and his lady, for their joint lives, a
jagyhire.
Sir J. Ajagghire ?
Thomas. The term is Indian, and means an
annual income. — Foote, The Nabob, Act I.
Jail, to imprison. A writer in N.
and Q., IV. xi. 94, says, " I find in a
New York paper a very handy word
which we nave not yet adopted —
jatfaf."
And sith our Bodyes doe but Jaile our
Minde,
While we haue Bodyes, we can ne'er be free.
Davits, Mus^s Sacrifice, p. 81 (1612).
He that boasteth the strength of his body
doth but brag how strong the prison is
wherein he is jailed. — Adams, i. 227 (1614).
Eriz. My jailor
Bedinafield. One whose bolts,
That jaxl you from free life, bar you from
death. — Tennyson, Q. Mary, iii. 5.
Jail, goal.
There is no method for an arrival to
wisdom, and consequently no tract to the
Jail of happiness, without the instructions
and directions of folly. — Kennefs Erasmus,
Praise of Folly, p. 43.
Jail-fever. In days when prisons
were crowded and ill ventilated, it was
very common for a fever to break out
among the prisoners, and sometimes
prove fatal to those before whom they
were brought for trial.
We may be out, with all our skill so clever,
And what we think an ague prove jail-fever.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 266.
Janglery, empty chatter. R. has the
word with quotation from Gower. In
the subjoined extract it is used adjec-
tivally.
But loa to what purpose do I chat such
janglerye trim trams ?--Stanyhurst, ^En., ii.
113.
Japan, a black cane.
like Mercury, you must always carry a
caduceus or conjuring japan in your hand,
capped with a civet •'box. — The Quack's
Academy, 1678 (Harl. Misc., ii. 33).
Japannish, belonging to Japan. In
the extract it seems to refer to the
gaudy ornamentation on Japanese
work.
In some of the Greek delineations (the
Lycian painter, for example) we have already
noticed a strange opulence of splendour,
characterisable as half-legitimate, half-mere-
tricious, a splendour hovering between the
raffaelesque and the japannish. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, ch. vi.
Jab. On the jar = on the turn, a
little way open. L. , 8. v., refers to ajar,
and says that jar in this sense is now
never found as a separate word, but I
think it is not uncommon colloquially.
The door was on the jar, and, gently
opening it, I entered and stood behind her
un perceived. — U. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i.
oil.
**I see Mrs. Bardell's street door on the
On the what ? " exclaimed the little
» *i
jar
judge. " Partly open, my lord,7* said Sergeant
Snubbin. " She said on the jar," said the
little judge, with a cunning look. " It's all
the same, my lord," said Sergeant Snubbin.
— Pickwick Papers, ch. xxxiv.
Jargonist, one who uses a particular
jargon, or repeats by rote cant or
favourite phrases.
"And pray of what sect/' said Camilla,
^is this gentleman?" "Of the sect of
jargonists, answered Mr. Gosport ; " he has
not an ambition beyond paying a passing
compliment, nor a word to make use of that
he has not picked up at public places." —
Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Nothing in the language of the jaraonists
at whom Mr. Gosport laughed, nothing in
the language of Sir Sedley Oarendel, ap-
proaches this new Euphuism. — Macaulay,
Essays (Mad. D'Arblay).
Jarl, to snarl ; quarrel. The extract
is addressed to a dog : Lelaps is another
dog. Cf. Jaul.
What if Lelaps a better morsel find
Than you earst knew? Bather take part
with him
Than jarl. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 224.
Jarry, jarring ; reverberating.
Theese flaws theyre cabbans wyth stur
EDMijarrye doe ransack. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i.
63.
Jarvie, hackney coach-man. L. has
the word as signifying both the carriage
and its driver, but the extract from
Theodore Hook only illustrates the
former meaning.
The Glass-coachman waits, and in what
mood ! A brother jarvie drives up, enters
into conversation ; is answered cheerfully in
jarvie dialect ; the brothers of the whip
exchange a pinch of snuff, decline drinking
together, and part with good night. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt II. Bk. IV. ch. iii.
Jaul, to grumble. Cf . Jarl.
Well, 111 not stay with her : stay, auotha ?
To be yauld and jauPd at, and tumbled and
thumbled, and tost and turn'd, as I am by an
old hag. — Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng. Dr.,
iii. 317). «
JAUM
( 352 )
JEMMY
Her father o' th' other side, he yoles at her
andjoles at her, and she leads such a life for
you, it passes. — Ibid. (lb. iii. 342).
Jaum, jamb or side-post.
The jaumes of tlie lights being all of well
wrought free stone. — Survey of Maner of
Wimbledon, 1649 (Arch., x. 403).
Jaunty, brisk ; smart. The earliest
example of this word in the Diets, is
from a work published in 1662, quoted
by L., and it occurs in the Tatler,
Spectator, and Guardian. The annexed
quotations, however, will show that it
was scarcely naturalized then, and still
often wore its foreign dress. Smart,
quoted by R., writes it as an English
word, but spells it jauntee; so does
Fielding.
Turn you about upon your heel with a
janti air, bum out the end of an old song ;
cat a cross caper, and at her again. — Farquhar,
The Inconstant, Act I.
Your vivacity and jantie mien assured me
at first sight that there was nothing of this
foggy island in your composition. — Centlivre,
Hold Stroke for a Wife, ii. 1.
My jauntee sergeant was very early here
this morning. — Fielding, Amelia, Bk. V.
ch. vii.
Javelin, to pierce as with a javelin.
Scarce had she ceased, when out of heaven a
bolt
(For now the storm was close above them)
struck,
Furrowing a giant oak, taidjavelining
With darted spikes and splinters of the
wood
The dark earth round.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Javil. See extract.
Then must the foresaid jauils or stalkes
bee hung out a second time to be dried in
the sun. — Holland, Pliny, xix. i.
Jaw, to talk a good deal, especially
in scolding ; also a substantive.
He swore woundily at the lieutenant, and
called him lousy Scotch son of a whore, . . .
and swab, and lubbard, whereby the lieu-
tenant returned the salute, and they jaiced
together fore and aft a good spell. — Smollett ,
Bod. Random, ch. xxiv.
If you don't Rtop your jaic about him,
you'll have to fight me. — H. Kingsley,
Geoff ry Hamlyn, ch. xxvi.
Jaw-fallkn, depressed, chop-fallen ;
in second extract, astonished ; open-
mouthed.
He may be compared to one uojaiof alien
with over -long fasting that he cannot eat
meat when brought unto him. — Fuller,
Worthies, Essex (i. 345). *
The people who came about us, as we
alighted, seemed by their jaic-f alien faces
and goggling eyes to wonder at beholding a
charming young lady. — Richardson, CI. Har-
lowe, iii. 54.
J A whole. See quotation. In Robin-
son's Whitby Glossary (E. D. S.) the
word is given as meaning "a fissure
or opening in the land, as the mouth
of a stream. The arched entrance to
a cavern."
Before the door of Saunders Jaup . . .
yawned that odoriferous gulf, ycleped in
Scottish phrase the jawhole ; in other words,
an uncovered common sewer. — Scott, St.
Ronan's Well, ii. 141.
Jawless, without a jaw.
The jawless bum by signs begged his par-
don, for speak he could not. — UrqttharCs
Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xv.
Jazkrent, a short coat of mail with-
out sleeves. See H. s. v. jesseraunt.
Ajazerent of double mail he wore.
Southey, Joan of Arc,Tlk. VII.
Jealous, to suspect: still used in
Scotland.
This unwonted coldness in youth is the
more to be jealoused that, previous to the
marriage, the man did express an eager
impatience to enjoy his young bride. — The
Great Bastard, &c., 1689 (Sari. Misc^ iv.
235).
Jehup, to urge horses on, from the
sound made by drivers.
May I lose my Otho, or be tumbled from
my phaeton the first time I jehup my sor-
rels, if I have not made more haste than a
young surgeon in his first labour. — Foote,
Taste, Act II.
Jeltron, some piece of armour.
No armure so stronge in no dystresse,
Habergyon, helme, ne yet no Jeltron,
Hycke-Scorner (Hawkins, Eng. Dr., i. 78).
Jembles, hinges.
For a pare of Jembles for the stoole dore
x* — Leverton Chwardens Accts., 1588 (Arch^
xli. 366).
Jemmy, as an adjective = neat ; smart
See L., who adds that the word is used
substantially, but gives no example.
In the extract it signifies a particular
sort of boot of a dandy description.
Smollett (H. Clinker, i. 148) speaks of
tk new jemmy boots."
Buck. Hark'ee, Mr. Subtle, 111 out of my
tramels when I hunt with the king.
Subtle. Well, well.
JEMMY
( 353 )
JEWS TIN
a with my jemmyt: none of
i and jack-boots for me.
Englishman in Paris, Act I.
sheep's head, said to be
ecause James V. break-
ne before the battle of
o a crowbar (slang).
7 returned with a pot of porter
■ sheep's beads, which gave
;ral pleasant witticisms on the
es, founded upon the singular
"jemmies " being a cant name
;m, and also to an ingenious
ch used in his profession. —
Ticist, ch. xx.
crow-bars — jemmies is the
e they bear —
ough lock, and bolt, and bar —
ight is there !
igoldshy Let/ends (Nell Cook),
ato (?). This name is given
any articles : a great-coat,
sheep's head.
the shop perhaps is in the
□e, or the firewood and hearth-
ny other line which requires a
of eighteen pence. — Sketches
Dials).
gentleman.
pe 6ay (ko I) of such ijentman.
im not (ko she), doe the best
er Doister, iii. 3 (see also iii. 5).
From Jericho to June =
ice.
is tremendous, and when he
on would — to use an expres-
rn, which he had picked up
are — would send a man from
\e. — Ingoldsby Legends (Grey
mentioned by Davies in
reauen on Earth, p. 45, and
note to be
ler but feeding, and when he
much as his panch can hold,
td tree, and there straines out
gested betweane the twist of
so againe presently falles to
ig full, agaiue to the tree, and
i feede.
retch ; throw out, as a
his elbows in pulling his
er tower as one of our Irish
i not so wide as a belfre, and
lot jert out his elbowes in.—
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi 167).
[ letters. There are per-
taalem who tattoo on the
arm of visitors, if they wish it, the
sign of the cross, with the name of the
city and the date of their visit.
" If heaven should ever bless me with mora
children," said Mr. Fielding, "I have de-
termined to fix some indelible mark upon
them, such as that of the Jerusalem letters."
—H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 258.
Jess. See quotation. The metaphor
is taken from the jess or strap by wnich
the hawk was fastened to the hand.
A motion to a confession of our filthiness,
and the corrupt affections that dwell in us.
The first resting-place or jess in this pro-
gress.— Norden7s Progress of Piety, p. 47.
Jessimy. dandy ; delicate (?). Cf. Jack-
anapes coat.
I did this day call at the New Exchange,
and bought her a pair of green silk stock-
iugs, ana garters, and shoe-strings, and two
pair of jessimy gloves, all coming to about
2Zs.—Pepys, Feb. 15, 1668-9.
Jestee, a butt.
The mortgager and mortgagee differ the
one from the other not more in length of
purse than the jester &nd jestee do in that of
memory. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 55.
Jesuitocracy, rule of Jesuits.
If the state of Borne don't show his idea
of man and society to be a rotten lie, what
proof would you have ? perhaps the charm-
ing results of a century of Jesuitocracy, as
they were represented on the French stage
in the year 1793? — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. v.
Jesuitry, subtle argument; special
pleading.
The poor Girondins, many of them, under
such fierce bellowing of Patriotism, say
Death ; justifying, motivant, that most miser-
able word of theirs by some brief casuistry
and Jesuitry. Verjmiaud himself says Death ;
justifying by Jesuitry.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
III. Bk. II. ch. vii.
Jetstone, jet. The allusions to jet
attracting straws, &c. are frequent in
old writers.
It giues Wit* edge, and drawes them too
like jetstone. — Davies, Commendatory Poems,
p. 13.
Jewelly, jewel-like ; sparkling.
The jewelly star of life had descended too
far down the arch towards setting for any
chance of reaacending by spontaneous effort.
— De Quincey, Spanish Nun, sect. 19.
Jews tin. See extract, which is from
a letter to Prof. Max Mull or.
What you say about metamorphic language
is most true (even in my little experience).
You do not mention * f™» *»'« ' T^ia i«
Jews tin*
A A
This is
JIB
( 354 ) JOCKEY-CART
lumps of smelted tin (if I recollect right)
with a coating of hydrated oxide of tin, which
is caused by lying in water and bog. Jew*
tin is found inside Jews' houses, or in the
diluvium of old stream works. May this
not be merely, according to your etymology,
'house tin/ the tin found in the houses r—
C. Kingsley, 1806 (Life,u. 106).
Jib. The cut of a man's iib = his
outward appearance, the metaphor being
token from the jib-sail of a ship.
If she disliked what sailors call the cut of
their jib, . . . none so likely as they to give
them what in her country is called a sloan.
—Scott, St. BonaiCs WeU, i. 22.
Not know an Avenel ! We've all the same
cut of the jib, have not we, father ? — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. IV. ch. zxiii.
Jiggered, an imprecation. The ex-
pression arose from the suffering caused
by the chigoe insect in the West Indies,
which burrows in the feet of the bare-
footed negroes. See Jiggers.
u Well, then," said he, w I'm jiggered if I
don't see you home." This penalty of being
jiagered was a favourite supposititious case
of his. He attached no definite meaning to
the word that I am aware of, but used it,
like his own pretended Christian name, to
affront mankind, and convey an idea of
something savagely damaging. When I was
younger I had had a general belief that if
he had jiggered me personally, he would
have done it with a sharp and twisted hook.
— Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. xvii.
Jiggers, the chigoes. See Jiggered.
Numbers are crippled by the jiggers, which
scarcely ever in our colonies affect any but
the negroes.— Southey, Letters, 1810 (ii. 201).
Jillet, a contemptuous term for a
flighty girl : more familiar to us in the
contracted form jilt.
Were it not well to receive that coy jillet
with something of a mumming ?— Scott, Fair
Maid of Perth, u. 264.
Jim, neat. See Gim.
Though Surry boasts its Oatlands,
And Glare moot kept eajim ;
And though they talk of Southcote's,
Tis but a dainty whim.
Wcdpole, Letters, i. 422 (1755).
Jimp. H. says "slender." It seems
rather in the extract to mean the same
as Jim, q. v.
The kidnapping crimp took the foolish young
imp
On board of his cutter so trim and no jimp.
Ingoldslty Legends (Account of a
New Play).
Job. For a jocose etymology of this
word by Southey see quotation «. v.
DlSNATURALISE.
Job. To job a carriage or horses =
to have them on hire, not as one's own ;
the word is also used adjectivally.
Whitbread, d'ye keep a coach, or job one,
Job, job, that's cheapest; yes, that's best,
that's best — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 21.
He made nothing by letting him have jo&
horses for £150 a year. — Miss Edgeworth,
The Lottery, ch. i.
Job'8 comforters, people who, like
Job's friends, aggravate the sorrow
they pretend to console, or who say
disagreeable things.
Lady 8m* Indeed, Lady Answerall, pray
forgive me, I think your ladyship looks a
little thinner than when I saw you last.
Miss. Indeed, Madam, I think not; but
your ladyship is one of Job's comforters.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. iii.)-
Job's-news, bad news, such as Job's
servants brought to him.
Poverty escorts him ; from home there can
nothing come except Job's -news. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. HI. ch. iv.
Job's-post, a messenger of evil tid-
ings. Cf Job's-news.
It was Friday the eighth of March when
this JoVs-nost from Dumouriez, thickly pre-
ceded ana escorted by so many other Job's-
posts, reached the National Convention. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. iv.
Jockey, a contemptuous term for a
Scotchman, taken from their calling
Jack Jock.
What could Lesly have done then with
a few nntrain'd, unarmed Jockeys if we had
been true among ourselves? — Racket y Life
of Williams,i\. 142.
England deserv'd worse, and heard worse
than these Jocky - pedlars that chafferd
away their king, and our countrymen are
received abroad in some places to this day as
the off-scouring of Europe. — Ibid., ii. 223.
But now the Covenant's gone to wrack,
They say it looks like an old almanack ;
For Jockie is grown out of date
And Jenny is thrown out of late.
Merry Drollerie, p. 94.
Jockey-cart.
It was many years since the bones of Mr.
Parsons had been exposed to any conveyance
more rough and rude than Sir Matthew's
jockey -cart, which was constructed with
excellent and efficient springs. — Mrs. Trol-
lops, Michael Armstrong, ch. xvii.
JOCKEYJSM
( 355 ) J01NTURELESS
Jockeyism, race-riding; horsiness.
He was employed in smoking a cigar,
sipping brandy and water, and exercising his
conversational talents in a mixture of slang
and jockeyism. — Lytton, Pelhom, ch. lxi.
Jocqlatte, chocolate.
To a coffee house to drink Jocolatte, — very
good.— Pepys, Nov. 24, 1664.
They dranke a little milk and water, but
not a drop of wine ; they also dranke of a
sorbet Bnajacolait. — Evelyn, Diary, Jan. 24,
1682.
On Kursmas day at mworn they gav us
sum reed stuff to t' breakfast, — I think it
maun ha' been Jocklat, but we dud not like
't at af, t ommost puzzened us. — Southey, Hie
Doctor, Interchapter xxiv.
Joe, an old joke, such as is found
in the collection that goes under the
name of Joe Miller ; also, a fourpenny-
bit, a name derived from Mr. Joseph
Hume, who urged the issue of such
coin ; the coin, however, referred to in
the extracts was, as Wolcot expluins in
a note, " a Portugal coin vulgarly
called a Johannes.'1 Cf. Double- joe.
Of what use a story may be even in the
most serious debates may oe seen from the
circulation of old Joes in Parliament, which
are as current there as their sterling name-
sakes used to be in the city some threescore
years ago. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. xvi.
Be sure to make him glow
Precisely like a guinea or a Jo.
P. Pindar, p. 132.
Joggle. See extract
The excrescences in the sides of the stones
by which tbey are locked into each other,
aud which in masons' language would be
called a joggle. — Arch^ xxvii. 384 (1838).
John- a- Duck's mare. See quotation.
I am like John-a-Duck's mare, that will let
no man mount her but John-a-Duck. — Scott,
Jvanhoe, ii. 40.
John Bulltsm, English character.
Irving also uses Bullum by itself.
Little Britain may truly be called the
hearts core of the city; the stronghold of
John Bullism. — Irving, Sketch Book {Little
Britain).
Unluckily, they sometimes make their
boasted Bullism an apology for their preju-
dice or grossness.— Ibid. (John Bull).
John Cheese, a clown : this at least
I suppose to be the meaning. Ascham,
in the " little rude verse " made " long
ago," i. e. long before the Schoolmaster
was written, says that a man who could
not laugh, lie, &c. would never get on
at Court.
To laugh, to lie, to flatter, to face,
Four ways in Court to win men grace.
If thou be thrall to none of these,
Away good Peekgoose, hence John Cheese.
Schoolmaster, p. 48.
John of all trades, a smatterer:
used contemptuously. Cf . Jack of all
TRADES.
Whv, you mungrel,
You John of all trades, have we been your
guests
Since you first kept a tavern ?
Maine, City Match, ii. 5.
John Trot, a name for a clown ;
and so ordinary, commonplace.
Our travelling gentry either return from
the tour of Europe as mere Euglish boors as
they went — John Trot still— or come home
at best mere French petit maitres. — Colman,
Musical Lady, ii. 1.
The merest John Trot in a week you shall zee
Bienpoli, bienfrize', tout a fait un Mar<ruis.
Foote% Englishman xn Paris, Epilogue.
As to bis person and appearance, they are
much in the John-Trot style. — Mad.D'Arblay,
Diary, i. 203 (1779).
What other powers of Pat's invention
It might have been our lot to mention,
If nought had stopp'd his tongue's career,
Or clos'd poor Lucy's curious ear,
This John-Trot verse does not profess
To tell, or e'en presume to guess.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. ill.
Join, to enjoin.
And they join them penance, as they call
it, to fast, to go pilgrimages, and give so
much to make satisfaction withal. — Tyndale,
i. 281.
Jointless, stiff ; rigid.
*' Let me die here," were her words, re-
maining jointless and immovable. — Richard'
son, CI. Harlotoe, vi. 38.
Joint-sick, suffering from pain in
the joints.
How from tihwjoynt-sick Age to bite the
gowt. — Davies, Jrittes Pilgrimage, p. 41.
Jointureless, without jointure ; ap-
plied to a wife who had nothing settled
on her by her husband as provision after
his decease.
Three daughters in my well-built court un-
married are and fair :
Laodice, Chrysothemis that hath the golden
hair,
And Iphianassa; of all three the worthiest
let him take
All jointureless to Peleus' court; I will her
jointure make,
And that so great as never yet did any maid
prefer. — Chapman, Iliad, ix. 160.
A A 2
JOKESMITH
( 356J
JUBILATE
Jokbsmith, a manufacturer of jokes.
I feared to give occasion to the jests of
newspaper jokesmiths. — Southey, Letters, 1813
(ii. 336).
Mjjokesmith Sidney, and all his kidney.
Ibid., DexiVt Walk.
JOLLITBY, jollity.
No doubt it's an honourable employment
for a master to play the mimick and scara-
mouch before his men, . . . and to strain
jollitry not into annual (for once a Tear a
wise man may have leave to be mad), bnt
into a daily madness. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 637.
Most of those quarrels that end in blood
begin in wine ; joltitrv drunk too high de-
generates into fury. — llnd., p. 538.
Jommetry, geometry. In the quota-
tion it implies awkwardness, angularity.
See Geometry.
Miss. Lord ! my pettycoat, how it hangs
by jommetry.
Net. Perhaps the fault may be in your
shape. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
Jorum, a tumbler or other vessel full
of liquor.
The host smiled, disappeared, and shortly
afterwards returned with a steaming jorum,
of which the first gulp brought water into
Mr. Bumble's eyes. — Dickens, Oliver Twist,
ch. xxxvii.
Joss, a Chinese idol.
Who dotes on pagods, and gives up vile man
For niddle-noddle figures from Japan ;
Critick in jars and josses, shews her birth
Drawn, like the brittle ware itself, from earth.
Colman, Jealous Wife, Epilogue.
Down with dukes, earls, and lords, those
pagan Josses,
False Gods !— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 286.
Jot, to bump.
And then lay overthrown
Numbers beneath their axle-trees; who,
lying in flight's stream,
Made th' after chariots jot and jump in
driving over them.
Chapman, Iliad, xvi. 380.
Jourtng. N. gives this word =
swearing; and H. says jourinps in
Devonshire dialect = scoldings ; in ex-
tract it has a third meaning : the place
referred to is Somersetshire.
As this way of boorish speech is in Ireland
called The Brogue upon the Tongue, so here
it is named Jourina. It is not possible to
explain this fully by writing, because the
difference is not so much in the orthography
as in the tone and accent; their abridging
the speech, Cham for I am, Chill for I will,
Don for do on or put on, and Doff for do off
or put off, and tne tike.— Defoe, Tour thro*
O. Britain, i. 380.
Jovialise, to cheer ; make jovial.
The bishop did the honours with a spirit,
a gaiety, and an activity tfontjovialised us all,
and really we were prodigiously lively. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 364.
JoviALisT, festive: the Diets, only
give the word as a substantive.
There shall thy Jouialist Mechanicalls
Attend this table all in scarlet cappes.
Davits, Commendatory Poems, p. 5.
Jowder. See quotation*
Mr. Penruddock gave a spiteful hit, being,
as he said, of a cantankerous turn, to Mr.
IVeluddra, principal jowder, i. e. fish-salesman
of Aberalva. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch.
xiv.
Jowseb. See extract. The proposed
derivation of chouse is incorrect.
There are in England a class of men who
practise the Pagan rhabdomancy in a limited
sense. They carry a rod or rhabdos (pdptox )
of willow : this they hold h orison tally ; and
by the bending of the rod towards the ground
they discover the favourable places for sink-
ing wells ; a matter of considerable import-
ance in a province so ill-watered as the north-
ern district of Somersetshire. These people
are locally called jowsers ; and it is probable
that from the suspicion with which their art
has been usually regarded amongst people of
education, as the mere legerdemain trick of
the prof essional Dousterswivet (see the An-
tiquary), is derived the slang word to chouse
for swindle. — De Quincey, Modern Supersti-
tion.
Jotned-patent, associated as a part-
ner.
[A king purposing to take a second wife in
the life-time of the first was] so incredibly
blinded, . . . that he could think such a queen
would be content to be joyned-patent with
another to have such a husband.— Sidney,
Arcadia, p. 207.
Jcbaltbb, Gibraltar.
Even from Persepolis to Mexico,
And thence unto the straits of Jubalter.
Marlowe, 1 Tamburlaine, iii. 3.
We kept the narrow strait of Jubalter,
And made Canaria call us kings and lords.
Ibid., 2 Tamburlaine, i. 3.
Jubilate, to rejoice.
The States-General ... is there as a thing
high and lifted up. Hope jubilating cries
aloud that it will prove a miraculous Braaen
Serpent in the wilderness. — CarlyU, Fr. Bet^
Pt. I. Bk. V. ch. i.
The hurrahs were yet ascending from our
jubilating lips. — De Quincey, Autob. Sketches,
ch. ii.
Jubilate, joy, or perhaps it is an
JUDAIZATION ( 357 > JURAMENTALLY
expression of rejoicing, from the first
word of Psulm c. in Latin.
They were all in the highest triumph, and
would speedily be with us in a joint jubilate
on the banks of the Avon. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, ii. 244.
Judaization, conversion into a Jew.
Under the graver's hand Sir Smug became
Sir Smouch, a son of Abraham. . . .
Poor Smouch endured a worse judaization
Under another hand.
Southey, To A. Cunningham.
Judasly, Judas-like : also an adverb.
Jonas . . . hvred a shyppe to thentent he
myght Judasly flee from the face of our
lorde God.— Bt>. Fisher, p. 203.
Shall any oi them prove a devil, as Christ
said of Judas ? or ever, as these with us of
late, have to do with any devilish or Judasly
fact? — Andrews, i. 15.
It must needs be barbarously covetous and
Judasly sacriligious. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 519.
Jug, a term of contempt applied to
women.
(Meretrix.) Doost thou think I am a six-
pennyjug? — Preston, King Cambists {Haw
kins, Eng. Dr., i. 266).
Hark ye, don't you marry that ill-man*
ner'd Jug, the relict of a cheating old rogue
that has not left a foot of estate but what he
deserved to be hang'd for. — Centlivre, Pla»
tonic Lady, Act III.
Jugulate, to kill.
Let three years pass, and this clamorous
Parlement shall have both seen its enemy
hurled prostrate, and been itself ridden to
foundering (say rather, jugulated for hide
and shoes), and lie dead in a ditch. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. vii.
Juke, roost. The second extract is
given in Britten's Old Country and
Farming Words (E. D. S.). The first
edition of Worlidge was in 1669.
The beasts of the field take rest after their
feed, and the birds of the ayre are tXjuke in
the bushes. — Breton, Fantastiekes (Ttoelue of
the Clocke).
Imitating their [pheasants'] notes at their
juking-time, which is usually m the morning
and in the evening. — Worlidge, Sy sterna Agri-
culture (3rd ed., 1681), p. 252.
Jumble, to make shift ; to manage,
though perhaps awkwardly.
I have forgotten my logic, but yet I can
jumble at a syllogism, and make an argument
of it to prove it by. — Latimer, i. 247.
Jumpers, a sect that arose in Wales
about the middle of the last century :
jumping and leaping under spiritual
excitement form part of their worship.
Jenny [was] a Welshwoman; her rude
forefathers were goat -herds on week-days,
and Jumpers on Sundays.— Savage, B. Med-
licott, Bk. III. ch. xii.
Jungle usually = a thickly- wooded
swamp, but a note to the extract ex-
plains it as " a kind of small bamboo."
The wild boar and royal tiger .... are
found here in great plenty, the woods and
thick jungles affording excellent shelter for
beasts of prey.— A rchaol., viii. 252 (1787).
Juniper, bitter: but see third ex-
tract, which is given in Old Country
and Farming Words (E. D. S.).
Bishop Grouthead, offended thereat, wrote
Pope Innocent the fourth . . a juniper letter,
taxing him with extortion and other vitious
practices. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. iv. 29.
She will read me a juniper lecture {hand
suave encomium) for coming home in such a
pickle. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 39.
When women chide their husbands for a
long while together, it is commonly said,
they give them a juniper lecture ; which, I
am informed, is a comparison taken from
the long lasting of the live coals of that
wood, not from its sweet smell; but com-
parisons run not upon all four. — Ellis,
Modern Husbandman, VII. ii. 142 (1750).
Junkery, sweetmeats.
Marchpaines or wafers, with other like
junkerie. — UdaPs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 116.
Junkettaceous, fond of gaiety or
junketting.
Now you have a whole summer to your-
self, and you are as junkettaceous as my Lady
Northumberland. Pray, what horse-race do
you go to next? — Walpole, Letters, ii. 156
(1760).
Junonical, pertaining to Juno.
Yeet do I stil feare me theese f ayre Junonical
harbours.
In straw thear lurcketh soom pad.
Stanyhurst, AEn., i. 656.
Junquetries, sweetmeats.
You would prefer him before tart and
galingale, which Chaucer preheminentest
encomionizeth above all junquetries or con-
fectioneries whatsoever. — Nashe, Lenten Stvffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 158).
Juramentally, with an oath.
The emperor . . heartily intreated him to
make choice of any whatsoever thing in
Borne was most agreeable to his fancy, with
a promise, juramentallv confirmed, that he
should not be refused of his demand. —
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xix.
JURANT
( 358 )
KANGAROO
J u rant, swearing ; also one who
takes an oath.
Not that such universally prevalent, uni-
versally jurant feeling of nope could be a
unanimous one. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II.
Bk. I. ch. vii.
Jurant and Dissident with their shaven
crowns argue frothing everywhere. — Ibid.,
Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Juror, a swearer ; one who has taken
an oath. Bp. Ken uses the term in
contradistinction to nonjuror.
I am a juror in the holy league,
And therefore hated of the Protestants.
Marlowe, Massacre at Paris, ii. 6.
All the people that were there swore every
man by the Sancts of his parish ; the Paris-
ians, which are patched up of all nations, and
all pieces of countries, are by nature both
good jurors and good jurists, and somewhat
overweening. — UrouharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. oh.
xvii.
Frampton had M never interrupted com-
munion with the jurors" and would concur
in anything which tended to peace. — life of
Ken by a Layman, p. 691.
Just (Fr. joute)^ a game or tourna-
ment ; joutes mr Veau.
Round it are courts of trefflage that serve
for nothing, and behind it a canal, very like
a horse-pond, on which there are fireworks
vad justs. — Walpole, Letters, iii. 375 (1771).
Justiciary, legal.
The heart of the Jews is empty of faith ;
swept with the besom of hypocrisy, a jusii-'
eiary, imaginary, false-conceited righteous-
ness.- Adams, u. 37.
JCSTITIAR, judge.
Of the Lord Keeper North no single worJ
slips from his pen, . . . and, considering the
value of this great justitiar, ... is not so
notorious partiality in such a pompous writer
of history wonderful ? — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 2.
All which were amply conceded to him,
even by his adversaries ; which they ex-
pressed by owning him an excellent justiciar,
and that includes all the rest. — Ibid., ii. 62.
Justment, that which is due (?).
That for seven lusters I did never come
To doe the rites to thy religious tombe ;
That neither haire was cut or true teares
shed
By me o'er thee adjustments to the dead,
Forgive, forgive me.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 25.
Jut, a shove; kick; also a projec-
tion.
Mery. I will not see him, but giue him a
jutte indeed.
I cry your mastershyp mercie.
Roist. And whither now V
As fast as I could runne, sir, in poste against
you. — Udol, Roister Doister, iii. 3.
The fiend, with a jut of his foot, may keep
off the old, from dread of the future. — Mad.
D'ArMay, Cecilia, Bk. II. ch. iii.
The fowlers spread
Their gear on the rocks' bare juts.
Browning, By the Fireside.
Juvenile, a young person.
" Yes, yes, yes," cried the juveniles, both
ladies and gentlemen ; " let her come, it will
be excellent sport." — Miss Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xviii.
K
KA, quoth. Cf. Ko.
Enamoured, quod you? have ye spied out
that?
Ah, sir, mary nowe, I see you know what is
what.
Enamoured, ka ? mary, sir, say that againe.
Tidal, Roister Doister, I. ii.
Huan. Her coral lips, her crimson chin,
Her silver teeth so white within.
Zan. By Gogs-bones thou art a flouting
knave:
" Her coral lips, her crimson chin ! " Ka,
wilshaw. — Peele, Old Wives Tale, p. 455.
Kades, sheep's dung. H. gives it as
a Lincolnshire word.
I rather think the kades and other filth
that fall from sheep do so glut the fish that
they will not take any artificial bait. — La*r~
son, Comments on Secrets of Angling, 1653
(Eng. Garner, i. 197).
Kalotypography, beautiful printing.
English words derived from caXoc
usually begin with c; kaleidoscope is
Eerhaps the only ordinary exception,
ince Southey used this word, Mr. Fox
Talbot has invented a photographic pro-
cess which he called the calotype, thus
adopting the commoner spelling.
Perfect therefore it shall be, as far as
kalotypography can make it. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. ii. A. 1.
Kangaroo, the name of a species of
chair which seems to have been fashion-
able in 1834, the date of the extract.
KAROS
( 359 )
KEEP-OFF
It was neither a lounger, nor a dormeuse,
nor a Cooper, nor a Nelson, nor a kangaroo :
a chair without a name would never do ; in
all things fashionable the name is more than
half. Such a happy name as kangaroo. Lady
Cecilia despaired of finding. — Miss Edge-
wrth, Helen, ch. xvi.
Kabos, headache ; drowsiness.
The Karos, th' Apoplexie, and Lethargic,
As forlorn hope assault the enemy
On the same side.
Sylvester, The Furies, 356.
Kabrawan, caravan.
The sentiment might easily have come . .
to Tor or Sues, towns at the bottom of the
gulf, and from thence by karrawans to Cop-
toe.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iv. 62.
Kabum-ple. See quotation.
Athelstane . . swallowed to his own single
share the whole of a large pasty composed
of the most exquisite foreign delicacies, and
termed at that time a karum-pie. — Scott,
Ivanhoe, i. 217.
Kathenotheism. See extract.
( Max Miiller, in a lecture on the Veda, has
given the name of kathenotheism to the doc-
trine of divine unity in diversity. — E. Tyler,
Primitive Culture, ii. 254.
Keckle, to chuckle ; to laugh ; also
a substantive.
The auld carles keeklet with fainness as
they saw the young dancers. — Gait, Annals
of the Parish, ch. xlviii.
"I' glide faith," cried the bailie, with a
keckle of exultation, "here's proof enough
now." — Ibid^ Provost, ch. xii.
" Ah ! you're a wag, sir," keckled the old
man. — C. Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. iv.
Kedge, brisk.
I'm surely growing young again,
I feel myself so kedge and plump,
From head to foot I've not one pain,
Nay, bang me if I couldn't jump.
Bloomjuld, Richard ana Kate.
Keel, the name given to boats used
by the colliers at Newcastle. See H.
and extract s. v. Crimp. In the extract
from Sylvester it =» ship generally.
Thou and thy most renowned noble brother
Came to the Court first in a ktelt of Sea-
ooale.
Chapman, Revenge of Bussy
D'Ambois, Act I.
Such is thy case
To have thy vessell full of Vertues split,
Where lighter keels and empty never hit.
Sylvester, An Elegit.
He had come to Newcastle about a year
ago in expectation of journeyman work,
along with three young fellows of his ac-
quaintance who worked in the keels. — Smol-
lett, Roderick Random, ch. viii.
Keeling, a small cod. See quota-
tion s. v. Oregs.
For the soling of them were made use of
eleven hundred hides of brown cows, shapen
like the tail of a keeling. — Urquharfs Rabe-
lais, Bk. I. ch. viii.
Keep, the food that a person con-
sumes.
Ruth's salary of forty pounds was gone,
while more of her " keep,n as Sally called it,
was thrown upon the Bensons. — Mrs. Gas-
kell, Ruth, ch. xxviii.
Keep cut. N. has this phrase
with a quotation from Cotgrave's Wits
Interpreter, 1671, but no explanation.
" To xeep within bounds " would suit
the sense both in that passage and in
all the subjoined, i. e. to keep in the
groove marked out. In the second ex-
tract Breton is describing " a graceless
grove that never did man good."
Good brother Philip, I have born you long,
I was content you should in favour creep
While craftily you seemed your cut to keep.
As though that fair soft hand did you great
wrong.
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella, 85.
There might he see a monkey with an ape,
Climing a tree, aud cracking of a nut :
One sparrow teache an other how to gape,
But not a tame one taught to keepe the cut.
Breton% Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 8.
At the marriage of Sir Philip Herbert with
the Lady Susan Vere, . . . many great ladies
were made shorter by the skirts, . . . like the
Little Woman ; and Sir Dudley Carletou
says, " They were well enough served that
they could keen cut no better. If the reader
asks, What is Keeping cut ? he asks a question
I cannot answer. — Southey, The Doctor, Inter-
chapter xvii.
Keepebess, a woman who keeps a
man.
Hardly ever, I dare say, was there a keeper
that did not make a keeperess ; who lavished
away on her kept-fellow what she obtained
from the extravagant folly of him who kept
her. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi. 359.
Keeping-room, parlour.
Like many other buildings of the same
date and style, that which was designated as
the keeping-room or parlour was the passage
of the house. — Freeman's Life of W. Kirby,
p. 219 (1852).
Keep-ofp, long, and so adapted for
keeping foes at a distance : the original
is fiaxptf.
KEEP-WORTHY ( 360 ) KIBBLE-CHAIN
He fought not with a keep-off spear, or with
a far-shot bow,
But with a massy club of iron.
Chapman, Iliad, vii. 121
Keep-worthy, worth preservation.
Bodmer . . was the editor of the Zurich
Charter . . . and of other keep-worthy docu-
ments.— Taylor, Survey of German Poetry, i.
182.
K ell re " is the miner's name for a
substance like a white soft stone which
lies above the floor or spar, near to a
vein " (Note by Miss Edgewortk in
loc). The scene of the story from
which the extract is taken is in Corn-
wall.
I also saw them secrete a lump of spar in
which they had reason to guess there were
Cornish diamonds, as they call them, and
they carefully hid the bits of kellus which
they had picked out, lest the viewer should
notice them and suspect the truth. — Mist
Edgetoorth, Lame Jervas, ch. i.
Kelter in many dialects = rubbish ;
perhaps, therefore, in extract it means
poor, valueless. Peacock (Manley and
Corringham Glossary, E. D. S.) gives
" kelterly, rubbishy. n
He put him on an old Kelter coat.
And Uose of the same above the knee.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 350.
Kembo, to crook ; to place akimbo.
44 Oons, madam ! " said he, and he kemhoed
his arms, and strutted up to me. . . . " Kem-
hoed arms! my lord, are you not sorry for
such an air?" — Richardson, Granditon, iv.
288, 290.
Kempstock. See quotation.
Panurge took two great cables of the ship,
and tied them to the kempstock or capstan
which was on the deck towards the hatches.
— Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxv.
Ken, to lie within sight or ken of.
Pliny calleth a place in Picardy Portnm
Morinorum Britannicum,that is, The British
haven or port of the Morines, either for that
they tooke ship there to passe over into
Britain, or because it kenned Britaine over
against it on the other side of the Sea.—
Holland's Camden, ii. 221.
Ken, a house (thieves' slang). Bonking
in the first extract is no doubt misprint
for bouzing ; a bouzing-ken = a public-
house.
Then do I cry, Good your worship,
Bestow some small denier a,
And bravely then at the bouking ken
I'll bouse it all in beer a.
Merry Drollerie, p. 205.
To say nothing at all of those troublesome
swells,
Who come from the play-houses, flash he is,
and hells. — Ingoldsby Legends (St. Aloys).
Kennino-placb, a prominent object.
In Gibson's translation the extract is
"a spectacle exposed to the eye of all
the world."
Chester .... standeth forth as a kenning-
place to the view of eyes.— Holland's Camden,
p. 006.
Kernell, to embattle (cren&ler). In
margin "kemellare, what it is.1' H.
has the substantive with examples.
The king had given him License to fortifie
and kernell his mansion house; that is, to
embatle it. — Holland?* Camden, p. 753.
These walls are kernelled on the top. —
Archmol., iii. 202 (1775).
Kettle of fish, a mess or disturb-
ance. Kidellus or kiddle is a fishing
weir, and the keddle or kettle-nets are
large stake-nets used for catching fish
therein. Probably this is the origin of
the phrase. A kettle of fish is also
applied to a species of picnic described
in the second extract.
Fine doings at my house ! a pretty kettle
of fish I have discovered at last! Who
the devil would be plagued with such a
daughter?— Fieldi ng, T. Jones, Bk. XVIII.
ch. vui.
A kettle of fish is a fits chamvltre of a par-
ticular kind. . . A large caldron is boiled
by the side of a salmon river, containing a
quantity of water, thickened with salt to the
oonsistence of brine. In this the fish is
plunged when taken, and eaten by the com-
pany fronds super viridi. — Scott, St. Ronan"s
Well, i. 210.
Key of the street. A person who
has no house to go to at night, or is
shut out from his own, is said to have
the key of the street.
44 There," said Lowten, " it's too late now :
you can't get in to-night ; you've got the key
of the street, my friend." — Pickwick Papersf
ch. xlvii.
Keyless, unlocked ; without a key.
Faith and simplicity had guarded that
keyless door more securely than the houses
of the laity were defended by their gates
like a modern jail. — Reads, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. xciv.
Kibble-chain, the chain that draws
up the kibble or bucket from a mine.
One day at the shaft's mouth, reaching
after the kibble-chain — maybe he was in
liquor, maybe not, the Lord knows, but — I
KICKABLE
(361 )
KINGLIHOOD
didn't know him again, sir, when we picked
him ap. — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. viii.
Kick able, capable of being kicked ;
or adapted for that process.
Riff? was a most unen gaging kickabU boy
— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xfi.
He was not unconscious of being held
kickable. — Ibid., Daniel Deronda, ch. xii.
Kickee, a person kicked.
He . . was seen . . . kicking him at the
same time in the most ignominious manner ;
and in return to all demands on the part of
the kickee to know the reason for such out-
rage, simply remarking, " You are Pigviggin."
— Savage, R. MedlicoU, Bk. III. ch. viii.
Kid, a young child ; though this is
slang, kidnap is in ordinary use.
And at her back a kid that cry'd
Still as she pinch'd it, fast was ty'd.
DUrfey, Collin's Walk, cant. iv.
A fig for me being drowned if the kid is
drowned with me, and I don't even care so
much for the kid being drowned, if I go
down with him. — Meade, Never too late to
mend, eh. xxiii.
Kiddkrminstebkd, covered with a
Kidderminster carpet.
*• The hour when daylight dies " is equally
dear to shopkeeper and shepherd, and as
charming in tbe tradesman's contracted and
Kidder minster ed parlour as in the rosiest
thatched cottage. — Savage, R. MedlicoU, Bk.
III. ch. i.
Kiddy, some piece of now obsolete
slang ; not in the Slang Diet, which
has u Kiddily, fashionably/* but this
does not seem the meaning here.
It was his ambition to do something in
the celebrated " Kiddy " or stage-coach way.
— Sketches by Boz {Making a night of it).
Kiddy-pie, a pie made of goat's or
kid's flesh.
The goats furnished milk and Kiddy-pies.
—Kinysley, Westward Ho, ch. iv.
Kidney-lipt, hare-lipped.
First, Jollie's wife is lame ; the next, loose*
hipt,
Sqnint-ey'd, hook-nos'd, and lastly kidney'
Upt. — Herrick, Hesperides, p. 64.
Kilbuck, a term of contempt.
Thar. Well, have you done now, Ladie ?
Art, O my sweet kilbuck.
Thar. You now in your shallow pate
thinke this a disgrace to mee.
Chapman, Widdotoes Teares, Act I.
Kill-crop. See quotation.
Concerning the kill-crops, as his country-
men the Saxons call them, whom the devil
leaves in exchange, when he steals children
for purposes best known to himself, Luther
does not express any definite opinion, farther
than that they are of a devilish nature ....
In Saxonia near unto Halberstad was a mau
that also had a killcrop, who sucked the
mother and five other women dry, and be-
sides devoured very much. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. cexxx.
Kill-man, man slaughtering. " Kill
man Merion," is Chapman's highly con-
densed rendering of Mnpiovrjc r' ara-
Xavroc 'EvvaAiy avSpwpovry.
Whom war-like Idomen did lead, co-partner
in the fleet
With kill-man Merion.
Chapman, Iliad, ii. 573.
Kill-time. See quotation.
That which as an occasional pastime he
might have thought harmless and even
wholesome, seemed to him something worse
than folly when it was made a kill-time, the
serious occupation for which people were
brought together, the only one at which
some of them ever appeared to give them-
selves the trouble of thinking. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. lxv.
Kil-mkn, brick-makers or ki!n-men.
These busie Kil-men ply their occupations
For brick and tyle; there for their firm
foundations
They dig to hell. — Sylvester, Babylon, 164.
Kilt, to turn up short, like a kilt.
She kilted up her gown to run. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxxiii.
Kimbo, as a verb. See Kembo.
Kincob, brocaded work (Hindustani
Kimkhwab).
He is the son of Colonel Newcome, O. B.,
who sends her shawls, ivory chessmen,
scented sandal-wood work-boxes and kincob
scarfs. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. v.
Kindle- fire, promoter of strife, fire-
brand.
Heere is he the kindJU-fire between these
two mighty nations, and began such a flame
as lasted aboue an hundred yeeres after, and
tbe smoake thereof much longer.— Daniel,
Hist, of Eng., p. 189.
Kindling coal, a coal left smoulder-
ing overnight for the purpose of light-
ing the fire in the morning.
Thou kindling cole of an infemall fire,
Die in the ashes of thy dead desire.
Breton, Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 12.
Kinglihood, royalty.
He neither wore on helm or shield
The golden symbol of his kinglihood,
But rode a simple knight among his knights.
Tennyson, Coming of Arthur.
KIP
( 362 ) KITCHEN-PHYSIC
Kip. To tatter a kip = to wreck a
house of ill fame.
My business was to attend him at auctions,
to put him in spirits when he sat for his
picture, to take tne left hand in his chariot
when not filled bj another, and to assist at
tattering a kip, as the phrase was, when we
had a mind for a frolic. — Vicar of Wakefield,
ch.xx.
Kippered, dried by smoking. Sal-
mon are said to be kipper after spawn-
ing when they are very thin ; hence
the term is applied to them when dried.
Mingling with scents of butter, cheese, and
gammons,
Tea, coffee, sugar, pickles, rosin, wax,
Hides, tallow, Kussia-matting, hemp, and
flax,
Salt-cod, red-herrings, sprats, and kippered
salmons. — Hood, The Turtles.
Kibdlino, brandishing (?).
Now the youth grows mad,
The moon-man that was sad,
Starts up as wild as he,
With frowning angry look,
Stood kirdling with his hook,
And demands what he might be.
Merry Drollerie, p. 41.
Kiss-cheeks, an epithet of tears as
wetting the cheek.
Thus doubting clouds o'ercasting heav'nly
brain
At length in rows of kiss-cheeks tears they
rain. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 85.
Kisses, a person kissed.
This Hebe Mr. Gordon greeted with a
loving kiss, which the kisses resented. —
Lytton, Pelham, ch. 1.
Kit, a light woman.
Such foolish Kittes of such a skittish kinde
In Bridewell booke are every where to finde
Breton, PasquiVs Fooles-cappe, p. 2\\
Kit had lost her key, miscarri-
age (?), or perhaps, diarrhoea. Perdre
la clef de set f esses is a vulgar French
expression for the latter disorder.
Oblations and offerings of meats, of otes,
images of wax, bound pens and pins for
deliverance of bad husbands, for a sick cow,
to keep down the belly, and when " kit had
lost her key."—W. Patten, Exped. to Scotln
1547 (Eng. Garner, iii. 71).
Kit with the canstick, some sprite
or demon ; will o' the wisp (?). Can-
stick = candle-stick (see Hen, IV., III.
i.). The extract is quoted by Washing-
ton Irving in a note to his article on
Stratford on Avon in the Sketch Book*
They have so fraid us with bull-beggars,
spirits, witches, . . . kit with the cansticke, . . .
and such other bugs, that we were afraid of
our own shadowes. — Scot, Discoverie of
Witchcraft (1584).
Kitchen - cordials, kitchen - physic,
q. v.
If nor a dram of treacle sovereign,
Or aqua- vitas, or su gar-can dian,
Nor kitchen-cordials, can it remedy,
Certes his time is come, needs mought he die.
Hall, Sat., II. iv. 31.
Kitchendom, the domain of the kit-
chen.
What knowest thou of flowers, except belike
To garnish meats with ? hath not our good
king
Who lent me thee, the flower of kitchendom,
A foolish love for flowers?
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Kitchener, cook.
The industry of all crafts has paused;
except it be the smith's fiercely hammering
pikes, and in a faint degree the kitchener's
cooking off-hand victuals. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,
Pt. I. Bk. V. ch. v.
Kitchen-gain, kitchen-stuff; drip-
ping.
The sweat upon thy face doth oft appear
Like to my mother's fat and kitchen-gain.
Greene, p. 291.
Kitchenist, a cook, as one whose
work lies in the kitchen. Sylvester
reckons among those whose lot it is to
live in smoke,
Brick-makers, Brewers, Colliers, Kitchin-
ists. — Tobacco Battered, 427.
Kitchen-latin, inferior latin.
Observe too what it is that he sees in the
city of Paris : no feeblest glimpse of those
D'Alemberts and Diderot*, or of the strange
questionable work they did; solely some
Benedictine priests, to talk kitchen-latin with
them about Editiones principes. — Carlyle,
Misc., iii. 102.
Kitchen-physic, nourishing diet, fit
for an invalid. Cf. Kitchen-cordials.
For myselfe, if I be ill at ease, I like kit-
chyn physicke ; I make my wife my doctor,
and my garden my apoticanes shop. — Greene,
Quip for Upstart Courtier (Hart. Misc., v.
406).
Nothing will cure this man's understanding
but some familiar and kitchen-physic, which,
with pardon, must for plainness sake be ad-
ministered unto him. Gall hither your cook.
— Milton, Animadv. on Remonst., sect. 2.
The cook's boy in the kitchen . . .was then
master cook for the whole family; and he
performed his part so well in making their
broths and other necessaries, that he was the
best physician among the doctors ; for by his
KITCHEN-POKERNESS ( 363 ) KNICKERBOCKERS
kitchen-physic the sick was cured.— Barnardt
Life of Heylin, p. 113.
Cot. Well, after all, kit chen-phy sick is the
best physick.
Ld. S. And the best doctors in the world
Doctor Diet, Doctor Quiet, and Doctor
Merry man. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
Kitchen - P0KERNK68, extreme stiff-
ness.
He looked something like a vignette to one
of Richardson's novels, and had a clean-
cravatisb formality of manner, and kitchen'
pokerness of carriage which Sir Charles Gran-
dison himself might have envied. — Sketches
by Boz ( WatHns Tottle).
Kite. A man who raises money on
a bill is said to fly a kite (slang).
Here's bills plenty — long hills and short
bills — but even the kites, which I canity as
well as any man, won't raise the money for
me now. — Miss Edgeworth, Love and Law,
i.2.
In English Exchequer-bills f nil half a million,
Not kites manufactured to cheat and inveigle,
But the right sort of flimsy, all signed by
Monteagle.
Ingoldsby Legends (Jfer. of Venice).
Kitlinq, sharp ; kitten-like.
His kitling eyes begin to run
Quite through the table, where he spies
The homes of paperie butterflies.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 126.
Kitten hood, state of being a kitten.
For thou art beautiful as ever cat
That wantoned in the joy of kittenhood.
Southey, Nondescripts, i.
Kittenish, kitten-like.
Such a kittenish disposition in her I called
it ; for it is not so much the love of power
that predominates in her mind, but the love
of playfulness. — Richardson, Grandison, iv.
115.
Kittle, to tickle.
A man must hug, and dandle, and kittle,
and play a hundred little tricks with his bed-
fellow.— Kennel's Erasmus, Praise of Folly,
p. 23.
Kittle, ticklish; difficult to deal
with.
Women are kittle folk, manage them who
can. — Reade, Never too late to mend, ch. viii.
Knackino, downright (?).
distance. Tush, ye speake in jest.
Mery. Nay sure, the partie is in good knack'
ing earnest.
Udal, Roister Doister, iii. 2.
Knapknob, swelling lamp. Knap
= hill.
Enquyrye was eke made
For to snip, in the foaling, from front of
fillye the knapknob,
That the mare al greedy dooth snap.
Stanyhurst, uiEn., iv. 550.
Knatch, to knock.
One day hee gathered all the sicke, lame,
and impotent people of Rome into one place,
where hee hamperd their feete with straunge
deuisea, gaue them softe sponges in their
hands to throw at him for stones, and with a
great clubbe knatched them all on the hed as
they had been giauntes. — Gosson, Schoole of
Abuse, p. 47.
Knave, to make a knave of.
At the first sight of a raw gentleman, they
fly at him like a vulture at the quarry, and
for the same end also, to prey first upon his
virtue, then upon his money: how many
nets do they lay to ensnare the squire and
knave themselves. — Gentleman Instructed, p.
477.
Knaving, abuse.
No comfortable scriptures, nor yet anything
to the soul's consolation, may come out of
the mouths of these spiritual fathers, but
dog's rhetoric and cur's courtesy, knavings,
brawlings, and quarrellings. — Bale, Select
Works, p. 173.
Kneadingly, like one who kneads ;
pressing together.
And I perceived how she
Who loosed it with her hands, pressed knead-
inqly,
As though it had been wine in grapy coats.
Leigh Hunt, Foliage, p. 30.
Knees. To sit on one's knees = to
kneel.
His Majesty . . . calling me to him before
the whole company, I sitting upon my knees,
he gave me an especial charge. — Life of
Phineas Pette, temp. James I. {Arch., xii. 254).
Knez, a prince, applied to the Czar.
Velikie Knez = Grand Duke, in the
present day.
There are above forty severall nations,
both in Europe and Asia, which have the
Slavonick for their vulgar speech ; it reacheth
from Mosco, the court of the great Knez, to
the Turk's Seraglio in Constantinople, aud
so over the Propontey to divers places in
Asia. — Howell, Forraine Travell, sect. 11.
The knez of them [letters] may know what
Prester John
Doth with his camels in the torrid zone.
Ibid., Verses prefixed to Familiar Letters.
Knickerbockers, loose trowsers, end-
ing at the knee, after the manner of
the Dutch, and met by a long stocking
— much worn by children, sportsmen,
&c.
KNICK-KNACK- A TORY ( 364 )
KNOCK OFF
The puffed trunk-hose of 1580—1600 co-
existed with the finest cap-a-pie armour of
proof. They gradually in the country, where
they were ill made, became slops, i. e. hoick*
erbockers.—C. Kingsley, 1869 {Life, ii. 94).
Knickerbockers, surely the prettiest boy's
dress that has appeared these hundred years.
— Thackeray, Roundabout Papers, viii.
Knick-knack-atory, a collection of
knick-knacks; an old curiosity shop.
In the extract from Richardson the
initial k in the first part of the word is
omitted, but retained in the second..
Cf. NlCK-NACKERY.
One Mr. Webb, a rich philosopher, lived in
Bloomsbury. He was single, and his house
a sort of knick-knack-atory. — North, Life of
Lord Guilford, ii. 252.
For my part, I keep a knicknackatory or
toy-shop. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 15.
I know he has judgement in nick-knack-
atones, and even as much as I wish him in
what is called taste. — Richardson, Grandison,
v. 71.
Knick-knacker, a trifler.
Other kind of knick-knackers there are,
which betwixt knaue and foole can make an
ilfauord passage through the world. — Breton,
Strange Xeices, p. 6.
Knick-knackeries, curious or ele-
gant trifles.
He has attempted, in this instance, to be-
come ... a Writer of a short Epick Poem,
stuff' d with romantick knick-knackeries, —
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 42.
Knick - knacks, light refreshment ;
kickshaws.
He found me supporting my outward
tabernacle that was fatigued, starved, and
distempered, with some knick-knacks (deli'
ciis) at the confectioner's. — Bailey1 s Erasmus,
p. 377.
Knighthood-money. See quotation.
He was fined in October, 1630, for refusing
the honour of knighthood, a matter then
lately brought up to obtain money for his
majestie's use. This money which was paid
by all persons of 40 li. per an. that refused
to come in and be dub'd knights, was called
knighthood-money. — Life of A. Wood, 1642.
Knipperdollin, a fanatical fool.
Knipperdollin was an Anabaptist leader
under John of Leyden ; he was executed
1536. See Hyperdolin.
Hold! quoth Collin,
I am not such a Knipperdollin,
Not to allow, as the case stands,
That you are stronger of your hands.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. i.
Knipperkin, a small measure of
drink. See N., 8. v. Nipperkin.
Although I would not lose my credit
By letting the town know I quaff'd
A quart of claret at a draught,
Yet here with such a friend as you,
A brother, and in private too,
Myself a foe must needs profess
To all such knipperkins as this.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. iv.
Knit, compounded.
If the cakes at tea eat short and crisp,
they were made by Olivia ; if the gooseberry
wine was well knit, the gooseberries were of
her gathering. — Vicar of Wakefield, ch. xvi.
Knitch, a bundle.
If I dared break a hedge for a knitch of
wood, they'd put me in prison. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xxviii.
Knitting-cup, a cup of wine handed
round after a couple Lad been knit to-
gether in matrimony ; also called the
contracting-cup.
Mind
The parson's put to engage him in the busi-
ness;
A knitting-cup there must be.
Jonson, Magnetic Lady, iv. 1.
Knive, to cut with a knife.
A brute who in cold blood knived and tor-
tured them with bis own hand. — F. Walpolc,
The A nsayrii, ii. 8.
Knives, pair of, scissors.
I pray, when you write next, to send me
. . . half a dozen of pair of knives, — Hovell,
Letters, I. i. 14.
I must desire you (as I did once at Rouen)
to send me . . half a dozen pair of knives by
the merchant's post. — Ibid, I. ii. 20.
Knocking-underness, submission.
I'm for peace, and quietness, and fawn-
in gness, and what may be styled knocking-
underness. — De Quincey, Murder as a Fine
Art.
Knock - kneed, having the knees
turned somewhat in, and so knocking
together.
Once I thought my body was a church,
My head the belfry ; and you'd scarce believe
What clangour and what swinging to and fro
Went on, and how the belfry rock'd and
reel'd,
Till Death, the knock-kneed laggard, came to
Church.— Taylor, St. Clements Eve, iv. 2.
Knock off, to desist or give up ; and
so, to die. The expression is still in
common use among the working classes,
especially of leaving off work.
KNOCK UNDER TABLE ( 365 )
KNURLY
Id noting of their nativities, I have wholly
observed the instructions of Pitseus, where
I knock off with his death, my light ending
with his life on that subject. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, ch. x.
My gentleman knocks off, and, like the
serpent, exposes his tail to save his head,
1. e. drops his titles, offices, and greatness,
and gives up his favouriteship with all its
appurtenances, to save his skin. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 211.
It was your ill fortune to live amongst
such a refractory, perverse people, . . that
would not knock off in any reasonable time,
but lived long on purpose to spite their rela-
tions.— T. Brown, Works, iv. 183,
Knock under table, to yield.
South has "knock under board." See
g. v. Board ; knock under is the more
usual expression.
If, therefore, after this " I go the way of
my fathers," I freely waive that haughty
epitaph, magnis tamen excidit ausis, and in-
stead knock under table that Satan hath be-
guiled me to play the fool with myself. —
AsgUVs Argument, &c., 1700, quoted in
Sout key's Doctor, ch. clxxii.
I hope you'll be brought to knock under
the table, and own that you have given me
and yourself a great deal of unnecessary
trouble.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 296.
He that flinches his glass, and to drink is
not able,
Let him quarrel no more, but knock under
the table.— Ibid* iv. 16.
Knock up, to tire.
If Fanny would be more regular in her
exercise, she would not be knocked up so
soon. — Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. vii.
Knot, bud.
Whose suits hung upon him like fruits on
the citron-tree ; it bore some ripe ones, and
some sour ones, some in the knot* and some
in the blossom altogether. — Racket, life of
Williams, ii. 88.
Knot in a rush. To seek a knot in
a rush = to look for a needle in a bottle
of hay. H. refers to Elyot s. v. scirpus.
Cf. A PIMPLE IN A BENT, S. V. PlMPLE.
I saw a great many women using high
wordes to their husbands ; some striving for
the breeches, others to have the last word ;
some fretting they could not find a knot in a
rush, others striving whether it were wooll or
hair the goat hsxe. —-Greene. Quip for Upstart
Courtier(Harl. Misc., v. 397).
The bed of snakes is broke, the tricks come
out,
And here's the knot ? the rush.
Davenport, City Night-Cap, Act III.
Knowing, well-appointed; fashion-
able. Cf . Gnostic.
Many young men who had chambers in
the Temple, made a very good appearance in
the first circles, and drove about town in
very knowina gigs. — Miss Austen, Sense and
Sensibility, ch. xix.
Knowledgeable, educated ; intel-
ligent. L. has the word, but in the
sense of " cognisable."
Ill noane deny that in a thing or two I
may be more knowledgeable than Coulson.
I've had a deal o' time on my hands i' my
youth, and I'd good schooling as long as
father lived. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xxi.
Knowledge- box, head.
By Bedford's cut I've trimm'd my locks,
And coal-black is my knowledge-bos,
Callous to all, except hard knocks
Of thumpers.
Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 116.
Knownest, best known.
Death is the knownest and unknownest thing
in the world; that of which men have the
most thoughts and fewest meditations. —
Ward, Sermons, p. 53.
? Know thy Master. See extrnct,
which is taken from the Parish Regis-
ters of Loughborough, Leicestershire.
June, 1551. The Swatt called new ac-
quyntance, alles Stoupe Knave, and Know
thy Master, began the xxiiiith of this monethe
1551. — Archaol. xxxvui. 107.
Knuckle-deep, considerably ; having
the whole hand in.
You shall find St. Paul (1 Cor. vi. 5)
offend against this bill, ana intermeddle
knuckle-deep with secular affairs by inhibiting
the Corinthians very sharply for their chi-
canery, pettifoggery, and common barretry
in going to law one with another. — Socket,
Life of Williams, ii. 170.
Knuckle down or under, to give
way, perhaps from bending the knee.
So he knuckled down again, to use his own
phrase, and sent old Hulker with peaceable
overtures to Osborne. — Thackeray, Vanity
Fair j ch. xlii.
When the upper hand is taken upon the
faith of one's patience by a man of even
smaller wits . . . why it natnrally happens
that we knuckle under with an ounce of
indignation. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch.
liv.
Knurlt, gnarled, knotted.
Why, thus sffbuld statesmen doe
That cleave through knots of craggie pollicies
Use men like wedges, one strike out another,
Till by degrees the tough and knurly trunke
Be rived in sunder.
Marston, Antonio and Mellida, iii. 3.
KNURRED
( 366 ) LACHRYMENTAL
Knurrkd, knotted or studded.
Thee gates of warfare wyl then bee man-
nacled hardly
With Steele bunch chavne knob clingd,
knurd and narrolye linefeed.
Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 281.
Knurry, knotty, contorted. L. has
the word as part of a compound,
' knurry - bulked oak " (Drayton).
Chaucer (Cant. Tales, 1979), has
Knarry.
Vnder the oaken bark
The knurry knot with branching veins we
mark
To be of substance all one with the tree.
Sylvester, fourth day, first weeke, 103.
.... The knurry knob oake tree,
Thogh craggy in griping, in strength sur-
passeth a smooth slip.
Stany hurst, Conceites, p. 143.
Ko, quoth. Cf. Ka. Stanyhurst has
quoa. See *. v. Flamfews.
Bawawe what ye say (Ko I) of such a jent-
mau:
Nay, I feare him not {Ko she), doe the best
he can. — Udal, Router Doister, iii. 3.
Kritarchy, the rule of the Judges.
Samson, Jepthah, Gideon, and other
heroes of the Kritarchy. — Southey, The
Doctor, Interchapter xvii.
Kudos, praise. This Greek noun is
almost naturalized. Southey uses it in
the extract as a verb.
Bepraised in prose it was, bepraised in Terse,
Lauded iu pious Latin to the skies,
Kudos' d egregiously in heathen Greek.
Soutftey, Nondescript*, I.
Kurisees. See extract.
The renegado Wogan with twenty-four of
Ormond's Kurisees. — Letter of O. Cromwell,
Dec. 19, 1649.
What Kurisees are I do not know ; may be
cuirassiers in popular locution; some nick-
name for Ormond's men, whom few loved. —
Carlyle, Cromwell's Letters, &c., ii. 95.
K ye- bosk, a street slang term ; now,
I think, obsolete. The slang Diet,
gives Kibosh, nonsense or palaver.
" Hooroar ! " ejaculates a pot-boy in paren-
thesis, " put the Kyebosk on her, Mary." —
Sketches by Boz (Seven Dials).
Label, a tassel or pendant strip.
Fuller (Ch. Hi*., III. iii. 13), calls
Dover "the utmost edge, brink, and
labell" of England.
And a knit night-cap made of coarsest twine,
With two long labels button 'd to his chin.
Hall, Sat. IV. ii. 24.
Balak met Balaam, standing as it were on
his tiptoes, on the very last label of his land.
—Fuller, Pisyah Siyht, IV. i. 19.
Labour- in- vain, seems to have been
a favourite sign ; the picture was that
of a negro being washed to make him
white. I remember some thirty years
ago a large toy-shop in Southampton
that had this picture in the window,
with the legend, " Labour in vain, and
so it will be to find a cheaper shop
than this.'*
Let nature do her best, we dwelt at the
sign of the Labour-in-vain. Only Christ
hath washed us. — Adams, i. 398.
That Commission ended at Labour-in-vain;
not, as the old emblem is, to go about to
make a black-moor white, but to make him
that was white to appear like a black-moor.
—Hacket,Life of Williams, II. 67.
Labourous, industrious.
But sober, honest, wittie, thriftie, kinde.
Good shape, good face, expert, and labourous,
Good hand, good heart, good spirit and good
minde,
Discreetly careful, and not covetous.
Breton, Mother's Blessing % p. 9.
Labyrinth, to shut up in a maze or
labyrinth.
How to entangle, trammel np, and snare
Your soul in mine, and labyrinth von there.
Like the hid soeLt in an unbudded rose.
Keats, Lamia, Pt. II.
Lace, to open. Miss Edge worth
suggests in a note "perhaps from
lacker , to loosen."
Larry . . drove . . over great stones left
in the road by carmen, who had been driving
in the gudgeons of their axle-trees to hinder
them from lacing. — Miss Edyeroorth, Absentee,
ch. x.
Lachrymental, tearful ; lugubrious.
To see each wall and publike post defil'd
With diuers deadly elegies, compil'd
By a foule swarme of Ouckoes ox our times,
In lamentable lachrymentall rimes.
A . Holland (Davits' Scourge
of Folly, p. 81).
LACK
(367) LADY OF PLEASURE
Lack, to rake.
" We are lacking her through and through
every shot," said he; "leave the small
ordnance alone yet awhile, and we shall
sink her without them. — Kingsley, Westward
Mo, ch. zz.
Alongside ran hold Captain John [Haw-
kins], and with his next shot, says his son,
an eye-witness, " lacked the admiral through
and through." — Ibid., ch. xxviiL
Lack, blame. Cf. Belack.
. He did not stayne ne put to lacke or re-
bake his royall autoritie in geuing sentence.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p 197.
Lackstock, a man without money
invested in the funds, Ac.
We poor lacklands and lackstocks. — Southey,
Letters, 1820 (iii. 212).
Lack-thought, vacant ; foolish.
An air
So lack-thought and so lackadaisycal.
Southey, To A. Cunningham.
Lacqueian, pertaining to a lackey : a
word coined to represent a coined word
in the original, lacayuna.
Love would not lose the opportunity
offered him of triumphing over a lacqueian
heart. — Jarvis't Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV.
ch. iv.
Lacrymals, tears.
Something else I said that made her
laugh in the midst of her lacrymals. — Rich-
ardson, Grandison, vi. 317.
Lacune, a gap.
It is plain that after them there is a lacune
or blank which is to be filled up with the
kings death. — North, Examen, p. 149.
Ladage, boyhood.
Heer I have past my ladage fair and good,
Heer first the soft down on my cheek did
bud.— Sylvester, The Vocation, 170.
Ladder to heaven. There are two
plants to which this name is given :
Pofemonium cceruleum, also called
Jacob's ladder ; and Polygonatum
rmdtijlorum, sometimes styled Solo-
mon's seal. See Britten and Holland's
Eng. Plant Names (E. D. S.).
I ornamented it with a rich wreath of
roses, entwined with certain other flowers,
famed for their close connection with such
exploits, such as love and idleness, heart's
ease, ladder to heaven, lords and ladies, love
in a mist, none so pretty, true love of Canada,
and bachelor's buttons. — Nares, Thinks-I-to-
myself, n. 41.
Laddess, a girl.
I know he is a very amiable lad, and I do
not know that she is not as amiable a laddess.
— Walpole, Letters, iii. 243 (1768).
Ladies love. This plant is not
noticed in Britten and Holland's Eng.
Plant Names.
His cap was made of ladyes loue,
So wondrous light that it did moue
If any humming gnat or flie
Buz'd the aire in passing by.
Merrick, Appendix, p. 481.
Lads-love, southern-wood. Boy's-
love is given as a name of this plant in
Britten s Beauties of Wiltshire, 1825.
She gathered a piece of southern-wood,
and stuffed it up her nose by way of smell-
ing it. "What, ten you call this in your
country ? " asked she. " Old man," replied
Ruth. "We call it here ladfs-love."—Mrs.
Gaskell, Ruth, ch. xviii.
Lady, to play the lady.
A Jacke will be a gentleman
A mistris Needens lady it at least.
Breton, PasquiCs Madcappe, p. 10.
Lady, wife : this vulgarism is not so
very modern. The extract is from a
letter of Ph. Skippon, 1644.
General Ruthen's lady was taken seven
or eight miles hence this day. — Rushworth,
Pt. IH. Vol. II. p. 723.
Lady-clock, lady-bird.
You're not turning your head to look after
some moths, are you ? That was only a lady-
clock, child, * flying away home/ — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xxhi.
Lady-cow, a lady-bird: in the first
extract it is addressed as a term of
reproach by Goliath to David.
O Lady-cow,
Thou shalt no more bestar thy wanton brow
With thine eyes rayes.
Sylvester, The Trophies, p. 274.
A pair of buskings they did bring
Of the cow4adyes currall winge.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 475.
Lady op pleasure, a courtesan.
North has "lady of diversion." See
quotation s. v. Shah.
Thence the king walked to the Dutchess
of Cleveland, another lady of pleasure and
curse of our nation. — Evelyn, Diary, March
5, 1671.
Now I find that the strict pretences which
the ladies of pleasure make to strict modesty
is the reason why those of quality are
asham'd to wear it. — Farquhar, Constant
Couple, Act III.
You may rig out a first rate ship at less
expense than a lady of pleasure : she must
LAD Y OF THE LAKE ( 368 )
LAITH
appear at Hyde Park with a glittering equip-
age, and shroud the scandal of her life under
a veil of embroidery. — GentUman Instructed,
p. 288.
Lady of the lake, a courtesan;
from the old romance of Sir Lancelot
and the Lady of the Lake.
All women would be of one piece,
The virtuous matron and the miss ;
The nymphs of chaste Diana's train,
The same with those in Lewkner's Lane,
But for the difference marriage makes
Twixt wives and Ladies of the Lakes.
Hud&ras, III. i. 868.
Our Lady of the Lake
In mistick praise of Collin spake.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant, iv
Lady's Finger, a species of potato ;
also the kidney- vetch, the flowers of
which are yellow, but on some of the
Cornish cliffs and a few other places
they ore crimson, purple, cream-coloured
and white.
They have buried the fingers and toes,
Bloudie Jacke,
Of the victims so lately your prey ;
From those fingers and eight toes
Sprang early potatoes,
* Lodges' Fynqers ' they'r called to this day,
So tney say,
And you usually dig them in May.
Ingoldsby Legends {Bloudie Jacke).
Each has . . its ridge of brown sand, bright
with golden trefoil and crimson lady's-finyer.
— Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. vi.
Lady's Fingers, a species of biscuit,
so called from the shape. See quota-
tion s. v. Parliament.
" Fetch me that ottoman, and prithe keep
Your voice low/' said the Emperor, "and
steep
Some lady's fingers nice in Candy wine."
Keats, Cap and Bells, at. 48.
Lady's Slipper. Cypripedium cat-
ceolus, an orchidaceous plant
Charles . . . walked beside William across
the spring meadows, through the lengthen-
ing grass, through the calthas and the
orchises and the ladies slippers, and the
cowslips and the fribillaries, through the
budding garden which one finds in spring
among the English meadows.— if. Kingsley,
Bavenshoe, ch. Llv.
Lag, to steal : in the second extract
lugged == caught.
Some corne away lag
In bottle and bag.
Some Steele for a jest
Eggs out of the nest.
Tusser, Eusbandrie, p. 54.
Poore cunnie so bagged
Is scone ouer lagged.
Ibid., p. 86.
Lag, to imprison or transport: also
a convict. Cf . preceding entry.
"He is my brother on one side of the
house at least," said Lord Etherington, " and
I should not much like to have him fagged
for forgery."— Scott, S. Bonan's Well, ii. 201.
They'll ask no questions after him, fear
they should be obliged to prosecute, and so
get him lagged. — Oliver 7Vn«f,ch. xvi.
At last he fell in with two old lags who
had a deadly grudge against the captain. —
Beadt, Never too late to mend, ch. lx.
Lage, cant term for wash, and so,
poor thin drink.
I bowse no lage, but a whole gage
Of this I bowse to you,
Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act II.
Laqgoose, laggard.
Beware of Gill lag goose, disordering the
house,
Mo dainties who catcheth than craftie fed
mouse. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 174.
Laid, laid down as to sleep.
Pol. The maids and her half -valentine have
plied her
With courtesy of the bride-cake and the
bowl,
As she is laid awhile.
Lady T. Oh, let her rest.
Jonson, Tale of a Tub, iii. 5.
Thev that have drunk " the cup of slum-
ber " had need to be bidden " awake and
stand up," for they are sluggish and laid. —
Adams, 1. 169.
Lair. Peacock (Manley and Cor-
ringham Glossary, JE. D. S.) gives
Layer, i. e. lair, " the place where cattle
lie " — hence perhaps applied in extracts
to rabbits of the same litter or stock ;
for this seems the meaning.
His bride and hee were both rabbets of
one later. — Breton, Merry Wonders, p. 8.
A warrener propounded to Thomas Earl of
Exeter, that he should have a burrough of
rabbets of what colour he pleased. *• Let
them be all white-skinned," says that good
Earl. The undertaker killed up all the rest,
and sold them away, but the white lair. —
Socket, Life of Williams, ii. 186.
Laired. See extract.
In Scotland also, cattle ventnring in a
quaking moss are often mired or laired, as it
is called. — Lyell, Princ. of Geology, ii. 510
(12th ed.).
Laith, a barn. See H. s. v. lathe.
T' maister's down i' t1 fowld. Go round
by th' end of laith, if ye we went to spake
LAPLAND
( 37T )
LAUGH
I have been in the catacombs— caves very
curious indeed — we were lapidated by the
natives, pebbled to some purpose, I give you
my word.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 207.
Lapland. Lapland was famous for
witches ; they were supposed to be
able to sell winds to sailors. The first
extract is from some commendatory
verses prefixed to Lawes's Ay res and
Dialogues, 1653.
Hence all the Ayres flow pure and unconfin'd,
Blown by no mercenary Lapland wind,
No stolen or plundered fancies, but born free,
And so transmitted to Posteritie.
F. Finch.
O enigmatical rod which, like the stick of
a Lapland charmer, after an hasty, dirty, em-
barrassed journey, most ungraciously throws
or destroys its rider. — Hue and Cry after Dr.
Swift, p. 18 (1714).
Larchen, of larch. Cf. Eldern ;
HOLMEN.
Her brothers were the craggy hills,
Her sisters larchen trees ;
Alone with her great family
She lived as she did please.
Keats, Meg Merrilies.
Larcher, larch.
nrtvKt), the larcher tree, whose gum is
exceeding bitter. — Chapman, Iliad, xv.,
Comment.
Larson, a filcher : used apparently as
an English word, except that it has the
cedille.
Strong thieves should live ; only some poor
petty larcons and pilferers should come to
execution. — Bishop Hall, Works, v. 181.
Larder, a washing-place ; perhaps a
misprint for launder.
Sins of a lesser size never trouble us ; we
mind not the washing of them with a few
sorrowful tears ; but when a great sin comes
and disquiets the conscience, then repent-
ance, that old laundress, is called for, and
in that larder we wash out both the great
offences and the rest. — Adams, iii. 273.
Larg. Largo in music, slowly : larg
therefore, I suppose, is a slow note,
one to be dwelt upon.
O let the longest Largs be shortest Briefes
In this discordant note.
Davies, 3ficrocosmos, p. 81.
Largition, bounty.
As wise Spots wood says upon Malcolm the
Second, necessity is the compauion of im-
moderate lar(/ition. and forceth to unlawful
shifts.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 225.
Larrup, to beat (slang).
There was no rope-dancing for me; I
danced on the bare ground, and was larruped
with the rope.— Dickens, Hard Times, ch. v.
LASHLES8, without lashes.
His lashless eyelids stretch
Around his demon eyes.
Keats, Lamia, Pt. II.
Lask, to suffer from diarrhoea : un-
common as a verb.
So soft childhood puling
Is wrung with worms begot of crudity,
Are fand ?] apt to laske through much hu-
midity.—Sylvester, The Furies, 529.
Last, endurance.
It's a fair trial of skill and last between
us, like a match at football or a battle. —
Hughes, Tom Browns Schooldays, Pt. II. ch.
vii.
Latifundian, wide-apread.
The matters [were] openly transacted, and
never opposed or contradicted in any single
fact affirmed in it, although the interest of a
very latifundian faction was concerned. —
North, Exdmen, p. 414.
L ati bier. See quotation ; also H.
and L.
Latimer is the corruption of Latiner ; it
signifies he that interprets Latin ; and though
he interpreted French, Spanish, or Italian, he
was called the King's Latiner, that is, the
King's interpreter. — Selden, Table Talk, p.
179.
Latinless, without a knowledge of
Latin.
Latinlesse dolts, saturnine heavy-headed
blunderers, my invective hath relation to. —
Nashe, Lenten Stujfe (Harl. Misc., vi. 176).
You remember it in Claudian, eh, Pelham ?
Think of its being thrown away on those
Latinless young lubbers. — Lytton, Pelham,
ch. xxii.
Lation, " among philosophers, is the
translation or motion of the natural
body from one place to another in a
right line " {Baileys Diet.).
Make me a heaven ; and make me there
Many a lesse and greater spheare ;
Mtke me the straight and oblique lines,
The motions, lotions, and the signs.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 48.
Latish. rather late.
Dinner . . . will be a little latish to-day. —
Richardson, Pamela, ii. 172.
Latter-mint, a later species of mint
Savory, latter-mint, and columbines.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. IV.
Laugh. A person who is disap-
pointed, and so is sad when he IvA
LA UNCH
( 37« )
LAXITY
hoped tfl rejoice, is said to laugh or
smile on the wrong side of fas mouth or
face.
little knowest thou, laughing Joaillier-
Bijoutier, great in thy pride of place, in tby
pride of savoir-faire, what the world has in
store for thee. Thou laughest there ; by-
and-by thou wilt laugh on the wrong side of
thy face mainly. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace,
ch. iii.
Ladies may smile, but they would smile on
the wrong side of their pretty little mouths, if
they had been treated as I have been. — Jliss
Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xzvi.
Launch, to lance ; also a lancing.
If I shal perceaue that it shal be to your
welth, I will not stieke to giue you a launch
or two. — Traheron, 155S (Jfaitland on Reform-
ation, p. 80).
Wherefore at my handes you shal loke to
hane your boils launched, and to haue cor-
rosies and smarting plaisters laied vpon them
vntil thei be cured. — Ibid. {lb. p. 82).
Laubized, crowned with laurel.
Our humble notes, though little noted now,
Lauriz'd hereafter.
Sylvester, Posthumous Sonnets, III.
Lautitiohs, costly.
To sup with thee thou didst me home invite,
And niad'st a promise that miue appetite
Sho'd meet and tire on such lautitious meat,
The like not Heliogabalus did eat.
Merrick, Hesperides, p. 281.
Lavender, to perfume with lavender.
See quotation 4. v. Horsiness.
The solemn clerk goes lavender' d and shorn,
Nor stoops his back to the ungodly pair.
Hood, Two Peacocks of Bedfont.
Lavish, expenditure.
Such lavish will I make of Turkish blood,
That Jove shall send his winged messenger
To bid me sheathe my sword and leave the
field. — Marlowe, 2 Tamburlaine, i. 3.
Would Atropos would cut my vital thread,
And so make lavish of my loathed life.
Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng. Dr.,
iii. 323).
Lavolto, to leap high as in the lavolta
dance. See N. s. v.
Do but marke him on your walles, any
morning at that season, how he sallies and
lavoltos. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 164).
Law, a start, or an allowance of time.
In the first extract it= licence. Fuller,
more suo, puns upon that word.
Thou canst give such law
To thy detractive speeches.
Chapman, Iliad, xvii. 154.
This winged Pegasus posts and speeds
after men, easily gives them late, fetches
them up again, gallops and swallows the
ground he goes. — Ward, Sermons, p. 55.
These late years of our Civil Wars have
been very destructive unto them; and no
wonder if no Law hath been given te Hares,
when so little hath been observed toward
men— FulUr, Worthies, Ducks.
Law, to litigate.
Sir Samuel Bernardiston brought a writ of
error of this Exchequer chamber judgment
into the House of Lords, and there the
Knight lawed by himself, for no person
opposed him. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
i. 103.
Lawdaughter, daughter in law.
And Hecuba old Princesse dyd I see, with
number, an hundred
Lawdaughters. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 526.
Lawe, monumental tumulus of
stones.
[Certain hills in Northumberland] where-
upon (and that is wonderfull) there be many
▼err great heapes of stone, called La tee s^
which the neighbour inhabitants be verily
perswaded were in old time cast up and layd
.together, in remembrance of some there
slaiue. — Holland's Camden, p. 802.
Lawfather, father in law. Chora-
bus is spoken of as
Soon to King Priamus by law ; thus he late-
father helping. — Stanyhurst, JEnH ii. 354.
Lawing, cutting claws off a dog's
foot to prevent him from hunting.
See quotation s. v. Unlawed. L. has
lawing > but with meagre explanation.
Lawn (?), apparently some sort of
torture or punishment.
Here thou shrinkest to think of the gout,
colic, stone, or strangurian, shiverest to hear
of the strappado, the rack, or the lawn. —
Ward, Sermons, p. 00.
Lawn, to make into lawn.
Give me taste to improve an old family seat
By lawning an hundred good acres of wheat.
Anstey, New Bath Guide, Conclusion.
Lax, to relax.
Anextream fear and an extream ardour
of courage do equally trouble and lax the
belly. — Cotton's Montaigne, ch. xli.
Laxity, roominess.
The hills in Palestine generally had in
their sides plenty of caves, and those of
such laxity and receipt that ours in England
are but conny-boroughs, if compared to the
palaces which those hollow places afforded.
— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II. v. 5.
LAY
( 373 )
LEAN-TO
Lay. law.
"Hs churchman's lay and verity
To live in love and charity.
Peele, Edward /., p. 381.
Lay, a scheme or plan ; especially
applied to the projects of thieves, or to
the special line of dishonesty that they
adopt.
I have found them ont to he sure, and
well I might ; for it was I first set them on
the lay.— -Johnston, Chrysal, ch. xxviii.
M The Kinchins, my dear," said Fagin, " is
the young children that's sent on errands by
their mothers with sixpences and shillings ;
and the lay is just to take their money away
— they've always got it ready in their hands
— then knock 'em into the kennel, and walk
off very slow, as if there were nothing else
the matter but a child fallen down and hurt
itself. — Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xlii.
Layery, growing in layers.
From thick to thick, from hedge to layery
beech. — Leigh Hunt, Foliage, p. 9.
Lay-holding, seizing ; apprehend-
ing.
Laid hold on him with most lay-holding
grace. — iSidney, Arcadia, p. 89.
Laystow, a dungheap ; the place
where dirt is deposited : usually written
laystall. H. notices the spelling lay-
stoare.
In Cyclops kennel, thee laystow dirtye, the
foule den. — Stanyhurst, Mn., iii. 628.
Lazarous, leprous ; diseased.
Our godly sorrow for our sins is like the
pool of Bethesda; when that angel from
heaven, gracious Repentance, hath troubled
the waters, the lazarous soul does but step
into them, and is cured. — Adams, iii. 299.
Laze, laziness ; inaction : the verb is
not uncommon.
Thus folded in a hard and mournful late,
Distress'd sat he.
Greene {from If ever too Late), p. 301.
Lazybones, slothful person.
Goe tell the labourers that the lazie bones,
That will not worke,must seeke the beggars
gaines.
Breton, PasquiVs Madcappe, p. 12.
Gome on, can't yer? what a lazybones jet
are, Charlotte. — Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch.
xlii.
44 We want to get into your shop." " What
for in Heaven's name ? n u Shoon, lazybones.1*
— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. zziv.
Lazyboots, same as lazybones ; the
word alludes, I suppose, to the lagging
tread of an indolent person.
Nancy, as might ha' watched, is gone to
her bed this hour past, like a lazyboots as she
is. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xxxv.
Leaden-spirited, dull ; depressed.
Let leane-fao'd leaden-spirited Saturnists
(Who, madde with melancholy, mirth detest)
Prate what they list.
Davies, Humours Heaven on Earth,
p. 10.
Leaders, the fore - horses ; as dis-
tinguished from the wheelers who are
next the carriage.
St. Foix takes a post-chaise,
With for wheelers two bays, and for leaders
two grays.
Ingoldsby Legends (Black Mousquetaire).
Leads, a roof ; so a thanks, a pains,
a stews, &c.
If the mind of any man be so exalted that
he looketh down on his brethren as if he
stood on the top of a leads, and not on the
same ground they do, that man is high-
minded. — Andrewes, Sermons, v. 13.
Leaf. To turn over a new leaf =
to reform. See extract s. v. Mat.
Except such men think themselves wiser
than Cicero for teaching of eloquence, they
must be content to turn a new leaf. — Ascham,
Schoolmaster, p. 155.
Ye daily only consult how to delude and
abuse the country ; . . . but ye shall see now
it hath found your knavery, it will shortly
turn you over another leaf. — British Bellman,
1648 (Harl. Mix., vii. 632).
Sir Charles Grandison's great behaviour,
as he justly called it, had made such impres-
sions, not only upon him, but upon Mr.
Merceda, that they were both determined to
turn over a new leaf. — Richardson, Grandisonf
ii. 102.
Leaf, flap of a hat.
Harry let down the leaf of his hat, and
drew it over his eyes to conceal his emotions.
— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 129.
Leafiness, show of leaves.
But for these barren fig-trees,
With all their flourish and their leafiness,
We have been told their destiny and use.
Southey, Alderman* s Funeral.
Lean, to make lean.
The spiritual [dropsy] likewise, though it
leans the carcase, lards the conscience. —
Adams, i. 481.
Lean-to, a shed attached to and
partly supported by another building :
used also adjectivally.
The poor leper approached the church
under an extended pent-house or lean-to. —
Archaol., xxiii. 107 (1830).
Piety does not save the bed-ridden old
LEAP
( 374 )
LEGIONED
dame, bed-ridden in the lean-to garret, who
moans, It is the Lord, and dies. — Kingsley,
Two Years Ago, ch. xvii.
She nodded her head in the direction of
the door opening out of the house-place into
the lean-to, which Sylvia had observed on
drawing near the cottage. — Mrs. G ask ell,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. zliii.
Leap, a weel or trap to catch fish.
The basket-makers now gather their rods,
and the fishers lay their leapes in the deep. —
Breton, Fantastickes (October).
Leap. To take a leap in the dark =
to die. Cf. Rabelais's dying speech,
Je men vay chercher un grand peut-
estre, which Mot ten x translates, " 1 am
just going to leap into the dark" The
phrase is now often applied to any
action of which the consequences can-
not be foreseen.
My fever had brought me to a very low
condition, so that I expected every moment
when I should take a leap in the dark. — T.
Brown, Works, iii. 212.
Learnable, capable of being learnt.
These be mysteries, yet in some measure
learnable ; great depths, vet we may safely
wade in them. — Adams, id. 08.
When the lesson comes, if it does come, I
suppose it will come in some learnable shape.
— Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. zviii.
Leat, an artificial water channel.
See Mill leat.
Plymouth Leat. This artificial brook is
taken out of the river Mew, towards its
source at the foot of Sheepston Tor in a
wild mountain dell. Leat, Late, or Lake, as
it is sometimes pronounced, is perhaps a
corruption of lead or conductor, being ap-
plied, I believe, to any artificial channel for
conducting water. — Marshall, Rural Economy
of W. ofEng., ii. 260 (1706).
I have a project to bring down a leat of
fair water from the hill-tops right into
Plymouth town. — C. Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. zvi.
Leather, to beat. Cf. to Hide.
If you think I could carry my point, I
would so swinge and leather my lambkin;
God ! I would so curry and claw her. — Foote,
Mayor of Garret, Act I.
We snail hev a pretty house wi' him if
she doesnt come back; he'll want to be
leather in' us, I shouldn't wonder. He must
hev somethin1 t'ill-use when he's in a pas-
sion.— G. Eliot, Janet* s Repentance, ch. xzi.
Lebanonian, pertaining to Lebanon.
He the wisest man
Feasted the woman wisest then, in halls
Of Lebanonian cedar.
Tennyson, Princess, II.
Lectukess, a female lecturer.
'* But," continued the animated lecturcssy
" you must understand me." — Th. Hook, Manx
of many Friends.
Lee- gage, the lee or unexposed side.
Cf. Weather-gage.
He is a quick apprehensive knave, who sees
his neighbour's blind side, and knows how to
keep the lee-gage when his passions are blow-
ing high. — Scott, Jvanhoe, u. 205.
Leek?
O magistrates, who (to contract the great)
Make sale of justice on your sacred seat ;
And, breaking laws for bribes, profane your
place
To leaue a leek to your vnthankfull race.
Sylvester, third day, first weeke, 515.
Leer, to sneak away, to go oblique-
ly, usually applied to the glance.
I met him once in the streets, but be
leered away on the other side, as one
ashamed of what he had done. — Pilgrim's
Progress, Pt. I. p. 117.
Leer, a leer-eye — *n eye glancing
on all sides; in the quotation from
Jonson leer = left.
Clay with his hat turn'd up o' the leer side
too.— -Jonson, Tale of a Tub, i. 2.
A suspitious or jealous man is one that
watches himself e a mischief e, and keepes a
Isare eye still, for feare it should escape him.
Earle, Microcosmographie, No. 78.
Left. Over the left, implies incredul-
ity or contradiction of what has been
said.
With Mr. Solmes you will have something
to keep account of, for the sake of you and
your children : with the other, perhaps you
will have an account to keep too ; but an
account of what will go over the left shoulder ;
only of what he squanders, what he borrows,
and what he owes, and never will pay. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i. 242.
Leg, to make a leg or obedience.
The fool doth pass the guard now,
He'll kiss his hand and leg it.
Shirley, Bird in a Cage, v. 1.
Leg-rail. To give leg-bail = to run
away. Hood has it as a verb.
He has us now if he could only give us
leg-hail again ; and he must be in the same
boat with us. — Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xix.
What a leg to leg-bail Embarrassment's serf!
What a leg for a Leg to take on the turf !
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Legioned, enrolled or formed in a
legion ; banded. Cf. Regimented.
So once more days and nights aid me along
Like legion*d soldiers.
Keats, Endymion, Bk II.
LEGIONIZE
( 375 )
LEVANT
Leoionize, to form in a legion.
Descend, sweet Angels (legioniz'd in rankest,
And make your Heau'n on His Sepulchers
bankes.— Z>am>*, Holy Roode, p. 28.
Legs. To be on last legs = to be on
the point of collapse or dissolution.
I was on my last legs, gasping and giving
up the ghost, for want of the cordial of your
correspondence.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 237.
She can't possibly last long, for she's quite
upon her last legs. — Mad. D Arblay, Cecilia,
Bk. VII. ch. v.
Lengthy. See quotation. L. does
not give the word ; R. says, "Length-y,
adj., has lately been introduced (from
America ?) ; it is regularly formed, but
not wanted : our word is longsome."
Pope has lengthful.
Sometimes a poet when he publishes what
in America would be called a lengthy poem
with lengthy annotations, advises the reader
in his preface not to read the notes in their
places as they occur . . . but to read the
poem by itself at &nt.-—Southey, The Doctor,
ch. clx.
This gave so lengthy a look to his thin
person. — Mrs. Trotlope, Michael Armstrong,
ch.
Lentil-dew. See extract
Lentil-dew, a name given to the duckweed,
a green mantle of the standing pool, in old
herbals.— W. Taylor, 1800 (Rohberds's Memoir,
i. 345).
Lent-lover, a cold platonic lover.
Leaving a rabble of long prologues and
protestations which ordinarily these dolent
contemplative lent-lovers (amoreux de quar-
esme) make, who never meddle with the
lle&h.—Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xzi.
Lepkrize, to smite with leprosy.
Moses by Faith doth Miriam leperize.
Sylvester, Triumph of Faith, iv. 7.
Lepbt, leprosy.
Such are king's-euils, dropsie, gout, and
stone,
Blood-boyling lepry, and consumption.
Sylvester, The Furies, 557.
Lessen, to soar up or beyond : a tech-
nical term in falconry ; derived, I sup-
pose, from the fact of the hawk's
appearing smaller and smaller as it rises.
Our two sorrows
Work, like two eager hawks, who shall get
highest ;
How shall I lessen thine ? for mine, I fear,
Is easier known than cur'd.
Beaum. and Fl., King and No King, iv. 1.
In mounting up in Antiquity, like hawks,
they did not only lessen, but fly out of sight.
Fuller, Worthies, ch. xvi.
A flight of madness, like a faulcon's lessen*
ing, makes them the more gaz'd at. — Collier,
Eng. Stage, p. 73.
Letch, " an idle, foppish fancy" (H.),
but in the extract it = strong desire.
Robinson ( Whitby Glossary, E. D. S.)
gives " Lech, pron. letch, lust"
And surely if we, rather than revenge
The slaughter of our bravest, cry them
shame,
And fall upon our knees, and say we've
sinn'd,
Then will the Earl take pity on his thralls,
And pardon us our letch for liberty.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. I. ii. 6.
Lethargised, afflicted with lethargy.
The lethargised is not less sick because
he complains not so loud as the aguish. —
Adams, i. 353.
Lethargy, litharge ; white lead.
lie onely now emboss my book with brass,
Dye 't with vermilion, deck 't with coperass,
With gold and silver, lead and mercury,
Tin, iron, orpine, stibium, lethargy.
Sylvester, Third day, first weeke, 903.
There among her wreakf ul baits she mixes
Quicksilver, lithargie and orpiment,
Wherewith our entrails are oft gnawn and
rent. — Ibid., The Furies, p. 188.
Letification, rejoicing. N. has the
verb.
The last yeer we shewid you, and in this
place,
How the shepherds of Christ by thee made
letification.
Candlemas Day, Introduction (a.d. 1512).
Levbier, a grey-hound (Fr. Uvrier).
He hath your grey-hound, your mungrel,
your mastiff, your Uvrier, your spaniel. —
Return from Parnassus, ii. 5 (1006).
Levant. To throw or run a levant is
a term in gaming which, as Partridge
was not allowed to put his question, I
am unable certainly to explain; it
seems from the quotations to mean play-
ing without paying, arid so a man who
runs away from his creditors is said to
levant.
Crowd to the hazard table, throw a fa-
miliar levant upon some sharp lurching man
of quality, and, if he demands his money,
turn it off with a loud laugh, and cry you 11
owe it him to vex him. — Gibber, Prov. Hus-
band, Act I.
" Never mind that, man " [having no money
to stake], " e'en boldly, run a levant " (Part-
ridge was going to inquire the meaning of
the word, but Jones stopped his mouth),
** but be circumspect as to the man." — Tom
Jones, Bk. VIII. en. xii.
LEVEL
( 376 )
LICK-PENNY
Level, tax. H. gives " level, to tax
or assess." Breton prays to be de-
livered
From taking lentil by vnlawfull measure.
PasquiVs Precession, p. 8.
Levettis, leavings.
They gave almes, bat howe ?
When they have eaten ynowe,
Their gredy paunches replennisshynge,
Then gadder they vp their levettis,
Not the best morsels, but gobbettis,
Which vnto pover people they deale.
Roy and Bartow, Rede me and be
nott wroth, p. 80.
For the best meate awaye they carve,
Which for their harlottia must serve,
With wother frendes of their kynne ;
Then proll the servynge officers,
With the yemen that be wayters
So that their levettis are but thynne.
Ibid., p. 98.
Lewis-hole. The Imp. Diet gives a
picture of a lewis, and describes it as
" an instrument of iron used in raising
large stones to the upper part of a
building. It operates by the dove-
tailing of one of its ends into an
opening in the stone, so formed that
no vertical force can detach it."
The wells are almost entire, and perhaps
the work of the Romans, except the upper
part, which seems repaired with the ruins of
Boman buildings, for the lewis-holes are still
left in many of the stones. — Defoe, Tour
thro* G. Britain, ii. 287.
L.EXICOGRAPHI8T, lexicographer.
It is a pious fancy of the good old lexico-
graphic, Adam Littleton, that our Lord took
up nis first lodging in a stable amongst the
cattle, as if He had come to be the Saviour
of them as well as of men. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. 184.
Libbard, leopard ; the word is in
the Diets., but with no such recent
examples.
The lion, and the libbard, and the bear
Graze with the fearless flocks.
Cowper, Winter's Walk at Noon, 773.
Twelve sphered tables by silk seats insphered,
High as the level of a man's breast rearM
On libbard's paws. — Keats, Lamia.
Libel. Fuller ( Worthies, Lancashire,
i. 544) suggests the following punning
etymology: "Many a Lycbdl ('Lye'
because false ; ' Bell,' because loud)
was made upon" [Bancroft].
Licentiate, licentious.
Onr epigrammatarians, old and late,
Were wont be blamed for too licentiate.
Hall, Sat., I. ix. 29.
Lichen ed,- a word signifying the
effect produced by an overgrowth of
lichens.
And there they lay till all their bones were
bleaoh'd,
And lichen'd into colour with the crags.
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine.
Under eaves of lichened rock she had a
windiug passage, which none that ever I
knew of durst enter but herself. — Black'
more, Lorna Doone, ch. xvii.
Yon can go close down to the water, and
find still pools reflecting the silver-lichened
rocks. — Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch.
xvii.
Lichenoub, covered with lichen.
Her partner's young richness of tint
against the flattened hues and rougher forms
of her aged head had an effect something
like that of a fine flower against a lichenous
branch. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxvi.
Lick, to thrash. L. has the word
with extract from Thackeray, and it is
common enough all over England, but
Wolcot seems to regard it as a Devon-
shire provincialism.
Who, if she dare*3 to speak or weep,
He instantly would kick her ;
And oft (to use a Devonshire phrase)
The gentleman would lick her.
P. Pindar, p. 305.
Lick-box, a glutton or epicure.
Epistemon, describing the occupations
and habits of some of the departed in
Elysian fields, says,
Agamemnon a lick - box (lichecasse). —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxx.
Lick-dish, a parasite. H. says the
phrase liar liar lick-dish is an old one,
being found in the tragedy ef ffofman,
1631. The subjoined is 80 years earlier,
according to Oldys, though the earliest
known edition is 1575.
Thou Her lickdish, didst not say the neele
wold be gitton? — Gammer GurtonU Needle,
v.2.
Licking, a thrashing.
In vulgar terms, he'd had his lickina,
Not with Ma'am's cuffs, but by her kicking.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. ch. iii.
Licking is used curiously in extract,
and seems = painting or anointing.
Jezebel, for all her licking, la cast out of
the window.— Bishop Sail, Works, viii. 144.
Lick -penny, something expensive.
London Lick -penny is quoted as a
proverb in The Curates Conference,
1641 (Earl Misc., i. 498), and in
LICK-PLATTER
( 377 )
LIFT
Fuller (Worthies, London), who re-
marks, -''The best is ... it is also
London get Penny to those who live
here, and carefully follow their vo-
cations."
You talked of a law-suit— law is a lick-
penny, Mr. Tyrrel,— no counsellor like the
pound in purse.— Scott, S. Ronan's Well, ch.
xxviii.
Lick-flatter, a parasite.
He had a passion for independence, which,
though pushed to excess, was not without
grandeur. No lick-platter, no parasite, no
toad-eater, no literary beggar, no hunter after
patronage and subscriptions. — Lytton, My
JYovel, Bk. VI. ch. xxiu\ *
Lick-spigot, a drawer or waiter at a
tavern.
I^t the cunningest licke-spiggot swelt his
heart out, the beere sbal never foame or
froath in the cuppe.— Nashe, Lenten Stuff*
{Harl. Misc., vi. 178). *
Gnotho. Fill, lick-spigot.
Drawer. Ad imum, sir.
Massinger, Old Law, IV. i.
Lick-trencher, parasite.
Art hardy, noble Huon ? art magnanimous,
lick-trencher?— Dekker, Satiromastue (Haw-
kins, Eng. Dr., Hi. 159).
Lidded, covered by the lid, and so
downcast.
But the forgotteu eye is still fast lidded to
the ground,
As palmer's that with weariness mid-desert
shrine hath found.
Keats, Birthplace of Burns.
So said, one minute's while his eyes re-
mained
Half lidded, piteous, languid, innocent.
lb., Cap and Bells, st. 20.
Lidless, as applied to the eye, un-
sleeping.
To an eye like mine,
A lidless watcher of the public weal,
Last night their mask was patent.
Tennyson, Princess, IV.
Lie-a-bed, a sluggard.
If you had got up time enough you might
have secur'd the stage, but you are a lazy
lie-a-bed.— Foote, Mayor of Garrett, Act I.
Where tnere are two lie-a-beds in a house,
there are a pair of ne'er-do-weels.— /teak,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xlvi.
Lie at or upon, to importune or in-
stigate ; lay a* = to attack is a Surrey
provincialism.
The old dotard, he that so instantly doth
lie upon my father for me.—Gascoigne, Sup-
poses, I. i.
Dame Tullia lay ever upon him, and
pricked forward his distempered and troubled
mind. — Holland, Livy, p. 27.
He told her because she lay sore upon him
—Judges xiv. 17.
His mother and brother had lain at him,
ever since he came into his master's service,
to help him to money.— Evam. of Joan Perry.
&c., 1676 (Harl. Misc., III. 640).
Lieu, place. L. says this word is
only used in the phrase in lieu of, and
the examples given by him and R. do
not contradict this. Bp. Andrewes is
speaking of the offer of " all the king-
doms of the world " made by the
devil to our Lord, if He would worship
him.
One would think it a very large offer to
give so great a lieu for so small a service.—
Andrewes, v. 544.
Lifeblood. The involuntary quiver
in the lip or eyelid is vulgarly said to
be caused by the lifeblood. The second
extract is given in Peacock's Manley
and Gorringham Glossary (E. D. 8.).
My upper Up had the motion in it, throb-
bing like the pulsation which we call the
lifeblood.— Richardson, Grandison, vi. 241.
That curious muscular sensation or quiver,
to which the vulgar give the name of live
blood.— B. W. Richardson, Diseases of Modern
Life, p. 163.
Life-likeness, likeness to life.
I had found the spell of the picture in an
absolute life-likeness of expression, which, at
first startling, finally confounded, subdued,
and appalled me.-£. A. Poe, Oval Portrait.
Lifer, one transported for life.
They know what a clever lad he is ; he'll
be a lifer; they'll make the artful nothing
less than a lifer. — Dickens, Oliver Twist,
ch. xliii.
Liferentrix, woman having a life
rent interest in some property.
lAdy Margaret Bellenden . . . liferentrix
of the barony of Tillietudlem. — Scott, Old
Mortality, ch. ii.
Lifesome, lively.
0 Edward, you are all to me,
1 wish for your sake I could be
More lifesome and more gay.
Coleridge, Three Graves.
Lift, a shop-lifter. See quotation
*. v. Boult.
Women ... are more subtile, more dan-
gerous in the commonwealth, and more full
of wiles to get crownes than the cunningest
foyst, nip, lift, prigs, or whatsoever that lives
at this day.— Greene, Theeves falling out, 1615
(Harl. Misc., yui. 384). J * '
LIFTINGS
(378)
LIL Y-LIVER
Liftings, attempts; tentative at-
tacks. Cf. Heave at.
There had been some liftings at him in the
Court by Sir John Cook, who had informed
against him to the Lord Treasurer then
being. — Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 180.
Ligger. See extract.
The stones which composed these primi-
tive . . . mills . . were two ; an upper stone
or runner, and a nether, called in Derbyshire
a ligger, from the old word lig, to lie. —
Archaol., vii. 20 (1785).
Lighterage, price paid for unloading
ships by lighters or boats. In a He-
port to Lord Burleigh of the Cost of
delivering a Tun of Gascoigny Wine
in England, in November, 1583 (Eng.
Garner, i. 46), one item is —
The lighterage, carriage, and porters7 due,
£0 2s. Sd.
Light-fingered, dishonest.
Is any tradesman light-fngered, and lighter-
conscienced? — Adams, i. 161.
He knew him to be a little light-fingered,
and given to lying and swearing. — Dialogue
on Oxford Parliament, 1681 (Harl. Misc., ii.
124).
Lightful, glorious; also, joyous.
R. has the word = full of light (Wic-
lifs translation of "St. Matt. vi. 22).
Daily once they all should march the round
About the city with horn-trumpets sound,
Bearing about for only banneret
The lightful ark, God's sacred cabinet.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 109.
Tho' my heart was lightful and joyous be-
fore, yet it is ten times more lightsome and
joyous now. — Pilgrim's Progress, Pt. II.
p. 60.
Lightheadedness, wandering ; de-
lirium.
So lovely a voice uttering nothing but the
incoherent ravings of lightheadedness. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. A. ch. ix.
Lightly, to make light of; to dis-
dain.
The King of Peace would have a king of rest
To build His temple farre aboue the best ;
His House, whose front vpreard so high and
eaven,
That lightlied earth, and seemed to threat
the heaven. — Hudson's Judith, i. 78.
I began to think John Rawson had per-
haps not been so very mad, and that I'd done
ill to lightly his offer as a madman. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Ruth, ch. xvi.
Lightman, linkman.
The stars might go to sleep a-nights,
And leave their work to these new lights ;
The midwife moon might mind her calling,
And noisy lightman leave his bawling.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 255.
Likeable, pleasant ; capable of being
liked.
It is a very likeable place, being one of
the most comfortable towns in England. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. xxxiv.
Liked, was likely ; liked to have done
= nearly did.
He probably got his death, as he liked to
have done two years ago, by viewing the
troops for the expedition from the wall of
Kensington - Garden. — Walpole, Letters, ii.
193 (1700).
Lilac. It would appear from the
extract that lilac trees were not very
familiar objects in the middle of the
seventeenth century. Bacon, however,
mentions "the lilach tree." The Per-
sian lilac was cultivated in England
about 1638, the common lilac about
1597.
A fountaine of white marble with a lead
cesterne, which fountaine is set round with
six trees called lelack trees. — Survey of AFon-
such Palace, 1650 (Archaol., v. 434).
Lilburne, a stupid fellow.
Ye are such a calfe, such an asse, such a
blocke,
Such a lilburne, such a hoball, such a lob-
cocke. — Udal, Roister Doisttr, iii. 3.
Lilly. See quotations. So called
from the N. pole in a compass being
distinguished by nfleur de lis.
As to the Pole the lilly bends
In a sea-compass, and still tends,
By a magnetic mystery,
Unto the Arctic point in sky,
Whereby the wandering piloteer
His course in gloomy nights doth steer.
Hoicell, Letters, iii A.
If we place a needle touched at the foot
of tongs or andirons, it will obvert or turn
aside its lillie or north point, and conform
its cuspis or south extream with the andiron.
— Brown, Vulgar Errors, Bk. II. ch. ii.
Lilt, a song with " swing " or " go "
in it ; also, to sing in a spirited manner.
Which of Charles Mackay's lyrics cau
compare for a moment with the JEschylean
grandeur, the terrible rhythmic lilt, of his
"Cholera Chant"? — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. ix.
Hech, but she would lilt that bonnily. —
Ibid. ch. xxxiii.
Lily-liver, a coward.
When people were yet afraid of me, and
were taken in by my swagger, I always knew
that I was a lily-liver, and expected that I
LIMBER
( 379 )
LIONESS
should be found out some day. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xii.
Limber, to make pliant.
Her stiff hams, that have not been bent to
a civility for ten years past, are now limbered
into courtesies three deep at every word. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii. 366.
Lime- fingered, thievish, applied to
those to whose lingers other people's
property sticks. CI Birdlime.
All my fyngers were arayed with lytne,
So I oonvayed a cuppe manerly.
Hycke-Scorner {Hawkins, Eny. Dr., i. 99).
Who troubles the house? . . . Not care-
less, slothful, false, lime 'fingered servants;
but the strict master. — Bp. Hall, Works, v.
195.
Lime- rod, a stick smeared with bird-
lime, used iu catching birds; more
usually called lime-twig.
The currier and the lime-rod are the death
of the fowle. — Breton, Fantastickes (January).
Limitary, a beggar or canvasser
within certain limits or districts.
Great were the sums of money which the
piety of the design and the diligence of their
li notaries brought in from their several walks*
Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 210.
Limpabd, a cripple.
What could that gouty limpard have done
with so fine a dog ? — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
I. ch. xxxix.
Limpingness, lameness.
Lord W. did hobble, and not ungracefully,
-with Mrs. Selby . . . and both were applauded ;
the time of life of the lady, the Itmpingness
of my lord, considered. — Richardson, Grandi*
son, vi. 376.
Lineate, to delineate.
Life to the life the Ohessboord Ungates.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalitie, st. 8.
Liner, a steam-ship belonging to one
of the great steam-lines.
The spinning - jenuy and the railroad,
Cunard's liners and the electric telegraph,
are to me, if not to you, signs that we are,
on some points at least, in harmony with the
universe. — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. v.
He caught the glimpse of the spars and
funnel of a great liner above the smoke to
the left. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. liv.
Lines. Hard lines = a hard lot :
so in Ps. xvi. 6, the Bible version has,
" The lines are fallen unto me in pleas-
ant places : " in the Prayer-book, the
word is "Jot."
The old seaman paused a moment. " It is
hard lines for me, he said, " to leave your
honour in tribulation." — Scott, Redgauntlet,
i. 290.
Gad, Sir, that was hard lines ! to have all
the pretty women one had waltzed with
every evening through the Trades, and the
Httle children one had been making play-
things for, holding round one's knees, and
screaming to the doctor to save them. —
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. iv.
Lingerly, Iingeringly ; slowly.
Sometimes, preoccupied with her work,
she sang the refrain very low, very lingerly.
— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. iii.
Lingual, pertaining to the tongue:
the word is usually applied to those
sounds formed by the tongue, but as
L. s. v. observes, the term is too general.
Here indeed becomes notable one great
difference between our two kinds of civil
war ; between the modern lingual or Parlia-
mentary-logical kind, and the ancient or
manual kind in the steel battlefield. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. U.
Linqy, heathy.
His cell was upon a lingy moor, about two
miles from Mulgrave Castle. — Ward, Eng-
land's Reformation, p. 396 (margin).
Linhay, an open shed attached to a
farm-yard.
Home side of the linhay, and under the
ashen hedge-row, where father taught me to
catch blackbirds, all at once my heart went
down. — Blaekmore, Lama Doone, ch. iii.
Link, a kind of sausage, though
apparently distinguished from it in the
following quotations. See H.
He was ordinarily well furnished with
gammons of bacon . . . plenty of links, chit-
terlings, and puddings in their season, to-
gether with . . . great provision of sausages.
— UrquharCs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. iii.
Then followed seven camels loaded with
links and chitterlings, hog's puddings and
sausages. — Ibid., Bk. II. ch. ii.
Lino, a silk gossamer stuff.
He absolutely insisted upon presenting me
with a complete suit of gauze lino. — Mad.
D'ArUay, Diary, i. 310 (1780).
Lint, fluff or flue.
He's brushing a hat almost a quarter of
an hour, and as long a driving the lint from
his black cloaths with his wet thumb.— The
Committee, Act II.
Lioness, a remarkable woman: the
term is also applied to ladies visiting
the University.
Bring Mr. Springblossom — Mr. Winter-
blossom — and all the lions and lionesses ; we
have room for the whole collection. — Scott,
& Roman's Well, i. 129.
LIONISE
(38o)
LIQUOR
Mr. Tupman was doing the honours of a
lobster salad to several lionesses. — Pickwick
Papers, ch. xv.
For the last three months Miss Newcome
has been the greatest lioness in London, the
reigning beauty, the winning horse, the first
favourite out or the whole Belgravian harem.
— Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. xli.
M Now, boys, keep your eyes open, there
must be plenty of lionesses about : and thus
warned, the whole load, including the cor-
nopean player, were on the look-out for lady
visitors, profanely called lionesses. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxv.
Lionise, to show the lions or objects
of interest. See extract 8. v. Paste-
board.
He had lionised the distinguished visitors
during the last few days over the University.
— Disraeli, Lothair, ch. xziv.
Lionism, celebrity ; the condition of
being a lion.
An anecdote or two may be added to bear
out the occasional references to the honours
and humours of lionism which they contain.
— Chorley, Mem. of Mrs. Hemans, ii. 25.
Lip, to notch.
In these daies the maner is lightly to
barb© and pluck off with a sarding hook the
beards or striugs of the root, that being thus
nipped and lipped (as it were) they might
nourish the body of the plant. — Holland,
Pliny, xix. 6.
"Tis a brave castle," said the armourer
. . . '*it were worth lipping a good blade
before wrong were offered to it." — Scott, Fair
Maid of Perth, i. 168.
Lip, to utter (Shakespeare, as quoted
in the Diets. , uses it for a kiss).
Salt tears were coming, when I heard my
name
Most fondly lipp'd, and then these accents
came.— Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Lip-born, merely verbal, not hearty.
Why had he brought his cheap regard and
his lip-horn words to her who had nothing
paltry to give in exchange. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. Ixxx.
Lip-comport, consolatory words.
Lip -comfort cannot cure me. .Pray you,
leave me
To mine own private thoughts.
Massinger, Maid of Honour, iii. 1.
Lip - comforter, one who consoles
with mere words.
Court-moralists,
Reverend lip-comforters that once a week
Proclaim how blessed are the poor.
Southcy, Soldiers Funeral.
LlPB.
Tou shal se a weake smithe which wyl
wyth a lipe and turning of his arme take vp
a barre of yron yat another man thrise as
stronge can not stirre. — Ascham, Toxophilus,
p. 89.
Liplick, a kiss.
When she shal embrace thee, when lyp-
licks sweetlye she fastneth. — Stanyhurst,
JSn., i. 672.
Lipogrammatist, one who writes a
Eoem or other composition from which
e excludes some letter.
No author ever shackled himself by more
absurd restrictions, not eren the lipoaram-
matists or those who built altars ard hatched
eggs in verse, than Mr. Fox, when be resolved
to use no other words in his History than
were to be found in Dry den. — Southty in
Quarterly Review, xv. 561.
Lip-position, impracticable theory :
applied in extract to the philosophical
utterances of Seneca.
His house full
Of children, clients, servants, flattering
friends
Soothing his lip-positions.
Massinger, Maid of Honour, iv. 3.
Lip-reward, empty promises.
To euery act she giues huge lip-reward*
Lauish of oathes, as falsehood of her faith.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R. Grinuile,
p. 56.
Lip-righteousnbss, a mere profes-
sion of righteousness.
Dost thou think
To trick them of their secret ? for the dupes
Of humankind keep this lip-righteousness.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. V.
Lip-salve, flattering speech.
Spencer, that was as cunning as a serpent,
finds here a female wit that went beyoDd
him, one that with his own weapons wounds
his wisdome, and taught him not to trust a
woman's lip-salve, when that he knew her
breast was nll'd with rancour. — Hist, of Edtc.
II., p. 91.
Liquescent, liquid ; moist.
At the end of our path a liquescent
And nebulous lustre was born,
Out of which a miraculous crescent
Arose with a duplicate horn.
E. A. Poe, inalume (ii. 21).
Liquor. To liquor a man's boots =
to cuckold him.
He unfortunately happen 'd to catch her
with a new relation, of whom he was a little
jealous, believing for some reasons he had an
underhand design of liquoring his boots for
him. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 252.
LIRIPIPIONATED ( 381 )
LOAF
Liripipionatkd, hooded ; wearing
the liripoop, q. v. in N.
Master Janotua . . . liripipionated with a
graduate's hood . . . transported himself to
the lodging of .Gargantua. — UrqyJharVs
Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xviii.
Listen ess, attention; the opposite
to listlessness.
Then take me .this errand,
And what I shal prophecy with tentiue
listenu harcken.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 254.
Lithe, to make pliant.
The Grecians were noted for light, the
Parthians for fearful, the Sodomites for
gluttons, like as England (God save the
sample!) hath now suppled, lithed and
stretched their throats. — Adams, i. 308.
Lithoclast, stone-breaker.
A party of horsemen . . . were ready at
the gates of the mosque to assist the litho-
clast as soon as he should have executed his
task. — Burekhardt, Travels in Arabia, i. 307.
Lithographize, to lithograph.
This picture has been lithographtzed from
a drawing by Mr. Kerrich. — Archmol., xxii.
452 (1829).
Litter, to carry in a litter.
These Pagan ladies were litter'd to Gam-
pus Martius, ours are coached to Hyde-Park.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 112.
Little-go, the first examination at
the University ; the final one being the
great- gv : these terms are now almost
obsolete ; " smalls " and " greats " have
taken their place.
He was busily engaged in reading for
the little-go, and must therefore decline the
delight he had promised himself of passing
the vacation at Ginqbars Hall. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. vii.
Liveable, fit for residence.
There will be work for five summers at
least before the place is liveable. — Miss
Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. xxv.
Liverer, a servant in livery. Patten,
Exped. to Scotl., 1648 (Garner, iii. 74),
praising the magnificence of the Eng-
lish nobles, speaks of " their sumptuous
suits of liverers"
Liver-grown, having enlarged liver.
After six fits of a quartan ague with which
it pleased God to visit him, died my deare son
Richard ... I sufferM him to be open'd,
when they found that he was what is vul-
garly call'd liver-grown. — Evelyn, Diary, Jan.
27, 1858.
He had observed the same symptom, but
was informed by his friend that she was
only liver-grown, and would in a few months
be as well in the waist as ever. — Smollett,
Roderick Random, ch. xlvii.
Liversick, sick at heart.
Demon, my friend, once liversick of love,
Thus learn 'd I by the signs his grief remove ;
But mark, when once it comes to Gemini,
Straightway fish-whole shall thy sick liver
be.— Hall, Sat., II. vii. 47.
Livery, applied to a kept mistress.
Now 'cause I am a gamester and keep ordin-
aries,
And a livery punk or so, and trade not with
The money-mongers' wives, not one will be
Bound for me.
Massinger, City Madam, i. 3.
Ten livery whores, she assured me on her
credit,
With weeping eyes she spake it.
Ibid., A very Woman, ii. 2.
Livery. One of the livery = a
cuckold.
lis . . out of fashion now to call things
by their right names. Is a citizen a cuckold ?
no, he's one of the livery. — Revenge, or a
Match in Newgate, Act I.
Li very-table, a side-table or cup-
board.
If there were ten tables provided for that
purpose, the twelve cakes could not be
equally set upon them without a fraction.
I conceive therefore the other nine only as
side-cupboards or livery-tables, ministerial to
that principal one, as whereupon the shew-
bread elect was set before the consecration
thereof, and whereon the old shew-bread
removed, for some time might be placed,
when new was substituted in the room
thereof.— Fuller, Fisgah Sight, Bk. V. ch.
XVUl.
Livetide, fortune ; property.
She . . . founded a house heere for maidens
that were lepers, and endowed the same
with her owne patrimony and livetide. —
Holland's Camden, p. 245.
Livish, a herb of the genus Ligus-
ticum.
As for loueach or liuish, it is by nature
wild and savage. — Holland, Pliny, xix. 8.
Loaded, magnetised.
Great kings to war are pointed forth,
Like loaded needles to the North.
Prior, Alma, 747.
Loaf, to idle about : an American
expression. See Wedgwood, s. v.
Shoeblacks are compelled to a great deal of
unavoidable loafing ; hut certainly this one
loafed rather energetically, for he was hot
LOAFER
(382 )
LOGGER
and frantic in his play. — H. Kingsley,
Ravenshoe, ch. xli.
How can you go down to the beach by
yourself amongst all those loafing vaga-
bonds, who would pick your pocket or throw
stones at you? — Black, Princess of Thule,
ch. xiv.
Loafer, idle lounger.
The loafer in moleskin stood at some little
distance, scowling and muttering scornful
observations at the same time. — Blacky Ad-
ventures of a Phaeton, ch. zviii.
Loathe, to disgust.
Let not the voice of Ithay loathe thine ears.
Peele, David and Bethsabe, p. 475.
There shall they heap their preys of carrion,
Till all his grave be clad with stinking bones.
That it may loathe the sense of every man.
Ibid., p. 482.
Lob be your comfort, go to the
deuce. Cf. Lob's pound in Nares, who,
however, offers no materials for a bio-
graphy of Lob.
Lob be your comfort, and cuckold be your
destiny.— Peele, Otd Wives Tale, p. 455.
LOBBISH, loutish.
Their lobbish guard, ... all night had kept
themselves awake with prating how valiant
deeds they had done when they ran away. —
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 430.
Lob-dotterel, a loutish fool.
Grouthead gnat - snappers, lob - dotterels,
gaping changeUngs. — Vrquharfs Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. xxv.
Lob-like, clumsy ; loutish.
Four or Ave times he yawns, and leaning on
His (Lob-like) elbowe hears this message don.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 589.
Loblolly, lubber. See extract from
Cotton, s. v. Amoring.
This lob-lollie with slauering lips would be
making loue. — Breton, Grimelkfs Fortunes,
p. 9.
Loblolly Boy, a ship-surgeon's mate..
I was not altogether without mortifications
which I not only suffered from the rude
insults of the sailors and petty officers,
among whom I was known by the name
of Loblolly Boy, but also from the disposition
of Morgan. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch.
xxvii.
Lobscourse, or lobscouse ; a sea dish
of meat, onions, &c, stewed together.
The genial banquet was intirely composed
of pea-dishes ... a dish of hard fish swim-
ming in oil appeared at each end, the sides
being furnished with a mass of that savoury
composition known by the name of loh's
course, and a plate of salmagundy. — Smollett,
Peregrine Pickle, ch. ix.
Lobster, soldier; generally supposed
to be in allusion to the red coat, but
probably the term originally referred
to the soldier's cuirass. In 1643, just
before the battle of Lansdown, Sir
Arthur Haslerig's regiment came down
from London with new bright iron
breast and back plates, and were called
Lobsters by the King's troops. German
Krebs = lobster, and also cuirass. See
N.cuidQ.tV. v. 286.
The soldiers call them vagrants. . . . The
women, on the other hand, exclaim against
lobsters and tatterdemalions, and defy 'em to
prove 'twas ever known in any age or country
in the world that a red-coat died for religion.
—T. Brown, Works, i. 73.
Locale, place. This French word is
naturalised ; the final e which belongs
to it in its English dress may be a
mistake, or perhaps designed to dis-
tinguish it from the adj. local.
But no matter — lay the locale where yon
may,
And where it is no one exactly can say,
There's one thing at least which is known
very well.
Ingoldslty Legends (Old Woman in Grey).
Lock-up, a prison ; also used adjec-
tivally.
And bucks with pockets empty as their pate,
Lax in their gaiters, laxer in their gait ;
Who oft, when we our house lock up,
carouse
With tippling tipstaves in a lock-up house.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses, p. 164.
u We'll begin in some out-of-the-way place
till we get used to it." " And end in the
lock-up, I should say," said Tom. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. vi.
Locupleatly, richly. See extract
from Nashe, s. v. Bedocumentizb.
Locust, to devour and lay waste,
like locusts.
This Philip and the black-faced swarms of
Spain,
The hardest, cruellest people in the world,
Gome locusting upon us, eat us up,
Confiscate lands, goods, money.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, II. i.
Log-end, thick end.
The most heavy log-end of Christ's Cross
is laid upon many of them. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 122.
Logger, stupid.
My head too heavy was and logger
Even to make a Pettifogger.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 158.
LOGGERHEAD ( 383 )
LOMBARD
Loggerhead, an inferior species of
turtle.
All the Mediterranean tnrtle are of the
kind called loggerhead, which in the West
Indies are eaten by none but hungry seamen,
negroes, and the lowest class of people. —
Smollett, France and Italy, Letter sx.
Log- headed, stupid. Shakespeare
( Taming of Shrew, iv. 1) has logger-
headed.
For well I knew it was some mad-headed
childe
That invented this name that the log-headed
knave might be begilde.
Edwards, Damon and Pitheas (Dodsley,
O. P/., i. 287).
Logicalization, the making logical.
The mere act of inditing tends, in a great
degree, to the logicalization of thought.
E. A. Poe, Marginalia, xvi.
Logicalize, to make logical.
Thought is logicalized by the effort at
(written) expression. — E. A. Poe, Marginalia,
xvi.
Logic-fisted, consistently grasping ?
or, simply, close-fisted (?). The origi-
nal of the whole extract is — " Hie fes-
tinat quidquid habet profundere ; Me
per fas nefasgue congerit."
One with an open-handed freedom spends
all be lays his fingers on; another with a
logick- filed grippingness catches at and
grasps all he can come within the reach of.
— Kennefs Erasmus, Praise of Folly, p. 87.
Logicioner, logician.
There is no good looicioner bnt would think,
I think, that a syllogism thus formed of such
a thieving major, a runaway minor, and a
traitorous consequent mnst needs prove, at
the weakest, to such a hanging argument. —
Patten, Exped. to Scotl., 1548 (Eng. Garner,
■•• 1nii\ * "
ill. 137).
Logocract, government by words.
In this country every man adopts some
particular slang-whanger as the standard of
nis judgment, and reads everything he writes,
if he reads nothing else ; which is doubtless
the reason why the people of this logocracy
are so marvellously enlightened. — Irving,
/Salmagundi, No. xiv.
Loiolite, a Jesuit. Cf. Loyolist.
The third vv-cpamrivr^v that contended
with the Jesuit for the palm of victory, and
to bring eye-salve to the dim-sighted lady,
was Dr. Laud, then Bishop of St. David's,
who galled Fisher with groat acuteness;
which the false Loiolite traduced, and made
slight in his reports. — Racket, life of Wil-
liams, i. 172.
Lolion. The editor (Parker Soc.
ed.) quotes from Eliot. Biblioth., " a
vicious grayne, called rine of darn ell,
whiche commonlye groweth amonge
wheate."
They had no pleasure to hear the Scribes
and the Pharisees ; they stank in their nose ;
their doctrine was unsavoury; it was of
lotions, of decimations of aniseed, and cum-
min, and such gear — Latimer, i. 200.
Loll, one who lolls about ; a loafer.
Then let a knaue be known to be a knaue,
A thiefe a villaine, and a churle a hogge ;
A minkes a menion, and a rogue a slaue,
A trull a tit, an vsurer a dogge,
A lobbe a loute, a heavy lou a logge ;
And euery birde go rowst in her owne
nest,
And then perhaps my Muse will be at
rest.
Breton, Pasquifs Madcappe, p. 10.
Lollard, a loller, used in extract
punningly.
It is not necessary to the attainment of
Christian knowledge that men should sit
all their life long at the foot of a pulpited
divine; while he, a lollard indeed over his
elbow cushion, in almost the seventh part of
forty or fifty years, teaches them scarce half
the principles of religion. — Milton, Means to
remove hirelings.
Loller, one who lolls. See extract
from Stanyhuret, s. v. Muffe maffe,
where it seems = lubber. R. has the
word, but only as = Lollard.
Griselda, who was . . one of the fashion-
able toilers by profession, established herself
upon a couch. — Miss Edgeworth, Griselda,
ch. xi.
Lollop, to lounge or idle about.
Here's fine discipline on board, when such
sculking sons of b— ches as you are allowed,
on pretence of sickness, to lollop at your
ease, while your betters are kept to hard
duty. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xxxiv.
If one's ever so cold, he lollops so that one
is quite starved. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia,
Bk. II. ch. iv.
She does so stoop and lollop, as the women
call it.—- Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 219.
A superb Adonis rose with an injured look,
and led Gerard into a room where sat or
lolloped eleven ladies, chattering like mag-
pies.— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. Hi.
Lombard. N. gives this as meaning
a banker, but it also signifies a bank.
See extract s. v. Encaptive.
The royal treasure he exhausts in pride
and riot ; the jewels of the Crown are in the
Lumbard. — Hist, of Edtr. II., p. 27.
A Lombard unto this day signifying a bank
for usury or pawns. — Fuller, Ch. Hint, III.
v. 10.
LOMBARDEER ( 384 )
LOOT
Lombardeeb, a banker.
By their profession they are for the most
part brokers and Lombaraeers. — Howell, Let*
ters, I. vi. 14.
Lombard- Street. Lombard- Street
to a China Orange = very long odds.
Here I shall inform the small critic what
it is M a thousand pounds to a penny/1 as the
nursery song says, or as the newspaper re-
porters of the King have it, Lombard-Street
to a China Orange* no small critic already
knows, whether he be diurnal, hebdomadal,
monthly, or trimestral, that a notion of
progressive life is mentioned in Bishop
Berkeley's Minute Philosopher. —Southey, The
Doctor, ch. ccx.
44 It is Lombard-Street to a China Orange"
quoth Uncle Jack. '* Are the odds in favour
of fame against failure really so great?
Tou do not speak, I fear, from experience,
brother Jack," answered my father. — Lytton,
Caxtons, Bk. IV. ch. iii.
London Pride, a common plant,
saxifraga umbrosa.
A pride there is of rank, a pride of birth,
A pride of learning and a pride of purse,
A London pride, in snort, there be on earth
A host of prides, some better and some
worse.— Hood, Ode to Roe Wilson.
Long, two breves in music. See L.
Here, because our life is short, we sing it
in breves and seroibreves ; hereafter we shall
sing it in longs for ever. — Adams, iii. 122.
Longanimity, foresight ; the word
usually = forbearance, long-suffering,
and in this sense is illustrated in the
Diets.
Mentally short-sighted as she affected to
be, none had more longanimity for their own
interest.— Miss Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. vii.
Long arm, a person who reaches
across a table, &cM for anything is said
to make a long arm.
It divided them, and it divided them not ;
for over that arme of the sea could be made
a long arm'. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
3fisc., vi. 167).
Long-bullets, a game played by
casting stones. H. says, "a North-
country game," but the scene of the
extract is Ireland.
"When you saw Tady at long-bullets^ play,
Tou sat and lous'd him all a sunshine day.
Swift, Dermot and Sheelah.
L0NGI8H, pretty long. See quotation
from Hood *. v. Blues.
The head was longish, which is always the
best sign of intellect. — Carlyle, Life of Ster-
ling, Pt. II. ch. ii.
Farmer Bobson left Haytersbank betimes
on a lonoish day's journey, to purchase a
horse. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. ix.
Longitudinarian, having to do with
longitude.
What was the centre of London for any
purpose whatever — latitudinarian or longitu-
dinarian— literary, social, or mercantile? —
De Quincty, Autob. Sketches, i. 188.
Long-minded, patient
[A judge must be] long-minded to endure
the rusticity and homeliness of common
people in giving evidence, after their plain
fashion and faculty. — Ward, Sermons, p. 120.
Longshore, water side, applied to
those whose haunts are along shore ;
used also as a substantive. It is gener-
ally employed disparagingly.
Our captain said, The 'longshore thieves
Are laughing at us in their sleeves.
Browning, Waring.
I want none of your rascally lurching long-
shore vermin, who get five pounds out of this
captain, and ten out of that, and let him
sail without them after all, while they are
stowed away under women's mufflers and
in tavern cellars. — Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. i.
Out of the way, you loafing longshores!
shouts the Lieutenant. — Ibid., Two Years
Ago, ch. iii.
Loose. See first extract.
We call this figure [homoio teleuton] fol-
lowing the original, the like-Zoos*, alluding to
th' Archer's terne, who is not said to finish
the feate of his shot before he give the loose,
and deliver his arrow from his bow, in which
respect we vse to say marke the loose of a
thing for marke the end of it. — Puttenham,
Arte of Eng. Poesie, ch. xvi.
Surely the poet gives a twang to the loose
of his arrow, making him [Robin Hood]
shoot one a cloth-yard long at full forty-
score mark, for compass never higher than
the breast, and within less than a foot of
the mark. — Fuller, Worthies, Notts.
Loose-kirtle, a woman of bad
character. See N. a. v. Loose-bodied
gown.
Here's a fellow calls himself the captain
of a ship, and her Majesty's servant, and
talks about failing, as if he were a Barbican
loose-kirtle trying to keep her apple-squire
ashore. — Kingsley, Westward IIo, ch. xxx.
Loot, to plunder: an East Indian
word.
I cannot quite satisfy my mind whether
it was originally intended for the reception
of coals, or bodies, or as a place of temporary
security for the plunder " looted n by laun-
dresses.— Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller,
xiv.
LOPE
(3*5 )
LOVE
Lope, to leap : this use is noted both
by N. and EL, but they give no ex-
ample, save of its use as the old per-
fect of leap: it is also a substantive.
Lope-off, to g° away in a secret sly
manner, is still in use in Sussex (Parish's
Glossary).
This whinyard has gard many better men
to lope than thou. — Greene, James IV.
Induction.
His malice lopes at a venture, and his
ignorance is no check to \t.—Northy Examen,
p. 73.
I cannot do the author justice .... with-
out taking a large lope over the next reign.
— Ibid., p. 618.
It is more than probable that in process
of time he had advanced himself by the
pure strength of his genius, but not by such
large strides as he made in getting money
and loping into preferments as he did, with-
out the aid of friends and good fortune. —
I bid., Life of Lord Guilford, i. 00.
Lord. Drunk as a lord = very
drunk: for similar comparisons see
*. v. Drunk.
If I, said he, remember right,
I was most lordly drunk last night.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour i. c. 7.
I took care to make him mix his liquors
well, and before 11 o'clock I finished him,
and had him as drunk as a lord, sir. —
Thackeray, Misc., ii. 237.
Lord. "In Suffolk husbandry the
man who (whether by merit or by
sufferance I know not) goes foremost
through the harvest with the scythe
or the sickle, is honoured with the title
of Lord, and at the Horkey or Har-
vest-home feast collects what he can
for himself and brethren from the
f irmere and visitors to make a frolic
afterwards, called " the largess spend-
ing" (Preface by Bloomfield to the
Ballad in which the extract occurs).
*~~Jfy Lord begg'd round, and held his hat.
Says Farmer Gruff, says he,
There's many a lord, Sam, I know that,
Has begg'd as well as thee.
Bloomfield, The Horkey.
Lord have mercy upon me. See
extract
The Uliake passion, or a peine and wring-
ing in the small gats, which the homelier
sort of phisicians doe call Lorde have mercy
upon me. — JVomenclator, 1585, p. 433.
Lordkin, little lord.
Princekin or lordkin from his earliest days
has nurses, dependents, governesses, little
friends, schoolfellows . . . flattering him and
doing him honour. — Thackeray, The New-
comes, ch. liii.
Lords and ladies, the wild Arum.
There were great "lords and ladies"
(arums) there, growing in the bank, twice
as big as ours, and not red, but white and
primrose— most beautiful.— C. Kingsley, 1864
(Zt/«, ii. 171).
Even in the Lords and Ladies clumped in
the scoop of the hedgerow . . . there was
aching ecstasy, delicious pang of Lorna. —
Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. xvii.
Loric, breast-plate (Latin, lorica).
Each with his bay-leaf fillet, loose-thonged
vest,
Loric, and low-browed Gorgon on the breast.
Browning, Profits.
Lose, loss.
Alms and good deeds are sacrifices pleasing
to God ; but without zeal the widow's mites
are no better than the rest ; it is the cheer-
ful lose that doubleth the gift.— Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 78.
Loud, showy = more so than good
taste would allow.
This Edward had picked up ... a
thoroughly Irish form or character ; fire and
fervour, vitality of all kinds in genial abund-
ance ; but in a much more loquacious, osten-
tatious, much louder style than is freely
patronised on this side of the Channel. —
Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. ii.
Lounderer, an idler, a vagabond.
Lousengers and lounderers are wrongfully
made and named hermits, and have leave to
defraud poor and needy creatures of their
livelihood, and to live by their false winning
and begging in sloth and in other divers
▼ices. — Testament of Wm. Thorpe (Bale, Select
Works, p. 130).
Lounge, a place where people pass
away idle time.
She went with Lady Stock to a bookseller's,
whose shop served as a fashionable lounge.
— Miss Edgeworth, Almeria, p. 278.
Louvre, a dance. The scene to
which' tlie extract refers is laid at the
Court of William and Mary.
As soon as the minuet was closed, the
princess said softly to Harry in French,
" The Louvre, sir, if you please." This was
a dance of the newest fashion, and was cal-
culated to show forth and exhibit a graceful
person in all the possible elegances of move-
ment and attitude. — H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, ii. 99.
Love. To play for love= to play
for nothing. In reckoning a score,
that of the player who has counted
nothing is said to be love. This is the
CO
LOVE
( 3»6)
LOW-DAY
meaning of the word in the first quota-
tion.
Ton reckon your chickens before they are
hatched; I have seen those lose the game
that have had so many for love (Vidx qui
vincerent ab hoc numero, qui nihil haotbant).—
Bailey7 8 Erasmus, p. 46.
When I am in sickness, or not in the best
spirits, I sometimes call for the cards, and
play a game at piquet for love with my
cousin Bridget. — Essays of Elia {Mrs. Battle
on Whist).
Love, a game in which one holds up
one or more fingers, and another, with-
out looking, guesses at the number. In
some editions of Erasmus the word in
the original is micatione.
If any unlearned person or stranger should
come in, he would certainly think we were
bringing up again among ourselves the
eountrjnneu's play of holding up our fin-
gers (dimicatione digitorum, i. e. the play of
love). — Bailey's Erasm., Colloq., p. 159.
Love. No love last, between people,
usually means that they dislike each
other ; in the first extract, however, it
signifies that their affection had never
been interrupted ; in the second, from
the same work, it bears the more com-
mon sense.
I kissed her : " And is it for me, my sweet
cousin, that you shed tears? there never was
love lost between us : but tell me, what is de-
signed to be done with me that I have this
kind instance of your compassion for me." —
Richardson, CI. Marlowe, ii. 217.
He must needs say there was no love lost
between some of my family and him. — Ibid.,
in. 150.
Loveablb, amiable ; winning affec-
tion. The extract shows that the word
was not familiar, as it is now, in 1814.
L. gives only extract from Tennyson's
Elaine^ but R. has a quotation from
Wiclif.
" There is something so soothing, so gentle,
so indulgent about Mrs. Percy, so foveaMe."
" She is . . . very loveable — that is the exact
word." u I fear it is not English ," said Miss
Hauton. " // merite bien Petre" said God-
frey.— Miss Edgeworth, Patronage, ch. v.
Loveach, a herb of the genus Ligus-
ticum.
As for loveach or liuish, it is by nature
wild and sauage.— Holland, Pliny, xix. 8.
Love-bird, a small bird of the parrot
species.
Mr. Guppy going to the window tumbles
into a pair of lovebirds, to whom he says in
his confusion, '* I beg yonr pardon, I am
sure."— Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xxix.
Unless they are two behind a carriage-
perch they pine away, I suppose, ... as one
love-bird does without his mate. — Thackeray,
Lovel the Widower, ch. iv.
Love-child, bastard. See quotation
from Miss Austen 0. v. all to one.
Nothing won't do us no good, unless we
all repent of our wicked ways, our drinking,
and our dirt, and our love-children, and our
picking and stealing. — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. xxviii.
What a source of mischief in all our coun-
try parishes is the one practice of calling a
child born out of wedlock, a ' love-child ' in-
stead of a bastard. It would be hard to
estimate how much it has lowered the tone
and standard of morality among us ; or for
how many young women it may have helped
to make the downward way more sloping
still. — Abp. Trench, Study of Words, ch. li.
Lovke, the person loved.
Violent love on one side is enough in con-
science, if the other party be not a fool or
ungrateful : the lover and lovee make gener-
ally the happiest couple. — Richardson^ Gran-
dison, vi. 47.
LOVKFDLL, full Of love.
Th' euerlasting Voice
Which now again reblest the lovefull choice
Of sacred wedlock's secret binding band.
Sylvester, The Colonies, 505.
Lovelings, little loves.
These frollike louelings freighted nests do
make
The balmy trees oV-laden boughs to crack.
Sylvester, The Magnificent*, 092.
Love -lornn ess, state of desolation,
through desertion of a lover.
It was the story of that fair Gostanza who
in her love-lornness desired to live no longer.
— G. Eliot, Romola, ch. hri.
Loverless, without a lover.
Loverless and inexpectant of love, I was as
safe from spies in my heart-poverty, as the
beggar from thieves in his destitution of
purse. — Miss Bronte, ViUette, ch. ziii.
Love- worth, that which is worthy
of love.
Homer for himself should be belov'd,
Who ev*ry sort of love-worth did contain.
Chapman, Iliad, To the Reader, 73.
Low-boy, a name for a Whig and
low churchman.
No fire and faggot ! no wooden shoes ! no
trade-sellers ! a low-boy, a low-boy ! — Cent-
livre, Gotham Election.
Low-day, an ordinary day, as dis-
tinguished from a feast-day or high-
day.
L0W1SH
( 387 ) LUCK-PENNY
Such days as wear the badge of holy red
Are for Devotion marked and sage Delights,
The vulgar Low-days undistinguished
Are left for Labour. Games, and sportful
Sights. ^
Campion, lyrics, &c., 1613,
Eng. Garner, iii. 286.
Lowish, rather low.
Money runs a little lowish, after what I
have laid out.— Richardson, Pamela, i. 82.
Loyalty. Mr. J. S. Mill (Logic, Pt.
IV. ch. v. 1, quoted in L.) remarks
that though this word once signified
fair open dealing and fidelity to engage-
ments, it is now restricted to fidelity to
the throne. Mr. Mill adds that he is
not sufficiently versed in the history of
courtly language to be able to say by
what process this change came about.
" I can only suppose that the word was
at some period the favourite term at
court to express fidelity to the oath of
allegiance, until at length those who
wished to speak of any other, and, as it
was deemed, inferior sort of fidelity,
either did not venture to use so digni-
fied a term, or found it convenient to
employ some other in order to avoid
being misunderstood." The extract
from North supports Mr. Mill's hypo-
thesis, and fixes the time of Charles II.
as the period ; though probably loyalty,
as understood in that reign or by Roger
North, meant much more than simple
fidelity to the oath of allegiance, and
implied thorough partisanship in behalf
of the measures of the Court.
So few gentlemen of the law were noted
for loyalty (I use the word of that time) that
it was made a wonder at Court that a young
lawyer should be so.— North, Examen, p. 513.
Loyolist, a follower of Ignatius
Loyola. Howell, in the book cited,
frequently uses the term. Cf . Loiolitb.
Of late years that super-politick and irre-
fragable society of the Loyolists have propt
up the ivy.— Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 00.
Lozs, praise.
And that thy loze ne name may neuer dye,
Nor thy state turne stayed by destinie.
Puttenham, Eny. Poesze, Bk. III. ch. xix.
Lozengk - coach, a dowager's car-
riage; a widow* s arms being on a
lozenge.
I am retired hither like an old summer-
dowager ; only that I have no toad-eater to
take the air with me in the back part of my
lozenge-coach, and to be scolded.— fValpole,
to Mann, ii. 172 (1746).
Lozknged, shaped like a lozenge.
There shot out the friendly gleam again
from the lozenged panes of a very small
latticed window. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch.
xxviii.
Lubberliness, loutishness ; clumsy
weight.
You, like a lazr hulk, whose stupendous
magnitude is full big enough to load an ele-
phant with lubberliness. — T. Brown, Works,
u. 179.
Lubber's-hole, the vacant space be-
tween the head of a lower mast, and
the edge of the top ; it offers an easier
way of getting into the top than by the
f uttock shrouds.
And yet, Sir Joseph, Fame reports you stole
To Fortune's top-mast through the lubber*
hoU.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 232.
I was afraid to venture, and then he pro-
posed that I should go through lubber's hole,
which he said had been made for people
like me. I agreed to attempt it, as it appeared
more easy, and at last arrived . . . in the
main-top. — Marry att, P. Simple, ch. vii.
Lucency, brightness ; lustre.
These are the Septemberers (Septem-
briseurs) ; a name of some note and lucency,
but lucency of the Nether-fire sort.— Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. I. ch. vi.
Luciferous, devilish. The Diets,
have the word in the sense of light-
bringing.
I must teach ye ones again to frame your
sentences, els wold ye couple your sorcerous
masmongers with God's maiestye in one
honour, which we wil not take at your luci*
ferns perswasyons. — Bale's Decl. of Bonner's
Articles, 1554 (Art. i.).
Lucklest, most unlucky.
Nay faith, mine is the luckiest lot,
That ever fell to honest woman yet.
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 202.
Luckly, prosperous.
Our first encounter by fortun lucklye was
ayded. — Stanyhurst, JEn., II. 304.
The peaceable days of the wicked, and their
luckly proceedings in this world, by the tes-
timony of Job, enrageth their impudence
against Heaven. — Adams, i. 908.
Luck-penny, a small sum returned
by the vendor for luck on the comple-
tion of a bargain. H. gives it as a
North-country word ; it seems to be
current in Ireland also. Cf. Luck-
STROKEN.
Didn't I give fifteen guineas for him, bar-
ring the luck-penny ? — Miss Edgeworth,
Ennui, ch. vi.
CC 2
LUCKS
( 388)
LUNGE
Lucks, locks of wool twisted on the
finger of a spinner at the distaff. Ken-
net defines tucks as " Looks and flocks
of coarse and refuse wool ; " also called
dag-wool.
She straight slipp'd off the wall and hand,
And laid aride her lucks and twitches,
And to the hutch she reach'd her hand,
And gave him out his Sunday breeches.
BloomJUld, Richard and Kate.
Luck-strokrn, having received the
luck-penny, q. v.
Go, take possession of the church-porch door,
And ring thy bells, luckstroken in thy fist ;
The parsonage is thine or ere thou wist.
Hall, Satires, II. v. 17.
Lucky. To make or cut one's lucky
» (in slang language) to run away.
That was all out of consideration for
Fagin, 'cause the traps know that we work
together, and he might have got into trouble
if we hadn't made our lucky,— Oliver Twist,
%_ Ml
ch. xvui.
Lucky, handy ; unlucky in the oppo-
site sense is not uncommon.
Bellm. Perhaps I may have occasion to
use you, you used to be a lucky rogue upon
a pinch.
Mast. Ay, master, and I have not forgot
it yet.
Centlivre, Love's Contrivance, Act I.
Lucrative, greedy of gain.
He requires no such diligence as the most
part of our lucrative lawyers do use, in defer-
ring and prolonging of matters and actions
from term to term. — Latimer, i. 110.
* Lucubrate, to study by candle-light;
hence generally, to discuss.
I like to speak and lucubrate my fill.
Byron, Beppo, st. 47.
Ludditb8, machine- breakers ; so
called from Ned Lud, an idiot whojbad
a propensity for breaking frames. They
first rose towards the end of 1811, and
had a skirmish with the military in
1812. The Rejected Addresses pub-
lished in the following October refer
to them more than once.
Who makes the quartern loaf and Luddites
rise?
J. and H. Smith, Rejected
Addresses, p. 5.
A sanguinary plot has been formed by
some united Irishmen combined with a gang
of Luddites.— Ibid^p. 150.
Ludlam's dog. Cotton in a marginal
note to the first extract says, " Tis a
proverb that Ludlam's Dog lean'd his
head against a wall when he went to
bark." ' A correspondent of N. and Q-,
L i. 382, observes that the phrase is
very familiar in South Yorkshire,
especially in Sheffield ; another version
is that the dog laid himself down to
bark.
Squire tineas, huge Tarpawlin,
Like Ludlam's Curr on truckle lolling.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 1.
Who was Ludlam whose dog was so lazy
that he leant his head against a wall to bark ?
— Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxv.
LUK, to sift.
I had new models made of the sieves for
lueina, the box and trough, the buddle,
wrecK, and tool. — Miss Edgeworth, Lame
JervaSfCh.vL.
Lug-loaf, heavy ; loutish.
She had little reason to take a cullian, lug-
loaf y milksop slave, when she may have a
lawyer, a gentleman that stands upon his
reputation in the country. — WUy Beguiled
(Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 334;.
Lukbt, window ; look-out (?).
Hope and feare . . made her . . to un-
loope her luket or casement, to look© whence
the blasts came. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Hart
Misc., vi. 108).
Lummy, first-rate (slang). ' Robinson
( Whitby Glossary, E. D. S.) gives it
as a word used in that neighbourhood.
" A lummy lick « a delicious morsel."
To think of Jack Dawkins — lummy Jack —
the Dodger — the artful Dodger — going
abroad for a common twopenny-halfpenny
aneeae-box. — Dickens, Oliver Tvnst, eh. xliii.
Lumpers, militia-men.
He hath a cursed spite to us because we
shot his father. He was going to bring the
lumpers upon us, only he was afeared, last
winter. — Blackmore, Loma Doone, ch.
xxxviii.
Lunary, white as the moonlight (?).
Cause then your parlour to be kept carefully,
Wash'd, rubVd, perf um'd, hang'd round from
top to bottom
With pure white lunary tap'stry, or needle-
work;
But if 'twere cloth of silver, 'twere much
better. — Albumasar, ii. 3.
Lunge, to run a horse round in a
ring.
He came one day as the coachman was
lunging Georgy round the lawn on the gray
pony. — Thackeray, Vanity Fair, oh. xlvL
The centre of this quad, in place of the
trim grass-plat, is occupied by a tan lunging
ring. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. iii.
LUNG LESS
(389)
LYRIC
Lungless, without lungs.
A body heartlesse, lunglesse, tongnelesse
too.— Sylvester, Trophies, 760.
Lurch, a game at tables. See L.,
who, however, gives no example.
By two of my table-men in the corner-
point I have gained the lurch. — Vrquhorfs
Rabelais, Bk. II. oh. xii.
My mind was only running upon the lurch
and tric-trac— Ibid., Bk. III. ch. xii.
Lady ha* cried ber eyes out on lotting
a lurch, and almost her wig. — WalpoU,
Letters, iv. 371 (1784).
Lurch, a swindle.
The tapster having many of these lurches
fell to decay.— Pse^* Jests, p. 619.
Lurch. To lie at lurch = to lay wait
Another Epicurean companie, lying at
lurch, as so many vultures, watching for a
prey of Church goods, and ready to rise by
the downfall of any. — Burton, Democ. to
Reader, p. 29.
Luripup8, tricks ; antics (?).
I see you have little to doe that have so
much leisure to play your luripups. — Breton,
Packet of Letters, p. 34.
Lurk back, to snatch back.
Mine are those herbs, mine those charms,
that not only lurk back (revocat) swift time
when past and gone, but, what is more to
be admired, clip its wing, and prevent all
farther flight. — Rennet's Erasmus's Praise of
Folly, p. 18.
Lush, intoxicating drink ; said to be
derived from Lushington, a brewer;
also, as a verb, to drink.
Two half - quartern brans, pound of best
fresh, piece of double Glo'ster, and, to wind
up all, some of the richest sort you ever
lushed.— Oliver Twist, ch. zxziz.
" He gave us a thundering supper ; lots of
lush." « What is lush ? " " Tea, and coffee,
and barley-water, my dear." — Bead*, Never
too late to mend, ch. 1.
Lushey, tipsy.
It was half-past four when I got to Somers-
Town, and then I was so uncommon lushey
that I couldn't find the place where the
latch-key went in. — Pickwick Papers, oh. zx.
Luskard, a kind of grape.
It is a celestial food to eat for breakfast
hot fresh cakes with grapes, especially the
frail clusters, the great red grapes, the mus-
cadine, the verjuice grape, and the luskard.
—Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. L oh.
Lute, to sound sweetly like a lute.
And in the air, her new voice luting soft,
Cried, " Lycius ! gentle Lycius ! "
Keats, Lamia.
Knaves are men
That lute and flute fantastic tenderness,
And dress the victim to the offering up.
Tennyson, Princess, iv.
Lutrin, a lectern.
Sacristies, lutrins, altar-rails, are pulled
down; the mass-books torn into cartridge
papers. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk V .
ch. iv.
Lutulent, muddy.
These then are the waters, . . . the lutulent,
spumy, macnlatory waters of sin. — Adams, i.
166.
Luxate, out of joint. R. and L.
have the word, but only with quotation
from Wiseman's Surgery.
Spotted we were, and nothing but naked*
nesfl was left to cover us ; sick, but without
care of our cure ; deformed and luxate with
the prosecution of vanities. — Adams, i. 399.
Lyddern, an idle fellow ; one who is
lither.
It is better (they say in Northfolke) that
younge Lyddemes wepe than olde men. —
Vocacwon of John Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc.,
Lying to, adjacent to.
Neither bee there wanting woods heere
. . . and parkes ; for many there are lying to
Noblemen's and gentlemen's houses re-
plenished with game. — Holland's Camden, p.
459.
Lynce, a lynx (Bp. Hall, quoted by
R., has llyncean').
This prudent counsellor unto his prince,
Whose wit was busied with his mistress' heal,
Secret conspiracies could well convince ;
Whose insight pierced the sharp-eyed lynce;
He is dead.
Greene, Maiden's Dream {Prudence).
Lynch, to punish without legal pro-
cess ; to take the infliction of punish-
ment into private hands. Some attri-
bute the ongin of the term to a farmer
of this name in Virginia or Carolina,
who acted thus ; some to a commander
called Lynch, who in 1687-8 was sent
to suppress piracy on American coasts
(the term is said to have come into use
at end of 17th century), while others
refer it to a word lingeor lynch=tobeat,
still current in some parts of England.
The prison was burst open by the mob,
and George was lynched, as he deserved.—
Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. ix.
Lyric, to sing in a lyrical way.
Parson Punch makes a very good shift still,
and lyrics over his part in an anthem very
handsomely. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 249.
L YR1SM
( 390 ) MACHICOLATED
Lyrism, musical performance.
The lyrism, which had at first only mani-
fested itself by David's sotto voce perform-
ance of " My love's a rose without a thorn,"
had gradually assumed a rather deafening
and complex character. — G. Eliot, Adam
Bede, ch. liii.
Lythb, a species of cod.
There is no need for good fishing when
you catch lythe ... It is only a big white
fly you will need, and a long line, and when
the fish takes the fly, down he goes, a great
depth. Then when you have got him, and
be is killed, you must cut the sides as you
see that is done, and string him to a rope
and trail him behind the boat all the way
home. If you do not that, it is no use at all
to eat. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. ii.
M
M. To have no M. under your
girdle = to be wanting in proper re-
spect, i. e. not to use the title, Mr. or
Madam.
Mery. Hoighdagh, if faire mistreaae dis-
tance sawe you now,
Ralph Royster Doister were hir owne I
warrant you.
Royster. Near* an M by your girdle ?
Mery. Your goode mastershype
Maistersbyp were her owne niistreshyp's
mistreshyp.
Udal, Roister Doister, iii. 3.
Miss. The devil take you, Neverout, besides
all small curses.
Lady Ans. Marry come up, what, plain
Neverout ? methinka you might have an M
under your girdle, Miss. — Swift, Polite Con-
versation (Conv. i.).
Macaroni, a dandy. The Spectator
(No. 47) uses the word of a jack-pud-
ding. The earliest use of it in its
other sense that I have met with is in
an epilogue by Goldsmith ; the second
quotation assigns the origin of the
word —
To this strange spot rakes, maccaromes, cits,
Come thronging to collect their scatter'd
wits.
Goldsmith, Epilogue to an uncertain play.
The Italians are extremely fond of a dish
they call Macaroni, composed of a kind of
paste ; and as they consider this as the sum-
mum bonum of all good eating, so they figura-
tively call every thing they think elegant
and uncommon Macaroni. Our young travel-
lers, who generally catch the follies of the
countries they visit, judged that the title of
Macaroni was very applicable to a clever fel-
low; and accordingly, to distinguish them-
selves as such, they instituted a Olub under
this denomination, the members of which
were supposed to be the standards of taste.
The infection at St. James's was soon caught
in the city, and we have now Macaronies of
every denomination, from the Oolonel of the
Train'd-Bands down to the Printer's Devil,
or errand-boy. They indeed make a most
ridiculous figure, with hats of an inch in the
brim, that do not cover, but lie upon the
head ; with about two pouuds of fictitious
hair, formed into what is called a dub, hang-
ing down their shoulders, as white as a
baker's sack : the end of the skirt of their
coat reaches not down to the first button of
their breeches, which are either brown striped,
or white, as wide as a Dutchman's ; their
coat-sleeves are so tight they can with much
difficulty get their arms through the cuffs,
which are about an inch deep, aud their shirt-
sleeve, without plaits, is pulled over a bit of
Trolly Lace. Their legs are at times covered
with all the colours of the rainbow; even
flesh-coloured and green silk stockings are
not excluded. Their shoes are scarce slip-
pers, and their buckles within an inch of
the toe. Such a figure, essenced and per-
fumed, with a bunch of lace sticking out
under its chin, puzzles the common passen-
ger to determine the thing's sex ; and many
have said, by your leave, madam, without
intending to give offence. — Pocketbook, 1773.
Macaroon, a sort of sweet cake or
biscuit. The word in this sense is
given in L. with a quotation from Miss
Acton's Cookery Book, 1850; the ex-
tract is nearly 240 years older.
If you chance meet with boxes of white
comfits,
Marchpane, and dry Bucket, macaroons, and
diet-bread,
Twill help on well. — Albumazar, ii. 3.
Maoco, a gambling game.
The servant brought back word that the
play-party bad not yet broken up ; his uncle
was still at the macco-tstole. — Th. Hook, Man
of many friends.
When the supper was done, and the
gentlemen as usual were about to seek the
*»o<ra-table upstairs, Harry said he was not
going to play any more.— Thackeray, The Vir-
ginians, oh. lui.
Machicolated. furnished with machi-
colations, or holes made through the
roof of portals to the floor above, so
that molten pitch, &c, might be
MACHINE
( 39* )
MADPASH
poured down on the heads of assail-
ants.
The oak-door is heavy and brown,
And with iron it's plated, and machieolated
To pour boiling oil and lead down.
Ingoldsby Legends (Bloudie Jacks).
The lofty walls of the old balliam still
stood, with their machieolated turrets, loop-
holes, and dark downward crannies for drop-
ping stones and fire on the besiegers. — C.
Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. vii.
The wide-wing'd sunset of the misty marsh
Glared on a huge machieolated tower,
That stood with open doors.
Tennyson, The Last Tournament,
Machine, a carriage or coach : the
only vehicle now so called is a bathing
machine.
"Here, you my attendants," cried she,
stamping with her foot, " let mv machine be
driven up ; Barbacela, Queen of Emmets, is
not used to contemptuous treatment." She
had no sooner spoken than her fiery chariot
appeared in the air. — Goldsmith, Citizen of
the World, Letter xlviii.
E'en though I'd the honour of sitting
between
My lady Stuff-Damask and Peggy Moreen,
Who both flew to Bath in the nightly
machine.
Anstey, New Bath Guide, Letter jriii.
A pair of bootikins will set out to-morrow
morning in the machine that goes from the
Queen's Head in the Gray's Inn Lane. To
be certain, you had better send for them
where the machine inns. — Walpole, Letters,
iv. 12 (1775).
" Coachman, if you don't go this moment,
I shall get out," said Mr. Minns . . . "Going
this minute, sir," was the reply : and accord-
ingly the machine trundled od for a couple of
hundred yards. — Sketches bg Box (Mr. Minns).
Machinize, to fashion or form.
The traveller . . reads quietly The Times
newspaper, which, by its immense corre-
spondence and reporting, seems to have
machinized the rest of the world for his
occasion. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. iii.
Macks, some species of bird.
One Cortina . . when he supped on a time
with Augustus toke vp a leane birde of the
kinde of blacke mackes out of the disbe, and,
holding it in his hand, he demaunded of Omar
whether he might send it awaie. — VdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth^ p. 274.
Mackninny, puppet show (?).
He was good at draught and design, and
could make hieroglyphics of Popery and
arbitrary power ; and represent emblematic-
ally the downfall of majesty as in his raree-
show and mackninny, as I touched before. —
Xorth, Examen, p. 590.
Macuxatory, defiling.
These then are the waters . . . the luta-
lent, spumy, maculatory waters of sin. —
Adams, i. 166.
Madam, to address as madam. See
extract from Southey, 9. v. Sir.
I am reminded of my vowed obedience;
Madam1 d up perhaps to matrimonial per-
iection.— Richardson, CI. Harlowe, viii. 803.
Madbrain, a madcap. Shakespeare
has it as an adjective (Taming of the
Shrew, iii. 2) : so also has Davies
(Paper* 9 Complaint, 1. 14).
Here's a madbrain o' th' first rate, whose
pranks scorn to have presidents. — Middleton,
A mad world my Masters, Act I.
Brent, a wilae madhraine, wns at length
banished out of the reahne. — Holland's Cam-
den, p.a812.
Madder, a wooden vessel, mazer (?).
Usquebaugh to our feast
In pails was brought up,
An hundred at least,
And a madder our cup.
Swift, Irish Feast.
Madefy, moisten.
The time was when the Bonners and
butchers rode over the faces of God's saints,
and madefied the earth with their bloods. —
Adams, i. 85.
Madhead, mad fellow.
Some madhead in the world might have as
much leysure to read as I had [to] write. —
Breton, Merry Wonders (To the Reader).
Madhbaded, giddy ; crazy.
Hee that will put himselfe in needelesse
daanger
To f ollowe a mad-headed companie.
Breton, PasquiTs Fooies-cappe, p. 28.
For a few mad-headed wenches, they seek
to bring all, yea, most modest matrons, and
almost all women in contempt. — Ibid., Praise
of Vertwjus Ladies, p. 56.
Madling, mad or goin£ mad ; also a
mad person: still used in neighbour-
hood of Whitby. See Robinsoirs Glos-
sary (B. D. S.).
80m takes a staf for hast, and leaues his
launce,
Some madling runnes, som trembles in a
traunce. — Hudson, Judith, vi. 240.
Gooid-for-naught madling! . . . flinging
t' precious sifts o' God under fooit. — E.
Bronte, Wutkering Heights, ch. ziii.
Madpash, wild ; cracked.
Let us leave this madpash bedlam, this
hair-brained fop.— Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk.
III. ch. zzv.
MADRIGALLER ( 392 ) MAGNIFICAT
Madrigalleb, a composer of madri-
gals. L. has madrigalut.
Sonneteers, songsters, satyrists, panegy-
rists, madriyallers, and such like impedi-
ments of Parnassus. — Tom Brown, Works,
ii.155.
Mafflkd. See extract : maffie = to
stammer is in the Diets.
She was what they call in the country
maffled, that is, confused in her intellect. —
Southey, Letters, 1820 (iii. 186).
Mao, an abbreviation of magazine.
And now of Hawkesbury they talked,
Who wrote in mays for hire.
WoUot, P. Pindar, p. 309.
Mag, a halfpenny (slang).
If he don't keep such a business as the
present as close as possible, it can't be worth
a may to him. — Dickens, Bleak House, ch. liv.
As long as he had a *' may " to bless him-
self with, he would always be a lazy, useless
humbug. — JET. Kinysley, Ravenshae, ch. ix.
Mag, talk, chattering (?): the expres-
sion in the extract is Mrs. Thrale's.
"I can figure like anything when I am
with those who can't figure at all."
Mrs. T. " Oh, if you have any may in you,
well draw it out."— Mad. D'ArUay, Diary, i.
100.
Magab, a great ship.
Filling our seas with stately argosies,
Calvars and mayors, hulks of burden great.
Greene, Orl. Fur^ I. i.
Magazine, to store.
He entered among the Papists only to get
information of persons and particulars, with
such secrets as he could spy out, that being
mayaxined up in a diary might serve for
materials. — North, Examen, p. 222.
Maggot, seems to be used in the
extract as we might use butterfly, a
careless, idle fellow. The original is
nihil fuerit te nugacius. Akerman's
Wilts. Glossary (1842) gives magotty—
frisky, playful. A man suffering from
rheumatism told me that in the fine
weather he went about " as peart as a
maggot."
Po. I admire you had so much prudence,
when you were as great a maggot as any in
the world when you were at Paris.
Gl. Then my age did permit a little wild-
new. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 177.
Maggs diversions. One of the titles
thought of by Dickens for the book
which eventually was called David
GopperHeld was "Mag's Diversions,
being the personal history of Mr.
Thorn ns Mag the younger of Blunder-
stone House." It is to this he refers in
the second quotation.
Who was Mayy, and what was his diver-
sion ? was it brutal, or merely boorish ? the
boisterous exuberance of rude and unruly
mirth, or the gratification of a tyrannical
temper and a cruel disposition ? — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. czxv.
I suppose I should have to add though by
way of motto, And in short it led to the very
Mao's Diversions. Old saying. Or would it
be better, there being equal authority fur
either, And in short they all played Mag**
Diversions. Old Saying? — Forster, Life of
Dickens, Vol. II. ch.
Magian, magician. L. has the word
as an adjective = pertaining to the
magi.
Leave her to me, rejoined the magian.
Keats, Cap and Belts, st. 60.
Magisteriality, domination. R. and
L. have the word in its technical
chemical sense.
When these statutes were first in the state
or magisteriality thereof, they were severely
put in practice.— .FWfer, Ch. Hist., Bk. IX.
fv. 11.
Magistratical, pertaining to magis-
trates.
They are allowed the highest marks of
magistratical honour; scarlet gowns, the
Sword, and Gap of Maintenance, and four
Sergeants at Mace. — Defoe, Tour thro* G,
Britain, ii. 824.
Magnanimate, to cheer ; make great-
hearted.
Present danger magnanimates them, and
inflames their courage, but expectation makes
it languish. — Hoveu, Dodonafs Grove, p. 4.
Magnificat. The proverb is ex-
plained in the extract.
A swine to teache Minerua was a proverbe
against soche . . . that wil take vpon theim
to be doctours in those thinges in whiche
theimselfes haue no skill at all, for whiche
we saie in Englishe, to correct Magnificat be-
fore he haue learned Te Deum. — Udavs Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 380.
Magnificat at Mattins, something
out of place : in the second quotation
it is the same expression in the original.
The note is here all out of place . . . and
so their note oomes in like Magnificat at
mattins. — Andrewes, Sermons, v. 49.
He shoed the geese, tickled himself to
make himself laugh, and was cook-ruffin in
the kitchen ; made a mock at the gods, would
cause sing Magnificat at matins, and found it
MAGNILOQUENT ( 393 )
MAIN
▼err convenient so to do. — UrquharVs
Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xi.
Magniloquent, high and mighty in
speech. R. and L. have magniloquence,
each with the same quotation from
Bentley.
She was a trifle more magniloquent than
usual, and entertained tu with stories of
colonial governors and their ladies. — Thacke-
ray, Newcomes, ch. xxiii.
Magnisonant, great-sounding.
He was an anonymous cat ; and I having
just related at breakfast with universal ap-
plause, the story of Bumpelstilzchen from a
German tale in Grimm's collection, gave him
that strange and magnisonant appellation. —
Southey, The Doctor (Cats of Greta Hall).
Magpie, sixpence (slang).
I'm at low-water-mark myself— only one
bob and a magpie; but as far as it goes 111
fork oat and stump. Up with you on your
pins. There ; now then, Morrice. — Dickens,
Oliver Twist, ch. viii.
Magpie, a name frequently applied
to bishops from the mingled black and
white of their robes ; it is now those
garments, not the wearers, which usu-
ally bear the name. Other references
will be found in N. and Q-, IV. xi. 220.
Lawyers, as vultures, had soar'd up and
down,
Prelates, like magpies, in the air had flown,
Had not the eagle's letter brought to light
That subterranean horrid work of night.
Howell, Verses prefixed to Familiar Letters.
Boot out of them all Anti-Christian
tyranny of most abominable Bishops; let
not those Silkworms .and Magpies have
dominion over us. — T. Brown, Works, i. 107.
Mahogany. See extract: the date
of the conversation is 1781. In
Haydn's Did. of Dates (ed. Vincent)
it is stated of the wood, u Mahogany is
said to have been brought to England
by Raleigh in 1595, and to have come
into general use about 1720." Southey
refers to this liquor {The Doctor, Inter-
chapter xvi.) but his notice of it is
evidently taken from Boswell.
Mr. Eliot mentioned a curious liquor pecu-
liar to his country, which the Cornish fisher-
men drink. They call it mahogany ; and it
is made of two parts gin and one part treacle,
well beaten together. I begged to have
some of it made, which was done with proper
skill by Mr. Eliot. I thought it very good
liquor; and said it was a counterpart of
what is called Athol porridge in the High-
lands of Scotland, which is a mixture of
whiskey and honey. Johnson said, u that
must be a better liquor than the Oornish, for
both its component parts are better." He
also observed, M Mahogany must be a modern
name ; for it is not long since the wood called
mahogany was known in this country." —
Boswell, Life of Johnson, viii. 53 (ed. 1835).
Mahometical, Mahometan.
Your understanding is drown'd in sensu-
ality, . . and you are stark mad with your
Mahometical happiness. — Gentleman In-
structed, p. 282.
What snail I say ... of those obscenities
that make up here the Mahometical Elysium
of libertines, and in good time will throw
them into the real hell of Christians ? — Ibid.,
p. 561.
Mahohetist, Mahometan; Turk.
The extract is from a translation of the
work quoted, made by W. T., 1604.
He [Charles the Great] became so great,
that the King of the Mahometists sought his
friendship. — Pedro Mexia, Hist, of all the
Roman Emperors, p. 525.
Mahohitb, Mahometan.
0 christian cor'siue I that the Mahomite
With hundred thousands in Vienna plaine,
His mooned standards hath already pight ;
Prest to join Austrich to his Thracian
raigne.
Sylvester, Miracle of Peace, Sonnet 38.
Maiden' s- blush, a name for the gar-
den rose.
1 came, 'tis true, and lookt for fowle of price,
The bastard phenix, bird of paradice ;
And for no less than aromatick wine
Of maydens-blush, commixt with jessimine.
Herrickj Hesperides, p. 281.
Maidlt, effeminate.
O cowards all, and maydly men,
Of courage faynt and weake.
Googe, Epitaphe on M. Shelley.
Maid of all work, a servant who
does all the work of the house. One
of the characters in Miss Austen's Sense
and Sensibility, ch. xxxviii., speaks of
44 A stout girl of all works."
Maiheme, the offence of maiming
another.
Who is he (though he be greued never so
sore) for the murdre of his ancestre, rauisshe-
ment of his wyfe, of his doughter, robbery,
trespas, maiheme, dette, or eny other offence
dare ley it theyre charge by any wey of
notion.— Simon Fish, Supplication of the Beg-
gars, p. 8.
Main, to furl.
When it is a tempest almost intolerable
for other ships, and maketh them main all
their sails, these hoist up theirs, and sail
excellently well. — T. Stevens, 1579 (Eng.
Garner, i. 132).
MA1NPRISER
( 394 ) MALEFACTOR
Mainpriskr, surety.
The same yeere [1317] the Potentates of
Ireland assembled themselves to the Parlia-
ment at Dublin : and there was the Barle of
Ulster enlarged, who tooke his oath, and
found mainprise™ or sureties to answer the
writs of law and to pursue the Kings enemies.
—Holland's Camden, ii. 176.
. Major, of age.
The young King (Louis XIV.) who had
lately been declared major >, had gone through
the solemnity of his coronation. — Godwin,
MandevUle, ii. 226.
Major, to strut.
Can it be for the puir body M'Durk's
health to major about in the tartans like a
tobacconist's sign in a frosty morning? —
Scott, St. Ronan's WeU, ii. 11.
Majorats, to augment. Bacon has
majoration.
Then the conformative and proper opera-
tions of the rationall soul begin upon the
embryo, who proceeds to majoration and
augmentation accordingly ; and it is no lease
then an absurdity to think that the infant
after conception should be majorated by the
influence of any other soul than that from
whom he received his formation. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 142.
Major-domo. See quotation.
This word is borrowed of the Spaniard
and Italian, and therefore new and not usuall,
but to them that are acquainted with the
affaires of court ; and so for his jolly magni-
ficence (as this case is) may be accepted
among courtiers, for whom this is specially
written. A man might haue said in stead of
Motor -domo the French word (maistre d'
hostell) but ilfauoredly, or the right English
word, Lord Steward. But methinks for my
owne opinion this word maiordomo, though
he be borrowed, is more acceptable than any
of the rest. — Puttenham, Poesie, Bk. Ill
ch. iv.
Make-game, a butt.
I was treated as nothing, a flouting-stock
and a make-game, a monstrous and abortive
birth, created for no other end than to be
the scoff of my fellows. — Godwin, Mande-
viUe, i. 263.
Make-king, a name given to the £.
of Warwick, the king-maker.
Anne Beauchamp . . . married to Bichard
Nevil, Earl of Salisbury and Warwick ; com-
monly called the Make-King, and may not
she then, by a courteous" proportion, be
termed the Make-Queen.— Fuller, Worthies,
Oxford (ii. 223).
Make-law, ordaining laws. " Make-
law Ceres " is Stany hurst's translation
(JEn.) iv. 61) of legiferce Ccreri.
Makeshift, an imperfect or rough
substitute for something better; also
used adjectivally.
44 When will life return to this cathedral
system ? n " When was it ever a living
system," answered the other ; **when was it
ever anything but a transitionary makeshift
since the dissolution of the monasteries ? " —
C. Kingsley, Yeast, cb. xvii.
One is apt to read in a makeshift attitude,
just where it mipht seem inconvenient to do
so. — O. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xv.
I am not a model clergyman, only a decent
makeshift. — Ibid., ch. xvu.
Make-up, appearance produced by
dress, bearing, habits, &c.
Perhaps he owed this freedom from the
sort of professional make-up which penetrates
skin, tones, and gestures, and defies all
drapery, to the fact that he had once been
Captain Gaskin. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. iii.
Making, a poem.
For fro thy makings milk and mellie flowes,
To feed the songster-swaines with Art's soot-
meats. — Davies, Eclogue, 1. 20.
Malappropriate, to misapply.
She thrust the hearth-brush into the grates
in mistake for the poker, and mal-appropri-
ated several other articles of her craft. — Miss
E. Bronte, TFuthering Heights, ch. xxxii.
Malapropoism, unsuitable and blun-
dering conduct or speech.
Sadly annoyed he is sometimes by her
malapropoisms. — Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch.
XXV.
Malarious, pertaining to or causing
malaria, i. e. impurity of air arising
from bad drainage, decomposing vege-
table matter. &c.
If it shall awaken the ministers of religion
to preach that [Sanitary Reform] — I hardly
ought to doubt it — till there is not a fever
alley or a malarious ditch left in any British
city, then, indeed, this fair and precious life
will not have been imperilled in vain. — C.
Kingsley, 1871 {Life, ii. 279).
Malefactor, usually = criminal,
but sometimes = one who has injured
another, and is opposed to benefactor.
Fuller (Hist, of Cambridge, iv. 19)
mentions that Edward IV. took land
from King's College to the value of
£1000 a year: the margin has, "King
Edward the fourth a malefactour to
this College." And again (Ibid, viii.
28), "Some Benefactors in repute are
Malefactors in effect." The malefactor
referred to by Brooke is a lawyer who
MALEFICATE ( 395 )
MAMMONITE
had led his client into long and useless
litigation.
George Warmhouse was mounted on a
round ambling nag, and rode much at his
ease by the chariot of his malefactor. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 252.
Malefic ate, to bewitch. The Diets,
have malificiate.
Exorcist. What will not a man do when
once he is maleficated !
Eunuch. Ay, and who could bring him
round withoutyour help?
Taylor j Isaac Comnenus, ii. 4.
Malefictal, injurious.
The late mention of the prelate's advice
in passing a law so malefictal onto them,
giueth me just occasion to name some, the
principal persons of the Clergie present
thereat.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. vi. 14.
Malbvolo (Ital.), a malicious person.
Cf . CURIOSO, FURI080, Ac.
Many plots were discovered daily against
our religion and our laws, in which ye
Machiavels of Westminster, ve Malevolos,
might have claimed the chiefest livery, as
Beelzebub's nearest attendants. — British
Bellman, 1648 (Harl. Misc., vii. 625).
Malignant, a name given by the
Roundheads to the Cavaliers. R. gives
a quotation from Clarendon.
About this time [1641] the word Malign-
ant was first born (as to the common use; in
England; the deduction thereof being dis-
putable, whether from malus ignis, bad fire ;
or, malum lignum, bad fewell; but this is
sure, betwixt both, the name made a com-
bustion all over England. It was fixed as a
note of disgrace on those of the King's party.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist^ XI. iv. 32.
Mal-influbnce, evil influence.
Opium . . . left the body weaker and
more crazy, and thus predisposed to any
mal-infiuence whatever. ■•- Be Quincey, Conf.
of Optum-eater (Appendix).
Malt, to drink beer (slang).
She drank nothing lower than curacoa
Maraschino, or pink noyau,
And on principle never malted.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Malt above wheat. To have the
malt above the wheat or the meal is a
proverbial expression = to be drunk.
The time to which Breton refers is
harvest.
Malt is now above wheat with a number of
mad people. — Breton, Fantasticks, p. 7.
When the malt begins to get above the meal,
they'll begin to speak about government in
kirk and state.— Scott, Old Mortality, ch. iv.
Maltee. See extract.
The vulgar adjective from Malta used by
sailors and others in the island is Maltee. I
suppose they argued that as the singular of
bees is bee, so the singular of Maltese is
Maltee.— Sir G. C. Lewis, Letters (1837), p.
77.
Maltman, maltster. It will be, ac-
cording to Gascoigne, among the signs
of the Millennium,
When colliers put no dust into their sacks,
When maltemen make us drink no firmentie.
Steel Glas, p. 79.
Maltmasteb, maltster.
The good sale of malt raiseth the price of
barley. ... If the poor cannot reach the
price, the maltmaster will. — Adams, ii. 246.
Malty, pertaining to or connected
with malt.
Mysterious men with no names . . fly about
all those particular parts of the country, on
which Doodle is at present throwing himself
in an auriferous and malty shower. — Dickens,
Bleak House, ch. xl.
Mamish, foolish, effeminate, mammy-
ish (?). Bp. Hall, speaking of the
husband having rule over the wife,
says —
Bnt why urge I this? None but some
mamish monsters can question it. — Works, v.
464.
Mammamouchi, buffoonish.
He drops his mammamouchi outside of
Oates's plot in the dark, no more to be heard
of in that reign. — North, Examen, p. 283.
Mammetrous, idolatrous.
John frith is a great mote in their eyes
for so turning over their purgatory, and
heaving at their most monstrous mass or
mammetrous mazan, which signifieth bread
or feeding.— Bale, Select Works, p. 165.
Mammonism, devotion to Mammon or
gain.
Alas! if Hero-worship become Dilettant-
ism, and all except Mammonism be a vain
grimace, how much in this most earnest
earth has gone, and is evermore going, to
fatal destruction ! — Carlyle, Past ana Present,
Bk. II. ch. xvi.
Mammonite, a follower or acquirer
of gain. Tennyson, in Maud, uses it
as an adjective, as Eingsley had before
him, in Alton Locke, ch. xxxiii.
If he will desert his own class, if he will
try to become a sham gentleman, a parasite,
and, if he can, a Mammonite, the world will
compliment him on his noble desire to " rise
in life." — C. Eingsley, Alton Locke, ch. v.
MAMMOTHREPT ( 396 ) MANY-SAINTS-DAY
Mammothrept, a spoilt child.
And for we are the Mammothrept* of Sinne,
Crosse vs with Christ to weane our joys
therein. — Davie*, Holy Roode, p. 15.
Man, to brave, like a man.
Ant. Well, I most man it out; what
would the Queen ?—Dryden, All for Love,
Act II.
Managerial, of or belonging to a
manager.
Having providentially been informed, when
this poem was on the point of being sent off,
that there is but one hautboy in the band, I
averted the storm of popular and managerial
indignation from the need of its blower. — J.
and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses, p. 158.
His hour of managerial responsibility past,
he at once laid aside his magisterial austerity.
— Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xiv.
At that period of the day, in warm weather,
she usually embellished with her genteel
presence a managerial board-room over the
public otboe.—Dtckens, Hard Times, ch. xvii.
Man-case, body.
He had an handsome man-case, and better
t had been empty with weakness than (as it
was) ill fill'd with vitiousness.— Fuller, Ch.
Hist., III. vii. 13.
Manch (in heraldry), the figure of
an ancient sleeve of a coat.
A rowle of parchment Clun about him beares,
Charg'd with the armes of all his ancestors :
And seems halfe ravisht when he looks upon
That bar, this bend, thaj, fern, this cheveron.
That manch, that moone, this martlet, and
that mound. — Herrick, Hesperides, p. 316.
Mangonist, a slave-dealer ; one who
sells men or women.
I hate, I nauseate a common prostitute
who trades with all for gain ; one that sells
human flesh, a mangonist. — Revenge, or a
Match in Newgate, Act I.
Mangy, mange.
The dog whose mangy eats away his haire.
St apy lion's Juvenal, viii. 42.
Manifesto, to issue manifestos or
declarations.
I am to be manrfestoed against, though no
prince ; for Miss Howe threaten! to have the
case published to the whole world. — Richard'
son, CI. Harlow, viii. 261.
Serene Highnesses who sit there proto-
coling, and manifestoing, and consoling man-
kind.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev.,pt. II. Bk. VI. ch. iii.
Man in the oak, apparently some
sort of sprite or demon. See extract
s. v. Hell-wain.
- Manipular, handling ; having to do
with the hands.
Mr. Squills seized the pen that Roland
had thrown down, and began mending it
furiously, thereby denoting symbolically how
he would like to do with Uncle Jack, could
he once get him safe and snug under his
manipular operations.— Zyttow, Caxtons, Bk.
XI. ch. vii.
Manceuvrkr, an intriguer. The Diets,
have manoeuvre as noun and verb,
though these words appear to be of
modern introduction, Burke being the
earliest authority cited. It will be seen
that matueuvrer was regarded by Miss
Edgeworth at the beginning of this
century as an exotic.
This charming widow Beaumont is a,
manatuvrer. We can't well make an English
word of it. The species, thank Heaven! is
not so numerous yet in Eugland as to require
a generic name. — Miss Edgeworth, Manoeu-
vring, ch. i.
Mansard, a curb roof. More fully
described in a quotation from Gwilt in
L., but the subjoined extract gives the
period of its introduction.
Louis XIV. . . covered the roof [of Cham-
bord] with unsightly mansards, at the in-
stigation of his favourite architect, Mansard.
—Feudal Castles of France, p. 232.
MAN8I0NARY. See extract.
They might be perhaps the habitations of
the mansionaries, or keepers of the Church.
—Archaol., xiii. 293 (1800).
Manuary, a consecrated glove.
Some brought forth canonisations, some
expectations, some pluralities and unions,
some tot-quote and dispensations, some par-
done, and these of wonderful variety, some
stationaries, some jubilaries, some pocularies
for drinkers, some manuaries for handlers
of relicks, some pedaries for pilgrims, some
osoularies for kissers. — Latimer, i. 49.
Manufact, manufacture.
And lay the ensigne of their pride,
Their silken ornaments, aside ;
Which would have been a wholesome act
T' encourage woollen manufact.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 3.
Many-feet, Anglicized name for
polypi.
Som have their hands groveling betwixt their
feet,
As th* inky Cuttles and the Many-feet.
Sylvester, Fifth day, first week, 87.
Many-Saints-Day, Pentecost.
Of those three thousand gained (on Many-
Saints -Day) by Saint Peter at Jerusalem
with the preaching of one sermon, each one
might punctually and precisely tell the very
MANY-WEATHERED ( 397 ) MARKS WOMAN
moment of their true conversion. — Fuller,
Ck. Hist., iii.. Dedication.
Many- weathered, variable in
weather.
The day,
Changeful and many ~ weathered, seem'd to
smile. — Southey, The Evening Rainbow.
Maple, mop.
Cales beards, aa broade as scullers maples
that they make cleane their boates with. —
JVashe, Lenten Stuffs, Dedie. (Hart. Misc., vi.
144).
Mappist, a maker of maps.
Yet learned Manpists on a paper small
Draw (in Abbriagement) the whole Type of
all;
And in their Chamber (painlesse, peril-lease)
See in an hoar, and circuit Land and Seas.
Sylvester, Little Bartas, 311.
Mapsticks. Cry mapsticks is an
apologetic expression ; mapsticks =
mopsticks, but it is difficult to trace
how the expression acquired the mean-
ing which it evidently has in the text.
Two conjectures, not very satisfactory,
will be found in N. and Q>, 2nd 8. ii.
315, 472.
Miss. Ton would not have one be always
upon the high grin.
Ntv. Cry mapsticks, madam, no offence I
hope. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
March. The proverb in the extract
is in common use.
Then came my lord Shaf tebury like the
month of March, as they say, in like a lion
and out like a lamb. — North, life of Lord
Guilford, ii. 74.
Marcher, one who marches; a
soldier.
Thirst, hunger, in th' oppressed joints, which
no mind can supply,
They take away a marcher's knees.
Chapman, Iliad, xix. 161.
Marchman, a borderer; one on the
marches.
Now Bowden Moor the marchman won,
And sternly shook his plumed head.
Scott, Lay of Last Minstrel, c. i.
Mare-lady. May-lady (?). Cf.
Mat-lord.
It is the part of an heathenish woman,
and not of a Christian matron, to be decked
and trimmed like a mart-lady or the queen
of a game. — Becon, ii. 346.
How unseemly a thing then is it for
homely and base maids ... so to trick ano#
trim their bodies, as though they were mare'
ladies or puppets in a game. — Ibid., ii. 370.
Margery Prater, gipsy cant for a
hen from its constant clucking. Mar-
gery was also prefixed to howlet. See
Here's grunter and bleater with tib of the
butt'ry,
And Margery Prater, all dressU without
slutt'ry. — Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act II.
Marials, hymns in honour of the
Blessed Virgin.
More tolerable of the two, and yet blas-
phemously enough, do they give it to the
Blessed Virgin in the closing of their rhym-
ing Marials. — Ward, Sermons, p. 5.
Marinal, salt ; bitter.
These here are festival, not marinal waters.
—Adams, i. 168.
Marinership, seamanship.
Euery bodie without excepcion would crie
fie on him that would take vpon him to sitte
and holde the stierne in a shippe, hauing
none experience in the f eate of marinershippe.
— XJdaVs Erasmus, Apophth., p. 6.
Maritorious, fond of a husband.
Dames maritorious ne're were meritorious.
— Chapman, Bussy D'Ambois, Act II.
Mariturient, wishing to become a
husband.
Mason . . . was notwithstanding, in his
fellow-poet's phrase, a long while mariturient,
and " praying to heaven to give him a good
and gentle governess." — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. cxxvi.
Markee, some article of clothing ;
misprint for market, which H. says is a
kind of night-cap ?
Beckon with my washerwoman ; making
her allow for old shirts, socks, dabbs, and
markees, which she bought of me. — Hue and
Cry after D. Swift, p. 9, 2nd ed. 1714.
Market, to send to market to sell ;
also to go to market to buy. R. gives
market as a verb, but no example.
Industrious merchants meet and market there
The World's collected wealth.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. iv.
The crop of these two States is now being
marketed.— The Standard, May 21, 1875.
Markingly, attentively.
Pyroclee markinqly hearkened to all that
Dametas said. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 417.
Markswoman, an archeress ; a wo-
man who aims at a mark.
The thought throbbed in many a fair
bosom that their ladyships might miss their
aim . . and that there might then be room
for less exalted, but perhaps not less skilful
MARK WORTHY ( 398 )
MARTINET
markswomen to try their chance. — Scott, St.
Ronan's Well, i. 809.
Markworthy, noteworthy.
To the commonest eyesight a markworthy
old fact or two may visibly disclose itself. —
Carlyle, Misc., iv. 298.
Marl. See extract : marl now gener-
ally denotes a clay soil with some ad-
mixture of lime; but on the Lincoln-
shire Wolds it still = chalk. See
Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary (E. D. S.).
Marlborough, so called from its hills of
chalk, which antiently was called marl. —
Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, ii. 52.
Marlock, to frolic ; also as a sub-
stantive. The marlock referred to in the
second quotation is the taking off a
hat in the way of salutation.
Dost ta' mean to say as my Sylvie went
and demeaned hersel' to dance and marlock
wi' a* th' fair-folk at th' Admiral's Head?—
Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xi.
Ay, courtin' what other mak' o' thing is t,
when thou's gazin' after yon meddlesome
chap, as if thou'd send thy eves after him,
and be making marlocks back at thee? —
Ibid., ch. xxvii.
Maronibt, a Virgilian ; a disciple of
Virgil.
And he, like some imperious Maronist,
Conjures the Muses that they him assist.
Hall, Sat., I. iv. 7.
Marquesal, belonging to a marquess.
The countess . . had been accustomed to see
all eyes not royal, ducal, or marquesal fall
before her own. — Trollope, Barchester Towers,
ch. xxxvii.
Marquess. Lady Marquess = mar-
chioness. Sam Weller therefore had
some authority for his " female markis."
The lady in the first extract was Anne
Boleyn, a Marchioness in her own right :
there was no male marquess of Pem-
broke.
There came in a Masque my lady Marquess
of Pembroke. — Triumph at Calais and Bou-
logne, 1532 (Eng. Garner, ii. 89).
Up and by coach to the coach-maker's;
and there I do find a great many ladies sitting
in the body of a coach that must be ended
by to-morrow : they were my Lady Marquis
of Winchester, Bellasis, and other great
ladies, eating of bread and butter, and drink-
ing ale.— Pepys, Ap. 30, 1669.
There's no daughters at my place, else o'
course I should ha' made up to vun on 'em.
As it is, I don't think I can do vith any thin'
under & female markis. — Pickwick Papers,
ch. xxxvii.
Marriage lines, marriage certificate.
And I took out of my bosom, where they
lie ever, our marriage lines, and kissed them,
again and again. — Keade, Cloister and Hearth*
ch. Iv.
Marsh-diver, some species of bird ;
the bittern (?).
My voice
Bang false ; but smiling, " Not for thee,"
she said,
" O Bulbul, any rose of Gulistan
Shall burst her veil; marsh-divers, rather,
maid,
Shall croak thee sister."
Tennyson, Princess, iv.
Martello Tower. L. says, " from
a fort in Corsica so named/' but see
extracts.
The origin of Martello Towers I believe to
have been that when piracy was common in
the Mediterranean . . the Italians built towers
near the sea, in order to keep a watch and
give warning . . . This warning was given by
striking on a bell with a hammer ; and hence
these towers were called torri da martello. I
cannot remember where I read this explan-
ation, but I am sure that I found it in some
credible book. — Sir G. C. Lewis, Letters
(1862), p. 412.
An attack was made on the tower of
Mortella in Corsica by the British forces
both by sea and land in February 1794. The
tower was taken after an obstinate defence,
but the two attacking ships were beaten off.
This circumstance is likely to have given
rise to the confusion between Martello Totrer*
generally, and this tower of Mortella. See
James's Naval Hist, of Great Britain (Lond.
1822) vol. i. p. 286, where the event is de-
scribed.— Ibid., p. 417.
Martenist, a follower of Martin
Marprelate.
After such biting petitions and Satyrick
Pasquils (worthy of such Martenists) came
open menacings of Princes and Parliaments,
Priests and People too. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 61.
Martial, a martialist ; a soldier.
The Queen of martial s
And Mars himself conducted them.
Chapman, Iliad, zviii. 469.
Others strive
like sturdy Martials far away to drive
The drowsy Droanes that harbour in the hive.
Fuller, David's Sinne, st. 36.
Martinet.
Old. Prithee, don't look like one of your
holiday captains now-a-days, with a bodkin
Axj your side, you martinet rogue.
* Man. . . . What, d' ye find fault with
martinet ? let me tell yon, sir, 'tis the best
exercise in the world ; the most ready, most
MARTINET
( 399 )
MA TA FUND A
emsy, most graceful exercise that ever wu
used, and the most —
Old. Nay, nay, sir, no more; sir, your
servant ; if you praise martinet once, I nave
done with yon, nr — Martinet ! Martinet !
Wycherley, Plain Dealer, HI. i.
Mabttnet, some military engine (?).
Him passing on,
From some huge martinet, a ponderous stone
Crush'd. — Southey, Joan of Arc., Bk. viii.
Martingale, a gambling term ; sig-
nifying the doubling of stakes, again
and again, until the player wins.
You have not played as yet ? Do not do
so ; above all avoid a martingale if you do. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xzviii.
Martyrly, martyr-like.
They flew in their very faces and eyes
without any respect to their Age, Learning,
Piety, Sanctity and Martyrly Constancy. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 15.
Martyrly fervencies are kept high and in-
tense by the Antiperistasis of persecution. —
Ibid., p. 34.
Marvel-monger, one who invents or
retails wonders.
The Marvel-mongers grant that He
Was moulded up but of a mortal metal.
Beaumont, Psyche, xviii. 92.
Mase, a term at basset.
ril make a parol! ; I mase as mnch more ;
your card loses, Sir James, for two guineas,
yours, Captain, loses for a guinea more. —
Centlivre% The Basset-Table, Act IV.
Mask art, masquerade; profanely
applied by some of the less respectable
Reformers to the Mass. Cf. Masking.
Such as have most wickedly called the
Mass a Maskarye, and the priests vestments
masking clothes, . . . may well be compared
with Pilate's men. — Christopherson, 1554
(Maitland on Reformation, p. 803).
Masked, bewildered: according to
H. mothered in this sense is still in
use. See quotation in N. ; also 8 p.
Sanderson, iii. 20, with Jacobson's note.
He doth the benighted traveller a dis-
courtesie rather than a kindnesse, who
lendetk him a lantern to take it away,
leaving him more masked than he was be-
fore.— Fuller, Holy War, Bk. III. ch. zii.
Masking. See Maskary.
They are also no followers of the Scrip-
tures; but peradventure they never read
them but as they find them by chance in
their popish portifoliums and masking books.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 175.
William Plaine . . . was also charged, that
seeing a priest go to mass, he said, " Now
you shall see one in masking" — Maitland on
Reformation, p. 293.
Mast, to feed on mast.
He was wont to rebuke the beneficed men
. . . being idle, and masting themselves like
hogs of Bpicurus' flock. — Becon, ii. 425.
Master, the jack at bowls : mistress
is the more common term. See N.
At diceplay euery one wisheth to caste
well ; at bowles euery one cranes to kisse the
maister. — Gosson, Schoole of Abuse, p. 60.
Masterfast, tied to a master.
Whoso hath ones married a wife is not
now from thensforthe all together his owne
man, but in maner half maisterfast. — VdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 87.
Masterhood, imperiousness.
I would . . . accommodate quietly to his
masterhood, smile undisturbed at his in-
eradicable ambition. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. xxxiv.
Mast-head, to send to the mast-
head for a certain time, as a punish-
ment.
The next morning I was as regularly mast'
headed, to do penance during the greater
Srt of the day for my deeds of darkness. —
arryat, Fr. MUdmay, ch. iv.
If you mast-head a sailor for not doing his
duty, why should you not weathercock a
parishioner for refusing? to pay tithes? —
Sydney Smith (Life, ch. ix.).
Mat, a mattress.
(Enter Careful, and tumbles over the mat.)
" A pox on your pride, we must have mats
with a vengeance, but I'll turn over a new
leaf with this house, 111 warrant you ; Til
have no mats, but such as lie under the
feather-beds." — Centlivre, Beau's Duel, iv. 1.
MatjEOLOGY, foolish words: tbe
words referred to in the extract are
such as astromancy, coscinomanqj, &c,
Ac.
The sapience of our forefathers and the
defectiveness of our dictionaries are simul-
taneously illustrated by the bead-roll of
mataology embodied in the extract here
following. — Hall, Modern English, p. 87.
Matjsotechnie, a useless or foolish
business.
A condign guerdon (doubtlesse) and verv
fit to countervayle such a peevish practice k
unnecessarie Mataotechnie. — Touchstone of
Complexions (Preface, p. 6).
Matafunda. See extract.
That murderous sling,
The matafunda, whence the ponderous stone
Fled fierce.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. viii.
MATCH
( 4oo )
MAUM
Match. A set match = a conspiracy.
They saw him anointed from God, and
(lest they should think this a set match
betwixt the brethren) they saw the earth
opening, the fire issuing from God ypon
their emulous opposites. — Holly Contempla-
tions (Aaron's Censer and Rod),
Mathematic, a mathematician.
The Memphian priests were deep philoso-
phers,
And curious gazers on the sacred stars,
Searchers of Nature, and great mathematicks,
Yer any letter knew the ancient'st Attiks.
Sylvester, The Colonies, 294.
Mathematical, astrological ; also, an
astrologer.
Though I do by the authority of God's
laws and man's laws damn this damnable art
mathematical, I do not damn such other arts
and sciences as be associated and annexed
with this unlawful astrology. — Hooper, i.
830.
The stars, the planets, and signs in the
firmament shall be strange pods, if we, being
deceived with the mathematical*, shall wholly
hang on them. — Bollinger, Deo. II., Serm. 2.
Mathook, a mattock.
Lyes and libels served as spades and mat-
hooks to work with. — North, Examen, p. 592.
Matriarch, the mother and ruler of
a family ; wife of a patriarch. In 1873
the New York Times uses the word
" matriarch, if we may be allowed to
coin a feminine for patriarch." The
extract shows, however, that it had
been coined before.
Dr. Souther has classed this injured
Matriarch [Job's wife] in a triad with Xan-
tippe and Mrs. Wesley. — Southey, The Doc-
tor, ch. cxvii.
Matter. Much about the matter =
pretty right.
Dt. Then you tell me your vessel is leaky ?
Er. Ton are much about the matter (hand
nutltum aberras a scopo), — Bailey's Erasmus,
p. 352.
Matter. All is a matter = it is all
the same.
Whether we make the common readers
to laugh or to lowre, all is a matter. — Put'
Unham, Poesie, Bk. II. ch. xiii.
Our maker therfore at these dayes shall
not . . . take the termes of Northern-men,
such as they vse in dayly talke, whether
they be noblemen or gentlemen, or of their
best clarkes, all is a matter.— Ibid,, Bk. III.
ch. iv.
Matterkul, pregnant; full of matter.
I turned to V. Bourne; what a sweet,
unpretending, pretty-mannered, matterful
creature! sucking from every flower, making
a flower of everything. — C. Lamb to Words-
worth, 1815, p. 97.
Mattebless, immaterial in both its
senses, t. e. spiritual, and of no conse-
quence. Ben Jonson, as quoted by R.
and by L., has the word, but applies it
to verse which is void of matter or
substance.
Tis matterless in goodness who excels,
He that hath coin hath all perfections else.
May, The Old Couple, II. i.
Ye grisly ghosts that walk in shades of
night,
Like shades whose substance (though quite
matterUsse)
The dayly fowle offender doth affright.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 35.
Matter-of-course, phlegmatic, in-
different.
I won't have that sort of matter-of-course
woqwenceDce.— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
ch.
Matutines, matins.
Matutines [were] at the first hour or six of
the clock, when the Jewish morning sacrifice
was offered ; and at what time Christ's Re-
surrection was by the angels first notified to
the women. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 287.
Maud, a shepherd* s plaid.
Michael Armstrong, promoted to a place
of trust, might have been seen sitting upon
the hill-side in one of the most romantic
spots in Westmoreland, a shepherd's maud
wrapped round his person, a sheep-dog at
his feet. — Mrs. Troltope, Michael Armstrong,
oh. xxviii.
Maugre. R. and L. give this only
as an adverb. H. says the substantive
= misfortune, while N. has it = harm.
In the subjoined it means unfriendli-
ness or grudge.
Pollio had afore tyme been angrie and
foule out with Timagines, and had none
other cause to surceasse his maugre, but
that Oassar begun to take displeasure with
the saied Timagines. — UdaPs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 289.
Maukin, a cloth used by bakers in
cleaning out their oven.
Gome forth, my lord, and see the cart
Drest up with all the country art ;
See here a maukin, there a sheet
As spotlesse pure as it is sweet.
Herrick, Hcsperides, p. 106.
Maum, to paw about.
Nev. (takes Miss's hand). Oome, Miss, let
us lay all quarrels aside and be friends.
Miss, Don't be mourning and gauming s
body so ! Cant you keep your filthy hands
MAUNDING
( 401 ) MEADOW-CRAKE
to yourself ? — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Con*, ii.).
Maundtno, commanding; imperious-
ly ess.
He died untimely for oar Bishop's good,
who acknowledgeth it under his hand, that
he dealt fairly with him ; not reckoning by
his maundings and rough language, Which
came from him to please the supervising
prelate. — Hacket, Life of William*, ii. 116.
Mausole, tomb ; mausoleum.
No gorgeous mausole grac't with flattering
verse,
Bternizeth her trunk, her house, and bene.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 1424.
And if I fall in such a sea of praise.
What rarer mausole may my bones include ?
Ibid., Sonnets on the Peace in France, xii.
Max, gin (slang). Jon Bee [J. Bad-
cock] in Diet, of Turf, &c, says that
it is an abbreviation of Maxime, and
means properly the best gin, though
now used indiscriminately.
Who, doffing their coronets, collars, and
ermine, treat
Boxers to Max at the One Tun in Jermyn
Street.
Ingoldsby Legends (Bagman '* Dog).
May-hill. May is a trying month
for invalids ; hence the expression, to
clitnb up May-kill, i. e. to get through
that month safely. It appears from
the extract that in the early part of the
seventeenth century ale was little drunk
except in winter.
Whereas in our remembrance Ale went
out when Swallows came in, seldom appear-
ing after Easter; it now hopeth (having
climbed up May-hill) to continue its course
all the year. — Fuller, Worthies, Derbyshire
(i.252). y
May-lord, the leader of a frolic or
May-game. Burton, quoted by R., has
May-lady. Cf. Mare-lady.
Cerdicus . . . was the first May -lord, or
captaine of the Morris-daunce that on those
embenched shelves stampt his footing. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Hart. Misc^ vi. 150).
Mayorlet, petty mayor.
The patriotic mayor or mayorlet of the
village of Moret tried to detain them. — Car-
lyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. in. ch. iv.
Mayor of Queenborough. "The
Miyor of Quinborough " was the name
of a comedy by Middleton : " a simple
play " (Pepys, June 16, 1666). Some
clowns contend in it for the office of
mayor of Queenborough.
The recorder Howel appeared ; and to
avert the rule for an attachment, alledged . . .
the disorder that might happen in the city,
if the mayor were imprisoned. The chief
justice put his thumbs in his girdle, as his
way was, and, "Tell me of the mayor of
London ? " said he : " tell me of the mayor
of Queenborough. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 114.
Mazan. See quotation.
John Frith is a great mote in their eyes,
for so turning over their purgatory, and
heaving at their most monstrous mass, or
mammetrous mazan, which signineth bread
or feeding. — Bale, Select Works, p. 165.
Mazard, cup ; usually written mazer
Mazard generally means head.
They lived sluttishlv in poor houses, where
they ate a great deal of beef and mutton,
and drank good ale in a brown mazard. —
Aubrey, Misc., p. 213.
Mazard, a species of cherry. H.
says, "in good esteem for making
cherry-brandy."
He . . . had no ambition whatsoever be-
yond pleasing his father aud mother, gettiug
by honest means the maximum of red qnar-
renders and mazard cherries, and going to
sea when be was big enough.— C Kingsley,
Westward Ho, ch. i.
Mazarine, a deep blue colour.
For the weather at once appeared clear and
serene,
And the sky up above was a bright mazarine.
Ingoldsby Legends (S. Romwold).
Mazarine, a gown, which derived its
name from the Duchess of Mazarin
(Bailey speaks of a Mazarine hood
with this derivation) ; or perhaps the
word refers to the colour of the dress,
a mazarine blue.
Bring my silver'd mazarine,
Sweetest gown that e'er was seen.
Anstey, New Bath Guide, Letter ix.
Mazeful, bewildering. The com-
parison in the extract is between an
unsympathetic mistress and Night.
Silence in both displays his sullen might,
Slow heaviness in both holds one degree
In both a mazeful solitariness.
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella, 96.
Meadow-Crake, " the corn-crake or
landrail : Ortygometra Crex." Pea-
cock's Manley and Corringham Glos-
sary (E. D. S.), where, however, it is
ppeft meadow-creak.
D D
MEAL
( 4°*)
MEER
My voice
Bang false; but smiling, "Not for thee"
she said,
" O Bulbul, any rose of Gulistan
Shall bunt her veil ; marahdivers, rather,
maid,
Shall croak thee sister, or the meadow-crake
Grate her harsh kindred in the grass."
Tennyson, Princess, iv.
Meal, sand-bank : a Norfolk word.
The cows, daring the hot weather when
they are attacked by the fly, get over the
meales, the name given to the sandbanks. —
Freeman's Life of W. Kirby, p. 147.
Meal -house, place where meal is
stored.
Now hairing seene all this,
Then shall you see hard by
The Pastrie, Meale-house, and the roome
Whereas the Coales do ly.
The Meale-house is a place
With set mischiefe fraught.
For sure the meale is made of corne
Y* is much worse then naught.
Breton, Forte of Fansie, p. 16.
Meaningness, significance.
She met me at her dressing-room door, and
looked so lovely, so silly, and so full of un-
meaning meaningness. — Richardson, Grandi-
son, vi. 341.
Meanless, meaningless.
Fair sylphish forms who, tall, erect, and
slim,
Dart the keen glance, and stretch the length
of limb ;
To viewless harpings weave the meanless
dance,
Wave the gay wreath, and titter as they
prance. — Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 126.
Meanor, demeanour ; behaviour.
If the testimony of that lady be true (it is
but one, and a most domestick witness), I do
not shuffle it over as if his meanor to the
Lord Marquess were not a little culpable. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 108.
Measurelessness, unlimited
quantity.
Feigned and preposterous admiration . .
varied by a corresponding measurelessness in
vituperation made the woof of all' learned
intercourse. — G. Eliot, Romola, ch. xix.
Meat, to feed. The Diets, only give
the participle mealed with extract from
Tusser.
Good husbandrie meateth
His friend and the poore.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 139.
Haste then and meat your men :
Though I must still say my command would
lead them fasting forth.
Chapman, Iliad, xix. 196.
Think it therefore no disgrace in a city-inn
to see your horse every dav yourself, and to
see him well meated. — Peacham, Art of Living
in Ijondon, 1642 {Harl. Misc., ix. 88).
Carriers are so merciful to their horses ;
meat them well to prevent their tyring. —
Fuller, Pisgah Sight, IV. v. 19.
Medalled, decked or presented with
a medal.
Irving went home medalled by the King,
diplomatised by the University, crowned,
and honoured, and admired. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xx.
Mediate, opposed to immediate.
There were three Abps. between Becket
and Langton.
To dispatch Becket out of our ways, just
a jubilee of years after his death, Stephen
Langton his mediate successor removed his
body.— Fuller, Ch. Hist , IIL ii. 69.
Medical finger, the middle finger :
it is the only finger supplied by both
nerves of the arm ; possibly this may
be the reason for the name.
At last he, with a low courtesy, put on her
medical finger a pretty handsome golden ring.
— Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xvii.
Meditationist, compiler of medi-
tations.
Jeremy Taylor's is both a flowery and a
fruitful stile: Hervey the Meditationist's a
weedy one. — Sou they % The Doctor, Interchap-
ter xxii.
Medite, to meditate.
Her hand (vn bidden) in her sampler sets
The King of Iuda's name and counterfets:
Who, mediiing the sacred Temple's plot,
By th' other twin at the same time is shot.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 770.
Medley, cloth of a mixed colour.
This mystery [Clothing] is vigorously pur-
sued in this County; and I am informed
that as Medleys are most made in other
shires, as good Whites as any are woven in
this County. — Fuller, Worthies, Wilts (ii.
435).
Medy, Mediolanum or Milan.
Ambrose, the bishop of the church of
Medy.—Philpot, p. 373.
Meer. The following note is ap-
pended to the subjoined extract " This
word is used for want of a better. It
means the practice common in hilly
countries of making a portion of the
hill, running along the Burface of it,
MEET-HELP
( 403 ) MERCANTILITY
level for purposes of cultivation, leaving
it nearly perpendicular for a few feet,
and beginning another level at the
bottom."
No doubt it [a field] was formerly
ploughed, and in it are some meers. — T.
Baker (1819), (Archaol., six. 168).
Meet- help, help-meet; wife.
I have been so fortunate in my discoveries
of him and his meet-help that now I look
upon the loathsome heap of scandalous
materials I have got together against him,
I am almost ashamed to make it public. —
Sprat1* Relation of Young'* Contrivance, 1692
(Hart. Misc^ vi. 217).
Meipsead, an egotistical writing.
Sou they coined this word on the model
of Iliad, &c.
My letters to you are such pure meipseads
that I have seldom room or leisure for any
but personal concerns. — Southey, Letters,
1817 (III. 57).
Melled, honied.
That hast the ayr for farm, and heav'n for
field,
Which sugred mel, or melled sugar yield.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 841.
Mellie, honey.
For fro thy makings milk and mellie
flowes. Davies, Eclogue, 1. 20.
Melodic, belonging to melody.
Herr Klesmer played a composition of
his own ... an extensive commentary on
some melodic ideas not too grossly evident. —
G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. v.
Melodist, a master of melody.
That predominance of the imaginative
faculty or of impassioned temperament which
is incompatible with the attributes of a sound
understanding and a just judgement, may
make a rharjsodist, a melodist, or a visionary
. . . but imagination and passion thus unsup-
ported will never make a poet in the largest
and highest sense of the appellation. — Sir
H. Tayler, Preface to Ph. van Artevelde.
Melophonist, a singer of melodies.
Here, as in the case of the Hebrew melo-
phonists, I would insinuate no wrong thought.
— Thackeray, A Dinner in the City.
Meltable, fusible, capable of being
melted.
Iron . . is the most impure of all metals,
hardly meltable. — Fuller, Worthies, Salop
(ii. 253).
Memoirism, memoir-writing.
Have we not done what lay at our hand
towards reducing that same memoirism of
the eighteenth century into history, and
weaving a thread or two thereof nearer to
the condition of a web? — Carlyle, Misc., ii
242.
Memorability, remarkableness.
The first years of Daniel's abode in Don-
caster were distinguished by many events of
local memorability. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. xlvii.
Memorables, remarkable things ; for.
similar uses see s. v. Observables.
He employed John Leland, a most learned
antiquary, to perambulate and visit the ruins
of all abbeys, and record the memorables
therein.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. vi. 24.
Hundreds of memorables haue met in your
Lordship's life.— Ibid., Ch. Hist., vi. p. 8S9.
Memorandummer, a taker of notes.
He had lately, he told me, had much con-
versation concerning me with Mr. Boswell.
I feel sorry to be named or remembered by
that biographical anecdotical memorandum'
met, till his book of poor Dr. Johnson's life
is finished and published. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, iii. 335.
Memph, an Egyptian. Sylvester uses
Memphytist and Memphian in the
same way, first day, first week, 312,
783.
Thou mak'st th' Ichneumon (whom the
Memphs adore)
To rid of poysons Nile's manured shoar.
Sylvester, sixth day, first weeke, 260.
Menise, minnow. See II. s. v.
mengy
And speak of such as in the fresh are found,
The little roach, the menise biting fast.
Denny s, Secrets of Angling
(Eng. Garner, i. p. 167).
The trout will take also the worm, menise,
or any bait. — Lauson, Comment on Dennys,
1653 (Ibid., i. 195).
Mennom. See extract.
The minnow still called . . . mennom in the
north of England is, as far as I can learn, at
present totally disregarded as an article of
diet— Arch., xv. 352 (1806).
Mensall.
The chiefe Lord had certaine lands in
Demesne, which were called his Loghtii, or
mensall lands in Demesne. — Sir John Davis
quoted in Holland's Camden, ii. 141.
Mentality, mental cast or habit.
Hndibrss has the same hard mentality,
keeping the truth at once to the senses and
to the intellect. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch.
xiv.
Mercantility, mercantile spirit.
44 Stay, you are a holy man, and I am an
honest one ; let us make a bargain " . . . .
And his eyes sparkled, and he was all 00
D D 2
MERCHANDIZER ( 404 ) MESSMAKING
fire with mercantility. — Beads, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. lxxvi.
Mkbchandizkr, merchant ; trafficker.
That which did not a little amuse the
merchandizes was that these pilgrims set very
light by all their wares. — Pilgrim's Progress,
Pt. I. p. 153.
Mrrchantrt, trade. Bp. Sanderson
(v. 106) uses merchandry.
I wish human wit, which is really very
considerable in mechanics and merchantry,
could devise some method of cultivating
canes and making sugar without the manual
labour of the human species. — Walpole, Let'
ters, iv. 482 (1789).
Mkbchks, marches ; borders.
Mercia, so called because it lay in the
middest of the island, being the merches or
limits, on which all the residue of the King-
domes did hound and border.— J»W/er, Ch.
Hist., I. v. 17.
Merciless, used as a substantive.
I pray in vain a merciless to move.
Daniel, Sonnet IV. {Eng. Gamer,
i. 582).
Mercy-stock, propitiation. Becon
(ii. 459) quoting 1 St. John ii. 2, uses
this word for propitiation.
Our Saviour and Mercy-stock saith that
this knowledge is eternal life. — Hutchinson,
p. 2.
Who jnstifieth and saveth us, but He who
is our Saviour, our Ransom, our Spokesman,
our Jfercy-stock 7 — Ibid., p. 192.
Mkrda, ordure. North perhaps uses
the Latin out of delicacy ; otherwise
merd or mard is an Eng. word, and is
used by Jonson and Burton.
[He] deals forth his merda by the hirelings
of the times, that he might not stink in all
companies, and so be found out by those
that otherwise do not know him. — North,
Examen, p. 644.
Meretrician, meritricious, pertain-
ing to a harlot.
Take from human commerce Meretrician
amours, you would find a horrid confusion of
all things and incestuous lusts disturb every
family.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 263.
Meridian, thorough-paced ; the word
is often used figuratively as a sub-
stantive.
Was it not strange usage of a Queen Con*
sort, when such an effrontery out of the
mouth of a meridian villain in public . . .
should be let pass without so much as a
reprehension. — North, Examen, p. 186.
Meridies, meridian ; middle : the use
of the Latin form is noticeable.
About the hour that Cynthia's silver light
Had touch 'd the pale meridies of the night.
Cowley's Essays (Agriculture).
Merlon, the plain part of an em-
battled parapet, between two embra-
sures.
The parapet often had the merlons pierced
with long chinks, ending in round holes
called oeiUeta— Arch., xii. 147 (1796).
The merlons and embrasures with which
the main portion of the building was fur-
nished are comparatively dilapidated. — Ibid.
(1841).
Merrie-go-sorie, a mingling of
laughter and tears ; an hysterical affec-
tion.
Joying to see the kinde heart of this other
olde gentleman, sorie to be an occasion of
such anger to himselfe, and trouble to his
house, betwixt a merriego sorie I fell to such
weeping as quite spilde mine eyes, and had
almost hurst my heart. — Breton, Miseries of
Mauillia, p. 49.
The ladle with a merrie go sortie . . . made
him this answer©. — Ibid., Fortunes of two
Princes, p. 25.
Merripy, to amuse.
The description of the benefit and the
crowd diverted me so much, that I read it
in public, and it merryfied us ail. — Mad.
D'ArUay, Diary, i. 324.
Merry-go-down, strong ale.
I present you with meate, and you (in
honourable conrtesie to requite mee) can
do no less than present mee with the best
morning's draught of merry-go-downe in your
quarters. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs, Dedication
(Harl. Misc., vi. 146).
Merry-night. " A term well known
in the North of England, and applied
to rural festivals, where young persons
meet in the evening for the purpose of
dancing " ( Wordsworth's note in loc).
A fuller description ot the merry-night
will be found in Willan's West York-
shire Glossary (E. D. S.).
He hears a sound, and sees the light,
And in a moment calls to mind
That 'tis the village Merry-Night.
Wordsworth, The Waggoner, c. II.
Meskeito (Sp. mesquita), a mosque.
The very Mahometans . . have their sepul-
chres near the Meskeito; never in it. — Bp.
Hall, Works, v. 514.
Message, to announce, or deliver a
message.
He dyd in expressed commaund to me
message his errand. — Slanyhurst, JEn., iv. 377.
Messmaking, eating together.
MESTIVE
( 405 ) MICROCEPHALOUS
This friendship begau by messmaking in
the temple hall. — Worth, Lift of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 59.
Mestivr, sad. N. has mestfull.
The Melancholy's mestiue, and too full
Of f earefull thought*, and cares vnrequisit.
Davits, Microcosmos, p. 31.
Now hane they scal'd this mestiue moun-
taine top. — Ibid., Holy Roode, p. 16.
Metagk, measurement.
Acts have very lately passed in relation to
the admeasurement or metage of coals for
the city of Westminster. — Defoe, Tour thro*
G. Britain, ii. 145.
Metals, mines.
It was impossible to live without oar king,
but as slaves live, that is, such who are
civilly dead, and persons condemned to
tnctals.—Bp. Taylor, Dud. Dub. (Dedic).
Mktaphrased, closely translated.
Bp. Hall addresses some verses to
Sylvester on " his Bartas metaphrased.'*
M staph ysicianish, science of meta-
physics.
Phrenology, and in great measure, meta-
physicianism have been concocted d, priori. —
E. A. Pot, Imp of the Perverse.
Mktaphysicked, made metaphysical.
I send you a new Strawberry edition,
which yon will find extraordinary, not only
as a most accurate translation, but as a piece
of genuine French, not metaphysicked by La
Harpe, by Thomas, &c.— Walpole, Letters, iv.
306 (1782).
Mbtempsychosize, to cause the soul
to change from one body to another.
He allowed that even Lsaak Walton of
blessed memory could not have shown cause
for mitigation of tbe sentence, if Bhadam-
anthus and his colleagues in the court below
had . . . sewed him metempsychosized into a
frog to the arming-iron with a fine needle
and silk. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. ccxii.
Meteor, applied to hail, &c. In the
second extract the speaker is supposed
to be a man who has been turned into
an otter.
Hail, an ordinary meteor, murrain of cattle
an ordinary disease, yet for a plague to
obdurate Pharaoh miraculously wrought. —
Hall, Invis. World, Bk. I. sect. ii.
I have a good warm coat about me that
will last me all my life long without patch-
ing or mending ; which kind of fences against
the injuries of time and tyranny of the
meteors, indulgent Nature provides for us
sensitive creatures before we come into the
world.— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 13.
Meteoro8COPE, instrument for ob-
serving the heavenly bodies.
Meanwhile,
With astrolabe and meteoroscope,
I'll find the cusp and alfridaria.
Albumazar, ii. 5.
Metopomanct, divination from what
is seen in a person's face : called also
nutoposcopy.
By the arts of astrology, geomancy,
chiromancy, metopomancy, and others of a
like stuff and nature, he foretelleth all
things to come. — Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk.
III. ch. xxv.
Metromaniac, mad after metrical
composition.
He seemed to have acquired the facility of
versification, and to display it with almost
metromaniac eagerness. — W. Taylor, Survey
of German Poetry, L 183.
Metropolis. The extract is a note of
Udal's ; the true derivation is that
which he rejects from urjTtjp\jirj] rpoc,,
iroAif.
The greke worde is utrrpfaroXtt, as if ye
shoulde saye, the place where all euils are
concerned, or from whence all euils doen
issue. For it is compouned not of uirpov
measuring, nor of furrqp, *pdt, mother, but
of unrpa, urn-pat, a matrice, that is to saie
the place of concepcion and of issuying.
And therof is Metropolis called the chief
citee where the Archbishop of any prouiuce
hath his See, and hath all the other diocesses
of that prouince subject to him, as Canter-
bury and Torke here in Englande. — UdaCs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 131.
Metusiast, one who holds transub-
stantiation.
The Metastasis and Papists . . believe the
substance of bread and wine is so changed
into the substance of Christ His Body, as
nothing remaineth but the real Body of
Christ, besides the accidents of bread and
wine. — Sogers on 39 Articles, p. 289.
Micacious, sparkling. L. has the
word but only in a literal sense, as* con-
nected with mica.
There is the Cyclopean stile of which
Johnson is the great example, the sparkling
or micacious possessed by Hazlitt, and much
affected in Reviews and Magazines— Southey,
The Doctor, Interchapter xxii.
Mice-eyed, keen-eyed.
O for a legion of mice-eyed decipherers and
calculators uppon characters now to augurate
what I mean by this.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., v\. 177).
Microcephalous, small-headed, and
so, deficient
M1CR0L0GY ( 406 )
MILIT1ATE
When you have old oak chairs, a microce-
phalous imot would know that you must have
an old oak table. — Black, Adventures of a
Phaeton, ch. zzv.
Microloqy, minuteness about words ;
hair-splitting.
I like Eichorn better than Paulas ; there is
less micrology, less tweezering at trifles, in
his erudition. — W. Taylor of Norwich, 1806
(Life by Robberds, ii. 146).
Mid, a midshipman.
I have written to Bedford to learn what
mids of the Victory fell in that action. —
Southey, Letter*, 1812 (ii. 315).
Middle, to balance or compromise.
And now to middle the matter between
both, it is a pity that the man they favour
has not that sort of merit which a person of
a mind so delicate as that of Miss Harlowe
might reasonably expect in a husband.—
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i. 102.
This way of putting it is middling the
matter between what I have learned of my
mother's over-prudent and your enlarged
notions. — Ibid. iii. 214.
Middling gossip, a go-between.
What do you say unto a middling gossip
To bring you ay together at her lodging?
Jonson, Devil is an Ass, i. 3.
Middlingness, mediocrity.
*' I make it a virtue to be content with my
middlingness," said Deronda smiling ; " it is
always pardonable, so that one does not ask
others to take it for superiority.'1 — G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxv.
M1DLE8S, without a middle. Sylvester
speaks of the world as
An unbeginning, midlesse, endlesse Ball.—
First day, first week, 343.
Midshipman's half-pay. See extract.
Tou fellows worked like bricks, spent
money, and got midshipman's half-pay (no*
thing a-day and find yourself) and monkey's
allowance (more kicks than halfpence). — C.
Kingdey, Letter, May 1856.
Midterranean, Mediterranean.
Narrow Mid-terranean Sea
Which from rich Europe parts poor Africa.
Sylvester, Colonies, 86.
Miff, irritated. The Diets, give it as
a substantive = pet or quarrel.
Tou are right about Burnett, but being
miff with him myself, I would not plead
against him in the least particular. — W.
Taylor, 1802 (Robberds's Memoir, i. 447).
Mignarize, to soothe, treat gently.
Men that are sound in their morals, and in
minutes imperfect in their intellectuals, are
best reclaimed when they are mignariz'd and
stroked gently. — Hacktt, Life of Williams,
i. 95.
Migrant, one who removes from one
place to another.
Your Grace has thrown open (for those
who are denied admittance into the palaces
of Parnassus) a cottage on its borders where
the unhappy migrants may be, if not magni-
ficently, at least hospitably, entertained. —
Foote, Dedic. to The Minor.
Milchy, milkgiving.
There, milchy goats come freely to the Paile,
Nor doe glad flocks with dugs distended fail.
Heath's Odes of Horace, Epode 16.
Mild, pity.
Then Progne phy for thee,
Which kildst thine only child,
Phy on the cruel crabbed heart
Which was notmovde with milde.
Gascoigne, Complaint of Philomene.
Milder, to moulder.
Unthankf ull wretch ! God's gifts thus to
reject,
And maken nought of Nature's goodly dower,
That milders still away through thy neglect.
H. More, Cupid's Conflict, st. 15.
Mildew. Wedgwood thinks that it
is owing to its white colour that mil-
dew is connected with honey-dew.
Some will have it called Mildew quasi
Maldew or Ill-dew ; others Meldew or Honey-
dew, as being very sweet (oh how lushious
and noxious is Flattery !) with the astrins;-
ency thereof causing an atrophy on [or f*]
consumption in the Grain. His etymology
was peculiar to himself, who would have it
termed Mildew, because it grindeth the Grain
aforehand, making it to dwindle away almost
to nothing. — Fuller, Worthies, Middlesex
(ii. 47).
Mildewy, belonging to mildew.
The damp mildewy smell which pervades
the place does not conduce in any great
degree to their comfortable appearance. —
Sketches by Box (Private Theatres).
Milrmarke, a milestone.
London-stone, which I take to have been
a milliary or milemarke such as was in the
mercate place at Rome. — Holland's Camden,
p. 423.
Militiate. In Walpole = to raise
militia ; in Sterne, militiating == mili-
tary.
We continue to militiate, and to raise light
troops, and when we have armed every ap-
prentice in England, I suppose we shall
transfer our fears to Germany.— Walpole to
Mann, iii. 346 (1758).
In the story of my father and his christen-
names, I had no thought of treading upon
MILK-AND-WATER ( 407 )
MILLING
Francis the first, nor in the affair of the
uose upon Francis the ninth, nor in the
character of my uncle Toby, of characterizing
the militiating spirits of my country. — Trist.
Shandy, iii. 177.
Milk-and-water, feeble ; insipid.
What slays a veteran may well lay a milk-
and-water bourgeois low. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. xxvi.
Milkdame, foster-nurse, wet-nurse.
Shee speaks too Barsen thee nurse of seallye
Sichsus,
For then her owne mylckdame in byrth soyl
was breathles abyding.
Stany hurst, JEn., iv. 681.
Milk-full, flowing with milk ; fertile.
O hony-dropping hills we yerst frequented!
O milk-full vales with hundred brooks in-
dented !
Delicious gardens of deer Israel !
Sylvester, The Decoy, 1053.
Milkmadge, milkmaid ; Madge or
Margery being a common female name.
At 1. 515, Stanyliurst uses Margery
for a witch.
Shal I now lyke a castaway milckmadge
On mye woers formoure be fawning?
Stany hurst, JEn., iv. 572.
Milk-meats, butter, cheese. &c.
Well then, compare ... a Jew abstaining
from swine's flesh, and a Christian abstain-
ing from flesh and milk-meats (lactariis) on
Friday. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 274.
Milk-warm, of the temperature of
new milk. Cf. extract s. v. Blood-
warm.
The water is but just milk-ioarm, so that
it is no less pleasant to go into than sanative.
Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, iii. 80.
They had baths of cool water for the
summer ; but in general they used it milk-
warm. — Smollett, France and Italy, Letter
xxxii.
Mill, the treadmill. See quotation
from Barham *. v. Nuts.
** Was you never on the mill ? " <• What
mill ? " enquired Oliver. " What mill ? why
the mill — the mill as takes up so little room
that it 11 work inside a stone-jug. — Dickens,
Oliver Twist, ch. viii.
Mill, to heat up and froth.
They then got up, and having breakfasted
on a pot of milled chocolate, they hurried to
London. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 235.
Mill, to fight ; also a substantive.
My lord related all his feats in London,
how he had been to the watchhouse, how
many bottles of champaign he had drunk,
how he had milled a policeman, &c. kc.—
Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, ch. viii.
He had storm 'd and treated her ill
Because she refus'd to go down to a mill,
She didn't know where, but remembered still
That the millet's name was Mendoza.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Now whether that word hath origin in a
Greek term meaning a conflict, as the best-
read boys asseverated, or whether it is nothing
more than a figure of similitude from the
beating arms of a mill, such as I have seen
in counties where are no water-brooks, but
folk made bread with wind, it is not for
a man devoid of scholarship to determine.
Enough that they who made the ring inti-
tuled the scene a mill, whilst we who must
be thumped inside it tried to rejoice in their
pleasantry, till it turned upon the stomach.
— Blackmore, lama Doone, ch. ii.
Mill-ben, a housebreaker (thieves'
cant).
The same capacity which qualifies a mill-
ben, a bridle-cull, or a buttock and file to
arrive at any degrees of eminence in his pro-
fession, would likewise raise a man in what
the world esteem a more honourable calling.
—Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. I. ch. v.
Milldoll, to do work on the tread-
mill ? (thieves' cant).
Marry come up, good woman ! the lady's a
—as well as myself, and though I am sent
hither to mill-doll, 1 have money enough to
buy it off as well as the lady herself.— Field-
ing, Amelia, Bk. I. ch. x.
Millenarian, one who looks for the
millennium.
Those who endeavour to revive the fable
of the Millenarians are therein contrary to
the Holy Scriptures, and cast themselves
down headlong into the Jewish dotages. —
Articles of Religion, 1552 (Art. xli.).
Tour very costermonger trolls out his
belief that "there's a good time coming,"
and the hearts of gamins as well as millen-
arians, answer, " True ! n — C. Kingsley, Feast.
ch. xvu.
Milliart, a milestone.
London-stone, which I take to have been
a milliary or milemarke, such as was in the
mercate place at Borne. — Holland's Camden,
p. 423.
Millifold, thousandfold.
Yet ere he parts his kisses millifold
Bewray his loue and louing diligence.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 27.
Milling, a thrashing.
Now Patrick, having fed his cattle,
Brush'd up his breakfast with a battle ;
Not such as boxing heroes try, *
To gain the well-paid victory ;
MILLIONIST
(408 )
MING
Or where resentment's rage fulfilling,
One blood gives t'other blood a milling.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. ii.
Millionist, millionnaire.
His revenue is less than that of many a
British peer, great commoner, or commer-
cial millionist. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
ccxxxiii.
Millionized, accustomed to millions.
To our now millionized conceptions the
foregoing accompts appear to be in a very
moderate ratio, — Arch., xxxiii. 201 (1849).
Mill-kkn, a housebreaker; men-
tioned among other names for thieves
of various sorts in The Nicker Nicked,
1669 (Harl. Misc., ii. 108).
Mill-lbat, a stream that conveys
water to a mill. Cf. Leat.
The spot ... is separated on the north-
east from the high land by the mill-teat
which feeds the town water-mill at Ware. —
ArchaoL, xxiv. 351 (1832).
Millocrat, a mill-owner; a pro-
minent manufacturer.
Millocrats . . . pile thousands upon thou-
sands, and acres upon acres, by the secret
mysteries of their wonderful compound of
human and divine machinery. — Mrs. Trollope,
Michael Armstrong, ch. ziii.
Those manufacturing fellows the
true blood-suckers, the venomous millocrats.
— Lytton, Cartons, Bk. II. ch. iv.
Millocratism, government by mil-
locrats, q. v.
His errors arose from intense sympathy
with the sufferings he had witnessed, amidst
the misery which accompanies the reign of
millocratism. — Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XIII. ch.
iv.
Mill-tail. See extract.
The Mill-tail, or Floor for the water below
the wheels, is wharf ed up on either side with
stone. — Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, i. 386.
Milt, moult (?).
Let men's beards milt, and women's bosoms
bleed;
Call forth my barbers.
Pesle, Edward J., p. 400.
Milwell. " Myllewell, a sort of
fish, the same with what in Lincoln-
shire is called millwyn, which Spelman
renders green fish ; but it was certainly
of a different kind." Kennett, Paroch,
Antiq. Gloss. (1695).
The yellow ling, the milwell fair and white.
Dennys, Secrets of Angling (Eng. Garner,
* i. 166).
Mim, prim ; retiring.
Wenches are brought up sa mim now-a-
days ; i' my time they'd ha' thought na' such
great harm of a kiss. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's
Lovers, ch. viii.
Mimm. The original is minimos, a
humbler title than the minors. Fuller
(see extracts, v. Subter-stjbterlativk)
wonders that none of the friars in their
affected humility had founded an order
of Minor minimos : according to Eras-
mus, but he is perhaps joking, there
was some such title.
Some will be called cordeliers, and these
subdivided into capuchines, minors, mimms,
and mendicants. — Kennct 's Erasm., Praise of
Folly, p. 112.
MlNDE-PARTS, 8enS08.
He (thinking his daughter's little wits had
quite left her great nowl) began to take her
in his arms ; thinking perchance her feeling
sense might call her mtnde parts unto her. —
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 407.
Mineless, without a mine.
There, without stroak, to conquer in the
field,
And mineless make their tumbling wals to
yield. — Sylvester, Little Bartas, 866.
Mineralogize, to collect or study
minerals.
He was botanizing or mineralogizina with
OToole's chaplain. — Miss Edgeworth, Ennui,
ch. xi.
Miner val, a gift from a scholar to a
master.
The chief Minerval which he bestowed
upon that Society was the structure of a
most goodly library, the best iu that kind in
all Cambridge.— Racket, Life of Williams, i.
96.
Ming, to mention. N. gives the
word in the sense of "to mi*;" and
then, giving the first quotation, adds,
" Hall seems to use it for to mention,
but it may mean, to mix in conversa-
tion." The second extract from the
same writer, however, shows that he
used it for " to mention ; " and Mr.
Singer states, "The word was in use iD
Northamptonshire in the times of Ray
and Lye.
Could never man work thee a worser shame,
Than once to minge thy father's odious
name.-M, Sat. IV. ii. 80
Meanwhile the memory of his mighty name
Shall live as long as aged earth shall last :
Enrolled on the beryl walls of fame,
Aye mimfd, aye mourn 'd. — Ibid., Elegy on
Dr. Whitaher. w
MINIFY
( 409 )
MINX
Minify, to make little.
Is man magnified or minified by consider-
ing himself as tinder the influence of the
heavenly bodies? — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
197.
Minikin, properly, a lute string. See
H., 8. v.
Sir Francis answered him with the old
simile, that his Lordship was no good musician,
for he would peg the minikin so high that it
cracked. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 147.
This day Mr. Caesar told me a pretty ex-
periment of his, of angling with a minnikin,
a gut-string varnished over, which keeps it
from swelling, and is beyond any hair for
strength and smallness. — Pepys, March 18,
1667.
Minimificence, little doings ; op-
posed to magnificence.
When all your magnificences and my
minimificences are finished, then .... 1 fear
we shall begin others. — Walpole, Letters, ii.
122 (1759).
Miniminess, extreme smallness.
And re wee, referring to what is said
about Bethlehem in Micah v. 2, and St.
Matthew ii. 6, says that the prophet's
word parvula (Vulgate) is turned by
the Evangelist into minima; from this
he coins the term in the extract ; for,
after naming certain fitnesses in the
selection of Bethlehem as the birth-
place of our Lord, he adds,
But these, though they agree well, yet
none of them so well as tins, that it was
minima — the very miniminess, as 1 may say,
of it. — Andrewes, i. 160.
Minion, a small gun.
Then let us bring our light artillery,
Minions, falc'nets, and sakers to the trench.
Marlowe, II. Tomb. iii. 3.
Misionette, delicate; effeminate.
Last night at Vauxhall his minionette face
seemed to be sent to lauguish with Lord K.
Bertie's.— Walpole, Letters, i. 205 (1749).
Minionise, to favour ; Da vies is
speaking of the Apostles as the minions
of our Lord.
Tou did none other than His Minions did,
Whom, of base groomes, His grace did min-
ionize,
Tet in His trouble all their heads they hid.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 26.
Ministello, a poor, petty minister.
What pitiful Ministellos, what pigmy Pres-
byters, what plebeian Preachers this nation
in after-ages is like to have ! — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 194.
Ministbator, administrator.
Having a reverence for so much as is called
the law, and the ministrators of it in that
time, I thought it reasonable to bid defiance
to this bold traducer, and turning turn round
shew his canvass back. — North, Examen,
p. 74.
Ministry. See quotation. "That
time "= time of Charles II.
To shew an instance of the author's tack-
ing the terms used of late to the affairs of
that time, . . . I must tell him that the
word Ministry was not then in use, but
Counsellors or Courtiers. For the King him-
self then took so much upon him, that the
ministers had not that aggregate title, as
if the Government had been but a Party,
and the ministers swayed it as they were
disposed to favour or to frown. — North,
Examen, p. 69.
Minorative. See quotation.
I let pass how for a minorative or gentle
potion he took four hundred pound weight
of colophoniac scaramony. — Urguhart's Rabe-
lais, Bk. II. ch. 33.
Minorite, an inferior or subordinate.
For a better colour to make licentious
invectives, the Bespondent takes no notice
that a Bishop wrote the letter : for why not
rather some minor ite among the clergy? —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 102.
Minsical, delicate.
A certain shee creature, which wee shep-
herds call a woman, of a minsical counten-
ance.— Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Minth, mint.
The primrose, and the purple hyacinth,
The dainty violet, and the wholesome minth.
Peele, Arraignment of Paris, I. i.
Minutary, precise to a minute or
tittle.
In such no mortal man can assign the
minutary juncture of time, when preparing
grace (which cleared the ground) ended, and
saving grace (which finish 'd the fabrick of
conversion) did first begin. — Puller, Ch. Hist.,
III. Dedication.
Minute-men. See quotation.
An account is come of the Bostonians
having voted an army of sixteen thousand
men, who are to be called minute-men, as
they are to be ready at a minute's warning.
— Walpole, Letters, iv. 2 (1775).
Minx, a lap-dog; now applied (like
bitch) as a term of reproach to a woman.
Sylvester (The Captaines, 386) has
Minks as the proper name of a dog ; in
that case, however, it is a gray-bitch.
There are tye dogs or mastifes ft r keep-
inge of houses; there ben litle minns or
pupees that ladies keepe in their cbaumbers
for especial jewels to playe withal. . . . When
MIP
( 410 ) MI SCONCE IT
I am hungry I am a title mynxe f ul of playe,
and when my bealy is full a mastife.— UdaTs
Erasmus1* Apophth., p. 143.
Mip. H. gives this as a nymph, but
in the extract Furor and Phantasm a,
who are addressed, are of the mascu-
line gender.
Come, brave mips, gather up your spirits,
and let us march on like adventurous
knights. — Return from Parnassus, Hi. 4
(1006).
Mire, to wonder.
Heere but alas he myred what course may
be warelye taken. — Stanyhurst, ^En.f iv. 292.
Mirific, marvel-making.
In the space of very few years you should
be sure to see the sancts much thicker in
the roll, more numerous, wonder-working,
and mirific. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. III.
ch. iv.
Misachievement, wrong-doing.
Let them sink in obscurity that hope to
swim in credit by such mis-atchievements. —
Fuller, Worthies, Cornwall (i. 209).
Misact, to act or represent badly.
The player that mi sad s an inferior and
unnoted part carries it away without cen-
sure.— Adams, i. 391.
Misadventurous, unfortunate.
He was bent upon the search of his misad-
venturous adventures. — Jarvis's Don Quixote,
Pt. II. Bk. II. ch. i.
1 feared
The tidings of our misadventurous synod
Augured but ill for both of you.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iv. 1.
Misadvertence, carelessness, want of
attention.
And once by misadvertence Merlin sat
In his own chair, and so was lost.
Tennyson, Holy Grail.
Misanthropos. This word is used
by Shakespeare (Timon of Athens, iv.
3), and the second extract would seem
to show that in 1660 it had not then
been Anglicised. The earliest instance
of misanthrope given in the Diets, is
from Swift.
Defye them all. finravdpturoi
And sqynteyd monsters ryght
They are.
A. NevyU, Verses prefixed
to Gooae's Eylogs.
Sir, I am grown a tru misanthropos, a
hater of men. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p.
131.
Misavkr, to assert wrongly.
Job hath mis-averrd.
And, wide of Wisdome, his discourse hath
err'd.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, iv. 215.
Miscall, to abuse: the distinction
marked by Fuller is worth noting. Cf .
Spenser, F. Queene, IV. iv. 24.
I admire much that Matthew of West-
minster writeth him [Walter de Wenlock]
William de Wenlock, and that a Monk of
Westminster should (though not mt'scaff)
mis-name the Abbot thereof. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Salop (ii. 257).
Miscape, to let forth inadvertently.
Not one day of all my lyfe, no, not one
houre I trow, was so truely expended to the
pleasure of God, but many deeds, words, and
thoughtes miscajped me in my lyfe. — Bp.
Fisher, Sermons, 1. 359.
Miscensure, misjudge : also, a sub-
stantive.
Pardon us, Antiquitie, if we miscensure
your actions, which are ever (as those of
men) according to the vogue and sway of
times. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 101.
Therefore, my Friends, return, recant, recall
Tour hard opinions, and mis-Censures all.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, ii. 162.
Mischancy, unlucky.
If ever I should be so mischancy as to
last so long as Ghysbrecht did . . . I'll thank
and bless any young fellow who will knock
me on the head. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. xix.
Mischiefful, mischievous.
Ah ! many's the merry freak we have had !
for this I must say, though Mat was but
bad at his book, for mischiefful matters there
wasn't a more ingenious, cuterer lad in the
school.— Foote, The Nabob, Act III.
Miscoloured, wrongly coloured, or
represented.
There was a £rand half-truth distorted
and miscoloured in the words, that silenced
me for the time. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. xxxiii.
Miscommit, to do amiss.
Remit, o Lord, what I have ill omitted ;
Remove (alas !) what I have mis-committed.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, i. 518.
Miscomplain, to complain wrongly.
Therefore doth Job open his mouth in vain,
And voyd of knowledge vet, yet mis-com-
plain.— Sylvester, Job Triumphant, iv. 256.
Misconceit, to misconceive.
If you would not misconceit that I studi-
ously intended your defamation, you shoulde
have thicke haile-shot of these. — Nashe, Len-
ten Stuff (Harl. Misc., vi. 180).
MISCONSTRUABLE ( 4" )
MIS-KEEP
Misconstruable, capable of mis-
construction.
If he had been taken up as a presupposed
prostitute oat of the goal without any dis-
covery leading to him, it had been miscon-
struabU, but not when there was express
proof that he was concerned. — North, Ex~
amen, p. 113.
Discontentment, discontent.
I here no specialte of the Kinges Majestes
ntyscontentement in this matter or landes, but
confusely that my doinges should not be
wel taken. — Bp. Gardiner to Paget, 1546
(Jfaitland on Be/., p. 332).
Miscreation, wrong or distorted
making.
Great dirty warrens of houses, miscalled
cities, peopled with savages and imps of our
own misertation. — C. KingsUy, 1871 {Life, ii.
277).
Miscredit, to disbelieve.
The miscredited Twelve hasten back to the
chateau for an answer in writing. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. vii.
Misdain, to misdeem ; misrepresent.
None but papistes or traytors can justly
accuse them of treason or disobedience ; of
whom to be misdained or slandered is in the
eyes of the godly no small commendation
and prayse. — Goodman, 1555 (Maitland on
Reformation, p, 122).
Misdoom, to misjudge.
Know, there shall Judgment com
To doom them right who others (rash) mis*
doom. — Sylvester, Job Triumphant, ii. 287.
Mis-eating, wrongful eating.
So that th' old yeers renewed generations
Cannot asswage his venging indignations,
Which haue no other ground to prosecute
But the miseating of a certain fruit.
Sylvester, The Imposture, 497.
Misenroll, to enroll wrongly.
To say thou wast the forme (that is the soule)
Of all this all, I should thee mistnroule
In booke of life.
Davits, Musis Sacrifice, p. 64.
Misepiscopist, a hater of bishops or
of episcopacy. Cf. Misoclebe.
Those misepiscopists . . . envied and denyed
that honour to this or any other Bishops. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 640.
Miserable, a wretch.
His lordship, . . . where he saw reason,
inclined to assist the miserables. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, i. 314.
lis a cruel journey to send a few miser-
ables. — Sterne, Ant. Journey, Montriul.
Hundreds of orphans and widows, and
other miserables, perish for want of the
sustenance which one infernal appetite de-
vours without remorse. — H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, i. 371.
Misfaith, mistrust.
A woman and not trusted, doubtless I
Might feel some sudden turn of anger born
Of your misfaith.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivian.
Mis-fate, misfortune.
Be mute that list and muzzle they their stile,
On whom his Bounty never daign'd to smile,
Were 't throw their own misfate in having
none,
Or, having Vertues, not to have them known.
Sylvester, Panaretus, 1405.
Mis fond, foolishly fond. Sylvester
(Little Bartas, 822) says that kings
ought to protect their subjects " with-
out mufond affection."
Misfortunate, unfortunate.
We were the poorest of all, madam, and
have been misfortunate from the beginning.
—Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. I. ch. ix.
My master aware,
If he should lose the day, the cause should
lie
In that misfortunate wasting of his strength
By sending aid to Ypres.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. iv. 4.
Misgestured, awkward or careless
in outward bearing.
The God of spirits doth most respect the
soule of our devotion, yet it is both vnman-
nerly and irreligious to be misgestured in
our prayers. — Hall, Contemjylotions (Foyle of
Amalek).
Mis-heed, carelessness. See another
example from Sylvester 8. v. Un-
HALLOW-WASHED.
But I think better not be borne,
Or, born, hence quickly to return
To our Mother's dusty lap ;
Than living, daily here to dye,
In cares, and feares, and miserie,
By Mis-heed, or by Mis-hap.
Sylvester, Map of Man, 312.
Misintelligence, wrong information.
Mr. Lort was certainly misinformed ... I
showed one or two of them to a person since
my recovery, who may have mentioned them,
and occasioned Mr. Lort's misintelligence. — •
Walpole, Letters, iv. 151 (1779).
Mis-keep, to keep wrongly. Cf.
Eccles.v. 13, " riches kept for the own-
era thereof to their hurt. '
Goods are great Us to those that cannot use
them;
Misers mis~keep, and Prodigals mis-spend
them.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalitie, st. 75.
MISLIGHT
( 412 ) M1SRESEMBLANCE
Mislight, to light wrongly, to lead
by a false light.
No Will o' th' Wispe mislight thee ;
Nor snake or slow-worme bite thee.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 232.
Mislikeness, bad likeness.
This countenance, such as it is,
So oft by rascally mislikenesa wrong'd.
Southey, To A. Cunningham,
Mislike with, to dislike ; disapprove
of.
Wise and graue men doe naturally mislike
with all sodaine innouations, specially of
lawes. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch.
xui.
Misliveb, an evil liver.
Therefore as mislyuers obstinate,
Tbey were destroyed nowe of late
With pestilence and dent of sworde.
Roy and Harlow, Rede me and
be nott wroth, p. 121.
M18LOCATION, misplacement. Fuller,
inserting Sir W. Windsor among the
Bucks Worthies, says, " I am confident
herein is no mislocation," (i. 141).
Misluck, to meet with bad fortune \
to miscarry.*
They are to ride by two different roads
towards Bohemia, that if one misluck, there
may still be another to make terms. — Carlyle,
Misc., iv. 343.
Mis-manners, ill breeding.
I hope your honour will excuse my mis-
manners to whisper before yon ; it was only
to give some orders about the family. — Van-
brughy The Relapse, iv. 1.
Mismate, to mismatch.
Be not too wise,
Seeing that ye are wedded to a man,
Not all mismated with a yawning clowu.
Tennyson, Geraiwt and Enid.
Misoclere, clergy-hating. Cf. Mis-
EPISC0P1ST.
King Henry the sixth acted herein by
some misoclere courtiers sent this Archbishop
for a new year's gift a shred -pie indeed,
as containing pieces of cloath and stuff of
several sorts and colours, in jeer because his
father was a taylor. — Fuller, Ch. Hist. IV.
iii. 11.
MtsooRAMMATisT, hater of letters or
learning.
Wat Tyler . . being a Misogrammatist (if
a good Greek word may be given to so bar-
barous a rebel) bated every man that could
write or read. — Puller, Worthies, Suffolk (U.
341).
Mispaint, to paint wrongly.
In the details, lucent often with fine
colour, and dipt in beautiful sunshine, there
are several things misseen, untrue, which is
the worst species of mispainting. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, Pt. II. ch. v.
Mispatch, having patches in wrong
places.
Now and then flitted in, to the number of
half-a-dozen or more by turns, subordinate
sinners . . wiuking and pinking, mispatcherl*
▼awning, stretching. — Richardson, CI. H*r-
lowe, viii. 158.
Misplead, to plead wrongly.
Perhaps the mispleading of a word shall
forfeit all.— Adams, ii. 482.
Mispolicy, wrong policy ; in the ex-
tract it seems to mean disaffection.
Any man may graduate in the schools of
Irreligion and Mispolicy, if he have a glib
tongue and a brazen forehead. — Southey, Th*
Doctor, ch. xcvi.
Mispdnctuate, to stop wrongly.
The writer who neglects punctuation, or
mis-punctuates, is liable to be misunderstood.
— E. A. Poe, Marginalia, V.
Mispursdit, a wrong or mistaken
pursuit.
The constant gist of his discourse was
lamentation over the sunk condition of the
world, which he recognised to be given up
to Atheism and Materialism,- full of mere
sordid misbeliefs, mispursuits, and miaresnlts.
— Carlyle, Life of Sterling, ch. viii.
Misreper, to refer or report wrongly.
For how can humane wisdome chuse but
erre,
When all hir science comes from th* outward
senses,
Which oft misapprehend and missereferre,
And so betrays our best intelligences.
Dames, Mirum in Modum, p. 12.
Misreflect, to reflect wrongly; mis-
represent.
To the censorious world who, like false
glasses,
Mingling their own irregular figures,
Misreflect the object, I shall appear
Some sinful woman, sold to infamy.
Tuke, Adventures of Five Hours, Act IV.
Misreporter, one who reports
wrongly.
We find yon shameful liars and mis-
reporters. — Philpot, p. 115.
I am glad to see you, Mr. Belford, said
she ; I must say so, let misrevorters say what
they will.— Richardson, C7. Harlqwe, viL 264.
Misresemblance, bad likeness.
The gallery
Of the Dutch Poet's mtsresemMances.
Southey, To A, Cunningham,
MISRESULT
( 4i3)
MISS W A Y
Misresult, a wrong or mistaken re-
sult. See extract *. v. Mxspubsuit.
Missal, a missive.
As the Puritans were encouraged to this
separation by the Missals and decretory
Letters of Theodore Beza, . . so were the
Papists animated to their defection by a
Bull of Pope Pius the Fifth.— Hey tin's Hist,
of the Presbyterians, p. 261.
Miss- answer, failure.
He that after the misse-answer of the one
talent, would not trust the euill seruant with
a second, because Hee saw a wilful neglect,
will trust Moses with his second Law because
Hee saw fidelitie in the worst errour of his
zeale. — Hall, Contemplations ( Vaylt of Moses).
Missatical, pertaining to the mass.
He profess'd open adherence to the
Romish Church, and did not renounce the
missatical corruption of their priesthood. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 101.
Missee, to take a wrong view : see
another example from the same author
*. v. Mispaint.
Herein he fundamentally mistook, mis-saw,
and so miswent, poor Prince, in all manner
of ways. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 236.
Mis-sense, misunderstand. Sylvester
has the word as a substantive dedicating
Honour's Farewell to certain noble
persons " without Offence, without
Mis-tense, or Blame/'
The false prophets . . . caused the people
not only to mislike the gospel of Christ that
they had received at St. Paul's hand, but also
to mis-sense the sacraments. — Jewel, i. 3.
Mis-sentence, wrong sentence.
That mis-sentence which pronounced by a
plain and understanding man would appear
most gross and palpable, by their colours,
quotations, and wrenches of the law would
be made to pass for current and specious. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 72.
Mission, to send or commission.
Me Allah and the Prophet mission here.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. V.
Lamia
Missioned her viewless servants.
Keats, Lamia, Pt. II.
General Belgrano with a force of a thousand
men missioned by Buenos Ayres came up the
river.— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 274.
MissisH, affected ; sentimental. Cf .
Missy.
But, Lizzy, you look as if you did not en-
ioy it. Ton are not going to be missish, I
iope, and pretend to be affronted at an idle
report. — Miss Austen, Pride and Prejudice,
ch. lvii.
How grieved I am you do not like my
heroine's name; the prettiest in nature! I
remember how many people did not like
that of Evelina, and called it affected and
missish till they read the book. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 47.
Miss-maze, a labyrinth. "I was all
of a mizmaze "= 1 was all in bewilder-
ment (Parish's Sussex Glossary).
Patterne of Vice, and Mould of Vanitie,
Made of the Molde that marres whatere it
makes;
Error's misse-maze, where lost is Veritie,
Or blinded so, that still wrong course it
takes. — Davits, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 10.
Misspeak, to blame or calumniate.
JEn . . Ah, shepherds, you bin full of wiles,
and whet your wits on books,
And rape poor maids with pipes and songs
and sweet alluring looks.
Dig . Mi sspeak not all for hir amiss; there
bin that keepen flocks,
That never chose but once, nor yet beguiled
love with mocks.
Pede, Arraignment of Paris, III. i.
Who but mis-speaks of Thee, hee spets at
Heaven. — Sylvester, The Decay, 616.
Missucceed, to turn out ill. R has
missuccess, with extract from Bp. Hall.
Miscarriages in his Government (many by
mismanaging, more by the missucceeding of
matters) exposed him [Richard II.] to just
exception. — Fuller, Worthies, Lincoln (ii. 7).
Missuit, to suit ill.
That Robe of Power, which those doth much
mis-suit,
Who have not on rare Vertue's richest Suit.
Sylvester, St. Lewis, 585.
He will not swagger nor boast
Of his country's meeds, in a tone
Missuiting a great man most
If such should speak of his own.
Mrs. Browning, Napoleon III. in Italy.
Missummation, misreckoning, mis-
take in adding up.
An inroad on the strongbox, or an erasure
in the ledger, or a mis-summation in a fitted
account, could hardly have surprised him
more disagreeably. — Scott, Bob Boy, i. 24.
Missure, mission.
This current parts itself into two rivulets
— a commission, a commixtion : the missure,
'* I send you," the mixture, " as lambs among
wolves." — Adams, ii. 110.
Mis- sway, to misrule.
Omitting other Princes, to descend
To the first Edward, that did just refine
MISSY
( 4H )
M1XTIF0RM
This Common-weale, and made the same
ascend
When through mis-swaying it seem'd to
decline. — Davits, Microcosmos, p. 60.
Missy, sentimental; young-ladyish.
Gf. Missish.
Her ladyship, I am convinced, has too
much discrimination, and values herself too
highly to make such a missy match. — Miss
Edueworth, Vivian, ch. xiii.
You cannot, I conceive, satisfy yourself
with the common namby-pamby little missy
phrase, ** ladies have nothing to do with
politics." — Ibid., Helen, ch. xxviii.
Mistkll, to miscount.
Their prayers are by the dozen, when if
they miss-tell one, they thinke all the rest
lost. — Breton, Strange Neves, p. 5.
And that Bizanttan Prince that did miss-tell
A four-fould Essence in the onely One.
Sylvester, Triumph of Faith, c. i. st. xxxv.
Mistitlb, to describe "wrongly.
Who then will venture to declare
That man's mistitled sorrow's heir?
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xxi.
Mistless, free from mist.
How soft are the nights of the continent !
How bland, balmy, safe! No sea-fog; no
chilling damp ; mistless as noon, and fresh as
morning. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. adv.
Mistradition, wrongful tradition.
My faith would seem
Dead or half-drown 'd, or else swam heavily]
Against the huge corruptions of the Church,
Monsters of mistradition, old enough
To scare me into dreaming, *• What am I,
Cranmer, against whole ages ? "
Tennyson, Queen Mary, iv. 2.
Mistral, see extract.
Did you ever hear of a mistral ? It is on
this wise. The whole of the air between the
Alps and Pyrenees rushes into the Mediter-
ranean from north-west — a three or four
days' gale, with a bright blue sky, cold wind,
parchiug and burning, with not dust merely
but gravel flying till the distances are aa
thick as in an English north-easter. It is
a fearful wind, and often damages crops
severely; but they say it is healthy and
bracing. — C. Kingsley, 1864 {Life, ii. 178).
Mistreat, to ill-treat.
A poor mistreated democratic beast.
Southey, Nondescripts, iv.
Mistress, to become mistress of.
Cf. Master, which is in common use.
This one is a first-rate gilder, she mistressed
it entirely in three days. — Reade, Never too
late to Mend, ch. zlii.
Mistressly, pertaining to the mistress
of a household.
Will he take from me the mistressly man-
agement, which I had not faultily dis-
charged?— Richardson, CI. HarUnoe, i. 298.
M18U8ANCE, misusage.
The clients at the bar had studied the good
nature of this Lord, and presaged that after
he had chafed at their misusanee, they might
promise to themselves a good cast of his
office long before the sun set. — Hacket, Life
of Williams, i. 202.
Mis-waste, to lavish foolishly.
Their Health, Wealth, Wit, misvasted,
Are but as blossoms blasted.
Sylvester, Spectacles, st. viii.
Mis-word, a cross, wrong, or awk-
ward word ; still used in Sussex and
Surrey.
That form of rule is a right comon-weal,
Where all the people haue an enter-deal :
Where (without aw or law) the tyrant's
sword
Is not made drunk with blond for a miss-
word. — Sylvester, The Captaines, 1015.
I haue receiued your snappish letter,
whereby I see you are more angry then I
thought you would haue beene for a mis-
word or two. — Breton, Packet of Letters,
p. 23.
Miter, top (?) ; as mitre is a head-
covering.
For like as in a limbeck th' heat of fire
Baiseth a vapour, which still mounteth
higher
To the still's top ; when th* odoriferous sweat
Above that miter can no further get,
It softly thickning falleth drop by drop.
Sylvester, third day, first treekc, 138.
Mitigatory, extenuation.
Now he is grown milder, and with much
moderation concerned for the poor sufferers ;
he talks of hard usages, and straining points
of law in cases of life, and such mitigatories.
— North, Examen, p. 316.
Mixible, capable of mingling.
Mizion vnites things mixible by change,
Or intermingling of their substances :
Things mixible are they which, though they
range,
Are yet contained in cither's essences.
Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 9.
Mixtiform, of mixed shape ; com-
posed of miscellaneous elements.
The General . . . speaks vaguely some
smooth words to the National President,
glances, only with the eye, at that so mixti-
form National Assembly ; then fares forward
towards the Chateau. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
I. Bk. VII. ch. ix.
MIZES
(4i5 )
MODE
Mizes. "The proGts of lands ; taxes or
tallages: expences or costs." (Bailees
Diet.)
Yon threaten . . . those that shall refuse
to pay any of your illegal and (now that the
war is ended) unnecessary impositions by
way of excise, loan, mizes, weekly and
monthly assessments. — British Bellman,
1648 (Harl. Misc., vii. 628).
Mob. See quotation from North.
Farquhar uses mob for clown. The
club to which North refers was the
Green Ribbon Club.
I may note that the rabble first changed
their title, and were called the mob, in the
assemblies of this club. — North, Examen,
p. 574.
Enter Kite with a mob in each hand drunk.
— Farquhar, Recruiting Officer, Act II.
Whenever this word [niob] occurs in our
writings, it intends persons without virtue
or sense in all stations ; and many of the
highest rank are often meant by it. — Fielding,
Tom Jones, Bk. I. ch. ix. note.
Mobbify out, to drive out by a mob,
to rabble.
This same High and Low shall . . . serve
for noise, and mobbifv out at elections con-
formable loyal gentlemen, whom we will
cry down for High Men, that is Adherents
to Popery. — North, Examen, p. 346.
Mob-driver, demagogue.
Colonel Hildmay an old Rumper, and late
mob-driver in Essex. — North, Examen, p. 126.
Yet a sideling-writer in harness upon the
road to a rebellion, without a single-faced
instance, shall cry, O the Papists are set up !
just as his mob-drivers did to their rabble. —
Ibid., p. 343.
Mobile, mover, or principle of
motion.
O Heaven crystalline,
Which by thy watry hue
Dost temper and refine
The rest in azurM blue ;
His glory sound,
Thou first Mobile,
Which mak'st all wheel
In circle round.
Howell, Letters, I. v. 11.
Mobma6ter, a demagogue.
Faction always sustains their project of
destroying the Government by inflaming the
rabble, or at least by making an appearance
as if they were inflamed, which is done by a
sort of military disposition of mob-masters
about in corners, that upon the watch- word
are to bring forward some hare-brained rout
which they call the people. — North, Examen,
p. 571.
Mobocracy, rule of the mob.
It is a good name that a Dr. Stevens has
given to our present situation (for one can-
not call it a Government), a Mobocracy. —
Walpole to Mann, iii. 245 (1757).
I must tell you a gooa sort of quirk of
Mr. Wilkes, who, when the power of the
mob and their cruelty were first reciting,
quarrelled with a gentleman for saying the
French government was become a democracy,
and asserted it was rather a mobocracy. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, v. 76.
Mocayare, mockado ; a stuff made
in imitation of velvet (Ital. moccaiaro).
There are also cotton wool ; tanned hides ;
hides in the hair ; wax ; camlets ; mocayares ;
grogerams.— Campion, Trade to Scio, 1570
{Eng. Gamer, i. 52).
Moccinigo, a small Venetian coin,
worth about ninepence.
Tou shall not give me rix crowns, nor five,
nor four, nor three, nor two, nor one, nor
half a ducat ; no, nor a moccinigo. Sixpence
it will cost you. — Jonson, Fox, II. i.
Mockado, mockery: the word is
usually applied to a stuff; a mock-
velvet. See N.
Neither of them would sit, nor put their
hats on : what mockado is this to such a
poor soul as I. — Richardson, Pamela, ii. 37.
Mock-god, a derider of God.
Think of this, you monsters, scorners, and
mock-gods, that forget your consciences, lest
they awake and tear you in pieces.— Ward,
Sermons, p. 100.
But what shall I say to such mock-god-like
Bsaus?— Ibid., p. 125.
Mock-guest, one who seems to offer
hospitality, but only in empty show, like
the Barmecide in the Arabian Nights.
Though charity commands me to believe
that some women which hang out agues,
notwithstanding will not lodge strangers;
yet those mock-guests are guilty in tempting
others to tempt them. — Fuller, Holy State,
I. i. 7.
Mock-mouths: " mouths have they
and speak not.'1
Those idols with their hands were so far
from defending themselves, that their mock-
mouths could not afford one word to bemoan
their finall destruction. — Fuller, Ch. Hut..
II. ii. 43.
Mode, to follow the mode; to be
fashionable.
Here he was accounted dypotKorrpot,
somewhat clownish, by the Romish Court,
because he could not mode it with the
Italians.— Fuller, Worthies, Sussex (ii. 388).
He could not mode it, or comport either
with French fickleness or Italian pride. —
Ibid., Warwick, ii. 407.
MODELIZE
(416 )
MOKE
Modelizk, to model See Modulize.
Which . . some silly saints and devout
bunglers will undertake to manage and
modelize beyond their line and measure. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 426.
Moderation-monger, professor of
moderation, used contemptuously.
Would St. Paul have rebuked such new-
fashion 'd extraordinary Christians, or would
he not? And if he would, do we imagine
that he would have done it in the modern
treacherous dialect, Touch not my rebels
and do my fanaticks no harm ? No moder-
ation-monger under heaven shall ever per-
suade me that St. Paul would have took
such a course with such persons. — South,
vi. 83.
Moderatress, female moderator or
President.
As there was something too little, so some-
thing too much for a canonicall councill ;
Hilda, a woman, being Moderatresse therein,
which seemed irregular.— Fuller, Ch. Hist,
II. ii. 90.
Moderatbix, mode rat ress, q. v.
Wisedom from above
Is th' only moderatrix, spring, and guide,
Organ and honour of all gifts beside.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 348.
Make your demands,
I'll sit as moderatrix, if they press you
With over-hard conditions.
Massinger, City Madam, ii. 2.
The Queen Mother, moderatrix of this and
all other solemn negotiations in France at
that time. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 210.
The debate was closed, and referred to
Mrs. Shirley as moderatrix. — Richardson,
Grandison, vi. 387.
Modernity, a piece of modern work ;
modernness.
But here is a modernity which beats all
antiquities for curiosity. — Walpole, Letters, i.
313 (1753).
Now that the poems have been so moch
examined, nobody (that has an ear} can get
over the modernity of the modulations, and
the recent cast of the ideas and phraseology.
Ibid., iv. 297 (1782).
Modestless, wanting in modesty.
Alas ! how faithles and how modest-les
Are you that (in your Ephemerides)
Mark th' yeer, the month, the day, which
euermore
Gainst yeers, months, days, shall dam-vp
Saturnes dore.
Sylvester, First day, first weeke, 410.
Modesty. To modesty away = to
lose through modesty.
Twice already have you, my dear, if not
oftener, modesty*d airay such opportunities
as you ought not to have slipped. — Richard-
son, CI. Harlotce, iv. 88.
Modesty-bit, " a narrow lace which
runs along the upper part of the stays
before, being a part of the tucker."
This is Addison's deGnition (in the
Guardian) of the modesty-piece as
given in L.
Smile if you will, young ladies! your
great-grandmothers wore large hoops, peaked
stomachers, and modesty-bits. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. lvi.
Modicum, inannikin.
Marc. Where are you, you modicum, you
dwarf?
Mart. Here, giantess, here.
Massinger, Duke of Milan, Act I J.
Modulet, a little model, applied here
to man as the microcosm.
But soft, my mtise ! what, wilt thou re-repeat
The little world's admired modulet ?
Sylvester, Seventh day, first weeke, 747.
Modulize, to model. See Modelize.
While with the Duke, th' Eternal! did devise,
And to his inward sight did modulize
His Tabernacle's admirable form.
Sylvester, The Law, 1115.
Mody, fashionable ; modish.
Mr. Longman would have me accept of
several yards of Holland, and a silver snuff-
box, and a gold ring .... I said, M O, dear
Mr. Longman, you make me too rich and too
mody. — Richardson, Pamela, i. 128.
Mohock.
Bob Tench was never at a loss for expedi-
ents, and had always a little phial of Fryar's
Balsam in his pocket, some gold-beater's
skin, and court-plaister, as well as his cork-
screw and mohock. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. X. ch. zxiv.
Moistry, moisture.
No Shire can shew finer ware, which hath
so large measure ; being generally fruitful,
though little moistry be used tnereon. —
Fuller, Worthies, So/nerset (ii. 275).
Moited, moithered (V). The meaning
seems to be " made u game of," " baited."
I would not willingly be present when
They interchange their hearts ; she will shew
too much
A tyrant, if she be not satisfied
With what was mine, but I must be moited
To be their triumph.
Shirley, The Gamester, Act V.
Moke, a donkey : said to be a gipsy
word.
Miss Chummey, when entreated by two
young gentlemen of the order of coster-
mongers, inclines to the one who rides from
MOLE-SPADE ( 4*7 ) MONEY MONGER
market on a moke, rather than to the gentle-
man who sella hia greens from a handbasket.
— Thackery, Newcomes, ch.
Mole-spade, a spade or spud used in
prodding for moles (?).
Poore Menaphon neither asked hia swaynes
for his sheepe, nor tookc hia mole-spade on
his necke to see his pastures— Greene, Mena-
phon, p. S3.
Molest, trouble.
Thus clogg'd with love, 'with passions, and
with grief,
I saw the country life had least molest.
Greene {from the Morning
Garment), p. 309.
Moliture, multure, a fee paid in
kind for the use of a mill. See Moul-
tdre.
This claim of universal power and authority
doth bring more moliture to their mill. —
Bramhall, ii. 159.
Moloch ize, immolate as to Moloch.
The people are as thick as bees below,
They hum like bees — they cannot speak —
for awe ;
Look to the skies, then to the river, strike
Their hearts, and bold their babies up to it
I think that they would Molochize them too,
To have the heavens clear.
Tennyson, Harold, I. i.
Moment, to arrange to a moment.
All accidents are minuted and momented by
Divine Providence.— -iWfcr. Worthies, Suffolk
(ii. 334).
Momently, each moment ; moment by
moment. The Diets, have momentally ;
momentarily.
Her face grew momently darker, more
dissatisfied, and more sourly expressive of
disappointment. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch.
xviii.
He contrived to impress me momently with
the conviction that I was put beyond the
pale of his favour. — Ibid., ch. xxxv.
Momish, foolish. The verses from
which the extract is taken are by Alex-
ander Neuyll.
Right so thy Muse (o worthy Googe),
Thy pleasaunt framed style,
Discoverd lyes to momish mouthes,
Reprochfull tongs, and vyle
Diffaming minds.
Verses prefixed to Googe's Eylogs.
Monasterially, iiionastically.
It is not the habit that makes the monk,
many being monasterially accoutred, who
inwardly are nothing less than monachal. —
Crquhart, Rabelais, bk. i., Author's Prologue.
Monday. Working men who are given
to drink, very often make Monday a
holiday; not being up to their work
after the Sunday's dissipation ; hence
it is called Saint Monday. For Black
Monday see «. v. Black.
I continued with him several years, work-
ing when he worked, and while he was keep-
ing Saint Monday, I was with boys of my
own age, fighting, cudgel-playing, wrestling,
&c. — life of J. Lackington, Letter iii.
Monday's Handsell. H. says " Han-
sel-Monday is the first Monday in the
year, when it is usual to make presents
to children and servants." Patten re-
lates how a Captain and twenty-one
soldiers, "a bunch of beggars," gave
themselves up to the English, and that
the Captain and six of these were given
into the custody of the Provost Mar-
shall rather " to take Monday's hand-
sell than for hope of advantage." —
(Earned, to ScotL, 1548. Eng. Garner,
iii. 84).
Money. " Money makes the mare to
go," a saying expressive of the power
of money ; but also frequently used to
insinuate that a bribe has been taken.
As money makes the mare to go,
Even so it makes the lawyer too.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. ii.
I'm making the mare go here in Whitford,
without the money too sometimes. — Kingsley,
Two Fears Ago, 7ntrod.
Money-dropper, a sharper who scrapes
acquaintance with a dupe by asking
him about a piece of money which he
pretends to have just picked up ; this
oegets confidence and companionship,
which the cheat takes advantage of to
fleece the other. Cf . Ring-dropper.
He assured us . . . that this polite, honest,
friendly, humane person who had treated us
so civilly, was no other than a rascally money-
dropper, who made it his business to decoy
strangers in that manner to one of his own
haunts, where an accomplice or two were
always waiting to assist in pillaging the prey
they had run down. — Smolletty Rod. Random,
ch. xv.
Money-monoer, a dealer in money ;
an usurer. See quotation from Mas-
singer s. v. Livery.
Thievery needs no more than the name to
prove it a water of stealth . . a sin which
usurers and money-mongers do bitterly rail
at. — Adams, i. 186.
The money -monger hath least need of all
other men to say his prayers, bee it wet or
K K
MONEY-MONGERING ( 418 )
MONOTONIST
dry, bee it tempest or calme ... he shall bee
sure of his money, for time onely works for
him.— R. Turner, Usurer's Plea answered,
p. 10 (1633).
Money - mongering, dealing with
money (in a grasping way).
The last place in which he will look for
the cause of his misery is in that very money-
monoering to which he now clings as fran-
tically as ever.— C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. xv.
Money-sack, purse.
The Money-sacke best kept the land from
BSLck.—Davies, Microcosmos, p. 61.
Mongibell. Mongibello or Monte
Gibello is the name given to M. uEtna
by the Sicilians, and so is used for a
volcano generally.
Within us we felt too often such flamings,
such furnaces or Monyibells of fires. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 134.
Monied. Chapman makes Nestor
speak of cattle which had been taken
as " soon-monied wares" (Iliad, xi. 590),
that is, I suppose, easily exchanged for
money. There is no corresponding word
in the original.
Monkey, to imitate, as a monkey
does.
And many murmured, " From this source
What red blood must be poured ! "
And some rejoined, *' 'Tis even worse ;
What red tape is ignored ! "
All cursed the Doer for an evil,
Called here, enlarging on the Devil —
There, monkeying the Lord.
Mrs. Browning \ Tale of Villafranca.
Monkey. To suck the monkey is,
properly, to abstract wine or spirits
from a cask by the insertion of a tube ;
in the second extract it is put for
drinking generally : the first gives yet
another meaning to it.
"Do you know what sucking the monkey
means? " * No, sir." " Well then, 101 fell
you; it's a term used among seamen for
drinking rum out of cocoa nuts, the milk
having been poured out, and the liquor
substituted." — Marryat, Peter Simple,ch. xxx.
St. Foix never would drink now, unless he
was dry ;
Besides, what the vulgar call sucking the
monkey
Has much less effect on a man when he's
funky.
Ingoldsby Legends {Black Mousquetaire).
Monkey's allowance. See extract.
You fellows worked like bricks, spent
money, aud got midshipman's half -pay
(nothing a day, and find yourself) and
monkey's allowance (more kicks than half-
pence).— C. Kingsley, Letter, May, 1856.
Monk-monger, fosterer of monas-
ticism.
Oswald (a great monk-monger, of whom
hereafter) held York and Worcester. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. v. 24.
Monmouth, a fiat cap. See extracts.
In Defoe's Tour thro1 G. Britain (ii
339), Bewdloy or Beaulieu in Worcester-
shire is spoken of as well supplied,
among other things, with " Caps, which
the Dutch Seamen buy, called Mon-
mouth Caps,"
The best Caps were formerly made at
Monmouth . . But, on the occasion of a great
plague hapning in this Town, the trade was
some years since removed hence to Beaudly
in Worcestershire, yet so that they are called
Monmouth Caps unto this day ... If at this
day the phrase of wearing a Monmouth Cap
be taken jn a bad acception, I hope the in-
habitants of that Town will endeavour to
disprove the occasion thereof. — Fuller,
Worthies, Monmouth (ii. 116).
The Welsh his Monmouth use to wear,
And of the same will brag too.
Merrie Drollerie, p. 25.
Monoculate, one-eyed.
Philosophy unbaptized with grace is said
to be monoculate, to have but one eye, and
that is of natural reason ; a left eye of the
soul. — Adams, ii. 378.
Monograph, treatise on a single sub-
ject, or on a single branch of a wide
subject. In 1843 Sir R. Murchison had
used the term in an essay, but it was
quite unfamiliar to Sydney Smith, who,
rather curiously, seems to have no idea
of what it might mean. L. has the
word, but no example.
The only expression I quarrel with is
monograph: either it has some conventional
meaning among geologists, or it only means
a pamphlet — a book. — 8. Smith, Letters, 1843.
Monopole, monopoly.
Some shuffled for some office ; some to game
Some monopole, which then could not be got ;
For Fortune did those monopole* restraine,
Because she thought 'twas in hir rule a blot
To pleasure one by all her subjects' paine.
Dairies, Humour's Heaven on Earth, p. 35.
Monopolite, monopolist
You marchant mercers, and monopolites,
Gain-greedy chapmen, perjur'd hypocrites.
Sylvester, Third day,Jtrst weeke, 522.
Nor privie Theeves, nor proud Monopolites.
Ibid., Hymn of Alms, 300.
Monotonist, one who harps on one
subject.
MONSTER-MAN ( 419 )
MOON-FACE
If I ruin such a virtue, sayest thou!
Eternal monotonist! — Richardson, Cl. Har-
loice, iv. 136.
Moxstkr-man, giant
Which like the vaunting monster-man of
Gath,
Haue atirr'd against vs little David's wrath.
Sylvester, The Imposture, 6*38.
Monster-master, brute-tamer. The
extract refers to Nimrod.
This monster-master stout,
This Hercules, this hammer-ill, they tender,
And call him (all) their Father and Defender.
Sylvester, Babylon, 85.
Monstricide, slaughter of a monster.
Andromeda had been a good deal exposed
to the Dragon in the course of the last five
or six days; and if Perseus had cut the
latter's cruel head off, he would have com-
mitted not unjustifiable monstricide. — Thack-
eray, The Virginians, ch. xxv.
Monstriferous, portentous.
This monstriferouse empire of women ....
U most detestable and damnable. — Knox,
First Blast (Maitland's Reformation, p. 129).
Monthlino, a being of a month old :
a word formed like yearling. The
extract is from " Address to my Infant
Daughter, on being reminded that she
was a month old."
Yet hail to thee,
Frail, feeble Monthling! — by that name
methinks
Thy scanty breathing time is portioned out
Not idly. — Wordsworth.
Moo, to low : an onomatopceous word.
1 can mind now how I used to smell the
grass, and see the dew shining, and hear the
pretty sweet cows a mooing. — Mrs. Trollops,
Michael Armstrong, ch. xxiv.
Moo-cow, a childish name for the cow ;
imitation of the lowing.
The sheeps all baa'd, the asses bray'd,
The moo-cow low'd, and Grizzle neigh'd.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xiv.
Mood, anger.
Romulus met them with an army, and in
one small skirmish made proof how Mood
{iram) without might is vain and bootless. —
Holland, Livy, p. 7.
And now my father in his mood may slay
this poor bondsman, but for his love and
loyal service to me. — Scott, Ivanhoe, ii. 88.
Moodishly, sulkily.
He had thought himself of consequence
enough to behave moodishly.— Ricliardson,
Grandison, i. 166.
Moon, to dawdle ; to indulge in
vague and idle dreams, like a person
staring at the moon instead of attend-
ing to the world's business: in the
second quotation from Kingsley it =
enjoying the moon-light.
He neglected alike work and amusement
for lazy mooning over books, and the dreams
which books called up. — Kingsley, Two Years
Ago4 ch. i.
From 7 to 10 the whole population will be
in the streets, not sunning but mooning them-
selves.— Kinasley, 1864 (Life, ii. 175).
Do you think Lavender and Sheila spend
their time in mooning up in that island of
theirs ? — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xxvii.
Moon. A blue moon is a vulgar ex-
pression for the Greek Calends. The
subjoined extract shows that a blue
moon as meaning something impossible
or absurd is an expression at least 350
years old.
Tf they saye the mone is belewe,
We must beleve that it is true,
Admittynge their iuterpretacion.
Roy and Barlowe, Rede me and
be not wroth, p. 114.
Moon. To make a man believe that
the moon is made of green cheese = to
impose upon him completely. In the
second extract Orosian = Welshman ;
in the third, the saying is varied though
the sound is similar.
"With this plesaunt mery toye he made
his frendes beleue the moone to be made of a
grene chese. — XJdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p.
193.
To make a pure Orosian thirst for blisse,
And daily say his prayers on his knees,
Is to persuade him that most certain 'tis
The moon is made of nothing but green cheese :
And then he'd ask of God no greater boon
Then place in heven to feed upon the moon.
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 120.
Tou may as well persuade me the moon is
made of a cream cheese, as that any nobleman
turned himself into a writing-master to ob-
tain Miss Groves. — Mrs. Lennox, Female
Quixote, Bk. IV. ch. i.
Moon-drake. The extract is from
some nonsense verses by Corbet
Marke ! how the lanterns clowd mine eyes,
See where a moon-drake 'gins to rise.
Bp. Corbet, A Non Sequitur.
Moon- face, an Oriental term for a
beautiful woman.
He blandly received their caresses ; took
their coaxing and cajolery as matters of
course, and surveyed the beauties of his
time as the Caliph the moon -faces of his
harem. — Thackeray, The Newomts, ch. liii.
E £ 2
MOON-RAKING
( 420 )
MOROSO
Moon-rakinq, wool-gathering;
spoken of one who is absent and dis-
traught. Wiltshire people are some-
times called moon-rakers, from some
story of a rustic who, mistaking the
reflection of the moon in a stream for a
cheese, tried to fieh it up with his rake.
It irked me much that any one should
take advantage of me ; yet everybody did so
as soon as ever it was Known that my wits
were gone moon-raking. — Blackmore, Lorna
Boone, ch. xvii.
Moon-sick, crazy ; lunatic.
If his itch proceed from a moon-sick head,
the chief intention is to settle his brains. —
Adams, i. 602.
Moony, stupid ; dawdling ; given to
mooning.
Heiresses vary, and persons interested int
one of them beforehand are prepared to find
that she is too yellow or too red, tall and
toppling or short and square, violent and
capricious or moony and insipid. — G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda, ch. xxii.
Moobery, the Moorish quarter.
They arose and entered the moorery, and
slew many moors, and plundered their
houses.— Southey, Chron. of the Cid, p. 386
(1808).
Moot up, to dig up.
A huge portion of it on all sides had, to
use the provincial term, been "mooted up,"
and carried away, for the sake of the stone
for building purposes. — Archaol., zzxvii. 428
(1855).
Mop, a fair at which servants are
hired.
Many a rustic went to a statute fair or
mop, and never came home to tell of his
hiring. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. i.
Mope, a spiritless person. This word
is in the Diets. ; but an absurd deriva-
tion of it from Merops may be seen,
8. v. Dumps. Perhaps in that passage
mopes does not mean spiritless persons,
but dumps or vapours.
Moppet, a grimace.
Albeit we see them sometimes counterfeit
devotion, yet never did old ape make pretty
moppet (mow). — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. III.
{Authors Prologue).
Mopsy-eyed, the same, I suppose, as
mop-eyed, short-sighted, though mopsy
— a puppet, so it might mean vacant-
eyed, like a doll.
44 Pretty mopsy-eyed soul!" was her ex-
Sression: "aud was it willing to think it
ad still a brother and sister ? n — Richardson,
a. Harlowe, i. 335.
Mobat, a drink made of honey, flav-
oured with the juice of mulberries.
See quotation *. v. Pigment.
There was grace after meat with a fist on
the board,
And down went the morat, and out flew the
sword. — Taylor, Edwin the Fair, ii. 6-
Six meals a day,
With morat and spiced ale is generous living.
Ibid., iii. 7.
Moreen, a stout woollen stuff, used
for curtains, &c.
Mr. Harding, however, thought the old
reddish-brown much preferable to the gaudy
buff -coloured trumpery moreen which Mrs.
Proudie had deemed good enough for her
husband's own room. — Trollope, Barchesitr
Towers, ch. v.
Morepobk, a bird, so called from its
note. Cf. Pork-porking.
Somewhere, apparently at an immense dis-
tance, a morepork was chanting his mono-
tonous cry. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Uamlx/n,
ch.
Morish, insufficient, i. e. requiring a
new supply ; sometimes used in a good
sense for nice, that of which one would
like to have more. See Peacock's
Mardey and Corringham Glossary
(E. D. S.).
Lady S. How do you like this tea, Colonel ?
Col. Well enough, Madam, but methinks
it is a little morish.
Lady S. Oh Colonel, I understand yon ;
Betty, bring the canister.— Stcift, Polite Con-
versation (Conv. i.).
Morning-stead, the place of the
morning, and so, morning.
Toward morning-sted
To mighty Pharaoh the Almighty sent
A double dream.
Sylvester, Maiden's Blush, 1176.
Mornly, in the morning.
All the winged quiers
Which mornly warble on green trembling
briers
Ear-tickling tunes.
Sylvester, Babylon, 327.
Morologically, in the way of moro*
logy, »'. e. the science that deals with
fools.
Morologically speaking, the production is
no richer or sillier than your prwe-fool from
Gloucestershire. — Lord Strangford, Letters
and Papers, p. 164.
Moroso, a surly person. Cf . Fcrioso,
Gratioso, &c. Fuller is speaking of ,
M0RPHET1C
( 421 ) MOTHER-IN-LAW
those who would object to organs, even
in private houses.
Such Morosos deserve not to be owners
of an articulate voice sounding through the
Organ of a Throat. — Worthies, Denbigh (ii.
588).
Morphetic, pertaining to sleep;
slumberous.
I never can sleep when I try for it in the
day-time; the moment I cease all employ-
ment my thoughts take such an ascendance
over my morphetic faculty, that the attempt
always ends in a deep and most wakeful
meditation. — Mad. D^ArUay's Diary, iv. 195.
I am invulnerably asleep at this very mo-
ment; in the very centre of the morplutic
domains. — Ibid., Camilla, Bk. II. ch. iv.
Morrice, a slang word for move ! be
off I See quotation s. v. Magpie. Per-
haps the allusion is to the morris-dance.
Tony. I don't value her resentment the
bounce of a cracker ; zounds, here they are !
Morrice! Prance! (Exit Hastings). — Gold'
smith, She stoops to conquer, Act III.
Morrice, to dance as a morrice-
dance.
However it's quite
As wild a night
As ever was known on that sinister height
Since the Demon-dance was morriced.
Hood, The Forge.
Morrowing, procrastination.
If he importune thee with borrowing,
Or careless liue upon thy purse's spending ;
Or daily put thee off with morrowing,
Till want do make thee wearie of thy lending.
Breton, Mother's Blessing, st. 66.
Mort. See extract.
The saddler he stuffs his pannels with
straw or hay, and overglaseth them with
haire, and makes the leather of them of
marts or tan'd sheep's skins. — Greene, Quip
for an Upstgrt Courtier (Harl. Misc., v. 413;.
Mortar, a cap ; the square college
cap is sometimes called a mortar-board.
No more shall man with mortar on his head
Set forward towards Borne.
Bp. Corbet to T. Coryate.
Some of them wore a mortar on their
heads, so ponderous that they could look
neither upward, nor on either side, but only
downward and forthright. — Fuller, Pisgah
Sight, IV. vi. 4.
Mortar up, to fasten up with mortar.
Electricity cannot be made fast, mortared
up, and ended like London Monument. —
Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. xiii.
Mort-cloth, funeral hangings.
The vast Ohamp-de-Mars wholly hung
round with black mort-cloth; which mort-
cloth and expenditure Marat thinks had
better have been laid out in bread in these
dear days, and given to the hungry living
patriot.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. II.
ch. vi.
Morter-man, a mason. Bp. Gauden
in] applying this term to the Babel-
builders was probably thinking of Gen.
xi. 3, " slime had they for morter."
They are likely to produce no better suc-
cessors either to this Church or Nation than
those morter-men did, whose work deserved
the nick-name of Babel or Confusion. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 513.
Mortstone. In a note Sir H. Taylor
says, "This was a large stone by the
way-side between a distant village and
the parish church, on which the bearers
of a dead body rested the coffin."
"Rs here,
Six furlongs from the chapel. "What is this ?
Oh me ! the mortstone !
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, v. 7.
Moscoviter, a Russian. Rabelais
simply has Sarmates ; the explanation
is Urquhart'B.
The falconry . . . was yearly supplied and
furnished by the Candianes, Venetians, Sar-
mates, now called Moscoviters, with all sorts
of most excellent hawks. — Urquhart's Rabe-
lais, Bk. I. ch. Iv.
Motelings, little motes, applied in
the extract to bees. See quotation *. v.
Dropling.
A crowd of moatlings hums
Above our heads, who with their cipres
wings
Decide the quarrel of their little kings.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 335.
Mother. A fit of the mother = hy-
steria, but in the extract the expression
is used by a sort of pun for pregnancy.
If after all the sin quickens in her womb,
and that within nine months she be in dan-
ger to fall into Jits of the mother, what pangs,
what throws, what convulsions tear this poor
creature's breast! — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 80.
Mother-in-law, step-mother. The
word in this sense is now little used
except by the uneducated, e. g. Mr.
Sam. Weller, passim, but the meaning
is not a new one. In the fifth series
of iV. and Q., vii. 519, an instance is
given from a will dated 1553 ; while in
viii. 137, a modern example is supplied
from Lord Lytton's Parisians. In the
vestry of my church hangs a copy of
MOTHER-NAKED ( 4« ) MOUNTEBANK
verses, undated, but belonging to the
earlier half of the 17th century, enti-
tled " Smith's moumfull peale of bells
on the late decease of his most vertuous
and piouslie disposed mother-in-law,
Mrs. Sarah Smith of Pear Tree." In-
stances will also be found in Richard-
son's Grandison, iv. 261, and in Miss
Austen's Sense and Sensibility, ch. i.
Cf. Father-in-law.
Mother-naked, completely naked, as
when born of his mother.
Young Harry on the other hand had every
member as well as feature exposed to all
weathers ; would run about mother-naked for
near an hour in a frosty morning. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 3.
A square blanket, twelve feet in diagonal,
is provided ... in the centre a slit is effected
eighteen inches long; through this the
mother-naked trooper introduces his head
and neck. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I.
ch. vii.
Mother's daughter. H. illustrates
"every mother's son" = every man.
Gauden (Tears of the Church, p. 407)
has, " every mother's child."
Ladies ! thou, Paris, mov'st my laughter,
They're deities ev*ry mother's daughter.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 258.
Mothersome, maternally anxious.
1 hope excuse, miss, if I seem over mother-
some and foolish about him. — Mrs. Trollope,
Michael Armstrong, ch. xv.
Motiveless, without motive or
reason.
What but the accident of birth or educa-
tion had made us to differ from those we
loathed or despised? And had not this
accident given us rather a motiveless con-
tempt and abhorrence for other?, than any
real advantage over them ? — Godwin, Mande-
ville, ii. 75.
Motivelessness, aimlessnesa, ab-
sence of motive.
That calm which Gwendolen had pro-
mised herself to maintain had changed into
sick motivelessness. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. xxiv.
Motley, a fool ; porhaps in the first
quotation it may rather mean, vaga-
bond.
Alas ! 'tis true I have gone here and there,
And made myself a motley to the view.
Shakespeare, Sonnet ex.
Jaques (to Touchstone). Will you be mar-
ried, motley ?— As you like it, iii. 3.
Motley, to variegate.
With thousand dies Hee motleys all the
meads.— Sylvester, Eden, 89.
Mottocrat, motto-king; one who
has mottoes at command.
Tou with your errabund guesses, veering
to all points of the literary compass, amused
the many-humoured, yet single-minded Pan-
tagruelist, the quotationipotent mottocrat. —
Sou they, The Doctor, Interchapter xiii.
Moult, to change or get rid of ; pro-
perly applied to birds shedding tlieir
leathers, but by way of jest to other
things.
Our hero gave him such a sudden fist in
the mouth as dashed in two of his teeth
that then happened to be moulting. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 104.
I do not aim yet at such preferment as
walking upstairs; but having moulted my
stick, I flatter myself I shall come forth
again without being lame. — Walpole, Letters,
w. 349 (1770).
I every day intended to thank you for the
copy of Nell Gwyn's letter, till it was too
late; the gout came, and made me moult
my quill.— Ibid., iii. 506 (1775).
Our men of rank . . . are not the only
persons who go by different appellations iu
different parts of their lives. We all moult
our names in the natural course of life. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxzx.
Moult and Moult, a great number ?
On the eve we went to the Franciscans*
Church to hear the academical exercises;
there were moult and moult clergy. — Wat-
pole, Letters, i. 39 (1739).
Moulture. See quotation and cf.
Moliture.
Out of one sack he would take two moul-
tures or fees for grinding. — Urquharfs Rabe-
lais, Bk. I. ch. xi.
Moundless, without a mound. Syl-
vester (Second day, first week, 59) calls
Chaos u that great maundleise Mound."
I suppose his meaning to be that Chaos
was a great heap of matter without
form or shape, and so while in one
sense a mound, yet unlike it as being
without any set arrangement
Mountain dew, whiskey.
His nose it is a coral to the view,
Well nourish'd with Pierian potheen ;
For much he loves his native mountain de* :
But to depict this dye would lack, I ween,
A bottle-red in terms as well as bottle-green.
Hood, Irish Schoolmaster.
Mountebank, to play the fool.
Shakespeare (Coriol. iii* 2) has the
verb =» to cheat
MOUNTEBANKISH ( 423 )
MO W- YARD
This Jack,
This paltry mountebanking quack.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 221.
Doubtless she is most holy — but for wisdom
Say if 'tis wise to spurn all rules, all censures,
And mountebank it in the public ways
Till she becomes a jest.
Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, ii. 4.
Do not suppose I am going, sicut mens est
tnos, to indulge in moralities about buffoons,
paint, motley and mountebanking. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, VIII.
MOUNTEBANKISH, juggling.
I espy a fox near that hedge who was a
Saturnian merchant born in Rugilia, whom
for his cunningness in negotiating, and for
som Hocos-pocos and mountebankish tricks I
transformed to a fox. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 87.
Mounted Andrew, a merry andrew
or mountebank.
While mounted Andrews, bawdy, bold, and
loud,
Like cocks, alarum all the drowsy crowd.
Verses prefixed to Kennet's Erasm.
Pr. of Folly..
Mountenance, value. N. says, " a
word belonging to the age of Chaucer,
Gower, &c, but retained by Spenser."
It is also used by Jonson.
Man can not get the mount' nance of an egg-
shell
To stay his stomach. — Tale of a Tub, Hi. 5.
Mourn, sorrow.
Hold, take her at the hands of Radagon,
A pretty peat to drive your mourn away.
Greene, Looking-Glass for London, p. 124.
Happy in sleep ; waking, content to languish.
Embracing clouds by night ; in day time
mourn ;
All things I loathe.
Daniel, Sonnet, xix. (Eng. Garner,
i. 590).
Mourneress, female mourner.
The principal mourneress apparelled as an
esquieresse. — Fosbrooke, Smith's Lives of the
Berkeleys, p. 211 (1596).
Mournsome, mournful.
Then there came a mellow noise, very low
and mournsome. — Blackmore, Lorna Boone,
ch. hi.
Mouse. A man or a mouse = some-
thing or nothing.
He was utterly mynded to put all in
hasarde to make or marre, and to bee man or
mens. — Udal's Erasmus's Apophth., p. 298.
The lawyer makes his clyent either a man
or a mouse. — Breton, Fantasticks {Ten o'clock).
Mouskkin, little mouse.
" Frisk about, pretty little mousekin," says
grey Grimalkin, purring in the corner and
keeping watch with her green eyes. — Tliacke-
ray, The Virginians, ch. xxxviii.
Mousle, to pull about ; the word is
still in use in Sussex. In Wycherley's
Country Wife, II. i. we have " toused
and moused.
He ... so mousled me. — Wycherley, Country
Wtfe, iv. 3.
Ben's a brisk boy ; he has got her into a
corner ; Father's own son, 'faith he'll touzle
her and mouzle her. — Congreve, Love for Love,
Act HI. * J
Mouth-organ, " a gew-gaw or Jew's
(jaw's) harp" (Holdemess Glossary,
E. D. S.).
The instrumental accompaniments rarely
extended beyond the shovels and a set of
Pan pipes better known to the many as a
mouth-organ. — Sketches by Boz {First of May).
Mouthy, full of talk.
Another said to a mouthy advocate, Why
barkest thou at me so sore? — PuttenJiam,
Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xvii.
Moveabled, furnished.
They entered into that straw - thatched
cottage, scurvily built, naughtily moveabled,
and all besmoked. — Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk.
HI. ch. xvii.
Move- all, the name of a game, ap-
parently like My Lady's Toilet.
Come, Morrice, you that love Christmas
sports, what say you to the game of move-all ?
— Mad. B'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. L ch. ii.
Mow, to make mouths or faces ; the
Diets, give no later example of this
verb than from the Tempest.
I heard at my back a noise like that of a
baboon when he mows and chatters. — Smol-
lett, Rod. Random, ch. lviii.
While Lenny was present to be mowed and
jeered at, there had been no pity for him . . .
Not that those who had mowed and jeered
repented them of their mockery. — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. HI. ch. xxiv.
Mowers. No morsel for mowyers =
not to be obtained by a poor man.
Lais, an harlot of Corinthe of excellent
beautie, but so dere and costly that she was
no inorsell for motryers. She was for none
but lordes and gentlemen that might well
paie for it. — Udal's Erasmus's Apophth.,j>. 379.
Mow-yard, place where the corn is
stacked.
We've been reaping all the day, and we never
will be beat,
Bet fetch it all to mow-yard, and then we'll
thank the Lord.
Exmoor Harvest Song {Lorna Boone,
ch. xxix.).
MO WL
( 424 )
MUFFLE
Mowl, same as mow, q. v. (?) or =
mewl (?).
like mimes they mope and motel, and
utter fake sounds for hire. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev. f Bk. I. ch. iv.
Muchness. Much of a muchness =
much the same.
** But you mustn't go to show me the very
wicked ones." •* Why they are all pretty
much of a muchness for that." — Reade, Never
too late to mend, ch. xviii.
" Some of our fellow countrymen," said
Halbert, " are, it seems to me, more detest-
ably ferocious than savages, when they once
get loose." " Much of a muchness, no better,
and perhaps no worse," said Sam. — H. Kings-
ley, Geoffru Hamlyn, ch. xxviii.
Oh ! child, men's men ; gentle or simple,
they're much of a muchness. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. xxxi.
Mucker, to fail, or make a mess of a
business ; also a substantive. In ex-
tract from C. Kingsley it = heavy fall.
He . . . earned great honour by leaping in
and out of the Loddon ; only four more do-
ing it, and one receiving a mucker. — C. Kings'
ley, 1852 (Life, I 275).
By -the -oye "Welter has muckered; you
know that by this time.— H. Kingsley, Ravens-
hoe, ch. xiv.
Muckibus, tipsy.
At a great supper t' other night at Lord
Hertford's, if she [Lady Coventry] was not
the best humoured creature in the world I
should have made her angry ; she said in a
very vulgar accent, if she drank any more,
she should be muckibus. " Lord ! " said Lady
Mary Coke, "What is that?" "Oh! it is
Irish for sentimental.''— Walpole, Letters, i.
498 (1756).
Muckingtogs, corruption of Macin-
tosh ; although referring to the togs
which people wear when mucking about
in rain and mud. See quotation from
Ingoldsby Legends s. v. Carpet-swab.
Mucksy. See quotation. Mucky is
in the Diets., and Lye has muxy as a
Devonshire word. Cf. Mux.
Mary runs in, combs her hair, slips a pair
of stockings and her best gown over her dirt,
and awaits the coming guests, who make a
few long faces at the *' mucksy sort of a
place," but prefer to spend the night there
than to bivouac close to the enemy's camp. —
Kingsley, Westtoard Ho, ch. xiv.
When the ground appeared through the
crust of bubbled snow ... it was all so
soaked and sodden, and, as we call it, mucksy,
that to meddle with it in any way was to do
more harm than good. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. xlvi.
Mucky, to dirty.
She even brought me a clean towel to
spread over my dress, " lest," as she said, " I
should mucky it." — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. ixii.
Muddify, to dirty.
Dou't muddify your charming simplicity
with controversial distinctions that will sour
your sweet piety. — Walpole, Letters, iv. 491
(1789).
Muddle-head, a confused person.
Mankind are not wanting in intelligence :
but, as a body, they have one intellectual
defect ; — they are muddle-heads. — Reade y
Never too late to mend, ch. vi.
Mudlark. L., who gives no ex-
ample, says, " Colloquial or slang for a
dirty boy who dabbles along the mini
of canals or rivers ; " and this, I think,
is its usual meaning, but see extract.
He . . became what is called a mud-lark ;
that is, a plunderer of the ship's cargoes that
unload in the Thames.— Miss Edgeworth,
Lame Jervas, ch. iii.
Muffin-cap, flat cap worn by charity
school boys, &c.
His jealousy was roused by seeing the new
boy promoted to the black stick and hat-
band, while he, the old one, remained station-
ary in the muffin-cap and leathers. — Dickens,
Oliver Twist, ch. vi.
Mr. Peters, though now a wealthy man,
had received a liberal education at a charity
school, and was apt to recur to the days
of his muffin-cap and leathers.— Ingoldsby
Legends (Spectre of Tappington).
Muffe maffe, a reproachful epithet,
though I cannot define its meaning*
more exactly, as there is no expression
corresponding to it in the original.
Stany hurst, however, makes iEneas
speak of the sleeping Polyphemus as
" the muffe maffe loller " (J5n. III. 647).
Stanyhurstis fond of such jingles as
ruffe raffe, swish swash, &c. ; and muff
= a fool was in use in his time. See N.
Miff mqff is given by H. as a North
country word for nonsense.
Muffle. " Among chymists is the
cover of a test or coppel which is put
over it in the fire " (Bailey's Diet.).
Both which (as a most noble knight Sir
K. D. hath it) may be illustrated in some
mesure by what we find passeth in the cop-
pilling of a fixed metall, which as long as
any lead or drosse or any allay remains with
it, continueth still melting, flowing, and in
motion under the muffle.— Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 148.
MUFFLED
( 425 ) MUMBLEMENT
Muffled, blinded.
Muffled pagans know there is a God, but
not what this God is. — Adams, iii. 160.
Mufti, an officer, &c. not wearing
his uniform is said to be in mufti.
Mufti being the high -priest among
Mahomedans, the term may have been
adopted by our troops in India to sig-
nify a peaceful garb.
He has no mufti-coaJt, except one sent him
out by Messrs. Stultz to India in the year
1821. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. viiL
Muo, face or mouth (slang).
Egad, Tom, they used to call vou the Knight
of the woful countenance, and Clive has just
inherited the paternal mug. — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. lvi.
I fought the best man of the lot, and
thrashed him so that his whole mug was like
a ball of beet-root. — Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. lxxxii.
Mugget, explained by sWolcot in a
note, "part of the entrails of certain
cattle." H. gives the word in the plural
= chitterlings.
I'm a poor botching tailor for a court,
Low bred on liver, and what clowns call
mugget. — P. Pindar, p. 192.
Mugle, confuse, muddle ?
You must no more look to force or mugle
men with the name of a Parliament. — British
Bellman, 1648 {Harl. Misc., vii. 634).
Mule. One mule doth scrub another
=one fool flatters another.
I need not flatter these, they'll do 't them-
selves,
And cross the proverb that was wont to Bay
One mule doth scrub another, here each ass
Has learn'd to clean himself.
Randolph, Muses1 Looking Glass, iii. 4.
Mulierose, fond of women. L. gives
mulierosity, with quotation from Henry
More.
Well then, dame, mulierose — that means
wrapped up body and soul in women; so
prithee tell me, how did you ever detect the
noodle's mulierosity? — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. xxxiii.
Mull, a thick kind of muslin.
It would be mortifying to the feelings of
many ladies could they be made to under-
stand how little the heart of man is affected
by what is costly or new in their attire ; how
little it is biassed by the texture of their
muslin, and how unsusceptible of peculiar
tendencies towards the spotted, the sprigged,
the mull or the jackonet. — Miss Austen, North-
anger Abbey, ch. x.
Mullet, a common name for a cow
in Suffolk.
Leave milking and drie vp old tnulley thy
cow,
The crooked and aged to fatting put now.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 135.
Mulliegrums, bad temper, the blues.
Mulligrubs is more usual.
Peter's successour was so in his mulliegrums
that he had thought to have buffeted him. —
— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 172).
Mulsack. The first extract is from
some nonsense verses by Bp. Corbet;
whether there is any reference to the
"famous chimney-sweeper," 1 do not
know : but it is unlikely, unless there
had been two generations of chimney-
sweeps of this name.
The putrid skyes
Eat mulsacke pyes,
Backed up in logicke breeches.
Bp, Corbet, A Non Sequitur.
Machara, A man then as famous for a
Oryer as Mulsack is now for a Chimney-
sweeper.— Stapylton, Juvenal, vii. 8, note.
Multipormous, varied.
His multiformous places compelTd such a
swarm of suitors to hum about him. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, i. 204.
Multiplex, manifold.
In favour of which unspeakable benefits of
the reality, what can we do but cheerfully
pardon the multiplex ineptitudes of the
semblance ? — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 137.
Trade everywhere, in spite of multiplex
confusions, has increased, is increasing —
Ibid., iv. 256.
Multiramified, divided into many
branches.
The Headlongs claim to be not less genuine
derivatives from the antique branch of Cad-
wallader, than any of the last named multi-
ramijied families. — Peacock, Headlong Hall,
ch. i.
Multuple, manifold.
It introduced two reports instead of one,
and multuple attendances. — North, Life of
Lord Guilford, ii. 78.
Mumble-matins, a contemptuous
name for an ignorant priest, as was also
Sir John. See N. s. v. sir.
How can they be learned having none to
teach them but Sir John 3Iumble-matins ? —
Pilkington, p. 26.
Mumblement, in u mble ; an indistinct
sound.
Lasource answered with some vague pain-
ful mumblement. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pfe. III.
Bk. III. ch. viii.
MUMCHANCE ( 426 )
MUSHY
The sound of them is not a voice con-
veying knowledge or memorial of any earthly
or heavenly tbiug ; it is a wide-spread inar-
ticulate slumberous mumblement, issuing as
if from the lake of eternal sleep. — Ibid.,
Cromwell, i. 2.
Mumchance, originally a game at
which silence was imperative (Bee N.),
then for silence or a silent person. In
the extract Mumchance is personified,
and even a biographical incident men-
tioned concerning him.
Why, Miss, you are in a brown study;
what's the matter ? methinks you look like
Mumchance that was haug'd for saying no-
nothing. — Swift,Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Mummanize, to embalm as a mummy.
Deere Vault, that veil'st him, mummanize
his corse,
Till it arise in Heauen to be crown'd.
Davies, M use's Teares, p. 9.
Mumps, dumps.
The Sunne was so in his mumps uppon it
that it was almost noone before hee could
goe to cart that day. — Naske, Lenten btuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 168).
Mums, lips (slang).
Why, you jade, you look so rosy this
morning, I must have a smack at your
mums. — Foote, The Minor, Act I.
Munkral, official ? Adams is argu-
ing that though there is an indelible
character of priesthood in both bishop
and priest, the former has a superiority
in jurisdiction. I suppose the meaning
to be that a bishop is not merely pri-
mus inter pares, but that certain offices
pertain to aim alone.
To be a bishop then is not a numeral but
a muttered function ; a priority in order, a
superiority in degree. — Adams, ii. 266.
Murine, belonging to mice.
The superabundance of the murine race
must have been owing to their immense
fecundity, and to the comparatively tardy
reproduction of the feline species.— Poetry
of Anti jacobin (note), p. 131.
Murphy, a potato, from the fondness
of the Irish for the vegetable. See
extract *. v. Tuck-shop. There seems,
however, to have been a special kind
of potato called " murphies.'' See
Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary (E. D. S).
There I watch a puss
Playing with two kittens ;
Playing round the fire,
Which of blazing turf is,
Roaring to the pot
Which bubbles with the murphies.
Thackeray, Pey of Limavaddy.
Murrain, plaguy (used adjectivally).
It is a tnurrion crafty drab. — Gamine r
Gurton's Needle (Hawkins* Eng. Dr., i. 195).
Thar's not within this land
A muriner cat than Gib is betwixt the Terns
and Tine,
Shafe as much wit in her head almost as
chave in mine. — Ibid, (Ibid., i. 209).
My Lady was in such a murrain haste to
be here, that set out she would, thof I told
her it was Ohildermass Day. — Cibber, Pro-
voked Husband, Act I.
Murrainly, excessively ; plaguily.
And ye 'ad bene there, cham sure you* Id
murrenty ha wondred. — Gammer Gurton's
Needle (Haickinsy Emj. Dr., i. 202).
Muscipular, mousy ; connected with
or pertaining to mice. The word is
coined in imitation of Johnson's Latin-
isms. Parturient is used by H. More.
Muscipula is Latin for " mouse-trap."
Parturient mountains have ere now pro-
duced muscipular abortions. — J. and II.
Smith, Rejected Addresses, p. 92.
MUSE-MAN, poet.
Each driueling Lozel now
That hath but seene a Colledge, and knows
how
To put a number to John Seton's prose,
Starts vp a sudden Muse-man, and streight
throws
A packe of Epigrams into the light.
Whose vndigested mish-mash would affright
The very ghost of Marti all.
A . Holland (Davies, Scourye
of Folly, p. 80).
Mushed, shattered ; depressed.
You're a young man, eh, for all you look
so mushed. — G. Eliot, Silas Marner, ch. x_
Mushroomed, promoted from low
origin : the substantive = upstart, at id
the adjectival use (e. g. "mushroom
nobility ") is common. The verb is
said in the extract to be a peculiar ex-
pression of Lovelace* s, to whom it is
attributed.
None but the prosperous upstart, mush-
roomed into rank (another of his peculiars),
was arrogantly proud of it. — Richardson, Cl.
Harlowe, i. 297.
Mushy, in several dialects = soft ;
crumbling. Perhnps it means in the
extract, She is not foolishly or demon-
stratively soft, but, &c.
A child-bearing tender-hearted thing is
the woman of our people ; her children are
MUSIC
( 427 )
MUT1NISE
mostly stout, as I think you'll say
Addy's are, and she's not mushy, hut her
heart is tender.— Or. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. xlvi.
Music, to play music.
A man must put a mean valuation upon
Christ to leave him for a touch upon an
instrument, and a faint idea of future tor-
ments to be fiddled and musick'd into hell. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 135.
Musk :l ess, unmusical ; inharmonious.
Their musicklesse instruments are frames of
brasse hung about with rings, which they
jingle in shops according to their march-
ings.— Sandys, Travels, p. 172.
Musk-cod, an abusive term, applied
to a scented courtier.
Hot. Deliver this letter to the young gal-
lant Druso, he that fell so strongly in love
with me yesternight.
A sin. It's a sweet musk-cod, a pure spic'd
gull. — Dekker, Satiromastix {Hawkins, Eny.
Dr., iii. 130).
I've breath enough at all times, Lucifer's
musk-cod,
To give your perfumed worship three venues.
Massinger, Old Law, iii. 2.
Musmilion, musk melon.
There is a musk milion ground trenched,
manured, and very well ordered for the
gTOweth of musmilions, which borders, herbes,
flowers, and musmilion ground, wee valew
to bee worth £3.Survey of Manor of Wim-
bledon, 1649 (Archaol. x. 432).
Muson, seems to mean a horn.
If I suffer this, we shall have that damn'd
courtier pluck on his shoes with the parson's
musons. Fine i' faith ! none but the small
Le rite's brow to plant your shoeing horn-
seed in. — Killigrew, Parson's Wedding, v. 4.
Musroll, nose-band of bridle.
Their bridles have not bits, but a kind of
musroll of two pieces of wood. — Modern Ac-
count of Scotland, 1670 (Harl. Misc., vi. 137).
Must, mouldiness ; mustiness.
A smell as of unwholesome sheep, blend-
ing with the smell of must and dust, is refer-
able to the nightly (and often daily) con-
sumption of mutton fat in candles, and to
the fretting of parchment forms and skins
in greasy drawers. — Dickens, Bleak House,
ch. xzzviii.
Mdstachoes, applied to ears of corn ;
we speak of bearded grain.
Heer for our food millions of flowrie grains,
With long mustachoes, waue vpon the plains.
Sylvester, Third day, first ice eke, 811.
Mustard- token, something very
minute.
A piece of silver! I never had but two
calves in my life, and those my mother left
me ; I will rather part from the fat of them
than from a mustard-token's worth of argent.
— Massinger, Virgin Martyr, ii. 2.
Muster, the technical term for a
company of peacocks.
Master Simon . . told me that according
to the most ancient and approved treatise
on hunting I must say a muster of peacocks.
—Irving, Sketch Book (Christmas Day).
Musty, to grow musty. In the first
extract a gambler tells a friend he shall
not allow a hundred pounds which he
has received to grow musty, 1. e. hoard-
ed, instead of being staked.
Wil. But hark thee, hark thee, Will, did'st
win it ?
Ha. No, but I may lose it ere I go to bed ;
Dost think ft shall musty? what's a hundred
pound ?— Shirley, The Gamester, Act II.
Tou . . keep your reputation mustying
upon an old foundation, which is ready to
sink for want of being repair'd by some
notable achievements.— T. Drown, Works, ii.
180.
Musty, moping. Cf. Fusty.
On her birthday
We were forced to be merry, and, now she's
musty.
We must be sad on pain of her displeasure.
Massinger, Duke of Milan, ii. 1.
Apollo, what's the matter, pray,
You look so mustily to-day ?
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 226.
Mutabilate, to change.
Pye, Doctor, fye ! you know it is a folly
Thus to submit and yield to melancholy ;
For 'twill mutabilate poor nature s light,
And turn its day into a gloomy night.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 243.
Mutation, post-house.
Neere or upon these Causeys were seated
.... mutations; for so they called in that
age the places where strangers, as they
journied, did change their post horses,
draught-beasts, or wagons. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 65.
Mutile, to mutilate.
Hee sees high Arches, huge shining heaps of
stone
Maim'd, mutiVd, murder'd by years wasteful
teen. — Sylvester, Spectacles, st. 32.
Mutiner, a mutineer.
Murmurers are like to mutiners, where one
cursed villaine may be the mine of a whole
camp. — Breton, A Murmurer, p. 8.
Mutinise, to mutiny.
Or if they must be thoughts, and a multi-
MUTISM
(428)
NAB
tude, jet . . . that they had not presumed
unto so bold approaches as to mutinise apud
me, within my heart. — Adams, iii. 281.
Mutism, silence.
Paulina was awed by the savants, but not
quite to mutism; she conversed modestly,
diffidently. — Miss Bronte, Villette, oh. xxvh.
Mutteration, subdued grumbling:
a word coined by Miss Grandison.
So the night passed off with prayings,
hopings, and a little mutteration. (Allow me
that word, or find me a better.) — Richardson,
Grandison, iv. 282.
Mutterods, muttering; buzzing.
Lyke bees in summer season, through rus-
ticall hamlets,
That flirt in soonbeams, and toyle with
mutterus humbling.
Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 414.
Mutton, "a French gold coin, so
called from its being impressed with
the image of a lamb" {Note by Scott
in loc).
He will pay you gallantly; a French
mtUton for every hide I have spoiled, and a
fat cow or bullock for each day I have been
absent.— Scott, Fair Maid of Perth, i. 112.
Mutuality, exchange of good offices.
His kindnesses seldome exceed courtesies.
Hee loues not deeper mutualities, because
he would not take sides, nor hazard himselfe
on displeasures, which he principally avoids.
— Earle, Microcosmographie {Plausible Man).
Mutuation, exchange.
O blessed mutation, blessed mutuation!
What we had ill, (and what had we but ill ?)
we changed it away for His good. — Adams,
i. 396.
Mux, to make a mess of. Cf . Muckst.
My mother and Nicholas Snowe . . had
thoroughly muxed up everything, being too
quick-headed. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch.
lxii.
Muzzing, stupidly loitering (?). The
speaker in the extract is the Hon. Mrs.
Cholmondeley, sister of Peg Woffing-
ton.
If you but knew, cried I, to whom I am
going to-night, and who I shall see to-night,
you would not dare keep me muzzing here. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, 1. 158.
Muzzy, muddled with drink ; also,
stupid, confused.
Lord Frederick Foretop and I were care-
lessly sliding the Banelagh round, picking
our teeth, after a damned muzzy dinner at
Boodle's. — Foote, Lame Lover, Act I.
Mr. L. a sensible man of eighty-two, strong,
healthy, and conversable as he could have
been at thirty-two ; his wife a dull muzzy old
creature ; his sister a ditto. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, i. 305 (1780).
A few of the more iudefatigable were con-
tinuing their labours, receiving reports from
scouts, giving orders, laying wagers, and very
muzzy with British principles and spirits. —
Lytton, My Xovel, Bk. XII. ch. xxxi.
Myall-bough.
" There's some folks don't believe in
witches and the like," he continued, " but a
man that's seen a naked old hag of a gin ride
away on a myall-bough, knows better." — //.
Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. ▼.
Myoner, miner.
The myoners . . . fully wrought the mine
through the castle wall. — Sir T. Fairfax to
Lenthall, Aug. 15, 1645.
Myrrhy, redolent of myrrh, per-
fumed.
As pours some pigeon from the myrrhy
lands,
Bapt by the whirlblast to fierce Scythian
strands
Where breed the swallows.
Browning, Waring.
Mythologist, a writer of fables ;
usually one who investigates or ex-
plains myths. L1 Estrange put forth an
edition in English of the "Fables of
jEsop, and other eminent Mythologist & ;
3rd edit, 1669."
N
Nab. H. says, " a cant term for the
head," but in the extracts it means a
hat.
Kite. Off with your hats ! 'Ounds, off with
your hats : this is the Captain, the Captain.
1st Mob. We have seen Captains afore now,
mun.
2nd Mob. Ay, and Lieutenant-Captains too:
s'flesh, I'll keep on my nab.
1st Mob. And I'se scarcely d'off mine for
any Captain in England.
Farquhar, Recruiting Officer, Act II.
There were particularly two parties, viz.,
those who wore hats fiercely cocked, and
NAB
( 429 )
NAPPED
those who preferr'd the nab, or trencher hat
with the brim flapping over their eyes. —
Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. II. ch. vi.
Nab, a rising ground.
Will you just turn this nab of heath, and
walk into my house ?—E. Bronte, Withering
Heights, ch. ixi.
Nabalitick, churlish, like Nabal
(1 Sam. xxv. 3).
^ It is then a sin arguing a Nabalitick and
Tile heart to meditate nothing but vile and
illiberal things for Qod.—Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 353.
Nabobbery, the nabob class.
"How particularly great he is to-night;
he reminds me of a nabob." "Nabobbery it-
self," said Hyacinth. — Savage, R. Medltcott,
Bk. II. ch. x.
Nabobess, female nabob ; wife of a
rich man, especially of one who had
made his fortune in India.
There are few nabobs and nabobesses in this
country.— Walpole, Letters, iii. 375 (1771).
I must alter the disposition of my acres
once more ; I will have no nabobs nor na-
bobesses in my family. — Burgoyne, Maid of
the Oaks, Act IV.
Mrs. Major Waddell played the Nabob's
lady as though she had been born a Nabobess.
— Miss Ferrier, Inheritance, Vol. II. ch. xiv.
Nads, adze. So nawl or nail for awl.
An ax and a nods to make troffe for thy
hogs. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 36.
Nag, to keep on with complaints or
reproaches.
Forgive me for nagging ; I am but a wo-
man.— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. xcvii.
Nail. To hit the nail on the head
= to speak to the point ; to touch the
matter exactly. The proverb is illus-
trated in N., but the following are
earlier by more than 70 years than the
earliest example there.
Thou hyttest the nayle vpon the heed,
For that is the thiuge tnat they dreed,
Least Scripture shuld come vnto light.
Dyaloge hetweene a Gentillman and
Husbandman, p. 142.
Did she not (think yon) hit the nail on the
head in thus taunting this bishop? — Bale,.
Select Works,?. 202.
Naivety, piquant simplicity. The
French naivetS is naturalized among us,
but this English form is peculiar.
His apologies and the like, when in a fit of
repentance he felt commanded to apologise,
were full of naivety, and very pretty and
ingenious. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling, l't. II.
ch. iii.
Namby-pamby, to talk mincingly ; to
flatter : the word is usually an adjec-
tive.
A lady of quality . . . sends me Irish cheese
and Iceland moss for my breakfast, and her
waiting gentlewoman to namby-pamby me. —
Miss Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. xvi.
Name-father, inventor of names.
I have changed his name by virtue of my
own single authority. Knowest thou not
that I am a great name-father ? — Richardson,
CI. Harlotce, iv. 45.
Name-son, godson, or perhaps only
namesake.
God for ever bless your honour! I am
your name-son sure enough. — Smollett, Sir L.
Greaves, ch. iii.
The Major was . . . highly flattered by the
interest expressed for his little name-son. —
Miss Ferrier, Inheritance, Vol. I. ch. xxvi.
Nan-boys, effeminate men (?).
The gittarn and the lute, the pipe and the
flute,
Are the new alamode for the nan-boys ;
With pistol and dagger the women out-
swagger
The blades with the muff and fan, boys.
Merry Drollerie, p. 12.
Nannicock, a silly, affected person.
See H. s. v. nanny hen.
Hee that doth wonder at a weathercocke,
And plaies with euery feather in the winde,
And is in love with euery nannicocke.
Breton, PasquiPs Fooles-cappe, p. 23.
Nap. Grose says, " to cheat at dice
by securing one chance." The term
referred to by Defoe was in use at
Halifax, and is applied to stealing.
Assisting the frail square die with high
and low f ullums, and other napping tricks. —
T. Brown, Works, iii. 00.
Hand Napjring, that is, when the criminal
was taken in the very act [of stealing cloth].
—Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, iii. 143.
N a pell, Lathyru* macrorrhizus,
called in Scotland gnajyperts or knap-
peris, and in Ireland napj)erty.
Hot napell making lips and tongue to swell.
Sylvester, The Furies, 179.
Napkin, to wrap in a napkin.
Let every man beware of napkining up the
talent which was delivered him to trade
withal. — Sanderson, iii. 97.
Napped, having a soft or woolly nap.
He had come on foot without attendants,
was dressed in a plain napped coat, and had
the mien and appearance of an honest coun-
try grazier. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i.
282.
NAPPY
( 430 ) NAUGHT OF, TO BE
Nappy, soft. The Diets, only give
the word as applied to ale = strong.
The lint or nappie downe which linnen
cloth beareth in manner of a toft cotton . .
is of great vse in Phyaicke. — Holland, Pliny,
xix. i.
Narcotism, condition produced by
narcotics ; coma.
From what I see of the case . . narcotism is
the only thing I should be much afraid of. —
G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. lxx.
Narrate, to relate. This verb is not
in R., and L. only cites for it Buckle's
Hist, of Civilization. In the extract it
is italicized as a Scotticism.
Thou tellest me that when I have least to
narrate, to speak in the Scottish phrase, I am
most diverting. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi.
223.
Narrow, ne'er a. Cf. Arrow.
I warrants me there is narrow a one of
all those officer fellows but looks upon him-
self to be as good as arrow a squire of 500/.
a year. — Tom Jones, Bk. VIII. ch. ii.
As for master and the young squire, they
have as yet had narro glimpse of the true
light. — Humphrey Clinker, i. 181.
Narrow- breath ed, short of breath.
He that is asthmatical, narrotc-breathed in
his faith, cannot but be lumpish and melan-
choly.— Adams, iii. 96.
Nasology, the science of noses.
Mr. Dickens is as deep in nasology as the
learned Slawkenbergitis ; his people are per-
petually wagging their noses, or flattening
them against windows, or rubbing them, or
evincing some restlessness or other in con-
nection with them. — Phillips, Essays from
the Times, ii. 336.
Nation, a body or company*: we use
tribe in the same way. The word is
sometimes used as an adverb = very,
but in that case it is an abbreviation of
tarnation or damnation.
A public defamer of the whole nation of
dissenters. — North, Examen, p. 416.
Nothing was difficult but his attendance
upon and dealing with the court ; . . . that
captious nation. — Ibid., life of Lord Guilford,
i. 172.
The whole nation of the law were at that
time apprised of all the arguments pro and
con. — Ibid., ii. 267.
The French had such a nation of hedges,
aud copses, and ditches. — Sterne, Trist.
Shantly, iv. 85.
What a nation of herbs he had procured.
— Ibid., v. 117.
Natitial, nativity.
Scarce fourteen times had hee beheld the
birth
Of th' happy Planet (which presag'd his
Worth)
Predominant in his Natitiall.
Sylvester, Henrie the Great, 39.
Native, an English oyster.
What different lots our stars accord !
This babe to be hail'd and woo'd as a lord,
And that to be shunn'd like a leper!
One to the world's wine, honey, and corn,
Another, like Colchester native, born
To its vinegar only and pepper.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
His eyes rested on a newly-opened oyster-
shop on a magnificent scale, with natives
laid one deep in circular marble basins in
the windows. — Sketches by Boz (Mr. John
D ounce).
Natter, to nag ; to find fault
" Ha' a drop o* warm broth ? " said Lisbeth,
whose motherly feeling now got the better
of her nattering habit. — G. Eltot, J dam Bede,
ch. iv.
Nattered, querulous ; impatient.
As she said of herself, she believed she
grew more "nattered" as she grew older;
but that she was conscious of her " nattered'
ness " was a new thing.— Mrs. Gaskell, Ruth,
ch. xxix.
Naturalness, absence of affectation.
Thackeray did not coin this word, or at
least was not the first to use it ; it occurs
in South, Dry den, and Addison. See L.
Gentility is the death and destruction of
social happiness amongst the middle classes
in England. It destroys naturalness (if I
may coin such a word) and kindly sympa-
thies.— Thackeray, Misc., ii. 293.
He seems to have risen above himself, by
a sudden inspiration, into that true natural'
ness which is the highest expression of the
spiritual. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Natural writer, a naturalist.
A lapwing, which bird our natural writers
name Vannellus. — Sir T. Brown, Tract iv.
Naturize. To naiurize all = to refer
everything to Nature.
Who is a Nature supernaturall ?
So say Diuines, so sayes Phylosophy :
Which call God Nature, naturizing all
That was, or is, or shal in Nature be.
Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 6.
Naught of, to be, to be regard-
less of.
For this their nureelings sake, both man
and wife abstaine from carnall company
together ; . . . . and to have the suckling of
the little child they count a sufficient re-
ward for being naught of their bodies. — Hol-
land's Camden, ii. i43.
NAUSEATION ( 431 )
NECK
Nauseation, disgust.
It caused not onely a nauseation iu the
people of England of Danish kings, but also
an appetite, yea a longing, after their true
and due Sovereign. — Fuller. Ch. Hist.. II.
vi. 10.
Nausity, aversion ; nausea.
It has in truth given me a kind of nausity
to meaner conversations. — Cotton's Montaigne,
ch. lxxvi.
Navel. The man without a navel =
Adam ; for, says the Annotator, " the
navel being only of use to attract the
aliment in utero materno, and Adam
having no mother, he had no use of a
navel, and therefore it is not to be con-
ceived he had any."
'Us I that do infect myself ; the man with-
out a navel yet lives in me. — Sir T. Brown,
Iieligio Medici, Pt. II. sect. x.
Navel-stead, place of the navel.
Full in the navel-stead
He ripp'd his belly up.
Chapman, Iliad, xxi. 173.
Navicular, belonging to a ship. The
" navicular spokesman " in the extract
is a Thames waterman.
u Rare game, master ! " cries our navicular
spokesman.— Tom Brown, Works, iii. 138.
Navigator, a labourer employed in
cutting or digging trenches, sluices,
&c. : usually abbreviated to Navvy, q. v.
There's enough of me, sir, to make a good
navigator, if all trades fail. — C. Kingsley,
Yeast, ch. xi.
I dare say you could drop down into a
navigator, or a shoeblack, or something in
that way to-morrow, and think it pleasant. —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xli.
Navvy, a labourer engaged in dig-
ging or cutting trenches, sluices, &c. :
an abbreviation of Navigator, q. v.
That Tim Goddard stole all my clothes,
and no good may they do him ; last time as
I went to gaol I gave them him to kep, and
he went off for a navvy meantimes. — C.
Kingsley, Yeast, ch. viii.
Nay-less, persistent ; one who will
not take No for an answer.
Like a nay-lesse Wooer,
Holding his cloak, shee puis him hard unto
her.— Sylvester, Maiden's Blush, 991.
Nazardly, mean ; foolish.
What ! such a nazardly Pigwiggen,
A little Hang-strings in a Biggin.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque,
p. 201.
Near, miserly. The expression in
Bp. Andrewes is similar.
This is that which makes the devil so good
a husbacd and thrifty, and to go near hand:
what need he give more when so little will
serve ?— Andrewes, v. 546.
Then came up Solmes's great estate: his
good management of it « A little too near
indeed, was the word (Oh how money-lovers,
thought I, will palliate! Yet my mother is a
princess in spirit to this Solmes).— Richard-
son, CI. Harlowe, i. 194.
" This is not my doctrine," cried Hobson :
I am not a near man neither; but as to
ping at that rate, it's quite out of charac-
ter. —Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. LX. ch. i.
Mr. Barkis, being now a little nearer than
he used to be, always resorted to this same
device before producing a single coin from
nis store.— Dickens, David Copperfield, ch.
Neatherders, woman who looks after
cattle. The Diets, give neatress.
But hark bow I can now express©
My love unto my neatherdesse.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 261.
What doth cause this pensiveness,
Thou most lovely neatheardesse ?
Ibid., p. 327.
Neck, to decapitate or strangle. Syl-
vester and Breton use neck and give the
neck in relation to the pieces at chess,
in which case " neck " seems to mean
" take." See next entry but one.
This leaps, that limps, this checks, that necks,
that mates,
Their Names are diverse, but their Wood
is one.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalitie, st. viii.
The plot had a fatal necking stroke at that
execution.— North, Examen, p. 220.
Throw iu a hint that if he should neglect
One hour, the next shall see him in my grasp,
And the next after that shall see him neck'd.
Keats, Cap and Bells, st. 22.
Neck. To break the neck = to strike
at the root of. A man who has got
through the hardest part of a task is
said to have broken the neck of it.
The last instance of his lordship's care of
the suitors was to quicken the dispatch at
the register's office and (if possible) to break
the neck of those wicked delays used there
North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 80.
His Knighthood, dating from the very year
of Cromwell's invasion (1G49), indicates a
man expected to do his best on the occasion ;
as in all probability he did, had not Tredah
Storm proved ruinous, and the neck of this
Irish war been broken at once.— Carlyle, Life
of Sterling, ch. ii.
NECK
( 432 )
NEEDLE
Neck. To give the neck = to give
the necking-stroke, to finish off ?
The king himself is haufhtie Care,
Which ouerlooketh all his men,
And when he seeth how they fare,
He steps among them now and then,
Whom when his roe presumes to checke,
His seruants stand to give the nee he.
Breton, Daffodils and Primroses, p. 5.
And when you plaie beware of checke.
Know how to saue and give a necke.
Ibid.
Neck and crop, head over heels, or
completely. See extract s. v. Squad.
Neck and heels, violently; in an
irregular manner.
The liberty of the subject is brought in
neck and heels as they say, that the Earl
might be popular. — North, Examen, p. 72.
Sir John. Can nobody tell me how he was
seized ?
Contrast. Seized ! why by that ruffian, neck
and heels.
Burgoyne, Lord of the Manor, iii. 4.
Neckhandkerchief, a cravat. Ker-
chief is a covering for the head ; so
neckhandkerchief is a very peculiar
word.
Open the top drawer of the wardrobe, and
take out a clean shirt and neck handkerchief.
— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xx.
Necklace, a band for the neck ;
usually of gold or silver or precious
stones ; not so in the extract.
A plain muslin tucker I put on, and my
black silk necklace instead of the French
necklace my lady gave me. — Richardson,
Pamela, i. 64.
Neck or nothing, ready to run all
hazards.
The world is stock 'd with neck or nothing ;
with men that will make over by retail an
estate of a thousand pound per annum to a
lawyer in expectation of being pleaded into
another of two hundred. — Gentleman In-
structed, p. 526.
Neck-question, question affecting the
lifp.
The Sacrament of the Altar was the main
touchstone to discover the poor Protestants.
... This neck-question, as I may terme it,
the most dull and d unci call Commissioner
was able to aske. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., VIII.
ii. 26.
Necrolatry, worship of the dead.
Egypt the native land of necrolatry. —
Etcald, Hist, of Isi'ael (Eng. trans.), iii. 50.
Necromancino, exercising necrom-
ancy.
The dead soldier in Lucan whom the
mighty necromancing witch tortures back into
a momentary life. — Be Quincey, Autobiog,
Sketches, i. 173.
Nectarell, sweet as nectar. Crashaw
has nectareal ; nectareous is also in use. •
Put on your silks ; and piece by piece
Give them the sceut of amber-greece ;
And for your breaths too, let them smell
Ambrosia-like or nectarell.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 17.
Neddy, a donkey. L., who gives no
example, thinks it a corruption of an
heady (animal); but more than one
Christian name is bestowed on this
animal ; e. g. Cuddy, Dicky, Jack,
See extract *. v. Donkey.
Her donkeys wandering at their own sweet
will answered the bay of the bloodhound
with a burst of harmony. " They 'm laugh-
iug at us, Keper, they neddies ; we 'm lost
our labour here." — Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. xv.
Need-be, necessity.
Princess de Lamballe has lain down on
bed ; " Madame, you are to be removed to
the Abbaye." " I do not wish to remove ; I
am well enough here." There is a need-?*
for removing. — Cariyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III.
Bk. I. ch. iv.
Needfire, fire produced by rubbing
two pieces of wood together. See
Wedgwood s. v. In the extract it =
beacon.
The ready page with hurried hand
Awaked the needfire' s slumbering brand,
And ruddy blushed the heaven.
Scott, Lay of Last Minstrel, c. iii.
Needful, used substantially for that
which is necessary or essential ; " the
needful" is a common expression for
money.
Mrs. Air. You have the needful?
Mr. Air. All but five hundred pounds
which you may have in the evening.
Foote, The Cozeners, Act III.
" He does not say how much his share will
come to, do he, Edward?" "No, ma'am,
you see he writes in a great hurry, and he
has only time, as he says, to mention the
needful." " And is not the money the need-
ful?" said Sir John Hunter. — Miss Edge*
worth, Manoeuvring, ch. viii.
For particulars Isabella could afford to
wait ; the needful was comprised in Morland's
promise. — Mist Austen, Northanger Abbey,
ch. xv.
Needle. See extract for a jocose
derivation.
This industrious Instrument, Needle, quasi
jVe idle, as some will have it, maintaineth
NEEDLING
( 433 )
NEGROFY
many millions. — Fuller, Worthies, London,
ii. 60.
Needling, one in want.
Sire a good tarn shall never guerdon want,
A gift to needling s is not given but lent.
Sylvester, The Sehisme, 467.
Needly, prickly, bristling.
As I looked down on his stiff bright head-
Siece, small quick eyes, and black needly
eard, he seemed to despise me (too much as
I thought) for a mere ignoramus and country
bumpkin. — Blaekmore, Lorna Boone, ch. xziii.
Needdom, the domain of want or
need.
Idleness is the coach to bring a man to
Needdom, prodigality the post - horse. —
Adams, i. 496.
Needments, necessaries. R. and L.
give the word, each with a single,
though different, quotation from the
F. Queene, to which may be added one
from Colin Clout9 8 come home againe,
line 193 ; it is not however confined to
Spenser.
The scrip with needments for the mountain
air. — Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Nrednot, a superfluity : still in use,
says Abp. Trench, among Quakers.
Whosoever shall 'observe the abundance of
gold and silver in Solomon's time in the city of
Jerusalem, will conclude this country not to
be the cistern, but fountain, of those metals.
As if Divine Providence had so divided it,
that other lands should be at the care and
cost to bear, dig out, and refine, and Judaea
have the honour and credit to use, expend,
yea neglect such glittering need - nots to
humane happinesse. — Fuller, Pisgah Sight,
Bk. I. ch. iii.
Needsly, of necessity. The Diets,
have needly.
Upon a vow who spouseth me must needsly
take in hand
The flying serpent for to slay which in the
forest is. — Peele, Sir Clyomon, I. i.
Needy-hood, state of want.
Floure of fuz-balls, that's too good
For a man in needy-hood ;
But the meal of mill-dust can
Well content a craving man.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 239.
Ne' er-be-oood, a worthless fellow ; a
tie 'er-do-well, which is the commoner
word.
Why, 'tis that ne'er-he-good, thy Son,
Has made me do what I have done.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 214.
Ne' er- do-well, wild ; also, as a sub-
stantive, a worthless person. See quot-
ation 8. V. LlE-A-BED.
The one, Ebsworthy, was a plain, honest,'
happy-go-lucky sailor, and as good a hand as
there was in the crew; and the other was
that same ne'er-do-ioeel Will Parracombe, his
old school-fellow who had been tempted by
the gipsy-Jesuit.— KingsUy, Westward Ho,
ch. xziv.
Neevie-neevie-nick-nack, a street-
boy's gambling game : one holds up
marbles or the like in his clenched fist,
while another guesses at the number.
'' Nivinivinach ' is mentioned among
the games played at by Gargantua
(Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxii.).
In the original it is a lanique noque.
44 He gave me half-a-crown yince, and for-
bade me to play it awa at pitch and toss."
" And you disobeyed him, of course ? " " Na,
I didna disobeyed him ; I played it awa at
neevie-neevie-nick-naek." — Scott, St. Ronan's
Well, ii. 197.
Nefast, wicked.
" They don't please you ; no accounting
for tastes." " I beg your pardon ; I account
for yours, if you really take for truth and
life monsters so nefast and flagitious." —
Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. X. ch. i.
Neg, nag.
They [Northumbrians] were a comical sort
of people, riding upon negs, as they call their
small horses. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
i. 272.
Neoant, one who denies. The ex-
tract is quoted by Strype from W.
Kingsmill's Defence of Priests' Mar-
riage, p. 352.
The affirmants of this proposition were
almost treble so many as were the negants.
— Strype, Cranmer, Bk. II. ch. iv.
Negatory, denying.
As vet no gilt autograph invites him, per-
mits him; the few gilt autographs are all
negatory, procrastinating. — Carlyle, Diamond
Necklace, ch. ri.
On Friday the 15th of July, 1791, the
National Assembly decides, in what negatory
manner we know. — Ibid., Fr. Rev., Pt. II.
Bk. IV. ch. ix.
Negotiatrix, female manager or
negotiator.
Our fair negotiatrix prepared to show the
usual degree of gratitude towards those who
had been the principal instruments of her
success. — Miss Edgeicorth, Manoeuvring, ch.
xv.
Neqrofy, to turn into a negro.
F F
NEMO SCIT
( 434 ) NEVER THE NEAR
And if no kindly cloud will parasol me,
My very cellular membrane will be changed,
I shall be negrofied.
Southey, Nondescripts, Hi.
Nemo scit, an unknown quantity. In
the first quotation a large amount is
meant ; in the second, where Gauden is
speaking of the inward illuminations,
&c. which some put forward as evi-
dences of their acceptance with God,
the reverse is implied.
Licences to marry within degrees forbid-
den ; for Priests' base Sonnes to succeed their
fathers in a benefice, and a hundred other
particulars, brought yearly a Nemo scit into
the Papal treasury. — Fuller, Ch. Hist^ V.
iii. 41.
These are (a nemo scit) as easily denied as
they are rashly affirmed, being indiscover-
able and incommunicable to any but God's
and a man's own spirit. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 214.
Neotebism, novelty ; innovation :
used by Dr. Hall in reference to new
words, as a term not exciting prejudice,
like neologism or innovation. See
quotation «. v. Heretic ate.
Neoterisms we must have, however, to the
end of time, and — such are human imitative-
ness and ignorance — the bad are likely to be
patronized by the thoughtless quite as readily
as the good. — Hall, Modern English, p. 19.
Nepotious, addicted to nepotism;
over-fond of nephews.
It may be questioned whether fond uncles
are not as numerous as unkind ones, notwith-
standing our recollections of King Richard
and the Children in the Wood. We may
use the epithet nepotious for those who carry
this fondness to the extent of doting, and, as
expressing that degree of fondness, it may be
applied to William Dove ; he was a nepotious
uncle. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. x.
With such a chapter, therefore, will I
brighten the countenance of many a dear
child, and gladden the heart of many a
happy father, and tender mother, and nepo-
tious uncle or aunt. — Ibid. ch. exxix.
Nepotist, one guilty of nepotism.
Were they to submit . . to be accused of
Nepotism by Nepotists? — Sydney Smith, 1st
Letter to Archd. Singleton,
Nervelet, small nerve.
I dream'd this mortal part of mine
Wan metamorphosed to a vine ;
Which crawling one and every way,
Enthrall'd my dainty Lucia.
Methought her long small legs and thighs
I with my tdndrils did surprize ;
Her belly, buttocks, and her waste
By my soft nerv'lits were embrae'd.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 13.
Nervy, strong ; sinewy. R. and L.
have the word, and the latter marks it
as obsolete, which no doubt it is, al-
though a modern instance of its use
may be adduced.
Between
His nervy knees there lay a boar-spear keen
Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Nescio, a proverbial phrase to ex-
press the difficulty which an unknown
man finds in getting preferment.
The man . . . seemed very fit to make a
Governour ; but, as our Cambridge term is, he
was staid with Nescios : he was not known
in court nor city.— Socket, Life of Williams,
ii. 97.
Nescious, ignorant.
He that understands our thoughts long
before they are born cannot be nescious of
our works when they are done. — Adams, ii.
171.
Nest, to relieve nature.
The most mannerly step but to the door,
and nest upon the stairs. — Modern Account
of Scotland, 1670 (Harl. Misc., vi. 137).
Nestle-cock, a foundling. N. has
nescoch, with quotation from Dun ton's
Ladie*? Diet., who refers also to cock-
ney; of which Fuller says some take it
for "One coaks'd or cocker'd\made a
wanton or a nestle-cock of." — worthies,
London (ii. 55).
Net, to cover with a net
It would have grieved him sorely, he said,
to leave his favourite tree to strangers, after
all the pains he had been at in netting it to
keep off the birds. — Miss Edgeworth, Belinda,
ch. xxi.
Nettie, natty.
Though danger be mickle,
And fauour so fickle,
Tet dutie doth tickle
My fansie to wright.
Concerning how prettie,
How fine and how nettie,
Good huswife should jettie
From morning to night.
Tusser, p. 159.
Never-strikb, a man who never
yields.
So off went Yeo to Plymouth, and re-
turned with Drew and a score of old never-
strikes. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xvi.
Never the near, never the nearer;
to no purpose.
I will not dispute the matter with them,
saith God, from day to day, and never the
near.— Latimer, i. 245.
NEW-FASHION ( 435 )
NICOR
Poor men put up bills every day, and
never the near.— Ibid., p. 275.
Boh. I kept a great house with small
cheer, bat all was ne*er the near.
Ober. And why ?
Boh. Because in seeking friends I found
table -guests to eat me and my meat. —
Greene, James the Fourth, Induction.
Men may search for a thing, and be never
the near, because they cannot search it out.
—Sanderson, ii. 328.
New-fashion, to rearrange or to
modernize.
Had I a place to new-fashion, I should not
put myself into the hands of an improver. —
Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. vi.
Newqated, imprisoned. C£ Bride-
welling.
Soon after this he was taken up and New-
gated. — North, Exatnen, p. 258.
News, a messenger with news.
In the mean time there cometh a News
thither with his horse to go over, and told
us he did come from Islington this morning.
—Pepys, July 31, 1665.
News. A house where they took in
the new seems to have been once a
euphemism for a brothel
During the election at Taunton, a gentle-
man, . . seeing the hostler, asked him if he
could inform him where they took in the news.
The hostler, understanding him in a literal
sense, directed him to a bookseller's shop on
the opposite side of the way. . . . "The
gentleman never asked me for a bad house ;
he only asked me for a house where they took
in the news." — Life of J. Lackington, pp. 84,
86.
Newsless, without news.
We are in such a news-less situation, that
I have been some time too without writing
to yo\x.— }Valpole to Mann, ii. 191 (1746).
Next door, approach ; nearness.
The next doore of death sads him not, but
bee expects it calmely as his turne in nature.
— Earle, Microcosmographie {Good old man).
Nexter, next
And in the nexter night
Ful many times do crie,
Remembring yet the ruthf ul plight
Wherein they late did lie.
Gascoigne, Complaint of Philomene,
p. 111.
Nib, to nibble.
When the fish begin to nib and bite,
The moving of the float doth them bewray.
Dennis, Secrets of Angling (Eng.
Garner, i. 151).
Nicher, to chuckle in a quiet way.
In the north of England the word also
means to neigh.
The old crone unicheredn a laugh under
her bonnet and bandage. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xix.
Nichil. See extract.
There is an Officer in the Exchequer, called
Clericus Nihilorum, or the Clerk of the
JVichills, who maketh a Roll of all such sums
as are niehilVd by the Sheriff upon their
estreats of the Green Wax, when such sums
are set on persons, either not found, or not
found solvible. — Fuller, Worthies, ch. xxv.
Nicifinity, finicalness. The 198th
Epigram in Davies's Scourge of Folly
is "Against Rontae's base pride, light
waight, and too much affected nxci-
finky."
Nick, to break windows. Those
who amused themselves by breaking
windows in their frolics were called
nickers. See L., «. v., who does not,
however, give the verb.
So through the street at midnight scours,
Breaks watchmen's heads, and chairmen's
glasses,
And thence proceeds to nicking sashes.
Prior, Alma, 1306.
Nick-eared, crop-eared.
Hold thy peace,
Thou nick-ear* d lubber ; what have we to do
With whys and wherefores?
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Vt. II. iii. 1.
Nickers. H., who givesno example,
says, " Nicker, a little ball of clay or
earth baked hard and oiled over for
boys to play at nickers"
You find one, out of a wonderfull conde-
scension and exemplary point of humility,
playing at Nickers and Marbles, or Cherry-
pit, or some such imperial recreation. —
Cotton, Scarronides, Preface.
Nick-nack, a feast where all con-
tribute ; a picnic.
Janus. I am afraid I can't come to cards,
but shall be sure to attend the repast. A
nick-nack^ I suppose ?
Cons. Yes, yes, we all contribute as usual :
the substantiate from Alderman Surloin's;
Lord Frippery's cook finds fricasees and
ragouts; Sir Robert Bumper's butler is to
send in the wine, and I shall supply the
desert. — Foote, The Nabob, Act I.
Nick-nacky, full of knick-knacks.
Cf. Knick-knackatory.
His dressing-room is a perfect show, so
neat and nick-nacky. — Miss Ferrier, Inherit-
ance, i. 86.
Nicor. See extract.
F F 2
NIDDIPOL
(436)
NIGHTY
u Did you ever tee a nicer ? " ** My brother
saw one in the northern sea, three fathoms
long, with the body of a bison-boll, and the
head of a cat, and the beard of a man, and
tusks an ell long lying down on its breast,
watching for the fishermen ; and he struck
it with an arrow, so that it fled to the
bottom of the sea, and never came up
again." "What is a nicor, Agilmand?"
asked one of the girls. " A sea-devil who
eats sailors."— Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xii.
Niddipol, foolish.
What niddipol hare brayne
Would scorne this couenant ?
Siany hurst, JEn., iv. 110.
Niddle-noddle, vacillating, or per-
haps head - shaking, and so affecting
wisdom after the manner of Lord Bur-
leigh in The Critic. See also extract
s. v. Joss. It is also used as a verb, to
shake or wag.
State-physicians,
And niddle-noddle politicians.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. i.
Her head niddle-noddled at every word.
Hood, Mist Kilmansegg.
Nidging, trifling ; insignificant
If I was Mr. Mandlebert, I'd sooner have
her than any of 'em, for all she's such a
nidging little thing. — Mad. UArblay, Ca-
milla, Bk. Y. ch. iii.
Nid-nod, to shake or wag.
That odd little nid-nodding face is too
good to be kept all to ourselves ; and 'tis so
comical, all its nods and grimaces seem as if
directed to our box. — Miss Ferrier, Inherit-
ance, iii. 104.
And Lady K. nid-nodded her head,
Lapped in a turbau faucy-bred.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Nieceship, the relationship of a niece.
She was a descendant of Noah, and of his
eldest son Japhet ; she was allied to Ham,
however, in another way besides this remote
nieceship. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. lxxii.
Nig, to be stingy.
Is it not better to healpe the mother and
mistre« of thy country with thy goods and
body, than by withholding thy hande, and
nigging, to make her not hable to kepe out
thine ennemy? — Aylmer, Harborough, &c.,
1559 (Maitland on Re/., p. 218).
Niggerling, a little nigger.
Black Venus rises from the soapy surge,
And all the little Niggerlings emerge
As lily-white as mussels.
Hood, A Black Job.
Tom Macaulay beheld the flight
Of these three little dusky sons of night,
And his heart swell 'd with joy and elation ;
" Oh see," quoth he, u those niggerlings three,
Who have just got emancipation."
Ingoldsby Legends (The Truants).
Night-cat. See extract. The trial
referred to is that of Hardy, Theiwall,
&c. in 1794.
The prisoners were charged with having'
provided arms, and instruments called night'
cats, for impeding the action of cavalry in
the streets. . . . Although a model of the
night-cat had been exhibited at a meeting, it
did not appear that anv had been ordered. —
Massey, Hist, of Eng., iii. 381.
Night-eater, a flea.
The innes now begin to prouide for gheat*,
and the night-eaters in the stable pinch the
trauailer in his bed. — Breton, Fantastickes
(September).
Nighted, benighted. Shakespeare
uses the word {Lear, IV. v. ; Hamlet, I.
ii.), but in a figurative sense.
Now to horse !
I shall be nighted; but an hour or two
Never breaks square in love.
Jonson, Fletcher and Middleton,
The Widow, Act II.
Nightingalize, to sing like a night-
ingale.
He sings like a lark when at morn he arises,
And when evening comes he nightingalizes.
Southey, Nondescripts, viii.
Nightman, a man who empties
privies, &c. at night.
In another is . . an advertisement of a
milch-ass, to be sold at the Nightman's in
Whitechapel— T. Brown, Works,m. 29.
Farriers should write on farcys and the
glanders,
Bug-doctors only upon bed-disorders ;
Farmers on land, ploughs, pigs, ducks, geese,
and ganders,
Nightmen alone on aromatic odours.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 149.
Night-suns, entertainments which
brighten the night seem to be so called.
I will not speake of every dayes delight,
They are so various, full of Rarities.
But are there not sweet pleasures for the
night?
Maskes, Bevels, Banquets, Mirthf ull Come-
dies,
Night-Sunnes, (kind Nature's dearest Prodi-
gies)
Which work in men with powerfull In-
fluence,
As having their first life, best motion
thence.
Hubert, Hist, of Edward II,
1629, p. 18.
Nighty, pertaining to night.
NIGRITUDE
( 437 )
NOBBLE
Wee keepe thee midpath with darcknesse
nightye beueyled.
Stanyhurst, J£n., ii. 369.
Nigritude, blackness.
I like to meet a sweep, . . . one of those
tender novices blooming through their first
nigritude, the maternal washings not quite
effaced from the cheek. — Essays of Elia,
Chimney Sweepers.
We've scrubbed the negroes till we've nearly
killed 'em,
And finding that we cannot wash them
white,
But still their nigritude offends the sight,
We mean to gild 'em.
Mood, A Black Job.
Nihilhood, nullity.
For 111 being but a meere defect of Good,
It followes then its but a meere Defect ;
Which is no more but a meere Nihilhood,
For Want can be no more in no respect,
And not to bee is nothing in effect.
Davits, Mirum in Modum, p. 23.
Nill, unwillingness.
It shall be their misery semper velle quod
nunquam erit, semper nolle quod nunquam non
erit — to have a will never satisfied, a nill
never gratified. — Adams, i. 239.
Nillt-willy, nolens volens: usually
written Willy-nilly, q. v.
A priest you shall be before the year is
out, nilly-tmlly. — Reads, Cloister and Hearth,
ch. ix.
Nilotic, belonging to the Nile.
I . . laid, confounded with all unutterable
slimy things, amongst reeds and Nilotic
mud. — De Quincey, Opium Eater, p. 151.
Nimious, excessive.
They ought ... to account their very feet
beautiful for their Lord's and embassage's
sake, only with this proviso, that divine and
nimious aderation be not given. — Ward,
Sermons, p. 8.
Nimshite. Jehu, the son of Nimshi,
drove furiously; hence Jehu is often
applied to a coachman. Nimshite I
have not found elsewhere.
Those Nimshites who with furious zeal drive
on,
And build up Rome to pull down Babylon.
Defoe, Hymn to the Pillory.
Nine-eted. H. says, "a term of
reproach," but gives neither explanation
nor example. I suppose it means squint-
ing. See Nine ways.
Out of doors, I say : come out. 111 fetch
ye out with a horse-pox for a damnable,
? trying, nine-ey'd witch. — Plautus, made Eng-
inh, Preface (1094).
You son of a nine-eyed whore, d'ye come
to abuse me? — Farquhar, The Inconstant,
Act II.
Nine-pegs, nine-pins.
Playing at nine-pegs with such heat
That mighty Jupiter did sweat.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 192.
Nines. To the nines — to perfection.
In the second extract the word is in the
singular, which, I think, is less usual.
He's such a funny man, and touches off
the Londoners to the nines. — Gait, Ayrshire
Legatees, ch. viii.
He then . . . put his hand in his pockets,
and produced four beautiful sets of handcuffs
bran new, polished to the nine. — Reade, Never
too late to mend, ch. lxv.
Nine ways. To look nine ways is a
strong expression for squinting. The
extract is supposed to be from a free
translation of Iliad, ii. 212 — 219, con-
taining the description of Thersites.
The line subjoined is the translation of
a single word in the original, ^oAr^c,
which used to be rendered " squinting,
though it probably has a different ety-
mology from that formerly assigned
to it, and means bandy-legged. Mr.
Roberts, in his note on the extract,
observes, " Modern roughs say, ' He
looks nine ways for Sunday.'" Cf.
Nine- eyed.
Squyntyied he was, and looked nyne waits.
~-UdaUs Erasmus* s Apophth., p. 203.
Ninny- whoop, a fool.
Do they think to have to do with a ninny-
whoop, to feed you then with cakes? —
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxxii.
Nip, a small dram (slang).
He sat down instantly, and asked for a little
drop of comfort out of the Dutch bottle ;
Mrs. Yolland sat down opposite to him, and
gave him his nip. — Wilkie Collins, The
Moonstone, Pt. I. ch. zv.
Young Eyre took a nip of whisky, and
settled himself so as to hear Lavender's
story. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xxiii.
Niplet, little nipple.
He with his pretty finger prest
The rubie niplet of her breast.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 77.
So like to this, nay all the rest,
Is each neate niplet of her breast.
Ibid., p. 175.
Nobble, to secure or get hold of.
The oulv friend she ever had was that old
woman with the stick — old Kew; the old
witch whom they buried four months ago
NOBBY
( 438 )
NODDY
after nobbling her money for the beauty of
the family. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. IviL
Nobby, good ; capital.
I'll come back in the course of the evening,
if agreeable to you, and endeavour to meet
your wishes respecting this unfortunate
family matter, and the nobbiest way of
keeping it quiet. — Dickens, Bleak House,
ch. liv.
Noble, used curiously in extract for
great, prodigious. It recalls the splm-
dide mendax of Horace, though really
the two phrases have from their con-
text quite different meanings.
That Saturnus should geld his father
Ooelius, to th' intent to make him vnable to
get any moe children, and other such matters
as are reported by them, it seemeth to be
some wittie deuise and fiction made for a
purpose, or a very noble and impudent lye. —
Puttenham, Eng. Poetic, Bk. I. ch. xii.
Noble. To turn or bring a noble to
ninepence was a proverbial expression,
signifying decay or degeneracy. The
Latin proverb for which Bailey offers
this equivalent is " ab equis ad asinos."
Many of you [women] are so lavish that
you make the poor husband oftentimes to
turn a noble to ninepence. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 59.
En. Have you given over study then ?
Po. Altogether ; I have brought a noble to
ninepence, and of a master of seven arts I
am become a workman of but one art. —
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 180.
Nobler, a go or glass (slang).
And I has two noblers of brandy, and one
of Old Tom ; no, two Old Toms it was and a
brandy.—- H. King si ey, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch.
Nocence, guilt.
I would iniquity was not bolder than
honesty, or that innocence might speed no
worse than nocence. — Adams, i. 212.
Nochell. To cry nochell in the ex-
tract seems to mean the same as a word
which was added to our language to-
wards the end of 1880, to ' Boycott/
though probably Gaffer Block only
said that he would not be responsible
for debts contracted by his wire. The
word seems the same as Nichill, q. v.
Will. The first I think on is the king's
majesty (God bless him!), him they cried
nochell.
Sam. What, as Gaffer Block of our town
cried his wife ?
Will. I do not know what he did; but
they voted that nobody should either borrow
or lend, nor sell nor buy with him, under
pain of their displeasure. — Dialogue on
Oxford Parliament, 1681 (Harl. Miscn ii-
114).
Noctivaoant, wandering by night.
The lustful sparrows, noctivagani adul-
terers, sit chirping about our houses. — Adams,
i. 347.
Nod. Land of Nod = sleep. See
Bedfordshire.
Oh bed, oh bed, delicious bed ! . . .
To the happy, a first-class carriage of ease
To the land of Nod, or where you please ;
But alas ! for the watchers and weepers.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Nodcock, simpleton : used in extract
adjectivally. N. has nodgecock.
So nodcoke I that long
Haue serued thee like a slaue,
For my reward, by dew desart,
Repentance gained haue.
Breton, Floorish upon Fancie, p. 22.
Noddie-peak, silly ; blockheaded.
Woodcock slangams, ninnie-hammer fly-
catchers, noddie-peak simpletons. — JJrquharVs
Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxv.
Noddle, to shake.
He used at the Temple to be described by
his hatchet face and shoulder of mutton
hand, and he walked splay, stooping and
noddling. — North, Life of Lord Guilford, i.
184.
She noddled her head, was saucy, and said
rude things to one's face. — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. V. ch. x.
NODDLE-CASE, a wig.
Next time you have occasion for a new
noddle-case, if you please, I'll recommend
you to the honestest pern wig-maker in Chris-
tendom.— T. Broum, Works, ii. 197.
Noddy, foolish. The word is not
common as an adjective, except in
composition, as noddy -poll, noddy-
peak.
You present us with an inane nihil, a new
directory of a noddy synod. — British Bellman,
1648 (Harl. Misc., vfi. 627).
Noddy, to make a fool of.
If such an asse be noddied for the nonce,
I say but this to helpe his idle fit,
Let him but thanke himself e for lacke of
wit.
Breton, PasquiVs Fooles-cappe, p. 24.
Noddy. The extract is from Can-
ning's Rovers, II. i., where the cha-
racters are introduced playing All-
fours, q. v. Several other terms of the
game are mentioned. In a note it is
stated, " A noddy, the reader will ob-
serve, has two significations — the one a
NODE
( 439 )
NONEST
knave at all -fours ; the other a fool or
booby." There was also a game at
cards called noddy* See N.
Beef. I beg.
Pudd. (deals three cards to Beefington).
Are you satisfied?
Beef. Enough. What hare you?
Pudd. High, Low, and the Game.
Beef. Damnation ! 'tis my deal (deals ;
turns up a knave). One for his heela ! (tri-
umphantly).
Pudd. Is king highest ?
Beef. No ! (sternly). The Game is mine.
The knave gives it me.
Pudd. Are knaves so prosperous? Ay,
marry are they in this world : they have the
game in their hands; your kings are but
noddies to them. — Poetry of Antijacobin, p.
199.
Node, a botch. L. (who quotes from
Wiseman* s Surgery) says, " rarely used
except in a scientific sense." The
nodes of a watch are, I suppose, the
figures, or perhaps the keyholes, which
in old-fashioned watches are often in
the face.
Whilst beauty fit to charm the Gods,
Was studded, like a watch, with nodes.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. 4.
Noqqin. "Partition framed of
timber scantlings, with the interstices
filled up by brick " (L., s. v. nogging,
but no example is given).
Many of them [Cinque-Port court-houses]
seem to have undergone little alteration, and
are in general of a composite order of archi-
tecture, a fanciful arrangement of brick and
timber, with what Johnson would have styled
" interstices reticulated and decussated be-
tween intersections " of lath and plaster. Its
less euphonious designation in the Weald is
a noggin. — Ingoldsby Legends (Jarvis's Wig).
Noggin-staves. To go to noggin-
staves = to go to pieces, or to be all in
confusion. Cf. Sticks and staves.
Silence, or my allegory will go to noggin-
staves. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. v.
Nohow. To look nohow = to be out
of countenance, or embarrassed.
I could not speak a word ; I dare say I
looked no-how. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 161.
Nointer, an anointer. Stapylton
always uses the forms noint, nointer,
Ac, even in the notes, where, of course,
there is no metre to require it
Tell me what's he in whom comes every man?
A Rhetorician, a Grammarian,
A Painter, Nointer, Augur, Geometrician.
Stapylton, Juvenal, iii. 91.
Noisancb, annoyance.
There is no snake in this countrey, nor any
venemous thing whatsoever ; howbeit munh
noisance they have every where by wolves. —
Holland's Camden, ii. 63.
Nonchalance, carelessness.
He sat there pursuing
His suit, weighing out with nonchalance
Fine speeches like gold from a balance.
Browning, The Glove.
Nonchalant, careless: a French
word almost naturalized.
The chief of the Turky Company were
also the demagogues or heads of the faction
in the city, and were most hearkened to by
the nonchalant merchants that went with
faction scarce knowing why. — North, Examen,
p. 463.
Nonchalantly, coolly ; carelessly.
I said nonchalantly, " Mr. Rochester is not
likely to return soon, I suppose." — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
Noncon, a nonconformist ; also ns
an adjective.
The very Noncons and the Church, we see,
Tho' when they pray to God, they disagree,
Yet fight with uniformity for thee.
T. Brown, Works, i. 128.
The king extended his mercy to diverse,
as, for instance, to one Rosewell, a Non-Con
teacher convict of high treason. — Northt
Examen, p. 645.
Nothing, however, in former times excited
so great a sensation in the small world of
Noncons as the death of one of their divines.
— Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxxiii.
Non-con pobmitancy, nonconformity.
Officers ecclesiastical did prosecute pre-
sentments, rather against non-conformitancy
of ministers and people than for debaucheries
of an evil life. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
•• A A
n. 44.
Non - confobmitant, a nonconform-
ist. Cf. CONFOBMITAN.
They were of the old stock of non-con-
formitants, and among the seniors of his
college, who look'd sour upon him, because
he was an adherent to ana stickler for the
discipline and ceremonies of the Church of
England. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 0.
This Bishop being not indiligent to preach
the Gospel, for which St. Paul and our own
canons had provided, was deciphered to the
king for an upholder of non-conformitants. —
Ibid. ii. 39.
None -child, own child; a darling.
An effemminate foole is the figure of a
baby, ... his father's loue, and his mother's
none-child. — Breton, Good and Bad, p. 13.
Nonest, nonce.
For the nonest I forbare to allege the
learneder sort, lest the unlearned should say
NONJURABLE ( 440 )
NOSE
they could no skill on such books. — PiVdng-
ton, p. 644.
Nonjurable, incapable of being
sworn. North (Examen, p. 264) calls
Dangerfield, who on account of his
notorious perjuries was incapacitated
from being a witness, " a nonjurable
rogue."
Nonplush, to discomfit. To be at a
nonplush = to be at a loss. This pro-
nunciation of nonplus is very common
in my Hampshire parish — it gives the
point to Hood's pun in the extract.
Below he wears the nether garb of males,
Of crimson plush,bnt non-plushed at the knee.
Hood, Irish Schoolmaster.
Nonresidence, digression.
I might here infer to your observation
without any nonresidence from the text that
the Ohnrch is called JUia Jerusalem* the
daughter of the people, for her beauty, for
her purity. — Adams, i. 398.
Nonresident, diverging.
But by the leave of his gravity, he was
herein non-resident from the troth itself, in
deriving a work so useful in the kind thereof
for honest and civil delectation. — Life of Sir
P. Sidney, prefixed to the Arcadia.
He himself is more non-resident from his
theme than a discontinue is from his charge.
— Adams, i. 473.
Nonsciknce, the reverse of science ;
unscientific error.
The doctor talked mere science or non-
science about humours, complexions, and
animal spirits. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch.
xxi
Nonsuch, an unequnlled person or
thing. Sylvester applies it to Plato's
ideal Republic, and is himself addressed
as 4* Rare Muses' Non-such " in some
commendatory verses by R. N. Gent.
Therefore did Plato from his None-Such
banish
Base Poetasters. — Sylvester, Urania, st. 42.
The Scripture . . . presenteth Solomon's
[temple] as a none-such or peerless structure,
admitting no equall, much less a superiour.
—Fuller, Pisgak Sight, III. (Pt. II.) viii. 1.
You are, as indeed I have always thought
you, a nonsuch of a woman. — Richardson,
Grandison, i. 166.
Noodledoh, a word formed like
rascaldom and scoundreldom, and ex-
pressing noodles collectively.
Lord So-and-so, his coat bedropt with wax,
All Peter's chains about his waist, his back
Brave with the needlework of Noodledotn,
Believes.
Browning, Bp. B long ram's Apology.
Nose, an informer (thieves' cant).
Now Bill — so the story, as told to me, goes—
And who, as his last speech sufficiently
shows,
Was a regular trump, did not like to turn
Nose. — Ingoldsby Legends {The Drummer).
Nose. As plain as the nose on ones
face, i. e. very obvious.
Those fears and jealousies appeared after-
wards to every common man as plain as
the nose on his face to be but meer forgeries
and suppositious things. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 35.
As witness my hand, Valentine Legend, in
great letters ; why 'tis as plain as the nose in
one's face. — Congreve, Love for Love, iv. 8.
The gentleman talks main well, and has
made it as vlain as the nose in one's face,
if one did but understand him. — Graves,
Spiritual Quixote, Bk. V. ch. xviii.
Nose. To cast in the nose = to twit.
We say more usually, to cast in the
teeth.
A feloe had cast him in the nose that he
Sue so large monie to soche a naughtie
abbe.— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 65.
Nose. To follow ones nose = to go
straight on. The saying, as appears
from the quotations, was sometimes ex-
panded not very delicately.
He that follows his nose always will very
often be led into a stink.— Congreve, Lore
for Love, iv. 10.
Footman. Madam, I don't know the house.
Lady Sm. Well, that's not for want of
ignorance: follow your nose, go, enquire
among the servants. — Swift, Polite Conversa-
tion (Conv. i.).
Tugwell very civilly inquired which was
the Bristol Road. " Follow your nose, and
your a-se will tag after," says a taylor's
prentice. — Graves, ' Spiritual Quixote, Bk.
VI. ch. i.
Nose. To hold a mans nose to the
grindstone = to be hard on bim, or
triumph over him.
It wil be a shame and to great a vilanie
for you which in al ages have been hable to
hold their nose to the grindstone, nowe either
for sparing of your goodes, which is nig-
gardie, or feare of your hues, which is
cowardise, to be their pesantes, whose lordes
your anncettors were. — Aylmer, Harborough,
&c., 1559 {Maitland on Ref.< p. 220).
Covetous hands and sacrilegious hearts
hold the nose of Religion so long to the grind-
stone of their Reformations, till they have
utterly defaced the Justice and Charity, the
Order and Beauty of Christian Religion.
— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 321.
I shall not neglect bringing the grindstone
to bear, nor yet bringing Dusty Boffin's note
NOSE
( 44i )
NOTIONLESS
to it. "His nose once brought to it shall be
held to it by these hands, Mr. Venus, till the
sparks flies out in showers. — Dickens, Our
Mutual Friend, Bk. III. ch. xiv.
Nose. To be bored through the nose
= to be cheated.
I have known divers Dutch gentlemen
grosly guld by this cheat, and som English
bor'd tuso through the nose this way. — Howell,
Forraine Travetl, sect. 8.
Nosebag, bag containing a horse's
provender: fastened on to his nose
when he feeds.
Calm as a hackney coach-horse on the Strand,
Tossing about his nose-baa and his oats.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 266.
There was Bell at his head, talking in an
endearing fashion to him as the Lieutenant
pulled the strap of the nosebag up ; and one
horse was safe. — Black, Adventures of a
Phaeton, ch. xiii.
Nosecloth, pocket-handkerchief: it
may, however, in the extract refer to
the can in which Silenus buried his
nose or face.
That proverbial fceeundi calices that might
wel haue been doore keeper to the Kanne of
Silenus, when nodding on his Asse trapt with
iuie, hee made his moist nosecloth the pausing
intermedium twixt euerie nappe. — Nashe,
Jntrod. to Greeners Menaphon, p. 15.
Noses. To tell or count noses = to
take the numbers present. The expres-
sion is usually somewhat contemptuous,
as where votes numerantur non ponder-
antur.
The polle and number of the names ... I
think to be but the number of the Beast, if
we onely tell noses, and not consider reasons.
— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 105.
The other eaten of the pincers was their
lordships' legislative vote, and their odds in
number above the bishops, if you counted men
by noses. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 168.
Nor think yourself secure in doing wrong,
By telling noses with a party strong.
Swift to Gay.
They would have had it in their power
to say they gave their opinions without any
reasons, an if their had been none better
than number or telling noses. — North, Ex-
amen, p. 523.
Nosey. See extract. The expres-
sion is not in Grose, nor in Hotten's
Slang Diet.
An admirable caricature of a musician,
what the vulgar of this day would call a
nosey, playing on a violin. — Archaol., ix. 143
(1789).
Nosocome. See quotation. The word
is taken from the original French, and
that from the Greek (voVoc topia).
He . . gave order that the wounded should
be dressed and had care of in his great hos-
pital or nosocome. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk.
I. ch. Ii.
Nostrum monoersh ip, ability to pro-
vide expedients or remedies : an absurd
word coined by Lovelace.
^ Should I be outwitted with all my senten-
tious boasting conceit of my own nostrum-
monger ship (I love to plague thee, who art a
pretender to accuracy, and a surface-skimmer
in learning, with out-of-the-way words and
phrases), I should certainly hang, drown, or
shoot myself. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii.
134.
Nosy, with a prominent nose.
The history leaves them, to give an account
who the knight of the looking-glasses and
his nosy squire were. — Jarvis's Don Quixote,
Pt. II. Bk. II. ch. xiv.
Notability, notableness ; capability
of managing well.
But she was, I cannot deny,
The soul of notability ;
She struggled hard to save the pelf.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xxvi.
Notched, a term applied to the
Roundheads on account of their closely-
cut hair; also to any persons with
cropped hair.
She had no resemblance to the rest of the
notch' d rascals. — The Committee, Act I
Some of the most eminent citizens who
can afford it have two religions going at
once, and will march you gravely at the
head of six notch' d apprentices to church in
the morning, and a meeting in the after-
noon.—T. Drown, Works, i. 210.
Noteless, unmusical. Both R. and
L. have the word = not attracting
notice.
The Bagpipe with its squeak and drone,
Or Parish-Clerk with noteless tone,
Are Owls to us sweet singers.
D*Urfey, Ttco Queens of Drentford,
Act I.
Nothing-do, an idler. Cf. Do-no-
thino.
What innumerable swarms of nothing-does
beleaguer this city \— Adams, ii. 182.
Notionless. Da vies means to say
that God knows essentially (i. e. because
He is God) everything, even thing that
never have existed or will exist, but
man can only form notions of existent
things. God then is called notionless, as
not deriving His knowledge in this way.
NOTOR Y
( 442 )
NUMBER Y
And though of That which is not nor shal be
Can be no Notion, so no knowledge right,
Tet Creatures only knowe in that degree,
But God knowes (Notionlesse) essentially.
Davies, Summa Totality p. 23.
Notoby, notorious.
Wat. Did they eny grevaunce to hyin ?
Jef. Out of this ly f e they did hym trymme,
Because he was Goddis servaunte.
Wat. He did some faulte gretly notary.
Jef. No thynge but for a mortuary
The preates agaynst hym did aryse.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and be
nott wrothe, p. 104.
Nource-oarden, nursery.
A Colledge, the nource-aarden (as it were)
or plant plot of good letters. — Holland's
Camden, p. 393.
Nource-son, foster-son.
Sir Thomas Bodley, a right worshipfull
knight, and a most worthy nource-son of this
Vniversity .—Holland's Camden, p. 382.
Nourice, to nurse.
The Siren Venus nouriced in her lap
Fair Adon.
Greene, Sonnet from Perimedes, p. 293.
Nous, sense. This Greek word has
become quite naturalized. In Peter
Pindar, p. 236, the word is in Greek
characters.
But soon her superannuated nous
Explain'd the horrid mystery.
Hood, A Fairy Tale.
Don't give people nicknames, don't even in
fun
Gall any one " snuff-coloured son of a gun ; "
Nor fancy, because a man nous seems to lack,
That, whenever you please, you can give him
the sack. — Ingoldsoy Legends (St. Medard).
Novice, used adjectivally ; inex-
perienced.
A novice theef that in a closet spies
A heap of gold that on the table lies ;
Pale, fearfull, shiuering, twice or thrice
extends,
And twice or thrice retires his fingers' ends.
Sylvester, The Imposture, 338.
These novice lovers at their first arrive
Are bashful! both.
Ibid., The Magnificence, 836.
The wisest, unexperienced, will be ever
Timorous and loath with novice modesty.
Milton, Paradise Regained, iii. 241.
Noviciate, inexperienced : the word
is usually a substantive meaning the
period which a novice has to pass
through before taking vows.
I discipline my voung noviciate thought
In ministeries of heart-stirring song.
Coleridge, Religious Musings.
Novilant, a recorder of new or
modern events.
For things past he was a perfect Historian ;
for things present a judicious Novilant ; and
for things to come a prudentiall (not to say
propheticall) Conjectures — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Essex (i. 365).
Both Novelants and Antiquaries must be
content with many falsehoods; the one
taking Reports at the first rebound before
come to ; the other raking them out of the
dust, when past their perfection. — Ibid.y
Monmouth (ii. 119).
Nub, to hang (thieves* cant). See
quotation & v. Filing-lay.
All the comfort I shall have when you are
nubbed is that I gave you good advice. —
Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. IV. ch. ii.
Nubbing- cheat, thieves' term for
gallows. Cf. Cheat.
I will show you a way to empty the pocket
of a queer cull without any danger of the
nubbing-cheat. — Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VIII.
ch. xii.
Nudifidian, one who has a bare
faith.
A Christian must work ; for no nudifidian^
as well as no nullifidian, shall be admitted
into heaven. — Adams, ii. 280.
Nuke. Bailey defines this "the
hinder part of the head, the noddle,"
but this does not seem the meaning in
the extract.
So Jove himself, as poets tell us,
Bred in his head his daughter Pallas,
Whom Vulcan midwiv'd at a hole,
With hatchet nuke, clove in his poll.
Ward, England's Reformation,
cant. 1. p. 2.
Nullah. See extract (an Indian
word).
Do you know what a nullah is ? Well, it's
a great gap, like a huge dry canal, fifteen cr
twenty feet deep. — Hughes, Tom Brovcn at
Oxford, ch. xliv.
Nullize, to make nothing ; to waste
away.
A lowly Fortune is of all despised,
A lofty one oft, of itselfe, nullized.
Sylvester, Honour's Farewell, 82.
Nuhbery, melodious.
No time lost Jubal ; th' unf nil harmony
Of vneven hammers beating diversly
Wakens the tunes that his sweet mtmbery
soule
Ver birth (some think) learn 'd of the war-
ling Pole.
Sylvester, Handie-Crafts, 1320.
NUMBER V
( 443 ) NYMPHOLEPTIC
This is the noble, sweet, voice-ord'ring Art
Breath's measurer, the guide of supplest
fingers
On living -dumb, dead - speaking, sinnew-
singers,
TV accord of discords, sacred Harmony
And numb'ru Law.
Ibid., The Columns, 25.
Numbeby, numerous.
Thy numbry Flocks in part shall barren be.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 1320.
So many and so numb'ry armies scatter 'd.
Ibid., Battle of Yvry, 25.
NumbboU8, capable of scansion.
The greatest part of -Poets haveaparelled
their poetical inventions in that numerous
kind of writing which is called Verse. —
Sidney, Defence of Poesie, p. 548.
Num-cumpus, a fool ; one non compos.
Sa like a groat num-cumpus I blubber'd awaay
o' the bed. — Tennyson, Northern Cobbler,
Nummbt. See quotation.
This nonemete, which seems to have been
a meal in lieu of a nap, is still the word by
which luncheon was called at Bristol in my
childhood, but corrupted into nunvnet. —
Southey, Common PI. Book, i. 477.
Nun, to cloister up as a nun.
If you are so very heavenly-minded . ; I
will have you to town, and nun you up with
Aunt Nell. — Richardson, Grandison, ▼. 50.
Nunchbon, luncheon. Originally
the mid-day drink ; from Middle Eng-
lish schenche, a drink ; A. S. scencan,
to pour out drink. See N. and Q. , 5th
S., iv. 366. The latest example in the
Diets, is from Hudibras; two more
recent are subjoined.
Tugwell, by a kind of instinct, began to
rummage his wallet for something to eat, . . .
and they took a comfortable noonchine to-
gether.— Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. IX.
ch. v.
I left London this morning at eight o'clock,
and the only ten minutes I have spent out
of my chaise since that time procured me
a nunchion at Marlborough. — Miss Austen,
Sense and Sensibility, ch. xliv.
Nunnery, the institution of conven-
tual life for women, not the building
in which they live. Cf. Friary. Fuller
observes that some suppose Jephthah's
daughter to have made a vow of per-
petual virginity, and gives as his
authority in the margin,
Nicolas Lyra in locum, with most Roman
commentators since his time, in hope to found
nunnery thereupon. — Pisyah Siyht, II. iii. 11.
Nurse-father, nursing-father, fos-
terer.
K. Edward, knowing himself to be a
maintainer and Nurse- father of the Church,
ordained three new Bishopricks.— Holland's
Camden, p. 232.
Nurse-mother, foster-mother.
And thus much briefly of my deare Nurte-
mother Oxford.— Holland's Camden, p. 383.
Nursery, a nurse-child.
Bethshan was afterwards called Nysa by
humane writers (and at last Scythopolis),
from Nysa, Bacchus his nurse, whom he is
said there solemnly to have buried. A jolly
dame no doubt, as appears by the well bat-
tling of the plump boy, her nursery. — Fuller,
Pisyah Siyht, II. viii. 21.
Nurt, to push with the horns. Wenr
net in extract = a calf just weaned.
Curst cattle that nurteth
Poore wennel soon hurteth.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 55.
Nutrient, nourishing.
How does the young reality, young Sans-
culottism, thrive? The attentive observer
can answer. It thrives bravely; putting
forth new buds, expanding the old buds into
leaves, into boughs. Is not French existence,
as before, most prurient, all loosened, most
nutrient for it ?—Carlylc, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk.
I. ch. ii.
Nuts, that which pleases one greatly.
To be nuts on = to be very fond of.
The first extract is a travesty of " Hoc
Ithacus velit, hoc magno mercentur
Atridcer
It will be nuts, if my case this is,
Both for Atrides and Ulysses.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 15.
This was nuts to the old Lord, who thought
he had outwitted Frank. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 87.
My aunt is awful nuts on Marcus Aurelius ;
I beg your pardon, you don't know the
Shrase; my aunt makes Marcus Aurelius
er Bible. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xi.
Nymph-hay.
Old Jaques . . could see from his house
the nuns of the priory of St. Mary's (juxta
Kington) come forth into the nymph-hay
with their rocks and wheels to spin, and with
their sewing work. — Aubrey, Misc., p. 219.
Nympholeptic, nymph-catching ;
endeavouring to seize nymphs. Mrs.
Browning uses the word again in The
Lost Bower.
Nymphs of mountain, not of valley, we are
wont to call the Muses ;
And in nympholeptic climbing poets pass
from mount to star.
Mrs. Broicning, Lady Geraldine's
Courtship.
OADE
( 444 )
OBJURE
o
Oadk, woad.
Somewhat of oade, wines, wainscot, and
Bait were found in the town. — Patten, Exped.
to Scotl.y 1548 (Eng. Gamer, iii. 134).
Oarless, without oars. Sylvester
(2nd day, 1283) speaks of a ship as
<l mast-less, oar-less, and from harbour
far."
Oase, osiers.
Som make their roofs with fearn, or reeds, or
rushes,
And som with hides, with oase, with boughs,
and bushes.
Sylvester, Handie-Crafts, 367.
But then hee sinks ; and, wretched, rould
along
The sands, and Oase, and rooks, and mud
among. — Ibid., Schisme, 1003.
Oatmeal. To think all the world
oatmeal = (perhaps) to consider all
the world capable of being devoured
or subdued.
Leosthenes had perswaded the citee of
Athenes to make warre, beeyng set agog to
thinks all the tporlde otemele, and to imagin
the recouering of an high name of freedoms
and of principalitee or soueraintee. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 329.
Oatmeal.
As I hope to live and breathe, I'D, 111, I'll
blow you all up without gunpowder or oat'
meal, if an honest gentlemau is thus to be
fooled with. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 156.
Oats. To sow wild oats = to have
had one's fling ; and so, to reform.
See L., but this is an earlier example of
the whole phrase than is given in the
Diets.
We meane that wilful] and unruly age,
which lacketh rypeness and discretion, and
(as wee saye) hath not sowed all theyr toy eld
Oates. — Touchstone of Complexions, p. 99
(1576).
Ob. See second extract.
They peep and mutter like Obs and Py-
thons, whispering as out of the earth and
their bellies, not from their hearts, more
dubiously than the Oracles of Apollo, and
more obscurely than the Sybil's leaves. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 336.
It seems worthy of notice tnat this magical
fascination is generally called Obi, and the
magicians Obeah men, throughout Guinea,
Negroland, &c. ; whilst the Hebrew or Syriac
word for the rites of necromancy was Ob or
()hh, at least when ventriloquism was con-
cerned.— De Quincey, Modem -S'ujterstition.
Ob ambulate, to walk about.
They do not obambulate and wander up and
down, but remain in certain places and re-
ceptacles of happiness or unhappineaa. —
Adams, iii. 148.
Obbraid, reproach. Patten, relating
how Hen. VIII. not only released some
Scotch prisoners, but gave them pre-
sents, says that he repeats not this to
fling such good turns in their teeth, but
the subject may " without obbraid of
benefits recount the bounty of his
Prince's largesse." — Exped. to SeotL,
1648 (Eng. Garner, iii. 66).
Obiit-sono, funeral song ; dirge.
They spice him sweetly, with salt teares
among,
And of sad sighes they make their Obiit-song.
Davits, Holy Roode, p. 27.
Obitual DAT. anniversary of death.
Edw. Wells, M.A., student of Oh. Ch.,
spoke a speech in praise of Dr. John Fell,
being his obitual day .... This speech was
founded by John Gross, apothecary, one of
the executors of the said Dr. Fell. — Life of
A. Wood, July 10, 1694.
Obituarist, the recorder of a death ;
the writer of a notice in memoriam.
He it was who composed the whole peal
of Stedman s triples, 5040 changes, which
his obituarist says had till then been deemed
impracticable. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
Object, obstacle.
To him that putteth not an object or let
(I use the schoolmen's words), that is to say,
to him that hath no actual purpose of deadly
sin [the sacraments] give grace, righteous-
ness, forgiveness of sins. — Becon, iii. 380.
Objectless, purposeless ; without
aim or object.
Strangers would wonder what I am doing,
lingering here at the sign-post, evidently
objectless and lost. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. xxviii.
Objectual, eternal ; visible.
A circular thing implies a perpetuity of
motion. It begins from all parts alike, et in
seipso desirxit, ends absolutely in itself with-
out any point or scope objectual to move it.
— Adams, i. 6.
Thus far . . concerning the material temple,
external or objectual idols. — Ibid., ii. 296.
Objure, to swear.
As the people only laughed at him, he
cried the louder and more vehemently ; nay,
OBLIGATE
( 445 )
OBSOLETED
at last began objuring, foaming, imprecating.
— Carlylc, Misc., i. 853.
Obligate, to oblige : a vulgarism.
It is also a technical term among Free-
masons.
A lady in them oases is much to be pitied,
for she is obligated to take a man upon his
own credit, which is tantamount to no credit
at all. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. X. ch. vi.
The Royal Princes, according to ancient
custom, were introduced as Knights of the
Temple, and haying been properly obligated,
were invested as Knights of the Temple and
Malta.— Standard, Dec. 15, 1879.
Obligeant, obliging : one of several
French words used by North as though
they were English. Cf. Bbavkur,
Orage, &c.
It is prodigious that a parcel of monstrous
incredible lyes exalted by solemn perjury,
shall be thus tenderly treated in the soft and
obligeant style of superstructures, and subse-
quent additions. — North, Examen, p. 193.
Oblique, to slant or incline.
He sat upon the edge of his"chair, placed
at three feet distance from the table, and
achieved a communication with his plate by
projecting his person towards it in a line
which obitqued from the bottom of his spine.
— Scott, Waverley, i. 101.
Oblite, dim ; smeared over (obtttus).
Surely the water of them is more clear
than the place alleadged out of the Canticles
to prove Solomon the author thereof, where
but obscure and oblite mention is made of
those water-works. — Fuller, Pisgah Siykt, II.
v.21.
Oblivionise, to sink in oblivion.
I now see him so seldom, so precariously,
and with such difficulty to himself, that I am
perpetually preparing myself for perceiving
his thoughts about me oblivionised.—Mad.
t)yArblay, Diary, v. 129.
Obmurmuring, objection.
Thus, maugre all th' obmurmvrings of sense,
We have found an essence incorporeall.
H. More, Immortality of the Soul,
II. ii. 10.
Obnixely, earnestly (Lat. obnixe).
The extract is from a letter from E.
Codrington to Sir E. Dering, May 24,
1641.
Most humbly and most obnixely I must
beseech both them and you. — Proceedings in
Kent (Camden Soc.).
Obscurantism, moral darkness.
No wonder then that these gifted dames
had soon to complain of Elsley Vavasour as
a traitor to the cause of progress and civil-
ization ; a renegade who had fled to the camp
of aristocracy, flunkey dom, cl>scurantism,
frivolity, and dissipation. — Kiwjsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. xi.
Obscurantist, promoting moral dark-
ness.
Tou working men complain of the clergy
for being bigoted and obscurantist, and hating
the cause or the people. — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. zvii.
Obsecrate, to beseech. Richardson
writes, "The verb to obsecrate is given
by Dr. Nott in his Glossary to Sir
Thomas Wyat: it has not occurred
to us in the poems."
It was, however, in vain that Andrew Fair-
service employed his lungs in obsecrating a
share of Dougal's protection.— &*o/f, Rob Roy,
ii. 223.
Observables, notable things. Fuller
is fond of these substantival adjectives.
Cf. Considerables. Memorables, Occa-
sion als, Ornamentals, Remark ables.
Thus satisfied for the main that Herod
rebuilt Zorobabel's temple, come we to some
memorable observables therein. — Fuller,
Pisgah Sight, III. (Pt. II.) vii. 1.
Know roost of the rooms of thy native
countrey before thou goest over the thresh-
hold thereof ; especially seeing England pre-
sents thee with so many observables. — Ibid.,
Holy State, III. iv. 4.
Some observables on the method and
manner of their meeting. — Ibid., Ch. Hist.,
II. iv. 3, margin.
Observal, observation.
The full force of the libel will not appear
without a previous observal of what has been
said of them. — North, Examen, p. 059.
Observer, flatterer.
His just contempt of jesters, parasites,
Servile observers, and polluted tongues. >
Chapman, Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois,
Act IV.
Obsidious, besetting (from without).
Lock up this vessel with the key of faith,
bar it with resolution against sin, guard it
with supervisiting diligence, and repose it in
the bosom of thy Saviour. There it is safe
from all obsidious or insidious oppugnations,
from the reach of fraud or violence. — Adams,
i. 261.
Obsign, to seal.
The sacrament of His Body and Blood,
whereby He doth represent, and unto our
faith give and obsign unto us Himself wholly,
with all the merits and glory of His Body
and Blood. — Bradford, p. 395.
Obsoleted, out of date.
Those [books] that as to authority are
obsoleted, go rounder off-hand, because they
OBSOLETISM ( 446 )
OCHRE
require little common-placing. — Norths JSr-
amen, p. 24.
The defendant appeared, and pleaded to
issue in battle, which law was then and is
yet in force, though obsoleted. — Ibid., life of
Lord Guilford, i. 130.
Obsoletism, an archaism.
Does then the warrant of a single person
validate a neoterism, or, what is scarcely dis-
tinguishable therefrom, a resuscitated ob-
solete'sm ?—Hall, Modem English, p. 35.
Obstination, obstinacy.
There was false lawe with oryble vengeaunce,
Frowarde obstynacyon with myscherous go-
vernaunce.
Hycke-Scorner {Hawkins, Eng. Dr., i. 90).
The stone of obstination must be taken
away from our hearts, ere we can hear thy
reviving voice. — Bp. Hall, Coni. (Lazarus
raised).
Obstined, hardened ; made obstinate.
You that doo shut your eyes against the
rayes
Of glorious light, which shineth in our
dayes;
Whose spirits self - obstin'd in old musty
error
Bepulse the Truth.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1274.
Obstbeperate, to make a loud noise.
Thump, thump, thump, obstreperated the
abbess of Andouillets with the end of her
gold-headed cane against the bottom of the
calesh. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, v. 120.
Obstropulous, vulgar corruption of
obstreperous.
ril be hanged, said she, if Sawny Waddle
the pedlar has not got up in a dream and
done it, for I heard him very obstropulous in
his sleep. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. viii.
I'm sure you did not treat Miss Hard-
castle, that was here a while ago, in this
obstropalous manner. — Goldsmith, She stoops
to conquer, Act III.
Obstupefaction, the state of being
stunned or stupefied, as with grief,
amazement, Ac.
I leave also Sophronio preparing for his
journey, and inexpressible it is what a black
kind of obstupefaction and regret all the
world was possessed withal in Elaiana's
court. — Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 109.
Obtempeb, to obey.
The feruent desire which I bad to obtemper
vnto your Majestie's commandement . . . en-
couraged mee. — Hudson's Judith (Ep. Dedic).
Obtention, procurement: a word
coined by Mad. D'Arblay to signify
that which is obtained.
There was no possibility of granting a
pension to a foreigner, who resided in his
own country, while that country was at open
war with the laud whence he aspired at its
obtention, a word I make for my passing con-
venience.— Mad. JfArUay, Diary, vii. 140.
Obtobtion, twisting.
Whereupon have issued those strange ob~
tortious of some particular prophecies to
private interests. — Bp. Hall, Works, viii. 500.
Obtrectator, a slanderer.
Some were of a very strict life, and a
great deal more laborious in their cure than
their obtrectators. — Hacktt, life of Williams,
i.95.
The blast that help'd to blow down this
cedar was the breath of obtrectators and tale-
bearers.—/Wi.t ii. 19.
Obturation, stopping up anything*
by smearing something over it.
Some are deaf by an outward obturation,
whether by the prejudice of the Teacher, or
by secular occasions and distractions. — Bp.
Hall, Cont. (Deaf and Dumb).
Obviate, to meet; seldom found in
the literal meaning. The first extract
is quoted in Dr. Hall's Modem Eng-
lish, p. 111. It is put in the mouth of
"Signieur Worde - monger, the ape of
eloquence," and is a skit on pedantic
and affected expressions.
As on the way I itenerated [sic]
A rurall person I obviated.
& Rowlands, Knave of Clubbs, 1600.
Our reconciliation with Rome is clogged
with the same impossibilities; she may be
gone to, but will never be 'met with ; such
er pride or peevishness not to stir a step to
obviate any of a different religion. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., XL ix. 74.
Occasionals, impromptus. For
similar instances of substantive-adjec-
tives, see Observables.
"Hereat Mr. Dod (the flame of whose seal
turned all accidents into fuel) fell into a
pertinent and seasonable discourse (as none
better at occasionals) of what power men
have more than they know of themselves to
refrain from sin. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. ix.
82.
Ochidore, shore-crab.
"O! the ochidore! look to the blue orAt-
dore. Who've put ochidore to maister's
pole?" It was too true; neatly 'inserted,
as he stooped forward, between his neck and
his collar, was a large live shore-crab, hold-
ing on tight with both hands. — Kingsley,
Westtrard Ho, ch. ii.
Ochre, money, from the colour of
gold (slang).
OCIVITY
( 447 ) OFFENDICLE
If you want to cheek us, pay your ochre
at the doors and take it out. — Dickens, Hard
Times, oh. vi.
OCIVITY, sloth.
"We owe to ourselves the eschewing and
avoiding of idleness and ocivity. — Hooper, ii.
92.
Octastic, a stanza of eight lines.
They found out their sentence as it is
metrified in this octastic. — Urquhart, Ra-
belais, Bk. III. ch. xvii.
Octave, a stanza of eight lines.
With mournful melodie it continued this
octave. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 351.
October, ale, from the month in
which it was brewed. See quotation
s. v. St i re. Emerson, who is speaking
of England in the seventeenth century,
seemB to be unaware that it was simply
ale.
Ld. Sm. Tom Neverout, will you taste a
glass of the October?
JVev. No, faith, my lord, I like your wine ;
and I won't put a churl upon a gentleman.
— Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. ii.).
We sat over a tankard of October. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 77.
The country gentlemen had a posset or
drink they called October. — Emerson, English
Traits, ch. xiv.
Odd, different.
How ferre odde those persones are from
the nature of this prince which© neuer
thinken theira selfes to be praysed enough.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 185.
Odd-comb-shortly, a chance or in-
definite time.
Col. Miss, when will you be married ?
Miss. One of these odd-come-shortlies,
Colonel. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv.
i.). ^
They say she is to be married and off to
England ane of thae odd-come-shortlies wi'
some of the gowks about the Waal down-by.
—Scott, St. Ronan's Well, i. 803.
Oddments, trifles ; remnants.
I have still so many book oddments of
accounts, examinations, directions, and little
household affairs to arrange. — Mad. D'Ar-
blay, Diary, vi. 54.
Odkman, writer of an ode.
Edward and Harry were much braver men
Than this new-christened hero of thy pen ;
Yes, laurelled Odeman, braver far by half .J
WoUot, P. Pindar, p. 18.
Odist, writer of an ode.
We hardly know which to consider as the
greater object of compassion in this case —
the original odist thus parodied by his friend,
or the mortified Parodist thus mutilated by
his printer. — Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 24.
Odorable, capable of being smelt.
The Philosopher gathers a triple pro-
portion, to wit, the arithmeticall, the geo-
metrically and the musicall. And by one of
these three is euery other proportion guided
of the things that haue conueniencie by re-
lation, as the visible by light, colour, and
shadow; the audible by stirres times and
accents ; the odorable by smelles of sundry
temperaments; the tastible by sauours to
the rate, the tangible by his objects in this
or that regard. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk.
II. ch. i.
Odorless, without smell.
It is tasteless, but not odorless. — E. A.
Poe, Hans Pfaal (i. 8).
Odoured, perfumed: ill-odoured =
unsavoury.
His eyes and his very thoughts are not his
own, and are wholly directed to a gilded,
nauseous, iVL-odoured idol.— Godwin, Monde-
vilU, i. 250.
Oeillet. See extract.
The parapet often had the merlons pierced
with long chinks ending in round holes called
oeillets.—Arch., zii. 147 (1796).
(Enomel, mixture of wine and honey.
So to come back to the drinking
Of this Cyprus — it is well,
But those memories, to my thinking,
Make a better anomel.
Mrs. Browning, Wine of Cyprus.
Offcast, rubbish ; something re-
jected.
The offcasts of all the professions — doctors
without patients, lawyers without briefs. —
Savage, K. Medlicott, Bk. III. ch. vi.
Off-chop, to chop off.
Her head shee felt with whiffing steel off-
chopt.
Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalitie, st. 41.
Off-cutting, cutting off: offcut
(substantive) is a technical term in
printing. See L.
Besides th' off-cutting of all passages,
As well of succours as of forrages.
Sylvester, Panaretus, 779.
Offence, to offend.
All the world, by thee offenced,
With such a present may be recompenced.
Hudson, Judith, vi. 323.
Offendant, offender.
If the offendant did consider the grief e and
shame of punishment, he would containe him-
selfe within the compasse of a better course.
—Breton, Packet of Letters, p. 43.
Offendicle, a stumbling-block. The
OFFENSIBLE
(448 )
OIL WA Y
second extract is quoted in Pilkington's
works, but is part of a Romish tract,
published 1561.
What is a slander to offend or to be
offendicle to any man ? — Becon, iii. 610.
As the prophet Jeremy says, " They have
fmt offeitdtcles in the house of Qod and pol-
ubed it."— Pilkington, p. 484.
Offensible. In the extract Breton
is speaking of the Incarnation, and
seems to mean that the Divine glory
without such vail of flesh would have
been too much for man.
This essence all incomprehensible,
Yet willing in His mercies to be knowne,
That glorie might not be offensible.
That in a shadowe onely should be showne.
Breton, Rauisht Soule, p. 7.
Offensive, usually = giving offence,
but in the extract = taking it.
I still feared to dare so haute an attempt
to so braue a personage; lest she offensiue
at my presumption, I perish in the height
of my thoughts. — Greene, Menaphon, p. 53.
Office. To give the office = to help,
or hint, or play into the hands of.
I'll give you the office ; Til mark you down
for a good claim. — Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. lis.
"You're not a deceiving imp? you brought
no one with you ? " M No, sir, no ! » " Nor
giv' no one the office to follow you ? " M No."
—Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. iii.
Officiary, subordinate.
The City and Signiory of Geneva . . was
governed by officiary and titular Earls. —
Heylin, Hist, of Presbyterianism, p. 3.
Officine, office- room. A section in
Fuller's Ch. Hist, Bk. VI. p. 284, is
headed, "Of the prime officers and
officines of Abbey 8. '
Officious is now always used in a
bad sense, of one who is fussy or too
forward in proffering services. The
subjoined is an example of the better
meaning, of a later date bjr nearly a
century than any given in the Diets.
They were tolerably well-bred ; very offi-
cious, humane, and hospitable ; in their con-
versation frank and open.— Burke, on French
Revolution, p. 111.
Offscums, contemptible people. L.
has qffscum as an adjective.
I see the drift. These offscums all at once,
Too idlely pampred, plot rebellions.
Sylvester, The La we, 328.
Off-shake, to shake off.
His fruit, yer ripe, shall be offi shaken al\.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, ii. 76.
Oodoastic, a stanza of eight lines.
It will not be much out of the byas to in-
sert (in this Ogdoastique) a few verses of the
Latine which was spoken in that age. —
Howell, Forraine Travell, sect. xi.
Ogive, having a Gothic arch.
The large ogive window that lighted the hall.
Ingoldsby Lsgends (St. Romwold).
Oorillon, a little ogre.
What treatment of his wife, what abuse
and brutal behaviour to his children, who,
though ogrillons, are children! — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xv.
Oil, study, as at night by lamp-
light. Pytheas told Demosthenes
(Plutarch's Life of Demosthenes,ch. viii.)
that all his arguments smelt of the lamp
(iXAvx^wv oZnv). In Udal's Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 370, this is rendered " smell
of the candle."
In reason whereof, I am perswaded, that
none of indifferent judgement©, shall think
his oyle and labour lost. — Touchstone of Coat'
plexions, Preface, p. vii.
In our first gamesome age our doting sires,
Corked and cared to have us lettered,
Sent us to Cambridge, where our oyl is spent.
Return from Parnassus, iii. 5.
Oil of angels, a gift or bribe of
money, the reference being of course
to the coin, angel.
Lawyers are troubled with the heat of the
liver, which makes the palms of their hands
so hot, that they cannot be cool'd, unlesse
they be rub'd with the oile of angels. — Greene,
Qutp for Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v.
407).
I have seen him
Cap a pie gallant, and his stripes wash'd off
With oil of angels.
Massinger, Duke of Milan, iii. 2.
Oil of holly, a beating. N. has oil
of baston and oil of whip with the same
meaning.
The oil of holly shall prove a present
remedy for a shrewd housewife. — Pennyless
Parliament, 1008 (Harl. Misc., i. 183).
Oil of swallows. See quotation.
Southey says in a note that he has
known it applied in the present century.
For broken bones, bones out of joint, or
any grief in the bones or sinews, oil of
swallows was pronounced exceeding sove-
reign, and this was to be procured by pound-
ing twenty live swallows in a mortar with
about as many different herbs. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. xxiv.
Oilway, a hole made for the purpose
of receiving oil to lubricate hinges, &c.
OIMEE
( 449 )
0LIVAR1AN
A curious illustration of the portcullis is
seen over the entrance of Goodrich Castle ;
a circular aperture in the wall on either side
shows where its roller worked ; an oblique
perforation in the stone served as an oilxoay
to render its revolutions easier. — Arch., xxix.
62 (1841).
Oimee, alas ! This Anglicized form
of the Greek dipo* seems to have puzzled
a former reader of Howell, for in my
copy obscene is suggested in a marginal
annotation in an apparently contempo-
rary handwriting. The speaker in the
extract is an otter who was once a
man.
How is this? I not only hear, but I under-
stand the voice of a man. Ounce! I am
afraid that Morphandra hath a purpose to
re transform me, and make me put on human
shape again. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 5.
Old-cattish, old-maidish.
Don't I begin to talk in an old-cattish
maimer of cards? — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary,
1. «jOtj.
Olden, to age.
He looked very much oldened, and it seemed
as if the contest and defeat had quite broken
him. — Thackeray, Pendennis, ch. lxx.
He looks terribly ill, pale, and oldened. —
Ilid^ Xewcomes, ch. lxviii.
Old Gentleman, a euphemism for the
devil.
I know not who'll take 'em for saints, but
the old gentleman in black. — T. Brown, Works,
iil 102.
We have a genuine witch in the house,
who is in close alliance with the old gentle-
man.— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xviii.
Old Gooseberry, like Old Scratch, or
Old Harry, a familiar name for the
devil.
In your tower there's a pretty to-do ;
All the people of Shrewsbury playing Old
Gooseberry
With your choice bits of taste and vertu.
Ingoldsby Legends (Bloudie Jack).
Ill play Old Gooseberry with the office,
and make you glad to buy me out at a good
high figure. — Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit,
ch. xxxviii.
He ran in his breeches and slippers down
the lawn, and began blowing up like Old
Gooseberry. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe,ch. lxiv.
Oldgrey, an ancient ; a greybeard.
Hee 'rested wylf ul lyk a wayward obstinat
oldgrey. — Stanyhurst, JEn., li. 679.
Old-maidish, like an old maid ; and
so, particular, fidgety.
Her cousin Miss Dorothy, who lives with
her, and began, you know, to grow rather
old-maidish, as we say, ma'am, made a sudden
conquest of Mr. Bumper. — Colman, The Deuce
is in him, ii. 1.
Lord, child, don't be so precise and old-
maidish. — Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. V.
ch. VUL
It is really pitiable to see such feelings in
a woman of her age, with those old-maidish
little ringlets. — G. Eliot, Janet1 s Repentance,
ch. in.
Old-maidism, state of being an old
maid ; advanced spinsterhood.
The Miss linnets were in that temperate
zone of old-maidism, when a woman will not
say but that if a man of suitable years and
character were to offer himself, she might
be induced to tread the remainder of life's
vale in company with him. — G. Eliot, Janet's
Repentance, ch. iii.
Old man, southern wood ; also called
Lad's love, q. v.
A few berry bushes, a black currant tree
or two, ... a cabbage bed, a bush of sage,
and balm, and thyme, and marjoram, with
possibly a rose-tree and old man growing in
the midst, . . . such plants made up a well-
furnished garden to a farm-house. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia1 s Lovers, ch. i.
Oldster, an elderly or grown-up
person.
I became the William Tell of the party,
as having been the first to resist the tyranny
of the oldsters. — Marryat, Frank Mildmay,
ch. ii.
I know oldsters who have a savage pleasure
in making boys drunk. — Thackeray, Misc.,
ii. 343.
A more ill-mannered fellow I never saw in
my life ; to go away and hide yourself with
that lovely young wife of yours, and leave all
us oldsters to bore one another to death. —
H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xlvi.
Old Tom, a name for a strong sort of
gin. See quotation, «. w. Blue-ruin ;
Nobler. According to Jon Bees Slang
Diet., 1823, the term is properly appli-
cable to the cask containing the liquor.
There are two side-aisles of great casks,
painted green and gold, enclosed within a
light brass rail, and bearing such inscriptions
as "Old Tom, 549," "Young Tom, 360,"
"Samson, 1421"; the figures agreeing, we
presume, with gallons understood. — Sketches
by Boz (Gin-shops).
Olivader, of an olive hue.
The Queene ariv'd with a traiue of Portu-
guese ladies in their monstrous fardingals or
guard - infantas, their complexions olivailer
and sufficiently unagreeable.— Evelyn, Diary,
May 30, 1662.
Olivarian, Cromwellian.
Monday a terrible raging wind hapued,
Q Q
OLIVER
( 450 ) 0NEIR0CRITE
which did much hurt. Dennis Bond, a great
Olivarian and antimonarchist, died on that
day, and then the Devil took Bond for
Oliver's appearance.— Life of A. Wood, Aug.
30 1658.
It would have been somewhat difficult to
have inspired Mrs. Willis with a cordial
sentiment for an Olivarian or a republican.
— Godwin, Mandeville, iii. 285.
Oliver. Swtet Oliver seems = good
fellow.
One boone you must not refuse mee in (if
you be boni socii, and sweete Olivers).— Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Karl. Mix., vi. 180).
Ologies. The sciences are sometimes
spoken of under this name, ology being
the termination of the name of several
of them. CI Isms.
She had attended a world of fashionable
lectures, and was therefore supposed to
understand Chemistry, Geology, PhUolofflr,
and a hundred other ologies. — Aares, Thinks-
1-to-myself, i. 68.
Omissible, capable of being omitted
or dispensed with.
He brings to light things new and old ;
now precious illustrative private documents,
now the poorest public heaps of mere pamph-
leteer and parliamentary matter, so attain-
able elsewhere, often so omissible were it not
to be attained.— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 71.
Omni-erudite, universally learned.
If, however, he followed the example of
Peiresc without choosing to mention his
name, that omnt-erudite man himself is likely
to have seen the books from whence Gaffarel
derived his knowledge.— Sovihey, The Doctor,
ch. zcv.
Omnify, to make everything of.
He affects nothing more, nothing else in a
manner than ... to cry down and nullify all
other excellencies whatsoever, that he might
. . . magnify or rather, as you see (Col. m.
11) omnify his Lord and Master Christ.—
Ward, Sermons, p. 3.
Omniparent, parent of all.
O Thou all powref ul-kind Omniparent,
"What holds Thy hands that should defend
Thy head ?
Is sinne so strong or so omnivalent
That by her pow'r Thy pow'r is van-
quished ?—Davies, Holy Soode, p. 12.
Omni-prevalent, having entire in-
fluence.
Being Chaplain to the Karl of Dunbar,
then omni-prevalent with King James, he
was unexpectedly preferred Archbishop of
Canterbury. — Fuller, Worthies, Surrey (ii.
360).
Omniregency, universal rule.
The Omniregency of Divine Providence is
the Tree of Life in the midst of the garden
of the world.— Racket, Life of Williams, i.
38.
Omni-significancb, universal mean-
ing.
The conspicuous and capacious, &c, which
in its omrd-siynificance may promise anything,
and yet pledges the writer to nothing. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. xciii.
Omnisufficient, all-sufficient.
These staffs princes must lean upon, being
such Gods as die like men, and such masters
as are neither omnisufficient nor independent.
—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 103.
Omnivalence, omnipotence.
This shewes the Sire's compleat omnipotence,
That still begets a Sonne as great as He ;
Which Sonne is but the Sire's Intelligence,
Making another one Omnivalence.
Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 17.
Omnivalent, all-powerful. See ex-
tract «. v. Omniparrnt.
Omnividency, universal inspection.
It is well they had so much modesty as
not to pretend inspection into the Book of
life, seeing all other books have come under
their Omnividencie.— Fuller, Worthies, ch. x.
Omoplatoscopy. See extract.
The principal art of this kind is divination
by a shoulder-blade, technically called sca-
pulimancy or omoplatoscopy, — & Tyler,
Primitive Culture, i. 124.
Onbethink, think on.
Now for my cousins John and Jeremiah ;
they are rich i' world's gear, but they'll prize
what I leave 'em if I could only onbethink
me what they would like. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. vii.
Oncoming, approach.
We are angered ... by hearing in hard
distinct syllables from the lips of a near
observer, those confused murmurs which we
try to call morbid, and strive against as if
they were the oncoming of madness. — G.
Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xx.
One and twenty, a youth.
The young Squire first took the pet, then
clouds began to rise, which made me expect
a tempest, nor was I deceived in my conjec-
ture . . . you would have thought this one and
twenty came in a direct line from Hercules,
he played the Furioso so lively .—Gentleman
Instructed, p. 19.
Oneirocrite, a judge or interpreter
of dreams. See second extract *. t'.
Oneirologist.
It is requisite for the better reading, ex-
plaining, and unfolding of these somniatory
ONEIROLOGIST ( 451 ) ONYGOPHAGIST
vaticinations and predictions of that nature,
that a dexterous, learned, skilful, wise, in-
dustrious, expert, rational, and peremptory
expounder or interpreter be pitched upon,
such a one as by the Greeks is called Oniro-
crit or Oniropolist. — Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk.
III. ch. xiii.
Oneirologist. See second quotation.
There is a book still extant on the
interpretation of dreams by Artemi-
dorus.
Hear how Artemidorus, not the oneirolo-
gist, but the great philosopher at the court
of the Emperor Sferamond, describes the
appearances which he had observed in dis-
secting some of those unfortunate persons
who had died of love. — Southey, The Doetort
ch. lxzvi.
The ooeirocrites or oneirologistt, as they
who pretended to lay down rules for the
interpretation of dreams call themselves, say
that if any one dreams he has the head of a
horse on his shoulders instead of his own, it
betokens poverty and servitude. — Ibid., ch.
cxxviii.
Oneiropolibt, an interpreter of
dreams. See quotation *. v. Oneiro-
crite.
One or other, altogether; beyond
comparison.
My dear, you are positively, one or other,
the most censorious creature m the world. —
Cihber, Careless Husband, Act V.
I declare 'twas a design, one or other, the
best carry 'd on that ever I knew in my life.
— Ibid.
Indiana has, one or other, the prettiest face
I ever saw. — Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. I.
ch. ii.
One rate, to load.
I will not onerate and overcharge your
stomachs with too much meat at once. —
Becon, i. 67.
Kilvert onerated the Bishop with ten
charges together. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
II. 122.
One-sided, partial ; taking in only one
side. De Quincey in a note to the ex-
tract says, " It marks the rapidity with
which new phrases float themselves into
currency under our present omnipre-
sence of the press, that this word, now
(viz., in 1853) familiarly used in every
newspaper, then (viz., in 1833) required
a sort of apology to warrant its intro-
duction."
Those features of your town will illustrate
what the Germans mean by a one-sided (ein-
seitiger) judgment. — Autob. Sketches, i. 290.
Onfall, attack. See quotation 8. v.
House-mother.
Nay, look : green uniforms faced with red ;
black cockades, the colour of night ! Are we
to have military onfall, and death also by
starvation?— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII.
ch. ui.
Onioned, flavoured with an onion.
In the extract it is applied to a tear not
getiuine, but produced by smelling an
onion.
Master Broadbrim, like a hopeful heir,
Pored o'er his father's will, and dropped the
onioned tear. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 58.
Onlooker, a spectator or looker-on.
You may rely upon me for knowing the
times and the seasons adapted to the different
stages of a work which is not to be mea-
sured by the facile conjectures of ignorant
onlookers. — G. Eliot, Jfiddlemarch, ch.
Only, except. In the sense of " except
that" it is common in the Bible and
elsewhere (see Macavlay's Hist., Vol.
III. p. 32, note).
Here, take all the trinkets, only the bait
that I'll use.— The Committee, Act V.
This morning Captain Cocke comes, and
tells me that he is now assured that it is true
what he told me the other day, that our
whole office will be turned out, only me,
which whether he says true or not, I know
not. — Pepys, Aug. 22, 1668.
I have written day and night, I may say,
ever since Sunday morning, only church-time
or the like of that.— Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
i. 248.
Onomatoloqist, student of names.
What would our onomatologist have said
if he had learned to read these words? —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. clxxvi.
Ontologic, having to do with on-
tology, or the science of being.
My father and my uncle Toby's discourse
upon Time and Eternity was a discourse
devoutly to be wished for; and the petu-
lancy of my father's humour iu putting a
stop to it as he did, was a robbery of the
Ontologic Treasury of .... a jewel.— Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, ii. 181.
Onus, burden. This Latin word is
naturalized.
I again move the introduction of a new
topic, ... on me be the onus of bringing it
forward. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
On ygoph agist, one who bites his
nails.
I was sitting at my desk, pen in hand and
in mouth at the same time (a substitute
for biting the nails which I recommend to
all onygophagists). — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
iii. Ai.
G G 2
OORALI
( 452 ) OPINIASTRETY
Oobali, curare : both of which names
are forms of a South American word
applied by the Indians of Spanish
Guiana and North Brazil to a poisonous
extract in which they dip their arrows.
It is obtained from some plant, perhaps
the Paullinia Cururu of the soap-
wort family. The object of its ad-
ministration in cases of vivisection
would be to produce a sedative action
upon the muscles, so as to prevent
struggling, whilst the vital functions
remained unaffected. This poison is
excluded from the anaesthetics allowed
under the Vivisection Act
I could think he was one of those who would
break their jests on the dead,
And mangle the living dog that had loved
him and fawn'd at his knee,
Drench'd with the hellish oorali.
Tennyson, In the Children's Hospital.
Opacular, opaque.
The main good these things do is only to
clarify the understanding, previous to the
application of the argument itself, in order
to free it from any little motes or specks of
opacular matter. — Sterne, Trist, Shandy, ii.
185.
Open, used substantively for open
country.
Then should we make a burst to get clear
of the trees, and should soon find ourselves
in the open. — Dickens, Uncommercial Travel'
ler, xi.
Between the dark green lines of the
hedges we met maidens in white with scar-
let opera-cloaks, coming home through the
narrow lane : then we got into the open, and
found the shores of the silver lake. — Black,
Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. xxvi.
Open-battockino, knouting (?)
A Russian judge . . fears the boiling caul-
dron or open-battocking. — Wordy Sermons,
p. 124.
Open-doored, very receptive; hos-
pitable.
Some,
Whose ears are open-doored to phantoms,
swear
"When they would sleep o* nights they hear
the voice
That was, they're pleased to say, ne'er born
of man,
And scared the synod.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iv. 1.
Bnter, therefore, and partake
The slender entertainment of a house
Once rich, now poor, but ever open-doored,
Tennyson, Geratnt and Eneid.
Open- handedness, liberality: open-
handed being opposed to close-listed.
The banker had given him a hundred
pounds. Various motives urged Bulstrode
to this open-handedness. — G. Eliot, Middle-
march, ch. lxviii.
Open-tail, a name given to the med-
lar, as being a laxative; also a light
woman.
Elate still exclaimea against great medlers,
A basic-body hardly she abides. . .
I muse her stomacke now so much should
faile
To loathe a medlar, being an open-taile.
Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 10.
Operant, a workman.
No Egyptian taskmaster ever devised a
slavery like to that, our slavery. No frac-
tious operants ever turned put for half the
tyranny which this necessity exercised upon
us. — Last Essays of Elia (Newspapers thirty-
Jive years ago).
Ophiolatry, serpent-worship.
For a single description of negro ophiolatry
may be cited Bosnian's description from
Whydah in the Bipht of Benin.— E. Tylor,
Primitive Culture, ii. 233.
Ophite, green porphyry: the spell-
ing in the first extract may be a mis-
print.
At the head of the former stands a column
of opite, on which is a statue of Justice. —
Evelyn, Diary, Oct. 22, 1644.
Towards the left are the statues of Ro-
mulus and Remus with the Wolf, all of
brasse, plac'd on a column of ophite stone
which they report was brought from the
renowned Bphesian temple. — Ibidn Oct. 25,
1644.
Opiated, drugged with a narcotic.
The opiated milk glews up the brain.
Verses prefixed to KenneVs Erasmus,
Praise of Folly.
Opilestone, perhaps the same as
ophite, q. v.
It is placed, as I remember, on a pillar of
opilestone, with divers other antiq urnee. —
Evelyn, Diary, Oct. 19, 1644.
Opinant, one who forms an opinion.
The opinions differ pretty much according
to the nature of the opinants. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, iv.
Opiniaster, an obstinate, self-willed
person.
As for lesser projects, and those opiniasters
which make up plebeian parties, I know
my lines to be diametrall against them.—
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 12 (Preface).
Opiniastrety, obstinacy. R. and L.
■*SB
0P1NIATRE
( 453 )
O RANGER Y
have opiniatrety ; the latter says, " This
word, though it has been tried in dif-
ferent forms, is not yet received, nor
is it wanted.1 '
But though these Protestants were wor-
thy of this contumely, yet surely the Roman-
ists are no fit persons to object it, whose
opiniastrcty did hinder an uniform Reforma-
tion of the Western Church. — Brajmhall, ii.
71.
And little thinks Heretick madness, she
At God Himself lifts up her desperate heels,
Whene'er her proud Opiniastrete
Against Ecclesiastick Sanctions swells.
Beaumont, Psyche, xyi. st. 203.
Opiniatrb seems in extract to be
used as a verb = to follow one's own
opinion obstinately. The Diets, give it
as substantive and adjective.
It is common in consults for doctors to
differ; and Dr. Short might differ from
what opinion prevailed, but, in the case of a
king, must not opiniatre, when the cause
was regularly by consult law carried against
him. — North, Examen, p. 648.
Opisometer, an instrument for mea-
suring curved lines in a map.
The contents of Mr. Stanford's shop
seemed to have been scattered about the
room, and Bell had armed herself with an
opisometer, which gave her quite an air of
importance. — Block, Adventures of a Phaeton,
en. m.
Opobopolist. See quotation.
A certain man stood at a fruiterer's stall,
or oporopolisVs, if you would have it in Greek.
— Bailey's Erasmus, p. 219.
Oppignoration, a pledge.
The form and manner of swearing . . .
by oppignoration, or engaging of some good
which we would not lose ; as, Our rejoicing
in Christ, our salvation, God's help, &c —
Andrewes, Sermons, v. 74.
Oppletion, fulness: repletion is the
more common word.
Health of the body is not recovered with-
out pain ; an imposthume calls for a lance,
and oppletion for unpalatable evacuatories.—*
Gentleman Instructed, p. 309.
Opportune ful, propitious.
If we let slip this opportuneful hour,
Take leave of fortune.
Middleton, Mayor of Quinborough,
Act IV.
Oppose, to offer or propose.
Let his true picture through your land be
sent,
Opposing great rewardes to him that findes
him.
Chapman, Blinde Begger of Alexandria, i. 1.
Oppositionist, member of the Opposi-
tion.
This fairness from an oppositionist pro-
fessed brought me at once to easy terms
with him. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, iv. 70.
Oppositionless, without an Opposi-
tion party.
The parliament is met, but empty and
totally oppositionless. — Walpole, Letters, ii.
82 (1758).
OPP08IVB, contradictory; cantanker-
ous.
They might have observed, even in his
cunicular days, in this Lodowick Muggleton,
an obstinate, dissentious, and opposive spirit.
— Account of L. Muggleton, 1676 (Harl. Misc.,
i. 610).
Oppressure, oppression ; injury.
The oppressures that in three and twenty
years without intermission exercis'd the
defence and patience of one man, made
him stand the stronger. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, ii. 222.
Oracle, a cant term for a watch.
Out of the right fob hung a great silver
chain, with a wonderful kind of engine at
the bottom. . . . He called it his oracle, and
said it pointed out the time for every action
of his life. — Swift, Voyage to lilliput, ch. ii.
Col. Pray, my lord, what's a clock by your
oracle?
Lord Sp. Faith, I can't tell ; I think my
watch runs upon wheels. — Ibid., Polite Con-
versation (Conv. i.).
Oracler, giver of an oracle.
Pyrrhus, whom the Delphian oracler
Deluded by his double-meaning measures.
Sylvester, Sixth day, first weeke, 823.
Orage, a storm. A French word, not
naturalized among us, though North
does not seem to use it as a foreign
word.
Though his gains by his office were great,
they were much greater by his practice ; for
that flowed in upon him like an orage, enough
to overset one that had not an extraordinary
readiness in business. — JVorth, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 170.
There was then, enough of the Church and
loyal party in full credit at that time, espe-
cially citisens, to stem that orage of faction.
— Ibid., Examen, p. 632.
Oragious, stormy.
M. D'lvry, whose early life may have been
rather oragious, was yet a gentleman perfectly
well conversed. — Thackeray, Nciocomes, ch.
xxxi.
Orangery, a species of snuff.
" Mockmode, . . taking snush, sneezes,"
on which his dancing-master exclaims,
OR A TOR J AN
O Lord, sir, you must never sneeie ; 'tis as
unbecoming after orangery as grace after
meat. — Farquhar, Love and a Bottle, ii. 2.
Oratorian, rhetorical.
Here is a reverend person who relates the
fact of a conspiracy in a good method, exact
style, and beautiful English ; in a word, in an
oratorian way. — North, Examen, p. 420.
Orbe, bereaved.
No father adopts unless he be orbe, have
no child ; or if he have one, for some deep
dislike have cast him off. — Andrewes, i. 59.
Orbical, circular.
Thee moone three seasons her passadge
orbical eended. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 658.
Orderable, complying ; obedient.
Cf. Biddable.
The king's aveneness to physick, and im-
patience under it, . . was quickly removed
above expectation ; the king (contrary to his
customs) being very orderable in all his sick-
nesee— Fuller, Ch. Mitt., X. vii. 22.
Ordinary, a settled order or use for
public service.
Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury, devised that
Ordinary or form of service, which hereafter
was observed in the whole kingdom. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., III. i. 23.
Ordinative, ordaining.
Episcopall power and precedency . . im-
mediately succeeded the Apostles in that or-
<it native and gubemative eminency. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 259.
Ordinatob, ruler.
If Nature, and her ordinator, God, deny
health, how un valuable are their riches. —
Adams, i. 424.
Orenge, apparently a mistress (?).
The churlish frampold waves . . . tossed
his dead carcasse, well bathed or parboyled,
to the sandy threshold of his leman or orenge,
for a disjune or morning breakfast. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 168).
Organ, taste or palate.
What is agreeable to some is not to others ;
what touches smoothly my organ may grate
upon yours. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 367.
Organie, marjoram ; origanum vul-
garc.
(Persons) may take out of their own homish
gardens ana ground such things as in strength
and operation countervayle these aforesaid,
that is to wit, Kosemarie, Basil, Saverie,
Organie, Marjoram, Dill, Sage, Baulme, &c.
— Touchstone of Complexions, p. 00.
Organifs, instruments.
Youth and love
Were th' vnresisted organies to seduce you.
Chapman, All Fooles, ii. 1.
( 454 ) ORKYN
Oroanity, organism.
Many put out their force informative
In their ethereall corporeity,
Devoid of heterogeneall oryanity.
H. More, Immortality of the Soul,
I. ii. 24.
Organizate, to organize : in the
tract it is a participle.
Death our spirits doth release
From this distinguish'd organizate sense.
H. More, Fraexistency of the Soul,
St. 21.
Orqanons, organs.
0 thou great God, ravish my earthly sprite !
That for the time a more than human skill
May feed the organons of all my sense.
Peele, David and Bethsabe, p. 484.
Our little world is made with much respect.
Our mother Nature hath been wise and kind.
By whom we have our orqanons asedgn'd
To execute what so our thoughts intend.
Hubert, Hist, of Edw. II., p. 16.
Orient, a pearl. Sterling (Life by
Carlyle, Pt. II. ch. ii.) reckons this
among the "new and erroneous locu-
tions ' in Sartor Resartns.
It is indeed . . a very Sea of Thought ;
neither calm nor clear, if you will ; yet
wherein the toughest pearl-diver may dive to
his utmost depth, and return not only with
sea-wreck, but with true orients. — CorlyU,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. ii.
Orifex, orifice ; opening.
1 feel my liver pierced, and all my veins,
That there begin and nourish every part,
Mangled and torn, and all my entrails bathed
In blood that straineth from their orifex.
Marlowe, 2 Tamburlaine, iii. 4.
Origin, to originate.
This proverb was origined whitest England
and Wales were at deadly feude. — Fuller,
Worthies, Cardigan (ii. 578).
Orkie.
Oblig'd he was not to account
To what those incomes did amount ;
Nor distribution make o' th* gold
But when he pleas'd or pastor would.
Which seldom chanc't, the poorest of 'em
Gould scarcely wrest an Orkie from him.
Ward, England's Reformation,
c. i. p. 126.
Orkyn, an earthen pot (Latin, orcd).
N., s. v. ork, cites a passage where, as
he says, ork seems to mean drinking
vessel.
They that goo about to bye an yerthen
potte or vessell for an orkyn dooe knocke
vpon it with their knuccle. — VdaVs Eras-
mus's Apophth^ p. 91.
ORLE
( 455 )
OTIATIOJN
Orle, in heraldry a border round
the shield.
His arms were augmented with an Orle of
Lions' paws. — Fuller, Worthies, Cumberland
(i.249).
Ornamentals, adornments. For
similar uses see 8. v. Obsebvables.
In the time of the aforesaid William Hey-
worth, the Cathedral of Litchfield was in
the verticall height thereof, being (though
not augmented in the essentials) beautified
in the ornamental* thereof. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., IV. ii. 65.
These light-armed Schismaticks and small
Skirmishers are like Pot-guns to Canons or
Pigmies to Giants, seeking to deface the
Pinnacles and Ornamentalls of Religion, but
not capable to shake the foundations of it. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 86.
Ornithomancy. See extract.
Omiihomancy (or the derivation of omens
from the motions of birds) grew into an
elaborate science. — J>e (juincey, Modern
Superstition,
Ornithoscopy, watching birds for
purposes of divination.
Speaking of ornithoscopy in relation to
Jews, I remember another story. — De Quincey,
Modern Superstition.
Orphancy, orphanhood.
Yet did not thy Orphancy nor my Widdow-
hood deprive us of the delightful prospect
which the hill of honor doth yield. — Sidney,
Arcadia, p. 237.
Obthopnic, one who suffers from
orthopncea, and can only breathe in an
upright position.
A* they prescribe for the asthma, which is
a disease in the body, to avoid perturbations
of the mind, so let this orthopnic, for the
help of his mind, avoid needless perturba-
tions of the body. — Adams, i. 506.
Osiered, twisted in a pattern like
osiers forming a basket.
Garlands
In baskets of bright osier' d gold were
brought. — Keats, Lamia, Pt. II.
08TELEB, ostler.
What office then doth the star-gaier bear?
Or let him be the heaven's osteUr,
Or tapster some, or some be chamberlain,
To wait upon the guests they entertain.
Hall, Sat., II. vii. 40.
Ostend, to appear prominently.
The time was when his affection ostended
in excess towards her. — Bp. Hall, Cont.
(Adonijah).
Ostent, to display ; to boast.
Such a church sometimes is more swelling
in bigness, and ostents a more bulky show. —
Adams, i. 410.
Malice not only discovers, but ostenteth her
devilish effects. — Ibid., i. 415.
Ostleress. See first quotation.
Because she [Empress Helena] visited the
stable and manger of our Saviour's nativitie,
Jews and Pagans slander her to have been
stabularia, an ostleresse, or a she-stable-groom.
—Fuller, Holy War, Bk. I. ch. iv.
A plump-arm'd Ostleress and a stable wench
Came running at the call.
Tennyson, Princess, i.
Ostlery, hostelry ; inn.
Good Saturn self, that homely emperor,
In proudest pomp was not so clad of yore,
As is the unaer-groom of the ostlery,
Husbanding it in work-day yeomanry.
Hall, Sat., III. i. 73.
Ostry, an inn. The inn, being ready
for guests at all hours, has its faggot
always burning. For another reference
to ostry-wood see extract s. v. Pimp.
Dick. What, Robin, you must come away
and walk the horses.
Bob. I walk the horses ! I scorn 't i* faith.
. . . Keep further from me, O thou illiterate
and unlearned hostler. . . . Keep out of the
circle, I say, lest I send you into the ostry
with a vengeance. — Marlowe, Faustus, ii. 3.
Think, mistress, what a thing love is:
why it is like an orfry-faggot, that, once set
on fire, is as hardly quenched as the bird
crocodile driven out of her nest.— Greene,
Looking Glass for London, p. 133.
Tom Tapster, . . . you cannot be content
to pinch with your small pots and your
ostrie faggots, but have your tugges to draw
men on to villanie. — Ibid., Quip for Upstart
Courtier {Harl. Misc., v. 413).
Other-gates, dissimilar : usually an
adverb, as in Twelfth Night, V. i.
All which are the great works of true,
able, and authoritative Ministers, requiring
other-yates workmen than are (now) in many
places much in fashion among common
people. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 19
(Preface).
Other-guess, a corruption of athei^
guise; noticed in the Diets., but with-
out example.
If your kinsman, Lieutenant Bowling, had
been here, we should have had other 'guess
work. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xxxii.
Tou have to do with other -guess people
now. — Ibid., ch. xlvii.^
Ot I at ion, taking ease ; leisure.
I haue obserued [others] in many of the
princes Courts of Italie to seeme idle when
they be earnestly occupied, and en tend to
nothing but mischieuous practises. and do
OTIOUS
( 456 ) OUT-BLUSTER
buuly negotiat by ooulor of otiation. —
Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xxv.
Otioub, leisurely. Otiose is some-
times used, though L. does not give
the word, and R. only cites Paley for
it. The speaker in the extract is com-
paring the burdens of public men with
those of
Private men (whose otious care
Scarce passe the threshold of their own door
dare). — Sylvester, Bethulia's Rescue, v. 121.
Otohy, a skeleton : a corruption of
anatomy.
Lord Sp. Lady Smart, does not your Lady-
ship think Mrs. Fade is mightily altered
since her marriage ?
Lady Sm. Why, my lord, she was hand-
some in her time ; but she can't eat her cake
and have her cake. I hear she's grown a
meer otomy.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Oubliktte. In some dungeons
there were concealed holes or traps
down which the prisoner was thrust,
and perished. He was lost and for-
gotten; hence the name, which is
French, but the word is often used as
English.
As if we had talked in following one
Up some long gallery. " Would you choose
An air like that?— the gait is loose —
Or noble." Sudden in the sun
An oubliette winks. Where is he ? Gone.
Mrs. Browning, Died.
Ouohlvng, the hooting of an owl.
He toke verie euill rest in the nightes by
reason of an owle breakyng his slepe euery
half© hower with her oughlyng. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 277.
Our Lady's mantle, Alchemilla
vulgaris.
I think he killed nobody, for his reme-
dies were " womanish and weak." Sage and
wormwood, sion, hyssop, borage, spikenard,
dog's-tongue, our Lady's mantle, feverfew,
and Faith, and all in small quantities except
the last. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, en.
xciv.
Out, not at home. This common
colloquial expression is given by L.
without example.
When we reached Albion Place they were
out ; we went after them, and found them
on the pier.— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park,
ch. v.
Out. When a young lady has left
the school-room and goes into society,
she is technically said to be out.
Pray, is she out or not? I am puzzled;
she dined at the parsonage with the rest of
you, which seemed like being out ; and yet
she says so little that I can hardly suppose
she is. — Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. ▼.
Out-active, to exceed in activity-
No wonder if the younger out-active those
who are more ancient. — Fuller, Worthies,
London.
0 u t- A N D-o uter, a thorough-going
person.
I am the roan as is guaranteed by unim-
peachable references to be an out-and-outer
in morals. — Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby,
oh. lx.
Master Clive was pronounced an out-and-
outer, a swell, and no mistake. — Thackeray,
The Newcomes, ch. xvii.
Outas, to Bhout or exclaim.
These cried there, like mad moody Bed-
lams, as they heard the thunder, ** They
are damned, they are damned ; " their wise
preachers outasing the same at Paul's cross.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 244.
Outas, octave (ecclesiastical).
The same Adam by a decree of the Church
was on the Munday after the outas of Easter
the yeere 1328, burnt at Hoggis. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 181.
Out ASK ed. When banns have been
published three times, the couple are
said to be outasktd. H. says this is
the term in the south-east of England :
in Hampshire the phrase is asked out.
All other suitors were left in the lurch,
And the parties had even been outasked in
Church. — Ingoldsby Legends {St. Romwdd).
Outbargain, to get the better in a
bargain.
The two parties with their opposite inter-
ests stand at bay, or try to outwit or out-
bargain each other. — Miss Edgeworth, Helen,
ch. xix.
Out-blundeb, to surpass in blunder-
ing.
Hell out-talk a Frenchwoman, and out-
blunder au Irishman or Teaguelander's un-
derstanding.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 108.
Out-bluster, to drive a person from
his purpose by blustering : at least this
seems its meaning in the first extract,
and perhaps in the second too, though
generally the word would mean to sur-
pass another in blustering.
Those wives . . . can suffer themselves to
be out-blustered and out-gloomed of their
own wills, instead of being fooled out of
them by acts of teuderness and complais-
ance.— Richardson, CI. Harlowe, ii. 15.
If ever I steal a teapot, and my women
don't stand up for mc, pass the article under
OUT-BOLT
(457 )
OUTFALL
their shawls, whisk down the street with
it, out-Muster the policeman, and utter any
amount of fibs before Mr. Beak, those beings
are not what I take them to be. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xxxii.
OUT-BOLT, bolt OUt
Those . . . first blot oat Episcopacy that
they may blot and out-holt, set up and pull
down Magistracy. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 557.
Outbound, to. bound beyond ; to ex-
cel in activity.
He could outran the reindeer, and out-
bound the antelope. — H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, ii. 23.
Out-brazen, to surpass in impudence.
The expertest devils . . . see their impu-
dence out-brazen'd by a club of mortal puri-
tans.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 216.
Outbrother, an outpensioner.
That good old blind bibber of Helicon, I
wot well, came a begging to one of the chief
cities of Greece, and promised them vast
corpulent volumes of immortality, if they
would bestowe upon him but a slender out-
brother's annuity of mutton and broth, and
a pallet to sleep on. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 147).
Outbuild, to build beyond what one
has means for. Both K. and L. give
the word = to excel in durability, with
extract from Young, Sixth Night:
" Virtue alone outbuilds the pyramids."
In the extract perhaps overbuild would
have been more usual.
She had left off building castles in the air,
but she had outbuilt herself on earth. — Miss
Edgeworth, Helen, ch. viii. .
Outbuzz, to drown some other sound
by the noise of buzzing ; so, generally,
to out-clamour.
The flies at home that ever swarm about
And cloud the highest heads, and murmur
down
Truth in the distance — these outbuzz' d me.
Tennyson, Columbus.
Outcast, to throw out.
It being the custom of all those whom the
Court casts out, to labour by all means they
can to outcast the Court. — Heylin, Life of
Laud, p. 156.
Outcome, visible result. I have not
come across any earlier instance of this
now common word than that in the
first extract.
We do the man's intellectual endowment
great wrong if we measure it by its mere
logical outcome. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 59 (1832).
The only outcome of that new sense of
responsibility was a rapid increase in the
number of floggings. — Kingsley, WesticaitU
Ho, ch. ii.
In the young bliss of loving he took
Gwendolen's perfection as part of that good
which had seemed one with life to him,
being the outcome of a happy, well-embodied
nature. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. vi.
Out-compliment, to eclipse or drive
out by compliments or caresses.
He thrice embraced Her, and gently strove
Her sorrow's fullness to out-compliment.
Beaumont, Psyche, xxiii. st. 181.
Out-corner, an out-of-the-way place.
Through the want of this catechising
many which are well skilled in some dark
out-corners of divinity have lost themselves
in the beaten road thereof. — Fuller, Holy
State, II. ix. 5.
Outcountenance, to outf ace or with-
stand.
"See which of our beardlesse yongsters
will take ye in, when I [Menaphon] haue
cast you foorth." « Those," quoth she, " that
outcountenance Menaphon and his pelfe, and
are better able than your selfe." — Greene,
Menaphon, p. 64.
While high Content in whatsoever chance
Makes the brave mind the starres outcounten-
ance.— Davies, Muse's Teares, p. 14.
Outdacious, wild: a common vul-
garism for audacious.
Ya wouldn't find Charlie's likes— 'e were
that outdacious at '6am,
Not thaw ya went to raake out Hell wi' a
small-tooth coamb.
Tennyson, The Village Wife.
Outdaciousne88, audacity : a vul-
garism.
They have the outdaciousness to complain
that the rents are raised. — Mrs. Trollope,
Michael Armstrong, ch. iv.
Out-edge, extremity ; outer limit.
Her fame had spread itself to the very
out-edge and circumference of that circle. —
Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 70.
A couple of sparrows upon the out-edge of
his window. — Ibid., Sent. Journey, The Pass-
port.
Out-equivocate,, to surpass in
equivocation.
The Jesuites, being out-shot in their own
bow, complained that he out-equivocated their
equivocation. — Fuller, Worthies, Kent (i.
500).
Outfall, outlet.
Haddenham Level in the Isle of Ely . .
contains 0500 acres, which were overflowed
chiefly through the neglect of preserving
and clearing the out-falls into the Sea. —
Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, i. 91.
OUTFIND
(458)
OUTLOOK
Out find, to find out.
Though envy strive, yet secret-searching
time
With piercing insight will the truth outfind.
Greene, from Never too late, p. 299.
Out-flino, sally.
Deronda, inclined by nature to take the
ride of those on whom the arrows of scorn
were falling, could not help replying to
Pash's out-Jiing. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. zUi.
Outolare, to exceed in prominence.
His monstrous score which stood outglaringail
Its hideous neighbours.
Beaumont, Psyche, xiv. st. 178.
Outolitter, to exceed in radiance.
All Cherubs and all Seraphs have I seen
In their high beauties on HeavVs Holydays,
But still the gracious splendour of this Queen
Sweetly outglitters their best tire of rays.
Beaumont, Psyche, ii. St. 218.
Out-gloom, to drive a person from
his purpose by ill- temper : at least this
seems the meaning in the extract (for
which see *. v. Out-bluster), though,
according to the analogy of similar
words, it would mean to surpass in
gloom.
Outgrain, to out-dye.
She blushed more than they, and of their own
Shame made them all asham'd, to see how far
It was outpurpled and outgrain'd by Her.
Beaumont, Psyche, iii. st. 51.
Out-grunt, to excel in grunting.
Not a porter here plies at the corner of a
street, but with his stubbed fingers can make
a smooth table out-grunt the harmony of a
double curtel.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 246.
Out-hymn, to excel in hymnody.
Inspired by that, my thoughts will quicker
flow,
And 111 by far out-hymn the fam'd De Foe.
'T. Brown, Works, i. 132.
Out-isles, islands circumjacent.
With which I accordingly will end this
booke, purposing to speake of the out-Isles,
Orcades, Hebudes, or Hebrides, and of Shet-
land, in their due place. — Holland's Camden,
ii. 54.
Out-lament, to exceed in lament-
ation.
If I thought complaining would make you
a farthing the better, I would out-weep a
church-spout, and out-lament a widow that
has buried three husbands, and now laments
for a fourth. — T. Brown, Works, iv. 175.
Outlandish er, foreigner.
Hollanders, Zealanders, Scots, French,
Westerne-men, Northren - men, besides adl
the hundreds and wapentakes nine miles
eompasse, fetch the best of their viands said
mangery from her market. For ten weeks
together this rabble rout of outlandiskers are
biUetted with her. — Nashe, Lenten StuJJFe
(Hurl. Misc., vi. 149).
Outlash, to exaggerate. L. has
overlash, a word which Fuller also
uses.
Malice hath a wide mouth, and loves to
outlash in her relations. — Fuller, Pisgah
Sight, III. (Pt. II.) iii. 5.
Outlash, a breaking out.
Underneath the silence there was an out-
lash of hatred and vindictiveness. — G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda, ch.
Outlavishing, extravagant.
He being now growne poore by his out-'
lauishing humour, began, it seemes, to be
little respected. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng^ p.
52.
Outlier, nonconformist.
I hope every worthy and true English Pro-
testant of the Kstablish'd Church (for I have
no hopes of the outlyers) will favourably
allow the following poem. — D'Urfey, Collin's
Walk, Preface.
Out-limbs, limbs, as opposed to
vitals.
The Albingenses hope to find favour if
men consider . . . the errours themselves
which are rather in the outlimbes than vitalls
of "religion. — Fuller, Holy War, Bk. III. ch.
It was not a scratch, but a wound : not a
wound in a fleshy parts or outlimbs of the
body, but in the very head, the throne of
reason.— Ibid., Good Thoughts in Worse Times
(Pers. Med., iv.).
Some accessions therefore might be made
(though not to the vitall parts, as I may say)
to the out-lims of the temple. — Ibid., Pisgah
Sight, IU. (Pt. II.) iii. 3.
Out-list, outside edge ; selvage.
The outlist of Judah fell into the midst of
Dan's whole cloth.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II.
x.22.
Outliver, survivor.
Seven they were in all, all aliue and well
in one day, six dead in the other ; the out-
liuer becoming a conuert to their religion. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 186.
Out-lodgings, lodgings in the town
outside the College gates.
As for out-lodgings (like galleries, necessary
evils in popular Churches), ne rather tolerates
than approves them. — Fuller, Holy State, II.
xiv. 3.
Outlook, prospect; survey. The
OUTLOOKER
( 459 )
OUT-ROOMS
Diets, only give a single instance of
this substantive, and then in the sense
of foresight.
The condensed breath ran in streams down
the panes, chequering the dreary outlook of
chimney-tops and smoke. — C. King sley, Alton
Locke, oh. h.
I went to Hamburg to study, and after-
wards to Gbttingen, that I might take a
larger outlook on my people and on the
Gentile world. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. zl.
Outlookeb, one who looks abroad;
and so, in the extract, an inconstant
lover.
They may be kinde, but not constant, and
Loue lones no out-lookers. — Breton, Packet of
Letters, p. 43.
Out-match, excel ; to be more than
a match for.
In labour the Oze will out-toile him, and
in subtlitie the Fox will out-match him. —
Breton, Diynitie of Man, p. 14.
Out-metaphor, to excel in metaphor.
Those very persons . . . out-metaphor' d all
Parnassus in their operas. — T. Brown, Works,
i. 192.
Out-move, to outgo ; to exceed in
quickness.
My father's ideas ran on as much faster
than the translation, as the translation out-
moved my uncle Toby's. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, ill. 40.
Out- nook, projecting nook or corner.
And yet this goodly globe (where we as-
semble)
Though hung in th' ayr doth neuer selfly
tremble ;
For it's the midst of the concentrik orbs
Whom neuer angle nor out-nook disturbs.
Sylvester, The Columnes, 194.
Out-of-doors, used as an adjective
= in the open air. H. has indoor with
extract from Disraeli.
Her out-of-doors life was perfect ; her in-
doors life had its drawbacks. — Mrs. Gaskell,
North and South, ch. ii.
Out-passion, to exceed in passion.
Thy patriot passion,
Siding with our great Council against Tostig,
Out-passion* d bis. — Tennyson, Harold, iii. 1.
Outpeak, to rise on the peak or
summit.
Lucifer outpeakiny in tips of mounted hill Ida
On draws thee dawning.
Stany hurst, JEn., ii. 828.
Out-please, to please beyond some-
thing that has pleased before.
A lapidary . . shews the buyer an orient
pearl, and having a little fed his eye with
that, outpleaseth bim with a sapphire. —
Adams, h. 203.
Outpoison, to exceed in venom.
Must sweet Arabia's beds belch out a stink
Outpois*ning all the Bane of Thessaly ?
Beaumont, Psyche, xi. 223.
Out-power, to exceed in power.
In the Saxon Heptarchy there was gener-
ally one who out-powered all the rest. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. iii. 41.
Out-praise, to exceed or vie with
another in praising.
( We had much literary chat upon this occa-
sion, which led us to a general discussion,
not only of Pope's life, but. of all his works,
which we tried who should out-praise. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, ii. 71.
Out-price, to excel in value.
And so the best men, though inherent Vice
May ouerweigh their Vertue, yet we see
Th' are called vertuous by their Vertue's
price,
That doth out-price the Vice, though more
it be. — Dames, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 44.
Out-purple, to dye of a more brilliant
purple. See extract «. v. Outgrain,
where both words = outblush.
Out-ray, to spread out in array (of
battle) ; and generally, to radiate forth.
All the time the great JSacides
Was conversant in arms, your foes durst not
a foot address
Without their posts, so much they f ear'd his
lance that all controll'd,
And now they out-ray to your fleet.
Chapman, Iliad, v. 793.
Man's soul from God's own life outray'd. —
H. More, Immortality of the Soul, III. ii. 23.
Out-rent, rent paid out.
John unto John, Davies to Davies sends
This little draught of new loue's large deuise.
A kinde acceptance shall your out-rent be.
Davies, Sonnet to J. Davies.
Outrive, to tear out. Bp. Hall
speaks of the impatient reader, who
Should all in rage the curse-beat page out-
rive.— Sat., TV. i. 11.
Out-rooms, outlying offices.
As for judicial astrology (which hath the
least judgement in it) this vagrant hath been
whipt out of all learned corporations. If
our artist lodgeth her in the out-rooms of his
soul for a night or two, it is rather to hear
than believe her relations. — Fuller, Holy
State, II. vii. 6.
The Roman Empire now grown ruinous
OUT-RUNNER ( 460 )
OUTSPURN
could not repair its out-rooms, and was fain
to let them fall down to maintain the rest. —
Ibid., Ch. Hist., I. v. 15.
Out- runner, offshoot ; branch.
Gad bait is a worm bred under stones in a
shallow river, or in some out-runner of the
river. — Lauson, Comments on Secrets of Ang-
ling, 1653 {Eng. Garner, i. 194).
Out- saint, to excel in sanctity.
Poets (1 grant) haue libertieto giue
More height to Grace than the Superlative :
80 hath a Painter lioeuce too to paint
A Saint-like face till it the Saint out- saint.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 63.
Outsale, an auction.
They that care not to be good will think
how to be wise ; yet did they ever think of
that that make away the inheritance of God's
holy tribe in an outsale ? Tis an unthrifty
sin.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 206.
Out -search, to probe to the bottom ;
to explore. The extract is a translation
from a writing of Bucar's.
We must in like manner take heed we
diminish not the force and majesty of Christ's
sacraments set forth by the Holy Ghost,
rather of us to be believed than by our
natural reason to be out-searched. — Strype,
Cranmer, Append., ii. 599.
Outsend, to emit. -
What ! doth the Sun his rayes that he out-
sends
Smother or choke ?
H. More, Immortality of the Soul,
III.ii.42.
Outsen dings, messages or other
things sent abroad.
The sea being open vnto him, his outsend-
ings might bee without view or noting. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 122.
Outsetting, beginning ; start,
The charity that I am most intent upon
promoting in France and in England too, is
that of giving little fortunes to young
maidens in marriage with honest men of
their own degree, who might, from such an
outsetting, begin the world, as it is called,
with some hope of success. — Richardson,
Grandison, iii. 18.
Out-shrill, to exceed in sound.
Arm-arming trumpets, lofty clarions,
Rock-battering bumbards, valour-murdering
guns
Dire instruments of death, in vain yee toyl.
For the loud cornet of my long-breath'd stile
Out-shrills yee still.
Sylvester, The Law, 20.
0UTSIDE8, hypocrites, or perhaps (in
the first quotation) people with nothing
in them, as we now say. The third
quotation illustrates the only surviving
use of this word as applied to persons,
i. e. outside passengers.
If Democritus were alive now, he should
see strange alterations, a new company of
counterfeit visards, whiflers, Cumane aases,
maskers, mummers, painted puppets, outside*,
phantastick shadows, gulls, monsters, giddy-
heads, butterflies.— Burton, Democ. to Reader,
p. 27.
The rest are hypocrites, ambodezten, out-
sides.— Ibid., p. 36.
There was a good coach dinner, of which
the box, the four front outsides, the one
inside, Nicholas, the good-tempered man,
and Mr. Squeers partook. — Dickens, Nicholas
Nickleby, en. v.
Outsioht, sight for that which is
without.
There are, as I heare, so many painters
of women's faces, so many instracters of
women's- tongues, and so manie flatterers of
women's humors, that if a man haue not both
his insight and his out sight f he may pay home
for his blindenesse. — Breton, Old Man's Lesson,
p. 11. '
Outsing, to surpass in singing. See
extract «. v. Outswim.
Outslino, to project ; cast forth.
'TIS opinion
That makes the riven heavens with trumpets
ring,
And thundring engine murd"roas balls out-
sling.
H. More, Immortality of the Soul, II. iii. 5.
Outsnatch, to seize violently.
Baging raptures do his soul outsnatch.
H. More, Life of the Soul, i. 60.
Outsparkled, outshone.
Yet when the starry Peacock doth display
His train's full Orb, the winged People all
Disgraced into anger and dismay
Let their outsparkled plumes sullenly fall.
Beaumont, Psyche, i. st. 84.
Outspend, to exceed in expenditure.
He had already acquired more envy and
hatred among his friends and neighbours by
the superior degree of intimacy he had con-
trived to achieve with her, than by all his
successful struggles to outspend them all. —
Mrs. Trollope, Michael Armstrong, ch. ii.
Outspit, to spit further than another.
In the extract tie allusion is to a reptile
spitting poison.
The first sup bold Menander got, and by
That cankering liquor so infected grew
That Simon he outspit in heresy.
Beaumont, Psyche, zviii. st. 161 .
OUTSPURN, to spurn away.
OUTSTAY
(46i )
OUT- WOMAN
When my deere, Lord, sayd not, What dost
thou here ?
Or, Get thee hence ! or like a dog outspume
mee,
But from my sinne vnto His mercie turne
me. — Breton, Blessed Weeper, p. 11.
Outstay, to stay longer than another
person.
After a little deliberation, she concluded
to outstay him. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk.
IX. ch. iii.
He would go, and Lucy, who would have
outstayed him, had his visit lasted two hours,
soon afterwards went away. — Hiss Austen,
Sense and Sensibility, ch. xxxv.
Outstrain, to surpass in exertion ;
also to stretch out
But vivid John, in whose soft bosom reign'd
More names of youth, and more of gallant
love,
Quickly his fellow-traveller outstreinyd
In ardor's race.
Beaumont, Psyche, xv. st. 144
The outstrain'd tent flags loosely.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. III.
Out-sum, to outnumber.
The prisoners of that shameful day out'
summed
Their victors.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. II.
Out-superstition, to exceed in super-
stition. Fuller, in his Worthies, under
the head of Saints of Lincolnshire,
remarks that in thirteen convents there
were 700 Monks and 1100 Nuns, adding,
" Women out-superstition Men " (ii. 8).
Outswift, to outstrip.
And on the sand leaving no print behinde,
Outswifted arrows, and outwent the winde.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 855.
But the Joyes of Earthly Mindes,
Worldly Pleasures, vain Delights,
Far outswift far sudden flights,
Waters, Arrowes, and the Windes.
Ibid., Spectacles, 25.
Outswim, to beat in swimming.
In swiftnesse the Hare will outrun him,
and the Dolphin outswim him ; in sweetnesse
the Nightingale outsing him. — Breton, Dig'
nitie of Man, p. 14.
Some on swift horseback to outswim the
Wind.— Sylvester, Maiden's Blush, 595.
Out-syllablk, to exceed in number
of syllables.
This Nation hankered after the Name of
Plantagenet; which, as it did out-syllable
Tudor in the mouths, so did it out-vie it
in the affections of the English. — Fuller,
Worthies, Warwick (ii. 406).
Out -thunder, to be louder than
thunder.
Though he out-thunder heaven with blas-
phemies, . . yet still he hopes to be saved by
the mercy of God. — Adams, ii. 277.
Out-toil, to surpass in endurance of
work.
In labour the Oxe will out-toile him. —
Breton, Dignitie of Man, p. 14.
Out - toiled, over - wearied ; worn
out.
Clifford . . . commanded his souldiers, out-
toiled with travelling so farre,and having but
small store of gun-powder, to passe over the
mountaines. — Holland's Camden, ii. 130.
Out-travel, to exceed in extent or
quickness of travelling.
She then besought him to go instantly,
that he might out-travel the ill news, to his
mother.— Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. X.
ch. ii.
OUT-TUFT, tO puff OUt.
Tee might betweene the buttons see
Her smocke out-tuft to show her levitee.
Davies, An Extasie, p. 90.
Our- vigil, to out-watch ; exceed in
vigilance.
The tender care of King Charles did out-
vigil their watchfullness. — Fuller, Worthies,
Kent (ii. 490).
Out- wealth, to exceed in wealth.
What arts did Churchmen in former times
use when they did so much out-wit and out-
wealth us! — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 253.
Out-wino, to turn the wing of an
army.
Colonel Dean's and Colonel Pride's [men]
outicinging the enemy, could not come to so
much share of the action. — Cromwell to
Lenthall, Aug. 20, 1648 {Carlyle's Cromwell,
i. 291).
Out-wit usually = to cheat, and all
the examples in the Diets, illustrate
this sense ; but Gauden employs it as
meaning to excel in ability. See extract
*. v. Out-wealth, where he is speaking
of the greater honour which Church
ministers had in old time.
Out- woman, to excel as a woman.
I have heard
She would not take a last farewell of him.
She fear'd it might unman him for his end.
She could not be unmann'd, no, nor out-
woman'd —
Seventeen — a rose of grace.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, iii. 1.
OVA NT
( 462 ) OVER-DRINK
Ovant, triumphing with an ovation.
Plautius .... sped so well in his battels,
that Claudius passed a decree, that he should
ride in pety triumph ovant. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 42.
And over Catacratus, whom, as I said, he
discomfited and put to flight, hee rode ovant
in pety triumph. — Ibid., p.447.
Ovary, pertaining to an ovation.
Their honorary crowns triumphal, ovary,
civical, obsidional, had little of flowers in
them.— Sir T. Brown, Tract ii.
Oven. To be in. the name oven = to
be in the same case. See another sense
in H. 8. v.
" Why the dickens didn't you tell me all
this before, sir? " said Evans, ruefully; "it
is no use now I've been and gone into the
same oven like a fool."— Reade, Never too late
to mend, ch. ziv.
Oven-cake, a baked cake. That
referred to in the first quotation we
find from the previous chapter to have
been muffins.
I think he might have offered us a bit of
his oven-cake. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. VII. ch. ii.
And he did such a breakfast make
On new-bak'd loaf and oven-cake,
That they all look'd with wond'ring eye
At his gaunt mouth's artillery.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. iii.
Oven-wood, wood only fit for burn-
ing (?)-
Oaks intersperse it, that had once a head,
But now wear crests of oven-wood instead.
Coicper, Needless Alarm, 12.
Overalls, leggings.
The other leaned more against the rock,
half sitting and half a-straddle, and wearing
leathern overalls, as if newly come from
riding. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. xxxvii.
Over- awn, to overshadow.
Above the depth four over-awning wings,
Unplum'd, and huge and strong,
Bore up a little car.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. iii.
Overbearance, annoyance.
Will this benevolent and lowly man retain
the same front of haughtiness, the same
brow of overbearance, the same eye of eleva-
tion, the same lip of ridicule, and the same
glance of contempt? — H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, i. 216.
Over- bias, to influence unduly.
I find some men of worth . . . over-awed
by the vulgar, or over-biassed by their own
private interests. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 180.
Over-black, to cloud or besmirch.
Nor hath the Brittaines any honour by
that antiquity of his, which over-blacks them
with such vgly deformities as we can see no
part cleere. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 6.
Over-body, to make too material ; to
despiritualize.
Then was the priest set to con his motions
and his postures, his liturgies and his lur-
ries, till the soul by this means of over-hody-
ing herself, given up justly to fleshly de-
lights, bated her wing apace downward. —
Milton, Reformation in England, Bk. i.
Over-bred, too polite. Gauden calls
those who were afraid to uphold the
Church of England when unpopular
" over-bred and too much gentlemen "
{Tears of the Church, p. 14, Preface).
under-bred is common.
Overburn, to cover with flames.
The first word of the text, but, is a strong
engine set to the walls of purgatory, to over-
turn them and overburn them with the fire of
hell. — Adams, ii. 471.
Overcatch, to go beyond ; to deceive.
But ere they came unto the place to win or
lose the matche,
For feare the Ducke with some odde craft
the Goose might ouercatch.
The Gander ran unto the Cranes and Cor-
morants, and praid,
Before the match was won and lost, the
wager might be staid.
Breton, Strange Newes, p. 13.
Over-critic, hypercritic.
Let no Over-critick causlesly cavil 1 at this
coat. — Fuller, Worthies, Devon (i. 295).
Over-dare. R. has this word = to
exceed in daring ; to be rash ; but it
also means, as in extract, to daunt.
Let not the spirit of iEacides
Be over-dar'd, but make him know the
mightiest Deities
Stand kind to him.
Chapman, Iliad, xx. 116.
Overdoer, one who does more than
is necessary or expedient.
Do you know that the good creature was
a methodist in Yorkshire ? These overdoers,
my dear, are wicked wretches: what do
they but make religion look unlovely, and
put underdoers out of heart? — Richardson,
Grandison, v. 50.
Over-drink, to drink too much.
These sins being so national and natural
to the countries : to over-drink in Germany ;
to over-eat in England; to wantonine in
Italy and Venice ; to quarrel in France ; tod
to be envious in Spain. — Adams, ii. 479.
O VER-DRIP
(463)
OVERLOOK
Over-drip, to overhang. Cf . Over-
drop.
God was offended at the Court, which
over-drip't so many with its too far-spreading
branches of arbitrary and irregular power. —
Hackety Life of Williams, ii. 132.
Over-drop, to overshadow. Cf. Over-
drip, and see H. s. v. over-dreep.
The kinp may be satisfied to settle the
choice of his high promotions in one minion ;
so will never the people : and the Advanced
is sure to be shaken for his height, and to be
malign'd for over-dropping. — Backet, Life
of Williams, ii. 15.
What spoyle and bavock they may be
tempted in time to make upon one another,
while they 'seek either to overdrop or to
destroy each other. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 22.
Overface, to outface or abash. H.
has it as a Somersetshire word = to
cheat.
The lord chancellor earnestly looked upon
him to have belike overfaced him; but he
gave no place ; that is, he ceased not in like
manner to look on the lord chancellor still
and continually. — Bradford, i. 465.
Over-fame, to exaggerate.
The city once entred was instantly con-
quered (whose strength was much over-
famed). — Fuller, Profane State, V. xviii. 14.
Overfawn, to flatter grossly.
And neuer be with flatterers ouerfawnd. —
Breton, Mother's Blessing, at. 43.
Over- flourish, to exaggerate.
I cannot think that the fondest imagination
can over-fourish or even paint to the life the
happiness of those who never check nature.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 279.
The fondness of imagination always mag-
nifies temporal pleasures: fancy over-four-
iihes the object, and paints beyond the life.
—Ibid., p. 202.
Overoaze, to look at too much (so
as to dazzle or weaken the eyes).
Oh that Wit were not amazed
At the wonder of his senses,
Or his eyes not overgazed
In Minerva's excellences.
Breton, Melancholike Humours,
p. 13.
Overget, to get over. Sidney, as
quoted by L., has it = to overtake.
Edith cannot sleep, and till she overgets
this she cannot be better. — Southey, Letters,
1803 (i. 230).
Overglaze. Greene says the saddler
"stufEes his pannels with straw or
hay, and overglaseth them with haire "
(see extract «. v. Mort), i. e. he hides
inferior materials with a thin covering
of something better. Overglaze would
generally mean to glaze over, to give a
glazed surface to something.
Overgloom, to overshadow.
The cloud-climbed rock, sublime and vast,
That like some giant king o'ery looms the hill.
Coleridge, To Cottle.
Overglut, overfed.
While epicures are overglut, I ly and starue
for foode,
Because my conscience can not thriue vpon
ill gotten goode.
Breton, Melancholike Humours, p. 9.
Overgrown apparently means ex-
hausted : the labour being too much
for them. In the first quotation it
seems to signify stolen, though it is
difficult to see how this sense can be
got out of the word.
Their theft is so well known that it needs
no prouing ; they are forced to keep watch
over all they have to secure it ; their cattle
are watched day and night, or otherwise
they would be overgrown by morning. —
Modern Account of Scotland, 1670 {Harl.
Misc., vi. 140).
If you will study, let it be to know what
part of my land's fit for the plough, what for
pasture, to buy and sell my stock to the best
advantage, and cure my cattle when they are
overgrown with labour. — Cibber, Love makes
the man, Act I.
Over-inspection, overlooking.
The Students when writing private letters
wer% used to cover them with their other
hand to prevent over • inspection. — Fuller,
Hist, of Camb., vi. 13.
Over-intreat, to over-persuade.
John Coles Esquire of Somerset-shire over-
intreated him into the Western parts. —
Fuller, Worthies, Bedfordshire (i. 119).
Over-keep, to keep too strictly.
If God would have a Sabbath kept, they
over-keep it. — Adams, ii. 339.
Over-linger, to detain too long.
He loves not to over-linger any in an afflict-
ing hope, but speedily dispatcheth the fears
or desires of his expecting clients. — Fuller,
Holy State, IV. i. 17.
Overlook, to bewitch.
If you trouble me, I will overlook (i. e.
fascinate) you, and then your pigs will die,
your horses stray, your cream turn sour,
your barns be fired. — C. Kingsley, Westward
Ho, ch. iv.
I tell you she has overlooked me, and all
this doctor's stuff is no use, unless you can
OVERMATCH ( 464 )
OVERTAKEN
say a charm an will undo her devil's work. —
H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. viii.
Over-match, to marry above one's
station.
If a yeoman have one sole daughter, he
roust over-match her above her birth and
calling to a gentleman forsooth. — Burton,
Anatomy, -p. 579.
Over-moneyed, bribed. In the same
work (Suffolk, ii. 338) Fuller uses
undtr-mtmied in the same sense.
Some suspect his officers' trust was under-
mined (or over-moneyed rather), whilst others
are confident they were betrayed by none
save their own security. — Fuller, Worthies,
Lancashire (i. 558).
Overnet, cover as with a net.
He . . has spider-threads that overnet the
whole world; himself sits in the centre,
ready to run. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace,
ch. iv.
Calonnes, Breteuils hover dim, far flown,
overnetting Europe with intrigues. — Ibid.,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. v.
Overniceness, excessive delicacy.
Overniceness may be underniceneas. — Rich-
ardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 8.
Over-preach, to preach above (the
heads of the people, as we say).
Many of us so over-preached our people's
capacities, that the generality of our auditors,
after many years' preaching, were very little
edified, nothing amended, being kept at too
high a rack, both of affected Oratory and
abstruse Divinity. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 117. •
0VERPRES80R, oppressor.
Fitz Stephen calleth him Violentus Cantii
incubator, that is, the violent overpressor of
£ent. — Holland's Camden, p 352.
Over-purchase, to pay too much for.
He who buys a satisfaction, tho' never so
glittering, at the eipence of duty, is sure to
over-purchase. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 280.
Whosoever buys either wealth or honour
at the price of a crime, over-purchases. — Ibid.,
p. 528.
Over- purchase, a dear bargain.
Mirth at the eipence of Virtue is an over*
purchase. — Collier, Eng. Stage, p. 161.
Over-rack, to over-strain ; to torture
excessively. In the second extract
Da vies is speaking of jealousy.
So shonlde . . their over-rackte Khethorique
bee the ironicall recreation of the Reader. —
Nashe, Introd. to Greene's Menaphon, p. 8.
The racke that ouer-racks the ouer-londe. —
Davie*, Microcosmos, p. 77.
But our new knowledge hath for tedious train
A drooping life, and over-racked brain.
Sylvester, Eden, 293.
Overset, overcharge; assess too
highly.
The usurers and publicans . . bought in
great the emperor's tribute, and to make
their most advantage, did overset the people.
—7yiKiafc,ii.71.
Ovkrshadowy, overshadowing.
The Fig Tree . . hath her Figs aboue the
leaf, because it is so large and otter shado trie.
—Holland, Pliny, Nat. Hist., xvi. 26.
Overshine, to excel ; outshine.
But now the man that overshin'd them sdl,
Sing, Muse. — Chapman, Iliad, ii. 673.
The Primate of Armagh . . . overshintd,
both as to his Learning, Judgement, and Life
(as the Sun in the firmament), all those
Comets and Meteors. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 646.
Overshroud, to overshadow ; darken.
What shadowes here doe ouershroicde the
eie! — Breton, Countess of Pembroke's Loue,
p. 23.
Over-sow, to sow another crop on one
already existing. In Sylvester it =
sprinkled over, or perhaps is meant for
a different word, over-sewn, i. e. em-
broidered. Adams no doubt had in
his mind the " superseminavit " of the
Vulgate reading of St. Matt xiii. 25.
Cf. SUPERSEMINATION.
Whilst he sleeps, the enemy oversows the
field of his heart with tares. — Adams, i. 480.
An azure scarf all over-son^n
"With crowned swords, and scepters over-
thrown.— Sylvester, Panaretus, 125.
Overstately, too haughtily; over-
bearingly.
Tarquiniua the proude . . for his high
minde and ouerstately vsing his dtezens, and
for his moste horrible crueltee, encurred their
mortal disdaiu and hatred. — XJdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 306.
Overstrain, excessive exertion.
Nancy, who does not love him, . . . says it
was such an overstrain of generosity from
him that it might well overset him. — Rich-
ardson, Grandison, vi. 144.
Overtaken, intoxicated.
He was temperate also in his drinking,
drinking often, but very often not above one
or two spoonfuls at once, which strangers
observing, and not knowing the small
quantity he sip'd, carried away an error with
them, which £rew into a false fame ; but I
never spake with the man that saw him over-
taken.—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 225.
OVER-THINK ( 465 )
OWLS
I that was almost continually with him
never saw him in a condition that they call
overtaken, and the most hath been but just
discoverable in his speech.— North. Life of
Lord Guilford, i. 90.
Archy M'Alpine, when he happens to be
overtaken (which is oftener the case than I
could wish), reads me a long lecture upon
temperance and sobriety. — Smollett, Hum-
phrey Clinker, ii. 58.
Over-think, to over-estimate.
What man, like Job, himselfe so over-
thinks?— Sylvester, Job Triumphant, iv. 147.
Over-tipled, intoxicated.
Richard the. last Abbot, Sonne to Earle
Gislebert, being over-tipled, as it were, with
wealth, disdaining to bee under the Bishop
of Lincoln, dealt with the king . . . that a
Bishops See might be erected here. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 493. *
Overvalue, to exceed in value.
She gave me a look that overvalued tho
ransom of a monarch.— H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, ii. 239.
Over- vault, to arch over.
Polycarp of old
. . By the glories of the burning stake
O'er-vaultcd.—Southey, Thalaba, Bk. IX.
Over - weeningness, presumption ;
undue pride.
The effect of the father's over-weeningness
was that the son got only more generally
laughed at.— Savage, M. Medlicott, Bk. I.
ch. xvi.
Over -weight (used adjectivally),
excessive.
He displaced Guy, because he found him
of no over-weight worth, scarce passable with-
out favourable allowance.— Fuller, Holy War*
Bk. II. ch. xlii.
Overwell, to overflow.
Then after going round a little, with sur-
prise of daylight, the water overwelled the
edge, and softly went through lines of light
to shadows and an untold bourne. — Black-
more, Lorna Doone, ch. xix.
Overwit, to outwit. R. has the par-
ticiple overtvitted, with a quotation from
Swift. It will also be found in Hacket's
Life of Williams, i. 138, 226.
Fortune our foe we cannot overwit,
By none but thee our projects are cross-bit.
Wycherley, Love in a Wood, v. 6.
Some call it overwitting those they deal
with.— Tom Brown, Work's, iii. 23.
Overwrite, to superscribe.
Tis a tale indeed, . . . and is overwritten,
The Intricacies of Diego and Julia.— Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, iii. 117.
Over-tear, to make too old. L. has
overyeared as an adjective, with quot-
ation from Fairfax.
There is not a proverb salts your tongue, but
plants
Whole colonies of white hairs. Oh, what a
business
These hands must have, when you have
married me,
To pick out sentences that over-year you !
AVmmazar, iv. 13.
Ovicide, sheep-slaughter.
There it lay— the little sinister-looking
tail impudently perked up, like an infernal
gnomon on a Satanic dial-plate ; larceny and
ovicide shone in every hair of it. — Ingoldshy
Legends (Jarvis's Wig).
Oviposit, to deposit eggs.
An insect . . . gets into the feet of people
as they walk, sucks their blood, oviposits in
them, and so occasions very dangerous ulcers.
— Kirby and Spence, Entomology, i. 90.
It is to be hoped that this new word [ovi-
posit] may be admitted, as the laying of eggs
cannot otherwise be expressed without a
periphrasis. For the same reason its sub-
stantive, Oviposition, will be employed. —
Ibid., note.
Owl, wool.
I have toiled and moyled to a good purpose
for the advantage of Matt's family, if I can't
safe as much owl as will make me an under
petticoat.— iSmo/fctt, Humphrey Clinker, i. 89.
Owler, a dealer in wool.
To gibbets and gallows your owlers advance,
That, that's the sure way to mortify France ;
For Monsieur our nation will always be
gulling,
While you take such care to supply him
with woollen.— T. Brown, Works, i. 134.
Owl in an ivy bush, a comparison
for a stupid fellow.
Lord Sp. Prithee, how did the fool look ?
Col. Look! I' gad, he look'd for all the
world like an owl in an ivy bush. — Swift,
Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Owlino Trade, wool trade.
The Owling Trade, or clandestine exporting
of wool, seems removed from Romney Marsh
to this Coast. — Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain,
i. 159.
Owlism, stupidity. In the extract
the reference is to lawyers.
Their oidisms, vnlturisms, to an incredible
extent, will disappear by and by ; their hero-
isms only remaining. — Carlyle, Past and Pre-
sent, Bk. II. ch. xvii.
Owls. Owls to Athens, a classical
proverb, having the same meaning as
coals to Newcastle ; Athens being, as
II H
OWLY
( 466 )
PA CABLE
Fuller says (Worthies^ Northumbcr-
land), " plentifully furnished with f owle
of that feather."
To be instant with that importunity, where
a people U sufficiently enrich'd already in
all knowledge, some perhap would apply
the old proverb unto it, that it were to bnng
owls to Athens. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
i. 217.
Our soil produces more Politicks than all
Europe besides ; bo that to transport foreign
is to send owls to Athens. — Gentleman In-
strutted, p. 545.
Owly, purblind.
Now Adam's fault was not indeed so light
As seems to reason's sin-bleard ovflie sight.
Sylvester, The Imposture, 535.
Leaue a twinckling eye to owlie sights. —
Breton, Packet of Letters, p. 26.
Owly eyed, owl-eyed.
Their wicked minds, blind to the lipht of
Virtue, and owly eyed in the night of wicked-
ness.— Sidney, A rcadia, p. 303.
Own, private ; selfish.
We do not lay aside Common Prayer
of our own accord, or out of any dialike
thereof, neither in contempt of our lawful
governors or of the laws, nor out of any base
compliance with the times, or other unworthy
secular own ends. — Sanderson, v. 55.
Ownness, individuality.
Napoleon, . . . with his ownness of impulse
and insight, with his mystery and strength,
in a word, with his originality (if we will
understand that), reaches down into the
region of the perennial and primeval. —
CarlyUy Misc., iv. 198.
Ox bo we, the bow of wood that goes
round the draught ox's neck.
With oxbowes and oxyokes, and other things
mo,
For oxteeme and horseteeme in plough for
to go. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 36.
Oxboy, boy who tends cattle : always
now called cow-bay.
The oxboy as ill is as hee,
Or worser, if worse may be found.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 143.
Oxrunq, a staff used in driving oxen.
Admetus's neatherds give Apollo a draught
of their goatskin whey bottle (well if they do
not give him strokes with their oxrungs), not
dreaming that he is the Sun-God. — Carlyle,
Fr. Bet., Pt. III. Bk. I. ch. vii.
Oxteam, a team of oxen. See extract
*. v. Oxbowe.
And Goad-man Sangar, whose industrious
hand
With Ox-teem tils his tributarie land.
Sylvester, The Captain**, 711.
Oxy, pertaining to an ox.
He took hia arrow by the nock, and to his
bended breast
The oxy sinew close he drew.
Chapman, Iliad, iv. 139.
Oyster. A stopping or choking
oyster is used of a retort or device
which puts another to silence. The
first and last quotations are from the
notes to Roberts's edition of Udal's
Erasmus.
I have a stopping oyster in my poke. —
Skelton, ed. Dyce, i. 48.
At an other season to a feloe laiyng to
his rebuke that he was ouer deintie of his
mouthe and diete, he did with this reason
gine a stopping oistre. — UdaVs Apopkthegmes
of Erasmus, p. 61.
Herewithall his wife to make up my mouth,
Not onely her husband's taunting tale avouth,
But thereto deviseth to cast in my teeth
Checks and choking oysters.
Heywootfs Proverbs, cap. xi.
Oysterer, an oyster-seller.
Not scorning scullions, coolers, colliers,
Jakes-farmers, fidlers, ostlers, oysterers.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 267.
Ozimus, probably an iron ore. Bniley
in his Diet, gives " Osmunds, the oar of
which iron is made (Old Statute)."
H. also has " Osmond, a kind of iron."
He sent ozimus, steel, copper, ke. — Heylin,
Hist, of Ref. ,i. 232.
Pabouches, slippers.
1 always drink my coffee as noon as my
feet are in my pabouches ; it's the way all
over the East.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii.
187.
Pacable, placable ; peaceable. It
occurs again in cli. x. of The Virgini-
ans.
The august prince who came to rule over
England was the most parable of sovereigns.
— Thackeray, Virginians, ch. iii.
That last Roundabout Paper . . . was
PACIFICITY
(467 )
PATNTERL V
written in a potable and not unchristian frame
of mind.— Ibid., Roundabout Papers, vi.
Pacipicity, pacific influence or inten-
tions.
We are hoping here for peace, and trust-
ing with the old confidence in Mr. Pitt's
pacificity. — W. Taylor, 1800 (Robberdss Me-
moir, i. 356).
Paci Picons, quiet; peaceful.
He watch 'd when the king's affections
were most still and pacificous; and besought
his Majesty to think considerately of his
chaplain. — ffacket, Life of Williams, i. 63.
Such as were transported with warmth to
be a fighting prevail'd in number before the
pacificdus. — Ibid., i. 79.
Pack, a term of reproach. The only
reason for giving an example of such a
common word is that it is rare to find
it without " naughty " prefixed. It is
also in the quotation addressed to a
boy, not, as is more usual, to a woman.
Cocles. God save you, sir !
Master. What does this idle pack want ?
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 44.
Packing penny. To give a packing
penny = to dismiss, as with a parting
present. The speaker is joking her
sister, who had seemed averse to mar-
riage, on her having changed her mind.
Will you give
A packing penny to virginity ?
I thought you'd dwell so long in Cypres isle,
You'd worship Madam Venus at the length.
Jonson, Case is Altered, iii. 3.
Packpaunch, a devourer. Stany-
hurst (jEn., iv. 187) calls Rumour " a
foule fog packpaunch" The original
is merely " Monstrum horrendum in-
gens."
Pacturb, composition.
The stone of this country has naturally
a slaty pacture, and splits easily. — Arch.,
zxxiv. 92(1851).
Pad, a reptile ; abbreviation of pad-
dock, which properly is a toad. See
extract $. v. Junonical.
Master Bailey, sir, ye be not such a fool,
well I know, but ye perceive by this tingling
there is a ttad in the straw (thinking that
Hodg his nead was broke, and that gam-
mer wold not let him come before them). —
Gammer Gurtonfs Needle, v. 2.
I haue . . . poynted to the strawe where
the padd lurkes, that euery man at a glirase
might descry the beaste. — Gosson, Schoole of
Abuse, p. 63.
Latet anguis in herbd, there is a pad in the
straw, and invisible mischief lurking therein.
—Fuller, Pisgah Sight, III. (Pt. II.) viii. 3.
Padding. L. gives pad, to travel
gently, but adds no example. In the
extract it seems rather to denote quick
movement.
Mercy looking behind her saw, as she
thought, something most like a lyon, and it
came a great nodding pace after. — Pilgrim's
Progress, ii. 105.
Pad-nag, to amble.
Will it not moreover give him pretence
and excuse oftener than ever to pad- nag it
hither to good Mrs. Howe's fair daughter?
—Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii. 235.
Pad-staff, pack-staff (?).
With his Pad~staffe he did dig a square
hole about it.— Fuller, Worthies, Surrey (ii.
355).
Pagan, a prostitute.
In all these places
I have had my several pagans billeted
For my own tooth.
Massinger, City Madam, ii. 1.
Paggbd, pregnant. Query, bagged.
The male deere puts out the veluet head,
and the pagged doe is neere her fawning. —
Breton, Fantastickes {May).
PAGGLE, to dangle ; hang heavily (?).
In the second extract Nashe's meaning
seems to be that Hero was pregnant.
And forty kine with fair and fournish'd
heads,
With strouting dugs that paggle to the
ground,
Shall serve thy dairy, if thou wed with me.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 171.
Hero . . was pay led and timpanized, and
sustained two losses under one. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 169).
Pailer, a straw bed or palliasse.
As for vs here in Italy, even as our maner
was in old time to lie and sleep vpon straw-
beds and chaffy couches, so at this day wee
vse to call our paiUrs still by the name of
Stramenta. — Holland, Pliny, Bk. XIX. ch. i.
Pain, to suffer.
So shalt thou cease to plague, and I to pain.
Daniel, Sonnet xi. (Eng. Garner, i. 586).
Paint, slang for to drink.
The muse is dry,
And Pegasus doth thirst for Hippocrene,
And fain would paint — imbibe the vulgar
call—
Or hot, or cold, or long, or short.
Kingsley, Tito Years Ago, ch. xxiv.
Painterly, pertaining to the work
of a painter.
A very white and red vertue, which you
could pick out of a painterly glose of a visage.
—Sidney, Arcadia, p. 47.
Ii II 2
PAINTINGNESS
( 468 )
PALTOCKES
Paintingness, picturesqueness : bo
we speak of word-painting.
One cannot enough praise the expression
aud paintingness of the style.— W. Taylor,
1801 {Robberds's Memoir, i. 374).
Palabba, speech ; palaver (Spanish).
To conquer or die is no theatrical palabra
in these circumstances, but a practical truth
and necessity. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III.
Bk. V. ch. vi.
PalvEoethnology, the science that
treats of ancient races or nations. See
L. s. v. ethnology.
It is of course of great importance to the
students of pahroethnology and archaeology
to know what foundation of truth there was
in the notice of the particular position of
the necropolis. — Archaologia,xUi. 103 (1863).
Palestra, the gymnasium.
Make him athletic as in days of old,
Learn'd at the bar, in the palastra bold.
Covoper, Conversation, 842.
Palate-man, epicure. Fuller again,
in speaking of garlic in Cornwall, writes,
"Our Palate people are much pleased
therewith " (i. 206).
Whether these tame be as good as wild
5heasants, I leave to Pallaie-men to decide. —
?uller, Worthies, Bucks (i. 134).
Palaver, to chatter : very often with
a subaudition of humbug.
I had therefore sufficient occupation in
telling her nursery tales, and palavering the
little language for her benefit. — Miss Bronte,
Vilkltt, ch. xiii.
PALEMrouR, a flowered stuff ; it some-
times also means an embroidered shawl
or robe worn as a sign of rank. The
name is probably from the town of
Palam-pnr, in the north of Guzerat.
Oh, sir, says he, since the joining of the two
companies we have had the finest Bettelees,
Palempores, Bafts, and Jamwars come over
that ever were seen. — T. Brown, Works, i.
213.
Scraps of costly Indian chintzes and palem-
pours were intermixed with commoner black
and red calico in minute hexagons. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xii.
Paletot, a light overcoat : a French
word, more common with us some years
ngo than now. See quotation from C.
Kingsley j. v. Heathendom.
A fellow with a hat and beard like a bandit,
a shabby paletot, and a great pipe between
his teeth. — Thackeray, Misc., ii. 393.
Instead of the threadbare rusty black coat
of the morning, he wore one of light drab
which looked as if it had dhce been a hand-
some loose paletot, now shrunk with washing.
— G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxiv.
Palimpsest, a term more commonly
applied to MS. written on a previously
used parchment. In the extract the
word refers to sepulchral brasses en-
graved on each side.
Palimpsest brasses are also found at Berk-
hampstead.— Arch., xxx. 124 (1843).
Palinodical, retracting.
Hor. I writ out of hot blood, which being
cool,
I could be pleas'd, to please you, to quaff
down
The poison *d ink in which I dip'd your name.
Tuc. Say'st thou bo, my palinodical
rhymster ?
Dekker, Satiromastix {Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., iii. 160).
Palisado, to enclose with palisades.
The Ditch is palisadoed.— Defoe, Tour thro1
G. Britain, i. 6.
Such a foss£ as we make with a cuvette in
the middle of jt, and with covered ways and
counterscarps pallisadoed along it. — Sterne*
Trist. Shandy, ii. 60.
Pallateen.
Here one they found stufft quite brimfull
Of patches, paints, and Spanish wooll,
With top-knots fine to make 'em pretty,
With tippet, pallateen, and settee.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 63.
Palm full, fruitful in palm-trees.
Neare where Idume's dry and sandy Soil
Spreads palmfull f orrests dwelt a man yer-
while. — Sylvester, Job Triumphant, 67.
Palpitant, trembling ; palpitating.
The grocer, palpitant, with drooping lip
sees his sugar tare. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II.
Bk. V. ch. iv.
Palsy, used adjectivally for pained.
Mark what a pure vermilion blush has dyed
Their swelling cheeks, and how for shame
they hide
Their palsy heads, to see themselves stand
by
Neglected. — Quarles, Emblems, i. 1.
Bind up the palsy knees, that are not well
knit up in the joints. — Sanderson, i. 404.
Palterly, paltry.
It is instead of a wedding dinner for his
daughter, whom I saw in palterly clothes,
nothing new, but a bracelet that her servant
had given her.— Pepys, Feb. 22, 1660-67.
Paltockes Inne, a very poor place.
Comming to Chenas, a blind village, in
comparison of Athens a Paltockes Inne, he
found one Miso well governing his house. —
Gosson, Schoole of Abuse, p. 52.
PALTRER
( 469 ) PAN-PUDDING
Swiftlye they determind too flee from a
oountrye so wycked,
Paltocks Inne leauing,toowrinche thee nauye
too southward. — Stanyhurst, j£n.y iii. 65.
Paltrer, a shuffler.
There be of you, it may be, that will ac-
count me a paltrer for hanging out the signe
of the Kedde-herring in my title-page, and
no such feast towards for ought you can
see. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Harl. Misc.. vi.
149).
Paludament, a military cloak. A
Latin word Anglicized.
Immediately came " sweeping by," in gor-
geous paludaments, Paulus or Marius, girt
round by a company of centurions. — De
Quincey, Opium Eater, p. 144.
Paludious, marshy.
The lions in Mesopotamia . . are destroyed
by gnats; their importunity being such in
those paludious places, that the lions by
rubbing their eyes grow blind, and so are
drowned. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
60.
Pamphleteering, writing or publish-
ing pamphlets.
By pamphleteering we shall not win.
Pamphlets are now too common. — C. Kings-
ley, 1870 (Life, ii. 246).
Pampilian, stuff such as that of
which servants' coats were made.
See H.
Lolio's side coat is rough pampilian,
Gilded with drops that down the bosom ran.
Hall, Sat., IV. ii. 19.
Pan. To savour -of the pan = to
savour of the source whence it pro-
ceeds, to betray its origin ; also to
savour of heresy; see second quota-
tion. Southey, in a note, remarks that
the French have an equivalent phrase,
" sentir le fagot."
Let him translate a work of JSneas Sylvius,
De gestis Basrliensis Concilii ; in the which,
although there be many things that savour-
eth of the pan, and also he himself was after-
ward a bishop of Rome, yet I dare say the
papists would glory but a little to see such
books go forth in English. — Ridley to Bern-
here, 1554 (Bradford, ii 160).
Bishop Nix of Norwich, one of the most
infamous for his activity in this persecution,
used to call the persons whom he suspected
of heretical opinions, "men savouring of the
frying-pan." — Southey, Book of the Church,
eh. xi.
Panaret, all-virtuous one.
Wilt have our bodies which Thou didst
create?
Then take them to Thee, Thou true Panaret.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 13.
Pandean pipes, a wind instrument
made of reeds fastened together, such
as Pan is represented playing. Cf.
Panpipe.
He looked abroad into the street ; all there
was dusk and lonely ; the rain falling heavily,
the wiud playing Pandean pipes, aud whist-
ling down the chimney-pots. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. iv.
Pandola, a musical instrument — mis-
print for Italian pandora, English pan-
dore or bandore, a sort of lute (?).
Their raw red fingers, gross as the pipes
of a chamber - organ, which had been em-
ployed in milking the cows, in twirling the
mop or churn - staff, being adorned with
diamonds, were taught to thrum the pan-
dola, and even to touch the keys of the
harpsichord. — Smollett, L. Greaves, ch. iii.
Panegyre, praise ; panegyric.
Instead of costly Suits of curious showes,
Of precious Gifts, %f solemn Panegyres,
Accept a Heart.
Sylvester, Maiden* s Blush (Dedic).
Panegyrick, to praise.
I had rather be reproached for sobriety
than caress'd for intemperance; and lam-
pooned for a virtue than paneyyrick'd for a
vice. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 539.
Pangpul, tortured ; suffering.
Overwhelmed with grief and infirmity, he
bowed his head upon his pangful bosom. —
Richardson, CI. Harloxce, vii. 224.
Pannel, to saddle, used chiefly of
mules or asses.
He saddled Rosinante with his own hands,
and pannelled his squire's beast. — Jarvis's
Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. iii.
Pannier ed, loaded with panniers.
Cf. Hampered.
Small change it made in Peter's heart
To see his gentle panniered train
With more than vernal pleasure feeding,
Where'er the tender grass was leading
Its earliest green along the lane.
Wordsworth, Peter Bell, Pt. I.
Panpipe, a pipe of reeds such as Pan
was represented with. Cf. Pandean
pipe.
At the end of the lime-tree avenue is a
broken - nosed damp Faun with a marble
panpipe, who pipes to the spirit ditties which
I believe never had any tune. — Thackeray,
The Neircomes, ch. xlvii.
Pan - pudding, pancake. H. says,
"A mention of the pan - puddings of
Shropshire occurs ii* Taylors Works,
1630, i. U6.M
PANTALOON
( 470 )
PARADISIAC
Their buttocks
Have left a peck of flour in them ; beat them
carefully
Over a bolting-hutch, there will be enough
For a pan-puddiny.
Mutdleton, Mayor of Quinborouyh, Act V.
Your begging progress is to ramble out
this summer among your father's tenants;
and 'tis in request among gentlemen's
daughters to devour their cheesecakes, ap-
ple-pies, cream and custards, flapjacks, aud
pun-puddinjs. — Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Pantaloon. That this article of
dress was once only used by gentry
is shown in the firat quotation. See
a notations s. w. Okay at string and
TITUPPINQ.
I could not but wonder to see pantaloons
and shoul dor-knots crowding among the
common clowns. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 273.
St. Pantaleon . . . was in more especial
fashion at Venice ; and so many of the grave
Venetians were in consequence named after
him, that the other Italians called them
generally Pantaloni in derision. . . . Now
the Venetiaus wore long small-clothes ; these
as being the national dress were called Pan-
It/oni also ; and when the trunk - hose of
Elizabeth's days went out of fashion we re-
ceived them from France with the name of
pantaloons. — Southey, The Doctor, Interchap-
ter zx.
Panter, the butler, or keeper of the
pantry.
Though all the bread be committed unto
the vantery yet for his fellows with him.
which give the thanks unto their lord, ana
recompense the panter again with other kind
of service in their offices. — Tyndale, i. 466.
Pantile, dissenting. Grose says, be-
* c uise dissenting chapels were so often
roofed with pantiles.
Mr. Tickup's a good churchman, mark
that ! He is none of your occasional cattle,
noue of your hellish pantile crew. — Centlivre,
Gotham Election.
This rascal Sly was against the peace, I
remember it well ; and I'll have you hang'd
for 't, I will, you pantile monster. — Ibid.
Panyard, pannier.
I saw a man riding by that rode a little
way upon the road with me last night, and
he being going with venison in bis panyard*
to London, I called him in, and did give
him his breakfast with me.— Pepys, Aug. 7,
1661.
PAPALI8T, Papist.
Patriot PEscuyer . . . determines on going
to Church in company with a friend or two,
not to hear mass, which he values little, but
to meet all the Papalists there in a body. —
Carlyle, Fr. Ret., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. iii.
PArKUY, like paper; thin, fluttering.
His kitling eyes begin to runne
Quite through the table, where he spies
The homes of paperie butterflies.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 126.
Papish, Papist.
Mark my last words — an honest living get ;
Beware of Papishes, and learn to knit.
Gay, The What d* ye call it ? ii. 5.
They were no better than Papishes who
didjiot believe in witchcraft. — Smollett, Sir
L. Greaves, ch. vii.
Papmrat, milk for babes.
I cannot bide Sir Baby . . .
Keep him off
And pamper him with papmeat, if ye will,
Old milky fables of the wolf and sheep,
Such as the wholesome mothers tell their
boys. — Tennyson, Pelleas and Ettare.
Papyral, formed of paper.
Uncle Jack, whose pocket was never with-
out a wet sheet of some kind, drew forth a
steaming papyral monster. — Lytton, Caxtons,
Bk. VII. ch. ii.
Par, "a small fish, not unlike a
smelt, which it rivals in delicacy and
flavour" (note by Smollett).
The ruthless pike intent on war,
The silver eel, and mottled par.
Ode to Levcn- Water (H. Clinker,
ii. 82).
" Eachiu resembles Conachar," said the
Glover, ** no more than a salmon resembles a
par, though men say they are the same fish
in a different state." — Scott, Fair Maid of
Perth, ii. 216.
Through the water, splash squire, viscount,
steward and hounds, to the horror of a shoal
of par, the only visible tenants of a pool
which after a shower of rain would be alive
with trout. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch.
XVUl.
Parachute, to send down as in a
parachute. See extract from Col in an
s.v. Balloon.
Parader, admirer: at least this
seems its meaning in the extract, the
idea perhaps being of a lover parading
before his mistress, and endeavour-
ing to show himself off to the best
advantage.
What think you, my dear, of compromis-
ing with your friends, by rejecting both
your men and encouraging my parader. —
Richardson, CI. ffarlowe, ii. 3.
Paradisiac, belonging to paradise.
PARADO
( 47i )
PARCELLIZE
The paradisiac beauty and simplicity of
tropic humanity. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. xl.
Parado, parade ; display. The
earliest example of parade (which we
get from the French) in the Diets, is
from Paradise Lost (iv. 79), which
was published eight years after Gau-
den's book appeared. The word will
be found again at p. 190, "all this
bustling and parado.
No less terrible was this paradox and
parado of Presbyterian Discipline and
Severity. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p/10.
Pabafront, asuperfrontal: the hang-
ing which covers the top of the altar,
as distinguished from the frontal orsuf-
front that covers the side.
What is set apart to God should be differene'd
in its name from common things, that religion
might have a dialect proper to itself, as
paten, chalice, corporal, albe, parafront, suf-
front, for the hangings above and beneath
the table. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 107.
The main engine at this time for advancing
money was the speeding of a commission in-
to all parts of the realm ... to seize upon all
hangings, altar • cloths, fronts, parafronts,
copes of all sort, with all manner of plate. —
Hey tin, Reformation, i. 281.
Parage, equality.
He thought it a disparagement to have a
parage with any of his rank ; and out of
emulation did dry his substance that it might
not flow so fast into charitable works. —
Racket, Life of Williams, ii. 115.
Paragonize, to compare ; and so to
exalt by comparison. See an example
8.V. ESMAYLE.
Though we might call this figure very well
and properlv the Paragon, yet dare I not so
to doe for feare of the courtiers' enuy, who
will haue no man vse that term but after a
courtly manner, that is, in praysing of horses,
haukes, hounds, pearles, diamonds, rubies,
cmerodes. and other precious stones ; speci-
ally of faire women whose excel lencie is
discovered by varagonizing or setting one to
another, whicn moved the zealous poet,
speaking of the mayden Queene to call her
the paragon of Queeaes. — Puttenham, Evy.
Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xix.
Paragonless, unsurpa88ed.
Having had good cheare at their tables
more than once or twice whiles I loytered in
this paragonlesse fish-town, citty, towne or
cuntry . — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 103).
Parallelogram, an instrument for
copying designs, prints, &c, now called
a pentayraph. t
This evening Mr. Spong come, and sat late
with me, and first tola me of the instrument
called a parallelogram, which I must have
one of, allowing me his practice thereon by a
map of England.— Pepys, Oct. 27, 1668.
To see Mr. Spong . . . and there I had most
infinite pleasure, not only with his ingenuity
in general, but in particular with his showing
me the use of the parallelogram, by which
he drew in a quarter of a hour before me, iu
little from a great, a most neat map of Eug-
land, that is, all the outlines. — Ibid., Dec. 9,
1668.
Parallelogram ical, in the form of
a parallelogram.
Rhomboides i&¶llelogramtnical figure,
with unequall sides and oblique angles. —
H. More, Interpretation General.
The table being parallelogramical and very
narrow, it afforded a fair opportunity for
Yorick, who sat directly over against Phuta-
torius, of slipping the chestnut in. — Trist.
Shandy, iii. 213.
Paralogize, to reason falsely;
though in the subjoined extract the idea
of falseness does not seem intended.
I had a crotchet in my head here to have
given the nines to my pen, and ran astray
thorowout all the coast-townes of England
. . . and commented and paralogized on their
condition in the present and in the preter
tense. — Wash's Lenten Stuffe (Marl. Misc.,
vi. 153).
Paramour. The subjoined is a late
instance of the use of this word in an
honourable sense. No scandal is implied
by it against Lieutenant Lismahago
and Mrs. Tabitha Bramble.
But my aunt and her paramour took the
pas, and formed indeed such a pair of originals
as, I believe, all England could not parallel.
— Humphrey Clinker, ii. 199.
Parasital, parasitical.
He saw this parasital monster fixed upon
his entrails, like the vulture on those of the
classic sufferer in mythological tales. — Lytton,
What will he do with it ? Bk. VIII. ch. vii.
Parasol, to shade as with a parasol.
And if no kindly cloud will parasol me,
My very cellular membrane will be changed,
I shall be negrofied.
Southey, Nondescripts, iii.
Frondent trees parasol the streets, thanks
to nature and the Virgin. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 268.
Parcellize, to divide.
And that same majesty which (as the base
And pedestal) supports the waight and grace,
Greatness and glory of a well-rul'd state,
Is not extinguish t nor extenuate,
FARCER Y
( 472 )
PARQUETTED
By being parcelliz'd to a plurality
Of petty kinglings.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 1154.
Parceby, apportionment.
This part was to Helen us by wylled par-
cerye lotted.— Stanyhurst, /En., iii. 347.
Parchfully, dimly.
In the den are drumming gads of Steele
parchfully sparckling. — Stanyhurst, Conceites,
p. 137.
Parch mentarian, a book bound in
parchment.
Brackets in my study . . support the parch*
mentarians. — Southey, Letters, 1808 (ii. 03).
Parchment lace, lace of a superior
quality ; made with gold or silver.
See Passement.
Nor gold nor silver parchment lace
Was worne but by our nobles,
Nor would the honest, harmless face
Wear© ruffes with so many doubles.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 450.
PARELIE8. u Trapf)\ia are vivid clouds
which bear the image of the Sunne"
(H. More, Interpretation Generall).
And though these outward forms and gawdy
features
May quail like rainbows in the roscid sky,
Or glistring Paretics on other meteors,
Yet the clear Light doth not to nothing flie.
H. More, Immortality of the Soul, I. iii. 25.
Parentele. H. has this word
(though without example) as meaning
kindred ; in the extract it seems to
signify parentage. The same writer
in his Life of Lord Guilford, when
giving an account of the family puts
in the margin, " Family and parentele."
See also ii. 209.
There were not so many noble families
strove for him, as there were cities strove
for the parentele of Homer. — North, Ex-
amen, p. 223.
Parge work, work that is pargeted
or plastered.
A border of freet or parge tcorke .... the
seeling is of the same fret or parge vorke. —
Survey of Manor of Wimbledon, 1649 (Arch.,
x. 403).
Park. The extract contains one of
Fuller's etymologies, which seems worth
preserving.
The word Parvus appears in Yarro (deriv'd
no doubt A parcendo, to spare or save) for a
place wherein such cattle [Deer] are pre-
served.— Fuller, Worthies, Oxford (i. 217;.
Parliament, conference; parley.
And in the 42. yeere of the same king,
in Carbry, after a certain Parliament ended
betweene the Irish and English, there were
taken prisoners. — Holland's Camden, ii. 194.
Parliament, a sweetmeat.
Roll, roll thy hoop, and twirl thy tops,
And buy, to glad thy smiling chops,
Crisp parliament with lollypops,
And fingers of the Lady.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected
Addresses,'}*. 85.
Parliament Christmas, a name
given by some to Christinas day on
the change from the old style to the
new. One of my parishioners who
died at an advanced age in 1866
would never acknowledge that we kept
Christmas on the right day ; she knew
that Jan. 6th was the proper anniver-
sary, because once, as a girl, she had
seen bees swarming at midnight on
Jan. 5th.
Both Christmas Days were kept at the
Orange. There were people in those times
who refused to keep what they called Par-
liament Christmas. But whether the old
computation or the new were right was a
point on which neither the master nor mis-
tress of this house pretended to give an
opinion. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. cix.
Parodist, writer of a parody.
*We hardly know which to consider as the
greater object of compassion in this case —
the original Odist, thus parodied by his
friend, or the mortified Parodist, thus muti-
lated by his printer. — Poetry of Antijacobin,
p. 24.
Paroxysm, a quarrel; the word is
used curiously in the quotation from
Milton, for a great quantity.
The greatest contention happening here
was the paroxysm betwixt Paul and Barna-
bas.— Fuller, Pisgah Sioht, IV. i. 29.
The paroxisme continued and encreased
betwixt the Scotish Bishops . . . and such
who celebrated Easter after the Roman rite.
— Ibid., Ch. Hist., II. ii. 88.
In the very midst of the paroxisme between
Hooker and Travers, the latter still bare
(and none can challenge the other to the
contrary) a reverend esteem of his adversary.
— Ibid. IX. vii. 59.
I will not run into a paroxysm of citations
again in this point. — Milton, Reformation in
Eng., Bk. i.
Paroxysmic, spasmodic.
like the Quakers, they fancy that they
honour inspiration by supposing it to be
only extraordinary and paroxysmic. — C
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xv.
Parqueted, inlaid.
PARREE
( 473 ) PASSAMENTED
The roomes are wainscotted, and some of
them parquetted with cedar, yew, cypresse,
be.— Evelyn, Diary, Aug. 23, 1678.
Parree, fencing-bout ; parry (?)
Mr. George Jefferies and one of the
prisoner's witnesses had a parree of wit. —
Aorth, Examen, p. 589.
Parrhbsy, boldness of speech
(Greek, irappnaia).
An honest and innocent parrhesy or free-
dome of speech such as becomes the Messen-
ger of Heaven, the Minister of Christ, and
the Ambassadour of God.— Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 274.
Parrot, to chatter, like a parrot.
Put you in mind in whose presence you
stand ; if you parrot to me long, go to—
Chaptnan, fVidaowes Teares, Act V.
"Well," said Mr. Riderhood, quailing a
little, "I am willing to be silent for the
purpose of hearing; but dont Poll Parrot
me."- Dickens, Our Mutual Friend, Bk. II.
ch. zii.
Parson and clerk, a children's game,
explained by the quotations.
Age has not only made me prudent, but,
luckily, lazy, and without this latter extin-
guisher, I do not know but that farthing
caudle my discretion would let my snuff of
life flit to the last sparkle of roily, like
what children call the parson and clerk in a
bit of burnt paper. — Walpole, Letters, iv. 455
(1788).
So when a child, as playful children use,
Has burnt to tinder a stale last-year's news,
The flame extinct, he views the roving fire.
There goes my lady, and there goes the
squire ;
There goes the parson, oh ! illustrious spark,
And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the
clerk.
Cowper, On observing some names
of little note in the Biog. Brit.
Parsonet, a little parson, jocosely
applied to a parson's child.
The Parson dearly lov'd his darling pets,
Sweet, little, ruddy, ragged, Parsonet s.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 132.
Parsonic, pertaining to a parson.
See quotation 8. v. Sap.
Vain-Glory glow'd in his parsonick heart.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 138.
Hence he, in calm parsonic state,
Approach *d the lordly mansion gate.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour iii. c. 5.
His manners I think you said were not
to your taste — priggish and parsonic? — ('.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxxvii.
Parson's week, lasts from Monday
till the Saturday week following.
Get my duty done for a Sunday, so that I
may be out a Parson's week. — J. Price, 1800,
in Life of H. F. Carey, i. 144.
Partile. " Partile aspect (in Astro-
logy), the most exact and full aspect
that can be1' (Bailey's Diet).
Saturn was lord of my geniture, culmin-
ating, &c., and Mars principal significator of
manners in partile conjunction with mine
Ascendent. — Burton, Democ. to Reader, p. 3.
Partlesse, explained by Da vies in a
note " without good partes."
For man of woorth (say they) with parts
indow'd
The tymes doe not respect, nor wil relive,
But wholly vnto partlesse Spirits giue.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 72.
Partlet, a hen. N. says that it is
used in this sense by Chaucer and
others down to Dryden, who is also
the last author quoted for it in the
other Diets.
I forgot to take your orders about your
poultry ; the partlet $ have not laid since I
went.— Walpole, Letters, i. 130 (1746).
Paschalists, disputers about the
proper time of Easter.
Tradition hath had very seldom the gift of
persuasion, as that which church histories
report of those east and western paschalists,
formerly spoken of, will declare. — Milton,
Prelatical Episcopacy.
Paschall, a large candle used by
Roman ists at Easter.
After the Jewes be thus baptized, they be
brought into the church, and there they see
the hallowing of the paschall, which is a
mightie great© wax taper. — Munday's Eng-
lish Romayne Life, 1590 (Harl. Misc., vii.
150).
Pasigraphy, a writing meant for
all, i. e. in a character and language
universally intelligible. Leibnitz con-
ceived the idea of such an universal
language. The illuminator's art is so
called, I suppose, as appealing to the
eyes of all alike, just as pictures have
been termed "the books of the un-
learned."
The illuminator of a manuscript blazons
in his pasigraphy only the capital of the
TV . Tt
ii. 53). *
paragraph — Jr. Taylor (Robberdsfs Memoirs,
Passage, to pass or cross.
Then Beauclerk passaged to Lady Daven-
ant. — Miss EdgcwoHh, Helen, ch. xvii.
Passamented. See quotation and H.
s. v. jxissamen.
PASSEMENT
( 474 ) PATCH-PANNEL
Above this he wore, like others of his age
and degree, the Flemish hose and doublet,
which in hononr of the holy tide were of
the best superfine Euglish broad cloth, light
blue in colour, slashed out with black satin,
and passamented (laced, that is) with em-
broidery of black silk.— Scott, Fair Maid of
PeHh, i. 76.
Passkment, lace. See H. s. v. passa-
men : " pasmain lace of green caddis "
is mentioned in Pattonn Exped. to
ScotLy 1548 (Eng. Gamer, iii. 92).
Figures and figuratiue speeches . . be the
flowers as it were, and coulonrs that a poet
setteth vpon his language of arte, as the em-
broderer doth his stoip and perle or passe-
ments of gold vpon the stuffe of a princely
garment. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III.
ch. i.
Passional, dealing with the passions.
The poetry, of course, is low and prosaic ;
only now and then, as in Wordsworth, con-
scientious ; or in Byron, jxxssional ; or in
Tennyson, factitious.— Emerson, E»g. Trails,
ch. xiv.
Passiuncle, a miniature or petty
passion. ('£. Consciunclk. De Quin-
cey referring to the use of the word
vibratiuncle by Hartley says,
Now, of men and women generally, paro-
dying that terminology, we ought to say —
not that they are governed by passions, or
at all capable of passions, but of passiuncle*,
—Autob. Sketches, i. 177.
Passiveless, not passive.
Which Hate is no less great than He is good,
That's infinite, for nought in Him is lease :
Wert in him, as in us, a passive moode,
He were not God, for God is passiuelesse.
Davies, Mirum in Jffodum, p. 20.
Pass-lamb, paschal lamb.
I will compare circumcision with Baptism
and the pass lamb with Christ's supper. —
Tyndale, iii. 245.
There's not a house but hath som body
slain,
Save th' Israelites, whose doors were markt
before
With sacred Pass-lamb* s sacramental 1 gore.
Sylvester, The Laxce, 583.
Pass-man, superhuman.
The passe-man wisdom of th' Isacian prince,
A light so bright, set in such eminence,
(Unhideable by enuious arrogance
Vnder the bushell of black ignorance)
Shines euery where, illustrates euery place.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1254.
Pass-praise, beyond all praise.
That skin, whose pass-praise hue scorns
this poor term of white. — Sidney, Astrophel
and Stella, 77.
Pasteboard, visiting card (slang).
I shall just leave a pasteboard; but I'm
not in the humour to be dancing about lion-
izing.— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch.
xzv.
Paste eggs. See extract.
In some part of the North of England
such eggs [Easter eggs] are still also pre-
sented to children at Easter, and caXled paste
(pasque) eggs. — Arch., xv. 359 (1806).
Pastkl, a name given to (so-called)
coloured chalks made by grinding col-
ours, and making them up into a paste
with gum ; -this is used instead of oil
or water-colours, and dries in the man-
ner of chalk. The term is also applied
to the picture itself done in this way.
What awfully bad pastels there were on
the walls ! what frightful Boucher and Lan-
cret shepherds and shepherdesses leered over
the portieres. — Thackeray, Netccomes, ch. lxiii.
Mr. Lavender bad finished another of
those charming heads in pastel, which at a
distance remiuded one of Greuze. — black,
Princess of Thule, ch. iii.
Pastille, "small aromatic ball,
burnt to scent the air of a room"
(Latham, who gives no example).
Its rooms and passages steamed with
hospital smells, the drug and the pastille
striving vainly to overcome the effluvia of
mortality. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. ix.
Pastorist, an actor of pastorals.
We are, sir, comedians, tragedians, tragi-
comedians, comi- tragedians, pastorists, hu-
morists, clownists, satirists. — Jfiddleton,
Mayor of Quinborough, V. i.
Past-price, invaluable.
The Soule is such a precious thing
As costs the price of past-price deerest bloud.
Davies, Mirum in Modum, p. 6.
Pasty, like paste, white or flabby.
You're very pale and pasty. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. liii.
Patch. To be not a patch on some
person or thing = to be not at all equal
to him or it
Soldier, you are too late : he is not a patch
on you for looks, but then — he has loved
me so long. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch.
xxxvii.
Patch - pannel, shabby ; botched :
also as a substantive, a ragged fellow.
Hang thee, patch-pannel ! — Dekker, Satiny-
tnastix (Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 140).
Whv, noble Cerberus, nothing but patch-
pannel 6tnff, old gallimawfries, and cotten
candle eloquence. — Wily Beguiled^ Prologue
(Ibid., iii. 293).
PATCHY
( 475 )
PATRIZATE
Patchy, cross.
** He'll be a bit patchy then, won't he? "
*' Well, just for a while of course he will,"
said Mrs. Moulder, " but there's worte than
him. To-morrow morniug maybe he'll be
just as sweet as sweet ; it don't hang about
him sullen-like." — Trollope, Orley Farm, vol.
II. ch. ill.
Pater cove, a hedge priest (gipsy
slang) : also called patrico. See
Broome's Jovial Beggars.
My idea at the moment was to disguise
myself in the dress of the pater cove. — Lytton,
Pelham, ch. Ixxx.
Patereros, chambered pieces of
ordnance. See H. who refers to Archce-
ologia, xxviii. 376, but gives no extract
His habitation is defended by a ditch, oyer
which he has laid a draw-bridge, and planted
bis courtyard with patereroes continually
londed with shot. — Smollett, Peregrine Pickle,
ch. i.
I can see the brass patararoes glittering on
her poop. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xix.
Paternoster, a line to which hooks
are attached at given intervals, also,
leaden shots to sink it. The likeness
of these last to beads in a rosary gave
the name. In a rosary one bead larger
than the rest is called the Paternoster,
whence the name is sometimes applied
to the entire rosary.
" Here's your gudgeons and minnows, sir,
as you bespoke," quoth Harry, " and here's
that paternoster as you gave me to rig up." —
C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. iii.
He . . saw through the osiers the hoary old
profligate with his paternoster pulling the
perch out as fast as he could put his line in.
— H. Kinysley, Ravenshoe, ch. lxiv.
Paternoster while, the brief time
occupied in saying the paternoster.
Alexander in his childhood excessiuely
making incense and sacrifice unto the goddes,
and euery pater noster vthyle renning to take
still more of the frankincense. — Udal's Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 205.
Patibulary, pertaining to a pati-
bulum, or fork-snaped gibbet.
Infinitely terrible is the Gallows; it be-
strides with its patibulary fork the pit of
bottomless terror. — Carlyle, Diamond Neck-
lace, ch. xvi.
Over all, rising as ark of their Covenant
the grim patibulary fork, forty feet high. —
Jbid., Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. II. ch. viii.
Patish, to stipulate. See H. s. v.
patising.
[He was] let go immediatly vpon the
briugyng of the money which the pirates
pati shed for his raunsome. — Udal's Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 293.
Patois. See extract : the word may
be said to be naturalized among us.
Patois, from the Latin word patavinitas,
means no more than a provincial accent or
dialect. It takes its name from Patavivm
or Padua, which was the birthplace of Iivy,
who, with all bis merit as a writer, has ad-
mitted into his history some provincial ex-
pressions of his own country. — Smollett,
France and Italy, Letter zxi.
Patriarch, applied to an English
Archbishop. Abp. Abbot was styled
by the Lord Keeper, " Primate and
Patriarch of all his [the King's]
Churches " (Rushworth> Hist. Coll.,
i. 61).
This godly King was superabundant in
his care that the See of York should be richer
by parting with this house, as is manifest by
the Lord Keeper's letter sent to that worthy
Patriarch of the North [Abp. Toby Matthew].
— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 187.
Patriarch dom, a patriarchate; the
office or rule of a patriarch.
Whenever the pope shall fall, if his ruin
be not like the sudden downcome of a tower,
the bishops, when they see him tottering,
will leave him, and fall to scrambling, catch
who may, he a patriarch dom, and another
what comes next nand. — Milton, Reformation
in Eng., Bk. i.
Pat ri arch ical. patriarchal.
The Patriarchicall Tradition and Practise
before the Law of Moses. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 519.
Patriciate, patrician order; nobility.
The professor stopped to deliver a lecture
or address on the villa of Hadrian .... It
was varied by portraits of the Bmperor and
some of his companions, and after a rapid
glance at the fortunes of the imperial patii-
ciate, wound up with some conclusions favour-
able to communism. — Disraeli, Lothair, ch.
xxv. *
Patriotess, female patriot.
A patriot (or some say it was a patriotess,
and indeed the truth is undiscoverable),
while standing on the firm deal-board of
Fatherland's altar, feels suddenly with in-
describable torpedo-shock of amazement, his
boot-sole pricked through from below. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. ix.
Patrizate, to imitate a father.
In testimony of his true affection to the
dead Father in his living Son, this Gentle-
man is thought to have penned that most
judicious and elegant Epistle (recorded in
Holinsbed's History, page 1266) and pre-
sented it to the young Earl, conjuring him,
PATROCINATE (476) PAUNCH-GUTTED
by the cogent arguments of example and
rule, to patrizate.— Fuller, Worthies, Hart-
ford (i. 431).
Patrocinate, to support ; patronize.
Preach it up and patrocinate it, prattle on
it and defend it as much as you will, even
from hence to the next Whitsuntide, if you
please so to do, yet in the end you will be
astonished to find you shall have gained no
ground at all upon me.— Urquhart's Rabe-
lais, Bk. III. ch. v.
Patrollotism, system of military
police or patrols. See quotation *. v.
House-mother.
The caricaturist promulgates his emblem-
atic tablature: Le Patrouillotisme chassant
le Patriotism, Patriotism driven out by
Patrollotism.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk.
VII. ch. i.
Pattened, wearing pattens.
Wherever they went some pattened girl
stopped to courtesy, or some footman in
dishabille sneaked off. — Miss Austen, North-
anger Abbey, ch. xxiii.
Pattening. See first extract : it is
also used of going about in pattens.
He drew out of me all my story— ques-
tioned me about the way " Lunnon folks "
lived, and whether they got any shooting or
"pattening" — whereby I found he meant
skating. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xii.
These household cares involve much pat-
tening and coxmiet-pattening in the back
yard.— Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xxvii.
Pattens. The tongue on patten*,
i. e. clattering.
But there an ye had hard her, how she began
to acolde,
The tonge it were onpatins.
Gammer uurtons Needle (Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., i. 199).
Patternable, not unexampled.
If 'twere the fashion auy where beside,
For Sense and Passion thus in chains to
lie, .
Our souls it would not torture to be ty'd
In patternable slavery ; but why
Must all the World laugh at our Woes,
whilst We
The sole Examples of this bondage be.
Beaumont, Psyche, xx. st. 257.
Patty-pan, a little pan in which a
patty is placed.
Thy book with triumph may indulge its
pride;
Preach to the patty-pans sententious stuff,
And hug that idol of the nose, called snuff.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 110.
Patulous, open. L. gives it, but
only as a medical word.
The ear yet hears more than ever the eye
saw, and by reason of its patulous admission,
derives that to the understanding whereof
the sight never had a glance. — Adams, iii. 15.
Paucify, to make few.
, We thought your exclusion of bishops
out of the upper house . . had been . . to
paucify the number of those you conceived
would counter vote you. — British Bellman,
1648 {Hart. Misc., vu. 626).
Pauciloquie, speaking little.
Fear no discredit by Pauciloquie,
All Jesus'* footsteps high and noble are ;
Never was stripped Sheep more mute than
He.— Beaumont, Psyche, xx. st. 202.
Paul's Pigeons. See extract.
Fuller refers to Stowe's Survey as his
authority for the nick-names.
Nicolas Heath was born and had his child-
hood in the City of London, being noted for
one of St. Anthonie's Pigs therein (so were
the Scholars of that School commonly called,
as those of St. Paul, PauVt Pigeons).— FulUr,
Worthies, London (i. 65).
Paul's -walker, a quid nunc or
gossip. See N. s. v. Paul's.
One Mr. Wiemark, a great Novilant and
constant PauTs walker. — Fuller, Worthies,
Suffolk (ii. 336).
Paum, to palm; a late use of thia
form.
To get rid of him he made an interest, and
pa ttmed him upon the Turkey Company. —
North, Life of Lord Guilford, l. 53.
Paunch-bellied, pot-bellied.
Can you fancy that black- a- top, snub-
nosed, sparrow-mouthed, paunch-bellied crea-
ture ? — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 31.
Paunched, stuffed with food ; the
usual meaning of the word is impaled,
or disembowelled.
Certain persones esteming and saiyng that
Demades had nowe geuen ouer to be soche
an haine as he had been in time past ; ** Yea
marie (quoth Demosthenes) for nowe ye see
him f ul paunched as lions are." For Demades
was couetous and gredie of money ; and in
deede the lions are more gentle when their
bealies are well filled. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 382.
Paunch-gut, pot-belly.
All that paunch-gut and little carcase of
thine is nothing but a sackful of proverbs
and sly remarks. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt
II. Bk. III. oh. xi.
Paunch- gutted, fat* pot-bellied.
What would this paunch-gutted fellow have
in this house?— Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. II.
Bk. I. ch. ii.
PA UNCHY
( 477 )
PEAKY
Paunchy, pot-bellied.
The gay old boys are paunchy old men in
the disguise of young ones. — Sketches by Boz
{Mr. John Bounce).
Padperess, female pauper.
Everybody else in the room had fits, ex-
cept the wards- woman, an elderly able-bodied
fxiuperess. — Dickens, Uncommercial TravelUr,
lii.
Pauperization, making paupers:
usually applied in relation to injudi-
cious alms-giving, by which people are
encouraged to depend on the benevo-
lence of others instead of their own
exertions.
AH the modern schemes for the ameliora-
tion which ignore the laws of competition
must end either in pauperization . . or in
the destruction of property.— C. Kingsley,
Yeast, ch. vi.
There is no pauperization of the peasantry
around ; the theory is that Queen Tita and
Bell merely come in to save the cost of dis-
tribution, and that nothing is given away
gratis, except their charitable labour. —
Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. xvi.
Pauperous, poor.
If you believe there be a country and city
that lies eastward, a new Jerusalem, where
there are rich commodities, as rich as any in
the East Indies, send your prayers and good
works to factor there for you, and have a
stock employed in God's banks to pauperous
and pious uses. — Ward, Sermons, p. 173.
Pavesade. Cotton, in a note, ex-
plains it, " a defence of shields ranged
by one another." R.# und H. have
pavese.
A number of harquebusiers drawn up
ready, and charged and all covered with a
p<ivesade,\ike a galliot. — Cotton's Montaigne,
ch. lxxix.
Pavid, fearful.
Eagles go forth and bring home to their
eaglets the lamb or the pavid kid. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xxxii.
Pavonian, pertaining to a peacock.
Instinct or inspiration . . directed my
choice to the pavonian pen. — Sou they, The
Doctor, Preface.
Pawnable, capable of being pawned.
Gines, who had neither gratitude nor good-
nature, resolved to steal Sancho Panza's ass,
making no account of Rosinante, as a thing
neither pawnable nor saleable. — Jarvis's Don
Quixote. Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. ix.
Peachy, peach like.
At this moment a beautiful little girl
about five years old got on the bed, and
nestled her peachy fheek against her mo-
ther's.— H. Kinysley, Ravenshoe, ch. iii.
Peacock, to exhibit ; also to make
proud. Cf. French, se pavaner, and
see the second extract.
I can never deem that love which in
haughtie hearts proceeds of a desire only to
please, and as it were peacock themselves. —
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 57.
You who understand and feel Italian so
well, how expressive are some of its words !
Pavoneggiarsi ! untranslateable. One can-
not say well in English to peacock oneself . . .
An Englishman is too proud to boast — too
bashful to strut ; if ever he peacocks himself,
it is in a moment of anger, not of display. —
Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xiv.
Tut, he was tame and weak enow with me,
Till peacocked up with Lancelot's noticing.
Tennyson, Oareth and Lynette.
Peacock in his pride. The bird is
so called when it has its tail fully dis-
played. At banquets a peacock was
sometimes served, with the feathers so
arranged.
There were snipes, there were rails, there
were woodcocks and quails,
There were peacocks served up in their pride
(that is tails).
Ingoldsby Legends (& Romwold).
And there they placed a peacock in his pride
Before the damsel.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Peagoose, a silly fellow ; but see N.
a. v. peak goose.
Tour lordship has the right garbe of an
excellent courtier ; respect's a clowne sup-
ple-jointed, courtesie's a verie peagoose ; 'tis
stiffe ham'd audacity that carries it. — Chap-
man, Mons. Df Olive, Act III.
The simple goosecap Lycus of Thebes, the
doating blockhead Agenor, the phlegmatic
peagoose Asopus. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
III. ch. xii.
Peakril, belonging to the Peak in
Derbyshire : both adjective and sub-
stantive.
The Peakrills, as they are called, are a
rude, boorish kind of people ; but bold,
daring, and even desperate in their search
into the bowels of the earth. — Defoe, Tour
thro9 G. Britain, iii. 79.
The weight of this pig [of lead], as I am
informed by Mr. Nightingale, is 1261b., a
proper load for a small peakril horse to
travel with, day by day, in bad roads. —
Archaol., y. 375 (1779).
Peaky, tapering to a peak.
Or over hills with peaky tops engrail'd.
Tennyson, Palace of Art.
PEALE
(478 )
PEDICULOUS
Pealr.
Now be we peale pelted from tope of bar-
bican hautye .— Stany hurst, JEn., ii. 429.
Pearl, a white spot in the eye.
See H.
The next day came hither an old bishop
who had a pearl in his eye. — Fox, vii. 104
(Maitland on Reformation, 503).
Boast oot of your eyes ; it is feared yon
have Balaam's disease, a pearl in your eye,
Mammon's prestriction. — Milton, A nitnadv.
on Remonst., sect. 3.
Pearled, blotched : carbuncle is the
jewel more often used as a simile.
To whom are all kinds of diseases, in-
firmities, deformities, pearled faces, palsies,
dropsies, headaches, if not to drunkards? —
Ward, Sermons, p. ISO.
Pearls, marks on the deer's horn
near the root.
You will carry the horns back to London,
and you will have them put up, and you will
discourse to your friends of the span, and
the pearls of the antlers, and the crockets. —
Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xxv.
Pearmonger. Why a pearmonger
is credited with pertness I cannot say,
unless it be from the similarity between
pear and pert or peart. The word pert
may not mean what we now signify
by it, but cheerful, sharp, or brisk, in
which sense it is still used provincially :
this is evidental'y the meaning in the
second extract, and perhaps in the other
also. See «. v. Maggot.
Miss. Lord, Mr. Neverout, you are grown
as pert as a pearmonger this morning. —
thrift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
Pert as a Pearmonger I'd be,
If Molly were but kind,
Oool as a cucumber would see
The rest of women-kind.
Gay, Neic Song of Xew Similes.
Pearte, openly; abbreviation of
apert.
Moreover that no clarcke be so bolde,
Privy or pearte with hym to holde,
Preachynge ought in his favoure.
Roy and Barlowe, Rede me and
be nott icrothe, p. 48.
Peasebolt, pease in the straw.
With peasebolt and brake
Some Drew and bake.
Tusser, Husband rie, p. 45.
Pease-liolt with thy pease he will haue
His household to feede and his hog.
Ibid., p. 143.
Peas-hook, instrument for cutting
peas.
They are now lost, or converted to other
uses, even literally to plough-shares an<l
peas-hooks, — Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, ii.
203.
Peccadil, a petty fault: the word
seems to be Anglicized in the extract
for the sake of the rhyme.
But for so small a Peccadil
To send a man up Holborn-hilL,
An act is of an odious dye,
And an unheard-of cruelty.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 161
Peccaddlia, peccadillo, slight
offence.
It were a smal faulte and a verie pecca-
dulia in them to dissemble the truth of
religion. — Traheron, Warning to England*
1558 {Maitland on Ref, p. 136).
Peck, a cant term for food. See H.
Here safe in out skipper let's cly off our
peck. — Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act II.
Peck of troubles. The earliest ex-
ample of this phrase in Nares is from *i
letter dated 1618. The subjoined is
from a document circa 1535. The Mr.
More referred to was afterwards Sir
Thomas More.
The said George cam to this deponent, and
told hym that Mr. More was in a peeks nf
troubles. — Arch., xxv. 97.
Peck point, a game.
So Panurge . . . played away all the points
of his breeches at primus tt secundus, and at
peck point, in French called La Vergetie.—
Vrgukarfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xviii.
Pedary, a scandal.
Some brought forth . . mannaries for
handlers of relicks, some pedaries for pil-
grims, some oscularies for kissers. — Latimer,
1.49.
Pedicular, lousy. The speaker in
the first extract is supposed to be a
mm who has been turned into an as*.
I am not subject to breed lice and other
vermin ; whereas this pedicular disease, with
a nomberlesse sort of other maladies aud
distempers, attend mankind. — Howell, Parly
of Beasts, p. 26.
Has humanity ever been put to a viler use
than by the Banians at Surat, who support
a hospital for vermin in that city, and regale
the souls of their friends who are undergoing
penance in the shape of fleas, or in loathsome
pedicular form, by hiring beggars to go in
among them, aud afford them pasture for
the night? — Southey, The Doctor, ch. ccxii.
Pediculous, lonsy.
Like a lowsy pediculous vermin, thou'st
but one suit to thy back. — Dekker, Satiiv
mastix {Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 115).
PEDLARISM
( 479 )
PEGMA
Pedlarism, petty dealing.
The Scots kick against the decrees of fate,
and instead of pedlars, a title their ancestors
acquiesced in for two thousand years and
upwards, set up for merchants forsooth ; but
if ever they make anything on'fc, says he
(and if they are not at last reduc'd to their
old antient pedtarism), V\\ forfeit my reputa-
tion of a prophet to you. — T. Brown, Works,
i. 188.
Pee and Cue. I do not understand
this expression in the first extract. To
mind ones Ps and Qs is, according to
Grose, "to be attentive to the main
chance ; " but I think it more usually
means, to be careful on points of pro-
priety, to be particular in behaviour.
See extract s. v. Jackassism. The ex-
pression arose perhaps in the printing
office, from the resemblance of the p to
the q.
A sin. If you fly out, ningle, here's your
cloak ; I think it rains too.
Hot. Hide my shoulders iu't.
A sin. Faith, so thou'dst need; for now
thou art in thy pee and cue : thou hast such
a vi llano us broad back that I warrant thou'rt
able to bear away any man's jests in Eng-
land.— Dekker, Satiromastix (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 130).
And I full five and twenty year
Have always been schoolmaster here ;
And almost all you know and see,
Have learn 'd their Ps and Qs from me.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. i.
Peel, a species of fish.
The ved, the tweat, the botling, and the
rest. — Dennys, Secrets of A ngling (Eny. Gar-
ner, i. 175).
Peel, a tower.
This kind of building was called in Scot-
land a peel, and in England a keep or dun-
geon.— Archaol., x. 102 (1792).
Peeldnesse, baldness.
Disease, scab, and peeldnesse. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 143.
Peeler, a policeman (slang) : so
called from Sir R. Peel, who instituted
the force.
He's gone for a peeler and a search-war-
rant to break open the door. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xxxv.
Peepers, eyes. The Alsatian slang
in the second quotation is explained in
a note to mean, " Slash him over the
eyes with your dagger.'
it
Ha ! whom do my peepers remark ?
Tis Hebe with Jupiter's jug ;
O no, 'tis the pride of the Park,
Fair Lady Elizabeth Mugg.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 102.
" I smell a spy," replied the other, looking
at Nigel ; " chalk him across the peepers with
your cheery." — Scott, Fortunes of Nigel, ch.
xvii.
The next question was how long they
should wait to let the inmates close their
peepers. — Reade, Never too late to mend, ch.
xlviii.
Peerdom, lordship (?). It seems to
be distinguished from barony in the
extract.
The Comte* contains twelve peerdoms aud
as many baronies. — Archaol., iii. 200 (1775).
Peerish, pertaining to a peer.
All this would not have done alone ; for
any other peer out of the list of protesters
might have been taken, and made a peerish
example of. — North, Examen, p. 109.
Peery, inquisitive; cautious; sus-
picious.
All these things put together excited their
curiosity ; and they engaged a peery servant,
as they called a footman who was drinking
with Kit the hostler at the tap-house, to
watch all her motions. — Richardson, CI. Har~
lowe, v. 71.
44 1 am not a person to betray people, but
you are so shy and peery ; . . if you have
been upon the snaffiing-lay — yon understand
me, I am sure." " Not I," answered Booth,
44 upon my honour." "Nay, nay," replied
the keeper, with a contemptuous sneer ; " if
you are so peery as that comes to, you must
take the consequences." — Fielding, Amelia,
Bk. II. ch. ix.
A queer, shambling, ill-made urchin, . . .
with a carroty pate in huge disorder, a
freckled, sun-burnt visage, with a snub nose,
a long chin, and two peery grey eyes which
had a droll obliquity of vision. — Scott, Kenil-
worth, i. 170.
From her twisted mouth to her eyes so peery,
Each queer feature asked a query.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Peg, a blow.
Many cross-buttocks did I sustain, and
pegs on the stomach without number. —
Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xxvii.
Pegma. R. and L. have pegm, with
a quotation from B. Jonson, where it
means some theatrical machina ; in the
subjoined the reference seems rather to
be to the speeches spoken therefrom.
We shall heare from his Lordship . . .
what presentments are towards, and who
penned the pegmas, and so forth. — Chapman,
Widdowes Teares, Act II.
PEGTOPS
( 480 )
PENCHANT
Pegtops, trousers wide at the top,
and tapering down like a pegtop.
Pegtops and a black bowler hat strike no
awe into the beholders.— H. King shy, Ravens-
hoe, ch. lxvi.
Peisant, heavy.
Yet like the valiant Palme they did sustaine
Their peisant weight.— Hudson' s Judith,u. 82.
PEIZLES8, light.
Like peizless plume born vp by Boreas breath,
With all these wings I soar to seek my death.
Sylvester, The Schism*, 978.
Pejoration, deterioration. The
word is also a Scotch law-term, signify-
ing deterioration.
Hence these luxations, distortions, dis-
locations, . . . which pejorations as to the
piety, peace, and honour of this Nation, no
man that hath eyes to see and a heart to be
sensible of can behold without sad and
serious deploring. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 131.
Pejority, worse condition.
There was but one devil before, now there
are eight. . . . This pejority of his state may
be amplified in six respects. — Adams, ii. 65.
Pelerine, a lady's cape.
Silks, muslins, prints, ribbons, pelerines
are awfully dear. — L. E. London {Life by
Blanchard, i. 111).
Pelf. See quotation. The examples
in the Diets, do not bear out Putten-
ham's censure of this as a low word ;
at present it is little used in serious
writing.
Another of our vulgar makers spake as
illfaringly in this verse written to the dis-
E raise of a rich man and couetous. " Thou
ast a miser's minde (thou hast a prince's
pelfe) ; " a lewde terme to be spoken of a
prince's treasure, which in no respect or for
any cause is to be called pelfe, though it were
neuer so meane, for pelfe is properly the
scrappes or shreds of taylors and skinners,
which are accompted of so vile price as they
be commonly cast out of dores, or otherwise
bestowed vpon base purposes : and carrieth
not the like reason or decencie, as when we
say in reproch of a niggard or vserer, or
worldly couetous man, that he setteth more
by a little pelfe of the world than by his
credit, or nealth, or conscience. For in
comparisons of these tresours all the gold or
siluer in the world may by a skornefull terme
be called pelfe. — Puitenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk.
III. ch. xxih.
Pelican, a species of shot or shell.
When your relation, General Guise, was
marching up to Carthagena, and the pelicans
whistled round him, he said, " What would
Chloe [the Duke of Newcastle's cook] give
for some of these to make a pelican pie ? "—
Walpole to Mann, iii. 84 (1754).
Pellum, dust. Pelham in thin
sense is given as a Somersetshire word
(Country and Farming Words, E. D.
S.). The extract is in the Devon
dialect.
Zom hootin', heavin', soalin', hawlin',
Zom in the mucks and pellum sprawtin.'
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 155.
Pettish, angry.
[He] flings
Among the elves, if mov d, the stings
Of pettish wasps.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 176.
Peltry, folly (?). N.haspeijfer==fool.
As Publius gentilly received Paale, and
by hym was healed of all hys dyseases, so
ded myne host Lambert receyve me also
gentilly, and by me was dely vered from hys
vayne beleve of purgatorye, and of other
popjshpeltryes. — Vocacyion of Johan Bale,
1653 ( Harl. Misc., vi. 440).
Pemmican, meat dried, pulverised,
and mixed with fat.
Not forgetting a large quantity of pro-
visions, such as pemmican, in which much
nutriment is contained in comparatively
little bulk.— E. A. Poe, Hans Pfaal (i. 11).
Penance, to punish, or inflict pen-
ance.
Did I not respect your person, I might
bring you upon your knees, and penance
your indiscretion.— Gentleman Instructed, p.
523.
I would not see thee dragg'd to death by
the hair,
Penanced, and taunted on a scaffolding.
Keats, Otho the Great, iv. 1.
I saw
The pictured flames writhe round a penanced
soul. — Southey, Joan of Arc, bk. iii.
Pen-and-ink-horn, a portable writing-
case ; ink/torn by itself is common.
^ They . . , projected the general destruc-
tion of all that wore & pen-and-ink-horn about
them, or could write or read. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., IV. i. 18.
Penary, penal, in the way of punish-
ment. Gauden says that God some-
times sends afflictions on Churches or
individuals "not alwayes for penary
chasti8ment8, but oft for tnall of
graces" (Tears of the Church, p. 76).
Penchant, inclination. This French
word is naturalized among us.
How far Kirkby was in the original depths
and lengths does not appear, but he shews a
PENCRAFT ( 481 )
PENNY
strong penchant to have his story, and the
plot itself, as it was called, to be believed. —
North, Era men, p. 171.
The impertinence of all thio shows the
author's penchant towards disguises.— Ibid.,
p. 329.
Pen-craft, authorship.
I would not give a groat for that man's
knowledge in pen-craft who does not under-
stand tins. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 185.
Pkxde, a pen ; an enclosure : also a
verb.
It shewed and represented to the eye
muche what the facion or likenesse of a
caige for byrdes, or of a pende wherein
to kepe other beastes. — XJdaVs Erasmus?*
Apophth., p. 135.
His high praise and commendacion was
not to be hidden or pended within the li mites
and precintes of Grece, but rather to ren
abroad e throughout all coastes and partes of
the worlde. — Ibid., p. 244.
Pendilatory, pendulous.
I have seen above five hundred hanged,
but I never saw any have a better counten-
ance in his dangling and pendilatory swag-
ging. — UrquharCs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xlii.
Pendulate, to hang, or swing.
The ill-starred scoundrel pendulates between
Heaven and Earth, a thing rejected of both.
— Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. xvi.
Penetrant, a far-sighted person ; a
solver of enigmas.
Our penetrants have fancied all the riddles
of the Public, which in the reign of King
Charles II. were many, came N. N. E. —
North, Examen, p. 121.
Pen-feathered, newly flpdged;
short -winged. See N. s. v. pinfeather,
and quotation from Prior in R.
Yonr intellect is pen-feathered, too weak-
wing'd to soar so high. — Gentleman In*
structed, p. 470.
P e N f u L . A pen/id of news is a
quaint expression, meaning, I suppose,
as much as could be recorded by a pen
dipped only once in the inkstand.
I came to town yesterday, and as nsual,
found that one hears much more news in
the country than in London. I have not
picked up a penful since I wrote to my
lord. — Walpcle, Letters to Lady Ossory, I. 11
(1771).
Pkn-gossip, to go<?8'p by correspond-
ence. R;chardson (Sir C. Grandison,
vi. 233) has penprattlinj.
It' I were not rather disposed at this time
to pen-yo*$ip with your worship. — Southey,
Letters, 1818 (in. 85).
Pen-gun, pop-gun. See extract s. v.
Hoast.
The mankin feels that he is a born Man,
that his vocation is to work. The choicest
present you can make him is a Tool ; be
it knife or pen-aun, for construction or for
destruction. — Carlyle, Sartor JResartus, Bk,
II. ch. ii.
Penile, peninsula.
Hee came to anchor in the hauen of Hogy
Saint Vast in Constantino, a great cape of
land or penile in Normandy. — Speed, History,
Bk. IX. ch. xii.
Pen-master, caligraphist.
When two such transcendent Pen-master*
shall again come to be born in the same
Shire, they may even serve fairly to engross
the Will and Testament of the expiring
Universe. — Fuller, Worthies, Hereford (1.
454).
Pennied, possessed of a penny.
The one-pennied Boy has his penny to
spare. — Wordsworth, Power of Music.
Pennipotent, strong on the wing.
In a note to Microcosmos, p. 41.
Davies says, " Hope's winges are
pennipotent "
Dismount your tow'ring thoughts, aspiring
Minds,
Vnplume their wings in flight pennipotent.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 15.
Penniworth. To cast penniworths
=* to count the cost, to balance advan-
tages and disadvantages.
When Caesar saied, " Be al dice alreadie
cast," his meaning was, to bee now ouerlate
to repente that he had doen, or to cal again
yesterdaie : and therefore that he would
now cast no more penztcorthes in the matter,
but go through with his purpose, channce
as it would. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p.
298.
Penny. Clean as a penny «■ quite
clean. Cf. Fine as fivepence.
I will go as I am, for, though ordinary, I
am as clean as a penny, though I say it. —
Richardson, Pamela, ii. 56.
Penny. Penny and paternoster are
frequently joined together, as in the
old proverb, "No penny, no pater-
noster" signifying " nothing for no-
thing." In the extract from Gascoigne
it means " neither for love nor money."
If I had thought yon would have passed
to the terms you now stand in, pity nor
pension, penny nor paternoster should ever
ha\ e made nurse once to open her mouth in
the cause.— Gascoigne, Supposes, i. 1.
1 I
PENNY
(482 )
PENURIOUS
Penny. A penny for your thoughts,
a common expression in addressing
one who is in a brown study.
Come, friar, I will shake him from his damps ;
( Comes forward.)
How cheer you, sir? a penny for your thought.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 161.
Penny. To think my penny silver =
to have a good opinion of myself.
Alvira. Believe me, though she say that
she is fairest,
I think my penny silver, by her leave.
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p.'123.
There are more batehelors than Roger,
and my penny is as good silver as yours. —
Breton, Packet of Mad Letters, p. 20.
Penny-rent.
He shall never marry my daughter, look
you, Don Diego, though he be my own
sister's son, and has two thousand five hun-
dred seventy-three pounds sterling, twelve
shillings and twopence a year penny-rent. —
Wtfcherley, Gentleman Dancina Master, ill. 1.
He proposes a joiuture of 1200/. a year,
penny-rents, and 400 guineas a year for her
private pirse. — Richardson, Grandison, iv. 43.
"Tuey usually give them." answered the
priest, "some benefice, or cure, or verger-
ship, which brings them in a good penny-rent,
besides the perquisites of the altar. — Jarvis's
Don (Quixote, Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. xii.
Penny wedding, a wedding at which
the guests contribute towards the set-
ting up in life of the new-married
couple.
Love that no golden ties can attach.
But nestles under the humblest thatch,
And will fly away from an Emperor's match
To dance at a penny wedding.
Hood, miss KUmansegg.
Penny white, rich.
Of the first sort we account the she-Bene*
dictiues, commonly called black nuns, but
I assure you peny white, being most richly
endowed.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI. i. 38.
Penny wise and pound foolish, a
proverbial saying applied to those who
neglect the main chance while careful
about small economies.
Nor would I advise him to cary about him
any more money than is absolutly necessary
to defray his expences, for some in this
particular have beene peny-wise and pound-
foolish, who in hopes of some small benefit
in the rates have left their priucipall, ex-
posing their persons and purses to dayly
hazard.— Howell, Forroine Travell, sect. 5.
Pension, expenditure; also, as a
verb, to lodge or live together.
TV Almighty made the mouth to recom-
pence
The Btomnk'* pension, nnd the time's expenee.
Sylvester, Sixth day, first weeke, 585.
When they meet with any person of note
and eminency, and journey or pension with
him any time, they desire him to write his
name with some short sentence, which they
call the mot of remembrance. — Howell,
Forroine Travell, sect. 4.
Penstock, a flood-gate. The extract
is from an estimate for the improve-
ment of Sandwich Harbour.
For Clay-Dams, Penstocks and Drains may
amount to about .£10,000 0s. Od. — Defoe,
Tour thro* G. Britain, i. 183.
Pentagrron, a conjurer's mysterious
charm or figure (?) Of. Pentacle.
The great ar jh-ruler, potentate of hell,
Trembles when Bacon bids him or his
fiends
Bow to the force of his pentageron.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 155.
Oonjnring and adjuring devils and fiends,
With stole and alb and strong pentaaeron.
Ibid., p. 176.
Pentamktrise, to turn into a penta-
meter.
44 Well begun," says the Proverb. " is half
done." Horace has been made to say the
same thing by the iusertiou of an apt word
which pentametrises the verse: ** Dimidium
facti qui bene capit habetT — Southry, The
Doctor, Fragm. on Mortality.
Pentweezle, a term of reproach.
Foote gives this name to a foolish
alderman and his wife in his comedy,
Taste.
Sim. I'm glad I miss'd this weapon, I'd
had an eye
Popt out ere this time, or my two butter-
teeth
Thrust down my throat instead of a flap-
dragon.
Lys. There's two, pentweezle. (Hits him.)
Masaingcr, The Old Law, iii. 2.
Penultim, penultimate.
The first male line of the Darcys being
thus determined, a second race succeeded,
derived from Norman Darcy, the joenultim
Lord in the last pedigree. — Fuller, Ch. Hist*
vi. p. 324.
Penurious. " Ignorant ladies often
mistake the word penurion* for nice
and dainty" {Note bv Swift in loc.).
Bailey in his Diet, defines the word
" covetous, niggardly, stingy; also
nice."
She's grown so nice and so penurious
With Socrates and Ep enrius.
Swift, Panegyrick on the Lian.
PEN WO MAN
( 483 ) PEREGRINATE
Penwoman, female writer.
Why, love, you have not written already !
You have, I protest! O what a ready pen-
woman!— Richardson, CI. Harloice, i. 329.
Pepper-and-salt, applied to cloth of
mingled black and white.
Tl» ere was a porter on the premises, a
wonderful creature in a vast red waistcoat
and a short-tailed pepper-and-salt coat. —
Dickens, Martin Chuzztewit% ch. xxvii.
Half a dozen men of various ages . . . were
listening with a look of concentrated intelli-
gence to a man in a pepper-and-salt dress. —
G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xlii.
Pepper-pot, a very hot West Indian
dish.
That most delicate palate-scorching soop
called pepper-pot, a kind of devil's broth
much e»t m the Went Indies, is always the
firnt dish brought to our table.— T. Brown,
Works, ii. 215.
Turenes of flattery are prepared so hot
By courtiers — a delicious pepper-pot.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 204.
Peptic, connected with digestion, in
the extract = capable of digesting.
L. gives the word, but without ex-
ample, except that he says " Peptic
Precepts" is the title of a work on
digestion, by Dr. Kitchener.
The whole not as dead stuff, but as living
pabulum, tolerably nutritive for a mind as
yet so peptic. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk.
II. ch. iii.
Pepticity, good digestion.
A most cheery, jovial, buxom countenance,
radiant with pepticity, good humour, and
ma ui fold effectuality in peace and war. —
Carlyle, Misc., iv. 254.
Perambulator, a little carriage for
children, propelled by the hand of the
person in charge of them.
She is an ordinary young lady . . . who,
after marriage, calmly and complacently
sinks into the dull domestic hind, whose
only thought is of butchers' bills and per-
ambulators.— Black, Princess of Thule, ch. ii.
Perambulatory, incidental ; perhaps
a misprint for preambtdatory^ i. e. pre-
liminary.
There be some perambulatory things that
I will but salute, a* first the name of the
Creed. — Adams, iii. 86.
Perare plums, apparently some
species of plum. Tusser names among
the " trees or fruites to be set or re-
mooued " in January,
Perare plums black and yelow. — Tusser, p.
76.
Perch, a candelabrum to bear perchers
or long candles. See N. s. v. percher.
Mv lord Mayor hath a perch to set on his
perchers when his gesse be at supper. — Calf"
hill, Answer to Martiall, p. 300.
Perch. To tip over the perch = to
die. To hop the twig is sometimes used
in the same way in modern slang.
Either through negligence, or for want of
ordinary sustenance, they both tipt over the
perch.— UrquharVs Rabelais,Bk. III. (Author's
Prologue).
My heart has aked every time these five
years, when I have play'd the sexton in
Hamlet, for fear when I am once got into
the grave, the grim tyraut should give me a
turn over the perch, and keep me there for
jesting with mortality. — T. Brown, Works,
ii. 237.
Her late husband could not stand in the
matrimonial contention of who should? but
tipt off the perch in it, neither knowing how
to yield, nor knowing how to conquer. —
Richardson, CI. Uarlowe, vi. 350.
Percollice, a portcullis.
I cannot thinke that cittie to be safe that
strikes downe her percollices, rammes vp her
gates, and sufferetn the euimie to enter the
posterne. — Gosson, Schoole of Abuse, p. 32.
Pkrcullis, portcullis.
Battering all the wall over the percullxs. —
J. Randolph, Honour Advanced, p. 3.
Percunctorily, dilatorily.
This is he that makes men serve God per*
cunctorily, perfunctorily ; to go slowly to it,
to sit idly at it. — Adams, ii. 46.
Perdiuo, a desperate man.
The Duke of Monmouth, with his party
of Perdidos, had a game to play whi -h would
not shew in quiet times. — North, Examen, p.
475.
Perdition money. See quotation.
He regulated also some disorders of the
quire, particularly the exacting of sconces or
perdition money, which he divided among
them that best deserved it, who diligently
kept prayers, and attended upon other
Ohtirch duties. — Barnard, life of Heylin, p.
112.
Perborate, to traverse.
Two pillars, . . which Hercules (when
he had peregrated all the worlde, as ferre as
any lande went) did erecte and set vp for a
memoriall that there he "had been. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 297.
Peregrinate, foreign.
I perceive too that there is something out-
landish, peregrinate, and lawless about me. —
Lytton, Cartons, Bk. XVIII. oh. ii.
Imagine this figure, grotesque, peregrinate,
I I 2
PEREGRINITY ( 484 )
PERK
and to the eye of a peasant certainly diaboli-
cal ! — Ibid., My Novel, Bk. I. cb. iv.
Peregrin ity. L. gives this word =
strangeness, with the two first quota-
tions. In Carlyle it denotes travel or
wandering.
These people, sir, that Gerrard talks of,
may have somewhat of a peregrinity in their
dialect, which relation has augmeuted to a
different language. — Johnson in BoswelCt
Tour to the Hebrides, p. 140, second edition.
Mr. Bos well says that Dr. Johnson coined
this word, and upon being asked if it was an
English one, he replied, No. ... It is, how-
ever, an old English word; and being in-
serted in the vocabulary of Oockeram early
in the seventeenth century, may be presumed
to have been in use ; but it is not worthy to
be revived. — Todd.
A new removal, what we call "his third
peregrinity" had to be decided on; and it
was resolved that Rome should be the goal
of it.— Carlyle. Life of Sterling, Pt. II. ch. vi
Perfection, to perfect. Cf. Affec-
tion, Reflection.
Both our labours tending to the same
general end, — the perfectioning of onr
countrymen in a most essential article, — the
right use of their native language. — Foote,
The Orators, Act I.
Perfectless, far from perfection ; a
stronger word than imperfect.
Fond Epicure, thou rather slept'st thyself
When thou did'st forge thee such a sleep-
sick elf
For life's pure Fount, or vainly fraudulent
(Not shunning the Atheist's bin, but punish-
ment),
Imaginedst a God so perfectless,
In works defying whom thy words profess.
Sylvester, Seventh day, first weeke, 133.
Perfebvid, very ardent.
What adjectives that perfervid Uhlan may
have been using — and he was rather a good
hand at expressing his satisfaction with any-
thing—we did not try to hear. — Black, Ad-
ventures of a Phaeton, ch. xxi.
Perfixtly, exactly ; definitely. The
extract is from the 1611 ed. ; in the
CherUey Worthies ed. the word is pre-
fixtly.
But though these works surmount all
nature's might,
Though his own sages them of gnile acquight,
Though th' are not casuall (sith the holy
man •
Foretels perfirtly what, and where, and
when),
And though that, liuing in the midst of his,
The Israelites be free from all of this,
Th' incensed tyrant, strangely obstinate,
Retracts the leave he grauted them of late.
Sylvester, The Laws, 561.
Performance, performance.
To cross this match
I used some pretty sleights, but I protest
Such as but sat upon the skirts of art ;
No cou juration*, nor such weighty spells
As tie the soul to their performancy.
Merry Devil of Edmonton (Dodsley,
O. PI., xi. 168).
Perfumt, sweet-scented.
The sweet atmosphere was tinged with
the perfumy breath which always surrounded
Her. — Mrs. Oliphant, Salem Chapel, ch. xiiL
Pergola. Evelyn uses this Italian
word as though it were familiar in
English : it rather means an arbour or
bower than a stand.
Neere this is a pergola or stand built to
view the sports. — Evelyn, Diary, July 20,
1654.
Periclitate, to search or test.
And why so many grains of calomel?
Santa Maria! and such a dose of opium,
periclitating, pardi ! the whole family of ye
from head to tail ? — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, v.
195.
Pericrane, pericranium.
The soundest arguments in vain
Attempt to storm thy pericrane.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, cant. I.
And when they join their pericranies
Out skips a book of miscellanies.
Swift, Pottry, a Rhapsody.
These issued out of Penry's brain,
And Udal's fruitful pericrane.
Ward, E>iy land's Reformation,
c. iii. p. 259.
Peril-less, without danger. See ex-
tract s. v. Mappist.
Perition, perishing ; annihilation.
Were there an absolute perition in our dis-
solution, we could not fear it too much. —
Bp. Ball, Works, vi. 411.
Perjuration, perjury.
The Cardinal . . . forgave them all their
perjurations, schisms, and heresies. — Fox, vi.
579 (Maitland on Reformation, p. 533).
Perjury-mongering. Harold applies
this epithet to William, because he en-
trapped him into taking an oath which
he meant to break.
Edith, Edith,
Get thou into thy cloister as the king
WilPd it; be safe: the perjury-mongering
Court
Hath made too good an use of Holy Church
To break her close. — Tennyson, Harold, v. 1.
Perk, a pirk : but see quotation.
Miss Edge worth (Ennui, ch. viii.) says,
PERKIN
( 485 )
PERSPIRE
" Just what would feed a cow is suffi-
cient in Ireland to f orm a park"
Upon inquiry how many deer his father
had in his perk, the truth will out, though
to shame both Scot and devil, That his
father kept no deer in his perk, aud that
the j call an inclosure a perk in his country.
— Scotland characterized, 1701 \Harl. Misc.,
viii. 370).
Pkrkin, a name given by Evelyn to
the Duke of Monmouth, and by others
to the Pretender, in aLusion to Peikin
Warbeck.
The Perkin had been made to believe that
the king had married her. — Evelyn. Diary,
July 15, 1686.
I'll undertake to prove this fellow deep in
the interest of young Perkin.— Cent It vre,
Gotham Election.
If you ran bring me unquestionable proofs
of your being an honest man . . . and that
you'd spend every shilling of my portion
iu defence of liberty and property against
Perkin and the Pope, I'll sign, seal, and de-
liver myself into your hands the next hour.
—Ibid.
Pbrpensity, attention.
I desire the reader to attend with utmost
perpensity; for now I proceed to unravel
this knotty point.— Swift, Tale of Tub, sect. 9.
Perpetrable, capable of being
perpetrated.
No wickedness perpetraMe with safety will
be left undone for attaining the corrupt
purchase.— Forth, Examen, p. 128.
Peepetuaunce, perpetuity.
For if trust to the gospell do purchase per*
petuaunce
Of life unto him who therein hath confidence.
What shall the light do ?
New Custom, II. i.
Perpolitr, very polished.
I find those numbers thou do'st write
To be most soft, terce, sweet, and perpolite.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 323.
Pebpondeb, to thoroughly weigh or
pjnder.
Perponder of the Red-Herringe's priority
and prevalence.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Hart.
Mite, vi. 157).
Pebbour, fringe or trimming of
vestments. See N. and Q., 3rd S. III.
449.
Their copes, perrours, and chasubles, when
they be in their prelately pompous sacrifices.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 528.
Perscrutation, scrutiny.
Such guessing, visioning, dim perscrutation
of the momentous future! — Carlyle, Past
and Present, Bk. II. ch. viii.
Persecutive, persecuting.
Use is made of persecutive and compelling
power, which is rather brutish than humane.
—Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 396.
Persrcutress, female persecutor.
Juno the Patronesse of the chast, and
implacable Persecutresse of immodest women.
— Stapylton, Juvenal, vi. 51, note.
Persecutrix, female persecutor.
Knox . . . calls her . . . that Idolatrous
and mischievous Mary of the Spaniards
blond, and cruel persecutrix of God's people.
— Heylin, Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 142.
The venom was ejaculated into the eyes
and upon the lips of its persecutrix. — Kirby
and Spence, Entomology, i. 132.
Persian, a species of silk ; in the
second extract, a window blind.
You . . . have had your jerkin made of
a gum taffeta, and the body liniug of it of a
sarcenet or thin persian. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, ii. 115.
Before thy song (with shifted rhymes
To suit my name) did I undo
The persian ? If it stirred sometimes,
Thou hast not seen a hand push through
A foolish flower or two.
Mrs. Browning, Parting Lovers.
Persiflage, light raillery: foreign
words in the book quoted are always
marked by italics ; Miss Edgeworth
therefore by not so marking pereiflnge,
though it occurs more than once, seems
to regard this French term as natural-
ised.
Beauclerc could not be drawn out either
by Churchill's persiflage or flattery. — Miss
Edgeworth, Helen, ph. xvi.
Personality, usually means indi-
vidua'ity of any one, or else personal
reflection on another: in the extract
personalities = personal qualities, or
advantages.
I now and then, when she teases me with
praises which Hickman cannot deserve, in
return fall to praising those qualities and
personalities in Lovelace, which the other
- never will have. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
ii. 133.
Perspirate, to perspire.
The sun breaks out in furious Maze,
I perspirate from head to heel.
Thackeray, Carmen Lilliense.
Perspire, to breathe through : usually
of the moisture exuded through the
pores.
What gentle winds perspire / As if here
Never nad been the northern plunderer
To strip the trees.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 240.
PERSTAND
< 4»6 )
PETTED
Perstand, to understand. I have
only met with this in Peele's Clyomon,
but v\ that it occurs several times.
But, lady, say what is yonr will, that it I
may perstand. — Peele, Clyomon and Clamy-
des, I. i.
Perstrictive, compressing.
They . . make no perstrictive or invective
stroke against it. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 333.
Persuadableness, a complying dis-
position.
He might mean to recommend her an a
wife by snowing her persuadableness. — Miss
Austen, Mansfield Parle, ch. xxviii.
PERD8INE, Peruvfan.
The American, the Perusine, and the very
Oanniball do sing and also say their highest
and holiest matters in certaine riming ver-
aicles, and not in prose. — Puttenham, Eng.
Poesie, Bk. I. ch. v.
The soule divine
With this wilde Goose-grasse of the Perusine
Hath f oure great quarrels.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 599.
Pervert, one who has been con-
verted to a different form of religion
or politics from that favoured by the
speaker; most generally applied to
those who join the Church of Rome,
having been previously Protestants or
Anglicans. It is a word of late intro-
duction. L. gives it without example.
See Vert.
That notorious u pervert n Henry of Na-
varre and France. — Thackeray, Roundabout
Papers, i.
Pervicacy, obstinacy ; pervicacious-
ne*8 is the word in the Diets.
Thomas of Oanterburie, whom hee so ad-
mired for his piety, while others condemned
him for pervtcacie against his prince. — Hol-
land's Camden, i. 328.
While Presbytery continued thus humble
and poor in spirit, it was esteemed honest
and excusable upon Christian charity, plead-
ing not pervicacy, but necessity. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 13.
Once more I write, although imperiously
prohibited by a younger sister ; your mother
will have me do so, that you may be desti-
tute of all detence, if you persist in your
pervicacy. Shall I be a pedant, Miss, for
this word ? — Richardson, CI. Harlove, ii. 31.
Pessimism, the worst or lowest point,
or the spirit which regards every tiling
as rapidly deteriorating.
Public criticism is, upon works of fine
literature, at the very point of pessimism. —
Southey, Letters, 1812 (ii. 253).
Pbstful, pestiferous.
After long and pestful calms,
With slimy shapes and miscreated life
Poisoniug the vast Pacific, the fresh breeze
Wakens the merchant-sail uprising.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nation*.
The Lybians pest-full and un-blest-full shore-
Sylvester, The Schisme, 417.
Pesture, injury ; annoyance.
The King of France repayring his wracked
navie, and the King of England's long stay-
ing for his, forced them both to winter in
Sicilia, to the great pesture and disturbance
of that people, themselves, and theirs. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 98.
Peter. To rob Peter to pay Paul.
See second quotation ; Westminster
Abbey is dedicated to St. Peter.
You may make a shift by borrowing from
Peter to pay Paul (faciez versure) and with
other folks' earth fill up his ditch. — f>-
quhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. iii.
The lands of Westminster so dilapidated
by Bishop Thirlby that there was almost
nothing left to support the diguity . . . Most
of the lands invaded by the great men of the
court, the rest laid out for reparation to the
church of St. Paul, pared almost to the very
quick in those days of rapine. From hence
first came that significant by-word (as is
said by some; of robbing Peter to pay Paul.
—Heylin, Hist, of Ref.\ 256.
Petitor, a candidate.
A very potent (I cannot say competitor,
the Bishop himself being never a petitor for
the place, but) desirer of this office was
frustrated in his almost assured expectation
of the same to himself. — Fuller, Ch* Hist.,
XI. ii. 48.
Petrary, a machine to cast stones.
When King John besieged Bedford Castle,
there were on the East side one petrary and
two mangonels daily applying against the
tower.— Archaol., iv. 384 (1777).
Some the mangonels supply,
Or charging with huge stones the murderous
sling
Or petrary. — Southey, Joan of Arc, bk. viii.
Petroville, patrol ?
And the sheriffs mounted alia capparisonee
with their blue coat attendance, rode the
Petroville about the city almost all night,
and no one attempted to make a bonefire. —
North, Examen, p. 580.
Pette, dimple ; pit.
If shee have her hand on the pette in her
cheeke, he is twyrking of his mnstachios. —
Breton, Praise of Vertuous Ladies, p. 57.
Petted, offended.
I would have sent to inquire after them,
but I was petted at their neglect of us during
PETTICOAT
( 487 )
PHALAR1K
onr long illness.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i. 193.
Petticoat, used adjectivally for
feminine. L. gives petticoat gi/vem-
mtnt ; and adds, "For example see
under press" where, however, none is
to be found.
Innkeeper. What does this petticoat
preacherTroRftonAf ru*] do here? Get yon in,
and mind your kitchen.
Wife. Well, so I will.
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 186.
Author. Mayhap I can produce still better
authority to prove to you, my friend, that
woman was not merely intended to form
and instruct us, to soften and polish the
rudeness of our mass; she was also ap-
pointed to native empire and dominion over
man.
Friend. By all means, my dear sir, I am
quite impatient to be instructed in the poli-
cies and constitution of this your petticoat-
government. — H. Brooke, Foot of (quality, i.
199.
Out came the very story, which I had all
along dreaded, about the expurgation of my
poems, with the coarsest ali'sions to petti-
coat influence. — C. Kinysley, Alton Locke, ch.
xxvii.
Pettier, scho'ars low in the school.
Mr. Lamb, whom succeeding times knew
to be Dean of Arches, came, by holding fast
to Fortune's middle finger, from a school-
master that taught petiies, to a proctor in
Christian Courts, and so to an official. —
Racket, Life of Williams, i. 37.
Petto, in petto = in the breast, and
so, in reserve : this Italian phrase has
almost been naturalized among us.
See extract s. v. Warrish.
In this view they were open and clear;
making no ceremony of declaring what the
next Parliament was to inflict upon their
adversaries, whatever else they might hold
undeclared in petto. — North, Examtn, p. 609.
Pew, a box in a theatre. Lord Bray-
brooke infers from this that pews in
church es were comparatively rare, as
the word had not acquired exclusively
its present meaning. He adds, "It
would appear from other authorities
that between 1646 and 1660 scarcely
any pews had been erected ; and Sir C.
Wren is known to have objected to
their introduction into his London
churches." Pepys, however, frequently
mentions his pew in church. Milton
uses the word of a sheep-pen, with
contemptuous reference to those pews
from which "the hungry sheep look
up, and are not fed."
His sheep oft-times sit the while to as
little purpose of benefiting, as the sheep in
their pews at Smithfield. — Milton, Means to
remove Hirelings.
To White Hall, and there, by means of
Mr. Cooling, did get into the play, the only
one we have seen this winter ; it was The
Five Hours Adventure ; but I sat so far I
could not hear well, nor was there any pretty
woman that I did see, but my wife, who sat
in my Lady Fox's pew with her. — Pepys,
Feb. 15, 1668-9.
Pewter- knots, studs or ornaments
mude of pewter (?)
Bavish a lock
From the yellow waiting-woman, use strata-
gems
To get her silver whistle, and way-lay
Her pewter-knots or bodkin ?
Maine, City Match, ii. 3.
Pezle mezle, pell-mell.
The Author falls pezle mezle upon the
king himself.— North, Examen, p. 53.
The State may alter, and then he falls in
pesle-mesle. — Ibid., p. 151.
Phalanstere, a French word, but
used as English in the subjoined, the
accent being omitted. C. Fourier, the
founder of Socialism, wished to asso-
ciate men together in capital, work,
and talent, and to divide them into
groupes, series, and phalanges, the pha-
lange was to be the simplest social
unit. From this word, phalanste)re
was manufactured on the model of
monastere, to express the dwelling-
place of the phalange.
Tracts which . . . having first laid it down
as a preliminary axiom that
"The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,"
substituted in place thereof Monsieur
Fourier's symmetrical phalanstere, or Mr.
Owen's architectural parallelogram. — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. IV. ch. viii.
The man who thinks it would be so much
more pleasant to live at his ease in a phalan-
stere than to work eight or ten hours a day.
— Ibid.
Phalanstery, same as phalanstere,
q. ▼.
Every room of it held its family, or its
group of families — a phalanstery of all the
fiends. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. viii.
England is a huge phalanstery, where all
that man wants is provided within the pre-
cinct.— Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. iii.
Phalarik, explained in the margin,
" Instruments of warr wherein wild
fire is put : " derived from Phalaris the
PHANTIKE
( 488 ) PHILANTHROPE
tyrant of Agrigentum, for whom Peril-
lus made the brazen bull in which men
were roasted alive. Phalariiks ure
described by Montaigne : see Cottons
Translation, ch. xxxvii.
With brakes and slings and Phalariks they
play,
To fier their fortress and their men to slay.
Sylvester, The Decay, 964
Phantike, fanatic.
So doth the Phantike (lifting vp his thought
On Satan's wing) tell with a tongue dis-
traught
Strange oracles.
Sylvester, The Imposture, 234.
Pharaoh, strong ale. H. says it is
mentioned in Praise of Yorkshire Ale,
1697, p. 3. See also extract from Tom
Brown s. v. Threb-thbkads.
Pharaoh, a game with cards, fashion-
able in the last century ; it resembled
basset, and is often, and more correctly,
spelt faro (Italian) ■= 1 will make.
See extract from Walpole s. v. Quinzk.
Pharaon in the first extract may be a
misprint.
Nannette last night at twinkling Pharaon
play'd,
The cards the Taillier's sliding hand obeyed.
Gay to PtUteney.
May I never taste the dear ctalight of
breaking a Pharaoh bank, or bullying the
whole room at a brag-party, if ever I was in
thought, word, or deed, accessary to his infi-
delity.— The way to keep him, Act i. (1760).
Behold a hundred coaches at her door,
Where Pharo triumphs in his mad career.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 249.
Pharoh, = shout (in use among the
Irish soldiery).
That barbarous Pharoh and outcry of the
Soldiers, which with great straining of their
voice they use to set up when they joine
battaile.— HollaneTs Camden, u. 75.
Piiabol, perhaps a misprint for
pharos, a watch-tower. The extract is
portion of a comparison between the
parts of a man and the parts of a ship.
His ears are the two chief scuttles, his
eyes are the pfutrols, the stowage is his
mouth.— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 10.
Pheon, the barbed head of a dart :
most commonly used as a term of
heraldry.
Can'st thou his skin with barbed Pheons
pierce?
Sylvester, Joh Triumphant, iv. 599.
Philander, to court or flirt, used
of either sex, but general y of men.
Thackeray (Esmond, Bk. III. ch. iv.)
uses the word, on which Dr. Hall
(Modern English, p. 275) remarks,
" Who in Queen Anne's time ever heard
... of tiie verbs cede, olden, philan-
der? This verb not impossibly did
not see the light till after Mr. Thackeray
himself. The allusion it conveys is
old." The first extract from Miss
Edge worth, however, is of earlier date
than 1812, the year of Thackeray's
birth. Philandering is also given sis a
Norfolk provincialism in Hollo way's
Diet., 1838; and in Spurden's Supple-
ment to Forby's Vocubulary of East
Anglia (E. D. S.), we nnd, "Philan-
der, v. real Greek ; how we came by it
is marvellous ; used not only of young
girls roaming in search of their sweet-
hearts, but lads occupied in the same
tender pursuit.' * In Beaum. and Fl.,
Laws of Candy, one of the dramatis
persona? is "Philander, Prince of Cy-
prus, passionately in love with Erota ; "
and the noun as applied to a lover may
have come from this. In Congreve's
Way of the World, V. i., which ap-
peared in 1700, Lady Wishfort says,
"I'll couple you; I'll baste you to-
gether, vou and your Philander; " and
in the Toiler for May 10, 1709, Sieele
describes Philander ns " the most
skilful of all men in an address to
women."
Sir Kit was too much taken up philander-
ing, to consider the law iu this case. — Miis
Edyeworth, Castle Rackrent, Pt. II. ^1800).
He will coquet for a time, and keep philan-
dering on till he suits himself, and then he'll
jilt us. — Ibid., Vivian, ch. vii.
Yon can't go philandering after her again
for six weeks. — G. Eliot, D. Deronda, ch.
XXV.
Philanderer, a flirter; one who
bangs about women.
At last, without a note of warning, ap-
peared in Beddgelert a phenomenon which
rejoiced some hearts, but perturbed also the
spirits, not only of the Oxford philanderers,
but those also of Elsley Vavasour. — Kingsley,
Two Years Ago, ch. xix.
Philanthrope, a philanthropist, or
lover of men.
^ He had a goodness of nature and disposi-
tion in so great a degree that he may be de-
servedly styled a philanthrope. — North, Lite
of Lord Guilford, 11. 127.
PHILANTHR0P1STIC ( 489 ) PHILOFELIST
Philanthropistic, professing bene-
volence.
Over the wild-surging chaos in the leaden
air are only suddeu glares of revolutionary
lightning ; then mere darkress with philan-
thropistic phosphorescences, empty meteoric
lights. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling, ch. v.
Philarea, a genus of Mediterranean
evergreen shrubs, Be vend species of
which are cultivated in our gardens.
In his garden he has four large round
philarcas smooth clipped, raised on a single
stalk. — Document dated 1691 (Jrch.y tii. 188).
His fears of being discovered to act on
both sides had made him take the rushing
of a little dog (that always follows him)
through the phy Hi rta-hedge for Betty's being
at hand. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, hi. 111.
Philargurods. money-loving, a word
used by L' Estrange of Hey 1 in, and
sneered at in the subjoined.
He sufficiently confuted the calumny of
L'E^trange who said, accordiug to his geutill
and new mode of writing hard words, the
Doctor was philaraurous, when, poor man,
what he parted with, aud what he was plun-
dered of, he had fcarce enough left to " in-
sconce his person from frigidity," according
to the good squire's language. — Barnard,
Life of Heylin, p. 194.
Philautia, self-love; but Tyndale
uses it for philosophy, implying, per-
haps, that self-love was mingled with
this. Joseph Beaumont (Psyche) has
philauty several times ; and it occurs
also in Urquhart's Rabelais > Bk. III.
ch. xxix.
They will say yet more shamefully that
no man can understand the Scriptures with-
out philautia, that is to say, philosophy. . . .
And there corrupt they their judgements
with apparent arguments, aud with alleging
unto them texts of logic, of natural philautia,
of metaphysic, and moral philosophy. —
Tyndale, i. 154, 157.
Philazer, or Philizer, an officer in
the Common Pleas, more properly spelt
JUazer^ one who files those writs
whereon he makes out process. See
quotation s. v. Ex I o enter.
Thomas Wiuford . . had formerly heen
philazer of Surrey, &c, and surrendered that
office into my hands.— North, Life of Lord
Guilford, ii. 47.
Philigree, an incorrect spelling of
filigree.
It is a little play-thing-house . . . set in
enamelled meadows with philigree hedges. —
Waljxtle, Letter*, i. 163.
On this stole were placed, at about the
distance of six inches from each other, quatre-
foils of philligree-work. — Archaol., iii. 382
(1775).
Philip and Cheyney. N. says, "A
sort of stuff ; " and H., who refers to
N., says, u formerly much esteemed."
I believe the reverse to have been the
case. In the first passage in N. (Beaum.
and Fl., Wit at Several Weapons, II.
i.), Lady Rainous sneers at a sum of
money as scarce enough " to put a lady
in Philip and Cheyney ... like a
chain ber- in a id ; " in the second (Tay-
lor, Praise of Htmpseed), the meaning
is that not only is there no silver, or
gold, or tissue, but even Philip and
cheiny are "not within our bounds."
Hence Philip and Cheiny came to be
used as two names to signify tag, rag,
and bobtail ; so we say, Tom, Dick, or
Harry. The words "more than a
good meiny" seem to have been often
added, perhaps more for the sake of
the jingle than of the sense. In the
third extract Becon is speaking of
prayers for the dead.
It was not his entent to bryng unto Sylla
phi Up and cheinie. mo than a good memy,
but to bryng liable souldiours of manhood
approued and well tried to his handes. —
Udal's Erasmus's Apophth., p. 311.
Loiterers I kept so meanie,
Both rhilip, Hob, and Cheanie.
Tusser, p. 8.
Ye pray for Philip and Cheny more than a
good "meany. — Becon, iii. 270.
Philistines, bailiffs, or even, as in
the passage quoted from Smollett,
creditors : the more modern use of the
word is noticed in L., though Swift
seems to use it something in this sense.
Lady Cons. But, Colonel, they say you
went to Court last night very drunk ; nay,
I am told for certain you had been among
the Philistians. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. i.).
She was too ignorant of such matters to
know that if he had fallen into the hands
of the Philistines (which is the name given
by the faithful to bailiffs), he would hardly
have been able so soon to recover his liberty.
— Fielding \ Amelia, Bk. V. ch. vi.
I must make an effort to advance what
further will be required to take my friend
out of the hands of the Philistines. — Smollett,
Humphrey Clinker, ii. 191.
Philofklist, a lover of cats.
Dr. Southey, who is known to be a philo-
felist, and confers honours upon his cats
according to their services, has raised one to
PHILOGALIST ( 490 )
PIAZZJAN
the highest rank in peerage.— Southey, The
Doctor, Fragment of Interchapter.
He made himself acquainted with all the
philofelists of the family. — J bid. (Cats of
Greta Hall).
Philogalist, a lover of milk.
Ton . . are a philogalist, and therefore
understand . . . cat nature. — Southey, Letters,
1812 (iii. 240).
Ph I lo -garlic, loving garlic: so
Southey has Philo-pig. See *. v. Bald-
sib.
With these pkilo-garlic men Kate took
her departure. — De Quincey, Spanish Attn,
sect. 9.
Philogtny, love of womanhood.
We will therefore draw a curtain over this
scene from that philooyny which is in us. —
Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. I. ch. x.
He was a Turk, the colour of mahogany,
And Laura saw him, and at first was glad.
Because the Turks so much admire philoayny,
Although their usage of their wives is sad.
Byron, Beppo, st. 70.
Philologue, a philologist. L. says
that philologue, the best form of the
word, is the rarest (it is in none of the
other Diets., and the only example he
gives is from his own writings), and
philologer, the worst form, is the most
frequent. In the subjoined philologue
is the word in the original, and in the
Glossary attached to Barry's edition of
Rabelais is explained, "ami des lettres;
philologv*."
This is the fittest and most proper hour
wherein to write these high matters and
deep sentences, as Homer knew very well,
the paragon of all pfiilologues. — Urauharfs
BabelaiSybV. i. (Author's Prologue).
Philosophedom, the realm of philoso-
phy.
They entertain their special ambassador in
Philosophedom, their lion's provider to furnish
Philosophe-provender. — Carlyle, Misc., iii
216.
Phosphorus, the morning star; the
bringer of light. D'Urfey addresses
the Earl of Dorset as "The Morning
Planet, Photfer of your time."
John Baptist was that Phosphorus or morn-
ing star, to signify the sun's approaching. —
Adams, iii. 224.
He wants nothing but a blue ribbon and a
star to make him shine the very Phosphorus
of our hemisphere. Do vou understand
those two hard words? If you don't, I'll
explain 'em to you. — Congreve, Double Dealer,
ii. 1.
Photometrician, measurer of light.
Dr. Zollner, the eminent German phcto-
metrician. — R. A. Proctor, The Sun (1871), p-
302.
Phraseman. speaker of phrases.
The poor wretch, who has learnt his only
prayers
From curses, who knows scarcely words
enough
To ask a blessing from his Heavenly Father,
Becomes a fluent phraseman, absolute
And technical in victories and deceit,
And all our dainty terms for fratricide.
Coleridge, Fears in Solitude.
Phrontisterion, school or semimary.
L. has phrontutery with extract from
a work of 1672.
Pan. Whose lodging's this? is 't not the
astrologer's ?
Ron. His lodging? no! 'tis the learn'd
phrontisterion
Or most Divine Albumaiar.
Albumazar, i. 3.
Phthisicky, consumptive.
One was for consuming 975 papers of
tobacco in six months, without any asaist-
auoe, to the poisoning of many a ptisicky
citizen about Temple Bar. — T. Brovn,
Works, ii. 190.
As to the watering-places, I'm told nobody
goes there that's fit to go anywhere else —
cripples and sharpers — phthisicky old gentle-
women and frolicksome young ones. — Col-
man, The Spleen, Act I.
Phthisozoics. See extract.
The second belongs to a science which
Jeremy, the thrice illustrious Ben tham, calls
Phthisozoics, or the art of destruction ap-
Slied to noxious animals. — Southey, The
>octor, ch. cexxviii.
Physeter, a large whale. R. does
not give the word, though s. v. whirl-
pool he has a quotation from Holland
in which it occurs.
When on the surges I perceiue from fax
Th' Ork, Whirlpool, Whale, or huffing
Physeter,
Methinks I see the wandering ile again
(Ortygian Delos) floating on the main.
Sylvester, Fifth day, first weeke, 109.
Piaculary, criminal.
He lived and died with general councils
in his pate, with windmills of union to con-
cord Rome and England, England and Rome,
Germany with them both, and ail other
sister Churches with the rest, without asking
leave of the Tridentine Council. This was
his piaculary heresy. — Racket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 102.
Piazzian, pertaining to a piazza or
arcade.
PICCANINNY ( 491 )
PIECENER
Or where in Plato's gardens palatine,
Mulciber's columns gleam in far piazzian
line. — Keats, Lamia.
Piccaninny, a child : a West Indian
word.
Bat spite of pounds or guineas,
Instead of giviug any hint,
Of turning to a neutral tint,
The plaguy negroes and their piccaninnies
Were still the colour of the bird that caws.
Hood, A Black Job,
Pick, the diamond, in a playing-card,
so culled from the point.
And here and there
And farther off, and everywhere ;
Throughout that brave mosaick yard
Those picks or diamonds in the card :
With peeps of harts, and club, and spade,
Are here most neatly interlaid.
Herrxck, Hesperides, p. 177.
Pickage, money paid for breaking
ground by those who set up booths at
fairs. The extract is from the form
used in granting the freedom of Bever-
ley.
Know ye that King Athelstan of famous
memory did grant ... an exemption of all
manner of Imposts, Toll, Tallage, Stallage,
Tannage, Lastage, Pickage, Wharfage. —
Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, in. 188.
Pickled, roguish : a troublesome or
mischievous child is still often called a
pickle. R. gives the phrase, a pickled
rogtte^ but no example.
His poor boy Jack was the most comical
bastard— ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, — a pickled dog, I
shall never forget him. — Farquhar, Recruit"
ing Officer, Act V.
Pick-pocketism, picking pockets.
The ordinary pick-pocket filches a purse,
and the matter is at an end. He neither
takes honor to himself openly on the score
of the purloined purse, nor does he subject
the individual robbed to the charge of pick'
pocketism in his own person. — E. A, Foe,
Marginalia, clxxxviii.
Pick-purse (used adjectivally), mer-
cenary ; fraudulent. The speaker is a
Protestant prisoner arraigned before
Bonner, 1555.
Such pick-purse matters is all the whole
rabble of your ceremonies; for all is but
money matters that ye maintain. — Maitland
on Reformation, p. 529.
Pickthank, to obtain by false and
flattering means.
It had been a more probable story to have
said he did it to pickthank an opportunity of
getting more money. — North, Examen, p.
278.
Pick-tooth, leisurely ; as it is in
vacant moments that the toothpick is
usually employed.
My lord and I after a pretty cheerful tete-
a-tete meal, sat ns down by the fireside in an
easy, indolent, pick-tooth way for about a
quarter of an hour. — Cibber, Provoked Hus-
band, Act m.
Picquerer, a skirmisher; one who
carries on a guerilla warfare.
This I shall do, as in other concerns of
this history, by following the author's steps,
for he is now a picquerer, relates nothing
bat by way of cavil. — North, Examen, p. 406.
Picturesquish, belonging to the
picturesque.
For many a mile he had not seen
But one unvarying level green ;
Nor had the way one object brought
That wak'd a picturesquish thought.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour i. c. 16.
Pie, the name given by printers to
their types when mixed together in
confusion, referring I suppose to "the
number and hardness of the rules called
the Pi*."
Unordered paradings and clamour, not
without strong liquor; objurgation, insub-
ordination ; your military ranked arrange-
ment going all (as the typographers say of
set types in a similar case) rapidly to pie. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Bk. II. ch. iv.
This same Dictionary without judgment
and without arrangement, bad Dictionary
gone to pie, as we may call it, is the store-
house from which subsequent biographies
have all furnished themselves. — Ibid., Crom-
well, i. 12.
Piece. The Diets, give this = a
woman, but it also sometimes means a
man. In the second extract a woman
is addressing a man.
What complyings and cringings must this
poore perplexed Minister use to fence him-
self against the crafty agitations of bis spite-
full neighbours and those pragmatick pieces
who in every corner doe hover over the heads
of Ministers, as Kites doe over Pigeons. — Gau-
den, Tears of the Church, p. 228.
Many fears urge my eares
That I should careful be,
I f eare I match a crabbed piece
If I should marry thee.
Roxburgh Ballads, ii. 441.
Piecener. See extract.
The children whose duty it is to walk
backwards and forewards before the reels,
on which the cotton, silk, or worsted is
wound, for the purpose of joining the
threads when they break are called r'ecer
PIECER
( 492 )
PIKE
or pieceners. — Mrs. Trollope, Michael Arm-
strong, ch. viii.
Pieces. See Piecener.
Pieces, at all, at all points.
The image of a man at Armes on horse-
backe, armed at all peeces, with a launce in
his hand. — Holland's Camden, p. 780.
Horsemen armed at all peeces. — Ibid., p.
783.
Pielf, to pilfer. See quotation *. v.
Christen tee.
The one partee bad pielf ed or embesleed
awaie a thiug of the others. — XJdaVs Eras-
mus's Apophtk.y p. 141.
Piq-cheer, food from the pig, as
ham, sausages, pork, &c. ; the word is
used in Yorkshire, and applied especi-
ally to dishes mude from the viscera of
the pig. See Holderness Glossary (E.
D. S.).
Christmas was formerly, as now, the prin-
cipal 6easom for pig-cheer. — Arch., xliv. 208
(1871).
Pigeon-toed, putting the feet down
straight, not turning out the toes.
The jacket, the loose trousers bows'd up
together — all
Guiltless of braces as those of Charles
Wetherall,
The pigeon-toed step and the rollicking
motion,
Bespoke them two genuine sons of the
Ocean.
Ingoldsby Legends (Dead Drummer).
Pigeon wood.
My lady Hervey, who you know doats
upon everything French, is charmed with
the hopes of these new shoes, and has already
bespoke herself a pair of pigeon icood. — JVal-
pole, Letters, i. 121 (1745).
Pigment, explained by Scott in a
note in loc. as " a sweet and rich
liquor composed of wine highly spiced,
and sweetened also with honey."
Oswald, broach the oldest wine-cask ; place
the best mead, the mightiest ale, the richest
morat, the most sparkling cider, the most
odoriferous pigments upon the board. — Ivan-
hoe, i. 49.
Pigmie, a small species of apple ?
A foot like a bear, a leg like a bedstaff , a
hand like a hatchet, an eye like a pig, and a
face like a winter pigmie. — Rowley, Match
at Midnight, Act II.
Pigs. To bring pigs to a fine market
s= to be disappointed or unsuccessful ;
to carry pigs to market = to deal or do
business.
Strap with a hideous groan observed that
we had brought our pigs to a fine market. —
Smollett, R. Random, ch. xv.
Roger may carry his pigs to another market.
—Ibid., H. Clinker, i. 89.
Pigs. Please the pigs, a very com-
mon expression = if all be well. Some
have supposed it to be a corruption
of " pleuse the pix," which held the
Host; others think it an abbreviation
of " please the pixies," or fairies. See
extract *. v. Pop.
I'll have one of the wigs to carry into the
country with me, and please the pig*. — T.
Brown, Works, ii. 198.
Pig-sconck, a fool ; a pig's head.
Jonson, quoted by K..has "pig-headed
sconce."
Ding. He is no pig-sconce, mistress.
Secret. He has an excellent head-piece.
Massinger, City Madam, III. i.
Pig together, to associate together
in a confused or untidy way.
When reason sleeps, extravagance breaks
loose ; quality and peasantry pig together ;
there is no difference between a lord and a
lacquey, but that he is more to blame. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 537
How the Smiths contrived to live, and
whether
The fourteen Murphy* all pjgg'd together.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Pike, a turnstile ; also an abbrevi-
ation of turnpike. The second quot-
ation is taken from a note on the first
in Bp. Jacobson's edition of Sanderson.
To pass the pikes was a proverbial
phrase expressive of difficulty. Another
example will be found in Burton's An-
atomy of Melancholy, p. 589.
Neither John's mourning nor Christ's
piping can pass the pikes; but the one hath
a devil, the other is a glutton and a wine-
bibber. — Sanderson, ii. 45.
There were many pikes to be passed through,
a complete order of afflictions to be under-
gone and accomplished. — Hacket, 3rd Sermon
on the Transfiguration.
"Wery queer life is a /nfo-keeper's, sir
.. . . they're all on 'em men as has met
with some disappointment in life," said Mr.
Weller, senior . . . "Consequence of vich
they retires from the world, and shut them-
selves up in pikes.n — Pickwick Papers, ch.
xxii.
Pike, quarrel (?)
Consisting of manifold dispositions there
was dayly wauerin^, sometimes pikes amongst
themselues. — Darnel, Mist, of Eng., p. 151.
This caused new pikes of displeasure.—
Ibid., p. 153.
PIKEMAN
( 493 )
PILOTEER
Pikeman, a turn-pike keeper.
Then there was . . . the cheery toot of
the guard '8 horn to warn some drowsy pike-
man or the ostler at the next change. —
Hughes, Tom Brown's School Days, Pt. I.
ch. iv.
Pilate's voice, a loud voice, such as
belonged to the part of Pilate in the
mystery-plays.
He heard a certain oratour speaking out
of measure loude and high, and altogether
in Pilate's voice. — VdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 382.
Pilch, to pilfer.
Some steale, some pilch,
Some all away filch.
Tusser, Husbandries p. 33.
Pile, Applied to a town.
Takiug a jorney on a time to the towne
of Myndus, he sawe great wide gates and of
gorgious or royal building, where as the
towne was but a little preaty pyle.— UdaTs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 146.
Pile, castle.
They left neither pile, village, nor house
standing unburnt. — Expedition in Scotland,
1544 (Ena. Garner, i. 119).
The inhabitants at this day call it Mil-
nesse; and as small a village as it is, yet
hath it a pile. — Holland's Camden, p. 775.
Swinburne, a little castle or pile, which
gave name unto a worthy family. — Hid.,
p. 806.
Pilgrimage, to go as a pilgrim.
To Egypt shell pilgrimage, at Meroe fill,
Warme drops to sprinkle Isis Temple.
Stapylton, Juvenal, vi. 555.
He . . pilgrimaged from one sanctuary to
another— Escape of Charles II. 1660 (Harl.
Misc., iv. 447).
Like pilgrimaging rats,
Unawed by mortals, and unscared by cats.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 186.
Pilgrim-salve, an old ointment. See
H., but in the subjoined it = ordure.
The whole pavement is pilgrim-salve, most
excellent to liquor shoes withal, and soft
and easy for the bare-foot perambulators. —
Modern Account of Scotland, 1670 (Harl.
Misc., vi. 137).
Pill. See extracts : also H. «. v.
Pill is a small creek capable of holding
vessels to load and unload. It is perhaps a
word peculiar to the Severn. — Archeol., xxix.
163 (1819).
The terra pyll is still nsed, and means a
creek subject to the tide. The pylls are the
channels through which the draining* of the
marshes enter the river. — P. de la Garde on
Loch Canal, Exeter, 1840 (Ibid., xxviii. 19).
About two miles north of Oldbury is a
pill or mouth of a brook. — Ibid., xiz. 10
(1841).
Pill, to black ball.
He was coming on for election at Bay's*
and was as nearly pilled as any man I ever
knew in my life. — Thackeray, Neiccomes, ch.
xxx.
Pillar. From pillar to post, or
From post to pillar = to and iro.
From thee poast toe piler with thoght his
rackt wyt he tosseth. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iv.
296.
And, dainty duke, whose doughty dismal
fame
From Dis to Dsedalus,/rom post to pillar
Is blown abroad, help me thv poor well-
wilier. — Ttco Noble Kinsmen, lii. 5.
In the tyme of her sister Queene Marie's
raigne how was she handled? tost from
pillar to post, imprisoned, sought to be put
to death. — Breton, Character of Elizabeth,
p. 5.
Our Guards from pillar banged to post,
He kick'd about till they were lost.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 62.
Pillaret, small pillar.
The Cathedrall of Salisbury (dedicated to
the Blessed Virgin) is paramount in this
kind, wherein the Doors and Ohappells equal
the Months, the Windows the Davs, the
Pillars and Pillaret s of Fusil 1 Marble (an
ancient Art now shrewdly suspected to be
lost) the Hours in the Year. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Wilts (ii. 436).
[A font] at Ancaster with interlaced arches
on long pillarets, like another at Neswick in
Yorkshire.— Archaol., x. 188 (1792).
Pillion, the head-dress of a priest.
See H. : hence pylyoned = adorned
with such head-dress.
The idolatour, the tyraunt, and the whore-
mongar are no mete mynisters for hym,
though they be never so gorgyously mytered,
coped, and tippeted, or never so finely forced,
pylioned and scarletted. — Vocacyon of Jolian
Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc., vi. 442).
Pill-monger, contemptuous name
for an apothecary.
There has, Major, been here an impudent
pill-monger, who has dar'd to scandalize the
whole body of the bench. — Foote, Mayor of
Garret, Act I.
Piloteer, pilot.
As to the Pole the lilly bends
In a sea-compass, and still tends,
By a magnetic mystery,
Unto the Arctic point in sky,
"Whereby the wandering piloteer
His course in gloomy nights doth steer.
Howell, Letters, iii. 4.
PILL-PATE
( 494 )
PINTADO
Pill-pate, shaveling; one who has
the tonsure.
These smeared pill-pates, I would say pre-
lates, first of all accused him, and afterward
pronounced the sentence of death upon him.
— Becon, ii. 815.
Pilotless, without a pilot.
Though Rudder -lease, not Pilot -lease this
Boat
Among the Reeds by the Floud's side did
float.— Sylvester, The Lav*, 168.
Pilulous, like or belonging to a pill.
Has any one ever pinched into its pilulous
smallness the cobweb of pre-matrimonial
acquaintanceship?— G. Eliot, Middlemarch,
ch. ii.
P i m p l B. Pimple in a bent, some-
thing very minute. Cf. Knot in a
bush.
I could lay down heere sundrye examples,
were yt not I should bee thoght oner curious,
by prying owt a pimple in a bent. — Stany-
hui st, JEneid, Dedic.
Pimps. See extract. Grose says
that they are so called because they in-
troduce the coals to the fire.
Here they make those faggots which the*
wood-mongers call Ostrey-wood, and in par-
ticular those small light bavins which are
used in taverns in London to light their
fagots, and are called in the taverns a Brush,
and by the wood-men Pimps.— Defoe. Tour
thro' G. Britain, i. 138.
Pinch-commons, miser.
What if this house be strewed in rains
before morning? Where would be the
world's want in the crazed projector, and
the niggardly pinch-commons by which it is
inhabited ?—&»«, Pirate, i. 92.
Pincdshioned, pierced or perforated
like a pincushion.
Her heart was pt'ncushioned with his filial
Crimea.— Thackeray, Lovel the Widower, ch. iv.
Pindfool, a ludicrous and sarcastic
form of pinfold.
Then began the pindfools and cloisters to
be made in the Churches to reserve their
new God in.— Hooper, i. 527.
Pin-drop. A pin-drop silence = a
profound silence, in which one might
hear a pin drop.
A pin-drop silence strikes o'er all the place.
Leiyh Hunt, Rimini, c. i.
Pin-eyed. Crabbe explains in a
note, " An auricula, or any other single
flower, is so called^ when the stigma
(the part which arises from the seed-
vessel) is protruded beyond the tube of
the flower, and becomes visible."
This is no shaded, run-off, pin-eyed thing,
A king of flowers, a flower for England's
king. — Crabbe, Borough, Letter viii.
Pink, a beauty. Pink of perfection,
courtesy, &c, are expressions still in
use, and are illustrated by L., but pink
by itself in this sense is less common.
He had a pretty pincke to his own wedded
wife. — Breton, Merry Wonder*, p. 7.
Pins, legs. See extract s. v. Magpie.
Than wolde I renne thyder on my pynnes
As fast as I myght go.
Hycke-Scorner (Hawkins, Eng. Drn
i. 102).
His body is not set upon nice pinnes to bee
turning and flexible for euery motion, bnt
his scrape is homely, and his nod worse.
— Earle, Microcosmoyraphie (Downe-right
scholler).
Mistake you ! no, no, your legs would dis-
cover you among a thousand ; I never saw a
fellow better set upon his pins. — Burgoyne,
Lord of the Manor, lii. 3.
Pins. To drink at pins. See ex-
tract. Fuller adds in the margin,
" Hence probably the proverb, He is in
a merry pin." The ordinance given
in the quotation is one of those at
the Synod of Westminster, A.D. 1102.
There is a picture of a peg - cup in
Hone's Year Book, p. 482, where it is
said they were ordained by King Edgar
to limit the draught, and so prevent
drunkenness, which had increased urder
Danish example. If this were the
object, it was not attained, if Fuller's
statement be correct.
That priests should not go to public drink-
in gs, nee ad pinnae bihant, nor drink at pins.
This was a Dutch trick (but now used in
England) of artificial drunkenness out of
a cup marked with certain pins, and he ac-
counted the man who could nick the pin,
drinking even unto it ; whereas to go above
or beneath it was a forfeiture.— Fuller, Ch.
Hist., III. ii. 3.
Pins and needles, the tingling sen-
sation which attends the recovery of
circulation in a benumbed limb.
A man . . . may tremble, stammer, and
show other signs of recovered sensibility no
more in the range of his acquired talents
than pins and needles after numbness. — G.
Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. lxiiL
Pintado, painted cloth (?).
To Woodcott. when I supped at my lady
Mordannt's at Ash ted, where was a roome
hung with Pintado, full of figures greate and
PINTLE
( 495 )
PISSEBOLLE
small, prettily representing sundry trades
and occupations of the Indians with their
habits.— Evelyn, Diary, Dec. 30, 1665.
Pintle. L.? who gives no example,
says, " corruption of pendulum : hook
of upper half of each hinge by which
the rudder is hung." The extract is
portion of a comparison between the
parts of a man's body and the parts of
a ship.
The planks are his ribs, the beams his
bones, the pintel and gudgeons are his gristle
and cartilages. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 9.
Pin wood, wood fit for pegs.
A clauestock and rabetstock carpenter's
crane,
And seasoned timber for pinwood to hane.
Tussers Husbandrie, p. 38.
Pionbes are among the "necessarie
herbes to growe in the garden for phy-
sick, not rehersed before," mentioned
in Tussers Husbandries p. 97: now
Anglicised into peonies.
Pipe, to set layers (?).
No botanist am I ; nor wished to learn
from you of all the muses that piping has a
new signification. I had rather that you
handled an oaten reed than a carnation one,
yet setting layers I own is preferable to
reading newspapers, one of the chronical
maladies of this age. — Walpole, Letters, iv.
440 (1788).
Pipe. To pipe the eye = to cry.
Then reading on his 'bacco box,
He heav'd a heavy sigh ;
And then began to eye his pipe,
And then to pipe his eye.
Hood, Faithless Sally Brown,
He was very frail and tearful: for being
aware that a shepherd's mission was to pipe
to his flocks, and that a boatswain's mission
was to pipe all hands, and that one man's
mission was to be a paid piper, and another
man's mission was to pay the piper, so he
had got it into his head that his own peculiar
mission was to pipe his eye; which he did
perpetually. — Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, ch.
xxxii.
Pipe merry, merry from wine (which
is stored in pipes).
Wine delinereth the harte from all care
and thought when a bodie is pipe merie. —
XJdaVs Erasmus1 s Apophth., p, 159.
Piper. Drunk as a 'piper or fiddler
= very drunk. For similar compari-
sons see *. v. Drunk.
Jerry thought proper to mount the table,
and harangue in praise of temperance ; and
in short proceeded so loug in recomme ding
sobriety, and in tossing off horns of ale, that
he became as drunk as a piper. — Graves,
Spiritual Quixote, Bk. X. ch. xxuc.
Piper. To pay the piper = to be at
the expense ; to be the loser.
"I like not that music, father Oedric,"
■aid Athelstane. . . . " Nor I either, uncle/'
said Wamba. " I greatly fear we shall have to
pay the piper" — Scott, Ivanhoe, i. 267.
Negotiation there now was. . . . Dupont
de Nemours as daysman between a Colonel
and a Marquis, both in high wrath ; — Buf-
fiere to pay the piper. — Carlyle, Miscellanies,
iv. 89.
Pipkinnet, little pipkin.
God ! to my little meale and oyle,
Add but a bit of flesh to boyle ;
And Thou my pipkinnet shalt see
Give a wave-offering to Thee.
Herrick, Noble Numbers, p. 404.
Pipy, long like a pipe.
Desolate places where dank moisture breeds
The pipy hemlock to strange overgrowth.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. i.
Piratess, a female pirate.
The pi rate 8 and piratesses had controul of
both. — W. H. Russell, My diary North and
South, i. 103.
Pirouette (Fr.), to whirl round.
If I were to put on such a necklace as
that, I should feel as if I had been pirouet-
ting.— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. i.
Pibcicapture, fish-taking. See
quotation more at length s. v. Snatch-
ing.
Snatching is a form of illicit piscicapture.
—-Standard, Oct. 21, 1878.
Pissabed. L., who gives no ex-
ample, says, "Name given to the
dandelion (Leontodon taraxacum) from
its tendency to act on the urine. Wol-
cot in a note says that the second Lord
Chatham was made F. R. S. for pre-
senting some such plant to the Royal
Society.
Through him each trifle-hunter that can
bring
A grub, a weed, a moth, a beetle's wing,
Shall to a Fellow's dignity succeed ;
Witness Lord Chatham and his piss-a-bed.
P. Ptndar,p. 234.
Pissebolle, a chamber-pot.
She beyng moche the more incensed by
reason of her housbandes quietnesse and
stilnesse, powred doune a pissebolle upon
hym out of a windore. — XJdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 25.
Whereat manye men are commonly at
heynouslye offended, and take the matter in
as greate snuff e, as they would to be crowned
P/SS JN A Q UILL ( 496 )
PL A CATION
with Kpyseebolle. — Touchstone of Complexion,
p. 99.
Piss IN A quill. This coarse expres-
sion = to agree in a course of action,
seems to be used proverbially.
So strangely did Papist and Fanatic, or (as
it stood then) the Anti-Court party p — s in
a quill ; agreeing iu all things that tended
to create troubles and disturbances. — North,
Exatnen, p 70.
Because we are apt to think a little amiss
of Ferguson, he would have us believe that
he and the Secretary p — d in a quill ; they
were confederates in this No Fanatic plot. —
Ibid., p. 399.
Pistoleer, one who holds or fires
a pistol ; the word is formed on the
model of cannoneer.
Is the Chalk-Farm pistoleer inspired with
any reasonable belief and determination ; or
is he hounded ou by haggard indefinable
fear? — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 94.
Pit, to put cocks in a cock -pit for
battle: hence the phrases, to pit one
person against another ; or to shoot or
fly the pit.
Their enemies rejoyce, their friends turn
craven, and all forsake the pit before the
battle.— Hist, of Edward II., p. 120.
The whole nation came into the interests
of the Crown, and siguified as much by
almost universal acclamations and addresses;
all expressing utmost detestatiou and abhor-
rence of the Whig priuciples, which made
the whole party shoot the pit and retire. —
North, Exatnen, p. 327.
Toe pitting them [cocks] as they call it,
for the diversion and eutertaiument of man
was, I take it, a Grecian contrivance. —
Archaol., iii. 133 (1775).
We were all to blame to make madam
here fy the pit, as she did. — Richardson,
Pamela, ii. 30o.
I've pledged myself to produce my beauty
at the next ball, and to pit her against
their belle for any money.— Miss Ed ye worth,
Belinda, ch. xvii.
Pit-a-pat, tread quickly.
As in grape-haruest with vnweary pains
A willing troup of merry-singing swains,
With crooked hooks the stroutiug clusters
cut,
In frails and flaskets them as quickly put,
Bun bow'd with burthens to the fragraut fat,
Tumble them in, and after pit-a-pat
Up to the waste.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1137.
Pitch, to pave roughly.
In July and Augu*t was the highway
from near the end ot St. Clement's Church
to the way leadiug to Marston pitched with
pebble*.— Z*/e of A. Wood, July 10, 1682.
Pitch and toss, a common grime
with street boys ; throwing up a cup-
per and calling heads or tails ; hence
to play pitch and toss with anything
is to be careless or wasteful about it.
Cf. Ducks and drakes.
The bounding pinnace played a game
Of dreary pitch and toss,
A game that on the good dry land
Is apt to bring a loss.
Hood , 7%e Sea-spell.
If anybody says the Radicals are a ret of
sneaks, Brummagem halfpennies, scamps
who want to play pitch-and-toss with the
property of the country, you can say. Look
at the member for North Loamshire. — G.
Eliot, Felix Holt, ch. xix.
Pitch-brand, black mark.
David makes this the pitch-brand, as it
were, of wicked wret he*, They call not upou
God.— Bp. Hall, Works, v. 660.
PlTCHER-sotJLED, shallow (?) ; trans-
parent.
He looks like a pitcher- soul ed fellow, and
I know little or he is as harmless as a piece
of bread. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk.
III. ch. xv.
Pitch-farthing, chuck -farthing,
which is the commoner word.
A group of half-grown lads were playing
at pitch-farthing. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. xix.
PlTCHKBTTLED, puzzled. Scotch,
kittled, with pitch intensative, or ex-
pressive of darkness ?
Thus, the preliminaries settled,
I fairly find myself pitchkettled,
And cannot see, though few see better,
How I shall hammer out a letter.
Cowper, Epistle to Lloyd.
Pitted, dimpled : only used now of
indentations which are not reckoned
beautiful, as small-pox marks.
Her pitted cheeks aperde to be depaint
With mixed rose and lilies sweet and faint.
Hudson, Judith, iv. 351.
Pittle-pattle, to chatter.
In our deeds I fear me too many of us
deny God to be God, whatsoever we pittle*
pattle with our tongues. — Latimer, i. 106.
Placation, propitiation.
They were the first that instituted sacri-
fices 01 placation, with inuocations and wor-
ship to them as to Gods. — Puttenham, Eng.
Poesie, Bk. I. ch. iii.
The people were taught and persuaded by
such ptacations and worships to receaue any
helpe, comfort, or beneute to thexnselues. —
Ibid., Bk. I. ch. xii.
PLACEBO
( 497 )
PLASM A TOR
Placebo. To be at the school of
Placebo = to be time-serving : the
usual phrase is "to sing Placebo."
See N. *. v.
Nowe they haue bene At the skoole of
Placebo, and ther they haue lerned amongst
ladyes to daunse as the deuill lyst to pype.
—Knox, Godlu Letter, 1644 (Maitland, &-
formation, p. 88).
Placentious, pleasing ; amiable.
He was . . a placentious Person, gaining
the good-will of all with whom he conversed
—Fuller, Worthies, York (ii. 642).
Plage, region. R. has the word, but
only as a plural.
Yon that have marched with happy Tarn*
borlaine
As far as from the frozen flags of heaven,
Unto the watery morning's ruddy bower.
Marlowe I. Tamburlaine, iv. 4.
He brings a world of people to the field,
From Scythia to the oriental plage
Of India.— Ibid., 2 Tamb., 1. 1.
Plagiary-ship, plagiarism j literary
theft.
Such Plagiary-ship ill becometh Authors
or Painters.— Fuller, Worthies, Warwick (ii.
417).
Plain, to lament; this word is in
the Diets., but the extract marks well
the distinction between plain and com-
plain, though the former word is some-
times used for the latter.
Though he plain, he doth not complain ;
for it is a harm, but no wrong, which he
hath received. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 117.
Plaisterish, cretaceous.
Fracastorius supposeth that the
IMand gpt the name Albion of the saide
plaisterish Soile. — Holland's Camden, p. 24.
Plaisterly, of the nature of plaster.
Others looked for it (cause of sweating-
sickness) from the earth, as arising from an
exhalation in most weather out of gipsous or
plaisterly ground. — Fuller, Hist, of Camb.,
vii. 36.
Planetary, wandering.
After the prince's out leap, the King lin-
gred at New-market till the time was nigh
that every day tidings were expected of his
safe arrival in Spain, that he might shew
himself to the Lords at Whitehall with
better confidence, which he did March 30,
being the first day that the Lord Keeper
spake with the King about his dear son's
planetary absence. — Hacket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 115.
I am credibly informed he in some sort
repented his removall from his parish, And
disliked hit own erratic*! and planetary life.
—Fuller, Ch. Bist., DC. vii. 68.
Plangent, beating, and in its second-
ary meaning, beating the breast, and
so, lamenting. In the latest edition of
Ph. van Artevelde (1877), Sir H. Taylor
has altered the word to " restless. " In
former editions, he says in a note, " I
have adopted this (as it sounds to my
ears) very euphonious epithet from a
little poem called " The Errors of Ec-
stadey by W. Darley ; a poem which is
full of this sort of euphony, and re-
markable on other accounts."
The seaman who sleeps sound upon the deck,
Nor hears the loud lamenting of the blast,
Nor heeds the weltering of the plangent
wave. — Ph. van Artevelde, Pt. I. i. 10.
Planoor, plaint.
Every one mourneth when he heareth of
the lamentable plangors of Thracian Orpheus
for his dearest Eurydice — Meres, Eng. Liter-
ature, 1598 (Enp. Garner, ii. 96).
Planless, indefinite ; without a plan.
One half of the armed multitude . . . had
been employed in the more profitable work
of attacking rich houses, not with planless
desire for plunder, but with that discrimin-
ating selection of such as belonged to the
chief Piagnoni, which showed that the riot
was under guidance. — G. Eliot, Bomola,
ch. lxvi.
Plant, the stock or apparatus used
in a business.
What with the plant, as Mr. Peck tech-
nically phrased a great upas-tree of a total,
branching ont into types, cases, printing-
presses, engines, &c my father's for-
tune was reduced to a sum of between seven
and eight thousand pounds. — Lytton, The
Caxtons, Bk. XI. ch. vl
Plant-plot, cultivated land.
Tributes also were imposed .... for
Oorne-grounds, plant-plots, groves or parks.
— Holland's Camden, p. 100.
Which .... they translated hither as
unto a more fruitefull plant-plot— Ibid. , p.
377.
Plap, an onomatopceous word to sig-
nify the dropping of water, or some
similar sound.
There is Barnes Newcome's eloquence
still plapping on like water from a cistern.
— Thackeray, Netccomes, ch. lxvi.
The white bears winked their pink eyes,
as they plapped up and down by their pool.
— Ibid., Roundabout Papers, x.
Plasm ator, former : this and the
succeeding word were euggested by
the words in the original.
The sovereign plasmator, God Almighty,
hath endowed and adorned human nature at
K K
PLASMA TURE ( 498 )
PLENIPO
the beginning.— Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk. II.
ch. viii.
PLA8MATURB, form.
By death should be brought to nought
that so stately frame and plasmature wherein
the man at first had been created.— Urqu~
hart, Babelais, Bk. II. ch. viii.
Platecote, coat of mail : the Diets,
give instances of plate = armour.
Spenser has plated-cote, and yron-coted
plate: breast-plate is still common.
An helmette and a Jacke or platecote
hideth all partes of a manne, sauyng the
legges. — Udal's Erasmus's Apophth., p. 308.
Platform, to plan ; to lay oat ; also,
to rest as on a platform.
Some . . do not think it for the ease of
their inconsequent opinions to grant that
church discipline is platformed in the Bible,
but that it is left to the discretion of men. —
Milton, Reason of Ch. Gov., ch. i.
And this dog was satisfied
If a pale thin hand would glide
Down his dewlaps sloping — #
Which he pushed his nose within,
After platf arming his chin
On the palm left open.
Mrs. Browning, To Flush.
Platitudinarian, a retailer of plati-
tudes or common-placeB.
You have a respect for a political plati-
tudinarian as insensible as an ox to every-
thing he can't turn into political capital. — G.
Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. zxii.
Plaud, to applaud.
That at our banquet ail the Gods may tend,
Plauding our victorie and this happie end.
Chapman, Blind Begger of Alexandria
(Conclusion).
But you fast friends of foul carnality
And false to God, His tender sonne do gore,
And plaud yourselves if 't be not mortally.
H. More, Life of the Soul, iii. 39.
Plausibelize, to recommend.
He endeavoured to work himself into their
.good will by erecting and endowingof re-
ligious houses, so as to plausibelize himself,
especially among the clergy. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist, IV. iv. 7.
Plausible, applauding ; rejoicing.
I will haste to declare of what virtue and
strength the true and Christian prayer is,
that men knowing the efficacy and dignity,
yea, and the necessity thereof, may with the
pure plausible and joyful minds delight in
it. — Becon, i. 141.
Playactorism, histrionism.
Sterling's view of the Pope, as seen in
these his gala days, doing his big playactor-
ism under God's earnest sky, was much
more substantial to me than his studies in
the picture galleries. — Carlyle, Life of Ster-
ling, Pt. II. ch. vii.
Pleasable, pleasant.
I have been compeled to speake in your
presens (and in presens of others) suche
thinges as were not pleasable to the eaxes of
men.— Knox, Godly Letter, 1544 {Maitland,
Reformation, p. 188).
Pleasurable, in the extracts plea-
sure-seeking ; its ordinary sense is
pleasure-giving.
A person of his pleasurable turn and active
spirit could never have submitted to take
long or great pains in attaining the qualifi-
cations he is master of. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, i. 74.
On the restoration of his Majesty of plea-
surable memory, he hastened to court, where
he rolled away and shone as in his native
sphere.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 2.
Pleasurer, a pleasure-seeker. Sir T.
Browne has pleasurist.
Let us turn now to another portion of the
London population ... we mean the Sun-
day pleasurers. — Sketches by Boz {London
Recreations).
Pleasureless, devoid of pleasure.
He himself was sliding into that pleasure-
less yielding to the small solicitations of cir-
cumstance, which is a commoner history of
perdition than any single momentous bar-
gain.— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. lxxix.
Plebe, people ; mob.
But still the Plebe with thirst and fury prest,
Thus roaring, raving, 'gainst their Chiefs
contest.
Sylvester, Bethulia's Rescue, iii. 391 .
Plectile, woven.
The crowns and garlands of the Ancients
.... were made up after all ways of art,
compactile, sutile, plectile. — Sir T. Brown,
Tract II.
Plenipo, plenipotentiary.
Til give all my silver amongst the drawers,
make a bonfire before the door, sav the pltni-
pos have signed the peace, and the Bank of
England's grown honest.— Vanbrugh, Prov.
Wife, iii. 1.
All passed well, and the plenipos returned
with their purchase, the return of the elec-
tion, back to London.— North, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 163.
Wliiteacre . . was the treason plenipo at
that time. — Ibid., Examen, p. 297.
We were buoyed up here for some days
with the hope that General Laurington was
gone to England as plenipo, to end the dread
contest without effusion of blood. — Mad,
D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 329.
PLENTIFY
( 499 ) PL0WWR1GHT
PusNTiFy, to make plenteous ; to
enrich.
For alms (like levain) make our goods to
rise,
And God His owne with blessings plentifUs.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 1145.
Pleonast, one who uses redundant
or tautologous expressions.
Ere the mellifluous pleonast had done oil-
ing his paradox with fresh polysyllables . .
he met with a curious interruption. — Reade,
Hard Cash, ch. xxv.
Plication, a fold : plicature is more
usual, though complication is common.
Thou hadst the two letters in thy hand.
Had they been in mine, the seal would have
yielded to the touch of my warm finger
(perhaps without the help of the post-office
bullet) ; and the folds, as other plications
have done, opened of themselves to oblige
my curiosity. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vi.
345.
Why the deuce should you not be sitting
precisely opposite to me at this moment, . . .
thy juridical brow expanding its plications, as
a pun rose in your fancy. — Scott, Redgauntlet,
Letter i.
Plod shoes, thick ; fit for plodding
over rough ground.
How like a dog will you look, with a pair
of plod shoes, your hair cropp'd up to your
ears, and a bandbox under your arm. — Van*
burgh, Confederacy, Act I.
Because I ha'n t a pair of plod shoes and a
dirty shirt, you think a woman won't ven-
ture upon me for a husband. — Ibid., JEsop.,
ActV.
Plooky, pimpled. In the Holderness
Glossary (E. D. S.), pluke, pronounced
plook, is given as a Yorkshire word.
His face was as plooky as a curran' bun,
and his nose as red as a partan's tae. — Gait,
Provost, ch. xxxii.
Plot, plan, with no ill or secret
meaning.
Th' eternall Plot, th' Idea fore-conceiv'd,
The wondrous Form of all that Form re-
ceiv'd,
Did in the Work-man's spirit divinely lie.
Sylvester, The Columnes, 424.
She likes Brampton House and Seat better
than ever I did myself, and tells me how my
Lord hath drawn a plot of some alterations
to be made there. — Pepys, Sept. 27, 1662.
Plotter, to trample. H. has plouter,
to wade through.
Miss's pony has trodden down two rigs o'
corn, and plottered through, raight o'er into
t* meadow. — E. Bronte, Wutheriny Heights,
ch. ix.
Plough, to pluck in an examination
(University slang).
These two promising specimens were not
"ploughed," but were considered fit and pro-
per persons to teach that Keligion to others,
the history of which they were so lament-
ably ignorant of themselves.— Driven to Bom*
(1877), p. 69.
Plough-tree, plough-handle.
I whistled the same tunes to my horses,
and held my plough-tree just the same as if
no King or Queen had ever come to spoil my
tune or hand. — Blackmore, Lorna Boone, eh.
lxxiv.
Plounce, plunge ; flounce.
Our observation must not now launch into
the whirlpool, or rather plounce into the
mudd and quagmire of the people's power
and right pretended, That the sovereignty is
theirs, and originally in them.— Hacket, Life
of Williams, u. 200.
Plousiocracy, the rule of the wealthy.
PltUocracy = the rule of wealth, is more
common. Southey has Plutarchy, q. v.
To say a word against the suitorcide delays
of the Court of Chancery, or the cruel pun-
ishments of the Game-laws, or against any
abuse which a rich man inflicted and the
poor man suffered, was treason against the
plousiocracy. — Sydney Smith, Preface to
Essays from Edinb. Rev.
Plow meat, food made of corn, as
distinguished from that derived from
pasture- land 8.
• Som cuntries lack plow meat,
And som doe want cow meat.
Tusser, Rusbandrie, p. 102.
Plowstar, Charles's wain: geminos
Triones.
Thee lights starrye noting in globe celestial
hanging,
The seun stars stormy, twise told thee plow-
star, eke Arcture.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 528.
Plowswain, a ploughman. See «. v.
Goad-groom.
I forced
Thee sulcking swinker thee soyle, thoghe
craggie to sunder ;
A labor and a trauaile too plowswayns hert-
elye welcoom. — Stanyhurst, JEn.,\. 4.
Beasts leave their stals, plough-swains their
fires forego,
Nor are the meadows white with drifts of
snow.
Heath's Odes of Horace, Bk. I. Ode 4.
Plowwright, maker of ploughs.
Tusser (p. 137) dividing the corn har-
vest into ten equal parts gives,
K K 2
PLUCKED
( 5°o )
PLUTARCH*
One part tot plowwrite, cart write, knacker,
and smith
Plucked, a man who fails to pass his
examination is said to be plucked.
He went to college, and he got tducked, I
think they call it. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. x.
He had been a medical student, and got
plucked, his foes declared, in his examination.
— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xx.
Plucked. A good or well plucked
person is one of courage and endur-
ance ; a hard-plucked one is a person
deficient in tenderness.
" Shall I break off with the finest girl in
England, and the best-plucked one, and the
cleverest and wittiest?*' ... a By Jove, you
are a good-plucked fellow, Farintosh." —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. lix.
Many a youngster beginnirg to drag his
legs heavily, and feel his heart beat like a
hammer, and the bad-plucked ones thinking
that after all it isn't worth while to keep it
np. — Hughes, Tom Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I.
ch. vii.
A very sensible man, and lias seen a deal
of life, and kept his eyes open, but a terrible
hard-plucked one. Talked like a book to me
all the way, but be hanged if I don't think
he has a thirty-two pound-shot under his
ribs instead of a heart— Ki ngsley, Two Years
Ago, ch. iv.
Pluck penny, a game.
He that is once so skilled in the art of
gaming as to play at Pluck penny, will quickly
oome to Sweepstake. — Theeves, Theeves, or Sir
J. GalVt proceedings in Derbyshire (1643),
p. 2.
Plucky, courageous.
If you're plucky, and not over subject to
fright.
And go and look over that chalk-pit white,
You may see, if you will, the ghost of old
Gill
Grappling the ghost of Smuggler Bill.
Ingoldsby Legends {Smuggler's Leap),
Plumb, thoroughgoing.
Neither can an opposition, neither can a
ministry be always wrong. To be a plumb
man therefore with either is an infallible
mark that the man must mean more and
worse than he will own he does mean. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 262.
Plumbeous, leaden (L. has plum-
bean). The speaker is a pedantic
schoolmaster.
Attend and throw your ears to me* ... till
I have endoctrinated your plumbeous cere-
brosities. — Sidney, Wanstead rlay, p. 622
Plumblbss, unfathomable
The moment shot away into the plumbless
depths of the past, to mingle with all the
lost opportunities that are drowned there. —
Dickens, Hard limes, ch. xv.
Plumery, plumage.
Then in the dewy evening sky,
The bird of gorgeous plumery
Poised his wings aud hover'd nigh.
Southey, Kehama, x. 90.
Plummy, good ; desirable.
The poets have made tragedies enough
about signing one's self over to wickedness
for the sake of getting something plummy.
O. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xvi.
Plumper, a man who gives all his
votes to one candidate in a contested
election is said to plump for him. The
votes so given are called plumpers.
Mr. Brooke's success murt depend either
on plumpers which would leave Bagster in
the rear, or on the new minting of Tory
votes into reforming votes.— G. Eliot, Mid-
dlemarch, oh. li.
Plum- porridge, applied to a man
contemptuously. Cr. Pudding-head.
I'll be hanged though
If he dare venture ; hang him, plum-por-
ridge!
He wrestle? he roast eggs.
Two Noble Kinsmen, ii. 2.
Plunger, * according to the Slang
Diet., a cavalry man ; but it also
means one who has gone to the bad.
It's an insult to the whole Guards, my
dear fellow, after refusing two of us, to
marry an attorney, and after all to bolt with
* plunger. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xvi.
PlubipresencE) presence in more
places than one.
Toplady. Does not their invocation of
saints suppose omnipresence in the saints ?
Johnson. No, Sir; it supposes only pluri-
presence; and when spirits are divested of
matter, it seems probable that they should
see with more extent than when in an em-
bodied state. — Boswell, Life of Johnson, iii.
299.
The high prerogative of ubiquity orplvri-
presence. — OxUe, Confutation of Diabotarchy,
p. 2.
Plushy, like plush ; soft and shaggy.
Sometimes she gave a stitch or two ; but
then followed a long gaie out of the win-
dow, across the damp gravel and plushy
lawn. — H. Kingsley, Geofiy Hamlyn, ch. iv.
Plutarchy, rule of wealth.
We had our monarchy, our hierarchy, and
our aristocracy, . . . but we had no plu-
tarchy, no millionaires, no great capitalist*,
to break down the honest and industrious
PLUTOCRAT
( Soi )
POIGNE
trader with the weight of their overhearing
aud overwhelming wealth. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. cii.
Plutocbat, one who rules in virtue
of wealth.
When they, the tyrants of the earth, who
lived delicately with her, rejoicing in her
sin*, the plutocrats and bureaucrat*, the
money-changers and devourers of labour,
are crying to the rocks to hide them, and to
the hills to cover them from the wrath of
Him that sitteth on the throne, then labour
shall be free at last. — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. xli.
Po, a sub-devil.
This is some pettifogging fiend,
Some under door-keeper's friends' friend,
That undertakes to understand,
And juggles at the second hand ;
And now would pass for Spirit Po,
And all meu's dark concerns foreknow.
Hudibras, III. i. 1395.
There was one Mr. Duke, a busy fanatic in
Devonshire in Charles II.'s days, whom old
Sir Edward Seymour used to call Spirit Po ;
that said Po being a petit dtable, a small devil
that was presto at every conjurer's nod. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxxix.
Poad ? H. has pode = tadpole.
Neverthelesse amonge this araye,
Was not theare one called Coclaye,
A littell pratye f oolysshe poade ?
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott wrothe, p. 43.
Poat. The Holderness Glossary
(E. D. S.) gives Pooat, to trifle, to
dawdle ; perhaps this is the meaning in
the subjoined. Sylvester is describing
the effeminate Sardanapalus.
See how he poats, paints, frizzles, fashions
him. — Bethulia's Rescue, v. 215.
Pocket-borough, a borough the re-
presentation of which was virtually in
the hands of one proprietor. One of
the objects of the Reform Bill of 1832
was to do away with these.
" When I think of Burke, I can't help
wishing somebody had a pocket - borough
to give you, Ladislaw." ..." Pocket-boroughs
would be a fine thing," said Ladislaw, "if
they were always in the right pocket, and
there were always a Burke at hand." — G.
Eliot, Jftddlemarch, ch xlvi.
Pocket-cloth, pocket-handkerchief.
Cannot I wipe mine eyes with the fair
pocket-cloth, as if I wept for all your abomin-
ations?— T. Brown, Works, i. 3.
Pocket of wool. H. says, " Half a
sack of wool is called a pocket : " but
see extract.
Here [at Stourbridge Fair] I saw what I
have not observed in any other County of
England, a Pocket of Wool; which seems to
have been at first called so in mockery, this
Pocket being so big that it loads a whole
waggon, and reaches beyond the most ex-
treme parts of it, hanging over both before
and behind ; and these ordinarily weigh a
Ton or 2500 pound weight of wool in one
bag.— Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, i. 96.
Pocket-pistol, a small flask.
He . . swigged his pocket-pistol. — Nay lor,
Reynard the Fox, p. 42.
A glass bottle enclosed in a leather case,
commonly called a pocket-pistol. — Babbage,
Passages in Life of a Philosopher, p. 218
(1864).
Pock-fretten, marked with smalt
pox.
He is a thin tallish man, a little pock*
fretten, of a sallowish complexion. — Richard-
son, CI. Hariowe, vi. 137.
Pococurante, a careless man; a
trifler. This Italian word is now pretty
well naturalized in our language.
Leave we my mother (truest of all the
Poco-curantes of her sex J careless about it,
as about everything else in the world which
concerned her.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iv. 214.
" I believe yon are misinformed, sir," said
Jekyl drily, and then resumed, as«deftly as
he could, his proper character of a poco-
curante.-—Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 190.
Pococtjrantism, indifference ; apathy.
Have thy eye-glasses, opera-glasses, thy
Long- Acre cabs with wnite-breeched tiger,
thy yawning impassivities, ,poeocurantisms. —
Carlyle, Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. xvii.
POCULARY, cup.
Some brought forth .... pocularies for
drinkers, some manuaries for handlers of
reticks, some pedaries for pilgrims. — Lati-
mer, i. 49.
Podestate, a chief.
I haue sene of the greatest podestates and
grauest judges and preaidentes of Parliament
in Fraunce. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III.
ch. xxv.
Poeticule, a poetaster.
The rancorous and reptile crew of poeticules
who decompose into criticasters. — A . C. Swin-
burne, Under the Microscope, p. 36.
Poione. H. has poigniet, wristband,
so perhaps the reference in the quotation
is to false dice being kept up the sleeve.
The witnesses which the faction kept in
poigne (like false dice, high and low Fullhams)
to be played forth upon plots and to make
discoveries as there was occasion, were now
chapf alien. — North, Examen, p. 108.
PZ ZTAJtCm
'■--rt?*3- i ma who gires all I
— . i ji sui ^ fi*mp for him. T ■
a *, Z--SB in .'j_t-ii pj*mperi.
»ii waua amid kan Boiler is
« :1 « w =». im Btntiv of 7 7
« is afurauj vavwj. — O. Eliot. A'
neus -rat who hu gone to the bad.
ti M — U *• tb* white Guard*, mj
PLUTOCRAT
trader with the ™**t of i
l I» 1ml m
. rf m«=. .,-
the hill* to a
Him that Htteth o* tbe -J
II be free at «■«.— C Wi J
Lock*, A. A
Po, 4 mb-dcriL
Thia it «m pnuf ofttjni 6t>(L
Sorcuj undo- dnor-k«(it* » frimi* b-JSK.
That muhftekca to nnd'iHaiitL
And joggle* at the xra- bill
And now would pad for Saiga ?>.
flat -™. rn i, ;»
There n ne Mr. Dokci fcwr *toaBc a
Deronahire in Charl™ Il.'t cm. wiion oi
Sir Edward Seymour wed » caZ ™— »i
that said Pa bong a jWu iaiit a •Dkl ord.
Sattluy, IV Bortur, ch- tmjx.
Poad? H. has ptxfc = Mprie.
Nererthelesae among* tin «*>.
Was not theare one called Cscx*.
A lit tell prat ye f ool ymh- aw '
fin a*f *=*»_ lair vw
it lot! wrcth,, f a '
Poat. The ffoldtntm Z'.mmr* £ "^"■*fera..
(E. D. S.) gives PooaL v, infc. a t j^" "*"■ — -P— m -j-**-^*
dawdle; perhaps tliuuth* ■ '""
the subjoined. Sylvester n i_
the effeminate Sardanipala*.
" i ■ -■■■ j • A ■ ■ niiiin r_
him.— SaOaiw'l Ikv,?. US.
POINDER
( 502 )
POLITICONE
The engineers . . . determined what was
to be communicated, and in what manner,
aud what to be kept in poigne, secret from
them.— Ibid., p. 393.
Poindeb, a man who pens or pounds
straying cattle : pinder or pinner are
more common forms.
The poinder chafes and swears to see beasts
in the corn, yet will pull up a stake, or cut a
tether, to find supply for his pinfold. — Adams,
i. 163.
Pointable, capable of being pointed
out.
You know, quoth I, that in Elias' time,
both in Israel and elsewhere, God's church
was not pointable ; and therefore cried he out
that he was left alone. — Bradford, i. 552.
Points. To come to points = to fight
with swords.
They would have come to points immedi-
ately, had not the gentlemen interposed. —
Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. iii.
Poisonie, poisonous. In Sixth day
also, 284, Sylvester calls the crocodile
" Nile' 8 poysony pirate."
Never pale Enuie's poysonie heads do hiss
To gnaw his heart, nor vultur Auarice.
Sylvester, Third day, first weeke, 1072.
Poke, Bcrofula.
Aubanus Bohemus referres that struma or
poke of the Bavarians and Styrians to the
nature of their waters. — Burton's Anatomy,
p. 71.
Poke, a bonnet, the top of which
projects over the face.
Governesses don't wear ornaments; you
had better get me a grey frieze livery and a
straw poke, such as my aunt's charity children
wear. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxiv.
Poker. Old Poker = the devil.
The very leaves on the horse-chesnuts are
little snotty-nosed things that cry and are
afraid of the north wind, and cling to the
bough as if Old Poker was coming to take
them VHKj.— WalpoUjLetterSt'vr. 359 (1784).
Poky, poor ; shabby.
The ladies were in their pokiest old head-
gear and most dingy gowns when they per-
ceived the carriage approaching. — Thackeray,
The Newcomes, ch. lvii.
Polklkss, without a pole.
Horses that draw a pole-lesse chariot. —
Stapylton, Juvenal, x. 156.
Poley, without horns ; polled. Poly-
cow is in Mr. Gower's Surrey Provin-
cialisms (£. D. 8.).
If it had been any other bea?t which
knocked me down but that poley heifer, I
should have been hurt.— ZT. Kingsley, Gtoffry
Hamlyn, ch. xxix.
Polianthea, a commonplace book
containing many flowers of eloquence,
&c.
The collector of it says, moreover, that if
the like occasion come again, he shall less
need the help of breviates or historical
rhapsodies than your reverence to eke oat
your sermonings shall need repair to postils
or poliantheas. — Milton, Betnonst. Defence,
Postscript.
His profession is like his allegiance, & mere
fucus : yet so well laid on, one at first sight
could not but swear it were natural ; his
commonplace, polyanthea and concordance,
and the height of his school-divinity, the
Assemblies-catechism. — Character of a Fa*a-
tick, 1675 (Harl. Misc., vii. 636).
Polipraqmatick, a busy - body.
Heylin (Life of Laud, p. 330) says
that Burton in his sermon on Nov. 5
called the Bishops " Jesuited poliprag-
matichf"
Polish, Polish draughts, a form of
the game still used on the Continent.
The board has 100 squares ; the pieces
when crowned can move, like a bishop
in chess, from one end of the board to
the other.
Can yon play at draughts, polish, or chess ?
— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 367.
Politicise, to deal with politics.
But while I am politicising, I forget to tell
you half the purport of my letter. — Walpole
to Mann, iii. 281 (1758).
Not to politicise too much, I believe the
world will come to be fought for somewhere
between the north of Germany and the back
of Canada.— Ibid., iii. 338 (1759).
Politico, a politician, and so one
whose conduct is guided by consider-
ations of policy rather than principle.
He is counted cunning, a meere politico, a
time-server, an hypocrite. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 256.
Our politicos also object that the people
were before the king. — Racket, Life of Wil-
liams, ii. 201.
Politicone. politician.
He was certainly a true Matchiavellian
politicone, and his skill lay in the English
State. — North, Examen, p. 118.
The plot was to introduce the Catholic
religion by such means as the politicones of
that interest thought most conducing. — Ibid.,
p. 209.
His friends he enjoyed at home, but formal
visitants and politicones often found him out
at his chambers. — Ibid., Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 155.
POLITIEN
( S03 )
POMPING
Politien. See quotation.
Politien ... is receiued from the French-
men, bat st this day vsuall ia Court and with
all good secretaries; and cannot finde an
English word to match him, for to haue said
a man politique had not bene so wel ; bicause
in trueth that had bene no more than to
haue said a ciuil person. Politien is rather
a surueyour of ciuilitie than ciuil, and a
publique minister or counsellor in the state.
— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. iv.
Pollabchy, rule of the mob.
A contest . . . between those representing
oligarchical principles and the vol larch 1/. — W.
//. Russell, My Diary, North and South, ii.
340.
Pollened, covered with pollen.
And we wallow'd in beds of lilies, and chanted
the triumph of Finn,
Till each like a golden image was pollen* d
from head to feet.
Tennyson, Voyage of Maeldune.
Pollino-pence, taxes.
Wil Englishmen, or can thei, suffer to be
poled and pilled moste miserably in payeng
continually suche polingpence and intoller-
able toll ages for all maner graine and breade,
befe, beare, and mutton ? — Bradford, Suppli-
cacyon,1565 (Maitland on Reformation, p. 167).
Tea, rather then thy bravery should faile,
begge poicling pence ior the verye smooke
that comes out of poore men's chemnies ? —
Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier, 1592
(Harl. J/iwr., v. 399).
Pollock, a species of cod.
Oh, the lazy old villain ! he's been round
the rocks after pollock this evening, and
never taken the trouble to bale the boat up.
— Kxngsley, Westward Ho, ch. vi.
Polony, vulgar abbreviation of
Bologna sausage.
They were addicted to polonies; they
didn't disguise their love for Banbury cakes ;
they made bets in ginger-beer, and pave and
took the odds in that frothing liquor. —
Thackeray, Xewcomes, ch. xviii.
He likewise entertained his guest over the
soup and fish with the calculation that he
(Bounderby) had eaten in his youth at least
three horses under the guise of polonies and
saveloys. — Dickens, Hard Times, ch. xviii.
Polt, blow.
If any one hath spite enough to give me a
polt, thinking to falsify my faith by taking
away my life, I only desire them first to
qualify themselves for my executioners. —
Asgill, Argument, &c. 1700 (Southey's Doctor,
ch. clxxii.).
One of those who stood close by him, be-
lieving he was making a mock of them, lifted
np a pole he had in his hand, and gave him
such a polt with it as brought Sancho Panza
to the ground.— Jarviis Don Quixote, Pt. II.
Bk. II. ch. x.
If he know'd I'd got you the knife, he'd go
nigh to give me a good polt of the head. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. II. ch. ix.
Polycephalist, one who has many
heads or rulers.
Both which methods must have left the
enlarged and numerous Churches of Christ
either Acephalists, confused without any
head, or Polycephalists, burdened with many
bear's. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 541.
Polyoamically, in a polygamous
manner or direction.
To suppose the family groups, of whom
the majority of emigrants were composed,
polygamically possessed, would be to suppose
an absurdity. — Dickens, Uncommercial Travel"
ler, xx.
Polygamize, to indulge in polygamy.
Did it not suffize,
O^lustf ull soule, first to polygamize ?
SufnVd it not, O Lamech, to distain
Thy nuptiallbed?
Sylvester, Handy Crafts, 603.
Polyphonian, many-voiced.
I love the air ; her dainty sweets refresh
My drooping soul, and to new sweets invite
me;
Her shrill-mouth'd choir sustain me with
their flesh,
And with their polyphonian notes delight me.
Quarles, Emblems, v. 6.
Polytheous, having to do with many
god 8.
Heav'n most abhor'd Polytheous piety .—
Beaumont, Psyche, xxi. st. 58.
Polythore. See extract.
I went to that famous physitian Sir Fr.
Prujean, who shew'd me his laboratorie, . . .
he plaied to me likewise on the polythore, an
instrument having something of the harp,
lute, theorbo, &c. It was a sweete instru-
ment, by none known in England, or de-
scrib'd by any author, nor us'd but by this
skilfull and learned doctor.— Evelyn, Diary,
Aug. 9, 1661.
Pomk-roie, a species of apple.
Hauing gathered a handfull of roses, and
plucking off an apple called a Pome-roie, hee
returned.— Bret on, Strange Fortunes of Two
Princes, p. 1°.
Pomolooist, one acquainted with
fruits.
Our pomologists in their lists select the
three or the six best pears "for a small
orchard. " — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. i.
POMPING, pompous.
As for example take their pompynge pryde,
and ye shall proue, their purpose once ob-
poMPOoy
( 504 )
POP
teined, thei will treade your heads in the
dust. — Bradford, Supplicacyon, 1555 (Matt-
land, Reformation, p. 162).
Pompoon, top-knot [Fr. pompon].
Marian drew forth one of those extended
pieces of black pointed wire with which, in
the days of toupees and pompoons, our fore-
mothers were wont to secure their fly-caps
and head-gear. — Ingoldsby Legends {Leech of
Folkestone).
Pond, to pen up as in a pond.
Another flood-gate . . ponds the whole
river, so as to throw the waste water over a
strong stone weir into its natural channel. —
Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, i. 379.
Ponder, meditation.
He laughed a little, and soon after took
his leave, not without one little flight to
give me for a ponder. — Mad. ITArblay, Diary,
iv. 27.
Pondkrlino, little weight.
The child was weighed, and yelled aa if
the scale had been the font. "Courage,
dame," cried Gerard ; ** this is a good sign ;
there is plenty of life here to battle its
trouble." "Now blest be the tongue that
tells me so," said the poor woman. She
hushed her vonderling against her bosom,
and stood aloof watching, whilst another
woman brought her child to scale. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxxvi.
Ponderose, weighty.
A grand alliance with the Emperor and
Spain brought down a ponderose army out of
Germany. — North, Examen, p. 470.
Pontific, belonging to a bridge.
Milton {Par. Lost, x. 312) has "art
pontifical" = bridge - building, which
sense, Todd, quoted by L., believes to
be "peculiar to Milton, and perhaps
was intended as an equivocal satire on
Popery." It will be seen that Sterne
uses substantially the same word in a
similar sense. The speaker has had
his hat blown off on the Pont Niuf.
L'ickless man that I am, ... to be driven
forth out of my house by domestic winds,
and despoiled of my castor by pontific ones.
— Sent. Journey, The Fragment.
Pont-levis, a drawbridge (French)."
Yonder's a plum-tree with a crevice
An owl would build in, were he but sage,
For a lap of moss like a fine pont-levis
In a castle of the middle age,
Joins to a lip of gum pure amber.
Browning, Sibrandus Schafnabvrgensis.
Pony, twenty-five pounds.
"Which hint is not taken, any more than
the bet of a "pony," which he offers five
minutes afterwards, that he will jump his
Irish mare in and out of Aberalva pound. —
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xviii.
Pooh-pooh, to put aside with con-
tempt. In the third extract it is used
adjectivally.
The question ... of its effect upon health
has been, as Members of Parliament say,
pooh-poohed. — Southey, The Doctor, Fragment
on Beards.
Though he stared somewhat haughtily
when he found his observations actually
pooh-poohed, he was not above being con-
vinced.— Lytton, My Novel, Bk. II. ch. vi.
There is a Saturnine philosopher standing
at the door of his book-shop, who, I fancy,
has a pooh-pooh expression as the triumph
passes. — Thackeray, Roundabout Papers, iv.
Poop, "to cheat; to deceive; to
cozen" (H., who, however, gives no
example).
Hodge. But there ich was powpte indeed.
Diccon. Why, Hodge ?
Hodge. Boots not, man, to tell ;
Cham so drest amonst a sort of fooles, chad
better be in hell.
Gammer Gvrton's Needle (Hawkins's Eng.
Dr., i. 186).
Pooped, a ship is said to be pooped
when a high sea breaks over her poop.
He was pooped with a sea that almost sent
him to the bottom. — Smollett, Sir JL Greaves,
ch. xvii.
Poop-noddy, "the game of love"
(Halliwell).
Crick. I can tell you he loves her well.
Gripe. Nay, I trow.
Crick. Yes, I know ; for I am sure I saw
them close together at poop-noddy in her
closet. — Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng. Dr.,
iii. 310).
Poor Robin, an almanack.
I was informed she discern'd by the beat
of the pulse a Feast from a Feria, without
the help of poor Robin. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 120.
Pop, to make a nois.e (with the
mouth).
Still to dilate and to open his breaste with
coughing, hawking, neesing and popping or
smacking with the mouthe. — Touchstone of
Complexions, p. 124.
Pop, ginger-beer.
Home-made pop that will not foam,
And home-made dishes that drive one from
home. — Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
With lobsters and whitebait, and other
swate-meats,
And wine, and nagus, and imperial pop.
Ingoldsby Legends (The Coronation).
POP
( SOS )
P0RKESP1CK
Pop. To pop the question, to make
a proposal of marriage.
Plagued with his doubts and your own
diffidences ; afraid he would now, and now,
and now, pop out the question which he had
not the courage to put. — Richardson, Gran'
dison, vi. 103.
I suppose you popped the question more
than once, when you were a young — I beg.
your pardon — a younger man. — Sketches by
Bot ( Watkins Tottle).
He had fixed in his heart of hearts upon
that occasion ... to whisper to Mrs.
M*Catchley those soft words which — but
why not let Mr. Richard Avenei use his own
idiomatic and unsophisticated expression.
«* Please the pigs," then said Mr. Avenei to
himself, " I shall pop the question" — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. V. ch. xvii
Pope's eye, gland surrounded with
fat in the middle of a leg of mutton.
Yon should have the hot new milk, and
the pope* s eye from the mutton, and every
foot of you would become a yard in about a
fortnight. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. 1.
Pope's head, a broom with a very
long handle : also called a Turk's head
g. v.
Bloom. You're no witch indeed if you
don't see a cobweb as long as my arm. Run,
run, child, for the pope's head.
House. Pope's head, ma'am ?
Bloom. Ay, the pope's head, which you'll
find under the stairs. — Miss Edgeworth, Love
and Liw, i. 5.
Yon are not going to send the boy to
school with this ridiculous head of hair;
why, his school-fellows will use him for a
pope's head. — Savage, Reuben Medlicott, Bk. i.
ch. m.
Popgunnery, use or discharge of
popguns : used figuratively in extract.
We now demand the light artillery of the
intellect. ... On the other hand, the light-
ness of the artillery should not degenerate
into popgunnery — t>y which term we may
designate the character of the greater por-
tion of the newspaper press — their sole
legitimate object being the discussion of
ephemeral matters in an ephemeral manner.
— E. A. Foe, Marginalia, xxv.
Popipy, to make a Papist.
The Prince and Buckingham were ever
Protestants ; those their opposite* you know
not what to term them, unless detestants of
the Romish idolatry. As if all were well so
they be not Popifed, though they have de-
parted from the Church in which they were
baptized.— Racket, Life of Williams, i. 121.
Popjoying, some mode of fishing (?).
Benjy had carried off our hero to the
canal in defiance of Charity, and between
them, after a whole afternoon's popjoying,
they had caught three or four small coarse
fish and a perch. — Hughes, Tom Brown's
School Days, Pt. I. ch. ii.
Poplars of Yarrum, cant term for
butter-milk. See extract in H., s. v.
pannam.
Here's pannum and lap, and good poplars
of Yarrum. — Broome, Jovial Crew, Act fl.
Popper, a gun or mortar.
And all round the glad church lie old bottles
With gunpowder stopped,
Which will be, when the Image re-enters,
Religiously popped.
And at night from the crest of Oalvano
Great bonfires will hang,
On the plain will the trumpets join chorus.
And more poppers bang.
Browning, Englishman in Italy.
Poppet, to jog or carry: onoma-
topoeous perhaps, representing the mo-
tion of the chair.
These lines of Bowe have got into my
head ; and I shall repeat them very devoutly
all the way the chairmen shall poppet me
towards her by and by. — Richard son, CI.
Harlowe, v. 16.
Popple, tares.
Thou shewest plainly here thy deceit,
which thou hast learned of them that travail
to sow popple among wheat. — Examination
of William Thorpe (Bale's Works, p. 119).
Popple, to bubble.
His brains came poppling out like water. —
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 226.
Popular, crowded.
Who should maintain the nice lady in her
carriage whirling through the popular streets?
— Adams, i. 42.
Pop- weed, the fresh- water bladder-
weed.
I stuck awhile with my toe-balls on the
slippery links of the pop-weed, and the world
was green and gliddery, and I durst not look
behind me. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. vii.
Porcupine, to cause to stand up, like
a porcupine's quills.
Thus did the cooks on Billy Ramus stare,
Whose frightful presence porcupined each
hair.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 50.
Porkbspick, porcupine. N. notices
this corruption of porc-pisce, but gives
no example.
He gaue for his deuice the porkespick with
this pqsie pres et loign, both farre and neare.
— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch. xii.
PORK-PORKING ( 506 )
POST
Pork-forking, onomatopoeous epithet
of the raven's cry ; CI Murk Pork.
From the mountains nigh,
The rav'ns begin with their pork-porking cry.
Sylvester, The Schisme, 285.
Portifolium, the breviary, portass,
or portif orium ; portiforium is so
called, because it could be easily
carried /was, out of doors.
I marvel that bishops can not see this in
themselves, that they are also no followers
of the Scriptures; but peradventure they
never read them, but a* they find them by
chance in their popish portii of turns and mask-
ing books. — Bale, Select Works, p. 175.
Though they never have beads, Latin
primers, portifoliomes, nor other signs of
hypocrisy, yet are they promised to have
atonement with God. — Ibid., p. 369.
Portify, to assume greater import-
ance than belongs to one. Thackeray
coined this word in allusion to the
saying, "Claret would be port if it
could?*
I grant you that in this scheme of life
there does enter ever so little hypocrisy ;
that this claret is loaded, as it were ; bat
your desire to portify yourself is amiable, is
pardonable, is perhaps honourable. — Thack-
eray, Roundabout Papers, xiv.
Port-mantick, portmanteau.
He would linger no longer, and play at
cards in King Philip's palace, till the messen-
ger with the port-mantick came from Borne.
— Racket, Life of miliamsji. 100.
Portmantca, portmanteau.
His portmantua had been carried into a
chamber. . . . He sent orders to his servant
to bring hinportmantua. — Mrs. Lennox, Hen-
rietta, Bk. V . ch. x.
Portugal, Portuguese.
Now have I set these Portugals a-work,
To hew a way for me unto the crown.
Peele, Battle of Alcazar, iv. 2.
The Portugal found a road to the East
Indies by the Cape of Good Hope. — Howell,
Letters, I. i. 95.
Porture, portrait or effigy ; the mar-
ginal summary has porterature. H.
has porture = carriage, demeanour.
The porture of a man in brasse or stone
should Dee bought up with three thousand
pieces of coyn, where as a pecke of mele was
to bee soldo for twoo brasse pens. And yet
ther nedeth no such image or porture for anie
necessarie vse of mannes life, without meale
there is no possibilitie of maintaining the
life— UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 99.
Port- way, Port-high- way, or High-
rouT-WAY = a paved highway.
The Port-way, or High paved street named
Bath-gate.— Holland's Camden, p. 557.
The high Port-way, or Roman street. — Ibid-,
p. 507.
I observed moreover . . . another High port-
way also, called Ould street. — Ibid., p~ 540.
This toune . . . standeth upon the old
Port High-tcay.—Ibid., p. 550.
Pos, positive. See extract, «. v. Rep.
It is perhaps this humour of speaking no
more than we needs must, which has so
miserably curtailed some of our words, that
in familiar writings and conversations they
often lose all but their first syllables, as in
mob, rep, pos, incog, and the like-, and as all
ridiculous words make their first entry into
a language by familiar phrases, I dare not
answer for these that they will not in time
be looked upon as a part of our tongue. —
Spectator, No. exxxv.
She shall dress me and flatter me, for I
will be flattered, that's pos. — Addison, Tht
Drummer, Act III.
Pose, to assume an attitude, like one
who is sitting to an artist.
He . . . "posed " before her as a hero of
the most sublime kind. — Thackeray, Shabby
Genteel Story, ch. vi.
Posed, firm, the reverse of flighty.
An old settled person of a most posed,
staid, and grave behaviour. — Urquhart, Rabe-
lais, Bk. III. ch. xix.
Pos I ED. inscribed with a posy or
motto.
Some by a strip of woven hair
In posted lockets bribe the fair.
Gay, To a Young Lady.
Possession, idea ; prepossession.
I have a strong possession, that with thia
five hundred I shall win five thousand. —
Cibber, Prov. Husband, Act I.
Possession ers, those belonging to
religious orders endowed with lands, as
distinguished from the mendicants. H.
notices this sense, but gives no example.
They are nether gostly nor divine.
But lyke to brut beastes and swyne,
"Waltrynge in synf ull wretchednes.
I speake this of the possessianers,
All though the mendicant orders
Are nothynge lease abhominable.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott wrotht, p. 62.
Post, the game of post and pair.
See N. s. v., who however gives no
example of post by itself. See also
quotation s. v. Greek.
He cometh in only with jolly brags and
great vaunts, as if he were playing at post,
and should win all by vying. — Jewel, i. 429.
POST ALONE
( 507 )
POTHEAD
Post alone, quite alone.
And when whole hosts were pras'd to stroy
my foen.
She chaog'd her cheer, and left me post alone,
Sackville, Stafford Duke of Buckingham,
st. 49.
Her self left also she deemed
Pott aloan, and soaly from woonted com-
panye singled.— Stany hurst, -J?n., iv. 492.
Posted, made a post-captain.
Tell me if when I returned to England in
the year eight with a few thousand pounds,
and was posted into the Laconia, if I had then
written to you, would you have answered my
letter? — Miss Austen, Persuasion, ch. xxiii.
Whispers were afloat, which came to the
ears of the Admiralty, and prevented him
from being posted, — Marry at, Peter Simple,
ch. Iv.
Post-ferment, the opposite of pre-
ferment. Fuller in another passage,
and also South, speak of being " pre-
ferred downwards."
This his translation was a Post-ferment,
6eeingthe Arch-bishoprick of Saint Andrews
was subjected in that age unto York. —
Fuller, Worthies, Durham (i. 329).
Postscribe, to write after.
He that took from sin the power to con-
demn us, took also from it the power to reign
in our mortal bodies. And the second is but
a consequent of the first, postscribed with
that word of inference, '* Now then," &c. —
Adams, i. 325.
It was but mannerly in Bellarmine to post-
scribe two of his tomes with Laws Deo, Vir*
ginique Matri Maria, — Ibid., ii. 7.
Postvide, to shut the door when the
steed is stolen ; to be wise after the
event.
" When the daughter is stolen, shut Pep-
per-gate ;" . . . when men instead of pre-
yenting postvide against dangers. — Fuller,
Worthies, Chester (i. 200).
Pot. To make the pot with two ears
=■ to set the arms akimbo.
Thou sett'st thy tippet wondrous high,
And rant'st, there is no coming nigh ;
See what a goodly port she bears,
Making the pot with the two ears.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 236 .
Pot. To keep the pot boiling = to
keep things going, to provide for the
necessaries of life. So artists call pic-
tures which are painted rather for im-
mediate sale than for artistic fume, pot-
boilers.
Whatsoever Kitching found it, it was made
poor enough before he left it ; so poor that
it is hardly able to keep the pot boilinj for a
parson's dinner. — Heylin, Reformation, p.
212.
No fav'ring patrons have I got,
But just enough to boil the pot.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xxiii.
" Keep the pot bilin\ Sir," cried Sam ; and
down went Wardle again, and then Mr.
Pickwick, and then Sam, and then Mr.
Winkle, and then Mr. Bob Sawyer, and
then the fat boy, and then Mr. Snodgrass,
following closely upon each other's heels.-—
Dickens, Pickwick Papers, ch.
Pot, to shoot or kill (for the pot).
The arrow flew, the string twanged, but
Martin had been in a hurry to pot her, and
lost her by an inch. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. viii.
" You don't seem to care about shooting
guillemots, Lavender." "Well, you see,
potting a bird that is sitting on the water— "
said Lavender, with a shrug. " Oh, it isn't as
easy as you might imagine."— Black, Prin-
cess of Thule, ch. xxiii.
Potato-jaw, mouth. The extract is a
speech of the Duke of Clarence's to Mrs.
Schwellenberg. Potato-trap is more
common.
" Hold you your potato-jaw, my dear,"
cried the Duke, patting her. — Mad. D'Ar-
blay, Diary, v. 209.
Potator, drinker.
Barnabee, the illustrious potator, saw there
the most unbecoming sight that he met with
in all his travels.— Southey, The Doctor, ch.
xliv.
Pot-boy-dom, the pot-boy class ; per-
sons of that sort of social position :
word formed like rascaldom, scoundrel-
dom, &c.
It is a part of his game to ingratiate him-
self with all pot-boy-dom, while at heart he is
as proud, exclusive an aristocrat as ever wore
nobleman's hat. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. xiii.
Potentiary, power : only nsual in
the compound, plenipotentiary.
Before Olive made his accustomed visit to
his friends at the hotel opposite, the last
great potentiary had arrived who was to take
part in the family congress. — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch.
Pot-gutted, fat; having a large cor-
poration. Pot-bellied is the more usual,
and perhaps, of the two, the more
elegant expression.
I a vessel of broth ! yea pot-gutted rascal
no more thai yourself ! — Graves, Spiritua
Quixote, Bk. IV. ch. viii.
Pothead, a stupid fellow.
POTHEEN
( 5o8 )
POUND
She was too good for a poor pot-head like
me.—Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xv.
Potheen, whiskey. See Potsheen.
His nose it is a coral to the view,
Well nourish'd with Pierian potheen.
Hood, Irish Schoolmaster.
Potion, to drug.
Lord Roger Mortimer, .... hauing cor-
rupted his keepers, or (as some others write)
hailing pottoned them with a sleepy driiike,
escaped out of the Tower of London. —
Speed, History, Bk. IX. oh. zl
Pot-liquor, thin broth, or the liquor
in which meat has been boiled.
Mr. Oeoffry ordered her to come daily to
his mother's kitchen, where, together with
her broth or pot-liquor, he contrived to slip
something more substantial into Dorothy's
pipkin. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. I.
ch. ix.
In the distribution of these comestibles, as
in every other household duty, Mrs. Bagnet
develops an exact system : sitting with every
dish before her ; allotting to every portion
of pork its own portion of vot-liouor, greens,
potatoes, and even mustard. — Dxckens, Bleak
House, ch. xxvii.
Pot - luck. To take pot-luck = to
accept an impromptu invitation to din-
ner, where no special preparation for a
guest has been made.
The gentleman said, as Wildgoose, he sup-
posed, had not dined, he should be very
welcome to take pot-luck with him ; that his
house was but at the end of the avenue of
firs, and he was just going to dinner. —
Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. IX. ch. xii.
He never contradicted Mrs. Hackit, a
woman whose pot-luck was always to be re-
lied on. — G. Eliot, Amos Barton, ch. i.
Potman, servant at a public-house
who attends to the pots, cleaning them,
carrying thein out, calling for them,
&c. Potboy is more common.
The potman thrust the last brawling
drunkards into the street. — Dickens, Uncom-
mercial Traveller, xiii.
Potsheen. See extract. The word
is usually spelt potheen, q. v.
" A glass of what, in the name of heaven ? "
said Lord Colambre. u Potsheen, plase your
honour ; beca-ase it's the little whiskey that's
made in the private still or pot ; and sheen
because its a fond word for whatsoever we'd
like, and for what we have little of, and
would make much of." — Miss Edgeworth, Ab-
sentee, ch. x.
Potter. "In the dialect of the
North, a hawker of earthenware is thus
designated " ( Wordsworth, note in loc.).
A Potter, air, he was by trade.— Peter BtU
Pt.I.
Pottle, a childish game.
I have as little inclination to write verses
as to play at pottle or whip-top. — Southey,
Letters, 1822 (iu. 334).
PoT-wiLLOKEB. See extract: mis-
print for pot- walloper (?).
The election of members here [Taunton]
is by those whom they call pot-walloners, that
is to say, every inhabitant, whether house-
keeper or lodger, who dresses his own victuals ;
to make out which, several inmates or lodgers
will, some little time before the election,
bring out their pots, and make fires in the
street, and boil victuals in the sight of their
neighbours, that their votes may not be called
in question.— 2>s/o6, Tour thro* G. Britain,
ii. 18.
Pot-walloping, the "pot-boiling, or,
in the extract, the sound caused by it
The trumpet that once announced from
afar the laurelled mail . . . has now given
way for ever to the pot-toallnrings of the
boiler. — De Quincey, Eng. Mail Coach.
Pouch, to purse up.
He pouched his mouth, and reared himself
up, and swelled. — Richardson, Grandison, v.
58.
Pouch-mouth, open-mouthed (?), or
with pu reed-up mouth (?). Ambidexter,
the vice or buffoon in Preston's King
Cambises, uses " Goodman pouch -
mouth'1 as a term of reproach or
insult {Hawkins, Eng. Dr., i. 263, 305).
Players, I mean, theaterians, pouch-mouth
stage-walkers. — Dekker, Satiromastix (Hate-
kins, Eng. Dr., iii. 172).
Poulter's measure, poulterer's mea-
sure. See quotation.
The commonest sort of verse which we vse
nowaday es (vis., the long verse of twelue
and fourtene Billables) I know not certainly
howe to name it, vnlesse I should say that it
doth consist of poulter's measure, which giueth
xii for one dozen and xiiijjfor another. —
Gascoigne, Instruction concerning the making
of verse, p. 39.
The first or the first couple hauing twelue
Billables, the other fourteene, which versi-
fyers call powlters measure, because so they
tallie their wares by dozens. — Webbe, Dis-
course of Eng. Poetrie, p. 62.
Pounce, usually applied only to the
talons of a bird of prey.
A lion may be judg'd by these two claws
of his pounce. — Uacket, Life of Williams,
i. 71.
Pound, to wager, and so to be certain.
44 Don't be out of temper, my dear," urged
POUND
( 509 ) PRJESC1ENTIAL
Fagin, submissively ; '.** I have never forgot
you, Bill, never once." "No! I'll pound it
that 70a han't," replied Sikes, with a bitter
grin. — Dickens, Oliver Twist, oh. xxxix.
Pound, to bruise or beat : this sense
is given in the Dicta. ; hence it = to
plod heavily.
A fat farmer, sedulously pounding through
the mud, was overtaken and bespattered in
spite of all his struggles. — C. Kingsley, Yeast,
ch. i.
Pour, a heavy rain : the compound
down-pour is more common.
He mounted his horse, and rode home ten
miles in tpour of rain. — Miss Ferrier, Destiny,
ch. xx.
Poverish, to impoverish.
No violent showr
Poverisht the land, which frankly did produce
All fruitfull vapours for delight and use.
Sylvester, Eden, 156.
Powder-monkey, a ship's boy: pro-
perly one who carried powder from the
magazine to the gun.
Lucifer himself, I'm sure, should he wage
new war with heaven, would not have given
threepence a piece to have listed them into
his service ; they would not have been fit for
so much as powder-monkeys, to have handed
fire and brimstone after the army. — T. Brown,
Works, ii. 212.
Ellangowan had him placed as cabin-boy,
or potodtr-monkey, on board an armed sloop
or yacht belonging to the revenue. — Scott,
Guy Mannering, ii. 305.
Power, a quantity : the word is often
used in old writers of a number of men,
a military force.
I am providing a power of pretty things
for her against I see ner next. — Richardson,
Pamela, ii. 389.
Pow-sowdy. H. gives "powsoddy,
a Yorkshire pudding," but see extract,
where the locality spoken of is West-
moreland.
The principal charm of the " gathering " . .
was not assuredly diminished to the men by
the anticipation of excellent ale, . . . and
possibly of still more excellent pow-sowdy (a
combination of ale, spirits, and spices). — De
Quineey, Autob. Sketches, ii. 109.
Practicality, active work.
The fair Susan, stirring up her indolent
enthusiasm into practicality, was very suc-
cessful in finding Spanish lessons, and the
like, for these distressed men. — Carlyle, Life
of Sterling, ch. x.
Practise, to carry out : the usage of
the word in the quotation is peculiar.
I copied &n inscription set up at the end of
a great road, which vex practised through an
immense solid rock by bursting it asunder
with gunpowder. —.Walpole, Letters, i. 36
(1739).
Pr^adamitical, existing before
Adam.
Upon what memorials do you ground the
story of your pra-adamitical transactions ? —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 414.
Prjeliation, battle ; contention.
We have stirred the humors of the foolish
inhabitants of the earth to insurrections, to
warr sxApntliation.— Howell, Parly of Beasts,
p. 33.
PrjEMETIAL, pertaining to the first-
fruits ; first-gathered.
If we should not, therefore, freely offer to
your Majesty some prametial handfuls of
that crop, whereof you may challenge the
whole harvest, bow could we be but shame-
lessly unthankful ?— Bp. Hall, Dedic. to K.
James.
Praemunire, used as a verb = to bring
within the penalties of a praemunire.
For you must know that Horn desir'd
To have good Bonner pramunired.
Ward, England's Reformation, c. 2, p. 166.
pRiEMUNiRE, scrape ; confusion. The
expression is derived from the legal
Eenalties attending a praemunire. Cf.
ISERARA.
If the law finds you with two wives at once,
There's a shrewd nremunire.
Massinger, Old Law, Act V.
He getting me drunk one night, I was
married to her, and was ready to cut my
own throat the next day ; but I, seeing what
a priminary I had by my ludness brought
myself in, I saw that it could not be avoided.
—Letter of Robert Young, 1680 (Harl. Misc.,
vi.334).
I'm in such a fright ! the strangest quan-
dary and premunire! I'm'all over in a uni-
versal^ agitation. — Congre've, Double Dealer.
Act IV.
So my lady has brought herself into a fine
premumre. — Centlivre, The Gamester, Act IV
Prjsnatal, previous to birth.
The Doctor thought there was no creature
to which you could trace back so many per-
sons in civilized society by the indications
which they afforded of habits acquired in
their pra natal professional education.—
Southey, The Doctor, ch. cexxix.
Pr£ sciential, fore-knowing; pre-
saging.
Love's of so quick a sight, that he
Aforehand with his object is,
And into dark Futurity
With prasciential rays doth press.
Beaumont, Love's Eye*
PR&1ER
( 510 ) PREBENDARY
Prater, post. See extract from
Naslie s. v. Paralogize.
To come, when Micah wrote this, and in
the future ; bat come, when St. Matthew
cited it, and in the prater — " When Jesus was
born at Bethlehem." But future and prater
both are in time, so this His birth in time. —
Andrewes, i. 162.
Prage, same as prog or prod (?).
Theyre blades they brandisht, and keene
jprages goared in entrayls
Of stags seun migty.
Stanyhurst, uEn., i. 196.
Pragmatic, a busy-body.
Such pragmaticks . . . labour impertinently.
— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 502.
Pragmatical, busy (in a good sense).
The word is not generally used so, nor
do the Diets, furnish any example.
I received instructions how to behave in
towne with directions to masters and bookes
to take in search of the antiquities, churches,
collections, &c. Accordingly the next day,
Nov. 6th, I began to be very pragmatical. —
Evelyn, IHary, Nov. 5, 1644.
Pragmatism, busy impertinence.
Mrs. Dollop, the spirited landlady of the
Tankard, in Slaughter Lane, . . had often to
resist the shallow pragmatism of customers
disposed to think that their reports from the
outer world were of equal force with what
had " come up " in her mind. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. lxxi.
Pragmatizer, busy-body.
The pragmatizer is a stupid creature ; no-
thing is too beautiful or too sacred to be
made dull and vulgar by his touch. — E. Tylor,
Primitive Culture, i. 407.
Praise-worth, praiseworthy.
Whose praise- loorth vertures, if in verse I
now should take in hand
For to comprize . . .
Holland's Camden, p. 290.
Pram. See extract.
Around us lay the foreign steamers, mostly
English, each with its crowd of boats and
prams. These prams are huge barges roofed
over, and resemble for all the world game-
pies or old-fashioned monitors. — Roe, Land
of the North Wind, p. 158 (1875).
Prancome, something odd or strange.
Gog's hart, I durst have laid my cap to a
crowu,
Ch' would learn of some prancome as soon as
ich cham to town.
Gammer GurtonJs Needle (Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., i. 173).
Prat, cant term for a buttock.
See H.
First set me down here on both my prats.
— Broome, Jovial Crete, Act II.
Prateful, chattering ; loquacious.
The French character seems to me much
altered ; . . the people are more circumspect,
less prateful. — Taylor of Norwich, 1802
(Memoir, 1. 208).
Prattiqde, practice ; habits.
How could any one of English education
and vrattique swallow such a low rabble sug-
gestion? Much more monstrous is it to
imagine readers so imposable upon to credit
it upon any one's bare relation. — North,
Examen, p. 306.
Prattle-basket, a talkative woman.
H. explains it a talkative child, but
Breton is speaking of a man's wife.
Cf. Bawdy-basket.
But if she be ilfauor'd, blind and old,
A prattle-basket, or an idle slut.
Breton, Mother1 s Blessing, st. 74.
Pratye, talkative.
Nevertheless© amonge this araye,
Was there not one called Coclave,
A littell pratye foolysshe poade ?
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott torothe, p. 43.
Prayant, one who prays. See ex-
tract more at length s. v. Euchite.
Fanatick Erruur and Levity would seem
an Euchite as well as an Eristick, Prayant
as well as predicant. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 93.
Prayer-monger, a contemptuous
name for one who prays.
I have led
Some camel-kneed prayer-monger through
the c&ve.—Soidhey, Thalaba, Bk. V.
Pray -pray -fashion, imploringly ;
clasped as in prayer.
" Pray, sir, forgive me ; " and she held up
her hands pray-pray-fashion, thus. — Rtchard-
son, Gr ami son, li. 183.
Preallably, previously (Fr. preal-
lablement).
No swan dieth until preallably he have
sung. — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. ill. ch. xxi.
Prearm, to forearm.
These be good thoughts to prearm our
souls. — Adams, iii. 25.
Pre- aver, to affirm beforehand ; to
prophesy.
Another, past all hope, doth pre-auerr
The birth of John, Christ's holy Harbenger.
Sylvester, First day, first weeke, 778.
Prebendary, a prebend ; usually,
the holder of that preferment.
PRECAUTIONARY ( 511 )
PREDECLARE
A prebendary was offered me, as they call
it : it was a good fat benefice, and I accepted
it. — Bailey** Erasmus , p. 184.
Precautionary, precaution : usually
an adjective.
Thou seest, Belford, by the above pre-
cautionaries, that I forget nothing. — Richard-
son, CI. Harlowe, iv. 49.
Precautious, provident ; careful.
It was not the mode of the Conrt in those
days to be very penetrant, precautious, or
watchful. — North, Examen, p. 93.
Precession, a going before or pre-
cedence. L. quotes a passage from
Barrow on the Pope's Supremacy,
where it means precedence, Dut it is
seldom used except in the phrase pre-
cession of the equinoxes. Breton, how-
ever, has a poem called Pasquil's Pre-
cession, which is a sort of satirical
Litany. I suppose, therefore, he em-
ploys the terra in the sense of prayer,
as though it came from preces.
Precessor, predecessor. Bp. Hall,
who had been Curate of Waltham, in
a letter to Fuller, who then held that
office (Aug. 30, 1651), signs himself,
" Your much devoted friend, precessor,
and fellow-labourer, Jos. Hall, B. N."
{Fuller, Ch. Histj X. v. 7). In the
extract, if the punctuation be right, it
is used adjectivally.
Fordham was herein more court-like and
civil to this Eudo, than Thomas Arundel, his
Precessour Bishop of Ely. — Fuller, Hist, of
Camb., iii. 62.
Precipation, precipitation: perhaps
a misprint.
The Dorien . . his falls, sallyes, and com-
passe be diuers from those of the Phrigien,
the Phrigien likewise from the Lydien, and
all three from the Eolien, Miolidien, and
Ionien, mounting and falling from note to
note such as be to them peculiar, and with
more or lease leasure or precipation. — Putten-
ham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch. xi.
Precipice, a headlong fall.
I am more amazed,
Nay thunderstruck, with thy apostacy
And precipice from the most solemn vows
Made unto heaven.
Massinger, Maid of Honour, ii. 5.
Cam. Tell me, when you saw this
Did not you grieve, as I do now to hear it ?
Ador. His precipice from goodness raising
mine,
And serving as a foil to set my faith off,
I had little reason. — Ibid., v. 1.
His fall is with a precipice, from a sublime
pinnacle of honour to a deep puddle of
penury. — Adams, iii. 293.
Precisionize, to lay down precise
rules or statements.
What a pity the same man does not . . .
precisionize other questions of political
morals!— Sir G. C. Lewis. Letters (1847), p.
143.
Preclusion, shutting out by antici-
pation.
Here be twins conceived together, born to-
gether ; yet of as different natures and quali-
ties as if a vast local distance had sundered
their births, or as if the originary blood of
enemies had run in their several veins. It
is St. Augustine's preclusion of all star-pre-
dictions out of this place. — Adams, i. 9.
Precur8IVE, fore-running; prepara-
tory.
But soon a deep precursive sound moaned
hollow. — Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Predatorious, predatory; fond of
plunder.
These are the holy sparks, these the bless-
ed flames of uncharitable and unquenchable
zeale, . . burning in some men's reforming
breasts so long, till they become predatorious
and adulterou8,consumptionaryand culinary,
false and base fires. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 321.
Predr, plunder. See also extract
8. v. Rinet. R. cites Holinshed for
the word, and says that it was pe-
culiar to him. Stanyhurst was one of
Holinshed's assistants in compiling his
Chronicle, and perhaps the passage
cited by R. is due to him.
For we hither sayld not thee Moors with an
armye to vanquish,
Or from their region with prede too gather
an heard flock. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 514.
Predecess, to precede ; to occupy
before another. The verb is coined
by Walpole from the substantive pre-
decessor.
Lord John Sackville predecessed me here.
— Walpole, Letters, i. 164 (1747).
Predecessive, preceding.
Our noble and wise prince has hit the law
That all our predecessive students
Have miss'd, unto their shame.
Massinger, Old Law,\. 1.
Predeclare, to foretell.
Though I write fifty odd, I do not carry
An almanack in my bones to predeclare
What weather we shall have.
Massinger, Guardian, i. 1.
PREDESERT
( 5» )
PRE LATELY
Like a rough surgeon,
Without a feeling in yourself you search
My wounds unto the quick, then predeclare
Tne tediousness and danger of the cure.
Ibid., A Very Woman, ii. 2.
Predesert, previous merit.
Some good offices we do to friends, others
to strangers, but those are the noblest that
we do without predesert. — Ly Estrange' s Se-
neca'* Morals, en. ii.
PREDE8TINARY, predestinarian.
The Zwinglian Gospellers . . . began to
scatter their predestinary doctrines in the
Reign of King Edward.— Heylin's Hist, of
the Presbyterians, p. 21.
Predevour, to devour in anticipation.
Sir Thomas Cooke . . was cast before-
hand at the Court (where the Lord Rivers
and the rest of the Queen's kindred had pre-
devoured his estate), and was onely for for-
malities sake to be condemned. — Fuller,
Worthies, Notts (ii. 207).
Prediction al, prophetic ; predictive.
The contests betwixt Scholars and Scholars
. .( were observed predictional, as if their
animosities were the Index of the Volume
of the land— Fuller, Worthies. Oxford (ii.
221).
Pbedie (?) : misprint for prettye (?),
or b ready (?).
Divers light and lewd persons be not
ashamed or af erde to say, Why should I see
the sacring of the high Masse ? Is it any-
thing else but a piece of bread, or a little
predxe round Robin ?— Fuller, Ch. Hist., V.
iv. 28.
Prediscover, to foresee.
These holy men did prudently prediscover
that differences in judgements would un-
avoidably happen in the Charch. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., IX. i. 52f
Predominate, predominant ; ruling.
He gave way to his predominate bias. —
Richardson, Grandison, ii. 141.
Predone, exhausted. Fordone is
used in this sense in old authors : e. g.
" All with merry task fordone " {Midi.
Night's Dream, V. ii.).
I am as one desperate and predone with
various kinds of work at once. — C. Kingsley,
1859 {Life, ii. 99).
Pre doom, to fore-ordain.
She went forth alone,
To the predoomed adventure.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Some read the king's face, some the queen's,
and all
Had marvel what the maid might be, but
most
PredoonCd her as unworthy.
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine.
Preferable is frequently used by
Richardson in the sense of " prefer-
ring."
I have a, preferable regard for Mr. Love-
lace.— CI. Harlowe, i. 203.
Lady L., don't think to rob me of my
Harriet's preferable love, as you have of Sir
Charles's : I will be best sister here. — Sir C.
Grandison, ii. 15.
If we could be so happy as to have Miss
Byron for our guest, I am sure of my sister,
and it would be my preferable wish. — Ibid.,
ii. 106.
Lady D. . . . knowing too my preferable
regard for your brother. — Ibid., vi. 204.
Prefidence, excessive confidence.
Out of Christ's conquest he [the devil]
makes a new assault ; that is, since He will
needs trust, he will set Him on trusting, He
shall trust as much as He will. As the for-
mer tempted Him to diffidence, so this shall
tempt Him to prefdence. — A ndrewes, Sermons,
v. 513.
Prefract, obstinate. Bp. Gardiner
said to Bradford at his examination,
Jan. 29, 1555—
Thou wast so prefract and stout in reli-
gion.— Bradford, i. 474.
Pregage, to pledge beforehand.
The members of the Councell of Trent,
both Bishops and Abbots, were by oath pre-
qaged to the Pope to defend and maintain
his authority against all the world. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., IX. i. 42.
Pregnancy, a promising youth.
Fuller has the s?ime expression in his
Worthies (Barkshire Statesmen).
This was the fashion in his reign, to select
yearly one or moe of the most promising
pregnancies out of both universities, and to
oreed them beyond the seas on the king's
exhibitions unto them. — Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
VI. p. 340.
Prejudice to, to prejudice against.
The perverseness and contradiction I have
too often seen in some of ray visits, even
among people of sense, as well as condition,
had prejudiced me to the married state. —
Richardson, Pamela, ii. 317.
Prelateitt, the notion of prelacy.
Neither shall I stand to trifle with one
that would tell me of quiddities and for-
malities, whether prelaty or prelateity in
abstract notion be this or that. — Milton, Ch.
Gov. against Prelaty, Bk. II. ch. i.
Prelatelt, prelatical
PRELATIAL
( 513 ) PRESTIDIGITAL
Their copes, perrours, and chasubles, when
they be in their prelately pompous sacrifices.
— Bale, Select Works, p. 526.
Prklatial, episcopal.
Servants came in bearing a large and
magnificent portfolio ; it was of morocco and
of grelatial purple. — Disraeli, Lothair, ch.
xvin.
Prelatish, episcopal.
In any congregation of this island that
hath not been altogether furnished or wholly
perverted with prelatish leaven, there will
not want divers plain and solid men. —
Milton, Apol.for Smectymnuus.
Premeditatkdness, deliberate cha-
racter, opposed to extempore effusions :
Gauden is speaking of the Prayer-Book.
Its order, premeditatedness, and constancy
of devotion was never forbidden or disal-
lowed by God.— Tears of the Church, p. 89.
Premio, premium.
It is just as if the ensurers brought in a
catalogue of ensured ships lost, taking no
notice of ships arrived and premios. — North,
Eramen, p. 490.
In all which offices the premio is so small,
and the recovery, in case of loss, so easy and
certain, that nothing can be shewn like it in
the world.— Defoe, Tour thro1 Q. Britain, ii.
111.
Prepare, to go ; repair.
With these Instructions he prepares to the
Court of Scotland, makes himself known
unto the king, . . . —Heylin's Hist, of the
Presbyterians, p.' 220.
Prkpractise, to do previously.
They suspected lest those who formerly
had outrunne the canons with their addi-
tional conformitie ^ceremonizing more than
was enjoyned) now would make the canons
come up to them, making it necessary for
others what voluntarily they had preprac-
tised themselves.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. iii.
14.
Preprovidk, to provide in advance.
Before livings were actually void, he pro-
visionally pre-provided incumbents for them.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. ix. 25.
Pbesagious, predictive ; ominous.
Some supernatural cause sent me strange
visions, which being confirmed with pre-
sayiou* chances, I had gone to Delphos, and
there received this answer.— Sidney, Arcadia,
p. 204.
Presbytebism, Presbyterianism. See
extract from Gauden *. v. Independ-
entism.
It looks not all like Popery that Preshy-
ttrtsrn was disdained by the king ; his father
had taught him that it was a sect so per-
fidious, that he found more faith among the
Highlanders.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii.
197.
Pre-scene, induction or prologue.
O holy knot in Eden instituted,
Not in this earth, with blood and wrongs
polluted,
Frofan'd with mischiefs, the pre-scane of hell
To cursed creatures that Against Heaven
rebell.
Sylvester, Sixth day, first weeke, 1072
Prescribe, to prefix in writing : not
often used literally. The subjoined is
from Chapman's Dedication of Byron's
Gonspiracie and Tragedie to Walsing-
ham, 1608.
Hailing heard your approbation of these
in their presentment, I could not but pre-
scribe them with your name.
Presidentess, female president.
I became by that means the presidentess of
the dinner and tea-table. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, iii. 171.
Presidiary, a guard : the Diets, have
the word as an adjective.
Not one of those heavenly presidiaries
struck a stroke for the prophet. — Bp. Hall,
Cont. (Elisha and the Assyrians).
Press, to commit to the press; to
print The subjoined is quoted by
Heylin from a dedication by Laud
(1637) to the king of an appendix to a
book by Dr. White.
The discourse upon this conference . .
staid long before it could endure to be
pressed. — Heylin, life of Laud, p. 121.
Pressman, a man engaged in press-
ing grape-juice.
One only path to all, by which the press-
men came
In time of vintage.
Chapman, Iliad, xviii. 515.
Press-master, leader of a press-
gang.
Are not our sailors paid and encouraged
to that degree, that there is hardly any need
of press-masters? — T. Brown, Works, iv. 123.
[Pallas] Whispered into the Major's ear
To act a Wapping Press-master.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, c. 2.
Presti digital, having fingers fit for
juggling.
Meadows was ambidexter. The two hands
he gathered coin with were Meadows and
Crawley. The first his honest, hard-working
hand; the second his three-fingered Jack,
his prestidiyital hand. — Reade, Never too late
to mend, ch. vi.
L L
PRE-STUD Y
( 5H )
PRIDE
Pre-study, to study beforehand.
He . . never broached what he had not
brewed, but preached what he had pre-studied
some competent time before. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Cambridge (i. 165).
Pretkrcanink, beyond the capacity
or nature of a dog.
A great dog . . . pawed me, however,
quietly enough, not staying to look up with
strange pretercanine eyes in my face, as I
half expected it would. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. zii.
Preternatcralism, unnatural state.
Camille'8 head, one of the clearest in
France, has got itself . . saturated through
every fibre with preternaturalism of sus-
picion.— Carlyle, A. JZe*., Pt. III. Bk. III.
ch. vui.
Preternuptial. " A pretemuptial
person " is a delicate expression for an
adulterer.
Nay, poor woman, she by and by, we find,
takes up with preternuptial persons. — Car-
lyle, Misc., iv. 97.
Pretexture, pretext.
Now we have studied both textures of
words and pretextures of manners, to shroud
dishonesty. — Adams, ii. 416.
Pretorture, to torture beforehand.
Remarkable was their cruelty in pretor-
turing of many whom afterwards they put
to death.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VIII. ii. 27.
Prevenancy, attention ; readiness.
La Floor's prevenancy (for there was a
passport in his very looks) soon set every
servant in the kitchen at ease with him. —
Sterne, Sent. Journey, The Letter.
Previse, to prewarn, or inform before-
hand.
Mr. Pelham, it will be remembered, has
prevised the reader that Lord Vincent was
somewhat addicted to paradox. — Lytton,
Pelham, ch. xv. (note).
Prey, to ravage (with direct ob-
jective).
The said Justice preied the countrey Tir-
connell. — Holland's Camden, ii. 166.
► Priamist, a son of Priam.
Then snatch'd he up two Priamists that in
one chariot stood.
Chapman, Iliad, v. 166.
Prick, to adorn, or embroider. See H.
I would [women] would (as they have
much wricking), when they put on their cap,
I would they would have this meditation:
" I am now putting on my power upon my
head." If they had this thought in their
minds, they would not make so much prick-
ing up of themselves as they do now a davs,
—Latimer, i. 253.
It is not idle going about,
Nor all day pricking on a clout,
Can make a man to thriue.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 155.
Prickant, spurring, and so, travel-
ling. In the second extract it = sharp,
or perhaps jutting out.
What knight is that, squire? ask him if he
keep
The passage, bound by love of lady fair,
Or else but prickant.
Beaum. and Fl.t Knt. of the B. Pestle, ii. 5.
Without his door doth hang
A copper basin on & prickant spear.
Ibid^ iii. 2.
Pricker, light horseman.
There were assembled in their camp . . .
two thousand horsemen, "prickers" as they
[the Scotch] call them . . . Four or five of
this Captain's prickers with their gads ready
charged did right hastily direct their course.
— W. Patten, Exped. to Scotland, 1548 (Any
Garner, III. 63, 88).
This sort of spur was worn by a body of
light horsemen, in the reign of Henry VIII.,
thence called prickers.— Arehmol., VIII. 113
(1787).
Prick - he - dainty, a fine, affected
person.
Tib. Then shall ye see Tibet, sirs, treade
the mosse so trimme,
Nay, why sayd I treade ? Te shall see hir
glide and swimme,
Not lumperdee clumperdee like our Span-
iell Big,
Trupen. Mary then, prick-me-dainti*, come
toste me a fig.
Udal, Roister Doister, II. 3.
Bailie Pirlet, who was naturally a gabby
prick^me-dainty body, enlarged at great length
with all his well dockit words, as if they were
on chandlers pins. — Gait, The Provost, ch.
xxxi.
Prickbhot, a bowshot, space between
the archer and the mark.
The tents, as I noted them, were divided
into four several orders and rewes lying east
and west, and a prickshot asunder. — Patten,
Exped. to Scotland, 1548 (Eng. Garner, III.
99).
Pricky, prickly.
A prickie stalke it hath of the owne . . .
prickie moreouer it is like a thorne. — Hol-
land, Pliny, xix. S.
Holme-trees grow plentifully with their
sharp prickey leaves alwaies greene. — Ibid.,
Camden, p. 351.
Pride, to be proud : all the examples
in the Diets, give it as a reflective verb,
which is its present use.
PRIDE
( SiS )
PRIMITIV1TY
Neither were the vainglorious content to
pride it upon success, and to stamp it upon
their money, " God with us," but sharpned
their presumption against the king's friends
with insultations and revilings. — Backet, Life
of Williams, II. 203.
It's a madness to pride in oar shame, and
to look big because we are poor and indigent.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 21.
To pride, dear brother, in greatness is a
pompous folly.— Ibid., p. 138.
You only pride in your own abasement,
and glory in your shame. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, i. 36*8.
I regretted he was no more ; he would so
much have vrided and rejoiced in showing
his place. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, V. 30.
Pride, full force ?
The princes were even compelled by the
hail that the pride of the wind blew into
their faces, to seek some shrouding place. —
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 132.
Pridian, belonging to the previous
day.
Thrice a week at least does Gann breakfast
in bed — sure sign of pridian intoxication. —
Thackeray, Sfiabby Genteel Story, ch. ii.
Priest, priestess.
On a seate of the same Chariot, a little
more eleuate, sate Eunomia, the Virgine
Priest of the Goddesse Honor. — Chapman,
Masque of the Mid. Temple.
Priest, to hold or exercise the office
of priest ; one ordained 'to the second
order in the ministry is now often said
to be priested.
Honour God and the bishop as high-priest,
bearing the image of God according to his
ruling, and of Christ according to his priest*
ing. — Milton, Prelatical Episcopacy.
Priggish, dishonest : the word usually
means conceited or pragmatical.
Every prig is a slave. His own priggish
desires which enslave him themselves, betray
him to the tyranny of others. — Fielding,
Jonathan mid, Bk. IV. ch. iii.
Priggish, thievery; "here" in the
second quotation is Newgate ; also con-
ceit, or pragmaticalness ; priggishness
is commoner.
How unhappy is the state of priggism!
how impossible for human prudence to fore-
see and guard against every circumvention !
— Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. II. ch. iv.
"While one hath a roguery (a priggism they
here call it) to commit, and another a roguery
to defend, they must naturally fly to the
favour and protection of those who have power
to give them what they desire.— Ibid., Bk.
IV. ch. iii.
Tour great Mechanics' Institutes end in
intellectual priggism. — Hughes, Tom Brown* »
Schooldays, Ft. I. ch. ii.
Prill, stream.
Each siluer prill gliding on golden sand.
Dairies, Microcosmos, p. 12.
Driue on thy flocke then to the motley plaines
Where by some prill that 'mong the nib-
bles plods,
Thou, with thine oaten reede and quaintest
6 trainee,
May rapt the senior swaines and minor
gods.
Ibid., Eclogue, 1. 150.
Prim, privet* See L. s. v. privet.
Set priuie or prim,
Set boxe like nim.
Set giloflowers all,
That growea on the wall.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 38.
Prim, to purse up the mouth, or to
prepare oneself generally in a precise
way ; and so to be particular or strait-
laced.
Have I not known these many years
Thy love to th' tribe with the long ears,
Where primming sister, aunt, or coz,
Tune their warm zeal with hum and buz t
D'Urfty, Collin's Walk, Cant. I.
When she was primmed out, down she came
to him. — Richardson, CL Harlotve, iii. 37.
Tell dear Kitty not to prim up as if we
had never met before. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, ii. 108 (1781).
With other thought mark also the Abb6
Maury ; his broad, bold face, mouth accur-
ately primmed, full eyes that ray out intelli-
gence, falsehood. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I.
Bk. IV. ch. iv.
Primage, allowance paid by the
shipper of goods to master and sailors
for loud ing the vessel therewith. In a
Report to Lord Burleigh of the coat of
delivering a Tun of Gascoigny unite in
England in November, 16o3 (Arber,
Eng. Garner, i. 46), one item is —
" The freight, primage, and Dover money
on the tun, £1. 13. 0."
And in Linschoten's Voyage to Goa,
1594, we are told that in the Spanish
car racks employed on the Indian voy-
ages, the Master and the Pilot had
specified wages, " as also ' Primnge,'
and certain tons of freight" {Ibtd.f
Eng. Garner, iii. 19).
Primitivity, primitiveness.
Oh ! I can tell yon the age of George the
Second is likely to be celebrated for more
primitivity than the disinterestedness of Mr.
Deard.— Walpole to Mann, iii. 331 (1759).
L L 2
PRIMROSED
( 5i« )
PROCESS
Prim rosed, adorned or covered with
primroses : cf. Cowbliped.
It stood cloee to the roadside, not one of
▼our broad, level, dusty, glaring causeways,
but a rig-sag, up-and-down primrosed by-
road.— Savage, Reuben Medlicott, Bk. I. ch. 1.
Princekin, little prince. Cf. Lord-
kin.
Every one of us according to his degree
can point to the Princekins of private life
who are nattered and worshipped. — The New-
comes, ch. liii.
Princeless, without a prince.
This county is Princeless, I mean, affords
no Royal nativities. — Fuller, Worthies, Rut"
land (II. 242).
Princelet, a petty prince.
German princelets might sell their country
niece-meal to French or Russian. — C. Kings-
ley, Alton Locke, ch. xxxii.
Princeling, a young or petty prince.
Our hopes, our just desires pursu'd,
To see our Princeling with a name indu'd.
Sylvester, Panaretut, 4.
The struggle in his own country has en-
tirely deprived him of revenues as great as
any forfeited by their Italian princelings.—
Disraeli, Lothair, ch. zlix.
Princessly, having the rank of
princess.
The busy old tarpaulin uncle I make but
my ambassador to Queen Annabella Howe,
to engage her (for example -sake to her
princessly daughter) to join in their cause. —
Richardson, CI. Harlow, i. 221.
Princum-Prancum. Grose gives " Mrs.
Princum Prancum, a nice, precise, formal
madam."
Princum Prancum is a fine dance. — Burton
Anatomy, p. 533.
What dance ?
No wanton jig I hope, no dance is lawful
But Prinkum-Prankum.
Randolph, Muses' Looking Glass, v. 1.
Princum 8, niceties of behaviour,
scruples.
My behaviour may not yoke
With the nice princums of that folk.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, Cant. I.
Privacy, a private matter.
The dislikers of the Liturgie bare them-
selves high upon the judgement of Master
Calvin in his letter (four years since) to the
Duke of Somerset, Lord Protectour, now no
longer a privacie% because publickly printed
in his Epistles. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., VII. ii. 18.
Privik, privet. See quotation from
Tusser *. v. Prim.
The borders round about are set with priuie
sweete,
Where neuer bird but nightingale preaumde
to set his feete.
N. Breton, Daffodils and Primroses, p. 3.
Prize, to risk or venture.
Thou'rt worthy of the title of a squire,
That durst, for proof of thy affection,
And for thy mistress' favour, prize thy blood.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 175.
Prizeable, valuable ; in use in Sussex.
Be careful of what love you venture few ;
For in so much as love is better worth,
So prudence is more prizeable in love.
Taylor, Virgin Widow, II. i.
The courage of the tongue
Is truly, like the courage of the hand,
A prizeable possession.
Ibid., St. Clements Eve, I. i.
Pro and con, used as a verb, to weigh
the arguments on both sides. See
quotation from Southey «. v. Shtlli-
shallirr.
A man in soliloquy reasons with himself,
and pros and cons and weighs all his designs.
— Congreve, Epist. Ded. to Double Dealer.
My father's resolution of putting me into
breeches . . . had nevertheless been pnfd
and cori&, and judicially talked over betwixt
him and my mother. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, iv.
197.
PROBALITY, probability.
[After describing a far-fetched derivation
for the name Brigantes.] But if such a con-
jecture may take place, others might with as
great probality derive them from the Brigantes
of Bntaine. — Holland's Camden, ii. p. 84.
Probatorie, house for novices.
In the same yeere Christian Bishop of
Iismore . . . and Pope Eugenius, a venerable
man, with whom he was in the Probatorie at
Clarevall, who also ordained him to be the
Legate in Ireland, . . . departed to Christ.—
Holland's Camden, ii. 151.
Probe, a printer's proof.
The thanksgiving for the queen's majesty's
preservation I have inserted into the collect,
which was apter place in mv opinion than
in the psalm ; ye shall see in the probe of
the print, and after judge. — GrindaTs Re-
mains, p. 268.
Procerous, lofty.
The compasse about the wall of this new
mount is five hundreth foot, . . . and the
procerous stature of it, so embailing and
girdling in this mount, twentie foot and Mxe
inches. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Jfise-,
vi. 153).
Process, to sue by legal process.
He was at the quarter-sessions proce$*?f
his brother. — Miss Edgeworth, Ennui, ch. viii
PROCESSION ( 517 ) PROLEGOMENOUS
Procession, to go in procession.
Bale, quoted by R., speaks of men
being processioned, i. e. beset with
processions (and other externals of
religion).
There is eating, and drinking, and pro-
cessioning, and masquerading. — Colman, Man
and Wife, Act I.
Thirteen St. Edmundsbury monks are at
last seen processioning towards the Win-
chester Manorhouse. — CarlyU, Past and
Present, Bk. II. ch. xcviii.
Truly this hisolatio suits my old bones
better than processioning. — Kinysley, Saint's
Tragedy, v. 1.
Processioner, one who goes in pro-
cession.
The processioners seeing them running to-
wards them, and with them the troopers of
the holy brotherhood with their cross-bows,
began to fear some evil accident. — Jarvis's
Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk. IV. ch. xxv.
Prochronism, anachronism.
The prochronisms in these mysteries are
very remarkable. — Archctol., xxvii. 252 (1838).
Proclaim ant, proclaimed
I was spared the pain of being the first
proclaimant of her flight. — E. Bronte, Wuther-
ing Heights, ch. xii.
Pboctorized, an undergraduate sent
for a proctor for some misdemeanour
is said to be proctorized.
One don't like to go in while there's any
chance of a real row, as you call it, and so
gets proctorized in one's old age for one's
patriotism. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
ch. xii.
Prodigalise, to lavish.
Major Mac Blarney prodigalises his offers
of service in every conceivable department
of life.— Zytton, Cartons, Bk. XVII. ch. i.
Productivity, power of production.
They have reinforced their own produc-
tivity, by the creation of that marvellous
machinery which differences this age from
any other age. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. z.
Profanatory, profaning.
Every one now had tasted the wassail-cup,
except Paulina, whose pas de fee on de fan-
tasie nobody thought of interrupting to offer
so profanatory a draught. — Miss Bronte, Vil-
lette, ch. xxv.
Professoress, female professor.
If I had children to educate, I would at
ten or twelve years of age, have a professor,
or professoress, of whist for them. — Thack-
eray, Roundabout Papers, xxx.
Proficiat. " Properly (Cotgrave
says), a fee or benevolence bestowed
on bishops in manner of a welcome,
immediately after their instalment."
[He] would have caused him to be burnt
alive, had it not been for M organ te, who for
his proficiat and other small fees gave him
nine tuns of beer.— Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk.
II. oh.
Proficiency, a start or advance;
generally applied to the student, not
the study.
By means whereof the Hebrew and Chal-
daiok tongues, which few in Oxon under-
stood, when I first came thither, became to
be so generally embraced, and so chearfully
studied, that it received a wonderful pro-
ficiency, and that too in a shorter time than
a man can easily imagine. — Heylin, Life of
Laud, p. 317.
Profuser, lavisher.
Fortune's a blind profuser of her own,
Too much she gives to some, enough to none.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 255.
Prog, food. The word is in R. and
L., but the subjoined is an earlier ex-
ample than any there given.
The Abbot also every Saturday was to
visit their beds, to see if they had not shuf-
fled in some softer matter or purloyned some
progge for themselves. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., v.
p. 290.
Progenerate, to beget
They were all progenerated colonies from a
Scythian or Tartar nce.—Archaol., ii. 250
(1773).
Progermination, birth ; growth.
Ignoble births which shame the stem
That gave progermination unto them.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 270.
Prohibiter, one who forbids.
Cecilia, with a sort of steady dismay in
her countenance, cast her eyes round the
church, with no other view than that of see-
ing from what corner the prohibiter would
start. — Mad. DUrblay, Cecilia, Bk. IX.
ch. vui.
Proker. Colman, in a note, says,
" Hibernicb, proker; Anglict, poker.*'
Before the antique Hall's turf fire
Was stretch'd the Porter, Con Maguire,
Who, at stout Usquebaugh's command,
Snor'd with his proker in his hand.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 46.
The proker s are not half so hot or so long,
By an inch or two, either in handle or prong.
Ingoldsby Legends (Old Woman in Grey).
Prolegomenous, introductory.
It may not be amiss in the prolegomenous
or introductory chapter to say something of
that species of writing which is called the
PROLIFY
( 518 ) PROPERTY-MAN
marvellous.— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. VIII.
oh. i.
Prolipt, to bring forth offspring.
There remained in the heart of such tome
piece of ill-temper unreformed, which in
time prolified, and sent out great and wast-
ing sins. — Sanderson, v. 338.
Prolix, long: usually applied to a
speech, or argument, or book.
She had also a most prolix heard and
mustachios.— Evelyn, Diary, Sept. 15, 1655.
Prolocutrix, spokeswoman.
Lady Countesse, hath the Lords made you
a charter, and sent you (for that you are an
eloquent speaker) to be their aduocate and
prolocutrix? — Daniel, Hist, of Eng.,p. 141.
A furious clash fell between them who
should be the prolocutrix. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 33.
Prolongate, to prolong or lengthen.
His prolongated nose
Should guard his grinning mouth from blows.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. ii.
Promenader, walker ; see next entry.
Promenade as a substantive is at least
as old as 1648. See quotation from
Bp. Mountague in R. and L. ; the latter
also has promenade as a verb, with an
example from Tennyson.
Play, laughter, or even a stare out of win-
dow at the sinful, merry, Sabbath-breaking
promenaders were all forbidden. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. i.
Promenaderkss woman taking a
walk.
Frilled promenaders saunter under the
trees ; white-muslin promenaderess, in green
parasol, leaning on your arm. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. VI. ch. iv.
Promiscuity, confusion.
The God-abstractions of the modern poly-
theism are nearly in as sad a state of per-
plexity and promiscuity as were the more
substantial deities of the Greeks. — E. A.
Foe, Marginalia, lxxv.
Promisefull, full of promises.
So som he wins with promisefull intreats,
With presents som, and som with rougher
threat*. — Sylvester, Babylon, 96.
Promontorious, overhanging like a
promontory, and so, high and pre-
dominant.
The Papists brag of their numerous multi-
tude, and promontorious celsitude. — Adams,
i.422.
Promontory, used adjectivally =
high ; projecting.
He found his flockes grazing vpon the
Promontorie Mountainea. — Greene, Mena-
phon, p. 23.
Who sees not that the clambering goats
get upon rocks and promontory places? —
Adams, i. 428.
Promo val, advancement.
Tell me if my recommendation can in
anything be steadable for the promoval of
the good of that youth. — Urguhart's Rabe-
lais, Bk. III. ch. xxix.
Prompterical, pertaining to a
prompter.
The Prompter's Boy, Messieurs, must stand
Near the Stage-Door, close at the Prompter's
hand;
Holding a Nomenclature that's numerical.
Which tallies with the Book prompterical.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 14.
Propagate, to scatter.
This short harangue propagated the Juncto,
and put an end to their resolves ; however
they took care of their fee, but then left all
concern for the lady behind them. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 544.
Propagatrkss, female promoter.
Tell me freely if you have a mind to see
Saturnia again, your native soyle . . . the
prime propagatresse of religion and learning.
—Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 89.
Propenbely, deliberately.
Others . . . looked upon it on the con-
trary as a real and substantial oath pro-
pensly formed against Yorick. — Sterne, TrisU
Shandy, iii. 203.
Propensive, favourable.
Edward the Thirde of his propensive minde
towardes them, united to Yarmouth Kirtley-
road from it seaven mile vacant. — JVashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 152).
Proper ation, haste.
There is great preparation of this banquet,
properation to it, participation of it. — Adams,
1. 216.
Properly, quite ; entirely.
Thence he carried me to the filing's closet,
where such variety of pictures and other
things of value and rarity that I was pro-
perly confounded, and enjoyed no pleasure
in the sight of them. — Pepys, June 24, 1664.
All which I did assure my lord was most
properly false, and nothing like it true. —
Ibid., July 14, 1664.
Property-man, the man in a theatre
who makes or provides the things re-
quired for the dramas represented at
theatres.
The religion of the day is a theatrical
Sinai, where the thunders are supplied by
PROPHECY-MONGER ( 519 )
PROSEMAN
the property-man. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch.
xiii.
Prophecy-monger, an inventor of
prophecies.
The English [are] observed by f orrainera
to be the greatest prophecy-mongers, and
whilst the Devil knows their diet, they shall
never want a dish to please the palate. —
Fuller, Ch. Histn IV. u. 46.
Prophet, to prophesy.
Nor propheting Helenus when he foretold
dangerous hard haps,
Forspake this burial mourning, nor filthye
Celssno.— Stanyhurst, J2n., III. 727.
Prophetize, to prophesy.
Heer sorrow stopt the door
Of his sad voice, and almost dead for woe,
The prophetizing spirit forsooke him so.
Sylvester, Handie Crafts, 785.
Nor, thrild with bodkins, raves in f rantik-
wise,
And in a f urie seems to provhetize.
Ibid., Schisme, 563.
Propless, without support or props.
The dull Earth's propless massie Ball
Stands steddy still.
Sylvester, Seventh day, first weeke, 94.
This our Globe hangs proplesse in the air.
Ibid., Little Bartas, 287.
Bncrease thy streames, laye ope the water-
springs,
That earth's foundations (proplesse) may
appeare. — Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 12.
Propontky, the Propontis, or Sea of
Marmora.
There are above forty several] nations,
both in Europe and Asia, which have the
Sclavonick for their vulgar speech ; it reach-
eth from Mosco the court of the great Knez
to the Turk's seraglio in Constantinople,
and so over the Propontey to divers places in
Asia. — Howell, Forraine Travell, Sect. xi.
Proposedly, purposely.
They had proposedly been plann'd and
pointed against him. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
i. 117.
Propriate, special, or, perhaps, ap-
propriated; assimilated.
But any simple Tom will tell ye,
The source of life is in the belly,
From whence are sent out those supplies,
Without whose propriate sympathies
We should be neither strong nor wise.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. 7.
Propulsity, propulsion ; motive
power. Davies says of Eternity —
It euer was : that was ere Time had room©
To stirre itself e by Heau'n's propulsity.
Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 10.
Prorex, viceroy.
In the second part of Tamburlaine,
Orcanes is described in the Dramatis
Persona? as King of Natolia, and Ga-
zellus as Viceroy of Byron ; the latter
addresses the former (I. i.) as "Prorex
of the world."
Create him Prorex of all Africa. — Mar-
lotoe, 1 Tamburlaine, I. i.
Proritation, provocation ; challeng-
ing.
Your Maimonides, after all your prori-
tation, holds no other than fair terms with
our Samaritan Chronicle. — Bp. Hall, Works,
x. 899.
Prosaicism, the character of prose.
As regards verbal construction, the more
prosaic a poetical style is, the better.
Through this species of vrosaicism, Cowper,
with scarcely any of the higher poetical
elements, came very near making nis age
fancy him the equal of Pope. — E. A, Poe,
Marginalia, xxviii.
Prosaist, one devoid of the poetical
temperament.
Without life, without colour or verdure ;
that is to say, Mignet is heartily and alto-
gether a prosaist; you are too happy that he
is not a quack as well. — Carlyle, Misc., iv.
121.
Prosapie, stock (Latin, prosapia).
My harte abhorreth that I should so
In a woman's kirtle my pelf disguise,
Beyng a manne, and begotten to
Of a mannes prosapie, in manly wise.
XJdaVs Erasmus, Apophth., p. 69.
Proscenium, the front of the stage : a
Latin word, but used as English.
Lips she has, all rubie red,
Cheeks like creame enclarited :
And a nose that is the grace
And proscenium of the face.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 146.
During his time, from the Proscenium ta'en,
Thalia and Melpomene both vanish 'd.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 16.
These thoughts dwelt long with Sterling ;
and for a good while, I fancy, kept posses-
sion of the proscenium of his mind ; madly
parading there to the exclusion of all else.
—Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. xiv.
Proscind, to rend.
They did too much proscind and prostitute
(as it were) the Imperial purple. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 573.
Proseman, a prose writer. The
second extract is from some compli-
mentary verses from Garrick to John-
PROSNE
( 520 )
PROTOCOL
son on the publication of the English
Dictionary.
Although a prayse or other report may be
allowed beyond credit, it may not be beyond
all measure, specially in the proseman. —
Puttenham, Eng.Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xviii.
Let them rally their heroes, send forth all
their powers,
Their verse-men and prose-men, then match
them with ours.
Boswell, Life of Johnson, ii. 53.
Prosne. See quotation.
I will conclude this point with a saying,
not out of Calvin or Beza who may be
thought partial, but out of a prosne or
homily made . . . two hundred years ago.
— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 66.
Prosopopby, personification. This
Anglicised form of prosopopoeia has
not become current.
The wittessly-malicinus prosopopey wherein
my Befuter brings in the Reverend and
Peerless Bishop of London pleading for his
wife to the Metropolitan, becomes well the
mouth of a scurril Mass-priest. — Bp. Hall,
Works, v. 235.
Prospectless, without any view.
Imagine its being as dismal and prospect-
less as if it stood "on Stanmore's wintry
wild ! "— Walpole, Letters, iii. 330 (1770).
ProbTITE.
But Fortune, that can change her mind,
Weary at last of being unkind,
And thinking now her Prostite had
For youth's excursions dearly paid,
Concludes it time to give him aid.
IfUrfey, Athenian Jilt,
Prostrator, one who overturns.
Common people . . are the great and
infallible prostrators of all religion, vertue,
honour, order, peace, civility, and humanity,
if left to themselves. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 189.
Protarch, a chief ruler.
In the age of the Apostles and the age
next succeeding, the highest order in the
Church under the Apostles were national
Protarchs or Patriarchs. — Bramhall, ii. 149.
Protectee, person protected. The
Fr. protegi may be deemed naturalised.
Your protectee, White, was clerk to my
cousin.— W. Taylor of Norwich, 1807 (Me-
moirs, ii. 198).
Protectiveness, sense of extending
protection.
Among the blessings of love there is
hardly one more exquisite than the sense
that in uniting the beloved life to ours we
cau watch over its happiness, bring comfort
where hardship was, and over memories of
privation and suffering open the sweetest
fountains of joy. Deronda's love for Mirah
was strongly imbued with that blessed pro-
tectiveness.— G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch-
lxx.
Protectoral, pertaining to a pro-
tector, or, as in the extract, to the Pro-
tector. L. has protectories.
The death of Cromwel . . . and perhaps
some untoward circumstances that occurred
in the contention of the representative
system and the protectoral power, over-
turned to the very foundation that fabric of
government which he had so ably begun to
erect. — Godwin, MandevilU, i. 225.
Protectorian, pertaining to the Pro-
tector ; Cromwellian. L. has protec-
tories,.
This Lord . . . during the tyranny of the
Protectorian times kept his secret Loyalty to
his Sovereign. — Fuller, Worthies, Hereford
(i. 465).
Protervity, petulance.
Companion to T. Becket in his exile, but
no partner in his protervity against his
Prince.— Fuller, Worthies, Wilts (ii. 442).
Protested, a bill not accepted or not
paid by the person on whom it is drawn
is Baid to be protested. This is applied
in the second extract to one person
not endorsing the statement made by
another.
The bill lies for payment at Dollar's and
Co., in Birchin-lane, and if not taken up this
afternoon will be protested. — Colznan, The
Spleen, Act I.
41 1 said— I did nothing," cried Lady Cecilia,
. . . An appealing look to Helen was how-
ever protested. ** To the best of my recol-
lection at least," Lady Cecilia immediately
added.— Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. vi.
PR0TE8TI0N, protestation: the word
seems to be meant, in the extract, to
jingle with " affection," like " glances "
with "fancies."
Neither may I think your glannces to
be fancies, nor your greatest protestion any
assurance of deepe affection. — Greene, Menu-
phon, p. 54.
Protocanonical, applied to the
canonical books of Scripture, as dis-
tinguished from' the Apocryphal or
deutero-canonical books.
[The Creed] is the word of God, though
not the Scripture of God, not sovereign but
subordinate, not protocanonical Scripture, yet
the key of the holy Scripture. — Adams, iii. 86.
Protocol, to issue protocols.
PROTO-PARENTS ( 521 )
PSALM
Serene Highnesses who sit there protocol-
liny, and manife&toing, and consoling man-
kind. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. VI.
en. in.
Photo-parents, Adam and tive, as
being our first parents : a hybrid word.
For since onr Proto-parenti lowest fall,
Onr wisdom's highest pitch (God wot) is low.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 23.
Protrack, to protract.
Bub with thy Dayes thy Dolours to protrackt
Thou shalt from thence unto Bethulia pack.
Sylvester, Bethulia' s Rescue, ii. 439.
Protractor, an instrument in survey-
ing* by which angles are taken.
This parallelogram is not, as Mr. Sheres
would the other day have persuaded me, the
same as a protractor, which do so much the
more make me value it, but of itself is a most
useful instrument. — Pepys, Feb. 4, 1668-9.
Protrite, worn out.
They are but old and rotten errors, pro*
trite and putid opinions of the ancient Gnos-
tickB.— Gaudtn, Tears of the Church, p. 195.
Proud, to make or be proud.
Sister proudes sister, brother hardens brother,
And one companion doth corrupt another.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 1333.
There prowdeth Pow'r, here Prowesse
brighter shines. — Ibid., Henrie the Great,
117.
Proudlino, a proud person.
Milde to the Meek, to Proudlings sterne
and strict. — Sylvester, Henrie the Great, 152.
Provender, to feed.
His horses (quatenus horses) are pro-
rendered as epicurely. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs
(Harl. Misc., vi. 179).
Proven UE8, provisions.
Our liberal Creator hath thought good to
furnish our tables with . . . the rich aud
dainty provenues of our gardens and orchards.
— Bp. Hall, Works, vi. 376.
Proverb. See extract.
Some will have a Proverb so called from
verbum a word, and pro (as in proavus) sig-
nifying before, being a speech which time
out of mind hath had peaceable possession
in the mouths of many people. Others de-
duce it from verbum a word, and pro for vice
(as in pro-prases), instead of, because it is
sot to be taken in the literal sense, one thing
beint; put for another. — Fuller, Worthies,
cb. ii.
Proverbialize, to use proverbs.
But I forbear from any f nrther wroverUal-
izing, lest I should be thought to nave rifled
my Erasmus's adages. — KenneVs Erasmus,
Praise of Folly, p. 135.
Proverbize, to make into a proverb ;
to call proverbially.
For house-hold rules read not the learned
writs
Of the Stagirian (glory of good wits) ;
Nor his whom for his honny-steepea stile,
They proverbiz'd the Attik-house yer-while.
Sylvester, Seventh day, first week, 653.
Provisionless, foodless.
The air clipped keen, the night was fanged
with frost,
And they provisionless.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Prowess ful, powerful ; vigorous.
Nimrod usurps : his prowesful policy
To gain himself the goal of souerainty.
Sylvester, Babylon (Argument).
Prowlery, robbery ; cheat.
Thirty-seven monopolies with other shark-
ing prowleries were decry'd in one proclama-
tion.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 51.
Prudery. The extract shows that
in 1718 this word was somewhat un-
familiar; the speaker, however, is a
Quaker hosier's wife, who, of course,
was not likely to be among the first to
pick up new terms of that kind. The
earliest example of prudery in the
Diets, is from the Toiler, No. 126
(1709).
Mrs. Lov. The world begins to see your
prudery.
Mrs. Prim. Prudery! What, do they
invent new words as well as new fashions ?
Ah ! poor fantastic age, I pity thee. — Cent-
livre, Bold Stroke for a Wife, Act II.
Prunellaed, gowned ; the barristers'
gowns being made of stuff called pru-
nello. Grose gives " Mr. Prunella = a
parson,1 ' for a similar reason.
Nods the prunella'd bar, attorneys smile.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 136.
Prutenic, Prussian. Rimhold in
1562 published a work on the motions
of the heavenly bodies, which he called
Prutmicce Tabulce ccelestium motuvm,
and he states that he styles these tables
Prutenic, to transmit to posterity the
memory of the liberality of Albert,
Duke of Prussia, to whom the book is
dedicated. See N. and Q., I. i. 284.
I trust anon, by the help of an infallible
guide, to perfect such Prutenic tables, as
shall mend the astronomy of our wide ex-
positors.— Milton, Doct. and Disc, of Divorce,
ch. i.
Psalm, to sing.
PSALMOD Y
( 522 )
PUDGY
That we her subjects, whom He blesseth by
her,
Psalming His praise may sound the same the
higher. — Sylvester, Handie Crafts, 73.
Psalmody, to sing.
It is an event which can be looked on;
which may still be execrated, still be cele-
brated and psalmodied; but which it were
better now to begin understanding. — Carlyle,
Misc., iv. 119.
The deathless suicidal Vengeur is written
deep in innumerable French songs and
psalmody ings. — Ibid., iv. 211.
Psaltkrian, Bweet, like the notes
of a psaltery. (Cf. Ezek. zzxiii. 32;
Ecclus. zl. 21.)
Then once again the charmed God began
An oath, and through the serpent's ears it
ran
Warm, tremulous, devout, psalterian.
Keats, Lamia.
Psaltery, usually, a musical instru-
ment, but here = psalter.
She had been such a good and religious
woman; so good indeed that she knew all
the Psaltery by heart, ay, and a great part
of the Testament besides. — Essays of Elia
{Dream-children).
Pseudo-bible, false Bible.
The work which the reader has now the
privilege of perusing is as justly entitled to
the name of the Koran as the so-called
pseudo-bible itself, because the word signifies
"that which ought to be read.1* — Southey,
The Doctor, Interchapter ix.
Pseudodoz, false opinion.
Shame we not to call sickness healthy
and to maintain the atheistical pseudodox,
which jud^eth evil good and darkness light?
— Adams, 1. 435.
According to the Hebrew paradox, Nothing
is good but a woman ; which others lewdly
thwart with a pseudodox, Nothing is bad but
a woman. — Ibid., ill. 138.
Pseudodox all, false ; mistaken. In
the extract Oroiia— Wales; Gherionian
= English.
Orosia is much degenerated from what
she was by the Gherionian sectaries, who
have infected the inhabitants with so many
pseudodoxall and gingling opinions. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 122.
Psychal, pertaining to the soul.
There are some who will find it hard to
reconcile the psychal impossibility of refrain-
ing from admiration with the too -hastily
attained mental conviction that, critically,
there is nothing to admire. — E. A. Pot, Mar-
ginalia, xxx vi.
Psychopannuchist, one who believed
that the soul after death entered on an
eternal night or sleep.
The Saducees might deny and overthrow
the resurrection against Christ; or the
Psychopannuchists the soul's immortality. —
Oauden, Tears of the Church, p. 283.
Psylly, the flea-wort, inula oonyza.
The dropsie-breediog, sorrow-bringing psylly *
Here called flea-wort.— Sylvester, The Furies*
176.
Ptochogony. See extract.
The whole plan of the Bishop of London
is a ptochopony—* generation of beggars. —
Sydney Smith, Third Letter to Archd. Singleton
Publicatb, to publish.
Little sins in them [the Clergy], if pub-
licated, grow great by their scandal! and con-
tagion.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 115.
Pucker, consternation ; disturbance.
The whole parish was in a pucker; some
thought the French had landed; others
imagined the commodore's house was beset
by thieves. — Smollett, Peregrine Pickle, ch. ii.
Pucklk, a spirit; a puck. See ex-
tract $. v. Hell- wain.
Puddeb, to potter: the Diets, only
have it as an active verb.
Som almost alwayes pudder in the mud
Of sleepy pools, and neuer brook the flood
Of crystall streams.
Sylvester, Fifth day, first week, 172.
Pudding-heart, coward.
Go, pudding-heart,
Take thy huge offal and white liver hence.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. iii. 1.
Puddtng-house, stomach. Cf. Bread-
basket.
He . . thrust him downe his pudding-house
at a gobbe. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 166).
Puddle, a term of contempt; used
both as substantive and adjective.
It seems the puddle-poet did hope that the
jingling of his rhymes would drown the
sound of his false quantity. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., I. iii. 1.
I remember, when I was quite a boy, bear-
ing her called a limping old puddle. — Maa\
D'ArMay, Cecilia, Bk. VII. ch. v.
Pudgy, soft and fat.
The vestry clerk, as everybody knows, is a
short pudgy little man in black. — Sketches by
Boz, en. i.
She surveyed him blandly ; and with in-
finite grace put forward one of the pudgy
little hands in one of the dirty gloves. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. vii.
PUDSEY
(523)
PULPITMAN
Pddsey, fat, pudgy ; hands are play-
fully called pud*.
He arose, took the little thinp from me,
kissed its forehead, its cheek, its lips, its
little pudsey hands, first one, then the other.
— Richardson, Grandison, vii. 232.
Pueriles, childish things.
Which seek . . to reduce ancient churches
of long growth, of tall and manly stature, to
their pueriles, their long coats and cradles. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 27.
Puerility, the time of childhood ;
usually = childishness.
Whether it be Tully or Panetius that says
it, or both, it is well said, as I learnt it in
my lessons of puerility. — Rackety life of
Williams, i. 30.
Puff-ring.
The goldsmith is not behinde . . . they
are most of them skil'd in alcumie, and can
temper mettals shrewdly, with no little profit
to themselves, and disadvantage to the buier ;
beside puffe-ringes and quaint conceits, which
I omit. — Greene, Quip for Upstart Courtier
{Harl. Misc., v. 416).
Puffroar, noisy blowing.
East, weast, and south wynd with pufroare
mightelye ramping.— Stanyhurst, JEn.y II.
437.
Puff-stone.
That soft, easy-to-be wrought stone at
Great Banington called puff-stone, prodi-
giously strong and lasting; a great deal of
which hath been used in the repairs of West-
minster Abbey. — Defoe, Tour thro1 G,
Britain, u. 284.
Puff- wig, a species of wig.
Here, sirrah, here's ten guineas for thee ;
get thyself a drugget suit and a puff-wig,
and so I dub thee Gentleman-Usher. — Far-
quhar, The Inconstant, Act I.
Pug, a name given to the fox.
There is a dead silence till vug is well out
of cover, and the whole pack well in . . .
Away he goes in gallant style, and the whole
field is hard up, till pug takes a stiff country.
— Miss Edgercorth, Absentee, ch. viii.
Cunning old farmers rode off at inexpli-
cable angles to some well-known haunts of
pug.— C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. i.
Pug, applied to a woman ; the
original gouge = woman, but often
with an ill signification.
In the vigour of his age be married Gargu-
melle, daughter to the king of the Parpaillons,
a jolly pug, and well-mouthed wench. — Ur-
quhart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. iii.
Pug, "a kind of loam" (Parish's
Sussex Glossary) ; but pugs in extracts
seem to be another name for rotten
chaff, &c.
It can not abide rank mucke, but content-
eth itself e with rotten chaffe or pugs, and
such like plain mullock. — Holland, Pliny,
zix. 5.
The best way to keep onions is in corn,
chaf , and such like pugs. — Ibid., xix. 6.
Pugil, a boxer.
He was no little one, but saginati corporis
bellua, as Curtius says of Dioxippus the
pugil. — Hacket, Life of Williams, L 37.
Puginesquery, that which has to do
with ecclesiastical architecture, from
Pugin, the well-known architect.
When they talk Puginesquery, I stick my
head on one side attentively, and " think the
more," like the lady's parrot. — C. Kingsley,
Yeast, ch. vi.
Pugnant, conflicting. Gauden (Tears
of the Church, p. 652) hopes for a time
when those in high places will deter-
mine matters with a view to the future
happiness of their country, rather than
" to the present pregnant and pugnant
interests.
Thee fat[e]s are pugnant. — St any hurst,
jEn., iv. 463.
Pugnose, nose turned up like a pug's.
Then half arose, from beside his toes,
His little pug-dog with his little pugnose.
Ingoldsby Legends (Hand of Glory).
Puissing, buzzing ; in some copies
the word is puling.
The merry crickett, puissing flye,
The piping gnatt for minstrillsey.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 471.
Pull, advantage.
You will be the companion of her pleasures ;
dressed as well as herself, courted by every
man who has a design upon her, and make a
market of her every day. Oh, you'll have
quite the pull of me in employment. —
Burgoyne, Lord of the Manor, Act III. sc. i.
Why does not some one publish a list of
the young male nobility and baronetage,
their names, weights, and probable fortunes ?
I don't mean for the matrons of May Fair ;
they have the list by heart and study it in
secret, but for young men in the world ; so
that they may know what their chances are,
and who naturally has the pull over them. —
Thackeray, The JYevxomes, ch. xli.
Pulfitarian, a preacher.
The Scottish brethren were acquainted by
common intercourse with these directions
that had netled the aggrieved pulpitarians. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 90.
Pulpitman, preacher.
PURSE-PINCHED ( 526 )
PUZZLEDOM
gowned vultures " (Democ. to Reader,
p. 49).
PURSE-PINCHKD, poor.
Ladies and Lords, purse-pinched and soule-
pain'd,
Poore, Rich and all (rich in allblessednesse),
Blesse Him by whom yee haue till now re-
main 'd,
To tast these Tymes which yeeld sweet
joyes vnfain'd.
Davies, Ificrocosmos, p. 14.
Pursument, pursuit.
The Spachies are horsemen, weaponed for
the most part at once with bow, mase, lance,
harquebush, and cymiter ; whereof they haue
the seuerall vses, agreeing with their fights,
their flights, or pursuments. — Sandys, Travels,
p. 48.
Puseyism, a name given to the great
religious revival, now more commonly
spoken of as the Oxford movement.
u Great of course was my joy when in
the last days of 1833 he [Dr. Pusey]
showed a disposition to make common
cause with us. His Tract on fasting
appeared as one of the series with the
date of December 21. He was not,
however, I think, fully associated in
the movement till 1835 and 1836, when
he published his Tract on Baptism, and
started the Library of the Fathers. He
at once gave to us a position and a
name" (Newman, Apologia, p. 136).
Had there been no Coleridge, neither hae
this been, nor had Euglish Puseyism, or some
other strange enough universal portents
been. — Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. II. ch. ii.
Pushery, pushing ; forwardness. The
extract is from a letter of Mr. T wiring's,
the translator of Aristotle's Poetics.
I actually asked for this dab of prefer-
ment ; it is the first piece of pusJiery I ever
was guilty of. — Mad. D'Arbtay, Diary, iv.
45.
Puss-gentleman, an effeminate man.
I cannot talk with civet in the room,
A fine puss-gentleman that's all perfume.
Cotcper, Conversation, 284.
Put, question, or thrust, as we some-
times say.
The dear creature, I doubted not, wanted
to instruct me how to answer the captain's
home put. — Richardson, CI. JIarlowe, iv. 316.
Put-case, one who suggests or argues
hypothetical cases. Put-case was an
expression in our older writers = sup-
pose.
He used to say that no man could be a
good lawyer that was not a put-case. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, i. 20.
Pute, a word that seems always to
be joined with "pure," and to have
much the same meaning.
Armioius . . . acknowledges faith to be
the pure pute gift of God. — Bp. Hail, Works,
x.432.
Pure, Pute Italians preferred in England
transmitted the gain they got . . into their
own country. — Fuller, Worthies, York (ii.
640).
Dangerfield had the honour to be a single
discoverer of a pure and pute sham-plot, name
and thing, and was concerned in nothing else ;
which stamped that famous title upon his
performance, from whence the very word sham
was taken, to serve in the English language
with like propriety as <jrcv&>« in the Greek.
— North, Examen, p. 256.
That cause . . was pure and pute factions.
— Ibid., p. 527.
Put fair for, to be in a fair way of
attaining — to bid fair for is the more
usual phrase. '
And he had put fair for it, had not death
prevented him, by which his life aud projects
were cut off together. — Heylin, Hist, of the
Presbyterians, p. 130.
Putidness, putridity.
High-tasted sawces made with garlick or
onions, purposely applied to tainted meats,
to make their putidness less perceptible. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 190.
Putt, stake or scheme? something
put out ?
2nd Stockbroker. Are you a bull or a bear to-
day, Abraham?
3rd Stockbroker. A bull faith ; but I have a
good putt for next week.
Centlivre, Bold Stroke for a Wife, iv. 1.
Puttyer, one who works with putty ;
a glazier.
There are some cracked old houses where
the painters and plumbers and puttyers are
always at work. — Thackeray, Lotxl the
Widower, ch. ii.
Put-up. See quotation.
" Well, master," said Blathers . . . « this
warn't a put-up thing." "Aud what the
devil's a put-up thing ? " demanded the doctor
impatiently. " We call it a put-up robbery,
ladies," said Blathers, turning to them as if
he pitied their ignorance, but had a contempt
for the doctor's, *' when the servants is in it."
— Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xxxi.
Puzzledom, bewilderment.
I was resolved to travel with him into the
land of puzzledom. — Richardson, CI. Hartotee,
vi. 367.
PYCKARDE
( 527 ) QUADRUPEDISM
Mark Armsworth poured a libation to the
goddess of puzzledom in the shape of a glass
of port. — KingsUy, Two Years Ago, ch. xxvi.
Ptckarde. See quotation.
A yonge man of Estsexe called Thomas
-was comminge and goynge, which for his
maister's affayres into Scotlande had hyred a
small ship, there called ipyckarde. — Vocacyon
of Johan Bale, 1553 (Hart. Misc., vi. 455).
Pymper, pamper, coddle.
Good mistress Statham . . seeing what case
I was in, hath fetched me home to her own
house, and doth pymper me up with all
diligence, for I fear a consumption. — Latimer >
ii. 386.
Pyroballogy, treatise or discourse
on casting fire.
He was enabled by the help of . . Gobesius's
military architecture and pyroballogy, trans-
lated from the Flemish, to form his discourse
with passable perspicuity. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy,
i. 180.
Ptrolator, a fire worshipper.
The fire [was rejected] as having too near
an analogy to the religion of the pyrolators.
—Southey, Thalaba, Bk. VIII., note.
Pythonist, a masculine of Pythoness ;
perhaps Caiaphas is so called in refer-
ence to St. John xi. 51.
See the conjuring, proud, remorceless Priest
Rend, in full rage, (too like a furious fiend)
The pompous vestures of this Pithonist,
When Christ doth (vrg'd) aright His cause
defend.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 7.
Q
Quacking titles. See quotation.
He has an admirable knack at quacking
titles ; perhaps you may not know what that
is, sir ; but for my part I do not, I confess,
understand it, but they tell me when he gets
an old good-for-nothing book, he claps a
new title to it, and sells off the whole im-
pression in a week. — Centlivre, A Gotham
Election.
Quackle, to choke ; also, to quack :
the word being in each sense onoma-
topoeous. See quotation 8. v. Skriggle.
As he was drinking, the drink, or some-
thing in the cup, quackled him, stuck so in
his throat that he could not get it up nor
down, but strangled him presently. — Ward,
Sermons, p. 153.
Simple ducks in those royal waters quackle
for crumbs from young royal fingers. — Car-
lyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. i.
Quadrimanous, f our-handed : usually
written quadrumanous, and applied to
a class of animals which includes apes
and monkeys. In the extract a com-
parison between these and some of the
revolutionary demagogues is implied.
Hence arises the complexional disposition
of some of your guides to pull everything in
pieces. At this malicious game they dis-
play the whole of their quadrimanous ac-
tivity.— Burke on Fr. Rev., p. 139.
Quadristllable, a word of four
syllables.
A distinction without a difference could
not sustain itself ; and both alike disguised
their emptiness under this pompous auadri'
syllable. All words are suspicious, tnere is
an odour of fraud about them, which — being
concerned with common things — are so base
as to stretch out to four syllables. — De Quin-
cey, Roman Meals.
Quadrivious, in four ways : the Diets,
give quadrivial.
This speedily bred a small but numerous
vermin. When the cheese was so rotten
with them that only the twigs and string
kept it from tumbling to pieces and walking
off quadrivious, it came to table. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xxiv.
Quadrupedal, pertaining to a quad-
ruped ; four-footed ; also as a substan-
tive = quadruped. The speaker in
the second extract is supposed to be a
man who has been turned into an otter.
Morphandra hath been pleased to promise
me the favor as to turn you into Man again,
if you have a mind to it ; and from that
groveling quadrupedal shape to make you an
erect and a rational creture once again. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 6.
My bloud, in statu quo nunc be observed, I
confess to be the coldest of any quadrupedals,
— Ibid., p. 11.
Quadrupedated, turned into quadru-
peds ; turned into beasts.
Spotted we were, and nothing but naked-
ness was left to cover us, . . . quadrupedated
with an earthly, stooping, grovelling cqvet-
ousness. — Adams, i. 399.
Quadrupedibm, the condition of a
quadruped.
Among the Mahometans also quadruped-
ism is not considered an obstacle to a certain
QU&DAM
( 528 ) QUARTER BOYS
kind of canonisation. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. cxcix.
Qu^dam, loose women.
He killed up the deer of the park ; settles
in Bugden-House for three summers with a
seraglia of Quadam, sells an organ that cost
120/. at IQl.—Haeket, Life of Williams, ii.
128.
Quaff, a draught.
Basni, now Alvida begins her quaff.
And drinks a full carouse unto her king.
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p. 141.
Quafftidk, time of drinking.
Quaftyde aproacheth,
And showts in nighttyme doo ringe in loftye
Oithaeron. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 314.
QUAITE.
Nothing but earth to earth, no pompons
weight
Upon him, but a pibble or a quaite.
Bp. Corbet, Iter Boreale.
Quakerish, somewhat quaker-like.
Don't address me as if I were a beauty ; I
am your plain Quakerish governess. — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxiv.
Her rippling hair, covered by a quakerish
net-cap, was chiefly grey. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. xviii.
Quaky, shaky.
Poor old Twoshoes is so old and toothless
and quaky that she can't sing a bit. — Thack-
eray, Roundabout Papers, xxix.
Qualm, to feel faint or ill ; in the
second quotation it = make sick.
Let Jesse's sov'reign flow'r perfume my
qualminy breast. — Quarles, Emblems, v. 2.
Solicitude discomposes the head, jealousy
the heart ; envy qualms on his bowels, pro-
digality on his purse. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 560.
Quamier, quavemire or quagmire.
If earth be not soft,
60 dig it aloft.
For quamier get bootes,
Stub alders and rootes.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 75.
Quandary, to hesitate. Both R. and
L. quote "I am qnandaried" from
Otway.
He quandaries whether to go forward to
God, or, with Demas, to turn back to the
world.— Adams, i. 505.
Quaquiner, a fish : it is Bailey's
translation of aranei pUcis.
There is a little fish in the form of a scor-
pion, and of the size of the fish quaquiner. —
Bailey's Erasmus's Colloq., p. 393.
Quau, object of pursuit j quarry.
The falcon (stooping thunder-like )
With suddain souse her to the aoyl shal
strike,
And with the stroak make on the senseless
ground
The gut-lea quar once, twice, or thrice re-
bound.— Sylvester, The Laws, 643.
Quarelbt, little square.
Some ask'd how pearls did grow, and where,
Then spoke I to my girle
To part her lips, and shew'd them there
The quarelets of pearl.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 22.
Quar-mak, quarry-man.
The sturdy quar-man with steel-headed cones,
And massive sledges slenteth out the stones.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1110.
Quarrelsomeness, habit of quarrel-
ing, or disposition to quarrel. Thack-
eray seems to think the word wants
an apology, but the Diets, illustrate it
from Bp. Hull and Geo. Herbert.
Even among these Stygians this envy
and quarrelsomeness (if you will permit me
the word) survive. — Thackeray, Eoundabout
Papers, zxviii.
Quarrender, a species of apple.
He . . . had no ambition whatsoever beyond
pleasing his father and mother, getting by
honest means the maximum of red quar-
renders and mazard cherries, and going to
sea when he was big enough. — Kingsley,
Westward Ho, ch. i.
Quarrier, a quarryman.
The men of Rome, which were the con-
querors of all nations about them, were now
of warriors become quarrier 3, hewers of stoue
and day laborers. — Holland, Livy, p. 35.
Quarron, body: a cant term. See
H. s. v. quarromes.
Here's pannum and lap, and good poplars of
Yarrum,
To fill up the crib, and to comfort the
quarron.— Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Quarter. See extract De Quincey
suggests, "as the origin of this term,
the French word cartayer, to manoeuvre
so as to evade the ruts."
The postillion (for so were all carriages
then driven) was employed, not by fits and
starts, but eternally, in quartering — i. e. in
crossing from side to side— according to the
casualties of the ground. — Autob. Sketches,
i. 298.
Quarter-boys, the chimes of a clock
that strike the quarters.
Their quarter-boys and their chimes were
designed for this moral purpose as much as
the memento which is bo commonly seen
QUAR7ER00N ( 5*9 )
QVEENDOM
upon an old clock face, and so seldom upon
a new one. — Sou they, The Doctor, ch. xxix.
Quarteboon, quadroon ; one with
fourth part of black blood.
Your pale-white Creoles have their griev-
ances: and your yellow Quarteroons? . . .
Quarteroon Og& . . felt for his share too that
insurrection was the most sacred of duties. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. H. Bk. V. ch. iv.
Quarter stroke, a blow with a
quarter-staff.
If preachers and spirituall ministers be
sache, where be we when we come to hand-
gripes? They must not only florishe, but
they must know their quarter strookes, and
the waye how to defend their head. — Ayt-
mer, Harborouah for faithful subjects, 1559
{Maitland on Information, p. 216).
Quartodeciman, one who maintained
that Easter was to be celebrated on the
14th day of the moon in March, what-
ever day of the week that might happen
to be.
Victor, Bishop of Rome, . . in the case of
Easter grew so zealously exasperated against
the Greek and Eastern Churches as Quarto-
decimans that he thought them worthy to
be excommunicated. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 600.
Quashey, a pumpkin.
With regard to these said quasheys, . . .
the beat way of dressing them is to stew
them in cream. — Southey, Letters, ill. 391
(1823).
Quatch, a word. H. gives it as a
Berkshire word.
Noe ; not a quatch, sad poets ; doubt you
There is not greife enough without you ?
Bp. Corbet, Elegy on Death of Q. Anne.
Quatorzain, a poem or stanza of
fourteen lines ; a sonnet.
Put out your rushlights, you poets and
rhymers ! and bequeath your crazed quator'
zains to the chandlers. — Nashe, 1591 (Eng.
Garner, i. 499).
Quave, quake.
... the waterish Fenne below
Those ground-workes laid with Stone uneath
coulde beare
(So quaving soft and moist the Bases were).
Holland's Camden, p. 530.
Queachy, wet ; washy (see N.), and
so helpless.
I'n got no daughter o' my own — ne'er had
one — an* I warna sorry, for they're poor
queechy things, gells is. — G. Eliot, Adam
Bede, ch. z.
Queazen, to sicken ; make queasy.
The spirable odor and pestilent steame . .
would have queazened him. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 173).
Qcteckshoes, kickshaws. Cf. Qu elk-
shoes.
Hath not (I beseech you) this English
world, Prince and Peasant, Pastors and Peo-
ple, great and small, had enough both in
cities and in villages of these late Hashshes,
Olives, and Queckshoes of Religion ? — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 204.
Queen Anne is dead = stale news.
The first extract, in which Bp. Corbet
satirizes the numerous elegies on Anne
of Denmark, Queen of James I., might
lead us to suppose that the saying re-
ferred to her rather than to her great
grand-daughter; but in Swift's Polite
Conversation, which was written about
1710, though not published for some
years after, Queen Elizabeth is the
sovereign whose demise is classed
among things generally known. The
extract from Kichardson may have
some connection with the saying ; this
at least may have led him to use Queen
Elizabeth's reign as a synonym for
antiquity.
Noe ; not a quatch, sad poets ; doubt you
There is not greife enough without you ?
Or that it will asswage ill newes
To say, Shee's dead that was your muse ?
Bp. Corbet, Elegy on Death of Q. Anne.
Lady 8m. Pray, what news, Mr. Neverout ?
Nev. News ? Why, madam, Queen Eliza-
beth's dead. — Polite Conv. (Con v. i.).
We will leave the modern world to them-
selves, and be Queen Elizabeth's women. —
Richardson, Grandison, i. 296.
Lord Brougham, it appears, isn't dead,
though Queen Anne is. — lngoldsby Legends,
Account of a New Play.
" He was my grandfather's man, and served
him in the wars of Queen Anne," interposed
Mr. Warrington. On which my lady cried
petulantly, " Oh Lord, Queen Anne's dead, I
suppose, and we ain't a going into mourning
for her." — Thackeray, Virginians, ch. lxziii.
Qdeen-oraft, art of ruling as a
queen. King-craft was a favourite
expression of James I.
She [Q. Elizabeth] was well skilled in the
Queen-craft— Fuller, Worthies, Kent (i.490).
Queendom, queenly condition or
character.
Where, O Juno, is the glory
Of thy regal look and tread?
Will they lay for evermore thee
On thy dim, straight, golden bed ?
M M
QUEEN ES
( 53o )
QUERL
Will thy queendom all lie hid
Meekly under either lid?
Mrs. Browning, The Dead Pan.
Qukknk8 Oilliflowers, explained in
Messrs. Payne and Heritage's Glossary
to Tusser (E. D. S.) to be " the Dame's
Violet, also called Rogue's or Winter
Gilliflower. Hespens matronalis."
They are mentioned by Tusser among
" herbes, branches, and flowers for
windowes and pots" (p. 96).
Queenhood, queenliness.
Low bow'd the tributary Prince, and she,
Sweetly and statelily, and with all grace
Of womanhood and queenhood, answer'd him.
Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
Queen ITE8, partisans of Queen Caro-
line, wife of George IV.
He thought small beer at that time of
some very great patriots and Queenites. —
Southey, The Doctor ', Interchapter xvi.
Queenlet, petty queen.
In Prussia there is a Philosophe King, in
Russia a Philosophe Empress; the whole
North swarms with kinglets and queenlets of
the like temper. Nay, as we have seen, they
entertain their special ambassador in Philo-
sophedom, their lion's provider to furnish
special Philosophe - provender. — Carlyle,
Misc., iii. 216.
Queen' s-game, some game at tables.
Here Love at tick-tack plaies, or at Queeris-
game,
But Irish hates for hauing tricks too blame.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 32.
r-
Queer, to ridicule ; sneer at (slang).
A shoulder-knotted Puppy, with a grin,
Queering the threadbare Curate, let him in.
Cclman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 144.
Queer cuffin, a magistrate : thieves*
cant. See quotation from Broome «. v.
Ruffin.
Ml
Go away," I heard her say, " there's a
dear man," and then something about a
" queer cujin," that's a justice in these cant-
ers' thieves' Latin. — Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. xiv.
Queerer, a hoaxer or ridiculer.
Twould be most tedious to describe
The common-place of this facetious tribe,
These wooden wits, these Quizzers, Queerers,
Smokers,
These practical nothing-so-easy Jokers.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 150.
Queerish, rather queer ; in a bad
way.
This happy event gave his Majesty leisure
to turn his attention to Scotland, where
things, through the intervention of William
Wallace, were looking rather quetrish.—
Ingoldsby Legends {Grey Dolphin).
" You Englishmen go to work in a queerish
kind of way," said he ; " you send a parcel
of soldiers to live on an island where none
but sailors can be of use." — Marryat, Frank
Mildmay, ch. xx.
Queer Street. To be in Queer
Street = to be in bad circumstances of
some sort : illness, debt, &c.
" 111 tell you what, sir," said the Major, . .
" a fair friend of ours has removed to Quftr
Street." "What do yon mean, Major?"
inquired Mr. Dombey. "I mean to say,
Dombey," returned the Major, " that you'll
soon be an orphan-in-law ; . . . your wife's
mother is on the move." — Dickens, Dombey
and Son, ch. xl.
I am very high in Queer Street just now,
ma'am, having paid your bills before I left
town. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xiv.
Quelk-chose, kickshaw.
For Time now swels (as with some poysonous
weede)
With paper Quelk-chose, never smelt in
Scholes. — Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 5.
Quell, weapon. In Macbeth, I. vii.
it signifies murder.
Awfully he stands,
A sovereign quell is in his waving hands ;
No sight can bear the lightning of his bow.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. ii.
Quench, extinction. See also Iliad,
xxi. 511, &c.
A harmful fire let run,
none came
To give it quench.
Chapman, Iliad, xix. 363.
QUENCH-COAL.
Zeal hath in this our earthly mould little
fuel, much quench-coal ; is hardly fired, soon
cooled. — Ward, Sermons, p. 71.
Yet this is not so ordinary as to extinguish
it [zeal] by the quench-coal of sin. — Ibid., p.
84.
Prynne follows next, and publisheth two
books at once (or one immediately on the
other), one of these called The Quench-coal, in
answer unto that called A coal from the
Altar— Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 328.
Querister, questioner.
Direct enough was this answer after
Christ's single doctrine, but not after tbe
pope's double and covetous meanings for
his oiled querister's advantage. — Bale, Select
Works, p. 199.
Querl, hand-mill ; perhaps misprint
for quern.
Pisones wer surnamed a pisendo, of grind-
ing with a querle, because it was their in-
uencion. — UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 338.
QUERULATION ( 53* )
QUI-HI
Querulation, complaint.
Will not these mournings, menaces, queru-
lotions, stir your hearts ? — Adams, i. 349.
Quest-dove, ring-dove. Queests&re
also mentioned among the birds served
up at Grandgousier's banquet (Bk. I.
cli. xxxvii.).
Panurge halved and fixed upon a great
stake the horns of a roe-buck, together with
the skin and the right forefoot thereof, . . .
the wings of two bustards, the feet of four
quest-doves, . . . and a goblet of Beauvois. —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xzvii.
Questword, a bequeathment.
The legacies or quest word of the deceased
supplied the rest. — Archmol., z. 197 (1792).
Queue, to fasten in a queue or pig-
tail.
The sons in short, square-skirted coats,
with rows of stupendous brass buttons, and
their hair generally queued in the fashion
of the times. — Irving, Sketch-Bock (Sleepy
Hollow).
Quew, cue.
At the third time the great door openeth,
for he shut in one before of purpose to open
it when his quew came. — Calfhiu, Answer to
Jfartiall, p. 209.
Quicksandy, having quicksands.
The rotten, moorish, quicksandy grounds
that some have set their edifices on have
failed their hopes. — Adams, i. 358.
Quick-wood, quickset.
[He] in a pond in the said close, adjoining
to a quick-wood hedge, did drown his wife. —
A ubrey, Misc., p. 101.
Quiddany. L., who supplies no ex-
ample, gives the word as meaning
" marmalade, a confection of quinces
made with sugar : " and N. has. u Quid-
danet, a confection between a syrup
and marmalade. — Duntori* Ladies'
Diet."
Boyl the syrup, until it be as thick as for
quiddany. — Queen's Closet Opened, p. 204
(1656).
Quiddell, to criticise ; the speaker
asks a clown, who is boasting of his
bass voice, to sing. See next entry.
Set up your buffing base, and we will
quiildell upon it. — Edwards, Damon and
PiVuas (Dodsley, O. PL, i. 279).
Quiddle, a fidget (?).
The Englishman is very petulant and pre-
cise about his accommodation at inns, and on
the roads ; a quiddle about his toast and his
chop. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. vi.
Quidifical, triflingly subtle.
Diogenes, mocking soch quidijicall trifles
that were al in^he cherubins, said, Sir Plato,
your table anTr your cuppe I see very well,
but as for your tabletee and your cupitee I
see none soche. — Udal's Erasmus's Apoplith.,
p. 139.
Quid pro quo, an equivalent This
Latin phrase may be regarded as na-
turalised.
Let him trap me in gold, and 111 lap him
in lead ; quid pro quo. — Middleton, A Mad
World, My Masters, Act II.
And at the morning's breakfast table,
I doubt not but T shall be able
With all fair reas'ning to bestow
What you will find a quid pro quo ;
Which I translate for Madam, there,
A Bowland for your Oliver.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. iii.
Quien, a dog (thieves' cant).
Curse these quiens, said he; and not a
word all dinner time but Curse the quiens.
I said I must know who they were before I
would curse them. Quiens ? why, that was
dogs; and I knew not even that much. —
Readc, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lv.
Quieten, to quiet.
I will stay, . . partly to quieten the fears
of this poor faithful fellow. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Ruth, ch. xxxiv.
Quietism, quiet. The Diets, only
give it as meaning the system of the
religious body called Quietists.
He would no doubt have preferred receiv-
ing me alone, had he not feared that the
thoughtlessness of my years might some-
times make me overstep the limits of quiet-
ism which he found necessary. — Godtcin,
Mandeville, i. 110.
Quietize, to make quiet ; to calm.
Solitude, and patience, and religion, have
now quietiied both father and daughter into
tolerable contentment. — Mad. D7Arblay,
Diary, v. 271.
Qui-hi, an English resident or official
in Bengal, from the Hindustani rol, any
one, and hat, is ; Is there any one V
being the form used for calling a serv-
ant. Many more servants are required
in Bengal than in the other two pre-
sidencies, the influence of caste being
so much stronger there ; hence Madras
and Bombay people call the Bengalese
officials Qui-his.
The old boys, the old generals, the old
colonels, the old qui-his from the club came
and paid her their homage. — Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. brii.
MM2
QUILL
( 532 )
QUI- VIVE
Quill. To be under the quill = to
be written about.
The subject which is now under the quill
is the Bishop of Lincoln. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, it. 28.
Quillet. N. s. v. remarks that Mr.
Pegge says that this word means "a
small parcel of land, but gives no au-
thority for it except Minshew, who
says nothing of the land." Halliwell
and Wright add that the word is " very
common in Anglesea in the present
day, signifying a small strip of land in
the middle 01 another person's field,
commonly marked out by boundary
stones, and arising from the tenure of
gavelkind formerly in force there."
"Suffolk Stiles." It is a measuring cast
whether this Proverb pertaineth to Essex or
this County; and I believe it belongeth to
both, which, being inclosed Countries into
petty quillets, abound with high Stiles. —
Fuller, Worthies, Suffolk (ii. 326).
Quill-man, a writer: the reed on
which weavers wind their heads for
the shuttle is called a quit. See IT.
And next observe how this alliance fits,
For weavers now are just as poor as wits :
Their brother quill -men, workers for the
stage,
For sorry stuffe can get a crown a page ;
But weavers will be kinder to the players,
And sell, for twenty pence, a yard of theirs.
Swift , Epilogue to a Play for benefit of
Irish weavers.
Quilted, stuffed (?)
He sat with me while I had two quilted
pigeons, very handsome and good meat. —
Pepys, Sept. 26, 1668.
Quinze, a game of cards somewhat
similar to vingt-un, only 15 is the game.
There were silver-pharaoh and whist for
the ladies that did not dance; deep basset
and qutnze for the men. — Walpole to Mann,
ii. 253 (1748).
Gambling the whole morning in the Alley,
and sitting down at night to quinze and
hazard at St. James's. — Colman, Man of
Business, Act IV.
Qoippkr, jester ; quibbler.
And here, peraduenture, some desperate
quijyper will canuaze my proposed compari-
son.— Nashe, Introd. to Greeks Menaphon,
p. 14.
Quibace, cuirass.
For all their bucklers, morions, and quiraces
Were of no proofe agaiust their peisant
maces. — Hudson, Judith, v. 365.
Quirily, revolvingly. H. has "quisle
wind, a whirlwind.
Soom doe slise out collops on spits yeet
quirily e trembling. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 219.
Qc 1ST RON. It. quotes for this Chaucer,
Rom. of Rose, 886, and says, " Mr. Tyr-
whitt thinks — a scullion, un guerrym de
cuisine: perhaps, as Urrv suppose-*!,
a beggar, from the Fr. Qutstrer, to a*k,
to beg." It may be useful to riie
another example for this word. Dido,
in her indignation at the departure of
iEneas, says —
Fro the shoare late a runnygat hedgebret,
A tarbreeche quystroune dyd I take, with
phrensye betrasshed.
Stanyhurst, jEn., iv. 393.
Quitch, couchgrass. L. has quitch-
grass.
Full seldom doth a man repent, or use
Both grace and will to pick the vicious qnif k
Of blood and custom wholly out of hira.
Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
Quits, fair, not in debt. Double or
quit {quits is more common) = tl-it
the loser of a wager should have a
chance of wiping out the score against
him ; but if his luck is again bad, that
he should pay double.
He has one ransom with him already;
methinks 'twere good to fight double or quit.
— Beaum. and FL, King and no King, iii. 1.
Lady F. So, you see. I am importuned by
the women as well as the men.
Bel. (aside). And she's quits with them
both. — Vanbrugh, Provoked Wife* iii. 1.
There are four guineas, you know, that
came out of my good lady's pocket when she
died, that with some silver my master gave
me, ... do you think, as I had no wages, I
may be supposed to be quits? By quits I
cannot mean thnt my poor services should be
equal to my lady's goodness, for that's im-
possible. But ... I would ask whether . • •
I may not have earned, besides my keeping,
these four guineas. — Richardson, Pamela* I
100.
Quitture, discharge; issue. See
also Iliad, xxiv. 374.
Still drink thou wine, and eat,
Till fair-hair'd Hecamed hath giv'n a little
water-heat
To cleanse the quitture from thy wound.
Chapman, Iliad, xir. 7. ,
Quiverish, tremulous.
Then f urth with a quiverish horror. |
Stanyhurst, AZn., iii. 30.
Qui- vive, the challenge of the Fren« h |
sentries = who goes there ? heniT i{*
be on the qui vive = to be on the alert ) j
QUIXOTE
( 533 )
QUOZ
the expression is naturalised among
us : in the extract, however, it is in
italics.
Our new King Log we cannot complain of
as too young, or too much on the qui-vive. —
Miss Edgetcorth, Patronage, ch. viii.
Quixote, to act like Don Quixote.
When you have got the devil in your body,
and are upon your rantipole adventures, you
shall Quixote it by yourself for Lopez. —
Vanbrugk, False Friend, iv. 2.
Quiz, to ridicule.
This is the gentleman who once actually
sent a messenger up to the Strangers' gallery
in the old House of Commons, to inquire the
name of an individual who was using an eye-
glass, in order that he might complain to the
Speaker that the person in question was
quizzing him. — Sketches Ity Jioz (Parliament'
art/ Sketch).
Quiz. L. gives this word as = one
who tries to make another ridiculous, a
biinterer; it also signifies one who is
himself absurd, or a subject for quiz-
zing. In the second extract it is one
of George III.'s daughters who uses
the word which, as Mad. D' Arblay re-
marks, would not have been employed
by Queen Charlotte.
Dick. What a damn'd gig you look like.
Pa ny loss. A gig ! Umph ; that's an Eton
phrase — the Westminsters call it quiz. — Col-
tuan, Heir at Law, iv. 3.
Twas the Queen dressed her; you know
what a figure she used to make of herself
with her odd manner of dressing herself;
but mamma said, "Now really, Princess
Royal, this one time is the last, and I cannot
suffer you to make such a quiz of yourself."
. . . The word quiz, you may depend, was
never the Queen's. — 5 fad. D' Arblay, Diary,
vi. 138 (1797).
Youug ladies have a remarkable way of
letting you know that they think you a
44 quiz? without saying the word. — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xxi.
Quizical, ridiculous ; perhaps in the
second extract it = quizzing.
I believe you have taken such a fancy to
the old quizical fellow that you can't live
without him. — Miss Edgemorth, Belinda,
ch. ix.
How many fugitive leaves quizzical, imag-
inative, or at least mendacious, were flying
about in newspapers. — Carlyle, Diamond
Aecklace, ch. xvi.
Quizzificatiox, joke ; hoax.
After all, my dear, the whole may be a
quizzification of Sir Philip's. — Miss Edge-
worth, Belinda, ch. xi.
Quizzify, to make odd or ridiculous.
The caxon quizzijies the figure, and thereby
mars the effect of what would otherwise
have been a pleasing as well as appropriate
design. — Sou they, The Doctor, ch. cxri.
Qoizziness, eccentricity.
His singularities and affectation of affecta-
tion always struck me: but both these and
his spirit of satire are mere quizziness; his
mind is all solid benevolence and worth. —
Mad. D Arblay, Diary, vi. 187.
Quoddlk, to parboil. See L. 8. v.
coddle. L. gives quoddle as a verb
neuter, with extract from Stillingfleet,
who speaks of " a duck quoddling in a
pool/'
Take your pippins green and quoddle them
in fair water, but let the water boyl first be-
fore you put them in. — Queen's Closet Opened,
p. 204 (1655).
Quodlibetic, given to niceties and
subtle points.
How partial are the principles of some
Protestant Preachers, of some Quodlibetick
Presbyters ! — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
681.
Quorum, materials or requisites ; a
peculiar use of the word.
Here the Dutchmen found fuller's earth,
a precious treasure, whereof England hath
(if not more) better than all Christendom
besides; a great commodity of the quorum
to the making of good cloath. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., III. ix. 12.
Quot ability, fitness for quotation.
It is the prosaicism of these two writers
[Cowper and Moore] to which is owing their
especial quot ability. — E. A. Poe, Marginalia,
xx viii.
Quotationipotent, powerful in quo-
tation.
Tou with your errabund guesses veering
to all points of the literary compass, amused
the many - humoured, yet single - minded,
Pantagruelist, the quotationipotent mottocrat.
— Soutfiey, The Doctor, Interchapter xiii.
Quoz, quiz ; it seems to be both a
singular and plural noun.
What does the old quoz mean? does he
want me to toss him in a blanket? — Mad.
D Arblay, Camilla, Bk. VII. ch. ix.
44 Upon my honour," cried Lynmere piqued,
" the quoz of the present season are beyond
what a man could have hoped to see."
"Quoz! what's quoz?" he replied. "Why,
it's a thing there's no explaining to you sort
of gentlemen ; and sometimes we say quiz,
my good old sir."— Ibid., Bk. VII. ch. xiii.
RABBET-STOCK ( 534 ) RAFFAELESQUE
R
Rabbet - stock, a joiner's tool for
cutting rabbets or joists. See extract
*. v. Clave-stock.
Rabbit, to ferret for rabbits.
She liked keeping the score at cricket, and
coming to look at them fishing or rabbiting
in her walks. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxfora,
oh. xxx.
Rabbit, a small boat (?)
Ned Finch t'other day, on the conquest of
Montreal, wished the king joy of having lost
no subjects but those that perished in the
rabbits. Fitzroy asked him if he thought
they crossed the great American lakes in
such little boats as one goes in to V auxhall :
he replied, "Yes, Mr. Pitt said the rabbits,"
— it was in the falls, the rapids. — Walpole,
Letters, ii. 191 (1700).
Rabble, low, vulgar, pertaining to
the rabble or mob.
How could any one of English education
and prattique swallow such a low rabble
suggestion Y — Forth, Examen, p. 306.
Rabious, raging, fierce.
Ethelred languishing in minde and body,
Edmond his sonne surnamed Ironside, (to
oppose youth to youth) was implored against
this rabious inuador. — Daniel, Mtst. of Eng.,
p. 15.
Race. See quotation.
The Spanish fashion, in the West Indies
at least, though not in the ships of the
great Armada, was, for the sake of carrying
merchandise, to build their men-of-war flush-
decked, or, as it was called, race {razes), which
left those on deck exposed and open. —
Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch.
Rack, to go between a trot and an
amble. N. has the substantive with ex-
tract from Taylor, the water-poet. Cf.
Canterbury rack.
He was thorough-paced in all Spiritual
Popery . . . but in Secular Popery (as I may
term it, touching the interest of Princes) he
did not so much as rack.— Fuller, Worthies,
Northampton (ii. 173).
He himself became a racking but no
thorough-paced Protestant. — Ibid., Stafford
(ii. 305).
Rack and manoer. To live at rack
and manger = to live of the best at
free cost. Naehe, Lenten Stttfe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 165), says, the herring is such
a choleric food that "whoso ties him-
self to rack and manger" to it shall
have a child that will be a soldier be-
fore he loses his first teeth.
Free from danger,
Muakein may live at rack and manger.
Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 213.
John Lackland . . . tearing out the bowels
of St. Edmundsbury Convent (its larders
namely and cellars) in the most ruinous way
by living at rack and manger there. — Carlyley
Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. L
Rackbter, a rake ; one who is con-
stantly seeking gaiety.
At a private concert last night with my
cousins and Miss Clements ; and again to be
at a play this night ; I shall be a rocketer, I
doubt. — Richardson, Grandison, i. 117.
Rackety, gay, noisy.
In all things he acquitted himself as a
model officer, and excited the admiration
and respect of Sergeant Major Mac Arthur,
who began fishing at Bowie, to discover the
cause of this strange metamorphosis in the
rackety little Irishman. — Kingsley, Two Tears
Ago, ch. vii.
Raddle, to rouge coarsely; also a
substantive. Cf. Ruddle.
Can there be any more dreary object than
those whitened and raddled old women who
shudder at the slips? — Thackeray, A'ewcomes,
ch. xx.
That bony old painted sheep-faced com-
panion, who's raddled like an old bell-wether.
— Ibid., ch. xliii.
Some of us have more serious things to
hide than a yellow cheek behind a raddle of
rouge. — Ibid., Roundabout Papers, xxxii.
Raddleman. See extract.
" Rutland Raddleman." . . Rod here is the
same with red, (onely more broadly pro-
nounced) . . Raddleman then is a Reddleman,
a trade (and that a poor one) onely in this
county, whence men bring on their backs a
pack of red stones or oker, which they sell
to their neighbouring countries for the mark-
ing of sheep. — Fuller, Worthies, Rutland (ii.
242).
Raff, a scamp, or low fellow.
Myself and this great peer,
Of these rude raffs became the jeer.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xx.
That fisherman they talk of,— Masaniello,
Was clearly, by his birth, a sorry fellow ;
One of the raffs we shrink from in the street,
Wore an old hat, and went with naked feet
Leigh Hunt, High and Lotr.
Raffaelesque, after the manner of
RAFFISH
( 535 )
RAILROAD
Raffaele. It is observable that in the
extract it is not spelt with a capital K.
In some of the Greek delineations (The
Lycian Painter, for example) we have already
noticed a strange opulence of splendour,
characterisable as half -legitimate, half-mere-
tricious— a splendour hovering between the
rajfaclesqxu and the japannuh.— - Carlyle, Life
of Sterling, ch. vi.
Raffish, disreputable.
It used to be considered that a sporting
fellow of a small college was a sad, raffish,
disreputable character.— Thackeray, Shabby
Genteel Story, ch. viii.
44 Zooks, sir ; I am fallen, but I am always
a gentleman." Therewith, Losely gave a
vehement slap to his hat, which, crushed by
the stroke, improved his general appearance
into an aspect so outrageously raffish, that,
but for the expression of his countenance,
the contrast between the boast and the man
would have been ludicrous. — Lytton, What
will he do with it ? Bk. VII. ch. v.
Rafter, to roof with rafters.
Buildyng an hous euen from the found-
ation vnto the vttermoste raftreyng and
reiring of the roofe. — UdaCs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 260.
Rag. Gentlemen of the order of the
rag = military officers.
It is the opinion which, I believe, most of
you young gentlemen of the order of the rag
deserve. — fielding, Amelia, Bk. II. ch. iv.
Ragamuffin, ragged ; the Diets, give
no instance of this word used adjec-
tivally.
Mr. Aldworth . . turned over the rest of
this ragamuffin assembly to the care of his
butler. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. viii.
ch. xxiii.
Rage. The E. D. S. editors of Tusser
make rage in this place an adjective =
wild, dissipated, but why may it not be
a verb?
Where cocking dads make sawsie lads,
In youth so rage to begin age,
Or else to fetch a Tibourne stretch,
Among the rest.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 214.
Ragg, ragstone. See quotation $. v.
Amygdaloid.
No man will rough-cast a marble wall,
but mud or unpolished ragg. — Bp. Hall,
Works, v. 114.
A little diamond may be more worth than
a whole quarry of ragg. — Sanderson, i. 391.
Ragged-robin, the meadow lychnis.
And should some great court-lady say, the
Prince
Hath pick'd a ragged-robin from the hedge,
And like a madman brought her to the
court,
Then were ye shamed.
Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
The viscid petals of the ragged-robin glim-
mered a bright crimson as they straggled
through the thorny branches of the haw-
thorn.— Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch.
Raggery, raggedness.
There were the . . grim, portentous old
hags, such as Michael Angelo painted, draped
in majestic raggery. — Thackeray, Newomes,
ch.
Rag-mannered, rude, vulgar.
This young lady swears, talks smut, and is
upon the matter just as rag-manner* d as Mary
the Buxsome. — Collier, Eng. Stage, p. 220.
Ragman's rewe. See Ragman's
Roll in N. Cf. Rig-my-roll.
These songes or rimes (because their
originall beginnyng issued out of Fescenium)
wer called in iktine Fescennina Carmina or
Fescennini rythmi or versus; whiche I doe
here translate (according to our English
Srouerbe) a ragman* s rewe or a bible. For so
ooe we call a long jeste that railleth on any
Eersone by name, or touch eth a bodie's
onestee somewhat nere. — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 274.
Rag out, to fray, or become ragged.
The extract is part of a speech from a
cobbler to Lord Burleigh.
Leather thus leisurely tanned and turned
many times in the Fat will prove serviceable,
which otherwise will quickly fleet and rag
out.— Fuller, Worthies, Middlesex (ii. 35).
Rah ate, to rate, scold.
He neuer linned rahatyng of those per-
sones that offred sacrifice for to haue good
health of bodie. — UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 86.
Raillery, a jest ; the use of the
indefinite article with the word is
peculiar.
They take a pleasing raillery for a serious
truth. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 13.
Sometimes they let fly a raillery, and
shoot a joke. — Ibid., p. 00.
Railroad, railway. L., who gives
the word without example, says that
railway is probably the older word.
Even the giddiness attendant on a journey
on this Manchester railroad is not so perilous
to the nerves as that, too frequent exercise
in the merry-go-round of the ideal world. —
Scott, Introd. to Count Robert of Paris (1831).
On Monday I shall set off for Liverpool by
the railroad which will then be opened the
whole way. — Lord Macaulay, 1838 (Trevel-
yanys Life, ii. 14).
RAINBO WED
( 536 )
RAMPAGE
Rainbowed, encircled with a rainbow
or aureole.
See him stand
Before the altar, like a rainhowed saint.
Kinysley, Saint's Tragedy, i. 3.
Raines, tine linen manufactured at
Rennes ; the word is variously spelt.
No man will buy their wares any more ;
the wares of gold and silver, and of precious
stones ; neither of pearl, and silk, and raines,
and purple, and scarlet.— Bale, Select Works,
p. 526.
She should be apparelled beautifully with
pure white silk, or with most fine raines. —
Ibid., p. 542.
Thou that wast clothed in raynes, and
purple, and scarlet . . shalt come to nought.
— Becon, ii. 415.
Alas, that great city that was clothed in
reins, and scarlet, and purple! — Jewel, ii
931.
Rainless, free from rain.
Rainles, their soyl is wet, and dowdies, fat,
Itself s inoist bosom brings in this and that.
Sylvester, The Lawe> 528.
A sense, awful and yet cheering, of a
wonder and a majesty, a presence and a
voice around, in the cliffs and the pine-
forests, and the great blue rainless heaven.
— C. Kinysley, Alton Locke, ch. xxzvi.
The next day was one of dry storm ; dark,
beclouded, yet rainless. — Miss Bronte, Vil-
lette, ch. ziii.
Rainy day. To lay vp for a rainy
day, to save for a time of need.
This they caught as an advantage we see,
and laid it up for a rainy day, and three
years after, out they came with it. — An-
drews, ii. 346.
Eryo, saith the Miser, part with nothing,
but keep all against a wet day. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, ch. xi.
Rake, a hawk is said to rake when
flying wide of the quarry.
Their talk was all of training, terms of art,
Diet and seeling, jesses, leash and lure.
'* She is too noble," he said, " to check at
pies,
Nor will she rake; there is no baseness in
her."— Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Rakehellonian, a wild dissolute
fellow.
I have been a man of the town, or rather
a man of wit, and have been confess'd a
beau, and admitted into the family of the
rakehellonians. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 313.
Rake-kennel, a scavenger
We will commit the further discussion of
the poet to a committee of gold-finders, or a
club of rake-kennels. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 44a.
Rakery, dissipation.
He not only diverted but instructed bis
lordship in all the rakery and intrigues of
the leud town. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, ii. 300.
The fatigue of a London winter between
Parliament and rakery is a little too much,
without interruption, for an elderly person-
age.— Walpole to Mann, ii. 339 (1750).
Raks jaks, "wild pranks "(H.). In
Gammer Gurton's Needle {Hawkins,
Una. Dr., L 204), a scolding woman
addressee another female as, " Thou
slut, thou kut, thou rakes, thoujVz£e«."
Dare ye loa, curat baretoura, in this my
Segnorie regal
Too raise such raks jaks on seas, and danger
vnordered? — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 142.
Ramble - headed, feather - headed ;
unsteady.
Lord, how we ramble-headed creatures
break in upon ourselves ! — Richardson, Gran-
dison, vi. 34.
Ram-cat, a Tom-cat
I'm told thou keenest not a single male ;
Nothing but females at thy board to cram ;
That no he-lapdog near thee wags his tail,
Nor cat by vulgar people called a ram,
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 174.
Ramex. rupture: a Latin word, hut
apparently in as common use as other
similar terms, hernia^ fistula, &c, when
The Widow was written.
A tooth, ha ! ha !
I thought 't had been some gangrene, fistula,
Canker or ramex.
Jonson, Fletcher and Middleton,
The Widow, iv. 2.
Rammish, lustful : the word usually
means strong-smelling.
Go, Cupid's rammish pandar, go.
Quarles, Emblems, II. i.
Rampacious, spirited ; unruly : ram-
pageous is more common.
He got his own horse down to a straw a
day, and would, unquestionably have ren-
dered him a very spirited and rampacious
animal on nothing at all, if he had not died
four and twenty hours before he was to have
had his first comfortable bait of air. — Dickens,
Oliver Twist, ch. ii.
Rampage, a state of angry excite-
ment ; also as a verb, to tear about.
Were I best go to finish the revel at the
Griffin? But then Maudie will rampange
on my return. — Scott, Fair Maid of Perth, i.
343.
"She sot down," said Joe, "and she got
up, and she made a grab at Tickler, and she
RAMPAGEOUS
(537 )
RASCALDOM
rampaged out. . . . She's been on the ram-
jxiye this last spell about five minutes." —
Dickens, Great Expectations, cb. ii.
They rampaged about wi' their grooms, an'
was 'on tin' arter the men. — Tennyson. The
Village Wife.
Rampageous, violent; unruly. Cf.
Rampacious.
As the land and kingdom gradually settled
down into an orderly state, the farmers and
country folk [had] no cause to drive in their
herds and flocks as in the primitive ages
of a rampageous antiquity. — Gait, Provost,
ch. xv.
There's that Will Maskery, sir, as is the
rampageousest Methodis as can be. — G. Eliot,
Adam Bede, ch. v.
He is a lion — a mighty, conquering, ram-
pageous Leo Belgicus. — Thackeray, Round-
about Papers, ch. xix.
Ramshackle, crazy ; out of repair.
There came . . . my lord the cardinal, in
his ramshackle coach. — Thackeray, Newcomes,
ch. xxxv.
The difficulty of getting it into the ram-
shackle vettunno carriage in which I was
departing was . . . great. — Dickens, Uncom-
mercial Traveller, xxviii.
Rancho, a Mexican word, signifying
a place where cattle are reared.
And we won it, and many a town
And rancho reaching up and down.
Joaquim Miller, Songs of the
Sierras, p. 41.
Rank-brained, coarse.
Insavia is that which euery Rank-brainde
writer and judge of Poeticall writing is rapt
withal ; when hee presumes either to write
or censure the height of Poesio. — Chapman,
Masque of the Mid. Temple, Preface.
Rankle, vb. act ; to attack ; carp at ;
make sore.
His teeth rankle the woman's credit. —
Adams, ii. 224.
Ransomable, capable of being ran-
somed.
Deign
For these fit presents to dissolve the ransom-
able chain
Of my lov'd daughter's servitude.
Chapman, Iliad, i. 20.
I passed my life in that bath with many
other gentlemen and persons of condition,
distinguished and accounted as ransomable.
— JarvisJs Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk. IV. ch.
xm
Aantantinglt, extravagantly.
I would not be snibd, or have it cast in
. my dishe that therefore I prayse Yarmouth
so rantantingly, because I never elsewhere
bayted my horse. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
{Had. Misc., vi. 153).
Rantipole, a reckless wild fellow.
R. gives the word as a noun, but with-
out example : it is also a verb and
adjective.
I was always considered as a rantipole, for
whom anything was good enough. — Marryat,
Fr. Mildmay, ch. xv.
Rap, to swear, especially to swear
falsely : thieves' cant : perhaps sug-
gested by the phrase rapping out an
oath.
As to Mr. Snap's deposition in his favour,
it was the usual height to which the ardour
of that worthy person's friendship too fre-
quently carried him. It was his constant
maxim that he was a pitiful fellow who
would stick at a little rapping for his friend.
—Fielding, Jonathan mid, Bk. I. ch. xiii.
Though I never saw the lady in my life,
she need not be shy of us ; d — n me ! I scorn
to rap against any lady.— Ibid^ Amelia, Bk.
I. ch. x.
Rapfully, violently.
Then far of vplandish we doe view thee fird
Sicil ./Etna,
And a seabelch grounting on rough rocks
rapfulye fretting.
Stanyhurst, JEn\, iii. 566.
Rapper, knocker of a door.
He stood with the rapper of the door
suspended for a full minute in his hand. —
Sterne, Trist. Shatidy, vi. 143.
Rapshin. In Rennet's translation of
Erasmus 8 Praise of Folly, p. 53,
among the inconveniences to which a
horse is subjected mention is made of
" his rapshin and fetters when he runs
agrass : T there is nothing correspond-
ing to this in the original, but I sup-
pose rapshin to be that with which a
horse is hobbled, and which may flap
or rap against its leg.
Rascabilian, a rascal. Cf. Raska-
bilia.
Their names are often recorded in a court
of correction, where the ^register of rogues
makes no little gaine of rascabilians. — Bre-
ton, Strange Newes, p. 6.
Rascaldom, rascality. Cf. Scoun-
DBELDOM.
As to Lamotte, the husband, he for shelter
against much, decisively dives down to the
subterranean shades of Rascaldom ; gambles,
swindles. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. vi.
Denis during these ten years of probation
walked chiefly in the subterranean shades of
Rascaldom. — Ibid., Misc., iii. 202.
How has this turbulent Alexandrian ras-
caldom been behaving itself in my absence ?
— Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. ii.
RASCALDRY ( 53* ) RATTLEPATE
Rascaldry, rascality, or the class
that practises it.
So base a rascaldry
As is too farre from thought of cbyualry.
Breton, PasquiVs FooUs-cappe, p. 21.
RascalE88, female rascal.
Then shall I have all the rascals and ras-
calesses of the family come creeping to me.
— Richardson, CI. Harlotce, i. 221.
Rascalism, the quality pertaining to
a rascal : scoundrelism is in the Diets.,
but not this word.
A tall handsome man with ex-military
whiskers, with a look of troubled gaiety and
rascalism. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch.
xiv.
Rabhbd, burnt by hasty cooking.
Bee H. : Fuller refers to Fox, Vol. I.
p. 920.
Mr. Fox . . . eonfesseth, and take it in
his own words, that the former edition of his
Acts and Monuments was hastily rashed up
at the present in such shortnesse of time . . .
that it betraied him to many mistakes. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., IV. ii. 61.
Raskabilia, rascally, worthless
people.
Beware raskabilia, slothfull to wurke.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 25.
Raspy, rough.
Such a raspy, untamed voice as that of his
I have hardly heard. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 197.
Rat, to desert a cause, as rats are
said to leave a falling house.
Lastly, as to the Pagan who played such a
trick,
First assuming the tonsure, then cutting his
stick,
There is but one thing which occurs to me —
that
Is, — Don't give too much credit to people
who rat.
Jngoldsby Legends (Lay of St. Aloys).
Egad, sir, the country is going to the dogs !
Our sentiments are not represented in Par-
liament or out of it. The County Mercury
has ratted, and be hanged to it ! and now we
have not one newspaper in the whole shire
to express the sentiments of the respectable
part of the community. — Lytton, Caxtons,
Bk. II. ch. iv.
Rat. Drunk as a rat = very drunk :
for other similar comparisons see «. v.
Drunk.
He walks about the country
With pike-staff and with bntchet,
Drunk as a rat, you'd hardly wot
That drinking so he could trudge it.
Merry Drollerie, p. 28.
Ratiocinant, reasoning.
I have not asked this question without
cause causing, and reason truly very ratio-'
cinant. — UrqukarVs Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. vi.
Rationability, power of reasoning.
Rationability being but a faculty or speci-
fical quality, is a substantial part of a man,
because it is a part of his definition, or his
essential difference. — Bramhall, ii. 24.
Rationable, reasonable, or in pos-
session of reason: the speaker in the
extract is an uneducated person.
She was, I take it, on this matter not
quite rationable.— Miss Edgeworth, Belinda,
ch. xxvi.
Ratter, one who rats or apostatises.
In the famous old print of the minister
rat-catcher in the Westminster election, the
likeness to each rat of the day is lost tons,
but the ridicule on placemen ratters remains.
^-Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xxvii.
Rattery, apostasy ; tergiversation.
Such a spectacle refreshes me in the rattery
and scoundrelism of public life. — Sydney
Smith, Letters, 1822.
Rattle, rebuke.
Richardson was again convented at the
Council Table, and peremptorily commanded
to reverse his former orders at the next
assizes for that county; withal receiving
such a rattle for his former contempt by the
Bishop of London, that he came out blubber-
ing.— Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 267.
Rattle-bladder, a bladder filled
with peas or the like to make a noise ;
used in frightening birds off ^orn
Our consciences now quite unclogged from
the fear of his [the Pope's] vain terricula-
ments and rattle-bladders, and from the fond-
ness of his trim-trams and gugaws. — Patton,
Exped. to Scot. 1548 (Eng. Garner, iii. 70).
Rattlehead, a thoughtless fellow.
Many rattleheads as well as they, did
bestir them to gain-stand this match. —
Hacket, Life of WiUiams, i. 130.
Rattle-headed, giddy ; flighty.
I rather fancy that the rattle-headed fellow
her husband has broke the poor lady's heart.
— Farquhar, Sir Harry Witdair, v. 3.
As for the People, it is an ordinary trope
of the author's by a rattle-headed scum of
the Oanaglia to fetch in the people forsooth.
— North, Examen, p. 114.
Rattlepate, a giddy, thoughtless
person. Cf. Rattlehead.
I ought to have told you of that doctor a
fortnight ago ; but, rattlepate as I am, I
forgot all about it. — Kingsley, Two Yoars
Ago, ch. xi.
RATTLE-PATED ( 539 )
REBAPTIST
Rattle-pated, giddy ; shallow.
There is a noisy rattle-pated fellow of
rather low habits. — Irving, Sketch Book
(John Bull).
Rattletrap, a contemptuous term
for a thing, as rattlehead is for a
person.
"He'd destroy himself and me too, if I
attempted to ride him at such a rattletrap as
that.9 A rattletrap! The quintain that she
had put up with so much anxious care . . .
It cut her to the heart to hear it so de-
nominated by her own brother. — Trollops^
Barchester Towers, ch. xxxv.
Raucid, harsh.
Methinks I hear the old boatman paddling s
by the weedy wharf, with raucid voice bawl-"
ing, " Sculls, Sculls."— C. Lamb, To the shade
of Elliston.
Rave. Bp. Jacobson has the follow-
ing note on the subjoined extract.
" To rave into. So in the editions of
1660 and 1671. The first edition has,
' to rove into ; ' those of 1681 and
1686, ' to rake into.' Rave, as a noun
substantive, is still in use in Lincoln-
shire and elsewhere, for the effect of
exposure produced by the removal of
a partition wall in whole or in part,
or the like. The meaning therefore
probably is, to tear them rudely open,
and discover their nature and aggrava-
tions." Mr. Peacock in the Manley
and Corringham Glossary (E. D. S.).
has "Rave up, to pull up, to gather
together ; commonly used in regard to
gathering up evil stories of some one."
See also H. s. v. Sanderson, though
a Yorkshire man by birth, spent most of
his life in Lincolnshire.
It can be little pleasure to us to rave into
the infirmities of God's servants, and briug
them upon the stage. — Sanderson, i. 100.
Ravelment, entanglement.
A series of ravelments and squabbling
grudges which, says Mademoiselle with
much simplicity, the Devil himself could
not understand. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 212.
Raver, one who raves ; a madman. ,
As old decrepite persons, yong Infantes,
fooles, Madmen and: Ravers. — Touchstone of
Complexions, p. 94.
Raveby, extravagance ; raving.
Their raveries are apt, not onely to amuse
the vulgar people, but to mend their own
fortunes. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
366.
Reject them not as the raveries of a child.
— Sir J. Sempill, Sacrilege sacredly handled
(Introduction).
Rax, to stretch.
So he raxes his hand across t' table, an'
mutters summat as he grips mine. — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xliii.
Rayn, to arraign.
They sue their subiettis at the lawe,
Whom they make nott worth a strawe,
Raynynge them giltless at the barre.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott wrothe, p. 98.
Reacheb, exaggeration.
I can hardly believe that Reacher, which
another writeth of him [Strongbow], that
" with the palms of his hands he could touch
his knees, though he stood upright." — Fuller,
Worthies, Monmouth (ii. 117).
Re-admiral, to reappoint to the office
of admiral.
Peerebrowne did not only hold his office
all the time of that King doeing plausible
service, but was againe re-admirald by Ed-
ward the Third.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl.
Misc., vi. 152).
Reakes, pranks : in the first quotation
it is used as a singular. Cf . a leads, a
thanks, a stews, &c.
Love with Rage kept such a reakes that I
thought they would have gone mad together.
— Breton, Dream of Strange Effects, p. 17.
The sound of the hautboys and bagpipes
playing reeks with the high and stately tim-
ber.— Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. u.
It were enough to undo me utterly, to fill
brimful the cup of my misfortune, and make
me play the mad-pate reeks of Bedlam. —
Ibid., Bk. III. ch. iz.
Realistically, in a manner that has
regard to objects as they really exist,
not as, for the purposes of art or poet-
ry, they might be idealized.
"Agrippa's legs will never do," said
Deronda. " The legs are good realistically"
said Hans, his face creasing drolly ; " public
men are often shaky about the legs." — G.
Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxzvil
Reanimate, to revive: usually an
active verb. Cf . the same writer's use
of animate, q. ▼.
" There spoke Miss Beverley ! " cried Del-
vile, reanimatino at this little apology. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. IX. ch. v.
Rebaptist, one who baptizes again,
or undergoes baptism a second time.
Some for rebaptist him bespatter,
For dipping rider oft in water.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 270.
REBLESS
( 540 )
RECKLING
Rebless, to bless Again.
He shall reblesse thee with ten thousand
blisses. — Davies, Holy Roode, p. 26.
Reblew, to make blue again.
Heav'n's sacred imp, fair Goddess that re-
new'st
Th' old golden age, and brightly now reblew'st
Our cloudy sky, making our fields to smile.
Sylvester, Handy Crafts, 13.
Rebus, to form into a rebus.
John Morton, Cardinal and Archbishop of
Canterbury . . . was a learned man, and bad
a fair library (rebus'd with More in text and
Tun under it) partly remaining in the posses-
sion of the late Earl of Arundell. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., IV. iv. 34.
Recalment, recalling ; countermand-
ing.
I followed after
And asked a* a grace what it all meant,
If she wished not the rash deed's recalment.
Browning, The Glove.
Recasket, to replace in a box or
casket.
I had hardly time to reeasket my treasures,
and lock them up, when she was at my side.
— Miss Bronte, Vtllette, ch. xadv.
Receipt, accommodation, power of
reception ; very frequent in Fuller, 8. v.
Laxity.
As for receipt, a house had better be too
little for a day than too great for a year. —
Fuller, Holy State, III. vii. 7.
His popular manner was of such receipt
that he had room to lodge all comers. — Ibid.,
V. xix. 10.
The greatest place of receipt in Samaria . .
was that void place at the entering of the
gate. — Ibid., Ptsgah Sight, II. ix. 25.
London, by reason of the receit thereof,
was likely to prove the residing place for the
English monarch. — Ibid., Ch. Hist., II. ii. 1.
Recentre, to replace in the midst.
Now I recentre my immortal mind
In the deep sabbath of meek self-content.
Coleridge, To the departing Year.
Reoeptable, receptacle; perhaps a
misprint, but it occurs again at p. 256,
and in neither case is it noted in the
list of errata ; at p. 187, however, and
elsewhere receptacle is used.
The good Josias . . ordained that that
place (before a Paradise) should be for ever
a receptable for dead carcases. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 186.
Receptiveness, power or readiness to
receive : receptivity is more common.
Many of her opinions, such as those on
Church government and the character of
Archbishop Laud, seemed too decided under
every alteration to have been arrived at other-
wise than by a wifely receptiveness. — G. Eliot,
Daniel Deronda. ch. iii.
Receptiveness is a rare and massive power
like fortitude. — Ibid., ch. xl.
Recess, to withdraw; to place in
retirement.
Behind the screen of his prodigious elbow
you will be comfortably recessed from curious
unpertinents. — Miss Edgeworth, Manoeuvring,
ch. xiv.
Rechant, to sing antiphonally.
*Hark, hark, the cheerful and rechaunting cries
Of old and young, singing this joifull dittie.
Sylvester, Handy Crafts, 31.
• Rechaos, to reduce again to chaos.
See another extract from Davies, s. v.
Reget.
So shall thy stay, when states re-chaosed lie,
Make thee great Steward to Eteruitie.
Davies, Sir T. Overbury, p. 16.
Rechekr, to cheer again.
Let neuer Sunne recheere them with his raies,
That Justice Sonne haue thus in purple
clowded. — Davies, Holy Roode, p. 27.
Rechew, to chew the cud.
Nor could he (as some beasts rechew their
meat,
To cause the same the better to disgest)
Rechew this Bread.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 23.
Rechild, to become a child again.
Just Dauid's just Son, for thy father's sake,
For his deer loue, for all that he did make
Of thee a childe, when he (re-child»'ng) sought
With childish sport to still thy cryes.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 526.
Reciprocal, applied to the returning
tide. Fuller uses the word in the same
way ; see $. v. Refluous.
The havens that are so choked up with
sand brought in with the reciprocall course
of the tides.— Holland's Camden, p. 206.
Rkciprocalty, mutual change.
With a reciprocalty pleasure and paine are
still united, and succeed one anotner in a
ring. — Burton, Anatomy, p. 12.
An acknowledged reciprocalitv in love
sanctifies every little freedom. — Kichardson,
CI. Harlow, hi. 188.
Reckling, is defined by H., who
gives no example, " the smallest and
weakest of a brood of animals ; " in
first quotation it is an adjective, and
in both is applied to a human being.
A mother dotes upon the reckling child
More than the strong.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt II. v. 3.
RECLAIM
( 541 )
RED-GUM
O ay, what say ye to Sir Valence, him
Whose kinsman left him watcher o'er his
wife
And two fair babes, and went to distant
lands :
Was one year gone, and on returning found,
Not two but three ; there lay the reckling,
one
But one hour old.
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine.
Reclaim, to reform: usually an
active verb.
Obliged to assume such airs of reformation,
that every varlet of ye has been afraid I
should reclaim in good earnest. — Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, iii. 33. u
Reclaim, to cry again, to re-echo.
Melt to tears, pour out thy plaints, let
Echo reclaim them. — Greene {From the
Mourning Garment), p. 307.
Reclear, to clear again.
He hurts and heals, He breaks and maketh
sound;
And so, when Pharao doth Him humbly
pray,
Recleers the floods, and sends the frogs away.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 469.
Thick streams recleer when storms and
stirrings cease. — Ibid., Memorials of Mor-
talitie, Ft. II. st. lzxxvii.
Recommendums, praises ; commend-
ations.
Even those that attend uppon the pitch-
kettle will bee drunke to my good fortunes
and recommendums. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Hart. Misc., vi. 180).
Reconnoitre, to recognize (a Galli-
cism).
He would hardly have reconnoitred Wild-
goose however in his short hair, and his
present uncouth appearance. — Graves, Spirit'
ual Quixote, Bk. TV. ch. i.
Reconnoitre, a survey. R. and L.
only give it as a verb ; and even the
verb Addison (Spectator, No. 165)
ridicules as an outlandish word, nor
did Johnson give it a place in his Diet.
Satisfied with his reconnoitre, Losely quitted
the skeleton pile. — Lytton, What will he do
with it, Bk. X. ch. i.
Recourse, to have recourse to.
The court recount to lakes, to springs, and
brooks,
Brooks, springs, and lakes had the like taste
and looks. — Sylvester, The Lawe, 432.
These dogmatists dare not recourse to
Scripture. — Racket , Life of Williams, ii. 201.
Recrew, to recruit.
One intire troop with some other odd
troopers, and some stragling foot, that were
to recrew other companies. — Prince Rupert* s
beating up of the Rebel Quarters at Post-comb
and Chinner (1643), p. xvi.
Recross, to oppose again.
For when we first to liue well goe about,
Ware crost and recrost by the Reprobate.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 53.
Recrucify, to crucify afresh.
Our sins . . . were the Judas betraying,
the Herod mocking, the Pilate condemning,
the Longinus wounding, the hand of Jews
recrucifying- Christ. — Adams, ii. 349.
Recrudescence, the becoming raw
again ; reopening. Bacon has recrud-
ency*
The king required some regulations should
be made for obviating the recrudescence of
those ignoramus abuses for the future, that
bad been so scandalous before. — North,
Examen, p. 632.
Rkctangularity, right-angled shape
or figure.
She sketched in strong caricature my
relaxed elongation of limb, and his rigid
rectangulurity. — Miss Edgeworth, Ennui,
ch. ii.
Recueil (Fr.), collection.
I made this recueil merely for mine own
entertainment. — Pref. to Annot. on Brown's
Religio Medici.
Recureful, recovering ; healing.
Let me for euer hide this staine of beauty
With this recureful maske.
Chapman, Gentleman Vsher, Act V*
Redaction, drawing back.
It stands not without doors as a mendicant
flexanimous persuader, but enters into the
closets of the heart, shoots the bar, unlocks
the bolts, takes away all reluctation and
redactvrn, — infuseth a pliable willingness. —
Ward, Sermons, p. 31.
Redan, fortification with two faces,
forming a salient angle : the word be-
came very familiar to us in the Crimean
War.
Upon the surface of which [bowling-green]
by means of a large roll of pack-thread, ana
a number of small piquets driven into the
ground at the several angles and redans, he
transferred the lines from his paper. — Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, iv. 217.
Red-gum, an eruption common in
newly - born infants. The word has
nothing to do with the gums, but comes
from A. S. gundy corruption. See L.,
also H. s. v. red-gown.
Their heads are hid with skalln,
Their limbs with red-gums.
Sylvester, The Furies, p. 531.
RED-LETTER DA Y ( 542 )
REFLECT
I found Charlotte quite in a fume about
the child : she was sure it was very ill ; it
cried and fretted, and was all over pimples.
So I looked at it directly, and, " Lord, my
dear," says I, " it is nothing in the world but
the red-gum." — Miss Austen, Sense and Sensi-
bility, ch. xxxvii.
Red-letter day, a bright day; a
festival, the Church festivals being
printed with red ink in the Calendar.
It is the old girl's birthday ; and that is
the greatest holiday and reddest-letter day
in Mr. Bagnet's calendar. — Dickens, Bleak
House, ch. xlix.
Redo, to do over again.
Prodigality and luxurie are no new crimes,
and . . we do but re-do old vices. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 262.
Redound, result; the verb is com-
mon, but the substantive is not in the
Diets.
We give you welcome : not without redound
Of use and glory to yourselves, ye come
The first-fruits of the stranger.
Tennyson, Princess, ii.
Red-Sea. Ghosts were supposed to
be effectually laid in this.
If the Conjuror be but well paid, he'll
take pains upon the ghost, and lav him, look
ye, in the Red-Sea, and then he's laid for ever.
— Addison, The Drummer, Act II.
Drain we the cup —
Friend, art afraid,
> Spirits are laid
In the Red-Sea.
Thackeray, The Mahogany Tree.
Red-shanks. L. says, a name given
to Scotch Highlanders on account of
their bare legs ; but it was applied to
the native Irish also, as to which N.
seems a little doubtful. Nashe's ety-
mology is of course jocular.
The Scotish jockies or Red-Shanks (so sur-
named of their immoderate maunching up
the red-shanks or red-herrings) upholde and
make good the same. — Nashe's Lenten Stuffe
(Zfarl. Misc., vi. 163).
Though all the Scottish hinds would not
bear to be compared with the rich counties
of South Britain, tbey would stand very well
in competition with the peasants of France,
Italy, and Savoy, not to mention the moun-
taineers of Wales, and the red-shanks of
Ireland. — Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, ii. 41.
Red-tape, official : used disparagingly
of routine administration. For example
of the substantive see *. v. Monkey.
We working men, when we do come out
of the furnace, come out, not tinsel and
papier mache, like those fops of red-tape
statesmen, but steel and granite. — C. Kings-
ley, Alton Locke, ch. iv.
Red-tapist, a man who is* a stickler
for official routine.
Tou seem a smart young fellow, but you
must throw over that stiff red-tapist of yours,
and go with Public Opinion and myself. —
Lytton, My Novel, Bk. X. ch. zz.
Red winds, blight.
The goodliest trees in a garden are soonest
blasted with red winds. — Ahp. Sandys, Ser-
mons, p. 103.
Reel, to make reel ; to shake.
We thought our Crowne so staid with many
props
(So yong and strong), that no cold puf of
feare
(However strong) could once but shake our
hopes
Which now this blast doth reels and back-
ward beare. — Davies, Muse's Tearts, p. 6.
Reel, to gather yarn off the spindle.
L. gives the word without example.
I say nothing of his lips ; for they are so
thin and slender that, were it the fashion to
reel lips, as they do yarn, one might make a
skein of them.— J arvi a' s Don Quixote, Pt. II.
Bk. III. ch. zv.
Reezed. N. explains this word as
rusty, and probably he is right in the
passages that he cites ; but in the sub-
joined extract it cannot signify this,
but rather fried or scorched.
Their souls may at last be had to heaven,
though first for a while they be reezed in
purgatory. — Adams, i. 65.
Refaction, retribution.
The soveraigne minister, who was then
employed in Elaiana, was commanded to re-
quire refaction and satisfaction against the
informers, or rather inventours and forgers
of the aforesaid misinformation. — Howell,
DodonaJs Grove, p. 113.
Re- fathered, applied to a man who
finds that an only child whom he had
thought dead was alive.
At the happy word, " he lives,"
My father stoop'd, re-fathered, o'er my
wounds. — Tennyson, Princess, vi.
Reflame, to burst again into flame.
Stamp out the fire, or this
Will smoulder and reflame, and burn the
throne
Where you should sit with Philip.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, i. 5.
Reflect, to bend again ; to appease.
Such rites beseem ambassadors, and Nestor
urged these,
That their most honours might reflect en-
raged (Eacides. — Chapman, Iliad, ix. 180.
REFLECTION
( 543 )
REGENCE
Reflection, to reflect. Cf. Affec-
tion, Perfection.
But refiectioning apart, thou seest, Jack,
that her plot is beginning to work.— Rich-
ardson, CI. Harlowe, vi. 3.
Refloweb, to cause to flower again.
See quotation 8. v. Regbeen.
Her footing makes the ground all fragrant-
fresh;
Her sight rtfiowres th' Arabian wilderness.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 805.
Refluous, flowing back.
The stream of Jordan, south of their going
over, was not supplied with any reciprocall
or refluous tide ont of the Dead Sea. —
Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II. i. 17.
Reform, to inform.
The prophet Esay also saith, " Who hath
reformed the Spirit of the Lord, or who is of
His council to teach Him ? " — Becon, ii. 39.
Reformeress, female reformer.
Holy Colette of portentous sanctity, the
Reformeress of the Poor Clares. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. codii.
Re fracture, a breaking back; an-
tagonism.
More veniall and excusable may those ver-
ball reluctancies, reserves, and refractures
(rather than anything of open force and
hostile rebellions) seem. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 562.
Refresher, an extra fee to a bar-
rister, given after the payment of the
first.
Every fortnight or so I took care that he
should receive a " refresher" as lawyers call
it, — a new and revised brief memorialising
my pretensions. — De Quincey, Sketches, 1. 72.
Refrication, a rubbing up afresh.
The second care must be had of the me-
mory, that a deep impression be made, fre-
quent refreshing and refrication be used with
David's watchword, " My soul, forget not all
His benefits." — Ward, Sermons, p. 138.
In these legal sacrifices there is a continual
refrication of the memory of those sins evenr
year which we have committed. — Bp. Hall,
Works, iv. 501.
Refugeeism, the condition of a re-
fugee, i. 6. of one who has taken refuge
in another country from dangers (usu-
ally political) that threatened him in
his own.
A Pole, or a Czech, or something of that
fermenting sort, in a state of political re-
fugeeism.— G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxii.
Regale, a treat or entertainment.
The Diets, do not give this word as a
substantive, though it is not uncommon.
Another instance from Cowper may be
found in The Garden^ 551.
Handsome regales sometimes buoy up
credit. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 18.
Our new acquaintance asked us if ever we
had drank egg-flip ; to which we answering
in the negative, he assured us of a regale,
and ordered a quart to be prepared. — Smol-
let, Roderick Random, ch. xiv.
Their breath a sample of last night's regale.
— Cowper, Tirocinium, 834.
The breakfast merited such eulogiums as
French hosts are wont to confer upon their
regales. — Scott, Quentin Durward, i. 42.
Regale in, to take pleasure in ; to
enjoy.
The little girl performed her journey
in safety ; and at Northampton was met by
Mrs. Norris, who thus regaled in the credit of
being foremost to welcome her. — Miss Austen,
Mansfield Park, ch. ii.
Regalia, entertainment ; delicate
food.
After having a long time treated their
prisoners very well, and given them all the
regalias they can think of, he to whom the
Prisoner belongs, invites a great assembly of
is kindred and friends. — Cotton, Montaigne,
ch. xxiv.
The Town shall have its regalia: the
Coffee-house gapers, I'm resolv'd, shan't
want their Diversion. — D*Urfey, Two Queens
of Brentford, Act I.
Rbualio, a banquet or regale.
Do you think . . that the fatal end of
their journey being continually before their
eyes, would not alter and deprave their
palate from tasting these rey alios? — Cotton,
Montaigne's Essays, ch. xvi.
Regalitie, a territorial jurisdiction
conferred by the king.
There be civill Courts also in everie rega-
litie, holden by their Bailiffes, to whom the
kings have gratiously granted royalties. —
Holland's Camden, ii. 8.
Regalo, entertainment.
I thank you for the last regalo you gave
me at your Museum, and for the good com-
pany.— Howell, Letters, I. vi. 20.
I congratulate you on your regalo from
the Northumberland's. — Walpole to Mann,
iii. 285 (1758).
Regence, government.
Some were for setting up a king,
But all the rest for no such thing,
Unless King Jesus : others tampered
For Fleetwood, Desborough, and Lambert;
Some for the Rump, and some more crafty
For Agitators and the Safety ;
REGENDER
( 544 )
REIGN
Some for the Gospel and massacres
Of spiritual affidavit-makers,
That swore to any human regencc
Oaths of supremacy and allegiance.
Hudibras, III. ii. 275.
Regkndkr, to renew ; rekindle.
Furth spirits fyre freshlye regendred. —
Stanyhunt, JEn., ii. 496.
Regenerative, giving new birth or
life.
She had been crushing and extirpating
out of her empire for centuries past all
which was noble, purifying, regenerative,
divine. — Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xvii.
She identified him with the struggling
regenerative process in her, which had begun
with his action. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch. 1st.
Regerminate, to sprout forth again.
And surely as man's health and strength
are whole,
His appetites regerminate, his heart
Re-opens, and his objects and desires
Shoot up renewed.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. Hi. 2.
Regbt, to generate again. R. has
the word = reobtain, with quotation
from Daniel.
Tory, although the mother of vs all,
Regetts thee in her wombe : thou fill'st her so
"With glory of thy vertues, that shee shall
Preserue thy name till she re-chaosed go
To purging flames.
Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 52.
Regian, used by Fuller of those who
upheld the royal supremacy as against
the Pope ; by Hacket, of royalists.
This is alleadged and urged by our Regions
to prove the king's paramount power in
ecclesiasticis. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. iii. 38.
Arthur Wilson . . favours all republicans,
and never speaks well of regions lit is his
own distinctions) if he can possibly avoid it.
—Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 39.
Regime, rule: a French word
naturalized.
I dream in my sleep of the new regime
which is to come, and I see only trouble,
and again trouble. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe,
ch. xv.
Regimental, a suit of regimentals.
If they had been ruled by me, they would
have put you into the guards. You would
have made a sweet figure in a regimental. —
Colman, Man of Business, Act II.
Regimented, drawn up or formed
into a regiment. R. has this word
with a quotation from Adam Smith,
who evidently thought it had not been
used before.
As in all states there is a civil as well as
military administration, so in this Oxford
(Economy the Faction had another order
regimented, being a detachment from the
libelling garrison in London. — Nortk, Ex-
amen, p. 100.
If women were to be regimented, he would
carry an army into the field without beat of
drum. — Richardson, Grandison, iii. 314.
Regimented companies of men, of whom
our Jocelin is one, devote themselves in
every generation to meditate here ou man's
nobleness and awfnlness. — Carlyle, Fast and
Present, Bk. II. ch. iii.
REGL08S, to put a fresh gloss on ;
to make shine again. Sylvester (Job
Triumphant, ii. 63) refers to houses
" rebuilt, regilt, reglost, reglas'd ; "
and Davies speaks of a fat man in a
suit of satin whose grease
So reglosst the sat ten's glosse that it
Was varnisht like their vailes that turn the
spit.
Davies, Humours Heaven on Earth, p. 6.
Regnipide, destroyer of a kingdom.
Regicides are no less than regnicides, for
the life of a king contains a thousand thou-
sand lives ; and traitors make the land sick
which they live in. — Adams, i. 418.
Regreen, to make green again.
The Sommer's sweet distilling drops
Vpon the meadowes thirsty yawning chop*,
Regreens the greens, and doth the flowrs
reflowr
All scorcht and burnt with Auster's parching
powr.— Sylvester, The Arke, 66.
Reguerdonment, requital.
In generous requerdonment whereof he
sacramental ly obliged himself e. — Ndshe,
Lenten Stuffe {Hart. Misc., vi. 163).
Reigle, to regulate. R. and H.
have the word as a substantive =
groove, or channel.
My letter was written to the Justices for
the reigling of the same. — Hacket, Life of
Williams, i. 92.
There is a clear statute made, 27 Eliz., for
the drawing all Westminster, St. Clement,
and St. Martins le Grand, London, into a
corporation to be reigled by a Dean, a
Steward, twelve Burgesses, and twelve As-
sistants.— Ibid., ii. 175.
All ought to regie their lives, not by the
Pope's Decrees, but Word of God. — Fuller,
Worthies, Wales (ii. 558).
Reign. Adams uses once in a reign
= once in a way.
If ever, in a reign, he lights upon a humour
to business, it is to game, to cheat, to drink
drunk. — Adams, i. 481.
If, once in a reign, he invites his neighbours
REIMBOSK
( 545 ) REMEMBERABLE
to dinner, he whiles the time with frivolous
discourses to binder feeding. — Ibid., i. 483.
Reimbosk, to re-enter the lair.
The Ampelonian Satyr, having thus dis-
gorged his stomack suddenly ran in and re-
tmbosch'd himself. — Howell, Dodona"s Grove,
p. 14.
Reinoendeb, to regenerate. Milton
(Animadv. on Remonst., sect. 4) speaks
of " the renovating and reingendering
Spirit of God."
Reister, a trooper.
Offer my services to Butrech, the best
doctor among reisters, and the best reister
among Doctors. — Sir P. Sidney to Hubert
Languet, Oct. 1577 (Zurich Letters, ii. 293;.
Reject i ble, to be rejected.
Will you tell me, my dear, what you have
thought of Lovelace's best and of his worst ?
How far eligible for the first, how far reject*
ible for the last ? — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
i. 280.
Relict, is generally used as a sub-
stantive = widow : in the first extract
it = deserted, in the second = left, or
surviving.
How unseemly was it that God Himself
should have the reversion of profaneness
assigned to His service, and His worship
wedded to the relict, yea (what was worse)
whorish shrines formerly abused with idol-
atry.— Fuller, Ch. Hist, I. ii. 11.
His Relict Lady . . . lived long in West-
minster.— Ibid., Worthies, Lincoln (ii. 13).
Relief-ful, comforting.
Never was there a more joyous heart . . .
ready to burst its bars for relief-ful expres-
sion.— Richardson, CI. Hctrlowe, v. 82.
Relievement, mitigation ; relief.
His delay yeelds the king time to oonfirme
his friends, vnder-worke his enemies, and
make himself strong with the English, which
he did by granting relaxation of tribute
with other relieuements of their doleances. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 45.
Reliever. See extract.
In some sweating places there is an old
coat kept called the " reliever" and this is
borrowed by such men as have none of their
own to go out in. — C. Kingsley, Cheap Clothes
and Nasty.
Religiosity, religious exercise : also
profession of religion.
Soporific sermons . . . closed the domestic
reliyiosities of those melancholy days. —
Son they, The Doctor, ch. ix.
He was obstinate and ruthless, and in
spite of his religiosity (for all men were
religious then) was by no means a " con-
sistent walker."— Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. xiii.
Reliquation, upshot ; that which is
got by liquation, or, perhaps, the resi-
duum ?
The reliquation of that which preceded is,
it looks not all like Popery that Presby-
terism was disdained by the king : his father
had taught him that it was a sect so per-
fidious, that he found more faith among the
Highlanders.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii.
197.
Relishable, capable of being relished
or enjoyed.
By leeven soured we make relishable bread
for the use of man. — Adams, ii. 346.
Rely, to rest (physically).
Ah see how His most holy Hand relies
Vpon His knees to vnder-prop His charge.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 15.
Rely to, to rely on.
Instead of apologies aud captation of good
will, he relies to this fort, passeth not for
man's day. — Ward, Sermons, p. 107.
Remarkable, a noteworthy thing :
for similar uses see *. v. Observables.
Jerusalem won by the Turk, with wof ull
remarkdbles thereat. — Fuller, Holy War, Bk.
II. ch. xlvi. (title).
The northern parts with much ice have
some crystal, and want not their remarkable s.
Ibid., Holy State, III. iv. 6.
In other remarkables Cade differed from
Jack Straw.— Ibid., Ch. Hist.t IV. iii. 22.
The chief remarkable there was a little
port which that gentleman with great con-
trivance, and after many disappointments,
made for securing snlall craft that carried
out his salt and coal. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 206.
Remblere, riddle (?).
"Would any antiquarie would explicate
unto mee this remblere or quidditie whether
those turbanto groutheads, that hang all
men by the throates on iron hookes (even as
our toers hang all there herrings by the
throates on wodden spits) first learnd it of
our herring-men, or our herring-men of them.
— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Hart. Misc., vi. 166).
Reheant, returning.
Most exalted Prince,
Whose peerless Knighthood, like the remeant
sun,
After too long a night regilds our clay.
Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, ii. 8.
Rememberable, capable of being re-
membered ; memorable.
Rightly it is 6aid of utter, utter misery
that it " cannot be remembered." Itself, as
N N
REMEMBERABLY ( 546 )
REP
a rememberable thing, is swallowed op in its
own chaos. — De (juincey, Autob. Sketches,
ch. i.
Bear witness that rememberabU day.
When, pale as yet, and fever -worn, the
Prince
Who scarce had pluck'd his flickering life
again,
From half-way down the shadow of the
grave,
Past with thee thro' thy people and their
love. — Tennyson, To the Quern.
Rememberably, in a way to be re-
membered.
My golden rule is to relate everything as
briefly, as perspicuously, and as rememberably
as possible. — Southey, 1806 (Mem. of Taylor
of Norwich, ii. 77).
Rememberer, one who remembers.
Miss Byron was not the first to make
the word. L. has it with extract from
Wotton.
This, Lncy, is the state of the unhappy
case, as briefly and as clearly as my memory
will serve to give it. And what a rememberer,
if I may make a word, is the heart ! Not a
circumstance escapes it. — Richardson, Grandi-
son, iv. 66.
Remercies, thanks. Spenser uses
the verb (F. Q„ II. xi. 16): a Galli-
cism.
So mildely did he beying the conquerour,
take the vnthankf ulnesse of persones Dy hym
conquered and subdued, who did . . . not
render thankee ne saie remercies, for that
thei had been let bothe safe and sounde. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 185.
Remigable, fit to be rowed upon ;
the extract is a translation of Horace,
Ars Pott., 65, "aptaque remis"
Where steril remigable marshes now
Feed neighboring cities, and admit the plough.
Cotton's Montaigne, ch. xxiv.
Remindful, remembering.
Meanwhile, remindful of the convent bars,
Bianca did not watch these signs in vain.
Hood, Bianca s Dream.
Reminiscitory, remembering, or hav-
ing to do with the memory.
I still have a reminiscitory spite against
Mr. Job Jonson. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. lxziii.
Remise, to send back, or resolve.
R. has the verb, but only as a legal
term.
Yet thinke not that this too-too-much re-
mises
Ought into nought.
Sylvester, 2nd day, 1st week, 164.
Remisses. negligences.
Such manner of men as by negligence of
magistrates and remisses of lawes, euery
countrie breedeth great store of. — Puttenham,
Eng. Poesie, Bk. i. ch. xix.
Remonstrable, demonstrable.
Was it such a sin for Adam to eat a for-
bidden apple? Yes; the greatness is re-
monstrable in the event. — Adams, ii. 356.
Remonstratory, expostulatory.
" Come, come, Sikea," said the Jew, appeal-
ing to him in a remonstratory tone. — Dickens,
Oliver Twist, ch. xvi.
Remdtation, changing back.
The mutation or rarefaction of water into
air takes place by day, the remutation or
copdensation of air into water by night. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. cczvii.
Rendesvouser, an associate.
• His lordship retained such a veneration
for the memory of his noble friend and
patron Sir Jeofry Palmer, that all the old
rendesvouser* with him, were so with his
lordship. — North, Life of Lord Guilford, i.
291.
Reneger, denier, renegade.
Their forefathers . . . were sometimes
esteemed blest Reformers by most of these
modern Renegers, Separates, and Apostates. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 57.
Renego, renegade ; perhaps a mis-
print for renegado.
This renego sailed from our ports in the
end of April. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i.
99.
Rennfble, fluent.
The like must we say for prayer ; the gift
whereof he may be truly said to have, not
that hath the most rennible tongue; for
prayer is not so much a matter of the lips as
of the heart ; but he that hath the most
illuminated apprehension of the Ood to
whom he speaks. — Bp. Hall, Works, vi. 478.
Renunciance, renunciation.
Each in silence, in tragical renunciance,
did And that the other was all too lovely. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. iii.
Rep, apparently an inferior sort of
fiddle, or perhaps anything of an in-
ferior kind. H. gives it = " a jade, or
lean horse."
Thus prove a crowd a Stainer, or Amati,
No matter for the fiddle's sound ;
The fortunate possessor shall not bate ye
A doit of fifty, nay, a hundred pound :
And though what's vulgarly baptized a rep,
Shall in a hundred pounds be deemed dog-
cheap. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 152.
Rep, abbreviation for reputation,
sneered at by Swift (in the Introduction
REPAIRABLE ( 547 ) REPRESENTEE
to Polite Conversation) and Addison ;
see quotation, s. v. Pos. It was mainly
used in the asseveration pon rep.
FlowerM callioocs that fill our shoars.
And worn by dames of rep', as well as whores.
D'Urfey, Two Queens of Brentford, Act I.
Nev. Madam, have you heard that Lady
Queasy was lately at the Play-house in Gog ?
Lady 8m. What, Lady Queasy of all women
in the world ! Do you say it upon rep ?
Nev. Pozz ; I saw her with my own eyes.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
Repairable, capable of being re-
paired. See extract 8. v. Repentable.
L. gives repairable without example.
Repairer, restorer.
Abraham (Melius, the repairer of ancient
geography. — Holland's Camden, ii. 221.
Repastour, one who takes a repast.
They doe plye theire commons lyke quick
and greedye repastours. — St any hurst, JSn.. i.
217.
Repeat, repetition. Achilles recapi-
tulates the causes which led to his
inaction, and adds, ''And so of this
repeat enough " {Chapman, Iliad, xvi.
57 ). L. has repeat as a substantive, but
only as a musical term.
Repelless, invincible.
Two great Armados howrelie plow'd their
way,
And by assaulte made knowne repellesse
might.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R. Orinuile,
p. 71.
Repent, repentance.
Last a passion of repent,
Told me flat, that desire
"Was a brand of love's fire,
Which consumeth men in thrall,
Virtue, youth, wit, and all.
Greene, from Never too late, p. 295.
Repent hath sent me home with empty hands
At last to tell how rife our follies are.
J bid., p. 299.
Repentable, capable of being re-
pented of.
It seems scarce pardonable because 'tis
scarce a repentable sin or repairable malice. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 05.
Reperriwig, to cover again at the
top, applied to leaves covering the
trees. Sylvester has the simple verb
"periwig" in the same connection
{nandie Crafts, 1 87), and is ridiculed for
this by Dryden. Howell also (Dodona's
Grove, p. 100) speaks of c* Druina's
royall Oke, whose top being already
periwigid with snowy age, was sickly
and impotent.'*
The sappy blood
Of trees hath twice reperriwigd the wood
Since the first siege.
Sylvester, The Decay, 815.
Repertor, finder.
Let others dispute whether Anah was the
inventor or only the repertor of mules, the
industrious founder, or the casual finder of
them.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, IV. ii. 32.
Repine, grudge.
And ye, fair heaps, the Muses' sacred shrines,
(In spite of time and envious repines)
Stand still and flourish.
Hall, Satires, II. ii. 8.
Rbpleat, to fill full.
Gold and hunger never yet
Co'd a noble verse beget ;
But your boules with sack repleat.
Herrick, Hesperxdes, p. 238.
Replexion, reweaving(?), and so re-
flection ; for which it is perhaps a
misprint.
Now begins the sunne to give light unto
the ayre, and with the replexion of his beames
to warme the cold earth. — Breton, Fantas-
tickes (Spring).
Replicate, to reply.
They cringing in their neckes, like rata
smothered in the holde poorely replicated, . .
"With hunger, and hope, and thirst wee
content ourselves." — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(HaH. Misc., vi. 180).
Replume, to preen again, to re-ar-
range.
The right hand replumed
His black looks to their wonted composure.
Browning, Saul.
Reportory, report.
In this transcursive reportory, without some
observant glance I may not dully overpasse
the gallant beauty of their haven. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 149).
Reposure, repose.
It was the Franciscans antient Dormitory,
as appeareth by the concavities still extant
in the walls, places for their severall reposure.
— Fuller, Hist, of Camb., viii. 19.
Representee, seems to mean, in the
extract, a representative; it should
rather signify a person represented, a
constituent. The word occurs again
in the same sense, p. 495.
Which is no hard matter where Bishops
are chosen (as anciently they were) by the
suffrages of the Presbyters or Ministers of
the Diocese either personally present, or, to
avoid noise and tumult incident to many, by
KN2
REPROBABLE ( 548 )
RESCOUNTER
their proxies and representees chosen and seat
from their several! distributions. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 448.
Reprobable, reproveable.
It is nothynge reprobable
To declare his mischefe and whordom.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and be nott
wrothe, p. 26.
No thynge ther in was reprobable,
But all to gedder true and veritable,
Without heresy or eny faolte.
Ibid., p. 44.
Reprobacy, wickedness.
"I should be sorry," said he, "that the
wretch would die in his present state of
reprobacy." — H. Brooke, Foot of Quality, ii.
134.
Reptonize, to lay out as Repton
would : a word formed like Macadamize,
Boswellize, &c. Humphrey Repton,
born 1752, died 1818, published
" Sketches and Hints on Landscape
Gardening" (1794).
Jackson assists me in Reptonizing the
garden.— Southey, Letters, 1807 (ii. 4).
ItEruBLicARiAN, a republican.
There were republicarians who would make
the Prince of Orange like a Statholder. —
Evelyn, Diary, Jan. 15, 1680.
Republicate, to set forth afresh;
rehabilitate.
The Cabinet-men at Wallingford-house
set upon it to consider what exploit this
lord should commence, to be the darling of
the Commons and as it were to republicate
his lordship, and to be precious to those who
had the vogue to be the chief lovers of their
country. — Racket, Life of William*, i. 137.
Repullulation, a rebudding. R.
and L. have the verb with one and the
same quotation from Howell $ Dodonas
Grove, Herrick has it also, p. 141.
Here I myselfe might likewise die,
And vtterly forgotten lye,
But that eternall poetrie
Repullulation gives me here
Unto the thirtieth thousand yeere,
When all now dead shall reappeare.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 284.
Repullulescent, springing up afresh.
One would have believed this expedient
plausible enough, and calculated to obviate
the ill use a repullulescent faction might
make, if the other way was taken. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 190.
Repulpit, to restore to the pulpit.
You have ousted the mock-priest, repulpited
The shepherd of St. Peter, raised the rood
again
And brought us back the mass.
Tennyson, Q. Mary, i. 5.
Repurge, to cleanse again.
All which haue either by their priuate
readings or publique workes repurged the
errors of Arte expelde from their pari tie. —
Nashe, Pref. to Greene's Menaphon, p. 11.
Repurge your spirits from euery hatefull
tin.— Hudson's Judith, i. 188.
Repurplb, to make purple again, to
doubly dye with purple.
The purple robe is oft re-purpelled
With royall blood.
Davies, Sir T. Overbury, p. 17.
Requiescence, return of rest
Such bolts clutched promptly overnight,
and launched with the early new morning,
shall strike agitated Paris, if not into re-
quiescence, yet into wholesome astonishment.
—Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. HI. ch. viii.
Requisition, to require, and so, to
press into service.
Such hundredfold miscellany of teams,
requisitioned or lawfully owned, making way,
hitting together, hindering each other. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. I. ch. viii.
Twelve thousand masons are requisitioned
from the neighbouring country to raze
Toulon from the face of the earth. — Ibid^
Bk. V. ch. iii.
Requite, requital.
Is this thy just requite? — Preston, K.
Cambists {Hawkins, Eny. Dr., i. 285).
Requiteless, free ; voluntary ; not
given in return for something else.
For this His love requiteless doth approue,
He gaue her beeing meerly of free grace,
Before she was, or could His mercie moue.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 63.
Rere-account, a supplemental
charge : an after-reckoning.
Such reckonings without the host are ever
subject to a rere-account. — Fuller, Holy War,
III. ch. xxii.
Though the second offering of David was
far short of the first in number of talents,
yet it is beheld in Scripture as most solemn
and of highest importance. . . This insinu-
ates that at this rere-account the talents were
talents indeed, and though in number fewer,
in worth more considerable than the former.
— Ibid., Pisgah Sight, III. Pt. II. i. 5.
Re-relapse, a repeated falling back.
Our shines (I feare) will worke worse after-
claps,
And tber's most danger in a re-relapse.
Sylvester, Miracle of Peace, Sonnet 35.
Rescounter. Grose, who gives the
word in the plural, says, " The time of
settlement between the bulls and bears
of Exchange-alley, when the losers must
RESEARCHER ( 549 ) RESURRECTIONIST
pay their differences, or become lame
ducks, and waddle out of the Alley."
You know the rescounter day, sir ; and if
Mr. Beverley does not pay his differences
within these four-and-twenty hours, the
world cannot hinder his being a lame duck.
— Colman, Man of Business, iv. 1.
Researcher, investigator.
He was too refined a researcher to lie open
to so gross an imposition. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, ii. 87.
Reshare, to share again.
Semiramis (whose vertue past compare)
This furious passion her did so remoue
From that shee was, that lusting to reshare
Hir Sonne, her Sonne her thread of life did
share. — Davies, Microcosmos, p. 66.
Resignal, resignation. Bp. Jacob-
son says, " I have not been able to trace
this form in any other writer." The
words are the opening of a sermon on
1 Sam. zii. 3.
A bold and just challenge of an old Judge
made before all the people upon his resignal
of the government into the hands of a new
King. — Sanderson, ii. 330.
Resignant, resigner.
Upon the 25th of October Sir John Suck-
ling ^brought the warrant from the King to
receive the Seal ; and the good news came
together, very welcome to the resignant,
that Sir Thomas Coventryshould have that
honour.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 27.
Resilient, springing back: resilience
is in the Diets.
Their act and search
Stretched to the furthest is resilient ever,
And in resilience hath its plenary force.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iii. 5.
Resins:, to sink again.
When Thou hadst plung'd me in the Font of
Grace,
So clens'd the filth I was conceiued in,
Though there I vow'd to keepe me in that
case,
I brake my vow, and me resuncke in sinne.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 29.
Resistant, antagonistic : a favourite
word with G. Eliot. Bp. Pearson,
quoted by R. and L., has it as a sub-
stantive.
This excommunication . . . simplified and
ennobled the resistant position of Savon-
arola.— O. Eliot, Romola, ch. Iv.
Respiring, breath.
They could not stir him from his stand,
although he wrought it out
"With short respirings, and with sweat.
Chapman, Iliad, xvi. 102.
Resplendishing, new splendour. R.
has the word as an adjective, with ex-
tract from Elyot *
And as the Sonne doth glorifie each thing
(Howeuer base) on which he deigns to
smile ;
So your cleare eyes doe giue resplendishing
To all their objects, be they ne'er so vile.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 7.
Rest, a wrest by which the strings
of musical instruments were tightened.
Home, calling on the virginall maker, buy
ing a rest for myself to tune my tryangle. •
Pepys, April 1, 1663.
Restant, in possession of.
With him they were restant all those
things that the foolish virgins could wish
for, beauty, daintie, delicates, riches, faire
speech. — Holland's Camden, p. 362.
Resultive, reciprocal.
There is such a sympathy betwixt several
sciences (as also betwixt the learned lan-
guages) that (as in a regular fortification
one piece strengtheneth another) a resultive
firmness ariseth from their complication. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., Bk. II. Dedication.
RE8TJRGE, to rise again; a word
jocularly coined from the hatchment-
motto, Re&urgam.
I wish my grandfather were here, and
would resurge, as he promises to do on his
tombstone. — Thackeray, Virginians, ch. viii.
Hark at the dead jokes resurging ! — Ibid.,
Roundabout Papers, xviii.
Resurgent, rising again.
The resurgent threatening past was making
a conscience within him. — G. Eliot, Middle*
march, ch. bri.
Resurrectionary, rising again, re-
viving.
Old men and women, ugly and blind, who
always seemed by resurrectionary process to
be recalled out of the elements for the
sudden peopling of the solitude. — Dickens,
Uncommercial Traveller, vii.
Resurrectionist, one who digs up
corpses in order to sell them to the
surgeons for dissection. The crimes of
Burke and Hare and Bishop who mur-
dered people in order to sell their
bodies caused an Act to be passed in
1832, which provided that unclaimed
bodies in workhouses, hospitals, &c,
should be given for dissection. This
stopped the trade of the resurrection-
ists, and the word is likely to become
less and less familiar. In the extract
it is used metaphorically.
RETAIL
( 55o )
REVOKE
He was merely a resurrectionist of obsolete
heresies. — Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xi.
Retail, retaliation ; law of retail =
lex talionis.
He that doth injury may well receive it.
To look for good and do bad is against the
law of retail. — Adams, ii. 116.
Retbnt. H. gives tent — to scare,
as a Yorkshire word: perhaps this is
the senBe of retent in the extract.
Their hidions horses braving loud and clear,
Their Pagans fell with clamour huge to hear,
Made such a dinne as made the heauen re-
sound,
Relented hell, and tore the fixed ground.
Hudson's Judith, in. 134.
Retex, to reweave ; alter.
Neither King James, King Charles, nor
any Parliament which gave due hearing to
the frowardness of some complaints did ever
appoint that any of his orders should be re-
tarsi. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 57.
Reticule, a lady's hand-bag, pro-
perly of net- work. L. has the word
without example.
There were also five loads of straw, but
then of those a lady could take no more
than her reticule could carry. — De Quincey,
Spanish Nun, sect. 9.
Retract, a retreat.
They erected forts and houses in the open
plains, turning the natives into the woods
and places of fastnesse, whence they made
eruptions and retracts at pleasure. — Howell y
Dodona's Grove, p. 35.
Retractile, capable of being drawn
back.
The pieces in a telescope are retractile
within each other. — Kirby and Spence, Ento-
mology, i. 151.
Retreater, one who gives way or
retreats.
He stopt and drew the retreaters up into a
body, ana made a stand for an hower with
them. — Prince Ruperfs beating up the rebels'
Quarters at Post-combe and Chenner, p. 8.
Retreatment, retreat; in the ex-
tract = the Hegira.
Our Prophet's great retreatment we
From Mecca to Medina see.
jyUrfey, Plague of Impertinence,
Retributor, repayer.
God is a just judge, a retributor of every
man his own. — Adams, i. 190.
Retrospect, to look back upon.
You and I have often retrospected the
faces and minds of grown people ; that is to
say, have formed images for [from ?] their
present appearances outside and in (as far as
the manners of the person would justify us
in the latter) what sort of figures they made
when boys and girls. — Richardson, CI. Har-
love, ii. 8.
My life, any more than yours, may not be
a long one ; and I will not sully the white-
ness of it (pardon my vanity, I presume to
call it so on retrospecting it, regarding my
intentions only) by giving way to an act of
injustice. — Ibid., Grandison, n. 61.
Rett, hunt?
Some members took up the greatest part
of the time in speaking to the redress of
petty grievances, like spaniels that rett after
larks and sparrows in the field, and pass over
the best game. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i.
109.
Reumicast, mucus of the nose.
Betweene the filthy reumicast of his blood-
shotten snowt there appeared smal holes. —
Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier (Harl.
Misc., v. 404).
Revel-dash, noise; riot. Cf. revel-
coyle and revel-rowt in N.
Have a flurt and a crash,
Now play revel-dash.
Green, Friar Bacon, p. 164.
Revenued, endowed with income or
revenue.
Sir Edmund de Trafford, f K™fht8> we*e -. •
Fuller, Worthies, Lancashire (i. 554)
Reverable, to be revered.
The character of a gentleman is the most
reverable, the highest of all characters. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 115.
Revict, to reconquer; reobtain.
Lord Chancellor EUesmere, upon a full
hearing, adjudged these two sued-for pre-
bends clearly to be returned to the Church,
until by common law they could, if possibly,
be r evicted. — Bp. Hall, Autob^ p. xxvii.
Re view age, work of reviewing.
Whatever you order down to me in the
way of reviewage I shall of course execute. —
W. Taylor of Norwich, 1807 (Jfemoirs,ii. 214).
Revive, revival.
Hee is dead, and therefore grieue not thy
memorie with the imagination of his new
rewhu. — Greene, Menaphon, p. 50.
Revoke, a term at whist ; a revoke
takes place when the player does not
follow the suit led, though able to do so.
She never made a revoke; nor ever passed
it over in her adversary without exacting
the utmost forfeiture. — Lamb, Essays of Eli*
(Mrt. Battle on Whist).
REVOLUTIONARY ( 551 )
RIB ROAST
Lord ! Hazeldean ; why that's the most
bare-faced revoke, ha, ha, ha! trump the
qneeu of diamonds, and play out the king!
Well, I never ! — Lytton, My Novel, Bk. i.
ch. xii.
Revolutionary, a promoter of revo-
lutions ; a revolutionist.
It is necessary for every student of history
to know what manner or men they are who
become revolutionaries, and what causes
drive them to revolution. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, Preface (1862).
Revolve, revolution: also, thought.
When Midelton saw Grinuill's hie revolve,
Past hope, past thought, past reach of all
aspire,
Once more to moue him flie, he doth resolue.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir R.
Grinuile, p. 50.
In all revolves and turns of state
Decreed by (what dee call him) fate.
jyurfey, Collin's Walk, cant. i.
Re-water, to pour water on again.
The Vrchin of the Sea in pieces rent,
JU~wUer*d joynes, and Hues incontinent.
Davits, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 64.
Re-young, to make young again ; to
refresh. See extract s. v. Glass.
Rbetory, a rhetorician.
They are (and that cannot be otherwise)
of the same profession with the rhetories at
Rome, as much used to defend the wrong as
to protect and maintain the most upright
cause.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 72.
Rhimy, rhyming.
Playing rhimy plays with scurvy heroes. —
T. Brown, Works, III. 30.
Rhinocerot, rhinoceros. This form
appears in the authorized version of
1611 (Isa. xxxiv. 7, margin), but is
altered in modern Bibles.
But his huge strength and subtle wit can not
Defend him from the sly rhinocerot.
Sylvester, Sixth day, first week, 53.
For a plough he $ot
The horn or tooth of som. rhinocerot.
Ibid., Handie Crafts, 295.
Rhotacism. See second quotation,
and s. v. Wharlino.
Young Daniel was free from all the isms
in Lily, and from rhotacism to boot. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. xvii.
Neither the Spaniards nor Portuguese
retain in their speech that strong rhotacism
which they denoted by the double rr, and
which Camden and Fuller notice as peculiar
to the people of Carlton in Leicestershire. —
Ibid., ch. ccxxiii.
Rhubarb, used adjectivally = bitter.
But with your rhubarb words ye must con-
tend
To grieve me worse.
Sidney, Astr. and Stella, xiv.
Rhubarbarum, rhubarb.
Children if one should begin to
tell them the nature of the Aloes or Rhu-
barbarum they should receive, would sooner
take their Physick at their ears than at their
mouth. — Sidney, Defence of Poesie, p. 550.
Rial. H. says, uan English pold
coin worth about fifteen shillings/' but
gives no example.
In like manner, you farmers and franklins,
you yomen and rich cobbes, abroad with
your rusty ryals and your old angels which
you hourd up. — Aylmer, Harhorough, &c.,
1554 (Maitland on Reformation, p. 221).
Ribands, reins.
We have all heard it said in the course of
our lives,
" Needs must when a certain old gentleman
drives ; "
'Tis the same with a lady, if once she con-
trives
To get hold of the ribands, how vainly one
strives
To escape from her lash, or to shake off her
gyves. — Ingoldsby Legends (S. Odille).
He drove his own phaeton when it was
decidedly low for a man of fashion to handle
the ribands. — Phillips, Essays from the Times,
i. 76.
If he had ever held the coachman's ribbons
in his hands, as I have in my younger days,
he would know that stopping is not always
easy. — G. Eliot, Felix Holt, ch. xvii.
Ribbanings, ribbons.
The f airie-psalter,
Grao't with the trout-flies' curious wings,
Which serve for watched ribbanings.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 96.
What gloves we'll give and ribanings.
Ibid., p. 231.
Ribless, without ribs; so fat that
tbe ribs cannot be felt.
Where toil shall call the charmer health his
bride,
And laughter tickle plenty's ribless side.
Coleridge, To a Young Ass.
Rib roast, to beat, is illustrated in
the Diets.; but in the subjoined "to
give a rib to roast " does not seem to
submit to a beating, but rather to exact
retribution.
Though the skorneful do mocke me for a
time, yet in the ende I hope to giue them al
a ryhbe to roste for their paynes. — Gascoigne,
Steel Glass, Ep. Ded.
RICK
< 55*)
RILE
Rick, a heap ; usually applied to hay
or corn.
Great King, whence came this courage (Titan-
like),
So many hils to heap vpon a rick.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 1147.
Ricketly, afflicted with rickets, and
so, weak. See another extract from
Gauden *. v. Stop-game.
No wonder if the whole constitution of
Religion grow weak, ricketly \ and consump-
tuous. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 262.
Rid, to clear ground.
A short time ago, as some persons were
ridding a piece of ground near Matlock
Bank, . . . they discovered an old! pig of
lead buried a few inches below the surface.
— Archaol., vii. 170 (1785).
Rideable, capable of being ridden.
I rode everything rideable. — Savage, R.
Medlicott, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Ride and tie. See quotation.
Mr. Adams discharged the bill, and they
were both setting out, having agreed to ride
and tie; a method of travelling much used
by persons who have but one horse between
them, and is thus performed. The two tra-
vellers set out together, one on horseback,
the other on foot : Now as it generally hap-
pens that he on horseback outgoes him on
foot, the custom is that when he arrives at
the distance agreed on, he is to dismount,
tie his horse to some gate, tree, post, or other
thing, and then proceed on foot ; when the
other comes up to the horse, unties him,
mounts, and gallops on ; till having passed
by his fellow-traveller, he likewise arrives at
the place of tying. — Fielding, Joseph Andrews,
Bk. II. ch. ii.
Rident, smiling ; grinning.
A smile so wide and steady, so exceedingly
rident indeed as almost to be ridiculous, may
be drawn upon her buxom face, if the artist
chooses to attempt it. — Thackeray \ Newcomes,
ch. xxiv.
Rider, a commercial traveller.
They come to us as riders in a trade,
And with much art exhibit and persuade.
Crabbe, Borough, Letter iv.
Its master ne'er maintained a rider,
like those who trade in Paternoster Row,
But made his business travel for itself,
Till he had made his pelf.
Hood, A fairy tale.
Riderless, without a rider.
He caught a riderless horse, and the cornet
mounted. — H. KingsUy, Ravenshoe, ch. liv.
Ridiculosity, a joke ; something to
raise a laugh.
Bring your good-natured Muses, all jour
witty jests, your bywords, your banters,
your pleasantries, your pretty sayings, and
all your ridiculosities along with you. —
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 64.
Rio, to make free with.
Some prowleth for fewel, and some away
rig
Fat goose and the capon, duck, hen, and the
pig. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 43.
If he presume to enter our house, and rig
euery corner, searching more then belongs
to his office, we lay holde on his locks, turne
him away with his backe full of stripes, and
his handes laden with his owne amende*. —
Gosson, Schools of Abuse, p. 54.
Rigged, ridged, hunched. Hall
reckons among popular sights —
The young elephant, or two-tailed steer,
Or the rigg'd camel, or the Addling frere.
Satires, IV. ii. 96.
Right-handed, a right-handed error
= a mistake on the right side, an error
arising from pushing to excess that
which in itself is right.
St. Paul tells us of divisions, and factions,
and schisms that were in the Church of
Corinth; yet these were not about the
essentials of religion, but about a right-
handed error, even too much admiration of
their pastors. — Bramhall, ii. 28.
Rightless, wrongfully; in the second
quotation it means deprived of rights.
See another instance from Sylvester of
the first sense, *. v. Taxless.
Whoso enters rightUs
By force, is forced to go out with shame.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 37.
Thou art liable to the Ban of the Empire
— hast deserved to be declared outlawed and
fugitive, landless and rightless. — Scott,
Quentin Durward, ii. 87.
Rig-my-roll, prolix ; circuitous. See
N. 8. v. ragman 8 roll- The extract is
noteworthy for the spelling, and the
adjectival use ; the meaning here seems
to be routine. See the explanation of
rigmarole in L.
You must all of you go in one rig-my-roll
way, in one beaten track — Richardson,
Grandison, vi. 155.
Rigorism, stiffness, austerity.
Tour morals have a flavour of rigorism ;
they are sour, morose, ill-natur'd, and call
for a dram of Charity. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 09.
Rile, to irritate. This word is some-
times regarded as an Americanism, but
it i6 not so. See Roil.
RILL
( 553 )
RIVALESS
Eh but the moor she riled me, she druv
me to drink the moor. —
Tennyson, Northern Cobbler,
Rill, a little stream. The quotation
is only noteworthy as showing that
the word was unfamiliar to North, who
perhaps thought it peculiar to the
county (Devonshire) of which he was
speaking. The Diets., however, show
that it was used by Drayton, Milton,
Pope, &c.
It stands at the mouth of a rill (as it is
called) of water. — North, Life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 266.
Rimless, without a rim.
The other wore a rimless hat. — Words'
worth, Beggars.
Rinet, rind, crust, that which binds
together.
Thee water hard curded with the chil ysie
rinet. — St any hurst, Conceites, p. 136.
And toe mar a virgin, to a freend such
curtesy e tending
"Were not a practise honest, nor a preede toe
be greatlye recounted ;
Thee rinet of friendship, vertu, such treach-
erye damneth. — Ibid., p. 139.
Ring, to lunge, q. v.
She caught a glimpse through the glass
door^opening on the park, of the General,
and a fine horse they were ringing. — Miss
Etlycworth, Helen, ch. vi.
Ring, fourth finger, or ring-finger.
The thumb in chiromancy we give Venus,
The forefinger to Jove, the midst to Saturn,
The ring to Sol, the least to Mercury.
Jonson, Alchemist, I. i.
Ring-dropper, one who for swindling
purposes scrapes acquaintance with a
stranger by asking him if he is the
owner of a ring which the sharper
pretends to have picked up. Cf . Money-
dropper.
Tom's evil genius did not . . . mark him
out as the prey of ring-droppers, pea and
thimble-riggers, duffers, touters, or any of
those bloodless sharpers. — Dickens, M. Chuz-
zlevrit, ch. xxxvii.
Ring-fence, an encircling fence.
In that Augustan era we descry a clear
belt of cultivation, . . running in a ring-fence
about the Mediterranean. — Dt Quincey,
Roman Meals.
Ring-hedge, ring-fence; boundary
encircling property, &c.
Lo, how Apollo's Pegasses prepare
To rend the ring-hedge of our Horizon.
Davits, Summa Totalis, p. 11.
Ringle, to ring hogs.
For rooting of pasture ring hog ye had neede,
Which being wel rivgled the better do f eede :
Though vong with their elders wil lightly
keepe best,
Yet spare not to ringle both great and the
rest. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 41.
Riotry, riotou8ne8s.
I hope your electioneering riotry has not,
nor will mix in these tumults. — Walpole,
Letters, iv. 221 (1780).
They at will
Enter'd our houses, lived upon our means
In riotry, made plunder of our goods.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. I. i. 3.
It [Punch's] is a voice that seems to be as
much in accord with the noise of towns and
the riotry of fairs, as the note of the cuckoo
with the joyousness of spring fields. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. zziii.
Ripple, to rub the seed vessels off
flax. See extract from Howell, s. v.
Brake.
Ripponeers, men of Ripon.
The Corporation of Rippon in Yorkshire
presented their petition to Queen Anne . . .
the Ripponeers humbly addressed themselves
to Queen Anne. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. ii. 15.
Rise, to take a rise out of a person
= to make him a butt, or to provoke
him (slang).
Possibly taking a rise out of his worship
the corregidor as a repeating echo of Don
Quixote. — De Quincey, Spanish Nun, sect,
zxiii.
Rise-bushes, sticks cut for burning.
See H. 8. v. rise.
The streets were barricadoed up with
chaines, harrowes, and waggons of bavins
or rise-bushes. — Relation of Action before
Cyrencester (1642), p. 4.
Risky, attended with risk or danger.
No young lady in Miss Verinder's position
could manage such a risky matter as that
by herself ; a go-between she must have. —
Wilkie Collins, The Moonstone, Pt. I. ch. xxi.
Rither, rudder.
He jumpeth and course th this way and
that way, as a man roving without a mark,
or a ship fleeting without a rither. — Jewel,
iii. 136.
Ritratto, picture (Italian).
Let not this ritratto of a large landscape
be thought trifling.— North, Examen, p. 251.
Tis more like a ritratto of the shadow of
Vanity herself.— Sterne, Tr. Shandy, iv. 186.
Rivaless, female rival.
Oh, my happy rivaless ! if you tear from
RIVERL1NG
( 554 ) ROBIN HOOHS
me my husband, be is in his own disposal,
and I cannot help it. — Richardson, Pamela,
iv. 153.
Riverling, rivulet or spring.
Of him she also holds her siluer springs,
And all her hidden crystall riverhngs.
Sylvester, 3rd day, 1st week, 133.
[God] sent as from the liuely spring
Of Has Dioineness som small riueru'ng.
Ibid., 6th day, 1st week, 755.
Rivet, bearded wheat.
White wheat or else red, red riuet or whight,
Far passeth all other for land that is light.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 48.
Road-worthy, fit for travelling;
likely to go well.
It was one of the rapidost constitutions
ever put together ; made, some say, in eight
days, by Herault Sechelles and others ; pro-
bably a workmanlike road-worthy constitution
enough.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev^ Pt. III. Bk. III.
ch. iv.
Roaned, roan (?) ; yet it seems used
as a depreciatory term rather than as
denoting colour.
[He] had euer more pitty on one good
paced mare then two roaned curtalles. —
Breton, Merry Wonders, p. 6.
Roar. Up in a roar — in an uproar.
When Demosthenes refused to doe it, the
people began to be vp in a rore against hym.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 371.
Roarer, a broken-winded horse.
His stalls in London were crowded with
useless steeds, his stalls at Melton inhabited
by slugs and roarers. — Th. Hook, Man of
many friends.
I never heard but one worse roarer in my
life, and that was a roan: it belonged to
Pegwell the corn-factor; he used to drive
him in his gig seven years ago, and he
wanted me to take him, but I said, " Thank
you, Peg, I don't deal in wind instruments.
. . But what the hell ! the horse was a penny
trumpet to that roarer of yours." — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. xxiii.
Roaster, a sucking-pig fit for roast-
ing.
When we keep a roaster of the sucking
pigs, we choose, and praise at table most,
the favourite of its mother. — Blackmore,
Lorna Doone, ch. 1.
Roast meat. To cry roast meat, not
to be able to keep one's good fortune to
one-self.
He might have swallowed those holy (but
now desecrated) morsells in secret, and not
have proclaimed on the housetop to all the
world the rost-meat he hath gotten. — Gavden,
Tars of the Church, p. 682.
They may imagine that to trumpet forth
the praises of such a person would, in the
vulgar phrase, be crying Roast Meat, and
calling in partakers of what they intend to
apply solely to their own use. — Fielding,
Tom Jones, Bk. IV. ch. v.
The foolish beast not being able to fare
well but he must cry roast meat . . . would
needs proclaim his good fortune to the world
below. — Lamb, Essays of Elia {Christ's Hos-
pital).
Roatino. H. gives "rooty ; rank,
as grass. Yorkshire."
The good shepherd will not let his sheep
feed in hurtful and rooting pastures. — Pit'
kington, p. 490.
Rob-altar, a sacrilegious plunderer.
"Will a man rob God?" . . . Bat alas
what law can be given to rob^sltars? —
Adams, i. 179.
Robe, the legal profession. Gentle-
men of the robe or long robe = barris-
ters. In the first extract from Foote
he uses it of the clergy also : " the
gown " is the more usual term for that
profession.
Squires of the long robe, he does humbly show
He has a just right in abusing you
Because he is a Brother-Templar too.
Wycherley, Plain Dealer (Epilogue).
Our ancestors unquestionably were at that
time unblessed by the liberal and learned
profession of the long robe. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality, i. 248.
The two orders of the long robe next de-
mand our attention, and . . the pre-eminence
is unquestionably due to the priesthood. —
Foote, The Orators, Act I.
I was some years in the Temple, but the
death of my brother robb'd the robe of my
labours. — Aid., Lame Lover, Act III.
His honour was even then a gentleman of
the long robe, being in truth a baby in arms.
Thackeray, Roundabout Papers, xviii.
Robin, a trimming on the front of
the dress.
In this parcel pinned together an several
pieces of printed calico, remnants of silk,
and such like, that, if good luck should
happen, and I should get work, would serve
for robins and facings. — Richardson, Patmala,
i. 98.
I most gladly assented, and got my work,
of which I have no small store, believe me !
— morning caps, robins, &c. &c., all to pre-
pare from day to day. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, iv. 171.
Robins, and caps, and sheets, and pillow-cases
Lose their sad stains, and smile with lily-
faces.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 237.
Robin Hood's penny-worths. See
first extract.
ROB ORATE
( 555 )
ROLLICK
"To sell Robin Hood1 s penny-worths:* It
is spoken of things sold under half their
value ; orf if you will, half sold, half given.
Robin Hood came lightly by his ware, and
lightly parted therewith; so that he could
afford the length of his Bow for a yard of
Velvet. Whithersoever he came, he carried
a Fair along with him, Chapmen crowding
to buy his stollen commodities. — Fuller.
Worthies, Notts.
Soldiers seized on all that he had in Aires-
ford for the use of the Parliament (as they
pretended), but sold as they passed along to
any chapman at inconsiderable rates, Robin
Hood's pennyworths, what they had a mind
to.— Barnard, life of Heylin, p. cxli.
Roborate, to strengthen.
This Bull also relateth to ancient privi-
ledges of Popes and Princes bestowed upon
her ; which herein are roborated and con-
firmed.— Fuller, Hist, of Camb., ii. 36.
Rob-thief, one who steals from
another.
His extortion hath erst stolen from others,
and now he plays rob-thief, and steals from
himself.— Adams, i. 195.
Roch, to harden like a rock.
Thee winter's coldnesse thee ziuer hardlye
rocking.— Stanyhurst, Conceites, p. 136.
Rochet, a bishop ;# he being desig-
nated by a distinctive part of his dress ;
so we now sometimes speak of "a
muster of lawn-sleeves" The jivord is
also used adjectivally = episcopal.
Take glorious Gardiner, blow-bolle Bonner,
tottering Tunstal, wagtaile Weston, and
carted Chicken, and all the other fine Rocket
men of England.— Bale's Decl. of Bonner's
Articles, Art. xxiv.
Our prelatical schism and captivity to
rocket apophthegms. — Milton, Of Reform-
ation in Eng., Bk. II.
They would strain us out a certain figur-
ative prelate, by wringing the collective
allegory of those seven angels into seven
single rochets. — Ibid., Reason of Ch. Gov.,
Bk. I. ch. v.
Rock, a hard sweetmeat. See ex-
tract *. v. Bullseye.
Rockish, rocky.
Thee pacient panting shee thumpt and launst
wyth a fyre bolt,
And wythal his carcasse on rockish pinnacle
hanged.— Stanyhurst, Mn., i. 54.
Rockbay, rock array (?), a shelf of
rocks.
Then we grate on rockrayes and bancks of
stoanye Pachynus.
Stanyhurst, Mi., iii. 714.
Rock-water.
An essay upon ice, or a treatise of the
sovereign efficacy of rock-water . . will be a
very cooling satisfaction to your parboil 'd
friends.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 191.
The river Wherfe . . runs in a bed of stone,
and looks as clear as rock-water. — Defoe, Tour
thro' G. Britain, iii. 124.
While I . . am all on fire with the rage of
slighted love, thou art regaling thyself
with phlegm and rock-water. — Richardson,
d. Harlowe, vii. 131.
I dare say she has signified this reconcili-
ation to her with intermingled phlegm and
wormwood ; and her invitation most cer-
tainly runs all in the rock-water style.— Ibid..
vii. 239. '
R o c o L 0, cloak ; roquelaure. Cf .
Roquelo.
I have often seen him strolling in the
most shady and unfrequented parts of the
Elysian fields, muffled up in a plain brown
rocolo.—Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, vi. 353.
Rodster, angler. I do not know of
any authority for this word except the
newspaper cited, nor does it seem to
be much wanted.
The affair was under the control of the
Sheffield Amalgamated Anglers' Association,
and there were close upon 500 competitors,
who included in their ranks rodsters from
all parts of the three kingdoms. — Leeds Mer-
cury, July 8, 1879, p. 8.
Roe, red.
So doth the fox the lamb destroy, we see,
The lion fierce the beaver roe or grey.
Dennys, Secrets of Angling (Eng.
Garner, i.172).
Roil, to make turbid ; hence an
angry person is said to be riled.
What are the chief miseries of this life
but the sordid apparel of the soul, the black
thoughts, the speckled phantasies, dark ob-
livion, roiled soiled affections? — Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 65.
The lamb down stream roiled the wolf's
water above. — North, Examen, p. 359.
The state was not very much roiled with
faction.— Ibid., Life of Lord Guilford, i. 181.
His spirits were very much roiled. — Ibid.,
ii. 69.
That his friends . . . should believe it was
what roiled him extremely. — Ibid., ii. 241.
Rollers, large waves.
From their feet stretched away to the
westward the sapphire rollers of the vast
Atlantic, crowned with a thousand crests of
flyinp foam. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch.
xxzii.
Rollick, to frolic, to move gaily.
L. has rollicking as an adj., and this is
the usual form.
ROLL UP
( 556 )
ROOMSTEAD
The shrieks of his lute rose shrill above
the shrieks of the flying and the wounded,
and its wild waits-time danced and rollicked
on swifter and swifter as the old singer mad-
dened, in awful mockery of the terror and
agony around. — Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xxix.
Roll up, to chant. The editor
(Parker Soc.) compares the expression
with running up the notes of the
gamut.
They care for no understanding: it is
enough if thou canst roll up a pair of matins
or an evensong, and mumble a few cere-
monies.— Tyndale, i. 243.
Roly-poly, unstable.
We have plotted and laboured long to
turn this glorious monarchy into a peddling,
roly-poly, independent Anarchy. — Speech of
Miles Corbet, 1647 (Harl.Misc., i. 273).
Roly poly, a vulgar fellow.
I'll have thee in league first with these
two roily poolies. — Dekker, Satiromastix
(Hawkins, Eng. Dr.), iii. 116.
Romancist, romancer; teller or in-
ventor of stories.
A story! what story? Pere Silas is no
romancist. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxxv.
Romanticism, taste or feeling for
romance.
Romanticism, which has helped to fill some
dull blanks with love and knowledge, had
not yet penetrated the times with its leaven,
and entered into everybody's food. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. xix.
Although doubtless a girl's romanticism
was a pretty thing, it would have to yield
to the actual requirements of life. — Black,
Princess of Thule, ch. xiii.
Romanticist, one belonging to the
romance era, as distinguished from the
classical ; alBO one of a romantic char-
acter or genius. Kingsley ( Westward
Ho, ch. ix.J calls Raleigh " a true
romanticist.
You, reader, like myself, will breathe a
malediction on the Classical era, and thank
your stars for making you a Romanticist. —
Be Quincey, Roman Meals.
Romanticness, romantic appearance.
Having heard me often praise the roman-
ticness of the place, she was astonished . . .
that I should set myself against going to a
house so much in my taste. — Richardson, CI,
Harlowe, ii. 40.
Romanza. It is curious that Fuller,
who is not greatly given to foreign
words, should use this instead of
romance, which had long been an
English word.
I am afrraied that our Infidel Age will
not give credit thereunto, as conceiving it
rather a Romanza or a Fiction than a thing
really performed. — Fuller, Worthies, Surrey
(ii. '665).
I confess the story of this Westmerland-
Hercules soundeth something Romanza like.
— Ibid., Westmoreland, ii. 432.
Rombelow, or Rum below, a burden
to an old sea-song ; but in the extract
from Marlowe there is nothing nautical
about it. Hycke- Scorner (Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., i. 38) names among other
places to which he has travelled, "the
londe of Rumbelowe thre myl out of
hell." Stanyhurst (J2n„ i. 206) speaks
of the Trojans as sailing " through Sicil
his raging wyld frets and rumbolo
rustling."
The fleering Scots,
To England's high disgrace, have made this
jig:
" Maids of England, sore may you mourn
For your lemans you have lost at Bannocks-
bourn,
With a heave and a ho.
What weeneth the King of England
So soon to have won Scotland,
With a rombelow ? n
Marlowe, Edw. II., ii. 2.
Romizkd, Romish. Cf. Anglized.
The Romiz'd faction were zealous in his
behalf, -Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. iv. 16.
JIondelet, a roundelay.
Then have you also a rondlette, the which
doth alwayes end with one selfe same foote
or repeticion, and was thereof (in my iudge-
ment) called a rondelet. — Gascoigne, p. 3d.
Rooker, a cheat.
Bookers and sharpers work their several
ends upon such as they make a prey of. —
Kennefs Erasm., Praise of Folly, p. 76.
Rookle, to rummage, to rout about.
What'U they say to me if I go a routing
and rookliny in their drains, like an old sow
by the way-side? — Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. xiv.
Rookler, a pig, from its roohling
about. See previous entry.
Such were then the pigs of Devon ; not to
be compared with the true wild descendant
of Noah's stock, high- withered, furry, griz-
zled, game-flavourea little rooklers, whereof
many a sownder still grunted about S win ley
down and Braunton woods. — Kingsley, West-
ward Ho, ch. viii.
Roomstead, lodging.
His grams take up six or seven houses or
room steads. — Document dated 1691 {An?kn
xii. 188).
ROOMTHSOME ( 557 )
ROTTOCKE
Roomthsome, spacious.
By the sea-side on the other side stoode
Heroe's tower ; . . . a cage or pigeon-house
roomthsome enough to comprehend her. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 167).
Rootlet, little root
The tree whose rootlets drink 'of every
river. — Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, v. 2.
Root-of-hbart, by heart, so as to
be able to repeat anything without
having it before the eyes. Banyan
perhaps confused root with rote.
I advise that thou put this letter in thy
bosome; that thou read therein to thyself
and to thy children, until you have got it by
root-of-heart. — Pilgrim* s Progress, Pt. II. p.
11.
Ropes, thick, glutinous] substance
found in beer, &c.
A pickled minnow is very good, if you
catch him in a stickle with the scarlet fingers
upon him, but I count him no more than the
ropes in beer compared with a loach done
properly. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. vii.
Ropes, intestines ; there is a quotation
from an old writer in N. ; but a com-
paratively modern instance is subjoined.
The second course, a brace of ostriches
roasted, at the upper end, with the ropes on
a toast.— Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. X.
ch. zi.
Rope-sick, diseased in the ropes or
entrails (?).
Rope-sick herrings that will not 'serve to
make barrelled herrings by their own law
they must not bring home into Holland. —
England's way to win wealth, 1614 (Harl.
Misc., iii. 397).
Ropes of pearl, strings of pearls.
The expression in Lothair has been
ridiculed, but it is not modern ; see
extract *. v. Intercurl.
What lady
I' th' primitive times wore ropes of pearl or
rubies ? •
Maine, City Match, ii. 2.
TH give you counsel worth two ropes of
pearl.— Killigrew, Parson's Wedding, ii. 5.
I want ropes of pearls. — Disraeli, Lothair,
ch. xxxiii.
Roquelo, a cloak, roquelaure. Cf.
Rocolo.
She then saw, parading up and down the
hall, a figure wrapped round in a dark blue
roquelo.— Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. IX.
ch. iv.
Rosated, crowned or adorned with
roses.
He appeareth there neither laureated nor
hederated Poet . . . but only rosated, having
a Chaplet of four Roses about his head.—
Fuller, Worthies, Yorkshire (ii. 513).
Rose, to perfume, as with roses.
See extract from Tennyson, 8. v. Horsi-
NESS.
A rosed breath from lips rosie proceeding.
— Sidney, Arcadia, p. 234.
Ross of Pottern. See quotation.
Who was old Ross of Pottern, who lived
till all the world was weary of him? All
the world has forgotten him now. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. czxv.
Rota-room, in 1659 a political de-
bating society called the Rota, was
established at Miles's Coffee-House in
New Palace Yard. It was dissolved
at the Restoration, but I suppose it is
from this that a coffee-house, being a
place where politics were discussed, is
called in the extract a rota-room.
A coffee-house is ... a rota-room, that,
like Noah's Ark, receives animals of every
sort. — Character of a Coffee-House% 1673
(Harl. Misc., vi. 465).
Rote, a regular row or rank. See
extract 8. v. Backstone.
Rot-gut, ah epithet applied to bad
liquor, as having a deleterious effect on
the stomach and bowels. H. and L.
have it as a substantive.
A poor old woman, with a diarrhoea,
Brought on by slip-slop tea and rot-gut beer,
Went to Sangrado with a woeful face.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 53.
•Then there's fuddling about in the public-
houses, and drinking bad spirits, and punch,
and such rot-gut stuff. — Hughes, Tom Brown's
School Days, Pt. I. ch. vi.
Rottenly, crumbly.
A rottenly mould
Is land woorth gould.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 44.
Rottle, an onomatopceous word =
to gurgle.
Why, Bacchus, dost thou think that she
Takes a delight in cruelty ;
In hearing blood in throats to rottle
Like liquor from a streight-mouth'd bottle ?
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 282.
Rottocke, or Ruttocke, a stick (?).
Diogenes swearing by St. Marie may
be noted.
^ Being asked how he would be buried, he
bidde that his dead carkesse should bee cast
out in the fieldes without sepulture. Then
said his frendes, " What, to the fowles of
ROTULA
( 558 )
ROUND UP
the aier and to the wyld beastes?" "No,
by Saint Marie/' quoth Diogenes again ; " not
so in no wise, but hue me a little rottocke
hard beside me wherewith to beate them
away." — Udaly$ Erasmus's Apophth., p. 174.
He put abrode the looures of the tente
with a ruttocke that he hadde in his hande.
— Ibid. p. 241.
Rotula, elbow : the word is usually
applied to the knee-pan, though Patella
is more common. Fr. rotule.
The ball entered my clothes and flesh, and
lodged on to the rotula of my left arm. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 126.
Rotuker (Fr. roturier), a plebeian ;
yet the context seems rather to require
a trade : perhaps it stands for a small
farmer. The speaker is supposed to be
an ass who was once an Artonian [i. e.
French] peasant.
I was once a man, an Artonian born ; my
profession was both a vineyard-man and a
roturer. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 18.
Rouge, to blush or redden : usually
to apply rouge.
They all stared, and to be sure I rouged
pretty high. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 314.
Madame d'Henin, though rouged the whole
time with confusion, never ventured to ad-
dress a word to me. — Ibid., vii. 102.
Rough it, to endure hardship or in-
convenience.
Take care of Fanny, mother ; she is tender,
and not used to rough it like the rest of us.
— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. xxxviii.
You are going then to Spaiu — to rough it
amid the storms of war? — Carlyle, Life of
Sterling, ch. x.
Rough-rider, one who breaks horses.
Lancelot had bought him out of the Pytch-
ley for half his value as unrideably vicious
when he had killed a groom and fallen
backwards on a rough-rider. — C. Kingdey,
Yeast, ch. i.
Round. To lead the round = to be
a ring-leader.
Ah ! villains, hath that Mortimer escaped?
With him is Edmund gone associate ?
And will Sir John of Henault lead the round 7
Marlowe, Edit. II, iv. 3.
Round-about, a dance.
Though the Miss Flamboroiiffhs were
reckoned the very best dancers in the parish,
aud understood the jig and the round-about
to perfection, yet they were totally un-
acquainted with country dances. — Vicar of
Wakefield, ch. ix.
Roundaboutation, circumlocution.
To finish my tale without roundaboutation.
— H. and J. Smith, Rejected Addressee, p. 177.
Rounders, a boy's game.
Prisoner's base, rounders, high-cock-a-lor-
um, cricket, foot-ball, he was soon initiated
into the delights of them all. —Hughes, Tom
Brown's School Days, Pt. I. ch. iii.
Round or Rattle, in every case (?).
In conjunction with them, or out of con-
junction, round or rattle, if he were rich, he
must be made a booty or a compounder. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 206.
Round- Robin, a seditious person.
Perhaps because dissatisfied people
sometimes make complaint to their
superiors by a round -robin.
These Wat Tylers and Round-Robins being
driven or persuaded out of Whitehall, there
was a buzz among them to make their way
to Westminster Abbey ; some said. Let us
Sluck down the organs ; some cried, Let us
eface the monuments. — Hacket, Life of
WUliams, ii. 177.
Round-Robin, a blasphemous name
given by some of the more disreputable
of the reforming party to the sacra-
mental wafer. See quotation s. v. Pre-
die, and Ridley?* Works, p. 265. H.
says round-robin = a small pancake,
in Devonshire.
Certain fond talkers . . . invent and apply
to this most holy sacrament names of de-
spite and reproach, as to call it Jack-in-the-
Box, and Round-Robin, and such other not
only foul, but blasphemous names. — Cover-
dale, i. 426.
Whereas the Sacrament was in those times
delivered unto each communicant in a small
round wafer, commonly called by the name
of Sacra/nentum Altaris, or, The Blessed
Sacrament of the Altar, and that such parts
thereof as were reserved from time to time
were hanged up over the altar in a pix or
box, these zealous ones, in hatred to the
Church of Rome, reproached it by the odious
names of Jack-in-a-oox, Round Robin, Sacra-
ment of the Halter, and other names so un-
becoming the mouths of Christians that they
were never taken up by the Turks and In-
fidels.— Heylin, Reformation*, i. 99.
Rounds, soldiers who go the rounds
to see that sentinels are at their post :
more usually called in old times " gen-
tlemen of the round " (Jonson, Every
Man in his Rum., iii. 2).
To send out strong patroulles or Rounds
for skouting all along the CharwelL — Prince
Rupert's beating up the rebels, 1643, p. 13.
Round up, to rebuke. In the Pil-
grim's Progress, Pt> I. p. 175, we read,
"Then Christian roundly answered,
saying, ( Demas, thou art an enemy to
ROUND Y
( 559 ) ROYSTEROUS
the right ways of the Lord,1 " &c. The
marginal summary is, " Christian round-
ethup Demas."
Roundy, round.
Her roundy sweetly swelling lips a little
trembling. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 287.
Rounsepal, big, large. In another
extract from Stanyhurst, «. v. Harsh,
it seems to be used as a substantive =
a heavy fall. Cf . Rdncivall.
Thee rounseual helswarme
Of Oyclopan burdens.
Stanyhurst, JEn., Hi. 690.
Rousing, brisk.
A Jew, who kept a sausage shop in the
same street, had the ill luck to die of a
strangury, and leave his widow in possession
of a rousing trade. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, vi.
109.
Rodtish, disorderly.
The Common Hall, instead of being de
melioribus, became a routish assembly of sorry
citizens. — North, Examen, p. 93.
Routle, to disturb, rout out.
A misdoubt me if there were a felly there
as would ha' thought o' routling out yon
wasps' nest. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xziii.
Rouzle, to rumple.
Well, I protest you are a waggish man ;
Lord, how you have rouzVd and touzl'd one !
All my rigging hangs as if 'twas zhaked on
with a shed vork, as the old zaying is. —
Centlivre, Platonick Lady, Act IV.
Rover. The Imp. Diet, defines
Roving as " the operation which gives
the first twist to cotton thread by draw-
ing it through an eye or aperture."
On the first stage were the Teaser, Carder,
Rover, Spinner, Reeler of the Cotton Wool.
— Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, iii. 180.
Roverie, piracy.
These Norwegians, who with their mani-
fold robberies and roveries did most hurt
from the Northern Sea, took up their haunt
into this Hand. — Holland1* Camden, ii. 205.
Rowdy, a blackguard or ruffian ; an
American term.
A drunken gambling cut-throat rovody as
ever grew ripe for the gallows. — C. Kinysley,
Tioo Years Ago, ch. x.
Reader, if you do not know that a man
will act from sentiment long, long years
after he has thrown principle to the winds,
you had better pack up your portmanteau,
and go and live five years or more among
Australian convicts and American rowdies. —
H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. lix.
Rowen-tailed, Rowen is the after-
growth of corn or grass ; this may have
something to do with the expression.
The time that Breton speaks of is
harvest.
Bucks now are in season, and partridges
are rowen-taild, and a good retriuer is a
spaniell worth the keeping. — Breton, Fantas-
tickes, p. 7.
Rowing, a process in dressing cloth ;
smoothing it with a roller.
The cloth worker, what with rowing and
setting in a fine nap ; with powdering it and
pressing it ; with shering the wooll to the
proofe of the threed, deale so cunningly that
they prove themselves the draper's minister
to execute his subtleties. — Greene, Quip for
Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc.,*. 416).
The number of hands which it employs in
this town and adjoining villages in spinning,
carding, rotcina, pulling, weaving, be, is
almost incredible. — Defoe, Tour thro9 G.
Britain, ii. 335.
Rowlet, a 8m nil groove.
Bulky carts are made with four rowlets
fitting these rails, whereby the carriage is so
easy that one horse will draw down four or
five chaldron of coal. — North, life of Lord
Guilford, i. 265.
Wherever there was like to be a friction,
a rowlet was placed to receive it. — Ibid., ii.
269.
Royalize, to bear royal sway ; the
Diets, only have this as an active verb,
and with a quotation from Richard
III., i. 3, where it means "to make
royal," as it does also in the closing
lines of Greenes Friar Bacon, and in
Marlowe, 1 Tamb., ii. 3.
Whom without force, vproar, or ryualing
Nature, and Law, and Fortune make a King,
Even he, (my son,) must be both just and
wise,
If long he look to rule and royalize.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 79.
Royolet, a petty prince. L. has
roytelet, with a quotation from Hey 1 in.
These royolets contented themselves that
their crowns (though not so big) were as
bright, their scepters (though not so great)
were as glistering as those of the mightiest
monarchs. — Fuller, Pisgah Sight, I. viii. 1.
There were indeed at this time two other
royolets, as onely Kings by his leave, vis.,
Beorred, King of Mercia,and Edmond, King
of East-Angles.— Ibid., Ch. Hist., II. iv. 10.
ROY8TEROD8, unruly, revelling. See
extract from Stany hurst, «. v. Heap-
flood.
"Was the like ever heard of ? The roytter-
ous young dogs ; carolling, howling, breaking
RUBBING POST ( 560 ) RUE-BARGAIN
the Lord Abbot's sleep.— Carlyle, Past and
Present, Bk. II. ch. xv.
Rubbing tost. See extract.
These Kistvaens are numerous, but they
have been generally deprived of their lone
covering stones, which have been converted
to rubbing posts, as they are termed in the
West of England, for the cattle. — Archaol.,
xxii. 434 (1829).
Rubbish-walling. See extract.
There is a want of homogeneity in the
manner of style which resembles what the
masons call rubbish-tcalling, where fragments
of anciently hewn and sculptured stone are
built in with modern brick-bats and pebbles
of the soil.— IT. Taylor of Norwich, 1805
(Memoir, ii. 107).
Rubelet, little ruby.
And in the midst, to grace it more, was set
A blushing-pretty-peeping rubelet.
Herriek, Hesperides, p. 243.
Rub OFF) to depart hastily. Cf.
Brush.
In a huff he call'd for his horse, rub'd off,
and left the field to Eusebius. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 351.
Rubor, redness.
Mr. Justice Jones . . . being of Welsh
extraction, was apt to warm, and, when
much offended often shewed his heats in a
rubor of his countenance. — North, Examen,
p. 563.
Rubric, to enact, as by a" rubric ;
also, to put in the calendar.
Hee firmed and rubrickt Kentishmen's
gaviU-lrinde of the son toinherite at fifteene.
— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 153).
He [the Pope] is too saucy . . . stretching
his arm to heaven, in rubricking what saints
he list. — Adams, ii. 255.
Rubric, pertaining to the calendar.
Hacket means that the Romanists en-
rolled in the list of their worthies many
to whom they had no claims; hence,
he speakB of rubric lies : rubric martyr
= one who has a place in the martyr-
ology.
They were of the most addicted to the
Church of Rome . . . impostors that are
accustomed to bestow rubrick lies upon the
best Saints of God, and whom they can not
pervert living, to challenge for theirs when
they are dead. — Hacket, Life of Williams, i.
223.
The grand jury have presented his [Boling-
broke's] works, and as long as there are any
parsons, he will be ranked with Tindal and
Toland; nay, 1 don't know whether my
father won't become a rubric martyr, for
having been persecuted by him. — Walpole to
Mann, iii. 86 (1754).
Rubric. The meaning of the extract
is, I suppose, that the Gardes Fran-
caises are to us mere red lines of men,
whom we cannot individualize.
A most notable corps of men, which has
its place in world-history ; though to us, so
is History written, they remain mere rubrics
of men, nameless ; a shaggy Grenadier mass,
crossed with buff-belts. — Carlyle, Fr. Rex.,
Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. vi.
Rubricalities, matters connected
with the rubrics : points of ritual.
° Where have yon been staying? n " With
yeung Lord Vieuxboix, among high art and
painted glass, spade farms, and model smell-
traps, rubricalities, and sanitary reforms.'* —
C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. vi.
RUB8T0NE, a sandstone for the
scythe. " The rub or buckle stone
which husbandmen doo occupie in the
whetting of their sithes." Harrison,
Descr. of England, Pt II. p. 64, quoted
in Eng. Dial. Soc.'s edit, of Tusser, who
reckons among " harvest tooles,"
A brush sithe and grasse sithe with rifle to
stand,
A cradle for barlie, with rubstone and sand.
Tusser, Rusbandrie, p. 37.
Ruckling, rattling.
The deep ruckling groans of the patient
satisfied every one that she was breathing
her last.— Scott, S. Ronan's Well, ii. 343.
Ruddle, to mark with ruddle or
ochre. Cf. Raddle.
On their cheeks to their chin unmercifully
laid on a shining red japan, that glistens in
a most flaming manner, so that they seem
to have no resemblance to human faces. I
am apt to believe that they took the first
hint of their dress from a fair sheep newly
ruddled. — Lady M. W. Montagu to Lady
Rich, Oct. 10, 1718.
Rude, robust : the phrase sneered at
in the extract is not uncommon.
Here and there smiled a plump rosy face
enough ; but the majority seemed under-
sized, under-fed, utterly wanting in grace,
vigour, and what the penny-a-liners call
u rude health." — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. xiii.
Rudish, somewat rude.
For man and wife to^uarrel before folks is
rather rudish, I own. — Foote, The Cozeners,
ui. 2.
Ruds, a name of the heliotrope
(Holland, Pliny, xix. 6).
Rue-bargain, the forfeit paid by one
who withdraws from a bargain.
He said it would cost him a guinea of rue-
bargain to the man who had bought his pony
RUFF
( 561 ) RUJSIC1VALL PEASE
before he could get it back again. — Scott, Rob
Hoy, ii. 145.
Ruff, a flourish on a musical instru-
ment.
The drum beats a ruff, and so to bed;
that's all, the ceremony is concise. — Far'
guhar, Recruiting Officer, Act V.
Ruffianage, rascaldom.
Rufus never moved, unless escorted by
the vilest ruffianage. — Palgrave, Hist, of
JVorm. and Eng., iv. 678.
Rufpin, or Ruffian, cant term for
the devil. See extract 8. v. Glaziers.
Rdfflery, noise ; disturbance. The
same writer uses ritfflered. See extract
s. v. Wherve.
But neere joynctlye brayeth with rufflerye
rumboled JStna. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 582.
Ruffpeck, cant term for bacon. See
extract 8. v. Casson, and in H. s. v.
pannam.
Ruffy-tuffy, dishevelled.
Powder'd bag-wigs aud ruffy-tuffy heads
Of cinder wenches meet and soil each other.
Keats, Cap and Bells, st. 86.
Ruftie-tuftie wise, roughly ; in-
decently. In the second quotation,
where there is a slight difference in
the spelling, Breton is describing the
ways of sailors, hurrying pell-mell to
the public house as soon as they land :
it is used in much the same way in the
third quotation = hey-day.
Were I as Vince is, I would handle you
In ruftie-tuftie wise in your right kinde.
Chapman, Gentleman Usher, V. i.
To sweare and stare until we come to shore,
Then rifty tufty each one to his skore.
Breton, Pilgrimage of Paradise, p. 16.
Lelia. Til prank myself with flowers of
the prime,
And thus I'll spend away my primrose time.
Kurse. Rufty, tufty, are you so frolick ?
tVily Beguiled (Hawkins,
.Eng.j>r.,w. 302).
Ruination. I only insert this word
because L. calls it "rare or obsolete."
I should have thought it common
enough and in everyday use.
The ordinary life, youth, and connection
of our old architecture has been mutilated
and corrupted in proportion as it has been
subjected to a Restoration, or (since the
Professor paused for a suitable word) I
would suggest Ruinat'on. — First Report of
Soc.for Protection of Anc. Monuments, 1878,
p. 32.
RULELES8NESS, want of rules. The
adjective ruleless is used by Spenser.
Its [the Star-Chamber's] rulelessness, or
want of rules that can be comprehended, is
curiously illustrated here. — The Academy,
July 19, 1879, p. 43.
Rumble-tumble, the seat behind a
carriage : usually only the first half of
this word is employed.
From the dusty height of a nimble-tumble
affixed to Lady Selina Vipont's barouche
. . . Vance caught sight of Lionel.— Lytton,
What will he do with it ? Bk. I. ch. xv.
Rumbooze, a drink. See H. s. v.
rambuze, who quotes from Blount's
Glossographia to the effect that it was
a Cambridge mixture. N. also cites
Blount, and adds, "of this learned
academ'cal word I have not met with
an example."
Piot, a common cant word used by French
clowns, and other tippling companions ; it
signifies rum-booze, as our gipsies call good-
guzzle, and comes from <*-/<», bibo. — XJrqu-
hart's Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. i. (noteV
This bowse [drink] is better than rom-
bowse. — Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Rumbustious, rough, unruly ; rum-
busticcU is the more common vulgarism.
The sea has been rather rumbustious, I
own.— Foote, Trip to Calais, Act I.
Rumine, to ruminate.
As studious scholar he se\l-rumineth. —
Sylvester, Qth day, 1st week, 44.
Rump, to turn the back on one.
This mythologirk Deity was Plutus,
The grand Divinity of Cash,
Who, when he rumps us quite, and won't
salute us,
If we are men of Commerce, then we
smash.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 129.
Nick rumps him completely and don't seem
to care a
Dump — that's the word, for his triple tiara.
Ingoldsby Legends (Old Woman in Grey).
Run, smuggled.
She boasted of her feats in diving into
dark dens in search of run goods — charming
things — French warranted — that could be
had for next to nothing. — Miss Edgeworth,
Helen, ch. xxv.
R unci v all pease, marrow-fat.
Tusser? Husbandrie, p. 95, mentions
" runctuall pease set in winter " among
" herbes and rootes to boile or to but-
ter." Messrs. Payne and Herrtage
say, " supposed to be derived from
Span. Roncesvalles, a town at the foot
0 0
RUNDLER
( S62 )
RYPECK
of the Pyrenees, where gigantic bones
of old heroes were pretended to be
shown : hence the name was applied to
anything of a size larger than usual."
Cf. HOUNSBFAL.
Another, stumbling at the threshold, tum-
bled in his dish of rouncevals before him. —
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act V.
She was clad in a robe of finest serge,
which had it been napped, each grain would
have been the size of a good ronceval pea. —
Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. vi.
Rundler, a round vessel. (?)
A catch or pinck no capabler than a rundler
or washiug bowle. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs
{Harl. Mite., vi. 163).
Runecraft, knowledge or skill in
runes.
Modern Swedish runecraft largely depends
upon his many and valuable publications. —
Arch., xliii. 98 (1871).
Runesmith, worker at runes.
No one has workt with more zeal than
Richard Dybeck of Stockholm ; no one has
publisht half so many Runic stones, mostly
in exact copies, as this energetic runesmith. —
Arch., xliii. 98 (1871).
Runlet, small stream ; runnel is the
commoner word.
Then ask me not, virgins, to stay ;
With a sigh seems the zephyr to blow ;
And the runlet that murmurs away
To wind with a murmur of wo.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 311.
Runner, a rope belonging to the
garnet, and to the two bolt-tackles ; it
is used to increase the mechanical
power of the tackle.
There are ... all kinds of Shipchandlery
necessaries, such as blocks, tackles, runner*,
be.— Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, i. 147.
Runner, a smuggler : we still speak
of running a cargo.
The unfair traders and runners, and such
as come in before the duties are recharged,
will undersell us, as they well may, paying
no custom.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii.
188.
By merchants I mean fair traders, and not
runners and trickers, as the little people
often are that cover a contraband trade.—
Ibid., Examen, p. 490.
Runners, police officers, before the
introduction of the new system, were
called runners or Bow-street runners.
In the quotations from Brooke and
Kingsley it seems = bailiff.
He issued early forth, accompanied only
by his huntsman and his agent's runner, who
knew and was known everywhere. — Brook*,
Fool of Quality, ii. 280.
He was called the Man of Peace on tbe
same principle which assigns to constables,
Bow-street runners, and such like, who cany
bludgeons to break folk's heads, and are
perpetually and officially employed in scenes
of riot, the title of peace-officers. — Scott, St.
Ro nan's Well, i. 58.
"It's the runners!" cried Brittle*, to all
appearance much relieved. '* The what ? *'
exclaimed the doctor, aghast in his turn.
"The Bow Street officers, sir," replied
Brittle*. — Dickens, Olivtr Twist, ch. xxx.
I'd sooner be a sheriff's runner, or a negro
slave. — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. in.
Running worm, Herpes, &c.
A kinde of S. Anthonies fire, whose heate
eauseth little blisters or wheales to ari*e,
creeping to fret the skin ; some call it the
shingles, some the running worme, some wild-
fire.— JVbmenclator, p. 440.
Runoloqist, one learned in runes.
The advanced school of Scandinavian
runologists holds that the Runic Futhark of
twenty-four letters is derived from the later
alphabet. — Athenaum, June 28, 1879, p. 818.
Runology, stud)' of runes.
Of late, however, great progress has been
made in runology. — Arch., xliii. 98 (1871).
Runt, a raw country girl.
This city spoils all servants; I took a
Welsh runt last spring, whose generation
scarce ever knew the use of stockings ; and,
will you believe me, my Lord, she had not
been with me three weeks before she sew'd
three penny canes round the bottom of her
shift instead of a hoop-petticoat. — Centlivre,
The Artifice, Act III
Rushelinqe, rushing, rustling. (?)
Than was all the rable of the shippe, hag,
tag, and rag, called to the reckeninge, rushel-
inge together as they had beene the cookes
of helle with their great Cerberus. — Voeacyo*
ofJohan Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc., vi 459).
Rustless, free from rust.
I have known her fastidious in seeking
pure metal for clean uses ; and when once a
bloodless and rustless instrument was found,
she was careful of the. price. — Miss Bronte,
Villette, ch. viii.
Rutted, marked with ruts.
The two in high glee started behind old
Dobbin, and jogged along the deep-rv/to/
plashy roads. — Hughes, Tom Brown's School-
days, Pt. I. ch. iii.
She saw the grey shoulders of the downs,
the cattle-specked fields, the shadowy plant-
ations with rutted lanes. — G. Eliot, Danid
Deronda, oh. lxiv.
Rypeck, the pole used to moor a
punt, while fishing, &c. Conjectures
R YTHMER
( 563 )
SADDLE
as to the derivation of the word will be
found in N. and Q., IV. xii. 294, 337.
He ordered the fisherman to take up the
rypecks, and he floated away down stream. —
U. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. lxiv.
RrrHMBR, rhimester.
Amongst all the foul mouthes belibelling
marriage, one railing rythmer of Anselme's
age bore away the belL— Fuller, Ch. Hist,
UI. ii. 13.
Sabin, a fanciful person. The refer-
ence is to the proverb, Sabini quod
volunt somniant, the Sabines attaching
great importance to dreams.
Grimsby, which our Sabins, or conceited
persons dreaming what they list, and follow-
ing their own fansies, will have to be so
called of one Grimes a merchant. — Holland's
Camden, p. 542.
Sableize, to make black.
Some chroniclers that write of kingdomes
states
Do so absurdly sableize my White
With Maskes and Enterludes by day and
night.— Davies, Paper's Complaint, 1. 241.
Sabred, furnished with a sabre:
swarded is used in the same way. Sabred
now = killed or wounded with a sabre.
There are persons whose loveliness is more
formidable to me than a whole regiment of
sabred hussars with their fierce - looking
moustaches. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
11. yy.
Saccage, to sack : the substantive is
not so uncommon.
Those songs of the dolorous discomfits in
battaile, aud other desolations in warre, or
of townes saccaged and subuerted, were song
by the remnant of the army ouerthrowen,
with great skrikings aud outcries. — Put ten-
ham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. I. ch. xxiv.
Sack. To give tlie sack = to dismiss ;
to get the sack — to be dismissed, the
person having to pack up his alls in a
sack, and be off. See N. and Q„ 1st
S. , Vol. VI. An extract from Ingoldsby
Legends will be found s. v. Nous.
I wonder what old Fogg *ud say, if he
knew it ; I should ^et the sack, I s'pose, eh ?—
Pickunck Papers, ch. xx.
The short way would have been ... to have
requested him immediately to quit the house ;
or, as Mr. Gann said, to give him the sack at
once.--Thackeray% Shabby Genteel Story, ch. v.
He is no longer an officer of this gaol ; he
has got the sack. — Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. xxvi.
Sackless, innocent; also foolish,
weak. See L. s. v. sake. Naslie treats
it as a Scotch term, for he is imitating
" some of the deftest lads in all Edin-
borough town© " in the passage cited.
'Gainst slander's blast
Truth doth the silly sackless soul defend.
Greene (from Never too late), p. 299.
Many sacklesse wights and praty barnes
run through the tender weamhs. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe (Hart. Misc., vi. 163).
" It looks melancholy, does it not, Ellen ? "
"Yes," I observed, "about as starved and
sackless as you." — E. Bronte, Wutliering
Heights, ch. xxii.
Sacramentize, to administer the sa-
craments.
Ministers made by Presbyterian govern-
ment in France and the Low Countries were
owned and acknowledged by our Bishops for
lawfully ordained for all intents and purposes,
both to preach and sacramentize. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., XI. ix. 65.
The governing part should be in the hands
of the bishops, the teaching and sacramentiz-
ing in the presbyters. — Ibid., XI. xi. 19.
Sacrabt, a sacred place ; a sanctuary.
H. has one quotation, but the subjoined
are later instances.
The purified heart is God's sacrary, His
sanctuary, His house, His heaven. — Adams, i.
259.
What is their crime that have carried them
quite away, both crown, and scepter, and
robes from their ancient sacrary ? — Hacket,
life of Williams, ii. 68.
Saddle. To set the saddle on the
right horse = to give a man his share
of praise or blame. Dryden ridic ile*
the delicacy of Racine, who represented
Hippolytus as exposing himself to death
rather than accuse his stepmother to
his father.
But take Hippolytus out of his poetick fit,
and I suppose he would think it a wiser part
to set the saddle on the right horse, and chuse
rather to live with the reputation of a plain-
spoken honest man, than to die with the
infamy of an incestuous villain. — All for
Love, Preface.
His episcopal lordship had done well to
have shown in his letter what was so added,
and then the saddle would have fallen on the
0 0 2
SADDLE-NOSED ( 564 )
right horse. — North, life of Lord Guilford,
i. 314.
Saddle- nosed, flat or broad- nosed.
There was also a servant in the inn, an
Asturian wench, broad-faced, flat -headed,
and saddle-nosed. — J arms' s Don Quixote, Pt.
I. 8k. III. ch. ii.
SAKES SAKE
How may tnW-saiVd verse express.
How may measured words adore
The full-flowing harmony
Of thy swan-like stateliness,
Eleanore?
Tennyson, Eleanore.
Saddlery, things belonging to har-
ness or horse's trappings.
He invested also in something of a library,
and in large quantities of saddlery. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. x]f iii.
Saddle-sick, galled from riding.
Roland of Ronoesvalles too, we see well in
thinking of it, found rainy weather as well
as sunuy, . . . was saddle-sick, calumniated,
constipated. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace,
ch. i.
Safe, safety.
If I with safe may graunt this deed,
I wil not it ref use.
Preston, K. Cambists {Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., i. 603).
Safeconduct, to convoy safely, or to
guarantee safety : the substantive is
common.
From perils all within this place
I will safeconduct thee.
Breton, Toyes of an Idle Head, p. 41.
Sao, weighed down : the verb is not
so uncommon.
He ventures boldly on the pith
Of sugred rush, and eats the sagae
And well bestrutted bees sweet bagge.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 127.
Sagamore, a title given to the chiefs
of some American Indian tribes.
The barbarous people were lords of their
own ; and have their sagamores, and orders,
and forms of government. — Bp. Hall, Works,
vii. 447.
Sagar, cigar.
Many a sagar have little Goldy and I
smoaked together. — Col man, Man of Business,
Act IV.
Sag ed, taught or invented by wise
men.
Begyn to synge, Amintas thou ;
For why ? thy wyt is best ;
And many a saged sawe lies hyd
Within thine aged brest.
Googe, Eglogs, i.
Sailed, furnished with sails : used
figuratively in the second extract.
Prostrated in most extreme ill fare,
He lies before his high-mi /'d fleet.
Chapman, Iliad t zix. 335.
Sail-less without sails.
But Beauty, Graoelesse,is a Sail-lesse Bark.
— Sylvester, Memorials of Mortalities st. 25.
A south-west wind, and above, a mighty
cobweb of sail-less rigging. — H. Kinysley,
Bavenshoe, ch. Ii.
Saintdom, state of sanctity.
I will not cease to grasp the hope I hold
Of saint dom. — Tennyson, S. Simeon Stylitcs.
Saintish, holy.
They be no diuels, I trow, which seme so
saintish. — Gascoiyne, Steele Glas, Epilogue.
Saint Lawrence's Tears. See ex-
tract. St. Lawrence having been broiled
alive may account for the fiery cha-
racter ascribed to his tears.
The August Meteors. — The student will
scarcely need to be reminded to keep a sedul-
ous watch* during the nights from the 9th to
the 11th of August, inclusive (and notably
on that of the 10th), for the familiar shower
of shooting stars, known of old as <Sf. Lau-
rence's tears, but now termed — rather more
scientifically — the Perseides, from the point
in the heavens whence they appear to radiate.
—The English Mechanic, 1874.
Saint Vitus' s Dance, a disease which
manifests itself in a convulsive motion
of the features or limbs.
Dr. Reid says it is remarkable that St
Vitus is nowhere to be found in the Roman
Kalendar ; and he supposes that ** from some
misunderstanding or inaccuracy of manu-
script, chorea invita% the original name of the
disease called St. Vitvs's dance, was read and
copied chorea Sti. Viti." This is very pro-
bable.— Southey, Omniana, i. 325.
Saithe, a species of fish.
He proposed he should go ashore and buy
a few lines with which they might fish for
young saithe or lythe over the side of the
yacht, — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xxvii.
Sake's sake, an emphatic adjuration.
" For any sake" is more common, and
"for goodness sake" commoner still.
In the second and third extracts it = for
auld langsyne.
Run after him, and save the poor fellow
for sake's sake. — The Cbmmittee, Act III.
Us be cum to pay 'e a visit. I've a been
long minded to do't for old soke's sake.—
Hughes, Tom Brown* s Scltooldays, Pt. I. ch.
iii.
SALEAB1LITY ( 565 )
Yet for old soke's sake she is still, dears,
The prettiest doll in the world.
King sky, Water-Babies,
SAMPHIRE
Sale ability, saleableness : predi-
cated of that for which there is a de-
mand in the market.
What can he do but spread himself into
breadth and length, into superficiality and
suitability ? — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 139.
Salic law. See quotation.
A French antiquarian (Claude Seissel) had
derived the name of the Salic Law from the
Latin word sal, comme une loy pleine de sel,
Jest a dire pleine de sapience, and this the
Doctor thought a far more rational etymology
than what some one proposed, either seriously
or in sport, that the law was called Salique
because the words Sialiquis and Si aliqua were
of such frequent occurrence in it. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. ccviii.
Salligot, a ragout of tripe.
He himself made the wedding with fine
eheeps-heads, brave haslets with mustard,
gallant salligots with garlic (tribars aux ails).
— Urguharfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxri.
Sally, to dance.
Herod also made a promise to the daughter
of Herodias when she danced and salied so
pleasantly before him. — Becon, i. 373.
Salmagundy, a sailor's dish described
in extract. See also s. v. Lobscodrse.
The descendant of Garactacus returned,
and ordering the boy to bring a piece of salt
beef from the brine, cut off a slice and mixed
it with an equal quantity of onions, which,
seasoning with a moderate proportion of
pepper and salt, he brought into a consist-
ence with oil and vinegar. Then tasting the
dish, assured us it was the best salmagundy
that ever he made. — Smollett, Roderick Ran-
dom, ch. xxvi.
Salpeetry, nitrous.
Rich Jericho's sometimes sal-peetry soil,
Through brinie springs that did about it boil,
Brought forth no fruit.
Sylvester, The Schisme, 674.
Salsolaceous, pertaining to the salt-
wort.
Sand, and nothing but sand : the salsolace-
ous plants, so long the only vegetation we
have seen, are gone. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry
Hamlyn, ch. xlii.
Salt, a sailor.
He can turn his hand to anything, like
most old salts. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Ox-
ford, ch. viii.
Salt, desire: as an adjective =
lecherous the word is not so uncommon.
Gifts will be sent, and letters which
Are the expressions of that itch
And salt which frets thy suters.
Uerrick, Hesperides, p. 186.
Salt. A useless person is said to be
not worth his salt, i. e. keep ; so salary
is literally salt-money.
He is a dissipated extravagant idler ; he is
not worth his salt. — Dickens, Hard Times,
ch. xvii.
Salt, hospitality. To eat a mans salt
= to partake of his hospitality : the
phrase is taken from the Arabs.
Abandon those from your table and salt
whom your owne or others' experience shall
descrie dangerous. — Hall, Epistles, Dec. i.
Ep. 8.
One does not eat a man's salt as it were at
these dinners. There is nothing sacred in
this kind of London hospitality.— Thackeray,
Newcomes, ch. v.
Salt. Children are told that they
can catch birds by putting salt upon
their tails ; hence the use of the phrase
in the quotations.
Such great achievements cannot fail
To cast salt on a woman's tail.
Hudibras,!!. i. 278.
His intelligence is so good, that were you
coming near him with soldiers or constables
or the like, I shall answer for it you will
never lay salt on his tail. — Scott, Rcdgauntlet,
Plenty of subjects going about for them
that know how to put salt upon their tails.
That's what's wanted. A man needn't go
far to find a subject if he's ready with his
salt-box. — Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. iv.
Saltee, a penny: from the Italian
soldo. Cf. Dacha-saltee (slang).
It had rained kicks all day in lieu of saltees,
and that is pennies. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. Iv.
Samaritanism, benevolence, like that
of the Good Samaritan.
Mankind are getting mad with humanity
and Samaritanism. — Sydney Smith, Letters,
1844.
Samphire. This plant is usually
derived from Saint Pierre, the herb of
St. Peter, though probably this is a sort
of punning dedication from its growing
on a rock. Smollett's derivation is
rather fanciful.
The French call it passe-pierre, and I sus-
pect its English name is a corruption of
sana-pierre. ... As it grew upon a naked
rock, without any appearance of soil, it might
be naturally enough called sang du pierre or
SANATII'ENESS ( 566 )
SANTO
sang-pierre, blood of the rock ; and hence the
name samphire. — Smollett, Travels, Letter iii.
Sanativeness, healing power.
There is an obscure Village in this County,
neare St. Neot's, called Haile-weston, whose
very name soundeth something of sanative*
ness therein. — Fuller, Worthies, Huntingdon.
Sanct, a saint. See another quota-
tion from the same book s. v. Mibific.
Cursed snakes, dissembling varlets, seem-
ing sa»rf 5. — Urqvharfs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. liv.
Sanctanimity, holiness of mind.
A " hath " or a " thou n delivered with con-
ventional unction, now well-nigh inspires a
sensation of solemnity in its hearer, and a
persuasion of the sanctanimity of its utterer.
— Hall, Modern English, p. 17.
Sanctum, a place which a person has
to himself, where he is safe from intru-
sion ; a retreat.
I should not be called upon to quit my
sanctum of the schoolroom, for a sanctum it
was now become to me, a very pleasant
refuge in time of trouble. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xvii.
Sandiferous, sand - bearing ; sandy.
The speaker is a pedantic schoolmaster.
The surging sulks of the Sandiferous seas.
— Sidney, Wanstead Play, p. 619.
Sandillions, numbers like the sand
on the seashore.
xj/afifiaKocria . . . having been coined by a
certain Alexis (perhaps no otherwise remem-
bered), and latinised arenayinta by Erasmus,
is now Anglicised sandillions by me. —
Southey, The Doctor, Interchapter vi.
Sand-lark, the sea-dotterel.
Along the river's stony marge
The sand-lark chants a joyous song.
Words worth, Idle Shepherd-Boys.
Sand -warped, drawn into a sand-
bank. (?)
CroRfiing Humber in a Barrow-boat, the
same was sand-warpt, and he drowned there-
in.— Fuller, Worthies, Cambridge (i. 165).
Sandwich. This term, as applied in
the extract, is now common, but per-
haps this may be the earliest instance.
He stopped the unstamped advertisement
— an animated sandicich composed of a boy
between two boards. — Sketches by Boz (Danc-
ing Academy).
Sangaree, rack punch.
A very jolly time we had; much better
than the Went Indies, where a fellow's liver
goes to the deuce with hot pickles and san-
garee.— Thackeray, Neircomes, ch. xxiii.
Sakglier (Fr. ) wild boar.
Bearing with shoutcry sootn boare, room
sanglier oughly. — Stany hurst, JEn.* i. 310-
Sanguinity, consanguinity. L. has
the word = ardour, with quotation from
Swift. Walpole, speaking of a duel
that was to have taken place between
the Duke of Burlington and his son-in-
law, writes —
Some say that the duel would have b*en
no breach of sanguinity. — Walpole to Ma^iu
i. 15 (1741).
Sanious, purulently bloody. R. and
L. have the word, but each with the
same quotation from Wisemans Sur-
gery. The subjoined extract is given
as showing that it occurs in other than
surgical works.
The cure was wrought ; he wiped the sanious
blood,
And firm and free from pain the lion stood.
Cowper, Transl.from V. Bourne
{Reciprocal Kindness).
Sanitation, care for the laws of
health, or regulations for their observ-
ance.
To extinguish any or all of the zymotic
diseases, we must look to sanitation. — Aidi-
Vaccinator, Sept. 2, 1872, p. 146.
Sans-appel, an infallible person ; one
whose decision is law.
He had followed in full faith such a sans-
appel as he held Frank to be. — Kingslcy,
Westward Ho, ch. ziz.
Sansculottery, the revolutionary
mob.
What profit were it for the Paris Sans-
culottery to insult us? — CarlyU, Fr. Bet.,
Pt. III. Bk. III. ch. ii.
Sansculottic, pertaining to sanscu-
lottism ; revolutionary. See Culottic.
Those sanscvlottic violent Gardes Fran-
caises or Centre Grenadiers shall have their
mittimus.— Car/yfc, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V.
ch. i.
Sansculotti8M, the principles of the
extreme French Revolutionists. See
Culottism.
No Pitt's crusade against French Sansnt-
lottism in the end of tne eighteenth century
could be so welcomed by English preservers
of the game as this defiance of the Spanish
Apollyon was by Englishmen in general in
the beginning of the seventeenth. — CarlyU,
Cromwell, i. 38.
Santo, a hymn. A black santo is a
profane, noisy, burlesque hymn. See
N. 8. v. Sanctus Black.
SANTONIC
( 567 )
SA UCER Y
Sometimes they whoop, sometimes their
Stygian cries
Send their black santos to the blushing skies.
Queries, Emblems, I. z. 20.
Santonic, a hood such as was worn
by a santon or dervish; Santonico
cucullo.
This Sanlonick or French-hood Martiall
calls Bardocucullus, a Fooles-hood. — Stapyl-
tan, Juvenal, viii. 191, note.
Sap, to study hard ; also one who
does so.
When I once attempted to read Pone's
poems out of school hours, I was laughed at
and called a sap. — Lytton, Pelham, ch.ii.
" They say he is the cleverest hoy in the
school; but then he sans.'* "In other
words," said Mr. Dale, with proper parsonic
gravity, " he understands that he was sent
to school to learn his lessons, and he learns
them. You call that sappina ; I call it doing
his duty."— Ibid., My Novel, Bk. I. ch, xii.
What's that book on the ground? Sap-
ping and studying still ?— C. Kingsley, Yeast,
ch. i.
Sapidless, tasteless ; insipid.
I am impatient and querulous under culi-
nary disappointments, as to come home at
the dinner hour, for instance, expecting some
savoury mess, and to find one quite tasteless
and sapidless.— Lamb, Essays of Elia (Grace
before meat).
Sab, serve (?).
I shall shut up for the present, and con-
sider my ways ; having resolved to " sar it
out," as we say in the Yale, holus-bolus,
just as it comes. — Hughes, Tom Brown's
Schooldays, Ft. I. ch. i.
Saracenism, Mahometanism ; the
religion of the Saracens. Cf . Turcism.
All Forraigners, Christian, Mahometan, or
Heathen, who come into this Island ...
may easily see such sights as rather proclaim
Saracenism, Barbarism, and Atheisme, than
such a sense of Ghristianisme as possessed
our noble Progenitors.— Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 556.
Sarcasmous, sarcastic ; insulting.
When he gets a sarcasmous paper against
the Crown, well backed with authority or
quality, then he pours it out at full length.
—North, Examen, p. 98.
Here is a sarcasmous reflection on the
House of Commons itself. — Ibid., p. 144.
Sarcophagal, flesh-devouring.
This natural balm . . . can at utmost but
keep the body living till the life's taper be
burnt out ; or, after death, give a short and
insensible preservation to it in the sarcopha-
gal grave. — Adams, i. 376.
Sargasos, gulf- weed.
The tide also threw up vast quantities of
sargasos and weeds. — Godwin, Mandeville,
i. 40.
Sarisbury. Plain Sarisbury = a
blunt, downright fellow. Is it a play
upon Salisbury Plain ?
This Demochares was one of the ambassa-
dours, and for his malapart tonge called at
home in his countrie in their language, Parr'
hesiastes (as ye would say in English), Thorn
trouth or plain Sarisbuirte.— UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 202.
Sartorial, pertaining to a tailor.
A north-country dame in days of old
economy, when the tailor worked for women
as well as men, delivered one of her nether
garments to a professor of the sartorial art.
—Southey, The Doctor, Interchapter ix.
In his apartments at one time there were
unfortunately no chairs ; . . . his visitor . . .
meanwhile, we suppose, sat upon folios or in
the sartorial fashion. — Carlyle, Misc., Hi. 101.
Sasarara, a corruption of certiorari.
See Siserara. In the extract it = with
a vengeance.
Out she shall pack with a sasarara. —
Goldsmith, Vicar of Wakefield, ch. xxi.
Satanophobia, fear of the devil.
Impregnated as he was with Satanophobia,
he might perhaps have doubted still whether
this distressed creature, all woman and
nature, was not all art and fiend. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. xcvi.
Satinity, smoothness like satin.
I knew him immediately by the smooth
satinity of his style.— C. Lamb, Letter to
Gilman, 1830.
Satirism, satire.
Or should we minister strong pills to thee,
What lumps of hard and indigested stuff,
Of bitter Satyrisme, of Arrogance,
Of Self-love, of Detraction, of a black
And stinking Insolence, should we fetch up !
Dekker, Satiromastix (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 190).
Satis-passion, fulfilment of suffering.
This is the great " with us," . . . u with
us n in all the virtues and merits of His life ;
with us in the satisfaction and satis-passion
both of His death.— Andrewes, i. 147.
Saturate, to satisfy: it is almost
always used in reference to liquids,
and = to drench.
After a saturating meal, and an enlivening
cup, they departed with elevated spirits. —
H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 91.
Saucery. See extract, and N. 9. v.
tawcery, where it is conjectured to be
the place where salt is kept.
SA UFRED
( 568)
SCAFFOLDERS
One little timber building tyled overhead,
near adjoining to the said under house-
keeper's house, commonly called the saucery
house, conteyning foure little roomes used
by the yeomen of the sauces. — Survey of
Nonsuch Palace, 1050 {Archaol., v. 435).
Saufred, saffron. In jEn. i. 696 the
word is spelt saffrod.
Also the roabe pretionse colored lyke saufred
Achantus. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 633.
Savagism, savagery ; utter barbarism.
The manner in which a people is likely to
pass from savagism to civilization. — W. Tay-
lor, Survey of German Poetry, ii. 295.
Savkrly, in a frugal manner. The
third rung in the " ladder to thrift " is
To count no trauell slauerie
That brings in penie sauerlie.
Tusser, HusbandrU, p. 17.
Savooreb, one imbued with or redo-
lent of something.
She was, it seems, a great Savourer and
Favourer of Wickliffe his opinions.— Fuller,
Ch. Hist., IV. ii. 61.
Savourly, heartily ; with a relish.
We see the toiling servant feed savourly
of one homely dish. — Adams, ii. 140.
'Tis wholesome food from a good gentle-
man's gate ; alas, good mistress, much good
do your heart ; how savourly she feeds. —
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act. IV.
I sat down, opened the foul clout the
money was in, looked at it, told it, found it
was all there, and then I fell a crying as
savourly as I did before, when I thought I
had lost it. — Defoe, Col. Jack, p. 217.
Saw. To be held at the long saw =
to be kept in suspense.
Between the one and the other he was
held at the long saw above a month. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, i. 148.
Sawder. Soft sawder (t. e. solder)
= flattery.
Why did not you go and talk to that brute
of a boy and that dolt of a woman ? You've
got soft sawder enough, as Frank calls it in
his new-fashioned slang. — Lytton, My Novel,
Bk. III. ch. xiii.
Saw dusty, of or belonging to saw-
dust ; strewn with sawdust.
An exceedingly retiring public-house, with
a bagatelle-board shadily visible in a saw-
dusty parlour. — Dickens, Uncommercial Tra-
veller, xxi.
Sawney, a Scotchman : a corruption
of Sandy, the abbreviation of Alexan-
der.
Thus wasteful spendthrifts to their shame
may see
The Caledonian loon's frugality ;
And learn from him against a time of need
To husband wealth, as sawny does his weed.
T. Brown, Works, i. 117.
Sawneying, idling; lounging.
Southey also uses sawney:. u saieney
and sentimental " (To A. Cunning-
ham).
It looks like a sneaking, sawneying Method-
ist p*nou.—Soulhey, Letters, 1808 (ii. 63).
Saxonist, Saxon scholar.
To these were soon joined . . . Mr. Klstob
the Saxonist.- Archaol., i. 25 (1770).
Say. To take say is a hunting term
= to draw a knife down the belly of a
deer to discover how fat it is. See N.
Saying-knife is the instrument with
which the cut is made ; say = the cut
itself.
The young man drove his saying knife
Deep in the old man's breast.
C. Kingsley, New Forest Ballad.
Look to this venison. There's a breast!
You may lay your two fingers into the say
there, and not get to the bottom of the fat.
— Ibid., Westward Ho, ch. viii.
Saynsure, censer ; perhaps a pun =
saying sure.
The sweet perfume of prayer should have
arisen from the saynsure of your heart to
Me.—CalfhM, Answer to Martiall, p. 124.
Sc abb ado, lues venerea*
Within these five and twenty years nothing
was more in vogue in Brabant than hot baths,
but now they are everywhere grown out of
use ; but the new scabbado has taught us to
lay them down. — Bailey* 's Erasmus, p. 151.
Scaddle, thievish : a Kentish word.
And there she now lay purring as in acorn !
Tib, heretofore the meekest of mousera, the
honestest, the least scaddle of the feline race.
— Ingoldsby Legends (Jarvis's Wig).
Sc£volise, to be like Q. Mulius See-
vol a, who was a celebrated professor of
civil law, and teacher of Cicero.
In Priuy counsell when our miseries
Thou doost bemoan, most Nestor like thou art,
And when in Paris parlament thy part
Of lawes thou plead'st thou seem'st to
Scctuolize.
Sylvester, Dedic. of Triumph of Faith.
Scaffolders, spectators in upper
gallery of theatre ; the " gods."
He ravishes the gazing scaffolders. — Hall,
Satires, I. iii. 28.
SCALADA
( 569)
SCARF
Scalada, escalade. H. and L. have
scalado.
The soldiers entred the castle both by
scalada and by forcing the gates. — Rackety
Life of Williams, ii. 220.
Scalda - banco, a mountebank, or
rather, in the extract, a stump orator.
The Presbyterians, those Scalda-bancos or
hot declamers, had wrought a great distast
in the Commons at the rang. — Hacket, Life
of Williams, ii. 182.
Scaldings. See quotation.
The boy belongin^to our mess ran to the
locker, from whence he carried off a large
wooden platter, and in a few minutes re-
turned with it full of boiled peas, crying
" •Scoldings " all the way as he came. — Smol-
lett, Roderick Random, ch. xxv.
Scale. See extract.
The great varietie of fishes that it [the Irish
Sea] breedeth, as . . . Soles, Pilchards, Raifish
or Scale, Thornback, Oisters. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 59.
Scalier. See quotation.
In the midst there was a wonderful scalier
or winding stair. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. I.
ch. liii.
Scaling, scaling-ladder.
They clinge thee scalinges too wals.
Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 462.
Scallop, a lace band or collar, scal-
loped at the edges.
My scallop bought and got made by Cap-
tain Ferrers' lady is sent, and I brought it
home ; a very neat one. It cost me about
£3.— Pews, Oct. 8, 1062.
(Lorcrs Day.) Made myself fine with
Captain Ferrers's lace band, being loth to
wear my own new scallop, it is so fine. — Ibid.,
Oct. 12, 1662.
Scalpless, without a scalp.
In the midst of all this chaos grinned from
the chimney-piece, among pipes and pens,
pinches of salt and scraps of butter, a tall
cast of Michael Angelo's well-known skinless
model — his pristine white defaced by a cap
of soot upon the top of his scalpless skull. —
C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Scamble, scramble. The Diets, only
give the verb, which is used in the third
line of the extract.
Here Bugs bestirre them with a bellowing
rore,
As at a scamble we see boyes to sturre,
Who for soules scamble on a glowing flore.
Davits, Humour's Heaven on Earth,
p. 23.
Scamling, an irregular, hasty meal ;
a snap. See II. s. v. scambling-days.
Other some have so costly and great din-
ners, that they eat more at that one dinner
than the poor man can get at three scamlinys
on a day. — Pilkington, p. 568.
Scampish, rascally.
The alcalde personally renewed his regrets
for the ridiculous scene of the two scampish
oculists. — De Quincey, Spanish Nun, sect. 23.
Scandalisation, scandalous sin.
Let one lyue neuer so wyckedly
In abhominable scandalisacion,
As longe as he will their church obaye,
Not ref usynge bis tithes duely to paye,
They shall make of him no accusacion.
Dyaloge bettcene a Gentillman and
a Husbandman, p. 168.
Scandal-mongeries, manufactories
of scandal.
Are there not dinner-parties, aesthetic teas,
scandal-mongeries, changes of ministry, police
cases, literary gazettes ? — Carlyle, Misc., iv.
186.
Scapulimancy. See extract. In Dr.
Hall's Modern English, p. 37, there is
a quotation from John Gaule's Tlvcr
fiavrta, p. 165 (1652), giving a long list
of similar words : scapulimancy, how-
ever, is not among them.
The principal art of this kind is divination
by a shoulder-blade, technically called scapu-
limancy or omoplatoscopy. — E. Tylor, Prtmi-
tive Culture, i. 124.
Scarborough, sudden ; hasty. Scar-
borough warning, i. e. no warning at all,
was a proverbial saying. See N. ; but
Stanyhurst uses Scarborough with other
words. H. quotes Scarborough leisure
from his Ireland*
Al they the lyke poste haste dyd make
with scarboro scrabbling. — Stanyhurst, jEn.,
iv. 621.
Scare, a fright. This substantive is
not in the Diets., though it is not un-
common now to signify a panic.
God knows this is only a scare to the Par-
liament, to make them give the more money.
—Pepys, Nov. 25, 1664.
Scare-sinner, one who frightens
sinners : applied in extract to Death.
Do stop that death-looking, long-striding
scoundrel of a scare-sinner who is posting
after ma.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, v. 76.
Scarf, a thin plate.
The Vault thus prepared, a scarfe of lead
was provided some two foot long, and five
inches broad, therein to make an inscription.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. x. 49.
SCARIFICATOR ( 570 )
SCHOLARISM
Scarificator, one who scarifies or
cuts open.
What though the scarificators work upon
him day by day ? It is only upon a caput
mortuum. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 141.
Scarlet, to clothe in scarlet.
The idolatour, the tyrannt, and the whore-
monger are no mete mynisters for hym,
though they be never so gorgyously mytered,
coped, and typpeted, or never bo finely forced,
pylyoned, and scarletted. — Vocacyon of Johan
Hale, 1553 (Harl. Misc., vi. 442).
Scarp, to slope.
Redoubts are carried, and passes and
heights of the most scarped description. —
Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. V. cb. vi.
Scarpines, an instrument of torture
like the boot Fr. escarpin, Ital. scarpa,
a shoe or slipper.
Being twice racked, and having endured
the water-torment, I was put to the scarpines,
whereof I am, as you see, somewhat lame of
one leg to this day. — Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. vii.
Scart, a cormorant.
On the points of some of the islands stood
several scarts, motionless figures of jet black
on the soft brown and green of the rock. —
Black, Princess of Thule, ch. vii.
ScATCHES, Stilts.
Others grew in the legs, and to see them
you would have said they had been men
walking upon stilts or scotches (eschasses). —
UrquharVs Rabelais, II. i.
Scathkire, destructive fire.
In a great scathfire it is wisdom not only
to suffer those houses to burn down which
are past quenching, but sometimes to pull
down some few houses wherein the fire is
not yet kindled, to free all the rest of the
city from danger. — Bramhall, iii. 559.
Scatomancy, divining disease by a
person's excrement. See extract 8. v.
Dririmancy.
Scatter-brained, thoughtless.
A certain scatter-brained Irish lad. — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xii.
This functionary was a good-hearted, tear-
ful, scatter - brained girl. — Hughes, Tom
Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I. ch. ii.
Scavengership, clearing away dirt.
To Mr. Mathewe for skarigersshipe. —
Churchwarden* s Accounts (1560) of S. Mi-
chad's, Cornhill, ed. by Overall, p. 152.
Scede, legal instrument ; schedule.
A deed (as I have oft seene) to convey a
whole manor was implicite contained in some
t-venty lines or thereabouts, like that scede,
or '"'ytala Laconica, so much renowned of old
in al contracts. — Burton, Dtmoc. to Reader,
p. 51.
Scelerate, wicked ; also a wicked
person.
That whole denomination, at least the
potentates or heads of them, are charged
with the most scelerate plot that ever was
heard of. — North, Examen, p. 191.
King James II. . . could not pretend to
the virtues of his father, though far from
being a scelerate. — Ibid., p. 648.
Scepterdom, reign.
In the scepterdome of Jdward the Confessor
the sands first began to growe into sight at
a low water. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl.
Misc., vi. 151).
Sceptry, sceptred ; royal.
Harm him not !
E'en for his highness Ludolph's sceptry hand,
I would not Albert suffer any wrong.
Keats, Otho the Great, i. 1.
Scheets, skates. See s. v. Sk bates,
where it will be seen that Pepys was
among the spectators on this occasion.
Having seen the strange and wonderful
dexterity of the sliders on the new canal in
St. James's Park, performed before their
Majesties by divers gentlemen and others
with scheets after the manner of the Hol-
landers, with what swiftnesse they passe, how
suddainly they stop in full carriere upon the
ice, I went home by water.— Evelyn, Diary,
Dec. 1, 1662.
Schismatise. R. says, "Cotgrave
renders Fr. scismatizcr, to schismatic
it, to play the schismatick." Gauden
wrote 27 years after Cotgrave's Diet
was published.
From which [Church] I rather chote boldly
to separate than poorly to schismatise in it.
—Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 42 (see also
p. 114).
Schismik, schismatic.
Content! quoth Achab; then to Carmel's
top
The schismik priests were quickly called up.
Sylvester, The Schisme, 525.
Vouchsafe onr sours rest without schismick
strife.— Ibid., Little Bartas, 1047.
Schist, a geological term for rock
that is easily split.
The vast ridge of limestone alternating
with the schist, and running north and south
in high serrated ridges, was cut through by
a deep fissure. — H. Kingsley, Geqffry Ham-
lyn, ch. xliii.
Scholarism, scholarship.
There was an impression that this new-
fangled scholarism was a very sad matter
SCHOLAR S-MATE ( 571 )
SCORN
indeed. — Doran, Memorials of Great Towns,
p. 225.
Scholar's -mate, a simple opening
by which the adversary is induced to
open his King, and is checkmated by
Queen guarded by Bishop after three
moves. It is only available against
beginners, as the attack is easily
avoided.
The two wrestlers made very pretty play
of it for some time, till James, feinting at
some outlandish manoeuvre, put George on
his back by a simple trip, akin to scholar' s-
mate at chess. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. vi.
Schollard, the vulgar pronunciation
of scholar.
The admiring patient shall certainly cry
you up for a great schollard, provided always
your nonsense be fluent. — The Quack's Aca-
demy, 1678 (Harl. Misc., ii. 33).
You know Mark was a schollard, sir, like
my poor, poor nibteT.—LyUon, My Novel, Bk.
I. ch. iii.
School, a shoal ; a number gathered
together.
He saw at the mouth of Nilus ... a scole
of Dolphins. — Sandys, Travels, p. 100.
A great shoal, or as they call it, a scool of
pilchards came with the tide directly out of
sea into the harbour. — Defoe, Tour thro* G.
Britain, i. 381.
We were aware of a school of whales wal-
lowing aud spouting in the golden flood of
the sun's light. — Roe, Land of the N. Wind,
p. 154 (1875).
Schoolless, without school. Sylves-
ter says that the H. Spirit enables —
Som (school-lease Schollers, Learned studi-
lesse)
To understand and speak all languages.
Little Bortos, 1009.
Scintilla, a spark ; this Latin word
is almost naturalised now.
Such was the disposition or rather pre-
cipitation of judgment in most people upon
a scintilla of evidence to conclude the King
was a Papist. — North, Examen, p. 655.
Scleragogy, hard treatment of the
body.
We let others run faster than we in tem-
perance, in chastity, in scleragogy, as it was
call'd. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 51.
Scoganism, a scurrilous jest. Scogan
was a famous jester. See N.
But what do I trouble my reader with this
idle Scoganism ? Scolds or jesters are only
fit for this combat. — Bp. Hall, Works, ix.
183.
Scoganly, scurrilous.
He so manifestly belies our holy, reverend,
worthy Master Fox, whom this scoaanly pen
dare say plays the goose. — Bp. Hall, works,
ix. 262.
Scomfish, to stifle or otherwise injure.
Remove your candles, for since the Saxon
gentlemen have seen them, they will eat
their dinner as comfortably by the light of
the old tin sconces, without scomfishina them
with so much smoke. — Scott, Legend oj Mont-
rose, ch. iv.
ril scomjish you if ever you go for to tell.
—Mrs. Gaskell, Ruth, ch. xviii.
Sconce, to fence or fortify.
They set upon the town of Jor, for that
was sconced and compassed about with
wooden stakes. — Linschoten, friary, 1594
(E)ig. Garner, iii. 328).
Sconce. Grose says, " To build a
sconce, a military term for bilking one's
quarters."
Thou huffing, puffing, sconce-building ruffi-
an !— T. Brown, Works, i. 80.
A lieutenant and ensign whom once I
admitted upon trust . . . built a sconce, and
left me in the lurch. — Ibid., ii. 282.
These youths have been playing a small
game, cribbing from the till, and building
sconces, and suchlike tricks that there was no
taking hold of. — Johnston, Chrysal, ch. xxviii.
Scopefull, extensive ; with a wider
prospect.
Sith round beleaguer*d by rough Neptune's
legions,
Within the strait-nookes of this narrow He ;
The noblest volumes of our vulgar style
Cannot escape unto more scopefull regions.
Sylvester, Sonnet to Master
R[ohert] N[icolson].
Scoreless, not making any mark or
score.
Thy patient bearing this thy scourge (or
Crosse)
Doth make it scoreless ; nay, thy score doth
crosse. — Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 69.
Scoriac, pertaining to scoria, or the
ashes on volcanoes.
These were days when my heart was volcanic
As the scoriac rivers that roll,
As the lavas that restlessly roll
Their sulphurous currents.
E. A. Poe, Ulalume (ii. 20).
Scorn, reproach ; the ordinary mean-
ing in such a passage as the subjoined
would be " object of contempt."
The babe must die that was to David born,
His mother's sin, his kingly father's scorn.
Peele, David and Bethsabe, p. 471.
SCORPIACK
( 572 )
SCRAGGED
Scorpiack, pertaining to a scorpion ;
scorpion-like.
What could exasperate more than when
an importunate man run into a fault to show
him no humane respect ? Nay, to make him
pass through the two malignant signs of the
Zodiaque, Sagitary and Scorpio? That is,
to wound him first with arrows of sharp-
pointed words, and then to sting him with a
scorpiack censure. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
i.82.
Scorpion, some engine or instrument
used in a siege.
Here croked Coruies, fleeicg bridges tal,
Their scathf ull scorpions that ruynes the wall.
Hudson's Judith, iii. 112.
Scortator, a whoremonger ; a Latin
-word used as English.
There be tumblers too, luxurious scortators,
and their infectious harlots. — Adams, ii. 119.
Scotch, to hinder ; especially to stop
the wheel of a coach from moving
buck by a stone, &c.
Hedges and counterhedges (having in
number what they want in height and
depth) serve for barracadoes, and will stick
as birdlime in the wings of the horse, and
scotch the wheeling about of the foot.—
Fuller y Holy State, II. xiii. 4.
Scotchery, Scottish peculiarity.
He is a mighty sensible man . . . but his
solemn Scotchery is a little formidable. —
Walpole, Letter st i. 61 (1740).
Scotize, to imitate the Scotch. Cf.
Spaniolize. Bp. Gauden (Tears of
the Church, p. 323) speaks of those
opposed to Episcopacy as animated
with " a Scotuing zeal.'
The English had Scotized in all their prac-
tices.— Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 328.
We must return to our Archbishop, whom
we shall find intent on the preservation of
the hierarchy and the Church of England
against the practices of the Scots and Scotiz-
ing English. — Ibid,, p. 398.
Scotoscope. See quotation.
Gomes Mr. Reeve with a microscope and
scotoscope. For the first I did give him £5.
10s. . . . The other he gives me, and is of
value; and a curious curiosity it is to dis-
cover objects in a dark room with. — Pepys,
Aug. 13, 1664.
Scoundreldom, scoundrelism. Cf.
Rascaldom.
Let the eye of the mind run along this
immeasurable venous - arterial system, and
astound itself with the magnificent extent of
Scoundreldom; the deep, I may say, unfathom-
able, significance of Scoundrelism. — Carlyle,
Diamond Xecklacey ch. xvi.
Scoundrelly, rascally.
I had mustered the scoundrelly dragoons
ten minutes ago. — Scott, Old Mortality ; ii. 303.
We have in this history a scoundrelly Love-
lace.— Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, eh.
viii.
" He says there are three regiments at
least have promised solemnly to shoot their
officers, and give up their arms to the mob."
H Very important, if true, and very scoun-
drelly too." — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke , ch.
xxxiii.
Scout, a Dutch sailing-boat. Cf.
Scute.
We took a Scout, very much pleased with
the manner and conversation of the passen-
gers, where most speak French. — Pepys, May
18, 1660.
Had I been travelling in a Dutch scout or
a Oravesend Tilt-boat, I could not have been
treated with less manners. — T. Brown. Works,
iii. 204.
We see more vessels in less room at Am-
sterdam . . . hoys, bilanders, and schouts. —
Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, ii. 147.
Scout, a sneak.
I'll beg for you, steal for you, go through
the wide world with you, and starve with
you, for though I be a poor cooler's son I am
no scout. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. xv.
Scower, an outlet for water. (?)
For 2 Gates 30 feet wide and 24 feet high,
and the 8 upper scowers, about £ 10,000. 0*.
0d.— Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, i. 183.
Scrabble, to scramble. In 1 Sam.
xxi. 13 scrabble = scribble. Cf.
Scribble.
After a while, Little faith came to himself,
and, getting up, made shift to scrabble on his
way. — Bunyan, Pilgrim's Progress, i. 201.
So is not continence you see ; that phan-
tom of honour which men in every age have
so contemned, they have thrown it amongst
the women to scrabble for. — Vanbrugh, Pro-
voked Wife, III. i.
Scragged, hung.
" He'll come to be scragged, won't he ? "
"I don't know what that means," replied
Oliver. " Something in this way, old feller,' '
said Charley. As he said it, Master Bates
caught up an end of his neckerchief, and
holding it erect in the air, dropped his head
on his shoulder, and jerked a curious sound
through his teeth ; thereby intimating by a
lively pantomimic representation, that scrag*
ging and hanging were one and the same
thing. — Dickens, Oliver Tmst, ch. xviii.
So Justice was sure, though a long time she'd
lagg'd.
And the Sergeant, in spite of his gammon,
got scragged.
Ingoldsby legends (Dead Drummer).
SCRAGGLING ( 573 )
SCRIMP
Scragglino, scraggy.
The Lord's sacrifice must be fat and fair ;
not a lean scraggling starved creature. —
Adams, i. 124.
Scrape-good, miserly ; avaricious.
None will be there an usurer, none will be
there a pinch-penny, a scrape-good wretch, or
churlish hardhearted refuser. — Urquhart's
Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. iv.
Scrapmongbr, dealer in scraps (of
intelligence, &c). The reference in
extract is to Boswell.
Thou, curious scrapmonger, shalt live in song,
When death has stilled the rattle of thy
tongue. — TFoleot, P. Pindar, p. 100.
Scrappy, not of a piece, made up of
odds and ends.
The partial genius is flashy — scrappy. The
true genius shudders at incompleteness. — E.
A . Poe, Marginalia, xliii.
Scratch. In a note to the passage
from P. Pindar, the author says, " A
small wig, or rather an apology for a
wig, so called, and generally worn by
our most amiable and august monarch.
When I was last at Paris, no person of
any condition, male or female, appeared but
in full dress, . . . and there was not such a
thing to be seen a&nperuque ronde ; but at
present I see a number of frocks and scratches
in a morning in the streets of this metropolis.
— Smollett, Travells, Letter vi.
Still o'er his haunted fancy waved the wig ;
Still saw his eye alarmed the scratch abhorred.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 48.
Scratch. To come up to the scratch
= to be ready for a certain object ;
though applied generally now, it origin-
ated in pugilistic slang, the combatants
when preparing to begin having to toe
a line drawn in the centre of the ring.
See extract s. v. Fistic.
Sir Bingo . . eyed his friend . . . with a
dogged look of obstinacy, expressive, to use
his own phrase, of a determined resolution to
come up to the scratch. — Scott, St. Ronan's
Well, ch. xii.
Soratohings. "The remainder of
the fat after it has been melted down
into lard" (Halliwell).
She'd take a big cullender to strain her
lard wi\ and then wonder as the scratching -s
rim through. — G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. xviii.
Sorattle, to scramble.
Twas dark parts and Popish then ; and
nobody knowed nothing, nor got no school-
ing, uor cared for nothing but scrattling up
and down alongshore like to prawns in a pule.
— Kinysley, Westward Ho, ch. xxx.
In another minute a bouncing and scrat-
tling was heard on the stairs, and a white
bull-dog rushed in. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. iii.
Scrawm, to tear. H. has " Scramb,
to pull or rake together with the hands.
Yorbh."
He scrawm'd an' scratted my faace like a
cat. — Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Scree, cliff ; scaur.
For a thousand feet it ranges up in rude
sheets of brown heather, and grey cairns and
screes of granite, all sharp and black-edged
against the pale-blue sky. — Kingsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. ii.
Screw, a stingy fellow.
The ostentatious said he was a screw ; but
he gave away more money than far more
extravagant people. — Thackeray, Newcomes,
ch. viii.
Screw-jack, a machine for raising
great weights, worked by a screw.
Entrance to the chamber was obtained by
the removal of the upper flat stones, by the
use of screw-jacks and rollers of timber. —
Arch., xxxviii. 411.
Scribblage, scribbling, contemptu-
ous word for writing.
A review which professedly omitted the
polemic scribblage of theology and politics. —
W. Taylor, Survey of Germ. Poetry, i. 352.
Scribble, a hurried walk. Cf.
Scrabble.
O you are come ! Long look'd for come
at last. What ! you have a slow set pace as
well as your hasty scribble sometimes. — The
Committee, I. i.
Scribble-scrabble, an ungainly fel-
low.
By your grave and high demeanour make
yourself appear a hole above Obadiah, lest
your mistress should take you for another
scribble - scrabble as he is. — The Committee,
Act I.
Scribe, to write.
It's a hard case, you must needs think,
madam, to a mother to see a son that might
do whatever he would, if he'd only set about
it, contenting himself with doing nothing
but scribble and scribe. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Cecilia, Bk. X. ch. vi.
Scrimp, to stint or contract.
'A could na bear to see thee wi' thy cloak
scrimpit . . an' should be a' most as much
hurt i' my mind to see thee i' a pinched
cloak as if old Moll's tail here were docked
too short. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lover*,
ch. vi.
SCRJP
( 574 ) SCRUPLENESS
Officer. You were the one sole man in
either house
Who stood upright when both the houses
fell.
Bagenhall. The houses fell !
Officer. 1 mean the houses knelt
Before the legate.
Bagenhall. Do not scrimp your
phrase,
But stretch it wider ; say when England fell.
Tennyson, (Jueen Mary, III. iii.
Scrip, scrap.
This be the rule — a scrip of parchment take,
Gut like a pyramid revero'd m make.
Aubrey, Misc., p. 134.
I believe there was not a note, or least
scrip of paper of any consequence in my
possession, but they had a view of it. — Bp.
Sprat's Narrative of Blackhead and Young
1602 (Harl. Misc., vi. 201).
Soripple, scruple ; apparently from
stress of rhyme.
Heer is a Sirapus de Bizanzis,
A little thing is enough of this ;
For even the weight of one scripple
Wil make you as strong as a cripple.
Heyicood, Four Ps. (Dodsley, O. PL,
i. 105).
Scripturalist, a student of the Scrip-
tures.
The Church of [Harrow] standing on the
summit of a hill, and having a very high
spire, they tell us King Charles II., ridiculing
the warm disputes amoug some critical Scrip-
turalists of those times concerning the Visible
Church of Christ upon Earth, used to say,
This was it.— Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain,
ii. 214.
Scripturian, biblical scholar.
Flo. Cursed be he that maketh debate
'twixt man and wife.
Sem. O rare scripturian ! you have sealed
vp my lips.
Chapman, Humerous dayes mirth, p. 103.
Scriven, to write as written by a
scrivener, or in a law hand.
Here's a mortgage scrivened up to ten
skins of parchment, and the king's attorney
general is content with six lines.— Worth
L(fe of Lord Guilford, ii. 302.
He . . . would, after two or three hours'
hard scrivemng, . . . permit me to yawn, and
stretch, and pity myself, and curse the use-
less repetitions of lawyers.— Miss Edgtworth,
Ennui, ch. xn. '
Si'ROG, a stunted bush.
" Scrogie Touchwood, if you please," said
the senior; -the scrog branch first, for it
must become rotten ere it become touch-
wood. '— Scott, S. Ronan's Well, ii. 300.
Scroop, back of the cover (?) ; quasi
scruff (?), q. v.
I took my dingy volume by the scroop, and
hurled it into the dog-kennel. — E. Jironte,
Wuthering Heights, ch. iii.
Scrub. See quotation : an Australian
word.
Scrub. I have used and shall use this
word so often that some explanation is due
to the English reader. I can give no better
definition of it than by saying that it means
" shrubbery." — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. xxvi., note.
Scrubbers. See quotation: an
Australian term.
The Captain was getting in the scrubbers,
cattle which had been left, under the not
very careful rule of the Douovans, to run
wild in the mountains. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry
Hamlyn, ch. xxix.
Scruff, the scurf or outside skin,
usually in the phrase, tcrvjf of the
neck, Cf. Scuff.
John Fry, you big villain ! I cried, with
John hanging up in the air by the scruff of
his neckcloth. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone,
ch. xxix.
Scruffy, scurfy.
The serpent goes to fenell when he would
clear his sight, or cast off his old scruffy skin
to wear a new one. — Howell, Parly of Itatsis,
p. 76.
Scrunch, to crush.
He had compromised with the parents of
three scrunched children, and just worked
out his fine for knocking down an old lady.
—Sketches l*y Boz {The last Cahdriver).
I saw Bedford's heel scrunch down on the
flunkey's right foot. — Thackeray, Lovel the
Widower, ch. iv.
Scruple, geographical minute ; also
a minute division of time ; a second, or
part of a second.
As touching the Longitude of this city, it
is 25 Degrees and 52 Scruples : and for the
Latitude it is 52 Degrees and 25 Scruples. —
Holland's Camden, p. 568.
Y'are welcome in a good hour, better minute,
Best second, happiest third, fourth, fifth, and
scruple. — Albumazar, i. 5.
Sir Christopher Hey don . . . boasted cf
possessing a watch so exact in its movements
that it would give him with unerring pre-
cision, not the minute only, but the very
scruple of time. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
lxxxvi.
Scrupleness, scrupulousness. One
of the chapters in Tusser's Husbandries
p. 69, is " agai:ist faiitnslicall scruple-
nes.
SCR UT1 NATE
( 575 )
SCUPPET
Scroti nate, to examine.
The whole affair [was] scruti netted by the
Court, who heard both the prosecution and
the defence. — North, Examen, p. 404.
The court scruti nated all poiuts of form,
and finding nothing amiss in the demand,
granted the cognisance. — Ibid., Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 75.
Scbdtine, to investigate.
They . . . departed to scrutine of the mat-
ter by inquiry amongst themselves. — Greene,
Quip of Upstart Courtier (Harl. Mite. v. 421).
Scry, to descry. See H. 8. v. ; also
R. s. v. ascrie. The subjoined is a
much more modern instance than any
given there.
The most that any close inspection can
scry out of it is that a party was found that
would oppose the Exclusion bill. — North,
Examen, p. 147.
Scryme, to fence : scrimer occurs in
Hamlet, iv. 7.
The fellow did not fight with edge and
buckler like a Christian, but had some new-
fangled French devil's device of scryming
and fencing with his point. — Kingsley, West"
ward Ho, ch. iii.
Scuddle, to hurry ; to move quickly ;
usually written scuttle.
How the misses did huddle, and scuddle,
and run ! — Anstey, New Bath Guide, Letter 13.
Scuff, the Bcruff, scurf, or outer skin.
[He] was seized by the scuff of the neck,
and literally hurled on the table in front. —
Lytton, What will he do with it ? Bk. X. ch. vii.
Sculk, properly, a company of foxes.
Stany hurst applies it to a knot of
adders.
Scrawling serpents with sculcks of poy-
soned adders. — Stanyhurst, Conceites, p. 138.
We say a flight of doves or swallows, a
bevy of quails, a herd of deer, or wrens, or
cranes, a skulk of foxes, or a building of
rooks. — Irving, Sketch Book (Christmas Day).
Scull, a boat that is sculled ; a
sculler.
Not getting a boat, I forced to walk to
Stungate, and so over to White Hall in a
scull.— Pepys, March 21, 1669.
Scullery, usually the place where
pots and pans are kept and washed,
but in the extract it seems = dirt, or
dirty things such as are found in a
scullery.
Shame and sordidnesse of living shall
threaten him as a minister, . . . besides the
black pots among which these doves must
lie, I mean the soot and skullery of vulgar
iascriency, plebeian petulancy, and fanatick
contempt. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
258.
Scullery science, a jocose name for
phrenology.
I did very much aggravate the phrenolo-
gist lately by laughing at the whole scullery
science and its votaries. — Chorley, Memorials
of Mrs. Uemans, i. 255.
Sculptress, female sculptor.
Perhaps you know the sculptress, Ney ; if
not, you have lost a great deal.— Zimmern,
Arthur Schopenhauer, p. 242.
ScuLFruRAL, pertaining to sculpture ;
statuesque.
Some fine forms there were here and
there ; models of a peculiar style of beauty ;
a style, I think, never seen in England ; a
solid, firm-set, sculptural style. — Miss Bronte,
Gillette, ch, xx.
Sculfi'URESque, statue-like ; chiselled.
Her figure was slim and sufficiently tall,
her face rather emaciated, so that its sculp-
turesque beauty was the more pronounced. —
G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xiii.
Scummer, to defile with ordure.
And for a monument to after-commers
Their picture shall continue (though Time
scummers
Vpon th' Bffigie).
Davies, Commendatory Verses, p. 13.
Scummer, one who takes off the
scum. L. has the word for the vessel
which is used in doing this. The ex-
pression in the original, escumeur de
mamnites, signifies a parasite, a trench-
erfly. Epistemon is describing the
occupations of some of the departed in
the Elysian Fields, and among the rest
catalogues —
Pope Boniface the Eighth, a scummer of
pots. — UrquharCs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxx.
Scunnered, satiated, so as to feel
disgust.
Eh, laddie, laddie, I've been treating ye as
the grocers do their new prentices. They
first gie the boys three days free warren
among the figs and the sugar-candy, and
they get scunnered wi' sweets after that. — C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. iii.
Scuppet, a shovel (see H. *. v. ) : also
a verb. See extract, 8. v. Skavel.
Our mitred archpatriarch, Leopold Herring,
exacts no such Muscovian vassailage of his
liegemen, though hee put them to their
trumps other while, and scuppets not his
beneficence into their mouthes with such
fresh water facility as M. Ascham in his
• S "hoolemaster ' would imply. — Nashe. Lt «-
ten Siuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 100).
SCUSE
( 576 ) SEA-SOLDIERS
What scuppet have we then to free the
heart of this muddy pollution ? — Adams, i.
26*7.
Scusr, excuse.
Yea, distance, better (they say) a bad
sense than none. — Udal, Roister Doister, v. 2.
Come but to the old proverbe, and I will
put you downe ; u Tis as hard to find a hare
without a muse as a woman without a scuse."
— Greene , Theeves falling out, 1615 (Earl.
Misc., viii. 382).
Scute, a light boat. See Scout.
All they that occupy boats, wherries, and
scutes, or sail upon the sea. — Bale, Select
Works, p. 533.
Where skuVs furth launched, theare now
the great wayn is entred. — Stanyhurst, Con-
ceites, p. 136.
Scutter, a hasty, noisy run.
The dog's endeavour to avoid him was un-
successful ; as I guessed by a scutter down-
stairs, and a prolonged piteous yelping. — E.
Bronte, Wuthering Heights, ch. xiii.
Scuttering, a hasty pace ; scuttle is
more common.
A sound behind the tapestry which was
more like the scuttering of rats and mice
than anything else. — Mrs. Gaskell, Curious
if True.
Sea. At full sea = at their height ;
in full sail, as we may say.
A satyricall Romane in his time thought
all vice, folly, and madnesse were all at full
sea. — Burton, Democ. to Reader, p. 28.
Seabelch, a breaker or line of
breakers. See extract s. v. Rapfully.
Sealer, one who seals. See extract
s. v. SriGURXELL. L. gives the word
without example.
On the right, at the table, is the sealer
pressing down the matrix of the great seal
with a roller on the wax to a patent. —
Archaol., xxxix. 358 (1860).
Seame, a quarter of corn.
Thy dredge and thy barley go thresh out to
malt,
Let malster be cunning, else lose it thou
shalt :
Th' encrease of a seame is a bushel for store,
Bad else is the barley, or huswife much more.
Tusser's Husbandrie, p. 55.
Seamstressy, the art or occupation of
sewing.
As an appendage to seamstressy the thread
paper might be of some consequence to my
mother. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iii. 49.
Sea-ore. See extract.
They have a method of breaking the force
of the waves here [Southampton] by laying
a bank of Sea-ore, as they call it. It is com-
posed of long, slender, and strong filament*
like pill*d hemp, very tough and durable ; I
suppose thrown up by the sea ; and this per-
forms its work better than walls of atone or
natural cliff.— Defoe, Tour thro9 G. Britain*
i. 223.
Seapie, a fowl of the genus ffcemat-
opus ; called also the oyster-catcher.
A couple of friends shooting on the Thames
with birding pieces, it happened they struck
a seapie or some other fowl. — The Great Frost*
Jan. 1608 (Eng. Garner, i. 86).
Seaplash, waves.
And bye thye good guiding through sea-
plash stormye we marched. — Stanyhurst,
JEn., iii. 161.
Search 1 no, being sought ; for a simi-
lar use of the participle by Miss Austen,
see Bringing. Carrying, and by Mad.
D'Arblay s. v. Mobocracy.
Precedents are searching and plans drawing
up for that purpose. — Walpole, Letters, i. 94
(1741).
Search ress, female searcher ; in the
extract = inventress or authoress.
Of these drirye dolours eeke thow Queene
Iuno the searchresse. — Stanyhurst, ^En., iv.
652.
Sear-cloth, to wrap in or robe with a
cere-cloth (which is the usual spelling),
i. e. a cloth anointed with some glutin-
ous matter of a healing nature.
He of the looking-glasses . . . parted from
Don Quixote and Sancho, to look for some
convenient place where he might sear-cloth
himself ana splinter his ribs. — Jarvis's Don
Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. xiv.
Seare.
We straytlye commaunde you to make
proclamation ... to all maner of men that
euery seare persone haue bowe and shaf tes of
his owne. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 79.
Seascape, view of the sea. Cf.
Skyscape.
He found perched on the cliff, his fingers
blue with cold, the celebrated Andrea Fitch
employed in sketching a land or a seascape on
a sheet of grey paper. — Thackeray, Snnbby
Genteel Story, en. v.
It is in these respects that the seascape with
figures . . . gains. — Macmillan's Mag., March,
1876, p. 461.
Sea-soldiers, marines.
That expert and hardy crew of some thou-
sands of sea soldiers would be to this realm a
treasure incomparable.— Dr. Dee, Petty *V<iry
Royal, 1576 (Eng. Garner, ii. 62).
SEASONLESS
( 577 )
SECTMASTER
Six hundred sea-soldiers under the conduct
of Sir Richard Levison. — Holland's Camden,
ii. 136.
Seasonles8, insipid.
And when the stubborne stroke of my harah
song
Shall seasonlesse glide through almightie
eares,
Vouchsafe to sweet it with thy blessed tong.
G. Jfarkham, Tragedie of Sir R. Grinuue
(JDedie. to Earl of Southampton).
Seat, seems to be a technical word
among shoemakers for a place of em-
ployment, or an engagement. A seat
of stuff = employment in making stuff
shoes.
After having worked on stuff work in the
country, I could not bear the idea of return-
ing to the leather-branch; I therefore at-
tempted and obtained a seat of stuff in Bristol.
— Ltfe of J. Lackington, Letter xvii.
I left my seat of .work at Bristol. — Ibid.,
Letter xviii.
Seat of honour, the posteriors. A
whimsical reason for this name is given
in the extract W. Combe calls the
same part " the seat of shame." See
quotation «. v. Grave-man.
A question was proposed, which was the
most Honourable part of a man ? Oue . . .
made answer that that was the most honour-
able part that we sit upon ; and when every
one cried out that was absurd, he backed it
with this reason, that he was commonly ac-
counted the most honourable that was first
seated, and that this honour was commonly
done to the part that he spoke of. — Baileys
Erasmus, p. 225.
Seats, thrones; as applied to the
angelic hierarchy.
That there are seats, lordships, princi-
palities, and powers in the hosts of heaven I
steadfastly believe. — Bullinger, yd. 337.
Seax. See quotation.
They invited the British to a party and
banquet on Salisbury Plain ; where suddenly
drawing out their seaxes (concealed under
their long coats) being crooked swords, the
emblem of their indirect proceedings, they
made their innocent guests with their bloud,
pay the shots of their entertainment. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., I. ▼. 25.
Sbccoon, a thrust in fencing.
Pr. Vol. Straight in Seceoon grim death
shall be his lot.
Pr. Pret. And with my point in Cart 111
lay her flat.
D'Urfey, Two Kings of Brentford,
Act II.
We'll go through the whole exercise;
carte, tierce, and segoon. — Colman, Jealous
Wife, Act IV.
Secession, retirement. Sterne is
speaking of sleep.
No desire or fear or doubt that troubles
the air, nor any difficulty past, present or to
come, that the imagination may not pass
over without offence in that sweet secession.
Trist. Shandy, III. 154.
Seclusk, seclusion.
To what end did our lavish ancestors
Erect of old these stately piles of ours,
For threadbare clerks, and for the ragged
muse,
Whom better fit some cotes of sad secluse ?
Hall, Satires, II. ii. 4.
Secret. See quotation.
He therefore wore under his jerkin a secret,
or coat of chain -mail, made so light and
flexible that it interfered as little with his
movements as a modern under- waistcoat,
yet of such proof as he might safely depend
upon. — Scott, Fair Maid of Perth, i. 75.
Secretarial, pertaining to a secre-
tary.
The career likeliest for Sterling, in his and
the world's circumstances, would have been
what is called public life : some secretarial,
diplomatic or outer official training. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, ch. v.
Secretarian, pertaining to a secre-
tary.
We may observe in his book in most years
a catalogue of preferments with dates and
remarks, which latter by the Secretarian
touches show out of what shop he had them.
— North, Exament p. 33.
The Popish Plot and the bill of Exclusion
. . must be aided by these false glosses built
upon certain Secretarian expressions in Cole-
man's letters. — Ibid, p. 144.
Secretary, confidant.
Ralph. Nay, Ned, never wink upon me ; I
care not, I.
K. Hen. Ralph tells all ; you shall have a
good secretary of him.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 174.
Sect, profession. Burton, speaking
of physicians, says,
I know many of their sect which have taken
orders in hope of a benefice. — Democ. to
Reader, p. 15.
Sectmaster, leader of a sect.
A blind company will follow a blind sect-
master— S. Ward, Sermons, p. 76.
And Isaac's Offspring for a Sect
Must pass in Hopkins' dialect,
As if the holy Isaac were
An heretick or sectmaster.
T. Ward, England's Reformation^
c. i. p. 73.
P P
SECULERNESS ( 57S )
SEMI-FIDEL
Seculernbss, secularity. The ex-
tract refers to the clergy acquiring
lands, and taking with them all secular
honours pertaining thereto.
The landes of lordes and dukes to possess©
Thei abasshe not a whit the seculerness,
Chalengynge tytles of worldly honour.
Dialoge bettoene a Gent ill man and a
Husbandman, p. 143.
Securance, assurance ; making cer-
tain.
For the securance of Thy Resurrection,
upon which all our faith justly dependeth,
Thou hadst spent forty days upon earth. —
Bp. Hall, Work*, viii. 342.
Securefol, protecting.
I well know the ready right hand charge,
I know the left, and ev'ry sway of my secure-
ful targe. — Chapman, Iliad, vii. 209.
Sedilia, seats in the chancel or
sanctuary for the clergy.
This goes a great way ii» accounting for
the varieties in the sedilia. — Arch., id. 343
(1794).
Seeable, that which is to be seen.
We shall make a march of it, seeing all
the seeables on the way. — Southey, Letters,
ii. 271.
Seed-full, full of seed ; pregnant.
Sylvester says of the Phoenix,
She sits all gladly-sad expecting
Sam flame (against her fragrant heap re-
flecting)
To burn her sacred bones to seedfull cinders.
Sylvester, fifth day, first weeke, 626.
Seeding, sowing.
You see the wicked's seeding and harvest.
—Adams, ii. 372.
Seedow, fit for sowing (?).
They must be all roughly dried before they
be seedow and fruitfull. — Holland, Pliny,
xU. 7.
Seedster, sower. Sylvester {Col-
umnes, 606) speaks of Mars as the
" Seedster of debate."
Seedy, poor ; badly off ; shabby.
However seedy Mr. Bagshot may be now,
if he has really plaid this frolic with you,
you may believe he will play it with others,
and when he is in cash you may depend on
a restoration. — Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk.
I. ch. rii.
'Wild answered ... he should be obliged to
him if he could lend him a few guineas ; for
that he was very seedy. — Ibid., Bk. IV. ch. ii.
He is a little seedy, as we say among us
that practise the law. Not well in clothes.
Smoke the pocket-holes. — Goldsmith, Good-
natured mant III. i.
The outward man of the stranger was in a
most remarkable degree what mine host of
the Sir William Wallace, in his phraseology,
calls seedy. His black coat had seen service ;
the waistcoat of grey plaid bore yet stronger
marks of having encountered more than one
campaign. — Scott, Introd. to Count Robert of
Paris.
Segqon, a labourer. See H. *. v.
Poore seggons halfe starued worke faintly and
dull.— Tusser's Husbandrie, p. 174.
Seizable, capable of being seized.
The carts, waggons, and every attainable
or seizable vehicle were unremittingly in
motion. — Mad. D'Arblay's Diary, vii. 177.
But Sir Jacob walked more slowly, and bow'd
Right and left to the gaping crowd,
Wherever a glance was seizable.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Select, selection.
Borrow of the profligate speech-makers or
lyars of the time in print, and make a set eft
out of a select of them to adorn a party. —
North, Examen, p. 32.
He . . . sets forth a select of the Rye- Plot
papers. — Ibid., p. 308.
Seleniscope, instrument for observ-
ing the moon : should be spelt selrny-
gcope.
Mr. Henahaw and his brother-in-law came
to visite me, and he presented me with a
seleniscope.— Evelyn, Diary, June 9, 1653.
Selenoqrapher, a describer of the
moon.
He belie v'd the sunn to be a material fire,
the moone a continent, as appears by the
late Stenographers. — Evelyn, Diary, Aug.
28,1655.
Selfless, unselfish.
So now, what hearts have men ! they nerer
mount
As high as woman in her selfless mood.
Tennyson, Merlin and Plvien.
The simple, silent, selfless man
Is worth a world of tonguesters.
Ibid., Harold, V. i.
Self-willedness, self-will; obstin-
acy.
It was the consequence of her ladyship's
self-willedness about the young horses. —
Miss Edgeworth, Belinda, ch. xi.
Semble, similar.
A tyrant vile
Of name and deed that bare the semble stile
That did this king.— Hudson's Judith, i. SO.
Semi-fidel, sceptical, but not infidel.
She casts her eye complacently toward an
assortment of those books which so many
writers, male and female, some of the infidel,
SEMIGOD
( 579 )
SENVIE
some of the semi-fdel, and some of the
super-fidel schools, have composed for the
laudable purpose of enabling children to
understand everything. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. xv.
Semigod, demigod, which is the com-
moner form.
Sejanns, whom the Romans worship in
the morning as a semigod, before night they
tear a-pieces. — Adams, i. 503.
Seminally, originally ; springing
from the seed.
Presbyters can conferre no more upon any
of Bishop than is radically, seminally, and
eminently in themselves.— Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 470.
Semitawbk, half a bull.
Some semitawres, and some more halfe a
beare,
Other halfe swine deepe wallowing in the
miers.
Breton, Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 8.
He sees Chimeras, Gorgons, Mino-Taures,
Medusas Haggs, Alectos, Semi-Tawres.
Sylvester, Bethulia's Rescue, vi. 108.
Semiuncial, half (the size of) uncial
(letters); literally, half-inch. The
second extract evidently refers to the
first.
Where contracting is the main business, it
is not well to write, as the fashion now is,
uncial or semiuncial letters, to look like pig's
ribs.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, i. 20.
A vile greasy scrawl indeed! and the
letters are uncial or semiuncial, as somebody
calls your large text-hand, and in size and
perpendicularity resemble the ribs of a
roasted pig.— Scott, Guy Mannering, ii. 257.
Semnable, similar.
" From Berwick to Dover, three hundred
miles over." That is, from one end of the
Land to the other. Semnable the Scripture
expression, "From Dan to Beersheba." —
Fuller, Worthies, Northumberland (ii. 188).
Sempiternize, to perpetuate.
Nature, nevertheless, did not after that
manner provide for the sempiternizing of the
human race. — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. III.
ch. vui.
Sempstry-work, sewing.
My wife had lately requested her to look
out for some sempstry-work among the neigh-
bours.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 159.
Senatory, the upper house of Par-
liament
As for the commens vniuersally,
And a greate parte of the senatory
Were of the same intencion.
Roy and Barlow, Rede me and
be nott wrothe, p. 40.
Senescent, aging.
If the senescent spinsters and dowagers
within the circle of his little world had not
cards as duly as their food, many of them
would have taken to something worse in
their stead.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxci.
The night was senescent
And star-dials pointed to morn.
E. A. Foe, Ulalume (ii. 21).
Sensation, is often used now adjec-
tivally in such phrases as <k sensation
novel," " sensation drama," meaning a
novel or drama with very stirring and
exciting, but improbable, incidents.
The date of the extract is 1861.
At the theatres they have a new name for
their melodramatic pieces ; and call them
u Sensation Dramas." — Thackeray, Round-
about Papers, xvi.
.Sense-boy. See extract: the place
referred to is Cape Coast Castle.
Each [servant] has servants to wait on
him, whom they call sense-boys, i e. they
wait on them to be taught.— L. E. Landwi
(Life by Blanchard, i. 200).
Sentencer, a judge ; one who pro-
nounces sentence.
It becomes not me to sentence either the
sentenced, or sentencers that adjudged him to
death.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 628.
Haruth and Maruth went,
The chosen sentencers ; they fairly heard
The appeals of men to their tribunal brought,
And rightfully decided.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. iv.
Sententially, by way of sentence ;
judicially.
We sententially and definitively by this
present writing judge, declare, and condemn
the said Sir John Oldcastle, Knight, and Lord
Oobham, for a most pernicious and detestable
heretic. — Bale, Select Works, p. 42.
The Pope incensed against King Henry,
had not long since sententially deprived him
of his kingdom.— Heylin, Hut. of Reforma-
tion, i. 22.
Sentimentalize, to indulge in feeling
or sentiment.
They reproach and torment themselves,
and refine and sentimentalize, till gratitude
becomes burdensome. — Miss Edgetoorth,
Emilie de Coulanges.
He wanted to be quiet and sentimentalize
over the roaring of the wind outside. — Kings-
ley, Two Years Ago, ch. iii.
Sentine, sink or sewer.
I can say grossly ... the devil to be a
stinking sentine of all vices; a foul filthy
channel of all mischiefs.— Latimer, i. 42.
Sen vie, mustard seed.
P P 2
SEPARATE
( 5So )
SERMONER
Senvie . is of a moat biting and stinging
tut, of a fierie effect, but nathelesse very
rood and wholesom for man's bodie. — Hoi-'
land, Pliny, xix. 8.
Separate, a separatist.
Chasing rather to be a rank Separate, a
meer Quaker, an arrant Seeker. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 41.
This seems to be the summarie sense of
that pious Apology lately offered in behalf
of all thorough-paced Separates. — Ibid. p. 43.
Separist, separatist.
In contradiction to the present thought,
My sole opinion signifieth nought ;
Tis over-rul'd, aud I am surely cast,
Which proves the fate of separists at last.
Labour in Vain, 1700 (Harl. Misc.,
vi.383).
Sepelition, burial.
The other extreme is of them who do so
over-honour the dead, that they abridge some
parts of them of a due sepelition.— Bp. Hall,
Works, v. 416.
Sept, fence. Fuller distinguishing
rd Up6v from 6 vaoc, describes the former
as
Containing all the verge and compass of
the courts about the temple, and within the
outward sept thereof. — Pisgah Sight, III., Pt.
UI.ix.2. y " y
Septemfluou8, flowing in seven
streams, Septemjluajlumina Nili (Ov.
Met. xv. 763).
Doth salvation necessarily depend upon
your septemfiuous sacraments ? — backet, life
of Williams, i. 220.
The town is seated on the East side of the
river Ley, which not only parteth Hertford-
shire from Essex, but also seven times parteth
from its self, whose septemfiuous stream in
coming to the town is crossed again with so
many bridges. — Fuller, Hist, of Waltham-
Abbey, p. 1.
Septemviou8, in seven directions.
Officers of the state ran sentemvious, seek-
ing an ape to counteract the bloodthirsty
tomfoolery of the human species. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. lxxiii.
Septi- fronted, having seven fronts.
Of these he forms his Antichrist,
And paints him in a figure horrid,
With ten large horns on ev'rv f orhead,
And with a septi-fronted scull.
Ward, England's Reformation,
c. iv. p. 363.
Septuple, to multiply by seven.
The fire in an oven whose heat was sep-
tupled touched not those three servants of
the Lord. — Adams, i. 91.
He that is quit of so bad a guest shall
septuple his own woes by his re-entertain-
ment.— Ibid. ii. 87. .
Sepulcher table, mural tablet.
1 have seen these antiquities also fastened
in the walles . . . and in a grave or semdcher-
table, between two images. — Holland's Cam-
den, p. 236.
Seraphic, a name frequently used by
Gauden, in a sneering way, of the sec-
taries of his day, in allusion to their
flaming zeal.
Where he is best known, he most look to
be less beloved by many high Serapkicks and
supercilious Separatists. — Gauden, Tsars of
the Church, p. 266.
Serena, the unwholesome evening
air ; the foreign form is noted as some-
what curious because the word had been
Anglicised long before by Jonson, &c.
They had already by way of precaution
armed themselves against the Serena with a
caudle. — Gentleman instructed, p. 108.
Serene. The Diets, only furnish
examples of this substantive in a bad
sense, viz. the mildew or blight of a calm
summer's evening. In the extracts it
signifies simply calm or serenity, with
no evil effects connoted.
Will ye continue to see the same cast and
habit of melancholy in this man's counten-
ance ? No more than ye can see the gloom
of last winter in the smiling serene of a sum-
mer's evening. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i. 220.
The serene of heartfelt happiness has little
of adventure in it. — Ibid. ii. 241.
Not a cloud obscured the deep serene. —
Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xiii.
My body is cleft by these wedges of pains
From my spirit's serene.
Mrs. Browning, Rhapsody of Life's
Progress.
Serenize, to make serene ; but in
the extract it seems = to glorify.
Thy Being's vniuersaU ; most exact !
Then, being such, what should my homage
be?
And be my Grace and Goodnesse most ab-
stract,
How can I, wanting both, serenize Thee ?
Davits, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 33.
Serfage, villainage.
It does not seem to me that the institutions
of a country, (except slavery or serfage) have
anything to do with the matter. — Senior's
Conversations with de Tocqueville, i. 24.
Sermoner, preacher; sermoniser.
Ben Jonson, quoted by R., has ser-
tnonecr.
SERMONET
< 58i )
SETT
This is the sin of schoolmasters, gover-
nesses, critics, sermoners, and instructors of
young or old people. — Thackeray, Roundabout
Papers, xxv.
Sebmonet, a little sermon.
A brief but stirring sermonet. — Ch. Times,
Sept. 27, 1872, p. 433.
Sermonoid, that which has the form
or appearance of a sermon.
For the want of merely a comma, it often
occurs that an axiom appears a paradox, or
that a sarcasm is converted into a sermonoid.
— E. A. Poe, Marginalia, v.
Serpedinous, creeping ; serpiginous
is the usual technical term.
The itch is a corrupt humour between the
skin and the flesh, runniDg with a serpedin-
ous course, till it hath denied the whole body.
Adams, i. 501.
Sebpentrt, serpent-kind.
Wipe away all slime
Left by men-slugs and human serpent ry.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. i.
Servanted. In the first extract
(which is given in the Diets. ) servanted
= reduced to the condition of a serv-
ant: in the second, attended by a
servant
My affairs
Are servanted to others.
Coriolanus, v. 2.
The uncles and the nephew are now to be
double-servanted, (smgle-servanted they were
before) and those servants are to be double
armed when they attend their masters
abroad.— Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i. 225.
Serve, the fruit of the service-tree.
Crato utterly forbids all manner of fruits,
as peares, apples, plumms, cherries, straw-
berries, nuts, medlers, serves, &c. — Burton,
Democ. to Reads, p. 68.
Server, conduit
They, . . . derived rilles and servers of
water into every street. — Holland's Camden,
p. 248.
Servitor, a soldier.
With that came forth a Spaniard called
Sebastian, who had been an old servitor in
Flanders. — Sanders, Voyage to Tripoli, 1584
(Eng. Garner, ii. 16).
Of these souldiers thus trained the Isle it
selfe is able to bring forth into the field
4000. And at the instant of all assaies ap-
pointed there bee three thousand more of
most expert and practiced servitours out of
Hampshire. — Holland's Camden, p. 275.
Serviture, slavery.
A very serviture of Egypt is it to be in
danger of these papistic bishops. — - Bale,
Select Works, p. 179.
Sesquipedalianism, the use of long
words ; literally half a yard long ( Ars
Poetica, 97).
Are not these masters of hyperpolysyllabie
sesquipedalianism using proper language? —
Hall, Modern English, p. 39.
Sesquipedality, great size. See
preceding entry.
Imagine to yourself a little squat un-
courtly figure of a Doctor Slop, of about four
feet and a half perpendicular height, with a
breadth of back ana a sesquipedality of belly
which might have done honour to a serjeant
in the horse-guards. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
i. 217.
Sestine, a poem of six stanzas ; the
word will be found elsewhere in the
Arcadia. See pp. 216, 438.
The day was so wasted that onely this
riming Sestine delivered by one of great ac-
count among them, could obtain favour to
bee heard. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 442.
Set, to mark out 'for robbery ; the
idea being taken from a dog who sets
birds.
He with his squadron overtakes a coach
which they had set overnight, having intelli-
gence of a booty of four hundred pounds in
it.— Memoirs of Du Vail, 1670 (Harl. Misc.,
iii. 311).
He might come to rob or to set the house,
now so few servants were'at home. — Sprat*s
Relation of Young's conspiracy, 1692 (Harl.
Misc., vi. 209).
A combination' of sharpers, it seems, had
long set him as a man of fortune. — Richard-
son, Grandison, iv. 294.
Set down, a lift is the more com-
mon expression.
Part of the journey I performed on foot ;
but wherever I could I got a set down, because
I was impatient to get near the Land's
End. — Miss Edgeworth, Lame Jervas, ch. ii.
Sett, a team of six horses.
I am preparing with Lady Betty and my
cousin Montague to wait upon my beloved
with a coach-and-four, or a sett : for Lady
Betty will not stir out with a pair for the
world. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 301.
Here to-day about five o'clock arrived Lady
Sarah Sadleir and Lady Betty Lawrence;
each in her chariot-and-six. Dowagers love
equipage, and these cannot travel ten miles
without a sett. — Ibid. vi. 226.
The nobility drive half-a-dozen rats in an
elbow-chair, and call them a sit of coach-
horses ; so that a poor devil of a chairman
can get nothing at all, at all. — Colman, Ocean
sional Prelude.
SETTING STICKS ( 582 ) SHACKLE-HAMMED
Setting sticks, " a stick used for
making the plaits or sets of ruffs"
(Halliwell). Breton {PasquWs Prog-
nostication,) p. 11) says that Dooms-
day will be near when u maides will use
no setting sticks"
Severity, used in a peculiar sense in
the extract, as though it came from
sever.
Gregory the Ninth in his Epistles blames
the English Clergy above any, that they
studied to undo one another. . . . He saw too
much into the nature of our insulary severity,
and not holdiug close together. — Rackety
Life of Williams, ii. 129.
Sewant. H. gives this, without ex-
ample, as a North-country name for the
plaice.
Behold some others ranged all along
To take the sewant, yea the flounder sweet.
Denny*, Secrets of Angling (Eng.
Garner, i. 171).
The suant swift that is not set by least. —
Ibid. p. 175.
Sewn up, intoxicated (slang).
He . . had twice had Sir Rumble Tumble
(the noble driver of the Flash-o'-ligbtning*
light-four-inside-post-coach) up to his place,
and took care to tell you that pome of the
party were pretty considerably "seven up"
too. — Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, ch. i.
Sexless, without sex; neither male
nor female. See extract a. v. Sireless.
I am too dull to comprehend what benefit
or pleasure your Deity will derive from the
celibacy of your daughter ; except indeed on
one supposition, which, as I have some faint
remnants of reverence and decency re-
awakening in me just now, I must leave to
be uttered only by the pure lips of sexless
priests. — Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xvii.
Sextine, sixteenth. Nashe seems to
hav^e thought that 1598 belonged to the
15th century.
From that moment to this sextine centurie
(or let me not be taken with a lye, Ave hundred
ninety-eight, that wants but a paire of yeares
to make me a true man) they would no more
live under the yoke of the sea. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 150).
Sextiply, to multiply sixfold.
A treble paire doth our late wracke repaire
And sextiplies our mirth for one mishappe.
Dairies, Microcosmos, p. 6.
So some affections our soules browes vnbend,
And other some doe sextiply each dent.
Ibid.}?. 38.
Sextoness, a female sexton. An
appointment as sextoness is advertised
for in the Church Times, Nov. 1, 1878.
On the contrary, Stany hurst (jEn., iv.
512) speaks of a sorceress as '* Seixteen
[t. e. sexton] of Hesperides Sinagog/1
Hesperidum templi custos.
Still the darkness increas'd, till it reach M
such a pass,
That the sextoness hasten'd to turn on the
gas.
Barham, Ingoldsby Leg. {Sir Rupert).
Sexuality, recognition of sexual
relations.
I have heard you say ere now that the
gopular Christian paradise and hell are but a
agan Olympus and Tartarus, as grossly
material as Mahomet's without the hon-
est thoroughgoing sexuality, which, you
thought, made his notion logical and con-
sistent.— C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. viii.
Seyst me and seyst me not. This
seems to have been a form of expres-
sion at the game of Bo-peep, i. e. Thou
seest me, and now thou seest me not.
They will pay no more money for the
housel-suppings, bottom-blessings, nor yet
for seyst me and seyst me not above the head
and under their chalices, which in many
places be of fine gold. — Bale, Select Works,
p. 526L
Shable, sword, or cut] ass.
At their pleasure was he completely armed
cap-a-pie, and mounted upon one of the best
horses in the kingdom, with a good, slashiug
shable by his side. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
I. ch. zh.
As he saw the gigantic Highlander confront
him with his weapon drawn, he tugged for a
second or two at the hilt of his shabbU as he
called it.— Scott, Rob Roy, ii. 170.
Shab off, to get rid of. H. gives it
as a North-country word = to abscond.
How eagerly now does my moral friend
run to the devil, having hopes of profit in
the wind ! I have shaltbed him off purely. —
Farquhar, Love and a Bottle, iv. 3.
Shabroon, a shabby fellow.
My wife too .. let in an inundation of
shabroons to gratify her concupiscence. — T.
Brown, Works, ii. 184.
Shack, a vagabond. The word is in
Peacock's Manley and Corringham
Glossary (E. D. S.).
Great ladies are more apt to take sides with
talking flattering gossips than such a shack as
Fitzharris. — North, Examen, p. 293.
Shackle-hammed, bow-legged. The
word occurs also in Ellis's Modern
Husbandman, III. i. 182, applied to
young colts (1750).
SHADOW HOUSE (583)
SHAKO
His head was holden uppe so pert, and his
legges shackle-ham1 d, as if his knees had been
laced to his thighes with points. — Greene,
Quip for Upstart Courtier (A. Misc., v. 403).
Shadow house, a summer house that
affords shade from the sun.
One garden, summer, or shadotee house
covered with blue slate. — Survey of Maner of
Wimbledon, 1649 (Archaol., x. 419).
Shadowless, unshaded, or without a
shadow ; a frequent attribute of uncanny
beings.
She had a large assortment of fairies and
shadowless witches, and banshees. — Miss
Edgeworth, Ennui, ch. iii.
His sinuous contortions and shadowless
eyes are forever before us as illustrative of
his wily wickedness. — Phillips, Essays from
the Times, ii. 335.
The moonlit threshold lay pale and shadow-
less before the closed front -door. — Miss
Bronte, Villete, ch. zzxvi.
Shaft or a bolt, a proverbial expres-
sion = something in one way or the
other ; a shaft for the long bow, or a
bolt for the cross bow.
Slender. Til make a shaft or a holt on't ;
VHd, 'tis but venturing. — Merry Wives of
Windsor, iii. 4.
The Prince is preparing for his journey ; I
shall to it again closely when he is gone, or
make a shaft or a bolt of it. — Howell, Letters,
I. Hi. 24.
Shagling, shaking, and so, feeble.
Edmnnd Crispyne of Oriell coll., lately a
shay ling lecturer of physic. — A. Wood% Fast
Oxon, Pt. I. col. 126.
Shag-rag and bobtail, every one, ol
iroXXoc — usually tag rag and bobtail.
See extract s. v. Farcical ; and for in-
stances of shag rag by itself = a beg-
garly fellow, see it.
Shagreen, rough (?) : peevish (?).
Arglicised form of chagrin (?).
The mastiffs, both English and Dntch, could
not endure to be held so long, six or seven
days together, by a pack of shagreen curs. —
Parable of the Bear - baiting, 1691 (Harl.
Misc., v. 191).
Shake-bag, a large game-cock. See
extract s. v. Turn-poke.
Wit. Will you go to a cock-match ?
Sir Wil. With a wench, Tony ? Is she a
shake-bag, sirrah ?
Congreve, Way of the World, iv. 11.
"I bless God (said he) that Mrs. Tabitha
Bramble did not take the field today." " I
would pit her for a cool hundred (cried Quin)
against the best shakebag of the whole main."
—Smollett, H. Clinker, l. 58.
Shake-buckler, a swaggerer, a
swashbuckler. The Sim seems to be
used by way of alliterative personifica-
tion, like Toby Tosspot, &c. Cf . " Sym
Swash " in extract s. v. Stemly.
Let the parents ... by no means suffer
them to live idly, nor to be of the number of
such Sim Shake-bucklers as in their young
years fall unto serving, and in their old years
fall into beggary. — Becon, ii. 355.
Antichrist hunteth the wild deer, the fox
and the hare in his closed parks with great
cries and horns blowing, with hounds and
ratchetts running, besides a great swarm of
Sim Shakebucklers. — Ibid. iii. 509.
Shake-down, a rough, extempore bed.
I would not choose to put more on the
floor than two beds and one shake-down. —
Miss Edgeworth, Rose, Thistle, and Shamrock,
i. 3.
" You can give him a shake-dawn here to-
night, can't you ? " " We must manage it
somehow," replied the lady ; " you don't
much mind how you sleep, I suppose, sir." —
Dickens, Nickleby, ch. vii.
Shake-rag, beggar, ragged person ;
used also adjectivally.
Do you talk shake-rag? heart! yond's
more of 'em ; I shall be beggar-mawl'd if I
stay. — Broome, A Jovial Crew, Act III.
" He was a shake-rag like fellow," he said,
" and he dared to say had gipsy blood in his
veins." — Scott, Guy Mannering, i. 269.
Shakes. No great shakes is said by
way of disparagement. L., who has
the phrase without example, thinks it
refers to the musical sense of the word
— an air that did not give much scope
for execution would afford no great
shakes.
I saw mun stand on the poop, so plain as
I see you ; no great shakes of a man to look
to nether ; there's a sight better here to plase
me. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xxx.
Shakes. In a couple or brace of
shakes = instanter. See H. *. v.
Ill be back in a couple of shakes,
So don't, dean, be quivering and quaking.
Ingoldsby Leg. (Babes in the wood).
Now Dragon could kill a wolf in a brace
of shakes. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch.
• ••
XCUl.
Shake up, to upbraid.
Mahel . . . did shake up in som hard and
sharpe termes a young gentleman. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 628.
Shako, military cap.
His sabre was cast upon the floor before
him, and his shako was on the table. — H.
Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xxxi.
SI1ALL0WLING ( 584 )
SHA VER
Shallowling, a shallow or silly per-
son ; the diminutive f orm increases the
contemptuous force of the expression.
Whores, when they have drawn in silly
shallowlings, will ever find some trick to
retain them. — British Bellman, 1648 (Harl.
Misc., vii. 833).
Can we suppose that any Shallowling
Can find much good in oft Tohacconing V
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 346.
Shaly, consisting of shale.
He lies down in the blazing German after-
noon upon the shaly soil. — Kingsley, Two
Years Ago, ch. xxiii.
Sham. See quotation ; also $. v.
Pote.
This term of art, sham-plot should be de-
cyphered. The word sham is true cant of
the Newmarket breed. It is contracted of
ashamed. The native signification is a town
lady of diversion in country maid's cloaths,
who to make good her disguise, pretends to
be so 'sham'd. Thence it became proverbial,
when a maimed lover was laid up, or looked
meager, to say he had met with a sham.
But what is this to plots? The noble Cap-
tain Dangerfield, being an artist in all sorts
of land piracy, translated this word out of the
language of his society to anew employment
he had taken up of false plotting. And as
with them, it ordinarily signifies any false or
counterfeit thing, so, annex'd to a plot, it
means one that is fictitious and untrue;
and being so applied in his various writings
and sworn depositions ... it is adopted into
the English language. — North, Examen, p.
231
Sham, a false shirt-front.
Sir, I say you put upon me, when I first
came to town about being orderly, and the
doctrine of wearing shams to make linen
last clean a fortnight. — Steele, Conscious
Lovers, Act I.
Shame, to shun through shame.
My master sad — for why, he shames the
court —
Is fled away. — Greene, James the Fourth, v. 6.
Shammish, deceitful.
The overture was very shammish. — North,
Examen, p. 100.
Shammockino, worthless; or per-
haps, cheating by running into debt.
Pox take you both for a couple of sham-
mocking rascals . . . you broke my tavern, and
that broke my heart. — T.Brown, Works, il
184.
Shan dry, a small cart or trap : some-
times culled a thundery-dan.
I ha' been to engage a shmndry this very
morn.— Mrs, Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch.
Sh anker, a loathsome botch.
With gentlest touch she next explores
Her shankers, issues, running sores.
Swift, Young Nymph going to bed.
Shanks's mare. To go on Shank* $
mare = to go on foot. Breton {Good
and Body p. 14) says, "the honest
poor man's horse is Bayard of ten
toes."
"I am away to London town to speak to
Mr. Frank." "To London! how wilt get
there?" « On Shanks his mare," said Jack,
pointing to his bandy legs.— Kingsley t West-
ward Ho, ch. xv.
Shanny - pated, giddy-pated. Cf .
Shag-brained.
And out ran every soul beside,
A shanny-pated crew.
Bloomfield, The fforkey.
Share-penny, miser.
I'll go near to coaen old father share-penny
of his daughter. — Wily Beguiled (Hauians,
Eng. Dr., in. 289).
Sharpling.
Th' hidden lone that now-a-dayes doth holde
The steel and load-stone, hydrargire and
golde,
Th* amber and straw ; that lodgeth in one
shell
Pearl-fish and sharpling.
Sylvester, The Furies, 60.
Sharrag, shear-hog, q. v.
Shave, a spoke-shave, or wheel-
wright's plane. In his catalogue of
"husbandlie furniture" Tusser reck-
ons—
Wheele ladder for haruest, light pitchfork
and tougfh,
Shave, whiplash wel knotted, and cartrope
ynough. — Tusser' s Husbandrie, p. 36.
Shave, a small coppice : H. gives it
as a Kentish word.
In January, 1738, were found in a shave
belonging to the estate of Sir John Hales,
who lives in this neighbourhood, and within
his manor of Tunstall near Sittingbourn,
several hundreds of Broad-pieces of gold. —
Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain, i. 168.
Shaver. See quotation.
Among all the characters which he bears
in the world, no one has ever given him
credit for being a cunning shaver. (Be it
here observed in a parenthesis that I suppose
the word shaver in this so common expression
to have been corrupted from shaveling, the
SHAWL
( S8S )
SHELL
old contemptuous word for a priest.) —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. cliv.
Shawl, to put on a shawl.
Her son assisted Grace Nugent most care-
fully in shawling the young heiress. — Miss
Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. iii.
Shawlless, without a shawl.
Standing boimetless and shawlless to catch
as much water as she could with her hair
and clothes. — E. Bronte, Wuthering Heights,
ch. ix.
Shawl-waistcoat, a waistcoat with
a large pattern like a shawl (?).
He had a shawl-waistcoat of many colours.
— Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, ch. viii.
Shay-brained, silly ; weak ; corrup-
tion of shanny -brained. See Shanny-
pated.
But while I take this shay-brain'd course,
And like a fool run to and fro,
Master perhaps may sell the horse.
Therefore this instant home 111 go.
Bloomfield, Abner and the Widow Jones.
She, her ; a common incorrectness,
but confined now to the uneducated.
Yet will I weep, vow, pray to cruel She.
Daniel, Sonnet IV. (Eng. Garner, i. 582).
George had a daughter, . . . and she had
George . . . tutored. — Peek's Jests, p. 616.
Sheale, Shealinq, a shanty.
A martiaU kinde of men, who from the
moneth of April unto August, lye out scatter-
ing and Summering (as they tearme it) with
their cattell, in little cottages here and
there, which they call sheaies and shealings.
— Holland's Camden, p. 506.
A horse was seen feeding upon the heath
near his shiel (which is a cottage made in
open places of turf and flag) and none could
tell who was the owner of it. — North, Life
of Lord Guilford, i. 270.
Shearhog, a ram or wether after the
first shearing (H.) ; but see first extract.
The weather we call first year a lamb ; the
second year a weather pug or teg ; the third
year a sherrug ; and the fourth a sheep. —
Ellis, New Experiments, 52 (1736).
He thought it a mere frustration of the
purposes of language to talk of shearhogs
and ewes, to men who habitually said shar-
rags and yowes.— G. Eliot, Mr. GilJU's Love
Story, ch. 1.
Sheat.
Neat, sheat, and fine,
As brisk as a cup of wine.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. 163.
Sheat-fish, the sly Silurus.
A mighty sheat-fish smokes upon the
festive board. — Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. z.
Shedding, division. Cf. Watershed.
Then we got out to that a shedding " of the
roads, which marks the junction of the high-
ways coming down from Glasgow and Edin-
burgh.— Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch.
xxbc.
Shedfork, pitchfork. See extract
8. V. ROUZLE.
Sheeped, abashed.
With shame and grief enough is that
sheeped tyrant returned to his Nineveh;
having left behind him all the pride and
strength of Assyria for compost to the Jewish
fields.— £p. Hall, Cont. (Sennacherib).
Sheep- mark. It seems to have been
the custom for persons who could not
write to make the same device with
which they marked their sheep do duty
for their signature : at least this seems
to be the meaning of the following in a
letter from Cranmer of about the date
1534.
I know not how I shall order them that
cannot subscribe by writing : hitherto I have
caused one of my secretaries to subscribe for
such persons, and made them to write their
shepe mark or some other mark as they can
. . . scribble. — Cranmer, ii. 291.
Sheep-pick, a kind of hay-fork. See
N. s. v. sheppick.
His servant Perry one evening in Camp-
den-garden made an hideous outcry, whereat
some who heard it coming in met him run-
ning, and seemingly frighted, with a sheep-
pick in his hand, to whom he told a formal
story how he had been set upon by two men
in white with naked swords, and how he
defended himself with his sheep-pick, the
handle whereof was cut in two or three
places. — Examination of Joan Perry, &c.,1676
(Harl. Misc., iii. 549).
Sheep's head, a fool.
Those persones who were sely poore soules,
and had no more store of witte then they
must needes occupie, wer euen then, and
yet still are in all tongues and places by a
common prouerbe called shepes heads or shepe.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apopth., p. 122.
Sheeten, made of sheeting; the
reference is to doing penance in a white
sheet.
Or wanton rigg, or letcher dissolute,
Do stand at Powles-Orosse in a sheeten sate.
Davies, Paper's Complaint, 1. 250.
Shell, to cover, as with a shell ; the
usual meaning is, to strip off the shell.
Montaigne, in Cotton's translation (ch.
lxxix.), remarks on the surprise caused
to the Mexicans by the sight of the
SHELt
(586)
SHINE
Spanish invnder "shelVd in a hard and
shining skin, with a cutting and glitter-
ing weapon in his hand against them.'*
Shell thee with steel or brass, advised by
dread,
Death from the casque will pull thy cautious
head. — Ibid. ch. zvi.
Shell, hilt, or that part of it which
protects the hand.
I imagined that his weapon had perforated
my lungs, and of consequence that the wound
was mortal; therefore, determined not to
die unrevenged, I seised his shell which was
close to my breast, before he could disen-
tangle his point, and keeping it fast with my
left hand, shortened my own sword with my
right. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch. lix.
The swords no sooner met than Castlewood
knocked up Esmond's with the blade of his
own, which he had broke off short at the
shell. — Thackeray, Esmond, Bk. III. ch. xiii
Shellies, shells ; this form in the
extract is, I suppose, due to the ex-
igencies of the rhyme.
Now little fish on tender stone begin to cast
their bellies,
And sluggish snails that erst were view'd do
creep out of their shellies.
Beaxim. and Fl., Knight of B. Pestle,
iv. 5.
Shell out, to disburse (slang).
Will you be kind enough, sir, to shell out
for me the price of a daacent horse ? — Miss
Edgevvrth, Love and Law, I. i.
Shepherdly, pastoral. L. says
Johnson considered this a better word
than shepherdish : it is earlier than
Jeremy Taylor, the earliest authority
cited.
Virgill in his shepherdly poemes called
Eglogues, vsed as rusticall but fit allegorie
for the purpose., — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie,
Bk. III. ch. xviii.'
Sheppy, the sheep-shed.
Then of the outer sheep (all now snowed
and frizzled like a lawyer's wig) I took the
two finest and heaviest, and with one be-
neath my right arm, and the other beneath
my left, I went straight home to the upper
sheppey, and set them inside and fastened
them. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. xlii.
Shepstare, sheep-shearer. Shepstare
time = the summer.
Somtime I would betray the byrds
That lyght on lymed tree,
Especially in Shepstare tyme,
When thicke in flockes they flye.
Googe, Eglogs, vi.
Sheregrig.
Weasels and polecats, sheregrigs, carrion
crows,
Seen and smelt only by thine eyes and nose.
JVolcot, P. Pindar, p. 186.
Sherifess, female sheriff.
I find Elizabeth the Widdow of Thomas
Lord Clifford (probably in the Minority of
her son) Sherifess (as I may say) in the six-
teenth of Richard the Second. — Fuller,
Worthies, Westmoreland (ii. 433).
Sheriffalty, the term of a sheriff's
office ; usually written shrievalty.
The year after I had twins ; they came in
Mr. Pentweazel's sheriffalty.— Foote, Taste,
Act I.
Sir Rowland Meredith, knighted in his
sheriffalty, on occasion of an address which
he brought up to the king from his county.
— Richardson, Grandison, i. 39.
She -school, girls - school. In the
margin of the subjoined, Fuller puts,
" Conveniency of snce-colUdges"
Nunneries also were good Shee - schools,
wherein the girles and maids of the neigh-
bourhood were taught to read and work. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 297.
SHiFTFULLjfull of shifts or resources.
Sylvester, Battle of Yvry, 33S, speaks
of the " shiftfull fear " of some fugi-
tives enabling them to find a means of
escape.
Shillishallier, an irresolute person.
He was no shillishallier, nor ever wasted a
precious minute in pro-and-conning, when it
was necessary at once to decide and act. —
Sbuthey, The Doctor, ch. cv.
Suin, to kick on the shins.
There's a pirouette ! — we're all a great deal
too near,
A ring ! give him room, or hell shin yon —
stand clear !
Ingoldshy Legends (House-warming).
Shine, a row ; disturbance.
I'm not partial to gentlefolks coming into
my place . . . there'd be a pretty shine made,
if I was to uo a wisiting them, I think. —
Dickens, Bleak House, ch. Ivii.
Mr. Malone's lot heaves crockery and
broken vegetables at him out of winder, by
reason of their being costermongera, and
having such things handy ; so there's mostly
a shine of a Sunday evening. — H. Kingsley,
Ravenshoe, ch. zli.
Shine. To take the shine out of a
person = to eclipse or surpass him.
As he goes lower in the scale of intellect
and manners, so also Mr. Dickens rises
higher than Mr. Thackeray — his hero is
greater than Pendennis, and his heroine than
Laura, while " my Aunt " might alike, on
SHINER
( 587 )
SHOES
the score of eccentricities and kindliness,
take the thine out of Lady Bockminster. —
Phillips, Essays from the Times, u. 333.
Shiner, a sovereign or guinea.
To let a lord of lands want shiners, 'tis a
shame. — Foote, The Minor, Act II.
Yon ne'er would call those shiners trash,
Whose touch is life, whose name is Gash.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour i. c. 13.
Is it worth fifty shiners extra, if it's safely
done from the outside? — Dickens, Oliver
Twist, ch. xix.
Shinky, slang for money.
We'll soon fill both pockets with the shinev
in California. — Reade, Never too late to meni,
ch. i.
Shingle, hide ; skin.
That lovely white hinde (though she hath
som black spots about her shingle) which I
see browsing upon that hedge, she was once
a womsak.— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 51.
Ship of guinea, the Nautilus.
Along all that coast we oftentimes saw a
thing swimming upon the water, like a cock's
comb (which they call a Ship of Guinea) but
the colour much fairer ; which comb standeth
upon a thing almost like the swimmer of a fish
in colour and bigness, and beareth under the
water strings which saveth it from turning
over. — T. Stevens, 1579 {Eng. Garner, i. 131).
Shippage, freightage.
You tell me in your letter of November 3d
that the quarry of granite might be rented
at twenty pounds or twenty shillings, I don't
know which, no matter, per annum. . . What
signifies the cheapness of the rent? The
catting and shippage would be articles of
some Tittle consequence. — Walpole, Letters,
i. 366 (1754).
Ship-shape, in good order.
WaTr will have wrote home from the
island, or from some port or another, and
made all taut and ship - shape. — Dickens,
Dombeyand Son, ch. xxiii.
Neat ship-shape fixings and contrivances. —
Browning, Bp. Blougram's Apology.
Look to the babe, and till I come again
Keep everything ship-shape, for I must go.
Tennyson, Enoch Arden.
This new house of theirs will be all the
drier in a month's time ; and their yacht will
be all the more ship-shape. — Black, Princess
of Thule, ch. xxvii.
Ship's-husband, freighter of a ship.
As for the three boys, they shall be either
made supercargoes, shitts-husbands, or go out
cadets and writers in the Company's service.
—Foote, The Nabob, i. 1.
His tea, right from China, he got in a
present from some eminent ship's-kusband&t
Wapping. — Scott, Rob Boy, ii. 99.
Then there was the selecting a vessel, and
all the negotiations with the ship's husband
as to terms. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
ch. xlviii.
Shibling. See extract.
My young ones lament that they can have
no more shirling in the lake ; a motion some-
thing between skating and sliding, and
originating in the iron clogs. — Southey, Let-
ters, 1820 (iii. 522).
Shittle, a shuttle.
My godsire's name, Til tell you
Was In-and-in Shittle, and a weaver he was,
And it did fit his craft : for so his shittle
Went in and in still.
Jonson, Tale of a Tub, iv. 2.
Shittle- witted, flighty ; unsteady.
Cf. Shuttle-brained.
Devotion, neighbourhood, nor hospitality,
never flourished in this land since such
upstart boies and shittlcwitted fools became
of the ministery. — Greene, Quip for Upstart
Courtier {Harl. Misc., v. 417).
Shock, to meet with violence. L.
has the word with a verb neut., but
with no example.
Have at thee then ! said Kay ; they shocked,
and Kay
Fell shoulder-slipt.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Shockheaded, having rough unkempt
hair.
I thanked my shockheaded friend, and
asked carelessly to whom the park belonged.
— Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. V. ch. 1.
Shoes. To die in one's shoes = to
be hung.
Whoever refused to do this should pre-
sently swing for it and die in his shoes. —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xlv.
He used to say George (his son) would die
in his shoes. — North, life of Lord Guilford,
ii. 96.
And there is Mc Fuse, and Lieutenant Tre-
gooze,
And there is Sir Carnaby Jenks of the Blues,
All come to see a man die in his shoes.
Ingoldsby Legends {The Execution).
Shoes. To be in the shoes of another
= to be in his place.
With violence and with force of arms he
drave
Our Benedictine brethren — not alone
Them that were placed by Edred tit the shoes
Of seculars that by Edred were expulsed,
But ancient men that had been there afore-
time.— Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iii. 8.
Shoes. Another pair of shoes =
something different
SHOLDER
( 588 )
SHOT
Shall colonists have their horses (and
blood 'tins, if yon please, good Lord !) and
not my London gentleman ? No, no ! Well
show 'em another pair of shoes than that,
Pip, won't us? — Great Expectations, ch. xl.
Sholder, shallower. See N., s. v.
shold.
In the scepterdome of Edward the Con-
fessor, the sands first began to growe into
sight at a low water, and more sholder at the
month of the river Hirus or Ierns. — Nashe,
Lenten Stuffe {Karl. Misc., vi. 151).
Sholve, shovel.
Get easting sholue, broome, and a sack with
a band. — Tusser's Husbandries p. 35.
Shone, radiance.
Stella alone with face unarmed march't,
Either to do like him [the sun] with open
shone.
Or careless of the wealth, because her own.
Sidney, Astrophd and Stella, st. 22.
Shool, to beg.
They went all hands to shooting and beg-
ging ; and because I would not take a spell
at the same duty, refused to give me the
least assistance. — Smollett, Bod, Random,
ch. xli.
Shoot, a rush of water.
At the tails of mills and arches small
Where as the shoot is swift and not too clear.
Dennys, Secrets of Angling
(Eng. Garner, 1. 171).
I have hunted every wet rock and shute
from Rillage Point to the near side of Hills-
borough.— C. Kingsley, 1849 (Life, i. 161).
Shoot able, capable of being shot ;
also, a vulgar pronunciation of suitable.
I rode everything rideable, shot everything
shootable, — Savage, R. Medlicott, Bk. III. ch.
• • •
m.
The lady's fortune is shootable; indeed, I
may say, pretty handsome. — Miss Ferrier,
Destiny, p. 192.
Shooter. See extract
He had a word for the hostler about " that
grey mare," a nod for the shooter or guard,
and a bow for the draftsman. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. 1.
Shooting-horn, alluring; as of a
woman who would make her husband's
horns shoot (?).
She . . . treats him with kind glances and
a few amorous witticisms, as long as his
money runs flush ; but as soon as that begins
to fail, her shooting-horn looks and freedoms
are turned into moody pouts and a scornful
reservedness. — T. Brown, Worksf iii. 96.
Shop, to shut up, or imprison. See
extract s. v. Sweeten and pinch.
They had likewise shopped up themselves
in the highest of their house. — Patten, Kxped,
to Scotl., 1548 (Eng. Gamer, iii. 86).
It was Bartlemy time when I was shopped,
and there warnt a penny trumpet in the fair
as I couldn't bear the squeaking on. Arter
I was locked up for the night, the row and
din outside made the thundering old jail so
silent that I could almost have beat my
brains out against the iron plates of the
door. — Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xvL
Shop. A person is said to talk shop
when he converses on subjects peculiar
to his own profession or occupation ;
thus there is military shop, clerical
shop, &c.
Had to go to Hartley Bow for an Arch-
deacon's Sunday-school meeting three hours
useless (I fear) speechifying and shop, bat
the Archdeacon is a good man, and works
like a brick beyond his office. — C Kingsley,
Letter, May, 1856.
Shop-lift, one who steals from a
shop = a shop-lifter. See extract, «. v.
Fender.
Shopocract, the trading class or
power.
Mr. Cranworth Oranworth had danced
with all the belles of the shopocracy of
Eccleaton.— Mrs, Gaskell, Ruth, on. xxnii.
Shoppy, belonging to trade.
Are those the Gormans who made their
fortunes in trade at Southampton ? Oh, I
am glad we don't visit them ; I don't like
shoppy people. — Mrs, Gaskell, North and
South, ch. ii.
Shore, sewer.
Ungrateful odours common-stare* diffuse.
Gay, Trivia, i. 171.
Shorling, shaveling ; priest : also
used adjectivally = shaven. The word
is also applied to the fell of sheep after
the fleece has been removed. See L. $. v.
This Babylonish whore, or disguised syna-
gogue of shorelings sitteth upon many waters.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 494.
A certain council called Concilium Latro-
nense, in the which were gathered together
wonderful swarms of smeared, spiritual,
shorling sorcerers. — Becon, ii. 260.
Short • windbdnbss, shortness of
breath.
Balm, taken fasting, ... is very good
against shortvindedness, — Adams, i. 374.
Shot, a shooter ; a soldier who carried
fire-arms ; used generally, and not with
regard to accuracy or otherwise of aim,
as now when we call a man a good or
bad shot.
SHOT
( 589)
SHO VEL
Come manage me your caliver. So, very
well; go to; very good, exceeding good.
O give me always a little, lean, old, chapt,
bald shot.— 2 Hen. IV., iii. 2.
A guard of chosen shot I had,
That walked about me every minute while.
1 Hen. VI., i. 4.
I was brought from prison into the town
of Xeres by two drums and a hundred shot.
— Peeke, Three to One, 1625 (Eng. Garner, i.
633).
Shot, usually = the reckoning, but
in extracts seems to be applied to the
quantity of ale for which some perhaps
fixed reckoning was paid.
About noon we returned, had a shot of ale
at Slathwaite. — Meeke, Diary, Jan. 23, 1691.
After dinner we went into the town to
drink a shot, as the custom is. — Ibid., Oct.
30, 1693.
Shotrel, a pike in the first year.
As though six mouths and the cat for a
seventh be not sufficient to eat an harlotry
shotrel, a pennyworth of cheese, and half a
score sparlings. — Gascoigne, Supposes, ii. 3.
The shotrell, 1 year, Pickerel, 2 year, Pike,
3 year, Luce, 4 year, are one. — Lauson, Com-
ments on Secrets of Angling, 1653 {Eng.
Gamer, i. 197).
Shoulder. To give the cold shoulder
= to discountenance, to keep at a dis-
tance. See quotation from Scott, s. v.
Twaddle.
He is well enough to do in the world — a
warm man, sir ; and when a man is really
warm, I am the last person to think of his
little faults, and turn on him the cold shoulder.
—Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XVII. ch. i.
" Ay, he comes back," said the landlord.
11 to his great friends now and again, and
gives the cold shoulder to the man that made
him." — Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. Iii
Shoulder knot, an ornament once
peculiar to gentlemen. It is only foot-
men now who are said to wear shoulder-
knots; though of course epaulettes
might be so described.
Clinch. Sir [to Sir Harry Wildair], I admire
the mode of your shoulder-knot ; methinks
it hangs very emphatically, and carries an
air of travel in it. — Farquhar, Constant Couple,
. 1.
I could not but wonder to see pantaloons
and shoulder knots crowding among the com-
mon clowns. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
i. 273.
Shoulder-knotted, wearing a shoul-
der-knot.
A shoulder-knotted Puppy, with a grin,
Queering the threadbare Curate, let him in.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 144.
8houlder of mutton. One shoulder
of mutton drives another down is a
proverb expressing the ease in doing
anything which comes by custom and
repetition.
As two shoulders of mutton drive down one
another, so two powerful griefs destroy one
another, by making^ a division. — 2*. Brown,
.Works, iii. 57.
Shoulder op mutton. The phrase
in the extract seems to have been pro-
verbial for a surprise of a disappoint-
ing kind ; the expression in the original
is carbonespro thesauro, the idea being
that of a man who dug in expectation
of obtaining treasure, and only found
coals. In the extract the speaker had
supposed a woman's melancholy to be
caused by love, but she tells him that
it arises from her desire to enter a
nunnery being opposed by her parents.
Ho ! I find I was out in my notion. To
leave a shoulder of mutton for a sheep* s head.
— Bailey's Erasmus, p. 120.
Shoulderslipt, having a dislocated,
shoulder. See quotation *. v. Shock.
Mr. Floyd brought word they could not
come, for one of their horses was shoulder'
slipt. — North, Examen, p. 173.
He mounted him again upon Bosinante,
who was half shoulder-slipped. — Jarvis's Don
Quuote,Ft. I. Bk. I. ch. vui.
Shoulder to shoulder, in close alli-
ance.
It was as if he had found an added soul in
finding his ancestry . . . exchanging that
birds-eye reasonableness which soars to avoid
preference and loses all sense of auality, for
the generous reasonableness of drawing
shoulder to shoulder with men of like inherit-
ance.— G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. briii.
Shoulerd, the bird shoveller.
The young heme and the shoulerd are now
fat for the great feast. — Breton, Fantastic $y
November.
Shout the gate, some boyish game.
Some reminded him of his haying beat
them at boxing, other at wrestling, and all
of his having played with them at prison-bars,
leap-frog, shout the gate, and so forth. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, ii. 168.
Shovel, a shovel hat.
She was a good woman of business, and
managed the hat shop for nine years . . . My
uncle the bishop had his shovels there ; and
they used for a considerable period to cover
this humble roof with tiles. — Thackeray, New-
comes, ch. xzv.
I once heard a venerable dignitary pointed
SHO VE-NET
( 59o )
SHY
out by a railway porter as an old party in a
shovel. — Alford, Queen's English, p. 228.
Shove-net. See extract.
To catch these [salmon-peal] they throw
in a net or an hoop at the end of a pole, the
pole going across the hoop, which in some
places they call a Shove-net. — Defoe, Tour
thro1 O. Britain, i. 387.
Showfully, gaudily.
The Torch-bearers habits were likewise of
the Indian garb, but more strauagant then
those of the Maskers; all showfully gar*
nisht with seueral-hewd fethers. — Chapman,
Masque of the Mid. Temple.
Shreakb, shred. Cf. H. 8. v. shrag.
Ribands, and then some silken shreakes
The virgins lost att barlye breakes.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 468.
Shred-pie, mince-pie. See extract
8. v. Misoclere. Tusser in his " Christ-
mas husband lie fare " reckons —
Beefe, mutton, and porke, shred-pies of the
best,
Fig, veale, goose and capon, and turkey well
Brest. — Husbandrie, p. 70.
In winter there was the luxury of a shred
pie, which is a coarse North country edition
of the pie abhorred by puritans. — Southey,
■ The Doctor, ch. viii.
Shrew-stbuck.
When my vather's cows was shrew-struck,
she made un be draed under a brimble as
growed together at the both ends, she a
praying like mad all the time. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xxi.
If a child was scalded, a tooth ached, a
piece of silver was stolen, a heifer shrero-
struck, a pig bewitched, a young damsel crost
in love, Lucy was called in. — Ibid., Westward
Ho, ch. iv.
Shrilly, shrill.
Its rest was rent in twain by a savage, a
sbarp, a shrilly sound. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. xx.
Shriveldy, withered ; shrunk up.
His elder brother . . is but a poor rickety,
shriveldy sort of a child. — Mrs. Trollope,
Michael Armstrong, ch. iii.
Shrivlng-pew, confessional.
To the Joyner for takynge downe the
shryvyng pew, and making another pew in
the same place. — Church icardens Accounts
(1648) of S. MichaeVs, Comhill, ed. by Over-
all, p. 09.
Shrone, shrine (?), which is the read-
ing in Nuttall's ed.
^ Joan Tuckville, . . . procured the posses-
sion, then the consecration of a parcel of
ground which she had fairly compassed
about, for the interment of such as were
executed at Hevie-tree hard by, allowing land
to buy a shrone for every one of them ; that
such as dyed Malefactors might be buried as
men, yea as Christians. — ftUler, Worthies,
Exeter (I. 307).
Shroudless, unobscured. R. has the
word as applied to a dead body destitute
of a shroud.
Above the stars in shroudless beauty shine.
— C. Swain, quoted in Southey's Doctor, ch.
lxxviii.
Shrove- Sunday. Sunday before
Shrove Tuesday (?).
Laud preachiug on Shrove- Sunday, Anno,
1614, insisted on some points which might
indifferently be imputed either to Popery or
Arminianism. — Heylin, life of Laud, p. 66.
Shrowdino corner, place of conceal-
ment.
This Isle afforded him a very fit shrowding
corner. — Holland's Camden, p. 224.
Shrubless, without shrubs.
This cold shrubless tract of bare earth and
stone wails. — Miss Ferrier, Inheritance, i. 13.
Shud, a husk ; that which is shed.
But what shall be done with all the hard
refuse, the long buns, the stalks, the short
shuds or sbiues? — Holland, Pliny, Bk. xix.
oh. i.
Shunt. See extract.
To shunt a train, in well known railway
phraseology, is to direct it on to another line
of rails.— Arch., xxxvii. 118 (1857).
Shuttered, protected with shutters.
The school-house windows were all shut-
tered up. — Hughes, Jbm Brown's Schooldays,
Pt. II. ch. ix.
Here is Gangway's, bolted and shuttered
hard and fast. — Dickens, Uncommercial
Traveller, xxi.
Shuttle, to move quickly to and fro ;
like a weaver's shuttle.
Their corps go marching and shuttling in
the interior of the country, much nearer
Paris than formerly. — Carlyle, Fr. Revn Pt.
II. Bk. VI. ch. i.
I had to mount into cabs with him ; fly fax
and wide, shuttling athwart the big Babel. —
Ibid., Life of Sterling, Pt. III. ch. 1.
Shuttle-brained, volatile ; unsteady.
See extract s. v. Capon. Cf. Shuttle-
witted.
Shy, a fling.
"There you go, Polly; you are always
having a shy at Lady Ann and her relations/'
said Mr. Newcome. " A shy ! how can yon
use such vulgar words, Mr. Newcome ? " —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xvi.
SIB
(S9i )
SIMILAR Y
Sib, in the following seems to be
used as " my dear/1 or " my love."
Edward II. addressing his queen says —
Tosh, Sib, if this he all
Valois and I will soon be friends again.
Marlowe, Edw. II., iii. 2.
Siccative, drying.
The juyce of cedars . . by the extreme
bitterness and siccative faculty . . . subdued
the cause of interior corruption. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 134.
Sicle. See extract.
Some have been burnt ... by leaving great
fires in chimneys (where the sparks or sides
breaking fell and fired the boards). — Season-
able Advice, 1643 (Harl. Misc., vi. 399).
Side-cousin, an illegitimate rela-
tive (?).
Here's little Dickon, and little Robin, and
little Jenny, though she's but a side-cousin.
— Tennyson, Queen Mary, ii. 3.
Side-slip, an illegitimate child. Cf.
By-chop.
The old man . . . left it to this side-slip of
a son that he kept in the dark. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. xl.
Sighfull, sorrowful.
In a cave hard by he roareth out
A sighfull song.
Sylvester, The Trophies, 1285.
Sight, insight; to be well seen in
any art or science is a common expres-
sion in old writers.
I gave my time for nothing on condition
of his giving me a sight into his business. —
H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 385.
Sightful, clear-sighted.
Tis passing miraculous that your dul and
blind worship should so sodainly turne both
sight full ana witfull. — Chapman, Masque at
Mid. Temple.
Sight-shot. Out of sight-shot =
out of sight Cf . Tongue-shot ; ear-
shot is common.
It only makes me run faster from the
place, till I get, as it were, out of sight-shot.
— Cowley, Essays (Obscurity).
Sightsman, guide ; cicerone.
In the first place our Sightsman (for so
they name certain persons here who get their
living by leading strangers about to see the
city) went to the Palace Famezi. — Evelyn,
Diary, Nov. 6, 1644.
Sight- worthy, worth seeing.
In our universities . . . the worst Colledge
is more sight-worthy than the best Dutch
Gymnasium. — Fuller, Holy State, III. iv. 4.
Sign, mark.
Nothing found here but stones, signed with
brasse, iron, and lead. — Holland's Camden,
p. 808.
Significatist. See quotation.
The Symbolists, Figurists, and Signifca-
tists . . . are of opinion that the faithful at
the Lord's Sapper do receive nothing bat
naked and bare signs. — Rogers on 39 Articles,
p. 289.
SiKETT, a brook.
Thence by a certain sikett, called Cavers-
well Brook, . . . thence by the same sikett to
the meadow called Cavershill. — Arch, xxxvii.
424(1857).
Silk- worm. See quotation. The
word seem3 also to have been used of
Bishops in allusion to their dress. See
extract from T. Brown, s. v. Magpie.
The fellow who drove her came to us, and
discovered that he was ordered to come
again in an hour, for that she was a silk-
worm. I was surprised with this phrase, but
found it was a cant among the Hackney fra-
ternity for their best customers, women who
ramble twice or thrice a week from shop to
shop, to turn over all the goods in town
without buying anything. — Spectator, No.
454.
Sillyton, simpleton.
Sillyton (inepta), forbear railing, and hear
what is, said to you. — Bailey* s Erasmus, p.
413.
Silvkrize, to silver.
In theaters, at publike playes and feasts,
Giue alwayes place vnto the hoary head,
So when like age shall siluerize thy tresse,
Thou shalf by others be like-honoured.
Sylvester, Quadrains of Pibrac, st. 119.
Silver sprigs. See extract. Fuller
( Worthies), speaking of rabbits in Nor-
folk, says, " Their rich or silver-hair-
slrins, formerly so dear, are now levelled
in prices with other colours.11
The true silver grey rabbits — stiver sprit/s,
they call them — do you know that the skins
of those silver sprigs are worth any money ?
— Miss Edgeworth, The Will, ch. i.
SlMIAL, apish.
This Jocelin . . . from "under his monk's
cowl has looked out on that narrow section
of the world in a really human manner ; not
in any simial, canine, ovine, or otherwise
inhuman manner. — Carlyle, Past and Present,
Bk. II. ch. i.
Similary, like.
The name of the Church of Christ serves
to ezpresse any one of those more noble
parts or eminent branches belonging to that
Catholick visible Church, which being simi-
SIMILIZE
( 592 ) SING SORROW
lary or partaking of the same nature by the
common faith, have yet their convenient
limits. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 25.
Similize, to imitate ; also, to compare.
Ill similize
These Qabionites ; I will myself disguize
To gull Thee, Lord.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 464.
The best to whom he may be similized
herein is Friar Paul the Servite. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, i. 53.
Simoner, a simoniacal person.
These simoners sell sin, suffering men and
women in every degree and estate to he and
continue from year to year in divers vices
slanderously. — Bale, Select Works, p. 129
{Exam, of W. Thorpe).
Simon ist, one who traffics in Church
preferment.
If we therefore be condemned as simon-
ists, your easiest censure is to be esteemed
infidels. — Adams, i. 463.
Simplar. See extract, s. v. Duplar.
Simples. Cutting for Hie simples is
an operation proposed for the benefit
of fools. According to H. s. v. Bat-
tersea was the place where it was to be
performed.
Miss. Indeed, Mr. Neverout, you should
be cut for the simples this morning. — Swift,
Polite Conversation (Con v. i.).
In the Cabinet what evils might be averted
by administering laxatives or corroborants
as the case required. In the Lord and Com-
mons by clearing away bile, evacuating ill
humours, and occasionally by cutting for the
simples. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxxxvi.
Simulator, feigner; actor.
They are merely simulators of the part
they sustain. — De Quincey, Autob. Sketches,
i. 200.
Sine, a gulf. Sylvester speaks again
of " the Persian Sine " (Colonies^ 94).
Such is the Gorman Sea, such Persian Sine,
Such th' Indian Gulf, and such th' Arabian
brine.
Sylvester, third day, first week, 98.
Sineqdanonniness, indispensability.
Nature herself shows us the utility, the
importance, nay, the indispensability, or to
take a hint from the pure language of our
diplomatists, the sinequanonniness of pockets.
—Southey, The Doctor, ch. Hi. A i.
Sinoing-hinny, a cake made with
butter and currants, and baked on a
girdle.
For any visitor who could stay, neither
cream nor finest wheaten flour was wanting
for turf -cakes and singing-hinnies with which
it is the delight of the northern housewife*
to regale the honoured guest. — Mrs. GtsktU,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. iv.
Singing- loaf or cake, the Each*
ristio wafer, because a psalm was
directed to be sung while it was
making. In quotation from Monday
it mean 8 an ordinary wafer. H. has
singing-bread.
A great deal of flour would not make so
many hosts, as they call thorn, or «aft»j
loaves, as hath been broken in our dap
between Christian princes, as they will be
called, to confirm promises that have not
been kept. — Tyndale, ii. 301.
If the church always professed a com-
munion, why have you one priest standing
at the altar alone, with one singing cake for
himself, which he showeth to the people to
be seen and honoured, and not to be eaten?
— Bp. Cooper, Defence of the Truth, p. 15&
The letters finished and sealed up with
singing-cake, he delivered unto us. — Mt»
day's English Bomayne Life, 1500 (HerL
jfisc, vii. 139).
Single, a tail. H. says, " properly
applied to that of a buck." In the
first extract the speaker is supposed
to be a hind ; in the second, Pan is
addressed.
There's a kind of acid humor that nature
hath put in our singles, the smell whereof
causeth our enemies, viz. the doggs, to tj
from us. — Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 63.
That single wagging at thy butt,
Those gambrels, and that cloven foot.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque,?. 277.
Si no small, to be humble or retiring ;
to draw in one's horns.
I must myself sing small in her company;
I will never meet at hard-edge with her.—
Bichardson, Grandison, i. 120.
So after all this terrible squall,
Fiddle-de-dee's at the top of the tree,
And Doldrum and Fal-de-ral-tit sing small.
Ingoldsby Legends (Bow in an
Omnibus Box).
Sing-song, to write poetry; a con-
temptuous expression ; the substantive
is common. Tom Brown ( Works, iii.
39) has it as an adjective, " from huf-
fing Dryden to sing-song D'Urfey."
There's no glory
Like his who saves his country, and you sit
Sing-songing here ; but if I'm any judge,
By God, you are as poor a poet, Wyatt,
As a good soldier.
Tennyson, Queen Mary, ii. 1.
Sing borrow, to fare badly.
Though this were so, and you should find
such a sword, it would be of service and use
SINGVLTIENT
( 593 )
SISTER
to those who are dubbed knights, like
>alsam ; as for the poor squires, they
sing sorrow. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt.
. III. ch. iv.
nodltiknt, sighing or sobbing;
>tlf and singvlt are in the Diets,
n of ripe age will screech, cry, and
3 in so many disordered notes and sin-
*nt accents. — Howell, Parly of Beasts,
N1STERNE88, wrongfulness.
e insolent folly and intolerable arro-
j which dares to put the ignorance,
nesse, emptinesse, vulgarity, rashnesse,
pitancy and sinisternesse of their silly
ires into the balance of Religion. — Gau-
Vears of the Church, p. 62.
on, a plant. See quotation «. v.
Lady's Mantle.
tple, to sip mincingly.
>m this topic he transferred his disquisi-
to the word drink, which he affirmed
improperly applied to the taking of
e inasmuch as people did not driuk, but
r nipple that liquor. — Smollett, Roderick
om, ch. xlv.
quis, to advertise ; from the words
which notices began. Si quis is
used to signify the public notice
n in Church of the name of any one
ing Holy Orders.
nust excuse my departure to Theoma-
, otherwise he may send here and cry
me, and <SY quis me in the next gazette.
ntleman Instructed, p. 312.
R, to add re 88 as sir.
r brother and sister Mr. Solmes'd him,
Sirr'd him up at every word. — Richard'
VI. Harlowe, i. 47.
Oh it looks ill
n delicate tongues disclaim all terms of
h
ng and Madam-ing as civilly
the road betweeu the heart and lips
a such a weary and Laplandish way,
the poor travellers came to the red gates
frozen. — Southty, To Margaret Hill.
[R el ess, would properly mean
eriess ; but in the extract seems
ungenerative. Sylvester in the
imph of Faith, ii. 33, speaks of the
\ Mary as one who " tireless bore
Sire," meaning I suppose that her
had no (earthly) father.
Plant is leafless, branch-less, void of
lit.
Beast is lust-less, sex-less, sire-less, mute.
Sylvester, Eden, 583.
irloin, the over-loin ; should be
written surloin. R. seems to accept
the derivation given in the extract, for
he writes, " the loin of beef so entitled
by James I. " Mr. Wedgewood quotes
from an account of the expenses of the
Ironmongers' Company, temp. Hen. VI.,
" a surloyn beeff viid. The sirloin is
also mentioned in Noshes Lenten Stufc
(Harl. Misc., vi. 164).
Nev. But pray, why is it called a sirloyn ?
Lord Sp. Why, you must know that our
King James I., who loved good eating, being
invited to dinner by one of his nobles, and
seeing a large loyn of beef at his table, he
drew out his sword and knighted it. Few
people know the secret of this. — Swift, Polite
Conversation (Conv. ii.).
Sirs, addressed to women ; still so
used in Scotland. In Beauin. and Fl.,
King and no King, ii. 1, Panthea says
to her waiting-women, " Sirs, leave me
all."
Siserara. H. says a hard blow, and
so in the quotation from Sterne it = at
once, at a stroke, but in the first from
Smollett it means rather a scolding.
Some suppose it to come from the writ
certiorari. See last extract. Cf. Sask-
rara and Premunire.
It was on Sunday in the afternoon, when
I fell in love all at once with a sisserara ; it
burst upon me 'an please your honour like a
bomb. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, vi. 47.
I have gi'en the dirty slut a siserary. —
Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, i. 80.
O that there was a lawyer here to serve
him with a siserari. — Ibid., Sir L. Greaves,
ch. ii.
Sistence, halting-place.
Extraordinary must be the wisdome of him
who floateth upon the stream of Sovereigne
favour, wherein there is seldome any sistence
'twixt sinking and swimming. — Howell,
Dodona's Grove, p. 122.
Sister, to address a person as sister.
See quotation s. v. Brother, and cf.
UN8I8TER. In the first extract it seems
to be applied to a man who while in
attendance on a woman as a secret
lover would pretend she was his sister.
Tou have got one of the best hidera of
such a business in the town : lord, how he
would sister you at a play. — Killigrew, Par-
son's Weddinu, ii. 3.
How artfully, yet I must own, honourably,
he reminds her of the brotherly character
which he passes under to her. How officious! v
he sisters her! — Richardson, Gramlison, iii.
251.
Q Q
S1TTEN
( 594 )
SKID
Think what it must be to be u How d'ye
doed" and to be "dear ristcred" by such
bodies as these in public. — Miss Edgevoorth,
Helen, oh.
Bitten, sat ; in the first extract the
speaker is an uneducated man.
They would not have yielded much to the
Bishops, for they were bloody mad at them ;
and I think, if they had sitten till now, they
would have sent them from the church to
the house to pray to God ; but not to have
letten them prate any more to the house of
lords. — Dialogue on Oxford Parliament, 1681
{Hart. Mite,, ii. 119).
Till in good time up starts me Gill,
Who all this while had sitten still !
Ward, Reformation, o. i. p. 100.
Having sitten together till near seven
o'clock, Mr. Wildgoose took Captain Johnson
with him. — Graves, Sp. Quixote, Bk. VIII.
ch. xvii.
Sit under, a person is sometimes said
to sit under a preacher ; t. e\ to be a
member of his congregation.
There would then also appear in pulpits
other visages, other gestures, and stuff other-
wise wrought than what we now sit under,
oft times to as great a trial of our patience
as any other that they preach to ns. — Milton,
Of Education.
If this chapter should neither be so long
as a sermon, nor so dull as those discourses
which perchance, and I fear perlikelihood, it
may be thy fortune to hear, O reader, at thy
parish church, or in phrase nonconformist to
sit under at the conventicle, it will be well
for thee. — Southey, The Doctor, ch. cczliii.
On a Sunday, (which good old Saxon word
was scarcely known at the Hermitage) the
household marched away in separate couples
or groups to at least half a dozen of religious
edifices, each to sit under his or her favourite
minister. — Thackeray, Hie Nevocomes, ch. ii.
SrzE. See second extract j. v. Hocus ;
though I am not sure whether the size
mentioned there has any connection
with this, nor do I quite know what
the word in either place means.
I grew weary of staying with Sir Williams
both, and the more for that my Lady Batten
aod her crew, at least half a score, came into
the room, and I believe we shall pay size for
it.— Pepys, Sept. 4. 1662.
Skating. See s.w. Scheets, Skeates.
Skavel, shovel.
Sharpe cuttingspade for the deniding of mow,
With skuppetand skauel that marsbmen alow.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 38.
Skeart, terrible ; also frightened.
But toe thee, poore Dido, this sight so skearye
beholding
What feeling creepeth ?
Stanyhurst, jEn^ iv. 438.
It is not to be marvelled at that amid such
a place as this for the first time visited, the
horses were a little skeary. — Blackmort,
Lorna Doone, eh. lix.
Skeates, skates. See N. b. v. skating,
but the subjoined are earlier instances
of the word in England than any ad-
duced by him, or in the other Diets.
Skating seems to have been learned by
tbe Cavaliers in Holland, and became
fashionable at the Restoration. Evelyn
was among the spectators on the first
occasion as well as Pepys. See Scheets.
Over the parke, where I first in my life, it
being a great frost, did see people sliding
with their skeates, which is a very pretty art.
—Pepys, Dec. 1, 1662.
To the Duke, and followed him into the
Park, where, though the ice was broken and
dangerous, yet he would go slide upon his
skeates, which I did not like, but he slide*
very well.— Ibid., Dec. 15, 1662.
Skein, a flight of wild-fowl.
The curs ran into them as a falcon does
into a skein of ducks. — Kingsky, Hypatia,
oh. zi.
Skblet, a skeleton.
What should I cast away speech upon
skelets and skulls, carnal men I mean, mere
strangers to this life of faith.— Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 22.
Skelp, strike ; slap.
Why uot take 'em by twos across thy knee,
and skelp 'em till they cry Meculpee. — Reade,
Cloister and Hearth, ch. lii.
Skeltering, hurrying ; driving : so
helter-skelter.
After the long .dry skelterina wind of March
and part of April, there had been a fortnight
of soft wet. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch.
xxii.
Skew, cant term for a cup. See H.
This is bien bowse, this is bien bowse [good
drink]
Too little is ray skew.
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Skew, a sidelong glance.
Whatever good works we do with an eye
from. His, and a skew unto our own names,
the more pains we take, the more penalty of
pride belongs unto us. — Ward, Sermons, p. 9.
Skid, a drag.
But not to repeat the deeds they did,
Backsliding in spite of all moral skid,
SKID
( S9S ) SKY-BLUE
If all were true that fell from the tongue,
There was not a villager, old or young,
But deserved to be whipp'd, imprison 'd, or
hung. — Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Skid, to scud or hurry.
The Dutch ladies . . . ran skidding down the
aisle of the chapel, tip tap, tip tap, like
frightened hares. — Mad. DArblay, Diary,
vii. 141.
Skift, to shift or remove.
He knaws, as weel as I do, who sud be t'
maister yonder. Ech, ech, ech ! he made ye
skift properly.
E. Bronte, Withering Heights, ch. xxiv.
Skill-thirst, desire for knowledge.
The greatest rinns
Were one in other linked fast as twinns ;
Ingratitude, pride, treason, gluttony,
Too curious skill-thirst, envy, felony.
Sylvester, The Imposture, 539.
Skimmington, row or quarrel ; from
the hubbub attending on riding the
Skimmington.
There was danger of a skimmington between
the great wig and the coif, the former hav-
ing given a flat lie to the latter. — Walpole,
Letters, i. 289 (1753.)
Skimpingly, parsimoniously.
The Squire and his son Frank were large-
hearted, generous creatures in the article
of apology, as in all things less skimpingly
dealt out — Lytton, My Novel, Bk. III. ch. xv.
Skink. Bailey defines it "a four-
footed serpent, a kind of land croco-
dile."
Th' horned Oerastes, th' Alexandrian Skink,
Th' Adder and Drynas full of odious stink.
Sylvester, Sixth day, first weeks, 200.
Skinless, without skin. See extract,
$. V. SCALPLESS.
Skin - merchant, a recruiting- ser-
geant.
I am a manufacturer of honour and glory
— vulgarly called a recruiting dealer, or more
vulgarly still, a skin-merchant. — Burgoyne,
Lord of the Manor, iii. 2.
Skip. See quotation ; the verb as
applied to reading, or rather not read-
ing, is common.
No man who has written so much is so
seldom tiresome. In his books there are
scarcely any of those passages which in our
school days we used to call skip. — Macaulay,
Essays ( Walpole).
Skip-brain, flighty ; volatile.
This skipp-braine Fancie moves these easie
movers
To loue what ere hath but a glimpse of good.
Davits, Microcosmos, p. 30,
Skipper, cant term for barn. See H.
Now let each tripper
Make a retreat into the skipper.
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Sktrk, shriek.
I, like a tender-hearted weneh, shirked out
for fear of the devil. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 152.
Skirl, to scream or cry: also a sub-
stantive.
That was the wild and ominous air that
was skirling upon the hill-side. — Black, Prin-
cess of Thule, ch. iv.
From the other side of the valley comes
another sound — the faint and distant skirl of
the pipes. — Ibid., ch. v.
Skise, to move about quickly.
He is the merriest man alive ; up at five a
dock in the morning, and out till dinner-
time; out again at afternoon, and so till
supper-time ; skise out this away, and skise
out that away ; he's no snail, I assure you.
— Broome, Jovial Crew, Act IV.
Skit, a light satire.
And as perhaps vou may have brought
A manuscript with learning fraught,
Or some n'.ce pretty little skit
Upon the times, and full of wit,
A dealing I should hope to drive.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. vii.
Skriggle, to struggle.
They skriggled and began to scold,
But laughing got the master ;
Some quackling cried, " Let go your hold,"
The farmers held the faster.
Bloomfield, The Horkey.
Skulk, a sneak or shirker.
Ye do but bring each runaway and skulk
Hither to seek a shelter.
Taylor, Isaac Comnenus, iv. 3.
Skulker, one who hangs in the back-
ground : generally applied to one who
sneaks out of danger, or hard work ;
but not so in the extract. The word is
not in the Diets, in either sense.
John himself was no skulker in joy; he
not only bestowed on Mr. Morland the high
commendation of beiug one of the finest
fellows in the world, but swore off many
sentences in his praise. — Miss Austen, North-
anger Abbey, ch. xv.
Skull, helmet.
A shift but no succour it was to many that
had their skulls on, at the stroke of the fol-
lower to shrink their heads into their shoul-
ders, like a tortoise into its shell. — Patten,
Exped. to Scoti., 1548 (Eng. Garner, iii. 122).
Sky-blue, milk and water.
QQ 2
SX Y-H1GH
( 596 ) SLANDERFULLY
Oh ! for that small, small beer anew,
And (heaven's own type) that mild sky-Hut
That wash'd my sweet meals down.
Hood, Retrospective Review.
Sky-high, as high as the sky. Cf.
Heaven-high.
The powder magazine of St. John of Acre
was blown op sky-high.-— Thackeray, Second
Funeral of Napoleon (II.).
Skylarking See first extract, and
so, generally, romping ; playing.
I had become from habit so extremely
active, and so fond of displaying my newly
acquired gymnastics, called by the sailors
44 skylarking," that my speedy exit was often
prognosticated. — Marryat, Fr. Mild may,
ch. iv.
Lucky for them it was, as it fell out, that
they were all close together at that work,
and not abroad skylarking as they had been
balf-an-hour before.— C. Kingsley, Westward
Ho, ch. xviii.
Harding, I found, was half-owner of a
station to the north-east, an Oxford man, a
great hand at skylarking. — H. Kingsley,
OeoJJry Hamlyn, ch. xx.
Skyless, without sky ; thick ; dark.
A soulless, skyless, catarrhal . day. — C.
Kingsley, Yeast, ch. i.
Sky-paklour, a room or place at the
top of a building. In the first extract
it = a gallery at a theatre ; in the
second (which is the motto prefixed to
a piper called " The First of May,"
in Sketches by Boz) it = an attic.
I beg leave to repeat the advice so often
given by the illustrious tenants of the the-
atrical sky-parlour to the gentlemen who are
charged with the " nice conduct " of chairs
aud tables — ** Make a bow, Johnny. Johnny,
make a bow." — Irving, Salmagundi, No. ii.
Now ladies, up in the sky^parlour : only
once a year, if you please. — Young Lady with
Brass Ladle.
Skyscape, sky view: word formed
like landscape or sea-scape, q. v.
"We look upon the reverse side of the
skyscape.— Proctor, Other worlds than ours,
p.*130.
Skyt-gate.
He, being so astonished with fear as to
throw himself and his followers out at a
skyt-gate was immediately cut to pieces by
the enemy. — Cotton, Montaigne's Essays,
ch. xiv.
Slabberdegullion, paltry; dirty.
The word in the form stubberdegtdlion,
and as a substantive, is in the Diets.
Slapsauce fellows, slabberdegullion drug-
gels, lubbardly louts. — Urquharfs habelais,
£tk. I. ch. xxv.
Slabbiness, sloppiness.
The way also here was very wearisom
thorow dirt aud slabbiness. — Bunyan, Pilg.
Progress, Pt. II. p. 183.
Slack, a remission; an interval of
rest.
Though there's a slack, we haven t done
with sharp work yet, I can see. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xliv.
Slack-bake, to bake imperfectly.
He would not allude to men once in office,
but now happily out of it, who had . . .
slack-baked the bread, boned the meat,
heightened the work, and lowered the soup.
—Sketches by Boz (Election for Beadle).
He isn't come to his right colour yet ; he's
partly like a slack-baked pie. — G. Eliot, Silas
Marner, ch. xi.
Slacky. In the first passnge the
word in the original is brassier =
sling ; in the second, tribard = short
cudgel; the explanation of slacky in
the second quotation is the translator's,
and has no equivalent in the French.
The other shepherds and shepherdesses,
hearing the lamentable shout of Forgier.came
with their slings and slackies, following them,
and throwing great stones at them as thick
as if it had been haiL—Urquhart1* Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. xxv.
Marquet's head was broken with a .slacky
or short cudgel. — Ibid., Bk. I. ch. xxxii.
Slaght-boomes, bars or barriers ; but
the first part of the word needs ex-
planation.
Each end of the high street leading
through the Towne was secured against
Horse with strong slaght-boomes which our
men call Turn-pikes. — Relation of Action
before Cyrencester, 1642, p. 4.
Slaight. See quotation ; Aubrey is
speaking of North Wilts.
Anciently the Leghs (now corruptly called
Slaights), i.e. pastures, were noble, large
grounds. — Aubrey, Misc., p. 216 (Appendix).
Slam, a shambling fellow. H. has
" slamkin, a female sloven." Lord
Foppington, however, to whom the
nurse refers, was the reverse of careless
as to dress or appearance.
Hoyd. I don't like my lord's shapes, nunse.
Nurse. Why in good truly, as a body may
say, he is but a dam.— Vanbrugh, The Relapse,
v. 5.
Slanderfully, slanderously. The
extract is from the Council of Edw.
VI. (1550).
He had at all times, before the judges of
his cause, used himself unreverently to the
SLANE
(597 )
SLAP-SA UCE
King's majesty, and very slanderfully to-
wards his council. — Strype, Cranmer, Bk. II.
ch, xix.
Slanb, a spade or shovel.
Dig your trench with slants. — Ellis,
Modern Husbandman, IV. ii. 40 (1750).
Unfortunately, in cutting the turf where
it was found, the shine or spade struck the
middle.— Archaol., vii. 167.
Slang, promontory.
There runneth forth into the sea a certain
shelfe or slang, like unto an out-thrust
tongue such as Englishmen in old time
termed a File. — Holland's Camden, p. 715.
Slang, to scold ; abuse.
The angry authors, in the adventures of
Gil Bias, were nothing to the disputants in
the kennel at Charing Cross ; we rowed,
swore, slanged. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. xlix.
" Be quiet, you fool," said another ; " you're
a pretty fellow to chaff the orator ; he'll slang
you up the chimney afore you can get your
shoes on." — Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. ii.
Slangrill, a term of abuse. H. has
slangam = a lout, which occurs once
or twice in Urquhart's Rabelais.
The third was a lon£, leane, olde slavering
sfangrill. — Greene, Quip for Upstart Courtier
(Hart. Misc^ v. 407).
Slangular, belonging to slang.
Little Swills is treated on several hands.
Being asked what he thinks of the proceed-
ings, characterises them (his strength lying
in a slangular direction) as " a rummy start."
— Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xi.
Slang - whanger, a scurrilous or
abusive person.
It embraces alike all manner of concerns ;
from the organisation of a divan ... to the
appointment of a constable, the personal dis-
putes of two miserable slang-whangers, the
cleaning of the streets or the economy of a
dust-cart. — Irving, Salmagundi, No. 14.
Slangy, given to slang.
He appeared to me merely a tall, hand-
some, conceited, slangy boy.— C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Slank, thin ; lank.
He is a man of ruddy complexion, brown
hair and slank, hanging a little below his
jawbones. — The grand impostor examined,
1656 {Had. Misc., vi. 435).
Slap, to spill about.
But huswiues that learne not to make their
owne cheese,
With trusting of others haue this for their
feese ;
Their milke slapt in corners, their creame al
to sost,
Their milk pannes so notte that their cheeses
bo lost. — Tusser's Husbamlrit, p. 220.
Slap-bang. Slap-bang- shop, accord-
ing to Grose, is a low eating-house
where you have to pay down ready
money with a slap-bang.
They lived in the same street, walked into
town every morning at the same hour, dined
at the same slap-bang every day, and revelled
in each others company every night. —
Sketches by Boz (Making a night of it).
Slap- dash, impetuous; outspoken.
In the first quotation it seems to mean
violence.
Hark ye, Monsieur, if you don't march off
I shall play you such an English courant of
slapdash presently that shan't out of your
ears this twelvemonth. — Centlivre, Perplexed
Lovers, Act III.
Let me die if I can account for your —
your — your refusal of me in so peremptory,
in so unceremonious a manner, slap-dash as
I may say. — Richardson, Grandison, i. 170.
It was a slap-dash style, unceremonious,
free, and easy — an American style. — Lytton,
My Novel, Bk. III. ch. vi.
Slapjack, a species of cake.
Soft anticipations stole over his mind of
dainty slapjacks, well buttered, and garnished
with honey or treacle. — Irving, Sketch Book
(Sleepy Hollow).
Slappaty - pouch, a game, part of
which, I suppose, consisted in slapping
the pocket. N. gives slatterpouch, with
quotation from Gayton, ana says, "A
boyish game of active exercise, but
not otherwise described." In the ex-
tract Charon is the speaker, and com-
plaining of want of custom ; he seems
to mean that he had been idle, and
slapping himself to keep himself warm,
as we may see cab-drivers, &c. do now
on a cold day when unemployed.
I cannot but with the last degree of sorrow
and anguish inform you of our present
wretched condition ; we have even tired our
palms and our ribs at slappaty-pouch, and . . .
I had almost forgot to handle my sculls. —
T. Brown, Works, ii. 126.
Slappe, an article of dress : perhaps
the same as slop. Breton in speaking
of fools describes one as
Hee that puts fifteene elles into a ruffe,
And seauenteene yards into a swaggering
slappe. — PasquiVs Fooles-cappt, p. 24.
Slap-sauce, a parasite. See quota-
tion from Urquhart's Rabelais, s. v.
Druggel, where it is an adjective.
At dinner and supper the table doth craue
Good fellowly neighbour good manner to
haue;
SLA PUP
( 59»)
SLIP-ALONG
Advise thee well therefore, ere tongue he
too free,
Or slapsauce he noted too saucie to bee.
Tnsssr*s Husbandry, p. 188.
Slap-up, fine.
Might not he quarter a oounteai'a ooat on
his brougham along with the Jones' arms, or,
more slap-up still, have the two shields
painted on the panels with the coronet over ?
— Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xxxi.
Slat.
Obadiah. Truly he came foreeably upon
me, and I fear has bruised some intellectuals
within my stomach.
Mrs. Day. Go in and take some Irish slat
by way of prevention, and keep yourself
warm.— The Committee, Act III.
Suppose a man falls from the mainyard,
and lies all bruised upon the deck, pray what
is the first intention in that case P A brisk
fellow answers, Ton must give him Irish
slats.— T. Brown, Works, in. 90.
Slavey, a slang name for a servant :
not usually applied, as in the quotation,
to a male.
Then the boy Thomas, otherwise called
Slavey, may say, There he goes again. . . .
The slavey has Mr. Frederick's hot water,
and a bottle of soda water on the same tray.
He has been instructed to bring soda when-
ever he hears the word slavey pronounced
from above. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xi.
Sleck-trodoh, the trough in which
a blacksmith cools hot iron (?). See
H. s. v. deck.
No sooner was King Harry made
Of English Church the Supream Head,
But he a Black-smith's son appointed
Head in his place : one who anointed
Had never been, unless his Dad
Had in the si cck-t rough wash'd the lad,
With an intent that that should do
For Ohrist'ning and for Priesthood too.
Ward, England?* Reformation, 0. i. p. 38.
Slkdder, a horse that draws a sledge.
Smiles, our youngest sledder, had been
well in over his withers. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. ii.
Sledge-hammer, to hit hard, as with
a sledge-hammer.
You may see what is meant by sledge-
hammering a man.— .Sir G. C. Lewis, Letters
(1834), p. 32.
Sleeking, gliding or sweeping:
usually a transitive verb.
For as the racks came sleeking on, one fell
With rain into a dell.
Leigh Hunt, Foliage, p. xxx.
Sleeping ly, sleepily.
To jog sleepinyly through the world in a
dumpish, melanchoUy posture cannot pro-
perly be said to live.— Kennsfs Erasmus,
Praise of Folly, p. 25.
Sleep-sick, fond of sleep: a word
formed like home-sick, and applied by
Sylvester to the apathetic god of the
Epicurean creed.
Fond Epicure, thou rather slept'st thyself,
When tnou didst forge thee such a sleep-sick
elf
For life's pure Fount.
Seventh day, first weeks, 129.
Slext, to rend.
If one do well observe the quality of the
cliffs on both shores, his eye will judge that
they were but one homogeneal piece of earth
at first, and that they were slentsd and
shiverM asunder by some act of violence, as
the impetuous waves of the sea. — Howell,
Letters, iv. 10.
Slibbeb-sauce, draff ; hogswash. R.
quotes the extract, s. v. slip, and says
it is slipper or slippery sauce.
His taste is corrupt, . . . longing after slib-
bersauce and swash, at which a whole stomach
is ready to cast his gorge. — Tyndale, i. 54.
Slice-sea, cutting the waves; an
epithet given by Sylvester to the alder,
because that tree was used in ship-
building: elsewhere {Babylon, 147) he
speaks of "adventurous alders" (cf.
Ueorgics, i. 136), and in the Vocation,
1019, of the swallow's "slicing nimble-
nesse."
The winding rivers bordered all their banks
With slice-sea alders, and green osiars smal.
Third day, first weeks, 564.
Slickenside. See extract
Many of the pebbles also, and stones two
feet and more in diameter, have acquired
that polish which is called slickenside. — Sir
C. Lyell, Principles of Geology, i. 230, 12th ed.
Sling-man, a slinger.
So one while Lot sets on a troop of horse,
A band of slingymen he anon doth force.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 825.
Slip. To slip the breath or wind =
to die.
And for their cats that happed to slip their
breath,
Old maids, so sweet, might mourn them-
selves to death.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 69.
"You give him the right stuff, doctor,"
said Hawes jocosely, M and he won't slip his
wind this time." — Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. x.
Slip- along, slipshod.
It would be less worth while to read Fox's
SLIP' CO IN
( 599 )
SLOW
Hip-along stories. — Maitland on Reformation,
p. 559.
Slip-coin, counterfeit coin : slip by
itself in this sense is illustrated in the
Diets.
This is the worldling's folly, rather to take
a piece of slip-coin in hand than to trust God
for the invaluable mass of glory. — Adams, i.
247.
Slipper. Shuffle the slipper is a
game more commonly called Hunt the
dipper. The players squat on the
ground in a circle, and pass a slipper
under them from one to the other ; a
person in the middle endeavouring to
detect where it is. See extract 6. v.
Dhawglove.
Slips, that part of a theatre at the
side of the stage from which the scenery
is slipped on ; also that part where the
actors stand before entering on the
scene. See extract s. v. Raddled. The
French Us coulisses has the same mean-
ing of slipping or gliding.
It was jnst half -past eight, so they thought
they couldn't do better than go at half-price
to the flips at the City Theatre.— Sketches by
Bos (Making a night of it).
Slip-slap, to slap repeatedly.
I ha' found her fingers slip-slap this a- way
and that a- way like a flail upon a wheatsheaf .
—Centlivre, The Artifice, Act III.
Slip-slop, sloveniy ; inaccurate.
The difficulty lies only in the rationalist's
shallow and sensuous view of Nature, and in
his ambiguous slip-slop trick of using the
word natural to mean, in one sentence,
" material," and in the next, as I use it, only
"normal and orderly." — C. Kingsley, Alton
Locke, ch. xxzviii.
Slip-slop, blunder.
He told us a great number of comic slip-
slops of the first Lord Baltimore, who made
a constant misuse of one word for another.
— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, iv. 14.
Slip-slop, thin or weak drink.
No, thou shalt feed, instead of these
Or your slip-slap [sic] of curds and whey,
On Nectar and Ambrosia.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 187.
At length the coffee was announced. . .
" And since the meagre slip-slop's made,
I think the call should be obey d."
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. i.
Slip-sloppy, wet ; splashy.
There was no taking refuge too then, as
with ns
On a slip-sloppy day, in a cab or a bus.
fngoldshy Legends (S. Romirold).
Slip-stocking- high.
This lady '8 fancy is just slip-stocking-high,
and she seems to want sense more than her
breakfast— CW/tVr, Eng. Stage, p. 92.
Slither, to slide. See extract from
Tennyson *. v. Huck.
After getting up three or four feet, they
came slithering to the ground, barking their
arms and faces. — Hughes, Tom Brown* s School'
days, Pt. II. ch. iv.
Gay girls slithered past him, looked round
at him, but in vain. — C. Kingsley, Two Years
Ago, ch. xziv.
Slivk, to sneak away, or to dawdle.
I know her gown agen ; I minded her
when she sliv'd off. — Centlivre, Platonick
Lady, Act IV.
I have had a hankering mind after her
these two years, but the sliving baggage will
not come to a resolution yet. — Ibid., The
Man's bewitched, Act III.
What are you a sliving about (quid cessas ?) ,
you drone? you are a year a lighting a
candle. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 41.
Sloaply, slopingly.
The next which there beneath it sloaply
slides,
And his fair hindges from the world's dinides
Twice twelve degrees, is call'd the Zodiac k.
Sylvester, The Columnes, 312.
Sloomt, " sluggish ; out of spirits "
(note to extract).
An' Sally war sloomy an' draggle-taail'd.
— Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Slop-dash, slip-slop ; weak, cold tea,
or the like.
Does he expect tea can be keeping hot for
him to the end of time ? He'll have nothing
but slop-dash. — Miss Edgeworth, Rose, Thistle,
and Shamrock, iii. 2.
Slot, track of a deer ; but in the ex-
tract is a verb = to follow on a track.
Three stags sturdye wer under
Neere the seacost gating, theym slot thee
clusterus heerd flock.
Stany hurst, JEn., i. 190.
Sloven nkss, slovenliness.
Happy Dunstan himself, if guilty of no
greater fault, which could be no sin fnor
properly a slovennesse) in an infant. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. v. 43.
Slow, a bog or slough ; which last is
the reading in the Chertsey Worthies
edition, reprinted from that of 1641 ;
the extract is from the edition of 1611.
With conquering ploughs
He furrows vp cold Strymon's slymie slotcs.
Sylvester, The Colonies, 223.
Slow, dull ; stupid.
SLOWISH
( 600 )
My uncle Major Pendennis was another of
the guests ; who for his part found the party
was what you young fellows call very jfcw.—
Thackeray, The JVetccomes, oh. xhx.
Slowish, rather slow.
The cabman, sensible that his pace was
Slued, intoxicated ,- a nautical meta-
phor (slang).
He came into our place one night to take
her home; rather slued, but not much.—
Dickens, Martin Chuzzleunt, ch. xxviii.
Slug, a dram (slang).
He ordered the waiter, who shewed them
mto a parlour, to . . . bring alongside a short
allowance of brandy or grog, that he might
cant a slug into his bread-room.— Smollett.
otr L. Greaves, ch. xvii.
Plug, a slow-sailing vessel.
_T1i28 hath .Independency, as a little but
tito Pinnace, in a short time got the wind of
and given a broad-side to Presbytery : which
soon grew •.slug, when once the North-wind
ceased to fill its sailes.— Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 381. J
His rendezvous for his fleet and for all
sluags to come to should be between Calais
and Dover.— Pepys, Oct. 17, 1666.
Slum, a low neighbourhood.
When one gets clear of the suburban slums
and the smoke of Liverpool, a very respect-
able appearance of real country-life becomes
visible.— Mack, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch.
xviu. •
Slushing, same as Slushy, q. v.
Philip went . . . through keen black east
wind, or driving snow, or slushing thaw.—
Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. x.
Slushy, spongy ; wet.
I gain the cove with pushing prow,
And quench its speed in the slushy sand.
Browning, Meeting at Night.
Slut, to befoul.
Tobacco's damnable infection
Slutting the body, slaving the affection.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 686.
Smack at, to relish, as shown by
pmacking the lips.
He that by crafty significations of ill-will
doth prompt the slanderer to vent his poison ;
... he that pleasingly relisheth and smacketh
at it; as he is a partner in the fact, so he is
a sharer in the guilt.— Harrow, i. 391.
Smackrring, smattering.
Such as meditate by snatches, never chew-
ing the cud and digesting their meat, they
may happily get a smackering for discourse
and table-talk, but not enongh to keep soul
and life together.— Ward, Sermons, p. 83.
SMALLS
Smackly, with a smacking sound:
heartily.
Queene Didoshal col the and smacklyebebasse
thee.— Stanyhurst,^n.,i. 670.
Smalach, celery or water parsley:
usually written smallage, q. v. in L.
Tusser recommends "smalach for
swellings " (Husbandrie, p. 97).
The leaves of this plant, which they termed
py the name of Maspetum, came very near
in all respects to those of smaUach or persely.
—Holland, Pliny, xix. 3.
Small beer. To think small beer of
anything = to have a low opinion of it.
See quotations & w. Gumptious, Queen-
ite, Stire.
She thinks small beer of painters, J. J —
well, well, we don't think snuUl beer of otu-
selves, my noble friend. — Thackeray, The
Newcomes, ch. ~— ^-
Small cattle, or meat. See first
extract
The due observation whereof would spare
the number of beefs aforesaid, or more : be-
sides those things sold by the Poulterers ;
and other small cattle, as calves, sheep, and
lambs innumerable, killed by the Butcher —
Privy Council on Fish-days, 1694 (Eng. Gar-
ner, 1. 304).
[Ipswich] has five Market-days weekly ;
Tuesday and Thursday for small meat ; Wed-
nesday and Friday for fish ; and Saturday
for all sorts of provisions.— Defoe, Tour thror
G. Britain, i. 27.
Small-clothes, trousers. L. has the
word, with quotation from Byron's
Bejy^o. The indignant censor referred
to by Southey is a writer in the Anti-
Jacobin Review. Stephens's Life of
Home Tooke appeared in 1813, and Dr.
Syntax's first Tour in 1812 ; Beppo in
lolo.
His small-clothes sat so close and tight,
His boots like jet were black and bright
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. xx.
Mr. Stephens having in his memoirs of
Home Tooke used the word small-clothe s% is
thus reprehended for it by the indignant
censor. * His breeches he calls small-clothes ;
the first time we have seen this bastard term',
the offspring of gross ideas and disgusting
affectation, in print, in anything like a book.
—Southey, The Doctor, Interchapter xx.
Smalls, breeches. See Small-
clothes.
His boots were of the Wellington form,
pulled up to meet his corduroy knee-smalls.
—Sketches by Boz {The Last Cabdriver).
SMALLS
( 601 )
SMITHFIELD
The only electric body .that falls
Wears a negative coat and positive smalls.
Hood, Miss Kilmanscgg.
Smalls, a slang name for the first
University examination — little-go, as it
used to be called ; its proper name now
is Besponsions.
In our second term we are no longer fresh-
men, and begin to feel ourselves at home,
while both " smalls " and greats are suffici-
ently distant to be altogether ignored, if we
are that way inclined. — Hughes, Tom Brown
at Oxford, ch. x.
Smart, to pain.
A goad that pricks the skin and smarts the
flesh. — Adams, li. 195.
Smart, a dandy.
He soon attracted the eyes of the company;
all the smarts, all the silk waistcoats with
silver and gold edgings were eclipsed in a
moment. — Fielding, Jos. Andrewes, Bk. II.
ch. iv.
I resolved to quit all further conversation
with beaux and smarts of every kind. — J bid.,
Bk. III. ch. iii.
Our cousin is looked upon among his
brother libertines and smarts as a man of
first consideration. — Richardson, Grandison,
iv. 292.
The gay sparkling Belle who the whole
town alarms,
And with eyes, lips, and neck, sets the smarts
all in arms.
Townely, High Life below Stairs,
Act II.
Smart as applied to dress is a com-
mon usage. H. gives no instance, and
the earliest in L. is from Dickens.
'* Sirrah," says the youngster, " make me a
smart wig, a smart one, ye dog." The fellow
blest himself ; he had heard of a smart nag,
a smart man, &c, but a smart wig was Chinese
to the tradesman. However, nothing would
S lease his worship but smart shoes, smart
ate, and smart cravats ; within two days he
had a smart wig with a smart price in the
box. The truth is he had been bred up with
the groom, and transplanted the stable -
dialect into the dressing-room. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 476.
Smartish, rather fine.
I bought . . . two pair of ordinary blue
worsted hose that made a smartish appearance
with white clocks, I'll assure you. — Richard"
son, Pamela, i. 51.
Smellers, nostrils: smeller is pugi-
listic slang for nose.
Old Priam sate, to hide from Greek here,
By kitchin fire in chair of wicker ;
Bit so with blond his nose did spin out,
He put that small fire that was in out ;
(For he on smellers, you must know,
Beceiv'd a sad unlucky blow).
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 64.
Smell-trap, a contrivance for shut-
ting off bad smells from a house.
u Where have you been staying ? " "With
young Lord Vieuxbois, among high art and
painted glass, spade farms, and model smell'
traps." — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. vi.
Smelts. The proverb in extract seems
to mean " to come to grief."
Let your news be as country folk bring
fruit to your markets, the bad and good
together. Say, have none gone "westward
for smelts" as our proverbial phrase is? —
Great Frost of January, 1608 (Eng. Garner,
i. 85).
Smicket, a smock. See extract from
Col in an s. v. Bucket.
Wide antlers, which had whilom grac'd
A stag's bold brow, on pitchforks plac'd,
The roaring dancing bumpkins show,
And the white smicket s wave below.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. v.
Smileless, without a smile.
The door closed upon the sallow and smile-
less nephew. — Lylton, Pel ham, ch. lziii.
And so the old man, whose life had been
so smileless, died smiling. — Ibid., What will
he do with it ? Bk. VI. ch. ix.
Smirkly, with a smirk.
Venus was glad to hear
Such proffer made, which she well shewed
with smiling chear,
And smirkly thus gan say.
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 258.
Smithereens, small fragments.
Smithers and smithereens are Lincoln-
shire words : see Peacock's Manley
and Corringham Glossary (E. D. S.).
He has raised a pretty quarrel there, I can
tell you — kicked the ostler half across the
yard, knocked heaps of things to smither-
eens, and is ordering everybody about. —
Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. iii.
Smithers, fragments.
Smash the bottle to smithers, the Divil's
in 'im, said I. — Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Smithfield bargain, applied to a
marriage of interest, where money is
the chief consideration : the allusion is
to buying a wife in Smithfield. Cf.
Breton, Olde Maris Lesson, p. 7 :
" Fie on these market-matches, where
marriages are made without affection."
By the procurement of these experienc'd
matrons, a marriage is struck up like a
Smithfield bargain. There is ranch higling
and wrangling for t'other ten pounds ; one
SMITHY-DANDER ( 602 )
SMUT
side endeavours to rain©, and the other to
beat down the market-price. — T. Brown,
Works, iii. 64.
The hearts of as women, when we are
urged to give way to a clandestine or unequal
address, or when inclined to favour such a
one, are apt and are pleaded with to rise
against the notions of bargain and sale.
Smithfield bargains you Londoners call them,
but unjust is the iutended odium, if prelimin-
aries are necessary in all treaties of this
nature. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 44.
Old Square-toes would not part with cash
enough down upon the nail ; and the devil
take me if I would marry an angel upon the
footing of a mere Smith field bargain.— -Graves,
Spiritual Quixote, Bk. V. ch. xv.
Tou deposit so much money, and be grants
yon such an annuity; a mere Smithfield
bargain, that is all. — Foots, The Bankrupt,
II. 1.
Smithy-dander, a cinder.
You cannot suppose that Harry Gow cares
the value of a smxthy-dander for such a cub
as yonder cat-a-mountain. — Scott, Fair Maid
of Perth, i. 68.
Smittle, infectious ; catching.
Oet thy saddles off, lad, and come in ; 'tis
a smittle night for rheumatics. — H. King si ey,
Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xzxvi.
Smock. This article of woman's dress
forms the first part of several com-
pounds, usually with a disparaging
meaning. Smock-faced ■» effeminate-
looking is in the Diets., but not the
substantive. In a mock " Catalogue of
Books of the newest Fashion" (Hart
Misc., v. 287), one is ascribed to
" smock-pecked S — k." Dr. Sherlock,
who at first refused to take the oaths to
William and Mary, afterwards changed
his mind ; it was supposed at the insti-
gation of his wife.
Now this tmocktoy Paris with berdlesse coom-
pauye wayted. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 222.
[Fortune gives] Some wealth without wit,
some nor wit nor wealth,
But good smock-faces.
Chapman, All Fooles, v. 1.
Tis but procuring ;
A smock-employment.
Massing er, Renegade, II. i.
I hope, sir,
You are not the man ; much less employed
by him
As a smock-agent to me.
Ibid., Maid of Honour, II. ii.
Peace, thou smock-vermin !—Ibid., III. i.
Keep these women matters
Smock-secrets to ourselves.
Jonson, Magnetic Lady, iv. 2.
Smoke - farthings, a contribution
from every one who had a house with
a chimney, payable in Whitsun week
to the cathedral of the diocese.
As for your smoke 'farthing* and Peter-
pence, I make no reckoning.— Jewed, iv. 1079.
Smoker, one who makes game of
another.
These wooden Wits, these Quiaers, Queerer*,
Smokers,
These practical, nothing-so-easy Jokers.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 150.
Smoking, bantering ; roasting.
" Oh ! " cried Mrs. Thrale, a what a ssnokimg
did Miss Burney give Mr. Crutohley ! " ** A
smoking indeed," cried he ; u never had I suck
a one before ; never did I think to get such
a character."— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, ii. 09-
Smoky, suspicious.
I' gad, I don't like his looks ; he seems a
little smoaky ; I believe I had as good brash
ofl.—Cibber, Prov. Husband, Act II.
A smoaky fellow this Classic ; but if Lucind*
plays her cards well, we have not ranch to
fear from that quarter. — Foote, Englishmen
in Paris, Act I.
Smoother, flatterer. Cf. Frtjbber.
These are my flatterers, my soothers, my
claw-backs, my smoothers, my parasites. — Cr-
quhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. hi.
Smouch, a cant term for a Jew. H.
has " Smous, a Jew. Suffolk." See ex-
tract «. V. JUDAIZATION.
I saw them roast some poor Smouches at
Lisbon because they would not eat pork. —
Johnston, Chrysal, i. 228.
Vhile I, like de resht of ma tribe, shrug and
crouch,
Tou find fault mit ma pargains, and say I'm
a Smouch.
Ingoldsby Legend* {Merchant of Venice).
Smudge. Nashe seems to use this as
meaning "to smoke" when speaking
of what was necessary to make a her-
ring chapmahable, q. v.
Smuggle, to cuddle or fondle.
Oh, the little lips! and 'tis the best-
nntured little dear. {Smuggles and kisses it.)
— Farquhar, Love and a Bottle, i. 1.
Smugness, trimness: it is a word
that would seem more appropriate to
what auctioneers call "a neat villa"
than to Winchester Cathedral.
I like the smugness of the Cathedral, and
the profusion of the most beautiful Gothic
tombs.— Walpole, Letters, i. 442 (1765).
Smut, to make obscene : less common
as a verb than a substantive.
SMUTS
( 603 ) SNAP- WORK GUN
Another smut$ his scene (a canning shaver),
Sure of the rakes, and of the wenches favour.
Prologue to Steele' i Conscious Lovers.
Shuts, particles of soot
She ventured into the drawing-room, and
was straightway saluted by a joyous dance
of those monads, called vulgarly $mut$.—
Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XIV. ch. ii.
Smuttiness, obscenity.
Smuttiness is a fault in Behaviour as well
as in Beligion. — Collier, English Stage, p. 6.
Snaffling - lay, highway robbery
(thieves' cant). Cf. Bridle - cull.
Highwaymen being mounted, the
names for them and their profession
are taken from horses' gear. See
quotation s. v. Peeby.
I thought by your look yon had been a
clever fellow, and upon the snaffling-lay at
least, but I find you are some sneaking-budge
rascal. — Fielding, Amelia, Bk. I. ch. iii.
Snaft, another term for wick, con-
nected with muffed (?).
Ton chandler . . . after your weeke or snaft
is stiffened, you dip it in filthy drosse, and
after give him a coat of good tallowe. —
Greene, Quip for Upstart Courtier (Harl.
Misc., v. 419).
Snaggy ,f all of snags or roughnesses.
Spenser (F. Q., I. vii. 10) speaks of " a
snaggy oke ; " so the word is used
provincially for ill-tempered.
An' I wur down i' tha mouth, couldn't do
naw work an' all,
Nasty an' snagay, an' shaaky, an' poonch'd
my 'and wi' the hawl.
Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Snail, to wind like a snail, or to move
slowly.
This sayd, shee trots on snayling, lyk a
toothshaken old hagge. — Stanyhurst, JEn.,
iv.689.
And sith all sound seems alwayes to ascend,
God plao't the ears (where they might best
attend)
As in two turrets, on the buildings top,
SnaUinq their hollow entries so asloap,
That while the voyce about those windings
wanders
The sound might lengthen in those bow'd
meanders.
Sylvester, Sixth day; first weeke, 637.
Draw in your horns, and resolve to snail'
on as we did before, in a track we are
acquainted with. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
iv. 124.
Snail's gallop. To go at a email's
gallop, i. e. very slowly. In the
original of the first extract the tor-
toise is the animal named " ut incedit
testudo."
I see what haste you make ; you are never
the forwarder, you go a snail's gallop. —
Bailey's Erasmus, p. 41.
But if he happen'd not to feel
An angry hint from thong or steel,
He, by degrees, would seldom fail
T' adopt the gallop of a snail.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour HI. e. iii.
Snake, to wind like a snake.
Anon vpon the flowry plains he looks,
Laced about with snaktna siluer brooks.
Sylvester, Seventh day, first weeks, 81.
Snap, a slight refection, same as
snack ; also a scrap or morsel.
The story of the Mamelukes ... is not
written directly, but by reflexion ; not storied
by any constant writer of their own, but in
snaps and parcels. — Fuller, Holy War, Bk.
IV. ch. xxxii.
It is one thing to laugh at them in transitu,
a snap and away, and another to make a set
meal in jeering them. — Ibid., Holy and Pro-
fane State, III. xii. 5.
Perchance he may get some alms of learn-
ing, here a snap, there a piece of knowledge,
but nothing to purpose. — Ibid., V. xiv. 1.
Mr. Henry Burton, Minister, rather took a
snap than made a meal in any university. —
Ibid., Ch. Hist., XI. ii. 69.
Mr. Pilgrim had just returned from one of
his long day's rounds among the farm-houses,
in the course of which he had sat down to
two hearty meals, that might have been mis-
taken for dinners, if he had not declared
them to be snaps. — G. Eliot, Janet's Repent'
ante, ch. i.
Snap, an earring: so called, I sup-
pose, from being snapped or clasped.
A pair of diamond snaps in her ears.—
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, in. 29.
Snapper, a cracker-bonbon.
And nasty French lucifer snappers with
mottos.
Ingoldsby Legends ( Wedding-day).
Snappers, castanets.
Their musicke is answerable ; the instru-
ments no other than snappers, gingles, and
round-bottomd drums.— Sandys, Travels, p.
172.
Snapsauce, licking one's fingers ;
pilfering food. Epistemon in the Ely-
sian fields saw
Hector a snapsauce scullion (fripe-saulce).
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. II. oh.
Snap-work gun, a gun with a spring
lock ; same as snaphance.
Betwixt the third couple of towers were
the butts and marks for shooting with a
SNATCHING
( 604 )
SNOB
snip-work gun {Varquebuse). — Urqukarfs Ra-
belais, Bk. I. ch. v.
Snatching. See extract.
" Snatching " is a form of illicit piscicap-
ture for which it in impossible to entertain
even that mitigated kind of sympathy which
the keenest sportsman cannot occasionally
help feeling towards poaching conducted in
a fair and sportsmanlike manner. A large
triangle is attached to a line of fine gut,
well weighted with swan-shot or a small
plummet. Some " snatchers " will use two,
three, or even four triangles ; but the mode
of operation is, of course, the same. The
line is then dropped into some quiet place
where fish are plentiful — a deep corner pool,
or the outfall of a drain, or the mouth of a
small affluent — and, as soon as the plummet
has touched the bottom, is twitched violently
up. It is almost a certainty that on some
one or other of the hooks, and possibly on
more than one, will be a fish foul-hooked. —
Standard, Oct. 21, 1878.
Snat-nosed, snub-nosed.
Silenus . . . was an euill disfigured apishe
body, croumpe shouldred, short-necked, snat-
nosed, with a sparowe's mouth. — TJdaVs Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 250.
Sneaking, an epithet often joined
with such words as kindness, liking,
preference, Ac. ; it signifies una vowed
or undemonstrative.
Tou, my dear, shall reveal to me your
sneaking passion, if you have one, and I will
discover mine.— Richardson, Grandison, i. 290.
For they posscss'd, with all their pother,
A sneaking kindness for each other.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. vii.
Sneaking-budge, thieves cant for
pilfering. See quotation s. v. Snaf-
fling-lay.
Wild . . . looked upon borrowing to be as
good a way of taking as any, and, as he called
it, the genteelest kind of sneaking-budge. —
Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. I. ch. viii.
Sneeze. Not to sneeze at a thing = •
not to object to it ; to value it.
A buxom, tall, and comely dame
Who wish'd, 'twas said, to change her name,
And, if I could her thoughts divine,
Would not perhaps have sneezUl at mine.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. 0. v.
Then his Riverence retrating discoorsed the
mating :
a Boys, here's your Queen, deny it if you
can;
And if any bould traitour or infarior craythur
Sneezes at that, I'd like to see the man."
Ingoldsby Legends {The Coronation).
Sneeze-box, a snuff-box. See quota-
tion *. vu. Clyfaking, Lummy.
Snick, to cut The Diet*, give it
only in the phrase snide and snee.
He began by snicking the corner of her
foot off with nurse's scissors.— J7. Kingsl^
Ravenshoe, ch. Ixiii.
Snickle. See H., who refers to Mar-
lowe, but does not give the passage,
which is clearly corrupt. Col. Cun-
ningham conjectures " snide, hard and
fast," though even this is obscure.
Snickle = to tie a noose, for the pur-
pose of catching hares, &c.
I carried the broth that poisoned the nuns
and he and I, snide hand too fast, strangled
a friar. — Marlowe, Jew of Malta, iv. 5.
Snift. to snuff.
I would sooner snift thy farthing candle.
—Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. IV. ch. viii.
Snip, a tailor.
Sir, here's Snip the taylor
Charg'd with a riot.
Randolph, Muses' Looking Glass,
iv. 3.
"Alton, you fool, why did you let oat
that you were a snip ?" " I am not ashamed
of my trade."— C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. xiii.
Snippetinkss, fragmentariness.
The defect of Fraser's Magazine among
magazines issnippetiness,* habit of publishing
so many articles that they are none of them
exhaustive. — The Spectator, quoted in Fraser's
Mag., March 1878, p. 400.
The whole number is good, albeit broken
up into more small fragments than we think
quite wise. Variety is pleasant, snippetiness
is not.— Church Times, April 9, 1880, p. 228.
Snip-snap-snorum, a round game at
cards, which is fully described in N
and Q., 3rd S., ii. 331, 379.
It had been found convenient to set down
the children and their young quests on these
occasions to Pope Joan or snip-snap-snorum*
which was to them a more amusing, because
a noisier game.— Southey, The Doctor, ch. cix.
Snite, a term of reproach. R. gives
suite = woodcock, which word is often
used for a fool, or it may be = snot.
Here enter not vile bigots, hypocrites,
Externally devoted apes, base snites.
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. liv.
Snob, a journeyman shoemaker. The
extract is a note on the words " tailor
by trade."
All who are familiar with the Police Re-
ports and other Records of our Courts of
Justice, will recollect that every gentleman
of this particular profession invariably thn«
describes himself, in contradistinction to the
SNOD
( 605 )
SOAKINGL Y
bricklayer, whom he probably presumes to
Y>« indigenous, and to the Shoemaker born a
*Snob. — Inyoldsby Legends (Old Woman in
Crrey).
Snod, to bind ; tie up.
On stake and ryce he knits the crooked vines,
.And snoddes their bowes.
Hudson, Judith, iv. 269.
Snoozle, to nestle.
A dog . . . snoozled its nose overf orwardly
into her face. — E. Bronte, Wuthering Heights,
ch. iii.
Snortle, to grunt. Breton says that
Folly teaches his scholar
To wallow almost like a beare,
And snortle like a hog.
School e of Fancie, p. 6.
Snorty, snoring; broken by snorts.
Stanyhurst speaks of the " dead sleape
snorty t " of Polyphemus (jEn., iii. 645).
Snow, a vessel with foremast, main-
mast, and abaft the latter a small mast
-with a trysail.
Far other craft our prouder river shows,
Hoys, pinks, and sloops, brigs, brigantines,
and snows. — Crabbe, The borough, Letter i.
There was no order among us — he that was
captain to-day was swabber to-morrow. . . I
broke with them at last for what they did on
board of a bit of a snow ; no matter what it
was ; bad enough, since it frightened me. —
Scott, Redgauntlet, ii. 156.
Snowbreak, thaw of snow.
And so, like snowbreak from the mountains,
for every staircase is a melted brook, it
storms ; tumultuous, wildashrilling, towards
the H6tel-de-Ville.— Carlyle,Fr. Rev., Pt. I.
Bk. VII. ch. iv.
Snubbish, surly ; repressive.
Spirit of Kant ! have we not had enough
To make religion sad, and sour, and snubbish ?
Hood, An Open (Question.
Snubby, short ; stunted.
Both have mottled legs,
Both have snubby noses.
Thackeray, Peg of Limavaddy.
Snudge-like, like a miser.
Who Snudge-like to his friend (whose heart
Was paynd with stitch and grief e)
Not one poore draught thereof would send,
To ease him with relief e.
Metrical version of Juvenal quoted in
Touchstone of Complexions, p. 103.
Snudgery, miserliness. See extract
S. V. HUDDLE-DUDDLK.
Snudge-snout, a dirty fellow.
I heard your father say that he would
marry you to Peter Ploddall, that puck-fist,
that snudge-snout, that coal-carrierly clown.
— Wily Beguiled (Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 303).
Snuff. Up to snuff — sharp ; clever
(slang).
Lady A., who is now what some call " up to
snuff," •
Straight determines to patch up a clandes-
tine match.
Inyoldsby Legends (Account
of a new play).
Snuffler, a religious canter.
You know I never was a snuffer ; but this
sort of life makes one serious, if one has auy
reverence at all in one. — Hughes, Tom Broxcn
at Oxford, ch. xliv.
Snuffle8, difficulty in speaking or
breathing owing to the nose being
stopped up through a cold.
First the Queen deserts us ; then Princess
Royal begins coughing; then Princess
Augusta gets the snuffles. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, iii. 180.
Snuffman, snuff-seller.
The proprietor confined himself strictly to
the sale of snuff, and had . . . nothing in
short that makes the shop of a snuffman of
the present day scarcely distinguishable
from the studio of a Cheapside miniature
painter. — Savage, R. Medlicott, Bk. III. ch. i.
Snuggle, to nestle.
We were friends in a minute — young New-
come snuggling by my side, his father oppo-
site.— Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. i.
Snush, to snuff or take snuff. N. has
the substantive.
Then filling his short pipe, he blows a blast,
And does the burning weed to ashes waste,
Which, when 'tis cool, he snushes up his nose,
That he no part of his delight may lose.
T. Brown, Works, i. 117.
Snuzzle, to sniff. H. says, to cuddle.
This, however, does not seem to be the
meaning in the extract, in which a bull-
dog is spoken of.
His general look, and a way he had of
going " snuzzling " about the calves of
strangers, were not pleasant for nervous
people. — Hugfies, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch.
iii.
Soak.
Stand forth, transformed Antonio, fully mued
From brown soak feathers of dull yeomanry
To th' glorious bosom of gentry.
Albumazar, iii. 4.
Soakingly, gradually, as liquid
sinks into the earth, &c.
A mannes enemies in battail are to be ouer-
comed with a carpenter's squaring axe, that
is to say, sokingly, one pece after an other.
SOAL
( 606 )
SO I LURE
A common axe cutteth through at the first
choppe, a squaring aze by a little and a little,
werketh the same effect©. — UdaVs Erasmus' 3
Apopkth^ p. 809.
Soal, to pull about : a Devon word.
Zom hootiu^ heavin', soalin', hawlin',
Zom in the muok and pellum sprawlin'.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 165.
Soal. See quotation.
I censored his light and ludicrous title of
" Down-Deny " modestly in these words :
" It were strange if he should throw a good
oast who tools his bowl upon an undersong ; "
alluding to that ordinary and elegant expres-
sion in our English tongue, " soal your bowl
well," that is, be careful to begin your work
well.—Branihall, ii. 366.
Soap. Soft soap = persuasion ; flat-
tery (slang).
He and I are great chums, and a little soft
soap will go a long way with him. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxiii.
Soapless, without soap ; unwashed.
The offered hand of his new friend . . . was
of a marvellously dingy and soapless aspect.
— Lytton, Pelham, ch. xlix.
Sober. The second extract explains
itself ; the first is curious, because sober
is so much used by us as meaning
temperate as regards drink, that to
speak of a woman being sober except
when she could get at liquor, reminds
one of Madam Blaize, who "never
followed wicked ways, except when she
was sinning/'
Shee's as discreete a dame
As any in these countries, and as sober,
But for this onely humour of the cup.
Chapman, Gentleman Vshtr, Act III.
Herald, saith he, tell the Lord Governor
and the Lord Huntley that we have entered
your country with a sober company (which
in the language of the Scots is poor and
mean) : your army is both great ana fresh. —
Heyltn, Reformation, i. 90.
Sobersides, a steady person.
Tou deemed yourself a melancholy sober-
sides enough t Miss Fanshawe there regards
you as a second Diogenes.— Miss Bronte, ViU
lette, ch. xxviii.
Soccated, fastened in sockets.
Two whyte marble columns or pillers,
soccated in two foote steppes of black marble.
— Survey of Maner of Wimbledon, 1640
(Arc h., x. 404).
Sociable, low phaeton.
The children went with their mother, to
their great delight, in the sociable. — Mist
Edyeworth, Belinda, ch. xix.
Cabs, hackney-coaches, " shay " carts, coal-
waggons, stages, omnibusses, sociable*, gig*.
donkey-chaises . . . roll along at their ut-
most speed. — Sketches by Boz (Greenwich
Fair).
SOCIETARIAN, social.
The all -sweeping besom of woctetarm
reformation, your only modern Alcides' club
to rid the time of its abuses, is uplift with
many-handed sway to extirpate the flutter-
ing tatters of the bugbear Mendicity from
the metropolis. — Lamb, Essays of Elia. (Dec**
of Beggars).
SociETlE, alliance.
It no writer had recorded that we English-
men are descended from Germans, the true
and natural! Scots from the Irish, the Britons
of Armorica in France from our Britans,
the societie of their tongues would easily
oonnrme the same. — Holland's CamuUn, p. 10.
Societyless, without companions.
Had not this composition fit seized me,
societyless, and bookless, and viewless as I
am, I know not how I could have whiled
away my being. — Mad. I/ArUay, Diary,
iv. 272.
Socinianize, to imbue with Socinian
doctrine.
I cannot be ordained before I have sub-
scribed and taken some oaths. Neither of
which will pass very well, if I am ever so
little Popishly inclined or Sociniams'd — T.
Brown, Works, i. 4.
So fane, pertaining to a sofa.
A sofa, of incomprehensible form regarded
from any sofane point of view, murmured,
" Bed."— Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, ri.
Soft, a fool.
It'll do you no good to sit in a spring-cart
o' your own, if you've got a soft to drive
you ; he'll soon turn you over into the ditch.
— G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. ix.
Soft-b/ode, cowardly.
A souldier, and afraid of a dead man ? A
soft-r'ods milksop? — Chapman, Widdoves
Teares, Act V.
Softy, a weak, silly person.
She were but a softy after all, for she left
off doing her work in a proper manner.—
Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xv.
Soilure. soil. N. has the word, with
quotation from Troilus and Cressida,
IV. i., and adds, "This word has not
been found elsewhere ; but I am not
one of those who suspect Shakespeare
of coining words, and therefore think
it will be found."
SOJLY
( 607 )
SOL VABLE
Then fearing rust or soilure fashion'd for it
.A case of silk.
Tennyson, Lancelot and Maine.
Soily, polluting or polluted ; dirty.
So spots of sinne the writer's soule did staine,
*Who«e sot/lie tincture did therein remaine,
Till brinish teares had washt it out againe.
Fuller, David's Sinne, st. 32.
No, quoth the earnest Water, I desire
His soy lie sinnes with deluges to scoura
Ibid., David's Repentance, st. 4.
^ Nor let your boots be over clean, . . . your
linen rumpled and soily when yon wait upon
her. — Richardson, CI. Harlow, vi. 93.
Soldat, soldier: a French word,
used as English.
Alarm, soldats, alarme ;
Take blades in hand and brands of burning
yre.— Hudson, Judith, v. 452.
Soldatesqde, soldierly.
He strode down Glavering High Street,
his hat on one side, his cane clankiug on
the pavement, or waving round him in the
execution of military cuts and soldatesque
manoeuvres.— Thackeray, Pendennis, ch. zxii.
Soldier, to go or act as a soldier.
The reckless shipwrecked man, flung
ashore on the coast of the Maldives long
ago, while sailing and soldiering as Indian
fighter.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. IIL Bk. I.
ch. vu.
He has proved himself so different from
me, and has done so much to raise himself
while I've been soldiering. —Dickens, Bleak
House, ch. lv.
Soldier. To come the old soldier =
to try to take in.
I should think he was coming the old soldier
over me, and keeping up his game. But no
— he can scarce have the impudence to think
of that.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ch, xviii.
Devilish well acted ! But you needn't try
to come the old soldier over me; I'm not
quite such a fool as th*t.— Hughes, Tom
Brown at Oxford, ch. xxxiii.
Soldier's wind. See quotation.
The breeze blowing dead off the land was
" a soldier's wind, there and back again," for
either ehip.—Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xix.
Sole, a wooden collar round the
neck of cattle to confine them to a
post. Tusser mentions, among " hus-
tandlie furniture/'
Soles, fetters, and shackles, with horselook
and pad. — Husoandrie, p. 38.
Solertiousne88, subtlety ; clever-
ness.
The king confessed that they had hit upon
the interpretation of his secret meaning;
which abounded to the praise of Mr. Wil-
liams's solertiousness. — Racket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 22.
Let them plead their own learning and
able parts without traducing the gifts of
them that are excellently seen in theological
cases of conscience, and singularly rare in
natural solertiousness. — Ibid., i. 200.
Solicit ate, solicit.
[He] did urge and solicitate him, according
to his manner of words, to recant. — Foxe,
quoted in Maitland on Reformation, p. 494.
Solicitrix, female petitioner.
The first motion he found in himself was
for the charming sollicitrix. — T. Brown,
Works, iii. 43.
If the wife had not been the solicitrix and
undertaker for the great things her husbaud
was to perform, be could never have made
his way so effectually. — North, Examen, p.
193.
When businesses of this nature want
shoulders at court to heave them forwards,
then great men and topping ladies (hopeful
solicitrixes) are taken in for shares, and so
let into the secret.— North, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 207.
Solitariousness, solitude ; seclusion.
Dysinge and cardynge haue ii tutours, the
one named Solitariousenes, whjche lurketh
in holes and corners, the other called Night,
an vngratiouse couer of noughtynesse. —
Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 52.
Solitarity, solitude.
I shall be abandoned at once to solitarity
and penury.— W. Taylor of Norwich, 1811
(Memoir, ii. 351).
Sollevate, to raise ; excite. N. has
sullevate, with quotation from Daniel ;
he adds, " It seems rather a pedantic
affectation than a word ever in use."
I come to shew the fruits of connivance
or 'rather encouragement from the magis-
trates in the city upon other occasions to
sollevate the rabble. — North, Examen, p. 114.
Fitzharris's [plot] was framed ... to blast
the king, arm the faction, sollevate the mob.
— Ibid., p. 273.
Solvable. The Diets, give this word
as meaning capable of being solved or
paid, and so Fuller uses it in the second
extract; but in the others it means
capable of paying, or solvent See
extract s. v. Nichill.
It was collected generally of all solvable
housekeepers. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. iii. 46.
Some of those corrodies (where the pro-
perty was altered into a set sum me of
money) was solvable out of the exchequer. —
Ibid., vi. p. 326.
Widows are commonly so wise as to be
SOMERSET
( 608 )
SORTS
sure their men are solvable before they trust
'em. — Wycherley, Love in a Wood, iii. 4.
Somerset, to turn head over heols.
Thea the sly sheepe-biter issued into the
midst, and summer$etted and fliptflappt it
twenty times above ground as light as a
feather.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 164).
In such extraordinary manner does dead
Catholicism somerset and caper, skilfully gal-
vanised.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. IV.
eh. ii.
Somnambular, belonging to somnam-
bulism or sleep-walking.
We stand to meet thee on these Alpine
snows,
And while the palpitating peaks break out
Ecstatic from somnambular repose
With answers to the presence and the
shout,
We poets of the people, who take part
With elemental justice, natural right,
Join in our echoes also.
Mrs. Browning, Napoleon III. in Italy.
Somnial, pertaining to dreams.
To presage or foretell an evil, especially in
what concerneth the exploits of the soul, in
matter of somnial divinations, is as much as
to say as that it giveth us to understand that
some dismal fortune or mischance is destin-
ated or prepared for us. — Urquhart, Rabelais,
Bk. in. ch. xiv.
Somniatory, pertaining to dreams.
See quotation from Southey *. v. Onei-
ROCRITE.
I shall to-morrow break my fast betimes
after my somniatory exercitations. — Ur</u-
harCs Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. xiii.
Somnific, causing sleep.
The voice, the manner, the matter, even
the very atmosphere, and the streamy candle-
light were all alike somnific. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. vi. A 1.
Somnivolency, a soporific ; some-
tiling to incline to sleep.
If these somnivolencies (I hate the word
opiates on this occasion) have turned her
head, that is an effect they frequently have
upon some constitutions. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, v. 345.
Sonless, without, or bereft of, sons.
Out of these, if the Emperonr die son~lesse,
a successor is chosen. — Sandys , Travels, p. 171.
How many fatherless, brother] ess, sonless
families have mourned all their lives the
unhappy resort to this dreadful practice. —
Richardson, Grandison, i. 319.
Sonnekin, little son.
The minister welcomed hym in Oreke, and
myudiug tenderly and gently to salute with
this word vaiiiov, sonnekin, at little sonn*,
tripped a little in his tongue, and by &
wrong pronunciation insteade of -r**&io» sai<l
vai3ioc, which being diuided into two woordes
wal JtAc, soaneth the sonne of Jupiter.—
UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 233.
SoNNETiZE, to celebrate in a sonnet
Now could I sonnetiu thy piteous plight.
— Southey, Nondescripts, V.
SoPHiSTRESS, a female sophist.
You seem to be a sophistress, you answer
so smartly. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 194.
Fa. Now you seem to play the sophist
with me.
Eh. Then do you play the sophistress with
me. — Ibid., p. 230.
Sophistry, to reason sophistically, or
fallaciously.
It is well sophist ried of you forsooth ; pre-
posterous are your judgements evermore.—
Bale, Select Works, p. 34.
Sorcerino, exercising sorcery.
His trade of sorcerinq had so inured him
to receive voices from his familiars in shape
of beasts that this event seemed not strange
to him. — Hall, Contemplation {Balaam).
Sordidity, squalor ; dirt.
Swimming in suddes of all sordiditie. —
Davies, Humours Heaven on Earth, p. 21.
Then how dare I (vile clod of base contempt)
Approch the presence of such Majesty,
That is from all impuritie exempt,
And I a sinck of all sordiditie ?
Ibid., Muse's Sacrifice, p. 19.
Sororially, in a sisterly way.
u This way then, my dear sister," cried
Jane to the newcomer, and taking her sorori-
ally by the hand, she led her forth from the
oak parlour.— Th. Hook, The Sutherlands.
Sorry, to grieve.
If he thundre, they quake ; if he chyde,
they feare ; if he complayne, they sory with
hym. — Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 42.
Sortilege, choosing by lot. L. has
the word, but no example.
She might have tossed np, having coins in
her pocket, heads or tails ! but this kind of
sortilege was then coming to be thought irre-
ligious in Christendom. — De Quincey, Spanish
Nun, sect. 10.
Sorts. Out of sorts = indisposed ;
out of spirits.
Diana ! why girl, I say, adsme, you're all
out of sorts ; I thought thy tongue and heels
could never have been idle. — Revenge, or a
Match in Neirgate, Act IV.
I was most violently out of sorts, and really
had not spirits to answer it. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, i. 141.
SO SB ELL Y
( 609 ) SPADES GRAFT
Sobbelly, »^^y belly ; fat.
What is thy idolatrous mas and lowsve
Lafcine seruice, thou sosbelly swilbol, bat the
very draf of Antichrist, and dregges of the
deuil ?—Bale, Declaration of Bo nner's A rticles
(Art. XXIX.).
Sottkry ; folly.
Episcopacy, and so Presbytery had indeed
. . . suffered very much smut, soyle, darkness
and dishonour by the Tyrannies, Fedities,
Luxuries, Sotteries and Insolencies of some
Bishops and other Churchmen under the
Papal prevalency. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 12. J
Sound. See extract ; Phaer's Virgil
appeared in 1558, but in 1525 Lord
Berners used sound in his translation of
Froissart.
Sonant is short, veet sowning in English
must bee long ; and much more yf yt were
Sounding as thee ignorant generaly but faJslye
dooe wryte ; nay, that where at I woonder
more, thee learned trip theyre pennes at this
stoane, in so much as M. Phaerin thee verye
first verse of Virgil mistaketh thee woorde,
yeet sound and sowne differ as much in Eng-
lish as solidus and sonus'm Latin. — Stany hurst,
uEnead, Preface.
Sound, to swoon : also a substantive.
H. remarks that it occurs as late as the
Vicar of Wakefield, ch. xi., but he
omits to observe that the speaker is
Miss Skeggs, and that therefore it was
probably meant, as it certainly is in the
still later passage from the Sp. Quixote,
for a vulgarism. But the first citation
shows that it was in use by the educated
some seventy years before.
I never saw a man before sound under an
argument, or discoursed into a calenture. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 304.
I was mortall sick, and troubled with the
gripes and the belly-ache, and I thought I
should have sounded away. — Graves. Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. v"II. ch. i.
Sounder. H. has this word = a herd
of swine ; and I have given examples
of it in this sense s. w. Hogsteer and
Rookler; but in the subjoined the
meaning is different.
It had so happened that a sounder (t. e. in
the language of the period, a boar of only
two years old) had crossed the track of the
proper object of the chase. — - Scott. Quentin
Dunoard, i. 180.
Sour-cake, unleavened bread (?).
Fine folks they are to tell you what's
right, as look as if they'd never tasted no-
thing better than bacon-sword and sour-cake
i' their lives.— G. Eliot, Adam Bede, ch. viii.
Source, to spring.
They . . . never leave roaring it out with
their brazen home, as long as they stay, of
the freedomes and immunities soursing from
him.— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi.
163).
Sous. This French coin is often
spoken of now ; but it is pronounced as
a French word : not so in the extracts.
Next came the treasurer of either house,
One with full purse, t'other with not a sous.
Churchill, Rosciad, 310.
I've been chief lion, and first Tiger here
For fifteen year ; —
That, you may tell me, matters not a souse;
But, what is more,
All London says, I am the greatest Boar
You ever had in all your House.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 30.
Soutage, bagging for hops ; coarse
cloth. Tusser is giving directions for
the construction of a hop-manger. See
also extract *. v. Hair-Patch.
Take soutage or haier (that covers the Eell)
Set like to a manger, and fastened well.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 136.
Soveraintess, female sovereign.
O second honour of the lamps supernal,
Sure Calendar of festiuals eternal
Sea's Soueraintess, Sleep-bringer, Pilgrim's
Guide,
Peace-loving Queen ; what shall I say beside ?
Sylvester, Fourth day first weeke, 718.
Sow- br bad, a plant of the genus
cyclamen. Cf . Swines - bread with
extract from Sylvester referring to the
antipathy between it and the colewort,
and to other stories about it.
The colewort has its enemy too ; for if it
be set near the herb called sow-bread (cycla-
mino) or wild marjoram (origano), it will
wither presently. — Bailey' }s Erasmus's Collog.,
p. 394.
Sow-drunk, beastly drunk. See
Davy's sow, though perhaps there is no
allusion to that phrase or story in this
expression.
Soa soic-drunk that tha doesn not touch
thy 'at to the Squire. — Tennyson, Northern
Cobbler.
Spade, a hart in the third year.
Your hart is the first year a calf, the second
year a brochet, the third year a spade, the
fourth year a stag, the fifth year a great stag,
the sixth year a hart.— Return from Parnassus
(1606), ii. 5.
Spade's graft, the depth a spade
goes in digging : a Cheshire word.
R R
SPADO
( 610)
SPARK
rhey [British relics] were discovered in
1827 near Gaisborough, at about a " spade's
graft " beneath the surface.— Proc. of Soc.
o/^n/iy.,i.30(1844).
Spado, sword : a Latin word, but not
naturalized.
By St. Anthony yon shall feel what mettle
my spado is made of (laying his hand to his
sword). — Centlivre, Marplot in Lisbon, I. i.
Spalpeen, an Irish term of contempt.
See extract s. v. Buckeen.
How many pigs be born to each spalpeen,
— Hood* Irish Schoolmaster,
I've brought away the poor spalpeen of a
priest, and have got him safe in the house. —
Kingsley, Tvo Years Ago, ch. arix.
Spaltam.
Why now there's your Susannah ; it could
not have produced you above twenty at
most, and by the addition of your lumber-
room diet, and the salutary application of
the spaltam pot, it became a Quido worth a
hundred and thirty pounds. — Foote, Taste,
Act I.
Spang, a violent motion, aR a leap or
clutch ; also to throw violently.
Set roasted beef and pudding on the oppo-
site side o' the pit o' Tophet, and an English-
man will make a spang at it. — Scott, Rob Roy,
ii. 164.
An I could but hae gotten some decent
claes on I wad hae slanged out o' bed. — Ibid^
Old Mortality, ch. vii.
She came up to the table with a fantastic
spring, and spanged down the sparkling mass
on it. — Reade, Never too late to mend, ch. lxv.
He spanged that in another direction. —
Ibid.
Spang-cockle, a childish game. See
quotation.
" Can you play at spang-cockle, my lord ? "
said the Prince, placing a nut on the second
joint of his forefinger, and spinning it off by
a smart application of the thumb. — Scott,
Fair Maid of Perth, i. 221.
Spange, narrow portion. Cf. Spong.
The West part of it joineth to the East side
by a very small spange of land. — Holland's
Camden, ii. 220.
Spangle, to glitter as with spangles.
Maskers . . . spangle and glitter for a time,
but 'tis through a tmsel. — Maine, Citg Match,
Preface.
Spanieless, spaniel-bitch.
He spoke no more to the pupils nor to the
mistresses, but gave many an endearing word
to a small spanieless (if one may coin a word)
that nominally belonged to the house, but
virtually owned him as master. — Miss £rontt,
Villette, ch. xxxvi.
Spaniolate, to make Spanish : ac-
cording to the extract, a phrase of Sir
Philip Sidney's.
His jaundiced eyes could see nothing but
the Spanish element in her, or indeed in
anything else. As Cary said to him once,
using a cant phrase of Sidney's, which he
had picked up from Frank, all heaven and
earth were spaniolated to him. — Kingsley,
Westward Ho, ch. xxvii.
Spaniolize, to become a Spaniard, or
in the interests of Spain. Cf. Scotize.
He was wholly Spaniolized, which could
not be unless he were a pensioner to that
state.— Hacket, Life of Williams,!. 134.
Spanish, money (slang). The
"word" referred to in the second line
is money.
In one just at Death's door it was really
absurd
To see how her eye lighted up at that word ;
Indeed there's not one in the language that
I know,
(Save its synonyms, 'Spanish? 'Blunt,'
4 Stumpy,' and • Rhino '),
Which acts bo direct and with so much effect
On the human sensorium.
Ingoldsby Legends {Old Woman in Grey).
Spank, to strike, and so to urge.
How knowingly did he spank the hordes
along. — Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story,
oh. v.
An* 'e spanks 'is 'and into mine.
Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Spareless, unsparing. In the BattU
of Yvry, 522, Sylvester calls the Fates
" the sisters sparelesse."
Alas I could not but even die for grief,
Should I but yield mine age's sweet relief.
My bliss, my comfort, and mine ey's delight,
Into the hands of hangmen's spareless spight.
Sylvester, The Fathers, 140.
Spark, gay or bright creature. The
peculiarity in the extract is that the
word is applied to a woman.
I will wed thee
To my great widdowes daughter and sole
heire,
The louely sparke, the bright Laodice.
Chapman, Widdowes Teares, Act I.
Spark. H. says this word occurs
several times in old plays in the sense
of diamond. No example is given in
this or the other Diets. In most of the
instances that I have observed spark
seems rather to mean precious stone,
the particular species being also ex-
pressed. In the first extract Mr. Dyce
conjectures " ruby-sparks." See also
SPARK
(6n )
SPATE-BONE
extract from Pepys, s.v. Turkey-stone.
It may, however, stand for diamond in
the passage from Shirley.
I'll grace them with a chaplet made of pear),
Set with choice rubies, sparks, and diamonds.
Greene, Geo-a-Greene, p. 255.
Good madam, what shall he do with a hoop
™gf
And a spark of diamond in it ?
Massinger, The Picture, ii. 2.
This Madona invites me to a banquet for
my discourse ; t'other Bona-roba sends me a
spark, a third a ruby, a fourth an emerald. —
Shirley, Bird in a Cage, ii. 1.
For all the haft twinkled with diamond
sparks. — Tennyson, Passing of Arthur.
Spark. See extract. An American-
ism (?).
When his horse was seen tied to Van
Tassel's paling on a Sunday night, a sure
sign that his master was courting, or, as it is
termed, ** sporking " within, all other suitors
passed by in despair.— Irving, Sketch Book
(Sleepy Hollow).
Sparkify, to smarten np.
A sharp pointed hat
(Now that you see the gallants all flat-
headed)
Appears not so ridiculous, as a yonker
Without a love-intrigue to introduce
And sparkify him there.
Lord Digby, Elvira, Act III.
Sparling, the smelt. L. explains
spurling as sparling, yet does not give
the latter word.
The gilden sparli ngs, when old winter's blast
Begins to threat, themselves together cast
In heaps like balls, and heating mutually
Live, that alone of the keen cold would die.
Sylvester, Fifth day, first week, 330.
He [the Gudgeon] is a dainty fish, like or
nearly as good as the sparling. — Lauson,
Comments on Secrets of Angling, 1653 (Eng.
Garner, i. 194).
Sparrow- mouthed, large -mouthed.
See quotation, s. v. Snat-nosed.
Can you fancy that black-a-top, snub-
nosed, sparrow - mouthed (ore pralargo),
paunch-bellied creature.— Bailey's Erasmus,
p. 31.
Sparse, thinly-scattered. L. (who
gives no example) says, "The word
passes for an Americanism, but the
editor saw it full five and thirty years
ago recommended by an English writer
as a good opposite to dense." Dr.
Latham probably refers to the article
Americanisms in the Penny Cyclopaedia
published in 1833, where, however, it
is, though recommended us an opposite
to dense, distinctly stated to be an
Americanism.
The congregation was very sparse.— Reads,
Hard Cash, ch. v.
That information had somehow power
enough over Deronda to divide his thoughts
with the memories wakened among the
sparse taliths and keen dark faces of wor-
shippers.—G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. lv.
Sparsettes.
To ye masyn for royndyng of crakes and
sparsettes, and mendyog of deffawtes. —
Leverton Churchwardens1 Accounts, 1517
(Archaol., zli. 346).
Spart, the dwarf rush. In Hol-
land's Pliny, Bk. xix., the second
chapter deals with " the nature of
spart or Spanish broome."
Spase, to measure. (?)
My eleven weighed together four and a
half pounds — three to the pound ; not good,
considering I had spased many a two-pound
fish, I know.— C. Kxngsley, Letter, May, 1858.
Spasmodist, one of the spasmodic
school ; one whose work is of an
uneven, irregular character.
Mozart declared on his death-bed that he
" began to see what may be done in music ; "
and it is to be hoped that De Meyer and the
rest of the spasmodists will eventually begin
to understand what may not be done in this
particular branch of the Fine Arts.— E. A.
Poe, Marginalia, xixvii.
Spat, spawned. L. has the word as
a substantive.
With a knife they raise the small breed
[of oysters] from the Cultch ; and then they
throw the Cultch in again, to preserve the
ground for the future, unless they be so
newly svat that they cannot be safely sever'd
from the Cultch. — Defoe, Tour thro' G.
Britain, i. 9.
Spate, torrent.
In this year likewise the bridge over the
Brawl burn was built ; a great convenience
in the winter-time to the parishioners that
lived on the north side, for when there hap-
pened to be a spait on the Sunday, it kept
them from the kirk.— Gait, Annals of the
Parish, ch. xxzi.
The last tall son of Lot and Bellicent,
And tallest, Gareth, in a showerful spring
Stared at the spate.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
8pate-bone, shoulder-bone.
To humble the Cardinal's pride, some m
afterwards set up on a window a painted
Mastiff-dog gnawing the spate-bone of a
shoulder of mutton to minde the Cardinal of
his extraction, being the son of a butcher. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. i. 32.
R R 2
SPEAK
( 612 ) SPENCER WIG
Speak, speech ; utterance. Stany-
huret (j£n., Dedication), having quoted
some instances of absurd poetry, says,
" Haue not theese men made a fayre
speake f "
Spear, ear of corn.
Tell me the motes, dost, sandfly and speares
Of corn, when Summer shakes his eares.
Herrick, Noble Number*, p. 3&4.
Spec, abbreviation of speculation.
A gentleman whom you knew very well,
Malderton, before yon made that first lucky
spec of yours, called at our shop. — Sketches
by Boz {Horatio Sparkins).
He had engaged in this adventure (by
which better word our forefathers designated
what the Americans call a spec) with the
hope of increasing his fortune. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. clxxiii.
If tradesmen will run up houses on spec
in a water-meadow, who can stop them r —
Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. xxv.
Specialist, one who devotes himself
exclusively to a particular art or study.
Deronda, like his neighbours, had regarded
Judaism as a sort of eccentric fossilised
form, which an accomplished man might
dispense with studying, and leave to special-
ists.—G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxii.
Specie. In specie = in kind ; usu-
ally applied to coin as distinguished
from paper-money.
He loved me with passion ; and, as I could
not pay him in specie, I endeavoured to sup-
ply my want of affection to him by attention
and assiduities.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i.294. J * y'
Specifial, specific.
They . . . ought first to put in a specifial
charge, and the Reus or Defendant first be
called to his answer.— Racket, Life of Wil-
liams, ii. 151.
It took away the power and priviledges,
that is, not the plumes and feathers, the
remote accidents, but the very specifial form,
essence, and being of a Parliament.— /taf..
ii. 176.
Specs, a common abbreviation of
spectacles.
He wore green specs with a tortoise-shell rim.
Ingoldsby Legends (Knight and Lady),
Spectable, visible ; remarkable.
The biasing starr was not more spectable in
our horizon, nor gave people more occasion
of talke. — Tom Tell-Troath, 1622 (Harl.
Misc., ii. 424). v
Their prayers were at the corners of
streets; such corners where divers streets
met, and so more spectable to many passen-
gers.—Adams, i. 104.
Spbctrauty, anything of a spectral
nature.
What is he doing here in inquisitorial wr-
benito, with nothing bnt ghastly spectral it its
prowling round him ? — Carlyle, Life of
Sterling, Pt. I. ch. i.
Spectred, haunted with spectres or
visions.
The spectred solitude of sleep.
WoUot, P. Pindar, p. 44.
Speechifier, one who makes speeches.
This expert speechifier, this ever idle, ever
busy scamperer, our heroine despatched to
engage a neighbouring family to pay her a
morning visit the next day. — Miss Edgeworthj
Manoeuvring, ch. viii.
A county member need have very little
trouble in that way, and both out of the
House and in it is liked the better for not
being a speechifier, — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda,
ch xh'v.
Speechify, to make a speech.
Dost not see what purferment neighbour
Grogram has got ; why, man, 'tis all brought
about by his speechifying.— Foote,The Orators,
Act I.
At a political dinner everybody is disagree-
able and inclined to speechify. —-Sketches by
Bos (Public Dinners).
Speed, to kill.
[Aruns] set spurs to his horse, and ran
amain with full carreer upon the Consul bis
own person, intending certainly to speed him.
—Holland, Livy, p. 39.
Speight, a bird of the woodpecker
kind.
Eue walking forth about the forrests gathers
Speights, parrots, peacocks, ostrich scat-
tered feathers.
Sylvester, Handle Crafts, 157.
Spell. To spell at or far a thing =
to try for it in an indirect manner.
Syntax with native keenness felt
At what the cunning tradesman spelt.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. iv.
Spellable, capable of being spelt.
The book for one thing was hailed by a
universal choral blast from all manner of
reviews and periodical literatures that Europe
in all its spellable dialects had. — Carlyle,
Misc., iv. 09.
Spencer wia, a wig, presumably so
called, like the garment, after the per-
son who set the fashion.
He was dressed in a blue frock with a gold
button, a green silk waistcoat trimmed with
jgold, black velvet breeches, white silk stock-
'ingB, silver buckles, a gold -laced hat, a
spencer wig, and a sUver-hilted hanger, with
SPEND/TORE ( 613 )
SPIRITER
a fine clouded cane in his hand. — Smollett,
Roderick Random, ch. xv.
Spenditore, a treasurer or clerk : one
of several Italian words used by Roger
North as though they were English.
One single witness was produced, a sort of
clerk or spenditore. — North% Examen, p. 519.
They settled their officers, spenditores, and
architects, and each clubster was free to
suggest his whim. — Ibid., p. 575.
Spheral, pertaining to the spheres ;
planetary.
Fortune, . . . calm and aloft amongst
the other angelic powers, revolves her
spheral course, and rejoices in Iter beatitude.
—Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XIV. ch. i.
Spice-plate. H., who gives no ex-
ample, says, " It was formerly the cus-
tom to take spice with wine, and the
plate on which the spice was laid was
termed the spice-plate."
There was a void p. e. collation] of spice-
plates and wine. — Coronation of Anne Boleyn
(Eng. Garner, ii. 60).
Spidered, infested by spiders; cob-
webbed.
Content can visit the poor spidered room.
Wotcot, P. Pindar, p. 89.
Spiplicate, kill: jocose corruption
perhaps of suffocate.
So out with your whinger at once,
And scrag Jane while I spiflicate Johnny.
Ingoldsby Legends {Babes in the Wood).
Spiflication, a jocose word for an-
nihilation, or at least heavy punish-
ment (slang).
Whose blood he vowed to drink — the
Oriental form of threatening spification. —
Burton, El Medina and Meccah, l 204.
Spiournell. See extract. The
officer was so called (says Bailey) from
Galf ridus Spigurnel, who was appointed
to that office by Henry III.
These Bohuns . . . were by inheritance for
a good while the king's spigumells, that is,
the seelers of his writs. — Holland's Camden,
p. 312.
Spillsbury. To come home by
Spillsbury = to fail. There are many
phrases which pun on the names of
places. Cf. other instances «. v. Bed-
fordshire.
His Majesty bewailed that his grand-
children, then young and tender, would be
very chargeable to England when they grew
to be men. It was their sole refuge ; they
might seek their fortune in another place
and come home by Spillsbury. — Socket, Life
of Williams, i. 208.
Spilters, the small branches on
stag's head.
Such silly coxcombs . . . deserve to wear
such branched horns, such spilters and troch-
ings on their heads, as that goodly stagg
bears which you see browsing among those
trees. — Hoicell, Parly of Beasts, p. 62.
Spin, to supply continuously: so we
speak of a man spinning a yarn.
Spatious pastures, and flockes of cattell
spinning forth milke abundantly. — Holland's
Camden, p. 279.
Spindle-twirl.
About the middle of the body was a
bronze finger-ring, and a stone spindle-ticirl.
—Archaol., xxxvi. 135 (1855).
Spineless, limp ; without a spine.
A whole family of Sprites, consisting of a
remarkably stout father and three spineless
sons. — Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, iv.
Spin8TRESS, a female spinner. The
Grecian spinstress in the first extract =
Penelope ; in the second, spinstress =
a woman who has to work for her
living.
Let meaner souls by virtue be cajoled,
As the good Grecian spinstress was of old.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 10.
Your father bore title and escutcheon, but
was not your mother a chambermaid? . . .
You are a kind of Mulattoe, European on
the one side, and savage on the other ; «'. e.
a compound of gentleman and spinstress. —
Gentleman Instructed, p. 149.
Spirable, able to be breathed or in-
haled.
The spirable odor and pestilent steamo
ascending from it put him out of his bias of
congruity. — Nashe, Lenten Stvffe {Harl. Misc.,
vi. 173).
Spirit, to breathe ; inspire. See s. v.
Christed.
God hath hewn us all out of one rock,
tempered all our bodies of one clay, and
spirited our souls of one breath.— Adams, i.
83.
Spiritaties. The Italian Spiritato
= one mad or possessed with an evil
spirit.
Did we never know., before these new Illu-
minates and Spiritaties rose up, what be-
longed to the. humble seeking, the happy
finding, and holy acquaintance with God ? —
Gov den, Tears of the Church, p. 195.
Spiriter, abductor ; one who spirits
another away.
spiritl y
( 614 ) SPLENDENCY
WhUe the poor boy, half dead with fear,
Writh'd back to view his spiriter.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 257.
Spiritly, spirited.
Pride, you know, must be foremost ; and
that comes out like a Spaniard, with daring
look, and a tongue thundering out braves,
mounted on a spiritly jennet named Inso-
lence.—Adams, ii. 420.
Spiritualty. Daniel in the extract
speaks of the Pope under this title : the
UHiial term of couree is Holiness.
The King of France whom hee had excom-
municated . . . shortly after so wrought as
his Spiritualty was surprised at Anagnc.—
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 168.
Spirket, a large wooden peg. See
H. s. v. sperket.
High on the spirket there it hung.
Bloomfeld, The Horkey.
Spit, to rain slightly.
It had been " spitting n with rain for the
last half-hour, and now began to pour in
good earnest.— Sketches by Boz (Steam Ex-
cursion).
Spit. The comparison in the extracts
explains itself.
Twoo girles, . . the one as like an owle, the
other as like an urchin, as if they had beene
sprite out of the mouthes of them.— Breton.
Merry Wonders, p. 8.
Nay, I'm as like my dad, in sooth,
9 As he had spit me out onfs mouth.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque,
p. 278.
Poor child ! he's as like his own dadda as
if he were spit out of his mouth.— Farquhar,
Love and a Bottle, \.\.
Spit, to plant ; place in the ground.
Bailey gives " SpU-deep,** much ground
in depth as may be dug up in depth at
once with a spade."
Saffron ... in the moneth of July, . . . when
the heads thereof have been plucked up, and
after twenty days spitted or set againe under
mould.— Holland's Camden, p. 453.
Spit sixpences, to be thirsty. See
N. 8. v. spit white.
He had thought it rather a dry discourse ;
and beginning to spit sixpences (as his saying
was}, he gave hints to Mr. Wildgoose to stop
at the first public-house they should come to.
—Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. IV. ch. vi. '
Spits-cocked, usually written spitch-
eocked, and applied to eels split long-
wise, and broiled with egg, bread
crumbs, &c. The form of the word in
the extract seems to suggest that the
cooking took place on a spit, but this
could hardly be.
The first course consisted of a huge plat-
terful of scorpions spits-cocked.— T. Brotr*,
Works, ii. 221.
Spitting-sheet.
To bed this night, having first put up a
sputiny-sheet, which I find very convenient.
—Pepys, Nov. 21, 1662.
Spittle-man, a jail-bird ; one who
lives in the spittle.
Good Preachers that line ill (like Spittle-men)
Are perfect in the way they neuer went.
Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 26.
Splash-board, a guard in front of a
carriage for keeping off splashes.
I was his conscience, and stood on the
splash-board of his triumph-car, whispering,
Hominem memento te— Thackeray, Rounda-
bout Papers, iv.
Splashy, damp and moist.
Not far from hence is Sedgemore,awatry,
splashy place.— Defoe, Tour thro* 6. Britain,
ii. 34.
It led me aslant over the hill, through a
wide bog which would have been impassable
in winter, and was splashy and shaking even
now in the height of summer. — C Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xxviii.
Splatterdashes, leggings: usually
written spatterdashes.
A modern figure of a soldier with splatter-
dashes, a tremendous cocked hat, and a goodly
long pig-tail.—^. A. Bepton, 1832 (Arvlueol.,
xxiv. 189).
Splatter-faced, broad or flat faced.
A splatter-faced wench neither civil nor
nimble.
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. vi.
Splay-mouthed, wide - mouthed.
Dryden is quoted in the Diets, for the
substantive.
These solemn, splay-mouth'd gentlemen,
Madam, says I, only do it to improve in
natural philosophy.— T. Brown, Works, u.271.
Spleen, to dislike.
Sir T. Wentworth spleened the bishop for
offering to bring his rival into favour. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 83.
Spleened, angry ; annoyed. R. and
L. have the word = deprived of the
spleen, with a quotation from Arbuth-
not.
The author ... is manifestly spleened at
the force with which they wrote ana preached
in the controversy.— North, Examen, p. 326.
Splendency, splendour.
SPLENDIAN
(6iS )
SPONGELESS
For thyself, my Lollia,
Not lollia Paulina, nor those blazing stars,
Which make the world the apes of Italy,
Shall match thyself in sun-bnght splendency.
Machin, Dumb Knight, Act I.
Splendian, splendid (?).
From the time of his predecessor Dr.
RusseJ, that was Lord Chancellor of England,
and sat there in the days of Bdward the
fourth, and laid out much upon that place,
none that followed him, no, not Splendian
Woolsey, did give it any new addition.—
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 29.
Splendidous, splendid. The Dicta,
give splendidious as peculiar to Drayton.
Worshipful merchants, ay, and senators
too, . . ever since my arrival have detained
me to their uses by their splendidous liber-
alties. — Jonson, Fox, ii. 1.
Splendiferous, splendid or splen-
dour-bearing.
0 tyme most jovf ull, daye most spUndiferus !
The clereness of beauen now apereth vnto vs.
Bale, Enterlude of Johan Bapt.t 1538
(Harl. Misc., i. 113).
Splent, a swelling on the shank- bone
of a horse. L. has the word with a
quotation from a Farrier's Diet.; a more
classical authority will be found «. v.
Fashion.
Splice, to join ; and so, to many.
Alfred and I intended to be married in
this way almost from the first ; we never
meant to be spliced in the humdrum way of
other people. — Jftss Bronte, Villette, ch. xl.
If you advise me to be spliced, why don't
yon get spliced yourself? a handsome fellow
like you can be at no loss for an heiress. —
Lytton, What will he do with it? Bk. IV.
ch. ix.
Split, to tell a secret (slang).
Don't let Emmy know that we have split,
else she'll be savage with us. — Th. Hook, The
Xutherlands.
While his man being caught in some fact
(The particular crime I've forgotten),
When he came to be hanged for the act,
Split, and told the whole story to Cotton.
Ingoldsby Legends {Babes in the Wood).
You're afraid of my making you split upon
some of your babbling ju*t now, are you ? —
Sickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, ch. xxiv.
Split-new, brand-new.
There cannot be a greater evidence of the
deplorable ignorance of the clergy, in these
times, in the ancient records of the Church,
than their suffering Melville and his party
to obtrude upon them the Second Book of
Discipline — a split-neie democratKail system, a
very farce of novelties, never heard of before
in the Christian Church. — Bp. Sage, quoted
in Harington's Notes on Ch. of Scotland, p. 25.
Spodomantic, divining by ashes.
The poor little fellow buried his hands in
his curls, and stared fiercely into the fire, as
if to draw from thence omens of his love by
the spodomantic augury of the ancient Greeks.
— Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. vii.
Spoffish, bustling.
A little spoffish man with green spectacles
entered the room. — Sketches by Boz {Horatio
Sparkins).
He invariably spoke with astonishing
rapidity ; was smart, spoffish, and eight-and-
twenty.— Ibid. {Steam Excursion).
Spoil-paper, a scribbler.
Touching the State, Ambassadors, or Kings,
My Satyre shall not touch such sacred
things :
Nor list I purchase penance at that rate
As some Spoilt-papers have dearly done of
late.
A. Holland {Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 81).
Spoke, to put a spoke in a persons
wheel or cart = to thwart hitn, or do
him a dis-serviee.
He had a strong and a very stout heart,
And look'd to be made an emperor for't,
But the Divel did set a spoke in his cart.
Merry Drollerie, p. 224.
There's a spoke in your wheel, you stuck-up
little old Duchess. — Thackeray, Newcomes,
ch. ix.
It seems to me it would be a poor sort of
religion to put a spoke in his wheel by refus-
ing to say you don't believe such harm of
him as you've got no good reason to believe.
— G. Eliot, Middlemarchf ch. xiii.
Spondiack, spondaic, which is the
usual form, belonging to or consisting
of spondees.
Which words serve well to make the verse
all spondiacke or iambicke, but not in dactii.
— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch. xiii.
Spong, an irregular narrow projecting
part of a field (llalliwell), cf. Spaxge.
Shiloh succeeds, in a narrow southern spong
of this tribe.— Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II. ix. 13.
They dwelt from Havilah unto 8hur, . . .
a spong of ground somewhat nigh a thousand
miles, (perchance not so entire but inter-
rupted with other nations), and not bearing
a proportionable breadth. — Ibid., IV. ii. 11.
The tribe of Judah with a narrow swng
con6ned on the kingdom of Edom. — Ibid^
IV. ii. 36.
Sposgeless, without a sponge.
My sponge being left behind at the last
Hotel, I made the tour of the little town to
bny another . . . What I sought was no
more to be found than if I had sought a
SPOOL
( 616 )
SPRUCIFY
nugget of Californiau gold, bo I went sponge-
less. — Dickens ^ Uncommercial Traveller, xxv.
Spool, piece of wood to wind yarn
upon.
He continued to throw the shuttle, whilst
his little boy and wife by turns wound soools
for him. — Afiss Edgetcorth, The Dun, p. j05.
That's a spool to wind a speech on. — O.
Eliot, Felix Holt, ch. ii.
Spoon-net, a net for landing fish.
We show them where the fish lie, and then
when they've hooked them, they can't get
them out without us and the spoon-net. —
C. Kinysley, Yeast, ch. iii.
SrooNY, a simpleton. L. has the word,
but only as an adjective.
I began the process of ruining myself in
the received style, like any other spoony. —
C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xv.
Spoor, see extract.
In this drift the shield was found, being
forced to the surface by the spoor, the im-
plement used in ballasting. — Archaol. xxvii.
299 (iv. 38).
Sport, to put forward, bring into
prominence. To sport the oak or the
door is to fasten it, so that it confronts
visitors.
Stop that, 'till I see whether the door is
sported. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xiii.
Sport abimty, playfulness.
I have something within me which cannot
bear the shock of the least indecent insinu-
ation ; in the sportability of chit-chat I have
often endeavoured to overcome it. — Sterne,
Sent. Journey, The Passport.
Sport able, presentable ; natural.
By the many sudden transitions all along
from one kind and cordial passion to another,
in getting thus far on his way, he had lost
the sportable key of his voice which gave
sense and spirit to his tale. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, vi. 115.
Sportance, sport, gaiety.
Then round in a circle our sportance must
be;
Hold hands in a hornpipe, all gallant in glee.
Peele, Arraignmenl of Paris, I. i.
Sporting-pikce, plaything.
Here I am again ! a poor sporting-piece for
the great ; a mere tennis-ball of fortune. —
Richardson, Pamela, ii. 35.
Spouse-bed, marriage.
fyfovse-bed spotless laws of God allow. —
Sylvester, Eden, 669.
Spout, to pawn (slang) : the refer-
ence is to the spout or shoot down which
pawnbrokers send the pledges to their
receptacles.
The dons are going to spout the college
plate.— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch.
xxiv.
Spraint, otter's dung. See extract
«. v. Crotells.
Two or three more gentlemen, tired of
Trebooze's absurdities, are scrambling over
the rocks above in search of spraints . . .
"Over!" shouts Tom, "there's the fresh
spraint on our side." — C. Kingsley, Two Veers
Ago, ch. xviii.
Spree, frolic.
John Blower, honest man, as sailors an
aye for some spree or another, wad take me
ance to see ane Mrs. Siddons. — Scott, St.
Ronan's Well, ii. 10.
Sprig, smart, well-trimmed.
Fair Daphne, his coy Miss,
Would never like that face of his.
For all he wears his beard so sprig t
And has a fine gold perriwig.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 2$t
Springe, active.
The Squire 's pretty springe, considering
his weight. — O. Eliot, Silas Marner, ch. xi
Springing, fresh ; suddenly arising.
His Majesty likewise presently requires
the stay of the delivery of the Proxy, untfl
he had sufficient assurance for the restitution
of the Palatinate: which your Lordships
will remember to be no new or springing
condition, but the very same that is urged
before.— Hacket, Life of WUliatns, i. 183.
Springle, a trap for birds.
But the sheep-shearing came, and the bay-
season next, and then the harvest of small
. corn ; . . . aud the stacking of the fire-wood,
and netting of the woodcocks, and the sprit-
ales to be minded in the garden and by the
hedgerows, where blackbirds hop to the
molehills in the white October mornings,
and grey birds come to look for snails at the
time when the sun is rising. — Blackmort,
Lorna Doone, ch. ix.
Sprinke, smart.
A svrinke youth that as farre as his money
would serve him did pricke toward the mar-
chant. — Breton, Merry Wonders, p. 9.
SrRUciFY, to smarten.
A hood of marten skins, each side whereof
had the resemblance of an ape's face, spruci-
fied up with ears of pasted paper. — Urqukari,
Rabelais, Bk. HI. ch. xxxvii.
The hardy adventures of Rhime and
Meetre in this squeamish humoursome age,
ought to sprucifie their thoughts with all the
decorum and embellishments of language.—
Cotton, Scarronides, Preface.
SPRUNG
( 617 ) SQUINT-MINDED
RrRUNG. Aubrey gives a receipt
To cure a beast that is sprung (that is)
poisoned. — Misc., p. 138.
Spume, to foam. L. has the verb
without example. R. also gives it =
" to scour, as a fleet of warlike ships,
the sea. Our verb in all the examples
found is written spoom."
At a blow hee lustelye swapping
Thee wyne fresh spuming with a draught
8 wild vp to the bottom.
Stany hurst, JEn., i. 726.
Spurry, forked or spiked, like the
rowels of a spur.
His crested helmet grave and high had next
triumphant place
On his curl'd head, and like a star it cast a
spurry ray. — Chapman, Iliad, xix. 367.
Squab, curt ; abrupt.
We have returned a squab answer, retort-
ing the infraction of treaties. — Walpole to
Mann, iii. 125 (1756).
He immediately applied for a court-mar-
tial, but was told it was impossible now, as
the officers necessary are in Germany. This
was in writing from Lord Holderness, but
Lord Ligonier in words was more squab.
44 If he wanted a court-martial, he might go
seek it in Germany."— Ibid., iii. 338 (1759).
Squabash, to kill ; to put an end to
(slang).
Harry the Sixth who, instead
Of being squabash1 dy as in Shakespeare we've
read,
Caught a bad influenza, and died in his bed.
Ingoldsby Legends {House- Warming),
Squad, sloppy mud.
An' I coom'd neck -an -crop soomtimes
slaape down i' the squad an' the muck. —
Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Squad. See extract. The word is
Cornish.
"The first thing which I can distinctly
remember is the being set, along with a
number of children of my own age, to pick
and wash loose ore of tin mixed with the
earth, which in those days we used to call
shoad or squad. I don't know what you call
it now." "We call it squad to this day,
master," interrupted one of the miners. —
Miss Edgeworth, Lame Jervas, ch. i.
Squail, to throw at cocks ; a cruel
sport, for which Shrove Tuesday was
the great day. See extract *. v. Cock-
bread.
Squamy, scaly. Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(If arl. Misc., vi. 160) calls the herring
*' captaine of the squamy cattell." The
Diets, have squamous.
Square, to strut.
No cost was spared to set out these costly
breeches, who had girt unto them a rapyer
and dagger gilt point pendante ; as quaintly
as if some curious Florentine had trick te
them up to square it up and downe the
streets before his mistresse. — Greene, C/uip
for an Upstart Courtier, 1592 (Harl. Misc.,
v. 397).
Squareman, one who cuts and squares
stone.
How many hammermen and sqvaremen,
bakers and brewers, washers and wringers,
over this France, must ply their old daily
work, let the Government be one of terror
or one of joy. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk.
V. ch. i.
Squarish, something of a square
shape, but not precisely square.
He found a squarish hole cut in the solid
chalk.— Defoe, Tour thro1 G. Britain, i. 319.
Squatter, to waddle (?) ; to stray (?).
Take up that pity, Miss de Bassompierre ;
take it up in both hands, as you might a
little callow gosling squattering out of bounds
without leave. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch.
xxv.
Squawk, squeak.
Gerard gave a little squaick, and put his
fingers in his ears. — Reade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. xxvi.
Squeaklet, little squeak.
List to the reviews and organs of public
opinion . . . here chaunting lo-paans ; there
grating harsh thunder or vehement shrew-
mouse squeaklets, till the general ear is filled
and nigh deafened. — Carlyle, Misc., iii. 49.
Squeezable, malleable ; compress-
ible.
You are too versatile and too squeezable,
. . . you take impressions too readily. —
Savage, R. Medlicott, Bk. I. ch. ix.
Squib, to squirt ; inject.
He squibs in this parenthesis. — Fuller,
Hist, of Camb. Univ., i. 52.
Squibbish, slight ; flashy. Southey's
quotation is from Mace's Musics Monu-
ment (1676).
Nothing in this opus corresponds to Mas-
ter Mace '8 Toys or Jiggs, which are "light,
squibbish things only fit for fantastical and
easy, light-headed people." — Sou they, The
Doctor, ch. xciv.
Squint-minded, deceitful; crooked-
minded.
You and I both are far more worthy of
pardon than a great rabble of squint-minded
fellows, dissembling and counterfeit saints.
— UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxxiv.
SQUIRALITY
( 618 )
STAG
Squirality, squirearchy.
I would effectually provide .... that such
weight and iufluence be pot thereby into the
hauds of the squirality of my kingdom, as
should counterpoise what I perceive my no-
bility are now taking from them. — Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, i. 98.
Squireaok, landed, untitled gentry.
As prosperous at this moment as the Eng-
lish Peerage and Squireage. — De Morgan,
Budget of Paradoxes, p. 46.
Squirkarchical, pertaining to the
squirearchy, or the rule and power ex-
ercised by the landed interest.
The question had been really local; vis.
whether the Lansmere interest should or
should not prevail over that of the squire'
archichal families who had alone hitherto
ventured to oppose it. — Lytton, My Novel,
Bk. I. ch. z.
Squirren, a petty squire: an Irish
term. See Buckeen.
Squireens are persons who, with good long
leases or valuable farms, possess incomes
from three to eight hundred a year, who
keep a pack of hounds, take out a commis-
sion of the peace, sometimes before they can
spell (as her ladyship said), and almost
always before they know anything of law or
justice. — Miss Edgeworth, Absentee, ch. vii.
A small squireen cursed with six or seven
hundreds a year of his own, never sent to
school, college, or into the army, he had
grown up in a narrow circle of squireens like
himself.— Kingsley, Two Years J go, ch. viii.
Squirelet, petty squire. Tennyson
has squireling ; and in Ireland the word
is squireen, q. v.
The iron may be a Scottish squirelet, full
of gulosity and gigmanity ; the magnet an
English plebeian, and moving rag-and-dust
mountain, coarse, proud, irascible, imperious :
nevertheless behold how they embrace, and
iuseparably cleave to one another.— Carlyle,
Misc., iii. 56.
The family of Bodley belonged to that
class of aquirelets ... of which Devonshire iu
the days of Elizabeth was very full. — Fraser's
Mag., May 1873, p. 647.
Squiress, wife of a squire.
The oue milliner's shop was full of fat
aquiresses, buying muslin ammunition. — Lyt-
ton, Pclham, ch. vii.
Stabler, horse-keeper.
Your horses must be sent to a stabler's
(for the change-houses have no lodging for
them), where they may feed voluptuously on
straw only — Modern Account of Scotland,
1670 (Harl. Misc., vi. 141).
Tli pre came a man to the stabler (so they
call the people at Edinburgh that take in
horses to keep), and wanted to know if he
could hear of any returned horses for
England.— Defoe, Col. Jack, p. 240.
Staff. To araue from the staff to the
corner = to raise some other question
than that under discussion.
He excepts against every word of this.
First against the lineal succession, because
none of these ancient bishops taught justifi-
cation by faith alone. This is an argument
from the staff to the corner. I speak of a
succession of Holy Orders, and be of a suc-
cession of opinions. — Bramhall, ii. 94.
Staff. To have the better or teorse
end of the staff = to be getting the best
or worst of a matter.
A rief thyng it is to see feloes enough of
the self same suite, which as often as thei
see theim selfes to haue the worse end* of the
staffe in their cause, doen make their recourse
wholly vnto furious brallyng. — UdaTs Eras-
mus's Apophth., p. 340.
Miss Byron, I have had the better end of
the staff, I believe ? — Richardson, Grandison,
ii. 122.
Staff. To set down or up one" s staff
= to take up one's abode.
If Cleanthes open his shop he shall have
customers ; many a traveller there sets down
his staff. — Adams, i. 185.
There are few men now at liberty near so
wealthy as this geutleman who has done us
the honour to set up his staff of rest in our
house. — //. Brooke, Foot of Quality, i. 370.
As the evening now came on, and the two
pilgrims were much fatigued with their early
rising and long walk, they thought it best to
set up their staff at the public-house where
they had preached. — Graves, Spiritual Qttlr-
ote, Bk. VIII. ch. x.
I did not thiuk a wife was the stall where
he would set up his staff. — Walpole, Letters,
iv. 326 (1782).
Staffless, without a staff. Fuller
(Worthies, Kent) tells a story of a
noblem in from whom Queen Elizabeth
in anger snatched the white staff ; and
adds, " The Lord remained Staff-Usse
almost a day " (i. 490).
Stafford law, violence ; Lynch law :
a play upon the name. Cf. Bedford-
shire, SriLLSBURY, &c.
Among souldiers, Stafford law, martiall
law, killing or hanging, is soon learned. —
Breton, Scholar ami Souldier, p. 29.
We have unlawfully erected marshall law,
club law, Stafford laic, aud such lawless laws
as make most for treason. — Speech of Miles
Corbet, 1647 (Harl. Misc., i. 273).
Stag, to watch or dog (slang) :
metaphor from deer-stalking (?).
STAG
(619)
STANCE
So you've been stagging this gentleman
ami me, and listening, have you ?— If. Kings-
ley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. v.
Stag.
Come, my little cub, do not scorn me
because I go in stag, in buff : here1 s velvet too,
thou seest I am worth thus much in bare
velvet. — Dekker, Satiromastix (Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 141).
Stage, to go by stage-coach.
He seasons pleasure with profit ; he stages
(if I may say so) into politicks, and rides
post into business. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 546.
Stageman, an actor.
Come foorth, you witts that vaunt the
pompe of speach,
And striue to thunder from a Stage-man's
throate.
T. Brabine, 1588 {prefixed to Greene's
Menaphon).
Stagebite, a jocose name for a stage-
player.
Thou hast forgot how thou amblest in
leather pilch by a play-wagon in the high-
way, and took'st mad Jerouimo's part to get
service among the mimicks; and when the
stagerites banish'd thee into the Isle of Dogs,
thou turn'dst ban-dog, villainous Guy, and
ever since bitest. — Dekker, Satiromastix,
{Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 153).
Stagging, speculating in an unscru-
pulous way.
If the Stock-Exchange and railway stag-
ging . . . are not The World, what is ? — C.
Kinasley, Yeast, ch. ii.
Tne slipperiness, sir, of one stagging parson
ha* set rolling this very avalanche. — Ibid.,
ch. xn.
Stag-horn. See extract.
With that plant which in our dale
We call stag-horn or fox's tail,
Their rusty hats they trim.
Wordsworth, Idle Shepherd- Boys.
Stain, to excel ; make poor by con-
trast.
O voice that doth the thrush in shrillness
stain. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 358.
That Virgil's verse hath greater grace
In forrayne foote obtaynde
Than iu his owu, who whilst he lyaed
Eche other poets staynde.
(Jooge, Epitaphe of Fhayre.
Stair, sedge ; course grass. See Pea-
cock's Manley and Corringham Glos-
sary, s. v. Star-thadc.
Item in marisco potest dominus habere
ft air pro coopertura domorum. — Taxation of
rrtbeid of Utskeff(Arch., i. 175).
Stairy, ascending by stairs ; gradu-
ated.
With wooden galleries in the church that
they have, and stayry degrees of seats in them,
they make as much roome to sit and heare
as a newe west-end would have done.—
JVashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 152).
Staked, tethered.
His mind was so airy and volatile, he could
not have kent his chamber, if he must needs
be there, staked down purely to the drudgery
of the law. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
i. 15.
Stalkoes. See extract.
Soft Simon had reduced himself to the
lowest class of stalkoes or walking gentlemen,
as they are termed ; men who have nothing to
do, and no fortune to support them, but who
style themselves esquire. — Miss Edgeworth,
Rosanna, ch. iii.
Stall, to forbear a debt for a time ;
to allow it to be paid by instalments.
That he might not be stuck on~ground, he
petition 'd that his Majesty would stall bis
fine, and take it up, as his estate would bear
it, by a thousand pounds a year. — Hacket,
Life of Williams, ii. 128.
Stall, to surfeit.
Mathematicks he moderately studieth to
his great contentment ; using it as a ballast
for his soul, yet to fix it, not to stall it. —
Fuller, Holy State, II. vii. 6.
Some men's speeches are like the high
mountains in Ireland, having a durty bog in
the top of them ; the very ridge of them in
high words having nothing of worth, but
what rather stalls than delights the audi tour.
— Ibid., III. xi. 8.
Staller. See extract.
Tovy, a roan of great wealth and authority,
as being the King's Staller (that is, Standard-
Bearer), first founded this Town. — Fuller,
Waltham Abbey, p. 6.
Stampede, a flight or rush : origin-
ally applied to a rush of horses or
other animals seized with panic.
So all the people, Sheila learned that
night, were going away from London ; and
soon she and her husband would join in the
general stamjxde of the very last dwellers in
town. — Black, Princess of Thule, ch. xviii.
Stampers, feet (slang).
Strike up, piper, a merry merry dance,
That we on our stampers may foot it and
prance. — Broome, Jovial Crew, Act I.
Stance, stave or stanza, which Italian
word is commoner than the French.
The Phcebades sing the first Stance of the
second song. — Chapman, Masque of Mid.
Temple.
STANCE
( 620 )
STARK
Stance, place ; standpoint In the
extract from Goscoigne it seems to
mean a standing quarrel.
Since I can do no better, I will set such a
staunce between him and Pasiphalo that all
this town shall not make them friends. —
Gascoigne, Supposes, ii. 3.
He fetched a gambol upon one foot, and,
turning to the left hand, failed not to carry
his body perfectly round, just into its former
stance. — UrquharCs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxxv.
The boy answered his invitation with the
utmost confidence, and danced down from
his stance with a galliard sort of step. —
—Scott, Kenilworth, i. 184.
Stanchnbss, reserve.
His Majesty would not that you should
press him for a note of his hand for secrecy
and stanchness, . . . but only by word to
refresh his memory of the faithful promises
he hath made in that point to the king. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 157.
Standard, a standing bowl, or large
drinking cup.
Frolic, my lords ; let all the standards walk,
Fly it, till every man hath ta'en his load.
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p. 141.
Stand-far-off, a coarse stuff. N.
has stand-further-qff 'in the same sense,
with quotation from Taylor, the water-
poet.
False miracles, . . . like the stnffe called
Stand-farre-off, must not have the beholder
too near, lest the coursnesse thereof doth
appeare. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., vi. p. 332.
In my child-hood there was one [cloth]
called Stand-far-off (the embleme of Hypo-
crime), which seemed pretty at competent
distance, but discovered its coarseness when
nearer to the eye. — Ibid., Worthies, Norwich,
Stanty.
These precarious and poor Associating^ of
Ministers are but a setting up a stanty hedge,
instead of a good quick-set or a brick-wall,
for the fense of Christ's vineyard. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 438.
Stanzo, stanza. In the second ex-
tract it = a song of more than one
stanza ; a stave.
Euerie stanzo they pen after dinner is full
poynted with a stabbe. — Nashe, Introd. to
Greene's Menaphon, p. 15.
Hee . . . sung a stanzo to this effect.-
Greene, Menaphon, p. 25.
Star.. See extract.
Stella a stando dicitvr. A star, quasi not
stir, further than the orb carries it. — Adams,
i. 455.
Starchy, stiff ; formal.
Nothing like these starkly doctors for
vanity! It was as I thought; he cared
much less for her portrait than his own. — G.
Eliot, Middlemarcn, ch. xxii.
Star-clark, an astronomer.
Sith the least star that we peroeiue to shine
Aboue, disperst in th' arches crystalline
(If, at the least, star-clarks be credit worth),
Is eighteene times bigger than all the earth.
Sylvester, Third day, first «*»*«, 494.
Star-divine, an astronomer.
Nor can I see how th* earth and sea should
feed
So many stars, whose greatnes doth exceed
So many times (if Star-Divines say troth)
The greatnes of the earth and ocean both.
Sylvester, Fourth day, first weeke, 134.
Stare. As like as he can stare =
extremely like.
His loving mother left him to my care,
Fine child, as like his Dad as he could stare.
Gay, The what d'ye call it, i. 1.
Stares, a person stared at.
There was a wild oddity in her countenance
which made one stare at her, and she was
delighted to be stared at —especially by me—
so we were mutually agreeable to each other
— I as starer, and she as staree. — Miss Edge-
worth, Belinda, ch. iii.
Star full, starry.
Melchisedec, God's sacred Minister,
And King of Salem, corns to greet him there,
Blessing his bliss, and thus with lealous cry
Devoutly pearc't Heav'n's starfull canopey.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 889.
Star-gazer, astronomer. The word
is not now, I think, used in an honour-
able sense, but rather of an astrologer.
North is spe.-iking of Flams tead, the
astronomer- royal.
His lordship received him with much
familiarity, and encouraged him to come and
see him often. . . . The star-gazer was not
wanting to himself in that ; and his lordship
was extremely delighted with his accounts
and observations about the planets. — North,
Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 253.
Staring of hair, hair on end. H.
quotes the expression from Florio.
The second extract is a translation of
" Obstupui, steieruntque comce, et vox
femribus Iwesit"
His cap born up with staring of his hair.
Sackville, Induction, st. 34.
I was amaz'd, struck speechless, and my hair
On end upon my head did wildly stare.
Cot ton7 s Montaigne, ch. xiv.
Stark, to stiffen.
Arise, if horror have not stark'd your
limbs. — Tayhr, St. Clement's Eve, v, 5.
STARK
( 621 ) STAY-AT-HOME
Stark, naked. Stark naked is a
common expression for entirely naked,
from which, by a little confusion, Wal-
pole, I suppose, derived his use of the
word.
There is a court dress to be instituted (to
thin the drawing-rooms), stiff-bodied gowns
and bare shoulders, what dreadful dis-
coveries will be made both on fat and lean !
I recommend to you the idea of Mrs. O.
when half -stark. — Walpole, Letters, ii. 346
(1762).
Madame du Deffand came to me the
instant I arrived, and sat by me whilst I
stripped and dressed myself; for, as she
said, since she cannot see, there was no harm
in my being stark. — Ibid., iv. 25 (1775).
Starken, to stiffen.
There is a voice calls thee, but not to reign,
The voice of her thou fain would'st take to
wife;
An excommunicated wretch she is
Ev'n now, and if thy lust of kingly power
Outbid thine other lusts, and starken thee
In grasping of that shadow of a sceptre
That still is left thee, 'tis a dying voice.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iv. 4.
Starrift, to mark with a star : the
following occurs in a " description of a
gallant horse."
Great foaming mouth, hot fuming nosthrill
wide,
Of chestnut hair, his forehead starryjCd.
Sylvester, Handie-Crafts, 413.
Start, tail or handle.
For . . . mending ye start of ye sanctus
bell ixd — Leverton, Churchwardens' Accounts,
1512 (Arch., xli. 344).
Startful? easily startled ; frightened.
Affectation is the virgin referred to in
the first extract
Say, virgin, where dost thou delight to
dwell?
With maids of honour, startful virgin ?
Woleot, P. Pindar, p. 174.
Stung with too keen a sympathy, the Maid
Brooded with moving lips, mute, startful,
dark. — Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
State, to keep state ; to be difficult
of access. Cf. "Our hostess keeps
her state M (Macbeth, I. iv.). Fuller
tells a story of a noble spendthrift
who reformed, owing to the mortifica-
tion he felt at being kept waiting a
long time by an Alderman, who had
made a great deal out of him. The
historian adds,
I could wish that all Aldermen would State
it on the like occasion, on condition their
noble Debtors would but make so good use
thereof.— Fuller, Worthies, Sussex (ii. 391).
Wolsey began to state it at York as high
as ever. — Ibid., Ch. Hist., V. ii. 4.
State, to establish ; to settle.
" To receive the adoption of children " is
to be stated in all that is good. — Andre toes,
i. 57.
But the name " Lord " goeth yet further,
not only to save us and set us free from
danger, to deliver us from evil ; but to state
us in as good and better condition than we
forfeited by our fall,— Ibid., i. 79.
Statesman, a North-country name
for a small land-owner or yeoman.
The old Westmoreland statesman (for such
he was) joined the group. . . . The West-
moreland yeoman and farmer was too sub-
stantial a customer to be refused. — Mrs.
Trollope, Michael Armstrong, ch. xxvii.
Statistic, statistician. R., who has
statistic ana statistical, says, " Statis-
tick (Fr. statisque) is a word for which
we are said to be indebted to a living
writer. Statisticks is applied to every-
thing that pertains to a state — its
population, soil, produce, &c." He
only illustrates the word statistical,
and that with an extract from Knox's
sermons. The earliest, and indeed the
only example of statistician in L. is
from Hallam'8 Middle Ages.
Henley said you were the best statistic in
Europe.— Sovthey, 1804 (Mem. of Taylor of
Norwich, i. 508).
Statize, to meddle in state affairs.
Secular . . . mysteries are for the know-
ledge of statizina Jesuits. — Adams, ii. 168.
Statueless, without a statue.
The drapeau blanc is floating from the
statueless column. — Thackeray, Roundabout
Papers, xix.
Statuize, to commemorate by a
statue.
James II. did also statuize himself in cop-
per.— Misson, Travels in Engn p. 309.
Statute-lace.
Master lawyer, pity me ; for surely, sir, I
was fain to lay my wife's best gown to pawn
for your fees: when I looked upon it, sir,
and saw how handsomely it was daubed
with statute-lace, ... I fell on weeping.—
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p. 124.
Stay -at -home, one who keeps at
home ; a house-dove : used also adjec-
tivally.
A talking pretty young woman like Miss
Crawford is always pleasant society to an
STEADABLE
( 622 ) STERNHOLDIANISM
indolent, stay -at- home man. — Miss Austen,
Mansfield Park, ch. v.
Go forth to find us stay -at- homes new
markets for our ware. — Kingsley, Westward
Ho, ch. xv.
"Cold!" said her father, "what do ye
stay-at-homes know about cold?" — Mrs.
Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. ir.
Stead able, serviceable. See another
extract from the same writer s. v. Pro-
moval.
I have succoured and supplied him with
men, money, friendship, and: counsel, upon
any occasion wherein I could be sUadable for
the improvement of his good. — UrquharVs
Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxviii.
Steady, a stithy or anvil. See Stiddy.
Job saith, Stetit cor ejus stent incus : His
heart stood as a steady.— Jewel, i. 523.
Steedyokes, reins. Hector is de-
scribed as appearing to JEneaa in a
vision, " Harry ed in steed yocks as of
earst" (Stany hurst, A5?i., ii. 279).
Steepful, steep.
Anon he stalks about a steepful rock.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 828.
Stkepish, rather steep.
I was suddenly, upon turning the corner of
a steepish downy field, in the midst of a retired
little village.— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park,
ch. xxv.
Steeple-fair. N. gives this as "a
fair at which servants were hired." In
the extracts it is applied to the simoni-
acal mart.
Thou servile fool, why couldst thou not
repair
To buy a benefice at steeple-fair ?
Hall, Satires, II. v. 8.
Are not you the young drover of livings
Academico told me of that haunts steeple-
fairs?— Return from Parnassus, iv. 2 (1606).
Steeple- hunting, steeple - chasing,
which more usual form is in L.
I have known few creatures whom it was
more wasteful to send forth with the bridle
thrown up, and to sot to steeple-hunting y in-
stead of running on highways. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, ch. v.
Stekrling, a young steer or bullock.
To get thy steerling, once again
I'll play thee such another strain.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 261.
Stelliscript, that which is written
in the stars.
One important rule is to be observed in
peruxing this great stelliscript. He who de-
sires to learn what good they prefigure must
read them from West to Bast ; but if he
would be forewarned of evil, he most rea \
from North to West ; in either case beginnia^
with the stars that are most vertical to him.
— Southey, The Doctor, ch. xcv.
Stem, to foul ; knock against.
like two great caraques in a fool sea, they
never met in counsel but they stemmed one
another.— Hacket, Life of William^ i. 132.
Stkmly, well-grown (?).
Then followed them Detraction and Deceit* ;
Sym Swash did beare a buckler for the first.
False Witnesse was the seconde sternly page.
Gascoigne, Steele Glas, p. 51.
Stenchful, full of bad smells.
The thick and foggy air of this sinful
world, as the smoke and stenchful mists ovtr
some populous cities, can soon sully the soul.
— Adams, ii. 66.
Stenograph, a writing in short-hand.
I saw the reporters' room, in which th«?y
redact their hasty stenographs. — Emerson,
Eng. Traits, ch. xv.
Stentorious, loud ; like the voice of
Stentor.
They will remember the loudness of his
stentorious voice.— Fuller, Ch. Hist.,X. iv. 64.
Stercorated, dunged or manured.
It savoured of the earth, he said, if not
of something worse, to have a man's miud
always grovelling in mould, stercorated or
unstercorated. — Scott, Pirate, i. 68.
Stereometry, measurement of solid
bodies.
It is an easie matter to recti fie weights,
&c., to cast up all, and resolve bodies by
Algebra, Stereometry. — Burton, Democ. to
Reader, p. 67.
Sternelesse, rudderless.
The prime of youth whose greene vnmel-
lowde yeares
With hoysed head doth checke the lof tie
skies,
And sette8 vp sayle, and sternelesse ship
ysteares,
With winde and waue at pleasure sure it
flies. — Gosson, p. 76.
Sternfully, sternly. See extract
*. v. Flail.
Sternholdianism, prosaicism : the
reference of course is to Sternhold,
the old translator of the Psalms. The
extract is from Bobberds's Memoir of
Taylor of Norwich, i. 99.
There is scarcely so nice a line to distin-
guish as that which divides true simplicity
from flatness and Sternholdianism (if I may
be allowed to coin a word). — Sir W. Scott,
1797.
STERT
( 623 )
STIFF
Stert, start : in the extract it means
distance.
Indeede he dwelleth hence a good stert I
confesse,
But yet a quicke messanger might twice
since, as I gesse,
Haue gone and come againe.
Udal, Roister Doister, iv. 5.
Stertorous, breathing heavily.
Sterling (see extract s. v. Environment)
classes this among the words in Sartor
Resartus " without any authority." It
is not uncommon now, but it does not
appear in R. , and Carlyle is the earliest
authority for it in L.
That hum, I say, like the 'stertorous,
unquiet slumber of sick life, is heard in
Heaven. — CarlyU, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I.
ch. iii.
Stethoscope, to examine the chest
by the aid of the instrument so called.
You wish me to submit to be stethoscoped.
— Savage, R. Medlicott, Bk. I. ch. xvi.
Stevedore, one who stows goods in
a ship's hold (Span, estivador).
The Scandinavian fancied himself sur-
rounded by Trolls, a kind of gobliu men with
vast power of work and skilful production —
divine stevedores, carpenters, reapers, smiths,
and masons. — Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. v.
Stewed, belonging to the stews.
0 Aristippus, thou art a greate medler with
this woman, beyng a stewed strumpette. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apopkth., p. 66.
Stick, a lot of twenty-five eels.
A bind of eels consists of ten sticks, and
every stick of twenty-five eels. — Archaol.,
xv. 357 (1806).
Stick, a dull or stupid person.
a You . . . will go and many, I know you
will, some stick of a rival." . . u I hope I shall
never marry a stick"— Miss Edyeworth, Be-
linda, ch. xz.
1 was surprised to see Sir Henry such a
stick ; luckily the strength of the piece did
not depend upon him. — Miss Austen, Mans-
field Park, ch. xiii.
The poor old stick used to cry out, " Oh
you villains child*," and then we sermonised
her on the presumption of attempting to
teach such clever blades as we were, when
she was herself so ignorant. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xvii.
Stick. To cut one's stick is a slang
expression = to run away. See quota-
tions *. w. Chalks, Rat.
All which remained for a decayed poet
was respectfully to cut his stick, and retire.
— De Quincey, Roman Meals.
Stick and stone, completely; root
and branch. Cf. Stock and block.
Stick is also used by itself in this way.
So in fine were thei beaten doune, their
citee taken, spoiled, and destroied bothe
sticke and stone. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 215.
We brake down the pier of the haven of
Perth, and burnt every stick of it. — Expetli-
tion in Scotland, 1544 (Eng. Garner, i. 120).
And this it was she swore, never to marry
But such an one whose mighty arm could
carry
(As meaning me, for I am such a one)
Her bodily away through stick and stone.
Beaum. and Fl., Knt. of B. Pestle, ii. 1.
For troops, like Richmond, that on valour
feast,
May, like wild meteors, pour into mine east,
And leave my palace neither stick nor
stone.— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 90:
Stick-in-the-mud, a slow fellow or
bungler.
This rusty-coloured one is that respect-
able old stick-in-the-mud, Nicias. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. x.
Stickle-haired, rough-haired.
Their dogs . . that seme for that purpose
are stickle-haired, and not villi ke to the Irish
grayhounds.— Sandys, Travels, p. 76.
Sticks and staves. To go to sticks
and staves = to go to pieces ; be ruined.
Cf. Noggin - staves. To beat all to
sticks = to completely surpass.
She married a Highland drover or tacks-
man, I can't tell which, and they went all to
sticks and staves.— Miss Ferrier, Inheritance,
i. 95.
Many ladies in Strasburg were beautiful, still
They were heat all to sticks by the lovely
Odille.— Ingoldsby Legends (St. Odille).
Stick the point, to settle the matter.
Fuller, after quoting a joint opinion
from Cotton, Selden, Spelman, and
Camden, adds,
This quaternion of subscribers have sticltn
the point dead with me that all antient Eng-
lish monks were Benedictines.— Fuller, Ch.
Hist., vi. p. 268.
Stiddy, a forge; a stithy. See
Steady.
Their habergions like stiddies stithe they
baire. — Hudson's Judith, iii. 225.
James Torke, a blacksmith, ... is a serv-
ant as well of Apollo as Vulcan, turning his
stiddy into a study. — Fuller, JVortlties,
Lincoln (ii. 24).
Stiff. To do a bit of stiff = to
accept or cash a bill — paper represent-
ing money, as a promissory bill, &c, is
STIFF
( 624)
STOCKINET
called 8tiff as distinguished from cash
which is hard.
I wish you'd do me a bit of stiff, and just
tell your father if I may overdraw my ac-
count I'll vote with him.— Thackeray, New
comes, ch. vi.
Stiff, to be stiff ; to persevere.
But Dido affrighted stift also in her ob-
stinat onset.— Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 090.
Stiff-girt, obstinate.
He, stiffe-girt and inexorable, went with
a short turn out of the Church.— Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 246.
Stiffler, stickler.
The drift was, as I judged, for Dethick to
continue such stiffiers in the College of his
pupils, to win him in time by hook or crook
the master's room. — Abp. Parker, p. 252.
Stile. To help over a stile, or a
lame dog over a stile = to help over a
difficulty.
But for this horrid murder vile
None did him prosecute.
His old friend helped him o'er tlie stile ;
With Satan who'd dispute?
Prior, The Viceroy.
Lady 8m. The girl's well enough, if she
had but another nose.
Miss. O, Madam, I know I shall always
have your good word; you love to help a
lame dog over the stile. — Swift, Polite Con-
versation (Oonv. i.).
I can show my money, pay my way, eat
my dinner, kill ray trout, hunt my hounds,
help a lame dog over a stile (which was Mark's
phrase for doing a generous thing), and thank
God for all. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch.
xxv.
Stiltify, to heighten as on stilts.
Skinny dwarfs ye are, cushioned and stil-
tifed into great fat giants. — Beade, Cloister
and Hearth, ch. lxv.
Stimulative, a stimulant; an in-
centive.
Then there are so many stimulatives to
such a spirit as mine in this affair, besides
love. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i. 225.
Stinch, to stanch.
First, the blood must bee stinched, and
howe was that done ?— Breton, Miseries of
Mauillia, p. 39.
Stipendiate, to pay.
All the sciences are taught in the vulgar
French by professors stipendiated by the
greate Cardinal.— Evelyn, Diary, Sept. 14,
1644.
Stire. See quotation.
The Athenaeum critic plays the master
with me, and tops his part. " It is clear,"
he says, " from every page of this book that
the author does not, in vulgar parlance, thick
small beer of himself." ... I am more in-
clined, as my master insinuates, to think
strong beer of myself, crww, Burton, Audi:
ale, old October, what in his parlance used
to be called stingo or . . . stire, cokaghee
or foxwhelp, a beverage as much better
than champagne as it is honester, whole-
somer, and cheaper. Or Perry, the Teijp-
ton -Squash. These are right old English
liquors, and I like them all. — Sauthey, TU
Doctor, Interchapter xvi.
Stirless, motionless.
Voiceless and viewless, stirless and word-
less, he kept his station behind the pile of
flowers. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxix.
Stitch. To go a good stitch = to
£0 a good way ; to go thorough stit*h,
t. e. (in modern slang) the whole huir,
is a common expression in our old
writers.
I promise you, said he, von have gone a
good stitch: you may well be aweary; sit
down.— Bunyan, Pilgrim's Progress, ii. 148.
Stithy-man, a smith.
The subtle stithy-man that lived whilere.
Hall, Satires, II- i. 44.
Stive. The usual meaning of this
word is to cram or stuff, but H. gives
as one of its significations, "To walk
energetically {North). Mr. Hunter
says, to walk with affected stateli-
ness." But perhaps in the extract
stive is a' slip of the pen or of the press
for stie.
This Saint of Falconers [S. Tibba] doth
stive so high into the air that my industry
can not flye home after the same. — Fuller,
Worthies, Rutland (ii. 242).
Stock and block, everything: in
the original, sors et tisura, capital and
interest. Cf. Stick and stone.
Before I came home I lost all, stock and
block. — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 181.
Stock-blind, blind as a stock ; stone-
blind.
True lovers are blind, stock-blind. — Wych-
erley, Country Wife, ii. 1.
Stock father, progenitor.
These [Veneticse] Strabo supposeth to
have been the founders and stockfathers of
the Venetians. — Holland's Camden, ii. 231.
Stockinet, some material of which
pantaloons were formerly made.
The tall gentleman in the stockinet pan-
taloons played billiards with uncommon skill.
— Th, Hook, The Sutherland*.
Do we crowd to see Mr. Macready in the
ST0CK1NGER ( 625 )
STOJS/EJUG
new tragedy, or Mademoiselle Elssler in her
last new ballet, and flesh-coloured stockinnet
pantaloons, out of a pure love of abstract
poetry and beauty ?— Thackeray, Paris Sketch
*Etook, ch. xvi.
Stockinger, a stocking-weaver.
The robust rural Saxon degenerates in the
mills to the Leicester stockinger. — Emerson,
-C«y- Traits, ch. z.
Some of our labourers and stockinger 3 as
used never to come to church, come to the
cottage. — G. Eliot, Amos Barton, ch. i.
Stocking - feet, without shoes on:
the phrase is not peculiar to Scotland.
Stoc)ciri-feeting8 is given in Peacock's
Jifanley and Vorringham Glossary.
Binnie found the Colonel in his sitting-
room, arrayed in what are called in Scotland
his stocking-feet. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch.
viii.
Stock ingless, without stockings.
They were all slip-shoed, stockingless some,
only under-petticoated all. — Richardson, CI.
Marlowe, viii. 156.
Stocks. To have something on the
stocks, i. e. in preparation ; a metaphor
taken from ship-building.
I am told Mr. Dryden has something of
this nature new upon the stocks. — T. Brown,
Works, iv. 42.
Stocky. H. gives the word as mean-
ing "stout." with a quotation from
Addison ; but in the first extract it
means stumpy, and in the second,
headstrong.
It is the fault of their forms that they
grow stocky, and the women have that dis-
advantage— few tall slender figures of flow-
ing shape, but stunted and thick-set persons.
— Emerson, Eng. Traits, ch. iv.
He was a boy whom Mrs. Hackit in a
severe mood had pronounced stocky (a word
that etymologically, in all probability, con-
veys some allusion to an instrument of
punishment for the refractory); but seeing
him thus subdued into goodness, she smiled
at him. — G. Eliot, Amos Barton, ch. v.
Stooged, set fast in the mire. The
first quotation is the motto to ch. v. of
Kingsley's Westward Ho.
It was among the ways of good Queen Bess,
Who ruled as well as ever mortal can, sir,
When she was stogged and the country in a
mess
She was wont to send for a Devon man, sir.
West Country Song.
They'll ... be stogged till the day of judg-
ment ; there are bogs in the bottom twenty
fet>t deep. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. v.
Stoker, one who attends to the fire
in an engine-room, &c. The only ex-
ample in R. and L. is from Green's
poem, The Spleen (1754). Noble wrote
towards the end of the last century,
but he seems to have met with the word
in some seventeenth-century authority.
John Okey Esq.'s origin was very obscure ;
the only account of him before the civil war
broke out is that he was first a drayman,
then a stoaker in a brew-house at Islington.
— Mark Noble, Lives of the Regicides, ii. 104.
Stomach, to encourage.
When He had stomached them by the Holy
Ghost to shoot forth His word without fear,
He went forward with them by His grace,
conquering in them the prince of this world.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 313.
Stomach-timber, food. Prior's lines
are —
The strength of every other member
Is founded on your belly-timber.
In Combe's time, it may be presumed,
belly had come to be reckoned a coarse
word.
As Prior tells, a clever poet, . . .
The main strength of every member
Depends upon the stomach-timber.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. vii.
Stomp, to stump : antiquated spelling
adopted in extract through stress of
rhyme.
And then will the flaxen-wigged image
Be carried in pomp
Thro* the plain, while in gallant procession
The priests mean to stomp.
Browning, Englishman in Italy.
Stone. To take a stone up in the ear
= to become a prostitute.
My spouse, alas! must flaunt in silks no
more,
Pray heaven for sustenance she turn not
whore;
And daughter Betty too, in time, I fear,
Will learn to take a stone up in her ear.
T. Brown, Works, i. 60.
Madam, I much rejoice to hear
You'll take a stone up in your ear ;
For I'm a frail transgressor too.
Ibid., ii. 92.
Stone-dead, quite dead.
For the contagion was so violent
(The wil of Heau'n ordaining so the same)
As often strook stone-ded incontinent.
Davies, Humour's Heauen on Earth, p. 47.
Stone-jug, thieves' slang for a prison.
See quotation s. v. Mill. The Gr.
ickpapoc, had the same double meaning.
" Stone doublet" is Urquhart's transla-
tion of the Fr. " jrrison" in fiabelain,
Bk. IV. ch. xii.
6 S
STONE-PRIEST ( 626 )
STORM
H Six weeks and labour/' replied the elder
girl, with a flaunting laugh ; " and that's
better than the stone jug anyhow. "Sketches
by Boz (Prisoners1 Van).
I will sell the bed from under your wife's
back, and send you to the stone-pug. — Beads,
Never too late to mend, eh. lxxxii.
Stone - priest, a lascivious priest.
So stone-horse = a Btallion.
But ne'er hereafter let me take you
With wanton love-tricks, lest I make you
Example to all stone-priests ever,
To deal with other men's loves never.
Grim the Collier, Act Y.
The villainous vicar is abroad in the chase
this dark night : the stone-priest steals more
venison than half the county. — Merry Devil
of Edmonton (Dodsley,0. P/.,xi. 155).
Stone-still, still as a stone : stock-
still is commoner.
The Bemora fixing her feeble horn
Into the tempest-beating vessel's stern,
Stayes her stone-still.
Sylvester, Fifth day, first week, 434.
Loue will
Part of the way be mett, or sitt stone-still.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 451.
Stonipied, petrified.
Wilkes of stone, a shell-fish stonified. —
Holland's Camden, p. 363, margin.
Stool, root
Vines shoot strongly from the stool, and
are not easily eradicated.— Archaol., iii. 91
(1775).
Stool, to shoot out.
I worked very hard in the copse of young
ash with my bill-hook and a shearing-knife,
cutting out the saplings where they stooled
too close together. — Btackmore, Lorna Doone,
ch. xxxviii.
Stoop, a pillar.
You glorious martyrs, you illustrious stoovs,
That once were cloistered in your flesnly
coops
As fast as I, what rhet'ric had your tongues ?
Quarles, Emblems, v. 10.
Dalhousie of an old descent,
My chief, my stoup, my ornament.
Allan Ramsay.
Stoop. To give the stoop = to yield ;
to knock under.
O that a king should give the stoop to such
as these.— Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 186.
Stop. Stop-hounds were dogs trained
to hunt slowly, and to stop as soon as
the huntsman threw down his pole.
The meaning of the extract seems to
be that if any Christians show zeal, the
rest try to restrain him.
Do we think He ever will digest us in the
temper we are in, which (to confess the
truth of the fashionable Christian), what is it
but a state of neutrality, incufferency, or
such a mediocrity as will just serve the time,
satisfy law, or stand with reputation of
neighbours? Beyond which, if any step a
little forward, do not the rest hunt upon the
stop? — Ward, Sermons, p. 91.
Stop-game, the end of the game (?) ;
a conclusion.
No violence and injustice can be proper to
usher in true Christian Religion and Reform-
ation: these methods have made them so
stunted and ricketly that they are come to
a stop-game. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 566.
Stop-gap, something that answers a
temporary purpose.
A bit of ink and paper, which has long
been an innocent wrapping or stop-gap, may
at last be laid open under the one pair of
eyes which have knowledge enough to turn
it into the opening of a catastrophe. — G.
Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xli.
Stopperlkss, without stoppers.
The stopperless cruets on the spindle-
shanked sideboard were in a miserably
dejected state. — Dickens, Uncommercial Tra-
veller, xxii.
Stopple, to cork up : the Diets, only
give the substantive.
A man, once young, who lived retired
As hermit could have well desired,
His hours of study closed at last,
And finish'd his concise repast,
SUnmled his cruise, replaced his book
mtnio its customary nook.
Cowper, Moralizer Corrected.
Stop-ship, the fish remora.
O Stop-ship say, say how thou can'st oppose
Thyself e alone against so many foes ?
O tell vs where thou do'ost thine anchors
hide,
Whence thou resistest sayls, owers, wind,
and tide Y
Sylvester, Fifth day, first weeke, 444.
Stobie8-han, authority for a story.
Fuller, quoting a Mr. Parker for some
assertion, says, " I tell you my story
and my stories-man.11 — Worthies, Hunt-
ingdon (i. 469).
Storm, to take by assault The
extract refers this use of the word to
the time of the Great Rebellion ; the
earliest instance in the Diets, is from
Dryden.
We have brought those exotic words plttn-
drina and storming, and that once abominable
word excise, to be now familiar among them.
— Ho well, Parly of Beasts, p. 37.
STORMLESS
( 627 )
STRAPPER
Stormless, calm ; without a storm.
Oar waking thoughts
Suffer a stormless shipwreck in the pools
Of sullen slumber, and arise again
Disjointed. — Tennyson, Harold, v. 1.
Stot, to stump or tramp.
They slotted along side by side. — Miss
Ferrier, Inheritance, li. 367.
Stoter, to stumble ; here perhaps =
to have foot-rot.
He'd tell what bullock's fate was tragick
So right, some thought he dealt in magick ;
And as well knew, by wisdom outward,
What ox must fall, or sheep be stotered.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, canto 1.
Stothe stones. H. gives "stothe,
a post or upright of a wall."
ii alter stones for stothe stones. — Leverton
Churchwarden's Accounts, 1566 (Archaol., xli.
364).
Stounding, crushing ; stunning.
Your wrath, weak boy ? Tremble at mine,
unless
Retraction follow close upon the heels
Of that late stounding insult.
Keats, Otho the Great, iv. 2.
Stouph, hot bath (Ital. stufa). Cf.
Stuplk.
It was nothing else but a Stouph or bote
house begunne by the Romanes, who . . . used
Bathes exceeding much. — Holland's Camden,
p. 681.
Stout, strong beer. R. illustrates
from Somerville, and L. from a poem
of Swift's written in 1720. In an
edition of Swift 1744 the editor ap-
pends a note, "cant word for strong
beer." It was in use, however, towards
the end of the previous century.
The genius of the land throughout
Being much like a large bowl of stout.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, canto 1.
Stoutish, rather fat or stout
At the bottom of the room sat a stoutish
man of about forty. — Sketches by Bos (Parlour
Orator).
Stoveing, a term in sailmaking, to
signify the heating of the bolt-ropes, so
as to make them pliable.
light upon some Dutchmen, with whom
we had good discourse touching stoveing, and
making of cables.— Pepys, Feb. 13, 1664-65.
Stowaway, one who hides or stows
himself away in a vessel, and does not
appear until she is on her voyage, so as
to obtain a free passage.
The large number of stowaways who arrive
at Liverpool in Atlantic steamers give some
notion of the bad times prevalent in New
York. Two of these stowaways were taken
before the local magistrates hist week, and
fined £5 and costs each, with the alternative
of two months' hard labour.— Leeds Mercury,
Oct. 28, 1877.
Straight-hearted, narrow-hearted :
should be spelt strait-hearted.
Another is sordid, unmerciful (here Trim
waved his right hand), a straight-hearted,
selfish wretch, incapable either of private
friendship or public spirit. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, ii. 47.
Strain, to distrain.
They are so very fierce that they will strain
every third day, till they have the £800 and
the use ; and as they order the matter, every
straining comes to twenty pound with charges
and fees. — Letter, a.d. 1650, in Whitaker's
Hist, of Craven, p. 303.
Strait - handed, niggardly ; close-
fisted. R. and L. have strait-handed-
ness, with quotation from Bp. Hall.
If you are straiuhanded the lawyer be-
comes resty, he will not stir. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 528.
Strake, bushel: more commonly
strike.
Gome, Ruose, Ruose, I sold fifty strake of
barley to-day in half this time. — Farquhar,
Recruiting Officer, Act II.
Stramash, a row or disturbance: a
Scotch expression, but adopted by Eng-
lish writers.
Then more calling and bawling, and squalling
and falling.
Oh, what a fearful stramash they 're all in ! '
Ingoldshy Legends (House-warming).
Last year at Oxford, I and three other
University men, three Pauls and a Braze-
nose, had a noble stramash on Folly Bridge.
That is the last fighting I have seen. — H.
Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xxxvi.
Strangulate, to strangle.
Creepers of literature, who suck their food,
like the ivy, from what they strangulate and
kill.—Soutkey, The Doctor, Interchapter vii.
Strangurian, strangury.
Here thou shrinkest to think of the gout,
colic, stone, or strangurian. — Ward, Sermons,
p. 60.
Strapper, a tall, large person.
"You who are light and little can soon
recover ; but I who am a gross man might
suffer severely." . . Poor Lady Ladd, who is
quite a strapper, made no answer, but she
was not offended.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary,
i. 125.
8 S 2
STRATAGEMATIC ( 628 )
STRIKE
"She'll a rare one, is she not, Jane?"
" Yes, sir." " A strapper, a real strapper, big,
brown, and buxom." — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. xx.
Stratagem atic, pertaining to strata-
gem : stratagemical is used by Swift.
Of this sort© of phantasie are all good
poets, notable captaines stratagematique, all
cunning artificers and enginers. — Puttenham,
Eng. Poesie, Bk. I. ch. viii.
Stravagant, extravagant See ex-
tract $ . v. Showfully.
Straw. A woman in childbed is
said to be in the straw ; no doubt for
the reason implied by Fuller, though
the extract from Burgoyne suggests
another.
Our English plain Proverb de Puerperis,
" they are in the straw" shows Feather- Beds
to be of no ancient as© among the common
sort of our nation. — Fuller, Worthies, Lincoln.
Mrs. Blandish, You take care to send to
all the lying-in ladies ?
Prompt. At their doors, madam, before the
first load of straw. (Beading his memoran-
dum,'as he goes out.) Ladies in the straw,
ministers, &c. — Burgoyne, The Heiress, I. i.
Although, by the vulgar popular saw,
All mothers are said to be in the straw,
Some children are born in clover.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Straw. A man of straw = one of
no substance ; like an effigy stuffed
with straw ; so also iface of straw.
I will not be your drudge by day, to squire
your wife about, and be your man of straw or
scarecrow only to pies and jays that would
be nibbling at your forbidden fruit. —
JFyeherley, Country Wife, iv. 3.
Off drops the vizor, and a face of straw
appears.— Nort h, Examen, p. 608.
All those, however, were men of straw with
me. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 387.
Straw. To lay a straw = to pause ;
perhaps the idea is that of marking the
place in a book.
Bat lay a straw here, for in a trifling mat-
ter others as well as myselfe may thinke
these notes sufficient, if not superfluous. —
Holland's Camden, p. 141.
Straw. To break a straw = to
quarrel.
"I prophecie (quoth he) that Plato and
Dionysius wil erre many daies to an ende
breake a strawe betwene them." For he had
alredie perceiued the king now a good while
to keepe his mynde secrete, and to dissemble
his angre and displeasure concerned against
Plato.— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 68.
St rawfork, pitchfork. Among "hus-
bandlie furniture " Tusser reckons
Flaile, strawforke, and rake, with a fan that
is strong. — Husbandrie, p. 35.
Straws. My eyes draw straws = I
am very sleepy. Children are some-
times told towards bedtime that they
have dust in their eyes, or that the
dustman is coming.
Lady Ans. I'm sure 'tis time for all honest
folks to go to bed.
Miss. Indeed my eyes draw straws. (She's
almost asleep.)
Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. iii).
Their eyelids did not once pick straws.
And wink and sink away ;
No, no, they were as brisk as bees.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 213.
Streak. H. , s. v. streek, sa vs ' • st reeked
measure is exact measure.1 Corn was
said to be streeked when a flat piece of
wood was passed over the top of the
measure containing it.
Clench. The squire is a fine gentleman.
Med. He is more.
A gentleman and a half, almost a knight.
Within six inches ; that is his true measure.
Clench. Zure you can gage 'un ?
Med. To a streak or less.
Jonson, Tale of a Tub, iv. 2.
Stream i nkss, streaming or trailing.
We have to inquire what form or degree
of streaminess . . . might be expected among
the 1600 stars.— Proctor, The Universe and
coming Transits, p. 22 (1874).
Streamling, a small stream.
In two square creases of vnequall aises
To turn two yron streamlings he devises.
Sylvester, Handle Crafts, 515.
A thousand streamlings that n'er saw the Son,
With tribute sillier to his seruice run.
Ibid., The Captaines, 118.
Strenuity, strenuousness ; energy.
And thus, unlike affects
Bred like strenuity in both.
Chapman, Hiad, xv. $49.
Stress, a distress ; a levy for rent or
taxes, &c.
We must offer it as it were a gift, volun-
tarily, willingly, cheerfully, . . though Hoph-
ni had no flesh-hook, though Caesar had no
Publican to take a stress. — Andrewes, v. 135.
Strike, to give the last ploughing
before the seed is sown.
To harrow the rydgis er euer ye strike,
Is one peece of husbandrie Suffolk doth like.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 39.
Strike, to creak.
STRIP
(629 )
STUFFING
The closet door striked as it uses to do,
both at her coming in and going out. —
Aubrey, Misc^ p. 83.
Strip, to outstrip.
Alate we ran the deer, and through the lawnds
Stripped with our nags the lofty frolic bucks.
Greene, Friar Bacon, I. i.
Strip, to milk very closely.
Renter's first opportunity of favouring
Kin raid's suit consisted in being as long as
possible over his milking ; so never were
cows that required such stripping, or were
expected to yield such afterings, as Black
Nell and Daisy that night. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia1 s Lover*, ch. xv.
St ro A kings, the last milk drawn from
a cow.
The cook entertained me with choice bits,
the dairy -maid with stroakings. — Smollett,
Roderick Random, ch. xL
Stroam, to stride.
He, ejaculating blessings upon his parents,
and calling for just vengeance upon himself,
stroamed up and down the room. — Mad.
VArblay, Camilla, Bk. III. ch. x.
Stbodle, to straddle.
Then Apollyon strodled quite over the
whole breadth of the way. — Bunyan, PiU
grinds Progress, Pt. i. p. 98.
Stroke, appetite.
Lady Ans. God bless you, Colonel, you
have a good stroak with you.
Col. O, Madam, formerly I could eat all,
but now I leave nothing.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. ii.).
Stroyal, waste-all ; spendthrift.
A giddie braine maister, and stroyal his knaue,
Brings ruling to mine, and thrift to his graue.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 21.
St rum mel, cant term for straw, g. v.
The bantling's born ; the doxy's in the
strummel, laid by an Autumn mort of their
own crew that served for midwife. — Broome,
Jovial Crete, Act II.
Strdmpetocracy, the rule of strum-
pets ; and so the strumpets exercising
that rule.
The strumpetocracy sits at its ease, in high-
cushioned lordliness. — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 80.
Stub is defined in Peacock's Manley
and Corringham Glossary "a horse-
shoe nail."
Every blacksmith's shop rung with the
rhythmical clang of busy nammers, beating
out old iron such as horseshoes, nails, or
stuht, into the great harpoons. — Mrs. Gaskell,
Sylvia's Lovers, ch. xvi.
Stuck-up, conceited. In the first ex-
tract the word is used in two senses.
" He's a nasty stuck-up monkey, that's
what I consider him," said Mrs. Squeers, re-
verting to Nicholas. *' Supposing he is,"
said Squeers, " he's as well stuck up in our
schoolroom as anywhere else." — Dickens, N.
NickUby, ch. ix.
Them stuck-up ways may do with the
Church folks as can't help themselves, but
they'll never do with us Dissenters.— Mrs.
Oliphant, Salem Chapel, ch. i.
Stud and mud. " Stvd and mud
walling, building without bricks or
stones, with posts and wattles, or laths
daubed over with road-muck " (Pea-
cock, Manley and Corringham Glos-
sary),
The buildings erected then were either of
whole logs, or of timber uprights wattled,
such as at this very day in the North is called
stud and mud. — Archaol., ix. Ill (1780).
Studding, unsteady.
Elder, asp, and salowe, evther for theyr
wekenes or lyghtenesse, make holow, start-
ing, studding, gaddynge shaftes. — Ascham,
Toxophilus, p. 125.
Studdle.
I'll tell you what, G., said I, some rascal's
been studdling the water ; look at the tail of
that weed there, all turned up and tangled. —
C. Kingsley, 1852 (Life, i. 273).
Studentry, body of students.
" If I take in gold, I pay in iron," answered
Wulf, drawing half out of its sheath the
huge broad blade, at the ominous brown
stains of which the studentry recoiled. —
Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xvi.
Studied, instructed.
Can it stand with any Christian sense, or
reason of State and true Religion, to exclude
those men, beyond any, from all publick
Councils of Church and State, who are most
in God's and Christ's stead, best studied and
acquainted with the Divine Will ? — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 643.
The State of Avignion, . . . lying as it did
within the limits of Provence, and being
visited with such of the French Preachers as
had been studied at Geneva, the people gener-
ally became inclined unto Calvin's doctrines.
— Heylin's Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 54.
Stuff, money.
Has she got the stuff, Mr. Fag? Is she
rich, hey ? — Sheridan, Rivals, I. i.
Stuffing, padding is the term now
more generally used.
If these topics be insufficient habitually to
supply what compositors call the requisite
STUGG Y
( 630 ) SUBANTICHRIST
stuffing, . . . recourse U to be bad to reviews,
magazines, and journals of celebrity for
amusive anecdotes.— W. Taylor, 1802 (Rob-
berds's Mem., i. 426).
Stuggt, thick -set: a Devonshire
word.
Like enough we could meet them man for
man (if we chose all around the crown and
the skirts of Exmoor), and show them what
a cross-buttock means, because we are so
stuggy ; but in regard of stature, comeliness,
and bearing, no woman would look twice at
us. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. v.
Stump, to pay — usually with "up"
annexed ; to pay on the stump or nail
(?) : money is called stumpy.
Why don't you ask your old governor to
stump up ?— Sketches by Boz ( Watkins Tottle).
Only a pound ! it's only the price
Of hearing a concert once or twice ;
It's only the fee
Ton might give Mr. C,
And after all not hear his advice ;
But common prudence would bid you stump
it,
For not to enlarge,
It's the regular charge
At a Fancy Fair for a penny trumpet.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Stum pl i no, little stump.
No poet's rage shall root our stumps and
stumplings. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 146.
Stumpy, money ; that which is paid
down on the nail or stump (slang).
See extract *. v. Spanish.
Reduced to despair, they ransomed them-
selves by the- payment of sixpence ahead, or,
to adopt his own figurative expression in all
its native beauty, "till they was reglarly
done over, and forked out the stumpy." —
Sketches by Bos {The First Cabdriver).
Down with the stumpy ; a tizzy for a pot
of half-and-half. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
ch. ii.
Stumpy, short and stout; in the
second quotation it means, worn to the
stump.
His knock at the door was answered by a
stumpy boy. — Sketches by Boz {Mr. Minns).
Nothing else indicated that this ground-
floor chamber was an office, except a huge
black inkstand, in which stood a stumpy pen,
richly crusted with ink at the nib. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. i.
Stdpent, stupefied.
The human mind stands stupent; ejacu-
lates the wish that such gulf of falsehood
would close itself, before general delirium
supervene. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch.
ii., note.
Stutlk, a hot bath. Cf. Stouph.
Vitrurius . . . aaith, Volvebant kmcausti
vaporetn, that is, the stuples did send away a
waulming bote vapour.— Holland's Comdex
p. 681.
Stupre, rape.
What is adultery? The unlawful com-
pany of man and woman To that per-
taineth stupre, incest, fornication, and like
abominations. — Becon, iii. 611.
Sty, to pig together, q. v. Shakespeare
(Temp. i. 2) has sty = to shut up as in
a sty.
What miry wallowers the generality of
men of our class are in themselves, and
constantly trough and sty with.— Richardson,
CI. Harhwe, viii. 168.
Styan, a pimple in the eye-lid,
usually called a sty, q. v. in N.
I know that a styan, as it is called, upon
the eyelid could be easily reduced, though
not instantaneously, by the slight application
of any golden trinket.— De Quincey, Autob.
Sketches, i. 72.
Stylet, a pointed iron instrument or
weapon ; a stiletto.
Himself has past
His stylet through my back.
Browning, In a Gondola.
At first the strong hieroglyphics graven as
with iron stylet on his brow, round his eye*,
beside his month, puzzled, and baffled in-
stinct.— Miss Bronte, Gillette, ch. xx.
Stylish, fashionable, having a good
air or style.
Did you ever see her? a smart, stylish girl,
they say, but not handsome. — Miss Austin,
Sense and Sensibility, ch. xxx.
The hoe of her dress was black too, but
its fashion was so different from her sister's,
— so much more flowing and becoming — it
looked aa stylish as the other looked puritan-
ical.— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xxi.
Stylishness, fash io nab leness.
Her air, though it had not all the decided
pretension, the resolute stylishness of Miss
Thorpe's, had more real elegance. — Miss
Austen, Northanger Abbey, ch. viii.
Stylist, the owner of a style in
writing.
The latter [Addison] while notably dis-
tinguished as a stylist for ease, a quality not
to be imitated, combines with it the extreme
of inexactness, and, more particularly, is
altogether anti-arohaio. — Hall, Modem Eng-
lish, p. 10.
Subantichrist, a lesser antichrist
These two main reasons of the prelates
. . . are the very womb for a new subantichrist
to breed in. — Milton, Reason of C%. Gov., Bk.
I. ch. vi.
SUB-BLUSH
( 631 ) SUBTER-SUBTERLATIVE
Sub-blush, to blush slightly.
liaising up her eyes, sub-blushing as she did
it, she took up the gauntlet.— -Sterne, Tr.
Shandy, vi. 174.
Subconcealed, hidden underneath.
To lye grossly and without art is a pro-
letarian vice, but to do it with address and
subconcealed artifice shews an academic edu-
cation.— North, Examen, p. 430.
Subdiminish, to lessen still more
something which had been already
reduced.
He caused new Coines (unknown before)
to be made. . . . But the worst was ..." the
weight was somewhat abated." . . . Yea,
succeeding Princes, following this pattern,
have sub-diminished their Coin ever since. —
Fuller, Worthies, Wilts (ii. 443).
Subdivisionatb, to subdivide. See
extract s. v. Division ate.
Subdue, subjugation.
Remilia's love is far more either priz'd
Than Jeroboam's or the world's subdue.
Greene, Looking Glass, p. 119.
Subduement, conquest. The only
example in the Diets, is from Troilus
and Crestida, iv. 5; and Johnson
pronounces it to be u a word not used,
nor worthy to be used." It is not,
however, quite peculiar to Shakespeare.
He sent a solemn embassage to Pope
Adrian the fourth to craue leaue for the
subdument of that oountrey. — Daniel, Hist,
of Eng., p. 81.
Subindividual, a division of that
which is individual.
An individual cannot branch itself into
subindividual s ; but this word angel doth in
the tenth verse, " Fear none of those things
which thou shalt suffer ; behold, the devil
shall cast some of you into prison." — Milton
Animadv. on Remonst., sect. 13.
Subjecture, submission : in the ex-
tract the sign of the genitive is, as often '
in old writers, omitted.
What eye can look through cleere Loue's
spectacle,
On Vertue's maiestie that shines in beauty,
But (as to nature's diuin'st miracle),
Performes not to it all subjecture dutie?
Davits, Wittes Pilgrimage, st. 32.
Subordain, to ordain to an inferior
position. Davies is speaking of the
subordination of Nature to God.
For she is finite in her acts and powre,
But so is not that Powre omnipotent
That Nature subordain'd chiefe Governor
Of fading creatures while they do endure.
Davies, Mirum in Modum, p. 24.
Subpenal, subject to legal authority
and penalties.
These meetings of Ministers must be
authoritative, not arbitrary, not precarious,
but subpenall; otherwise the restiveness,
laziness, wantonness, and factiousness of
some will mar all; either forbearing all
meetings, or perturbing them, if they be not
kept in some awe as well as order by their
betters and superiours. — Gauden, Tears of th»
Church, p. 483.
Subbcriptive, belonging to the sub-
scription or signature.
I made the messenger wait while I tran-
scribed it. I have endeavoured to imitate
the subscriptive part. — Richardson, d. Har*
lowe, viii. 78.
Substancelesb, unsubstantial ; empty.
If rootless thus, thus substanceless thy state,
Go, weigh thy dreams, and be thy hopes thy
fears
The counterweights.
Coleridge, Human Life.
Tou have made that life substanceless as a
ghost, that future barren as the grave. —
Lytton, What will he do with it? Bk. IX.
ch. i.
Subsycophant, inferior parasite.
His lordship was . . . ill-used at court by
the Earl of Sunderland, Jeffries, and their
subsyeophants. — North, Life of Lord Guilford,
li. 222.
Subtectacle, tabernacle ; covering.
This is true Faith's iutire subtectacle;
Fropitiatorie Sacrifice for sinne.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 20.
What shall I say ? A mass of miserie,
Confusion's Chaos, Frail tie's Spectacle,
The World's Disease, Time's vgliest Prodigie,
Th' abuse of Men, and Shame's subtectacle.
Ibid., Muse's Sacrifice, p. 10.
Subterrene, subterranean.
The earth is full of subterrene fires. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 202.
Not what stands above ground, but what
lies unseen under it, as the root and sub-
terrene element it sprang from and emblemed
forth, determines the value. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 138.
Subterrestrial, below the earth.
The most reputable way of entring into
this subterrestrial country is to come in at
the fore-door. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 209.
Subter-subterlative, a lower degree
of comparison than the (ordinarily)
lowest.
I much admire that none have since begun
an order of Minor-minimos, the rather be-
cause of the Apostle's words of himself,
" who am lease than the least of all saints."
SVBTILIZER
( 632 )
SUGAR
... as I may say, a subter-subterlative in his
humility.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI. i. 17.
Subtilizes, a splitter of haire ; one
who would draw fine distinctions.
North say e of Chief Justice Hales
that he was often
A slave to prejudice, a subtilizer, and
inventor of unheard of distinctions. — Lift
of Lord Guilford, i. 118.
Subtleties, dainties.
At the end of the dinner they have bella-
ria, certain subtleties, custards, sweet and
delicate things. — Latimer, i. 467.
Suburbican, neighbouring; belong-
ing to the suburbs.
It . . . extended not only to the walls of
that city, but to the suburbican distributions.
—Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 27.
Suburbs, used as a singular for
suburb. Cf. Leads.
From which Northward, is the Market-
place and St. Nicolas's Church, from whence
for a good way shoots out a Suburbs to the
North-east, . . . and each Suburbs has its
particular Church. — Defoe, Tour thro* G.
Britain, iii. 213.
Subventitious, supporting.
He should never help, aid, supply, succour,
norgrant them any subventitious furtherance.
— Xlrquhart, Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. zzxiii.
Sub vi bile, timid ; deficient in manli-
ness.
This put abundance of people of subvirile
tempers into a twitter.— North, Examen,
p. 549.
Suocedent, the success or result
Such is the mutability of the inconstant
Vulgar, desirous of new things but never
contented ; despising the time being, extol-
ling that of their forefathers, and ready to
act any mischief to try by alteration the suo-
cedent.—Hist, of Edw. II., p. 143.
Succouress, female helper.
Of trauayl of Trojans O Queene, thee
succeres only. — Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 581.
Succub, a succuba ; a female fiend.
Our Succub Satanick now found
She touch 'd his soul in place unsound.
D'Urfey, Athenian Jilt.
Succubinb, pertaining to a succuba,
or demon in female shape.
Oh happy the slip from his Succubine grip
That saved the Lord Abbot.
Ingoldsby Legends (S. Nicholas).
Succumbent, submissive.
Queen Morphandra . . useth to make nature
herself not only succumbent and passive to
her desires, but actually subservient and
pliable to her transmutations and changes. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 2.
Sucking, young ; just entering on a
profession.
My enemies are but sucking criticks, who
would fain be nibbling ere their teeth are
come.— Dryden, All for Love (Preface).
I suppose you're a young barrister, suckiny
lawyer, or that sort of thing, because you
was put at the end of the table, and nobody
took notice of you. — Thackeray, Netpcoaus,
oh. v.
Suckling, sucker.
The wanton Suckling and the Vine
Will strive for th' honour, who first may
With their green Arms incircle thine
To keep the burning Sun away.
Lawes, Ayres and Dialogues, p. 16.
Sufficient, sufficiency.
One man's sufficient is more available than
ten thousands multitude. — Sidney, Arcadia,
p. 452.
Sufflate, to inspire.
An inflam'd zeal-burning mind
Sufflated by the Holy Wind.
Ward* England's Reformation, c. iii.
p. 266.
Suffrage, to elect or vote for.
Why should not the piety and conscience
of Englishmen, as members of the church, be
trusted in the election of pastors to func-
tions that nothing concern a monarch, as
well as their worldly wisdoms are privileged
as members of the state in suffraging their
knights and burgesses to matters that con-
cern him nearly. — Milton, Reformation in
England, Bk. II.
Suffragist. Universal suffragist =
one who goes in for universal suffrage.
It is curious that one born and bred such
an ultra exclusive as Louisa Castlefort,
should be obliged after her marriage imme-
diately to open her doors, and turn ultra
liberale, or an universal suffragist. — Miss
Edgeicorth, Helen, ch. xxxv.
Suf front, frontal for the altar.
Religion might have a dialect proper to
itself, as paten, chalice, corporal, albe, para-
phront, suffront for the hangings above and
beneath the table.— Hacket, Life of Williams,
ii. 107.
Sugar, to sweeten with sugar: the
examples in the Diets, are only of the
past participle, and that in a figurative
sense, " sugared speeches," &c.
He sugared, and creamed, and drank, and
spoke not. — Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch.
in vi.
When I sugar my liquor, I like to feel
that I am benefiting the country by main-
SUGARCHEST ( 633 )
SUNBURNT
taining tradesmen of the right colour.— Q.
Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. li.
SUGABCHEST.
To flesh and blood this Tree but wormewood
seemes,
How ere the same may be of Suger-chest.
Davits, Holy Roods (Dedic).
Sugar-plate, sweet-meats.
There be also other like epigrammes that
were sent vsually for new yeares giftes, or
to be printed or put vpon their banketting
dishes of sugar-plate or of marchpanes, and
such other dainty meates. — Puttenham, Eng.
JPoesie, Bk. I. ch, xxz.
SUITOR, tO WOO.
Counts a many, and Dukes a few,
A suitoring came to my father's Hall.
Ingoldsby Legends (S. Nicholas),
Suitorcide, suitor-killing. Sydney
Smith speaks of " the suitorcide delays
of the Court of Chancery ; " see the
passage *. v. Plousiocracy.
Suitt, fitting ; suitable.
In loue, in care, in diligence and dutie,
Be thou her Sonne, sith this to sonues is
sutie.
Davits, Holy Roode, p. 18.
Sulck, to plough, or furrow. See
another extract from Stanyhurst *. v.
Plowswain.
Soom synck too bottoms, sulcking the
surges asunder. — Stanyhurst, &n., i. 117.
Sulk, a furrow. The speaker is a
pedantic schoolmaster.
The surging sulks of the Sandiferous Seas.
— Sidney, fVanstead Play, p. 619.
Sulks, a fit of sulkiness.
She is uncommonly well read, and says
confounded clever things too when she wakes
up out of the sulks. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke,
en. xvi.
Tib an honest lad, and a' shall have her,
gien she will but leave her sulks, and consent.
— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lii.
She thought that sulks would be her game ;
so sulks it was; to be carried on until the
Vicar relented. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Ham-
lyn, ch. iz.
Sullen, sullenness ; the plural, " the
suUens" is not uncommon.
If his Majesty were moody, and not in-
clin'd to his propositions, he would fetoh
him out of that sullen with a pleasant jest. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 84.
Sullen -sick, sick with ill -humour.
Halliwell says " sick of the sullen*"
occurs in Lilly.
If the state ... lie sullen-sick of Naboth's
vineyard, the lawyer is perchance not sent
for, but gone to. — Adams, i. 830.
On the denyall, Ahab falls sullen-sick. —
Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II. vii. 7.
Summer bird, a cuckold ; the refer-
ence being to the cuckoo.
Some other knave
Shall dub her husband a summer bird.
Scholehouse of Women, 1560.
So the poore man was cruelly beaten, and
made a Summer's Bird. — Sackful of News,
1673.
Summerly, belonging to summer ;
summerlike.
As summerly as June and Strawberry-bill
may sound, I assure you I am writing to you
by the fire-side. — Walpole to Mann, ii. 305
(1749).
The weather is but lukewarm, and I should
choose to have all the windows shut, if my
smelling was not muoh more summerly than
my feeling ; but the frowziness of obsolete
tapestry and needlework is insupportable. —
Ibid., Letters, iii. 370 (1771).
Summer-ripe, quite ripe.
It is an injury, or in his word, a curse upon
corn, when it is summer-ripe not to be cut
down with the sickle. — Hacket, Life of Wil-
liamst ii. 228.
Summer? room, summer-house ; which
is the more usual word. N. has sum-
mer-parlour.
On the summit of this Hill his Lordship is
building a Summer-room. — Defoe, Tour thro1
G. Britain, i. 335.
Summon, a summons.
Upon these so hasty summons we addressed
ourselves towards him. — Munday, English
Romavne Life, 1590 (Harl. Misc., vii. 189).
Estner durst not come into the presence
till the sceptre had given her admission ; a
summon of that emboldens her. — Adams, iii.
250.
Sumph, a simpleton.
"And yon, ye silly sumph" she said to
poor Yellowley, " what do ye stand glowering
there for ? "—Scott, Pirate, i. 104.
Put your conjuring cap on, consider and see,
If you can't beat that stupid old sumph with
his tea.
Ingoldsby Legends {Lord ofThoulouse).
A very sumph art thou, I wis. — Nayler,
Reynard the Fox, p. 37.
Sumpt, expense ; sumptuousness.
They spake dryly, more to taunt the sumpt
of our show than to seem to know the cause
of our coming. — Patteny Exped. to Scotl.,
1548 (Eng. Garner., iii. 74).
Sunburnt. Aschara applies the
SUNDA YS
( 634 ) SUPERNUMEROUS
word curiously to superficial scholars,
whose mind receives as transient an
impression from what they read as the
face does from exposure to the summer
sun.
But to dwell in epitomes and books of
common places, and not to bind himself daily
by orderly study to read with all diligence
principally the holiest Scripture, and withal
the best doctors, and so to learn to make true
difference betwixt the authority of the one
and the counsel of the other, maketh so many
seeming and sunburnt ministers as we have ;
whose learning is gotten in a summer heat,
and washed away with a Christmas snow
again. — Schoolmaster, p. 137.
Sundays. Month of Sundays, a
common expression for an indefinite
long time.
I haven't heard more fluent or passionate
English this month of Sundays. — C. Kingsley,
Alton Locke, ch. xxvii.
Sun derm ent, separation.
I saw him ill, oh how ill ! I felt myself
well ; it was therefore apparent who must
be the survivor in case of sunder me rU. — Mad.
D'ArMay, Diary, vii. 318.
Sunshine. To be in the sunshine =
to have taken too much to drink.
As each snap had been followed by a few
glasses of " mixture," containing a less liberal
proportion of water than the articles he him-
self labelled with that broad generic name,
he was in that condition which his groom
indicated with poetic ambiguity by saying
that *' master had been in the sunshine." — G.
Eliot, Janet's Repentance, ch. i.
Supellectile, pertaining to furni-
ture (Lat. supellex). In the extract it
seems = ornamental ; pertaining, that
is. to the adornments not the fabric.
The heart of the Jews is empty of faith
. . . garnished with a few broken traditions
and ceremonies; supellectile complements
instead of substantial graces. — Adams, ii. 37.
Super- ceremonious, too much ad-
dicted to ceremonies.
Most (if not all) of them were . . . con*
demned before they were tryed for super-
stitious and Super 'ceremonious Prelates. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 625.
Superconkormity, over conformity.
Gauden refers to those who wore over
precise in ceremonies, &c, as to which
the Church had laid down no precise
rules.
I never had either heart or hand, tongue
or pen, to assert anything that was by private
or particular men's fancies brought in ; either
to a peevish non-conformity, or to a prag-
matiok super-conformity. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 113.
Supercritical, too nice ; hyper-
critical is the more common and more
correct word.
There are some supercilious censors and
supercriticall criticks who cavill at, disown,
disgrace, and deny this glorious Name ol
the Church of England. -Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 15.
Supererogatorian, the word is coined
by Mr. Selby in regard to Miss Byron's
relations because they believed her per-
fect, or even more perfect than she
need be.
With all your relations indeed, their Har-
riet can not be in fault . . . Supererogatorian*
all of them (I will make words whenever I
please) with their attributions to you. —
Richardson, Grandison, i. 35.
Super- fidel, believing too much ;
superstitious. See extract 0. v. Semi-
fidel.
Superfube, to pour on the top cf
something else.
Dr. Slayer shewed us an experiment of a
wonderful nature, pouring first a very cold
liquor into a glass, and superfusing on it an-
other.— Evelyn, Diary, Dec. 13, 16S5.
Superhumeral, a burden ; that which
is placed on the shoulders.
Two differences I find between Him and
others : the faults and errors of their govern-
ment, others do bear and suffer — indeed
suffer them, but suffer not for them. He
did both; endured them, and endured for
them heavy things ; a strange superhumeral,
the print whereof was to be seen on his
shoulders. — Andrews*, Sermons, i. 25.
Suteriorness, superiority.
I don't see the great superiomess of learn-
ing, if it can't keep a man's temper out of a
passion. — Mad. D'ArMay, Camilla, Bk. III.
ch. vi.
Supernoditie, a burlesque title =
supreme foolishness.
There is one great foole of their owne
ohusing . . . who ... to the subjects of his
Supernoditie, set downe certaine articles to
be obserued and carefooly lookt unto. —
Breton, Strange Newes, p. 6.
Supernumerary, a theatrical term
for a person employed to go on as one
of a crowd in a play, or as a mute figure.
They have been purchased of some wretched
supernumeraries or sixth-rate actors. — Sketches
from Bos (Brokers1 Shops).
Supernumerous, over-many; super-
abundant.
SUPEROMNIVALENT ( 635 )
SUPPLEJACK
The Earl of Oxford was heavily fined for
sntpernumerous atteudance. — Fuller >, Worthies,
i\ jrthampton (ii. 182).
Superomnivalent, supremely power-
ful over all.
God by powre super-omnivalent. — Davies,
Mi rum in Modum, p. 22.
Superplus, excess; superfluity. R.
and L. have superplusage : overplus
and surplusage are more common than
either.
Yon will have riches more than enough
for every natural want, for every rational
wish, and it will sweeten your enjoyment
of them, and draw down the blessings of
Heaven on your head, to employ the super-
plus in acts of private benevolence and public
spirit.— Johnston, Chrysal, i. 18.
Superpolitic, specially politic (used
disparagingly) : in Milton perhaps the
meaning is that the axiom is at the
head of all politics an infallible prin-
ciple.
Of late years that superpolitic and irre-
fragable society of the Loyolists have propt
up the Ivy. — Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 60.
PThe Jesuits] have invented this super-
politic aphorism, as one terms it, One Pope
aud one King. — Milton, Reformation in Eng.,
Bk. II.
God hath satisfied either the superpolitick
or the simple sort of ministers with their own
delusions. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
251.
Supersemination, a sowing on the
top of something previously sown. The
Vulgate (S. Matt. xiii. 25) has, il Venit
inimicus ejus et superseminavit zizania
in medio tritici"
No good Christian can dislike the Hus-
bandman's sowing of wheat, but every good
Christian doth dislike the envious man's
su per semination, or sowing of tares above the
wheat. — Bramhall, ii. 132.
They were no more than tares .... and
being of another sowing (a supersemination,
as the Vulgar reads it) and sown on purpose
by a cunning and industrious enemy to raise
an harvest to himself, they neither can pre-
tend to the same antiquity, and much less to
the purity of that sacred seed with which the
field was sown at first by the heavenly Hus-
bandman.— Heylin, Reformation (Dedication).
Supersensual, above the senses ; im-
material— sitpra-sensual occurs in quo-
tation *. v. Bottle- boy.
In spiritual supersensual matters no belief
is possible. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. I.
ch. ii.
In our inmost hearts there is a sentiment
which links the ideal of beauty with the
Supersensual. — Lytton, What will he do with
it? Bk. VII. ch. xxiii.
For such a supersensual sensual bond
As that gray cricket chirpt of at our hearth —
Touch flax with flame — a glance will serve —
the liars ! — Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Supbrstructor, one who builds up
on anything.
Was Oates's narrative a foundation or a
superstructure, or was he one of the super-
structors or not ? — North, Examen, p. 193.
Super-supererogate to do infinitely
more than was required.
These super-supererogating workes
Proceeding from Thy superinducing loue
Might make us (though farre worse than
Jewes or Turkes)
To entertaine them as Thou dost approue.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 17.
Superterranean, above the earth.
The " superterranean quarry " in the
extract is an old castle on the Rhine.
It was one of those superterranean quarries
which are sometimes seen to spread them-
selves to such a miraculous extent in that
region. — Mrs. Trollope, Michael Armstrong,
ch. xxxiii.
Supbrvibal, supervision ; superin-
tendence.
Gilders, carvers, upholsterers, and picture
cleaners are labouring at their several forges,
and I do not love to trust a hammer or brush
without my own supervisal. — Walpole, Let-
ters, ii. 446 (1763) .
Supervisit, to supervise ; to watch
over.
Lock up this vessel with the key of faith,
bar it with resolution against sin, guard it
with supervisiting diligence, and repose it in
the bosom of thy Saviour. — Adams, i. 261.
Supper, to take or to give supper.
This night we cut down all our corn, and
many persons suppered here. — Meeke, Diary,
Aug. 27, 1691.
Kester was suppering the horses. — Mrs.
Gasktll, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. vi.
Suppering, supper.
The breakfasting-time, the preparations
for dinner, . . . and the supperings will fill up
a great part of the day in a very necessary
manner. — Richardson, Pamela, ii. 62.
Supple-jack, a strong, pliant cane.
Take, take my supple-jack,
Play St. Bartholomew with many a back,
Flay half the Academic imps alive.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 133.
He was in form and spirit like a supple-
jack—yielding, but tough ; though he bent,
SUPREMITY
( 636 )
SUSP1RI0US
he never broke.— Irving, Sketch Book (Sleepy
Hollow).
Supremity, supremacy.
Henry the Eighth . . . without leave or
liberty from the Pope (whose Supremity he
had suppressed in his dominions . . . wrote
himself King [of Ireland].— Fuller, Worthies,
ch. vi.
Surbrave, to bedizen ; make fine ; or
if * their* refers to the bands of the
other nations, surbrave would = to ex-
cel in finery.
The Persians proud (th' Empyre was in their
hands)
With plates of gold surbraued all their bands.
Hudson's Judith, III. 22.
Surceasse, cessation.
Tee priests also night Druidaa, your sacri-
fices leaw'd
And barbarous rites, which were forlet, in
wars Surceasse, renew 'd.
Holland's Camden, p. 13.
Surchargement, surplus.
The apt mixture of their phlegmatique and
sanguine complexions, with their promis-
cuous ingendnng without any tye of mar-
riage, yeelded that con tin nail surchargement
of people, as they were forced to vnburthen
themselves on other countries. — Daniel, Hist,
of Eng., p. 23.
Surcloy, to surfeit.
Last night with surfet and with sleep sur-
cloyd,
This careles step-dame her own child o'rlayd.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 490.
Who readeth much and never meditates,
Is like a greedy eater of much food,
Who so surcloy es his stomach with his cates
That commonly they doo him little good.
Ibid., Quadrains of Pibrac, st. 62.
Sureo, assured.
For ever blinded of our clearest light ;
For ever lamed of our sured might.
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 443.
Suroent, swelling.
But yet, my sisters, when the surgent seas
Have ebb'd their fill, their waves do rise
again.
Greene, Alphonsus, King of Arragon, Act I.
Surlyboot8, a surly fellow. Cf . Lazy-
boots.
A sudden jolt their slumbers broke,
They started all, and all awoke ;
When Surly-boots yawn'd wide and spoke.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. 22.
Surmisant, one who surmises.
He meant no reflection upon her ladyship's
informants, or rather surmisants (as he might
call them), be they who they would. —
Richardson, CI. Harloxoe, vi. 179.
Surprise able, surprising. The
speaker in the extract is an uneducated
person.
It's rather surpriseable to me he should
never have thought of it— Mad. IFArblay,
Cecilia, Bk. x. ch. vi.
Surprisement, surprisal.
Many skirmishes interpassed with surprise-
merits of castles. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 47.
Surrebound, to echo repeatedly.
Both sides ran together with a sound,
That earth resounded, and great heav'n
about did surrebound.
Chapman, Iliad, xxi. 361.
Surround, to go round.'
I finde that my name-sake, Thomas Fuller,
was pilot in the ship called the Desire,
wherein Captain Cavendish surrounded the
world. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. xi. (Dedica-
tion).
Surroundings, things around.
The ceiling and walls were smoky, and
all the surroundings were dark enough to
throw into relief the human figures. — G.
Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. xxxiv.
Surstylb, to surname.
Gildas, sirnamed the Wise, . . . was also
otherwise sur-stiled Querulus, because the
little we have of his writings is only %<A
Complaint." — Fuller, Worthies, Somerset (ii.
286).
Suspectible, liable to suspicion. It
will be seen that this word which Poe
craved was already in existence ; sus-
pectful will be found in more than one
passage in Milton's Prose Works.
As poverty is generally suspectible, the
widow must be got handsomely aforehand,
and no doubt but she is. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, iii. 358.
When we speak of " a suspicious man,"
we may mean either one who suspects, or
one to be suspected. Our language needs
either the adjective " suspectf ul w or the
adjective " suspectable." — E. A. Foe, Margin-
alia (iii. 606).
Suspenders, braces.
Correspondences are like small-clothes
before the invention of suspenders; it is
impossible to keep them up. — Sidney Smith,
Letters, 1841.
Susprrcollated, hung ; sus per coll. ,
a ludicrous coined word.
None of us Duvals have been suspercollated
to my knowledge. — Thackeray, Denis Duval,
ch. i.
Suspirious, sighing. Sydney Smith
(i. 166) speaks of Methodist preachers
SUSS A PINE
( 637 )
SWANNY
as "the lacrymal and suspirious
clergy."
Sussapine, a kind of silk (?).
Ill deck my Alvida
la sendal and in costly sussapine.
Greene, Looking Glass for London,
p. 128.
Sustentate, to sustain.
He was only the first of a long list of holy
and hard-hitting ones who have, by this
divine restorative, been sustentated, fortified,
corroborated, and consoled. — Reade, Cloister
and Hearth, ch. ii.
SUSTINENT, Support.
Tea make vs make the Orphane*s home our
brest,
And our right arme the Weedowe's sustinent.
Da vies, Microcosmos, p. 70.
Susurrant, whispering.
The soft susurrant sigh, and gently murmur-
ing kiss. — Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 146.
SUTHKRY. #
All the devils of hel together
Stood in aray, in suche apparel
As for that day there meetly fel ;
Their homes wel gilt, their clawes ful clene,
Their tayles wel kempt, and, as I ween,
With suthery butter their bodies anointed ;
I never saw devils so wel appointed.
Heywood, FourPs. (Dodsley, O. PI., i. 112).
Suycenebs, Swiss: the extract is a
note of Udal's own.
The Suyceners are the whole nacion of
Suycerlande which is called in Latine Helue-
tia, and the people of Heluetii, menne of
soche sorte that for money they will fight,
they care not under whose banner. And
imbjectes they ar vnto no prince, ne do any
thing passe on life or death, heauen or helle.
—TJdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 307.
Suycerlande, Switzerland. See *. v.
SUYCENERS.
Swab, an awkward fellow. Cf.
Swappes.
He swore accordingly at the lieutenant,
and called him . . . sicab and lubbard. —
Smollett, Rod. Random, ch. xxiv.
Swabbers. " Certain cards at whist
by which the holder was entitled to a
part of the stakes were termed swab-
bers" (Halliwell). A particular form
of whist seems to have been called
whisk and swabbers.
As whisk and swabbers was the game then
in the chief vogue, they were oblig'd to
look for a fourth person, in order to make
up their parties. — Fielding, Jonathan Wild,
Bk. I. ch. iv.
The society of half a dozen of clowns to
play at whisk and swabbers would give her
more pleasure than if Ariosto himself were
to awake from the dead. — Scott, Rob Roy, i.
225. y
Swag, plunder ; booty ; that which
swings heavily. See quotation s. v.
Crack.
" It's all arranged about bringing off the
swag, is it ? " asked the Jew. Sikes nodded.
— Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xix.
Twas awful to hear, as she went along, . . .
The dark allusion, or bolder brag
Of the dexterous dodge, and the lots of swag.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
He will shake all that nonsense to blazes
when he finds himself out under the moon
with thejwag on one side and the gallow son
the other. — Reade, Never too late to mend,
ch. zlvi.
Swainino, love-making, or (to ex-
plain one slang word by another)
spooning.
His general manner had a good deal of
what in female slang is called swaining. —
Mrs. Irollope, Michael Armstrong, ch. i.
Sw allowable, credible.
The reader, who for the first time meets
with an anecdote in its hundredth edition,
and its most mitigated and swallowable form,
may very naturally receive it in simple good
faith. — Jf ait land, Essays on the Reformation,
p. 315.
Swallow-pipe, gullet ; wind-pipe.
Each paunch with guttling was so swelled,
Not one bit more could pass your swallow-
pipe. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 147.
Swallow's tail, a tongue always
wagging. There may be a sort of pun
on swallow-tail = an arrow, q. v.
He'd tire your ear with pentagons,
With bastions, ravellings, and half-moons,
With counterscarp and parapet,
Bampires and horn-works make you sweat ;
And all your outworks would assail
With his eternal swallow's tail.
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, canto i.
Swallow-tail, an arrow.
The English then strode forward, and
drew their howstrings — not to the breast, as
your Highland kerne do, but to the ear— and
sent off their volleys of swallow-tails before
we could call on St. Andrew. — Scott, Fair
Maid of Perth, ii. 223.
Swanking, big ; strapping.
' There goes a tall ensign, there's a sivanking
fellow for you !— T. Brown, Works, ii. 192.
Swanny, swan-like.
Once more bent to my ardent lips the
swanny glossiness of a neck late so stately. —
Richardson, CI. Harloice, iv. 22.
SWAP PES
(638 )
SWEATER
SwArPES, a term of reproach, like
Swab, q. v.
And yet this swappes that neuer bloodied
sword.
Is but a coward, braue it as he list.
Breton, PasquiFs Madcappe, p. 6.
Swarded, turfed.
This awarded circle into which the lime-walk
brings us.
Mrs. Browning, Lady Geraldine*s
Courtship.
Swarf, to swoon. H. gives it as a
Northern word, but Master Erasmus
Holiday, the speaker in the subjoined
extract, lived in the Vale of White-
horse. Scott, however, did not.
The poor vermin was likely at first to
swarf for very hanger. — Scott, Kenilworth,
i. 173.
Swarth, sward; usually, however,
it means a swathe ; at full swarth —
in full awing ; the idea may be that of
the sweep of a scythe making swarths.
Though his design miscarried, his malice
was at full swarth. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 529.
The mountains instead of heath are
covered with a fine green swarth, affording
pasture to innumerable flocks of sheep.—
Smollett, Humphrey Clinker, ii. 101.
For I have loved the rural walk through lanes
Of grassy swarth close cropp'd by nibbling
sheep. — Cowper, The Sofa, 110.
Swarthiness, pallor.
Rich gormandisers have not been acquaint-
ed indeed with this misery, . . . but the poor,
the poor have grieved, groaned under this
burden, whiles cleanness of teeth and swar-
thiness of look were perceived in the common
face. — Adams, i. 420.
Swart- rutting, fierce; swaggering;
like a German horseman or swart-rutter,
q. v. in H.
I sildome fall into your hands, as being
quiet, and making no brawls to have wounds,
as swartruttina Velvet - Breeches dooth. —
Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier {Harl.
Misc., v. 406).
Swash ly, in a swashing manner;
lashing about.
Their tavls with croompled knot twisting
swashlye they wrigled. — Stanyhurst, *En.,
ii. 220.
Swashruter, a dashing rider, ap-
plied in extract to a strong wind. Cf.
swart-rutter in H.
Then Sootherne swashruter hufBiug
Flundge us on high sheluefiats.
Stanyhurst, j£n., i. 522.
Swatch, a pattern ; a shred or piece
cut off.
Consider but those little swatches
Used by the fair sex, called patches.
Ward, England's Reformation, canto L
p. 14.
There was likewise the allurement of some
compendious show of wild beasts : in short,
a swatch of everything that the heart of
man has devised for such occasions, to wile
away the bawbee. — Gait, The Provost, ch.
ZVUl.
Swathel - binding, the linen ban-
dages in which infants were once
swaddled or swathed. N. has swath-
band: and swathing-band is in Hall's
Satires, IV. iv. 103.
I swaddled him in a scurvy swathel-bind-
ing.—Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xiv.
Swathle, to swaddle.
Betweene euery arch the corses lie ranckt
one by another, shrouded in a number of
folds of linnen, swathled with bands of the
same.— Sandys, Travels, p. 133.
Swear by, to place great confidence
in some person or thing.
I have no very good opinion of Mrs.
Charles's nursery-maid. . . . Mrs. Charles
quite swears by her, I know.— Mi ss Austen,
Persuasion, ch. vi.
" I simply meant to ask if you are one of
those who swear by Lord Verulam." **I
swear by no man. I do not swear at all ; not
on philosophical subjects especially." — Miss
Edyeworth, Helen, ch. xiv.
Sweat, the sweating-sickness. The
first extract is from the Parish Register
of Loughborough, Leicester. The ru-
bric was first inserted in the Prayer-
Book of 1552.
June, 1551. The Swatt called new
quyntance, alles Stoupe Knave, and know
thy master began the xxiiiith of this monethe
1551. — Archafol., xxzviii. 107.
In the time of the Plague, Sweat, or such
other like contagious times of sickness or
diseases, .... upon special request of the
diseased, the Minister may only communi-
cate with him. — Communion of Sick; last
rubric.
Sweat. To sweat a golden coin =
to knock or pare off as much as is pos-
sible from it, without making it no
longer current.
His each vile sixpence that the world hath
cheated,
And his the art that every guinea sweated.
IVolcot, P. Pindar, p. 109.
Sweater, a middleman between the
tailors and their workmen.
SWEATLESS
( 639 )
SWERVE
At the honourable shops the master deals
directly with his workmen; while at the
dishonourable ones, the greater part of the
work, if not the whole, is let out to con-
tractors or middle-men — " sweaters," as their
victims significantly call them — who, in
their turn, let it out again, sometimes to the
workmen, sometimes to fresh middle-men,
bo that out of the price paid for labour on
each article, not only the workmen, but the
sweater \ and perhaps the sweater's sweater,
and a third, and a fourth, and a fifth, have
to draw their profit. — C. Kingsley, Cheap
Clothes and Nasty.
Sweatless, without toil.
Thou that from Heav'n thy daily white-bread
hast,
Thou for whom haruest all the year doth
last;
That in poor deserts rich abundance heap'st,
That sweatles eat'st, and without sowing
reap'st. — Sylvester, The Lawe, 839.
Swedeland, Sweden. Cf. Sweth-
LAND.
Let ns think no more about it, but travel
on as fast as we can southwards into Nor-
way, crossing over Swedeland, if you please.
—Sterne, Trtst. Shandy, ii. 190.
Sweepstake, sweeping away. "To
make sweepstake" seems to mean "to
make a clean sweep." See L. s. v.
"Why will they not pray without pence?
If the pope and his prelates were charitable,
they would, I trow, make sweepstake at once
of purgatory. — Bradford, ii. 271.
I cannot conceive from what ground this
general sweepstake of archbishops, bishops,
parsons, vicars, and all others in holy orders
should proceed. — Racket. Life of Williams,
u.172. J J
Sweetbread, a bribe or douceur.
I obtain 'd that of the fellow, .... with
a few sweetbreads that I gave him out of my
purse. — Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 163.
Swepestrete8, sweeping along the
streets, as in procession (?).
They are but pilde pel tinge prestos,
knightes of the dongehill, though they be
sir swepestretes, maistre doctours, and lord
bishoppes. — Vocacyon of Johan Bale, 1553
{Hart Misc., vi. 461).
Sweet, to sweeten.
[Hunger] bothe sweeteth all thynges, and
also is a thyng of no cost ne charge. — UdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 2.
Beeing clensed from my sinne by the onely
merite of Thy mercy, and sweeted in my soule
by the oile of Thy grace in the fruicts of
thanksgiueing, I may glorifye Thy holly
name. — Breton, Marie's Exercise, p. 11.
Sweet-cecily, a plant, the myrrha
odorata.
The abbess of Andoiiillets . . . being in
danger of an anchylosis or staff joint (the
sinovia of her knee becoming hard by long
matins), and having tried every remedy, . . .
treating it with emollient and resolving
fomentations, then with poultices of marsh-
mallows, mallows, bonus Henricns, white
lilies, and fenugreek, . . . then decoctions
of wild chicory, water-cresses, chervil, sweet
cecily, and cochlearia, and nothing all this
while answering, was prevailed on at last to
try the hot baths of Bourbon. — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, v. 112.
Sweeten and pinch, a cant term
among bailiffs for squeezing money
out of their prisoners by holding out
hopes of some indulgence.
A main part of his [bum-bailiff's] office
is to swear and bluster at their trembling
prisoners, and cry, "Confound us, why do
we wait? let us shop him;" whilst the
other meekly replies, "Jack, be patient, it
is a civil gentleman, and I know will con-
sider us;" which species of wheedling, in
terms of their art, is called sweeten and pinch.
— Four for a Penny, 1678 {Harl. Misc., iv.
147).
Sweeties, sweetmeats.
Instead of finding bonbons or sweeties in
the packets which we pluck off the boughs,
we find enclosed Mr. Carnifex's review of
the quarter's meat. — Thackeray, Roundabout
Papers, x.
Sweetkin, delicate ; lovely.
Flocking to bansell him and strike him
good luck, as the sweetkin madams did about
valiant Sir Walter Manny. — Nash*, Lenten
Stuffe {Harl. Misc., vi. 163).
Sweet-mouthed, dainty; fond of
good living. Cf. Dainty-chapped. We
speak now of a person's having a sweet
tooth, if he is fond of confectionery, &c.
Plato checked and rebuked Aristippus for
that he was so swete mouthed and drouned in
the voluptuousness of high fare. — Udal's
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 49.
Swelldom, the world of rank and
fashion.
This isn't the moment, when all Swelldom
is at her feet, for me to come forward. —
Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. xliii.
Swenkt, tired with work. Milton
(Comus, 291) speaks of the "svrink'd
hedger."
The swenkt grinders in this treadmill of an
earth have ground out another day. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. vi.
Swerve, to turn aside. R. has one
SWETHLAND
( 640 )
SWING
instance of this as an active verb from
Gower.
Those Scotish motions and pretentions . .
swerved them . . from the former good con-
stitution of the Church of England. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 490.
Swethland, Sweden. Cf. Swede-
land.
Touching them who have renounc'd all
obedience to Borne, there are the three kings
of Great-Britain, Denmark, and Swethland,
— Howell, Letters, ii. 11.
Every one knows what Olaus Magnus
writes of Erich's (King of SweethlamTs)
corner'd cap, who could make the wiud shift
to any point of the compass, according as he
turn'd it about. — Ibid., hi. 23.
Swibber-swill, draff.
In every matter concerning our Christian
belief is the scripture reckoned unsufficient
of this wicked generation. God was not
wise enough in setting the order thereof, but
they must add thereunto their swibber-swill,
that he may abhor it in us, as he did in the
Jews' ceremonies.— Bale .Select Works, p. 177.
Swift, a fast-running dog.
The buck broke gallantly ; my great swift,
being disadvantaged in his slip, was at the
first behind ; many, presently coted and out-
strip'd them. — Return from Parnassus, ii. 5
(1606).
SWIFTY, swift.
With charged staffe on fomyng horse
His spurres with heeles he strykes,
And foreward ronnes with swiftye race
Among the mortall pykes.
Googe, Epitaphs of M. Shelley.
Swill-bowl, drunkard. See quota-
tion $. V. SOSBELLY.
Lucius Ootta . . . was taken for the great-
est stoielbolle of wine in the woorlde.— XJdaVs
Erasmus's Apophth., p. 367.
Their oiled swill-bowls and blind Balaam-
ites.— Bale, Select Works, p. 193.
Is not he a brockish bore of Babylon, a
swilbol,B. blockhed, a belly-god? — Ibid., De-
claration of Bonner's Articles (Art. II.).
Swillinos, hog's wash.
Thy people, dearly bought even with Thy
blood, are not fed with the bread of Thy
word, but with swillings. — Bradford, i. 160.
Swill-pot, drunkard.
What doth that part of our army in the
meantime which overthrows that unworthy
swill-pot Grangousier ? — Urquhart's Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. xxxiii.
SWILL-TUB, a 80t.
The husband, instead of my dear soul, has
been called blockhead, toss-pot, swill-tub;
and the wife, sow, fool, dirty drab. — Bail, yt
Erasm. Colloq., p. 198.
Swimmable, capable of being swum.
I . . . swam everything swimmable. — Savoy e,
R. Medlicott, Bk. II. ch. iii.
Swimmer, bladder; "the swimmer
of a fish." See extract 8. v. Ship of
Guinea.
Swimminoness (as applied to the eye),
a tender and melting look.
Tenderness becomes me best, a sort of dy-
ingness ; you see that picture has a sort of
a — ha, Foible ! — a smimmingness in the eye —
yes, I'll look so. — Congreve, Way of the
World, iii. 5.
Swindlery, roguery.
Swindlery aud blackguardism have stretch-
ed hands across the Channel and saluted
mutually. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Bk. II. ch. vi.
Swine-penny. See extract
Here [Littleborough] . . . great numbers
of coins have been taken up in ploughing
and digging, which they call Swine-penies,
because those creatures sometimes rout them
up. — Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, iii. 9.
Swine-pox, as applied to human be-
ings, a species of chicken-pox. L. has
the word with a quotation from a
modern medical work.
The swine* s-pox overtake you ! there's a curse
For a Turk that eats no hog's flesh.
Massinger, Renegade, i 3.
It did not prove the small-pox, but the
swine-pox. — Pepys, Jan. 13, 1659-60.
Swinery, piggery ; place where pigs
are kept
Thus are parterres of Richmond and of Kew
Dug up for bull, and cow, and ram, and ewe.
And Windsor - Park so glorious made a
swinery. — Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 216.
Swines-bread, a plant of the genus
cyclamen. Cf. Sowbread.
Blew succorie hangd on the naked neck,
Dispels the dimness that our sight dotb
check ;
Swines-bread so vsed doth not onely speed
A tardy labour, but (without great heed)
If over it a child-great woman stride,
Instant abortion often doth betide.
Sylvester, Third day, first weeke, 704.
The Vine the dole, the Oole-wort Swines-
bread dreads,
The Fearn abhors the hollow waving reeds.
Ibid., The Furies, 9$.
Swing, to be hung.
If I'm caught, I shall swing ; that's certain.
—Sketches by Box (Drunkard's Death).
SW1NGEBREECH ( 641 ) SYMPOSIARCH
For this act
Did Brownrigg swing. Harsh laws! But
time shall come
When France shall reign, and laws be all
repeal'd. — Poetry of A nti jacobin, p. 7.
Swingebreech, a man who flaunts
about in fine clothes ? In Antony Gil-
by's Pleasaunte Dialogue, 1581 (one of
the Mar-prelate Tracts), among other
things objected to the Bishops is " Their
pompous trayne of proud, idle swinge-
breeches, in the steede of Preachers and
SchoUers."
Swinging. The packing of herrings
in casks or barrels was, according to
Nashe, called swinging them. See
extract s. v. Cade.
Swingle-bar, the cross-bar by which
the horse is yoked to the carriage, and
to which the traces are fastened.
Either with the swingle-bar, or with the
haunch of our near leader, we had struck the
off-wheel of the little gig. — De Quincey,
Eng. Mail-Coach.
Swipey, tipsy.
" He ain't ill ; he's only a little swipey you
know.*' Mr. Bailey reeled in his boots to ex-
press intoxication. — Dickens, Martin ChuzzU-
tcit, ch. zxviii.
Swirl, a whirling wavy motion ; also
as a verb. This word, though now
common, is not in the Diets., except H.,
who has it as a noun, without example.
And the far ships, lifting their sails of white
Like joyful hands, come up with scattered
light ;
Come gleaming up — true to the wish'd for
day —
And chase the whistling brine, and swirl into
the bay. — Leigh Hunt, Rimini, c. i.
Headlong I darted, at one eager swirl
Gain'd its bright portal.
Keats, Endymion, Bk Hi.
There was a rush and a swirl along the
surface of the stream, and " Caiman, Caiman,"
shouted twenty voices . . . the moonlight
shone on a great swirling eddy, while all held
their breaths. — C. Kinysley, Westward Ho,
ch. xxv.
Fierce swirls of foam . . . were dashing in
and through the rocky channels . . and he
knew that he was going down into the swirl-
ing waters beneath. — Black, Princess of Thule,
ch. xxiii.
Swish, to flog.
I pity that young nobleman's or gentle-
man's case : Dr. Wordsworth and assistants
would s irish that error out of him in a way
that need not here be mentioned. — Thackeray,
Misc.) ii. 470.
Switchy, whisking.
And now perhaps her switchy tail
Hangs on a barn-door from a nail.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. 20.
Sword, to slash with the sword.
Nor heard the King for their own cries but
sprang
Thro' open door, and swording right and left
Men, women, on their sodden faces, hurl'd
The tables over and the wines.
Tennyson, The Last Tournament,
Sword - grass, sedgy plants with
sword-like leaves.
The summer aire blow cool
On the oat-grass and the sword-grass, and
the bulrush in the pool.
Tennyson, New-Year's Eve.
SYOorHANTrsHLY, after the manner of
a sycophant. De Quincey also uses
the adjective. See extract s. v. Un-
sexual.
Neither proud was Kate, nor sycophant-
ishly and falsely humble. — De Quincey,
Spanish Nun, sent. xxv.
Syllabize, to articulate or divide
into syllables.
Tis Mankind alone
Can language frame, and syllabize the tone.
Howell, Verses prefixed to Parly of the
Beasts.
Sylph ish, sylphlike.
Fair Sylphish forms, who tall, erect, and slim,
Dart the keen glance, and stretch the length
of limb.
Poetry of the Antijacobin, p. 126.
Amidst the blaze of lustres; in sylphish
movements, espiegleries, coquetteries, and
minuet-mazes. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace,
ch. ii.
Sylvester, belonging to the wood,
and so, wild.
One time a mighty plague did pester
All beasts domestick and Sylvester.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 318.
SymboliSt, one who holds Zuinglian
views on the Eucharist. See extract
S. V. SlGNIFICATI8T.
Symbolizer, one who casts in (his
vote, contribution, or opinion) with
another.
The Bishops of England . . . were to be
sacrificed by I know not what strange fire,
as a peace-offering to the discontented
Presbyters of Scotland, and their ambitious
Symbolizers in England. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 591.
Symposiarch, the president or mode-
rator at a banquet.
T T
SYMPOSIA ST ( 642 )
SYNUSIAST
He does not condemn sometimes a little
larger ami more pleasant carouse at set
banquets, under the government and direc-
tion of some certain prudent and sober
symposiarchs or masters of the feasts. — T.
Brown, Works, iii. 260.
As Alexander and Caesar were born for
conquest, so was Johnson for the office of a
symposiarch, to preside in all conversations.
— Sir J. Hawkins (Bosuell, i. 219).
Symposiast, banqueter.
Lady is tolerably well, with two
courses and a French cook. She has fitted
np her lower rooms in a very pretty style,
and there receives the shattered remains of
the symposiastt of the house. — Sidney Smithy
Letters, 1842.
Synaqoguish, fanatical ; belonging
to conventicles.
How comes (I fain would know) th' abuses,
The jarring late between the houses,
But by your party synagoyuish,
Not half so politique as roguish ?
D'Urfey, Collin's Walk, canto i.
Synapise, to sprinkle, properly, with
mustard. The word is taken from the
original sinapiser.
Put the said chronicles betwixt two pieces
of linen cloth made somewhat hot, and so
apply them to the place that smartetb,
synapisiny them with a little powder of
projection. — UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. II.
(Author's Prologue).
Then cleansed he his neck very well with
Eure white wine, and after that took his
ead, and into it synapised some powder. —
Ibid., Bk. II. ch. xxx.
Syncop, a swoon: usually written
syncope.
Some affirm passion had almost stopp'd
respiration, and that she had certainly ex-
pired of a syncop, had she not taken coach,
and thrown off the stifling humour in the
bosoms of a female Juncto. — Gentleman
Instructed, p. 105.
Synecpoch. This Anglicised form
of synecdoche is unusual.
The seven angels, you say, . . . are not to
be taken literally, but synecdochically ; per-
haps so ; but then the synecdoch lies in the
seven, but not in the angels. — Bp. Hall,
Works, x. 332.
Synedrion, assembly or sanhedrin.
The extract, though printed in 1677,
belongs to the time of the Greit
Rebellion.
Alas ! how unworthy, how nncapable am
I to censure the proceedings of that great
senate, that high synedrion, wherein the
wisdom of the whole state is epitomised. —
HovelVs Vindication of himself 9 1677 {Hari.
Misc., vi. 128).
Syngraph, written document or
covenant.
I went to court this evening, and had
much discourse with Dr. Bayers, one of his
Majesty '8 chaplains, the greate traveller, who
shew'd me the sy nymphs and original sub-
scriptions of divers Eastern Patriarchs and
Asian Churches to our Confession. — Evelyn*
Diary, Oct. 29, 1862.
Synodian, a synodsinan ; the refer-
ence in the extract is to those who
attended the Synod of Dort.
Of such as dislike the synod, none falls
heavier upon it than a London Divine, charg-
ing the synodians to have taken a previous
oath to condemn the opposite party on wi.at
termes soever. — Fuller, Ch. Histn X. ▼. 5.
Synonym a, synonyms. This plurul,
as L. observes, was common in the
time of the Elizabethan dramatists, but
the subjoined is a late instance of it.
" Was he unfortunate then, Trim ? " said
my uncle Toby, pathetically. The corporal,
wishing first the word and all its synoninas
at the devil, forthwith began to run back in
his mind the principal events in the Kiug of
Bohemia's story. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, vi. 31.
Synonymous, similar: an incorrect
use.
Tis needless to expose
His stockins, or describe his shooes,
Or legs or feet, since 't may be guess'd
They were synonymous to th' rest.
Vtirfey, Collins Walk, canto i.
Synusiast, one who holds consubstan-
tiation. A believer in transubstantia-
tion is called a Metusiast, q. v.
The Svmtsiasts or Ubiquitaries . . . think
the Body of Christ is so present in the
Supper, as His said Body with bread and
wine, by one and the same mouth, at one
and the same time, of all and every com-
municant, is eaten corporally. — Rogers on 39
Articles, p 289.
(643 )
TAIL-EMDS
T
T. To suit to a T = to suit exactly,
as by a Tee square.
Having cajoled my inquirer, and fitted
his humour to a T.— Labour in Vain, 1700
(Harl. Misc., vi. 387).
We could manage this matter to a T. —
Sterne, Tr. Shandy, i. 193.
Tabr, wasting disease.
They put a pleurisy into their bloods, a
tabe, and consumption into their states. —
Adams, i. 191.
Table, to lay down, as on a table.
Forty thousand francs; to such length
will the father-in-law, moved by these tears,
hy this hre-eloquence, table ready-money. —
C artyle, Misc., iv. 97.
Which sure trump-card Royalty, as we see,
keeps ever and anon clutching at, . . . yet
never tables it, still puts it back again. — Ibid.,
Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. vi.
Table-d'h6tb, a meal at an hotel
where any who choose are admitted to
eat together at a fixed price. The word
and thing are now common in England.
All this is but table d'hoste ; it is crowded
with people for whom he cares not. — Cowley,
Essays, Of Liberty.
Table-peer, fellow-commoner, con-
vive. The allusion is to Ps. lxxviii. 26.
God's pensioner, and angels' table-peer,
O Israel.
Sylvester, The Laice, 843.
Taboo, a word of the South Sea
Islanders = sacred, forbidden as
sacred ; see L., who, however, has no
example ; it is also a verb.
Often things that were undesignedly said
touched upon the taboo' d matter. — Miss
Edgeworth, Helen, ch. xl.
Women up till this
Cramp'd under worse than South-Sea-isle
taboo.
Tennyson, Princess, iii.
Art and poetry were tabooed both by my
rank and my mother's sectarianism. — Kings-
ley, Alton Locke, ch. i.
Tace is latin for a candle. This
phrase contains a hint to be silent, or
an intention of being so. See extract
s. v. Brandy.
" Tace, Madam," answered Murphy, is
Latin for a candle ; I commend your pru-
dence.— Fielding, Amelia, Bk. I. ch. x.
Tactility, see extract.
Tou have a little infirmity — tactility or
touchiness. — Sydney Smith, Letters, 1831.
Tadpoledom, the tudpole state.
The instinct (as I have often proved) of
the little beggars an inch long, fresh from
water and tadpoledom is to creep foolishly
into the dirtiest hole they can find in old
walls, kc.—C. Kingsley, 1803 (Life, ii. 157).
Tago. See quot from Brande.
They all played tagg till they were well
warmed. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 87.
A writer in the Gentlemau's Magazine for
1738 tells us that "in Queen Mary's reign
tag was all the play; where the lad saves
himself by touching of cold iron — by this it
was intended to show the severity of the
Church of Rome. In later times this play
has been altered amongst children of quality,
by touching gold instead of iron." — Brand,
Popular Antiquities, ii. 443.
Taolioni, an overcoat which took its
name from the great dancer : it is now
obsolete, at least by that name.
I've brought to protect myself well, a
Good stout Taylioni and gingham umbrella.
Inyoldsby Legends (S. Romwold).
Tail, a following; attendants upon
another.
Why should her worship lack
Her tail of maids more than you do of men?
Jonson, Tale of 2V6, ii. 1.
«Ah!" said he, "if you Saxon DuinhS-
wassel (English gentleman) saw but the
chief with his tail on." " With his tail on ? "
echoed Edward in some surprise. " Yes ;
that is, with all his usual followers, when
he visits those of the same rank." — Scott,
Waverlty, i. 107.
Ay, now's the nick for her friend Old Harry
To come with his tail like the bold Glengarry.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Tail-end, latter part.
The tail-end of a shower caught us. —
Black, Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. xxii.
Tail-ends. Inferior samples of corn,
such as being hardly marketable are
usually consumed at home.
If everybody tried to do without house
and home, and with poor eating and drinking,
and was allays talking as we must despise
the things o' the world, as you pay, I
should like to know where the pick o' the
stock and the corn and the best new-milk
TT2
TAILL
( 644)
TALL YMAN
cheeses 'ud have to go. Everybody *ud be
wanting bread made o' tail-ends. — G. Eliot,
Adam Bede, eh. vi.
Taill.
If he be the King's true subject, well and
taill.— Latimer, ii. 388.
T&IL0M8B, to connect with or bring
under tailors.
Oar clothes-thatch . . . tailorises and de-
moralises.— Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I.
ch. viii.
Tail-pipe, to tie a tin-can or the like
to a dog's tail.
Even the boys . . . tail-piped not his dog. —
Kingsley, Two Years Ayo, en. ii.
Take, a witch's charm ; Shakespeare
has the verb (Hamlet, I. i.) " no fairy
takes:'
He hath a take upon him, or is planet-
struck.— The Quack's Academy, 1676 (Harl.
Misc., ii. 34).
Take down, a peg is commoner than
a button-hole in this phrase.
Til take you down a button-hole. — Peele,
Edw. I., p. 395.
Take in, to cheat
As if his nephew were taken in, as he calls
it, rather by the eyes than by the under-
standing.— Richardson, Grandison, i. 39.
But I would not have him taken in: I
would not have him duped. — Miss Austen,
Mansfield Park, ch. v.
Hostess. I took you in last night, I say.
Syntax. Tis true ; and if this bill I pay
You'll take me in again to-day.
Cotnbe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. iv.
Take in, a trick or cheat.
I know so many who have married in the
full expectation and confidence of some one
particular advantage in the connection, or
accomplishment or good quality in the per-
son, who have found themselves entirely
deceived, and been obliged to put up with
exactly the reverse. What is this but a take
in? — Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. v.
Take off, to imitate ; to mimic.
He so perfectly counterfeited or took off,
as they call it, the real Christian, that many
looked to see him, like Enoch or Elijah,
takon alive into heaven. — H. Brooke, Foot of
Quality, i. 370.
Talisman ist, one who uses talismans
Or charms.
Such was even the great Paracelsus, . . .
and such were all his followers, scholars,
statesmen, divines, and princes, that are talis-
manists. — Defoe, Duncan Campbell (Preface).
Talkee talkee, a common expression
to signify verbosity ; it is taken from
the broken English of negroes or
savages.
The talkee talkee of the slaves in the Sugar
Islands, as it is called, will prevail in Suri-
nam.—Southey, Letters, 1810 (ii. 206).
There's a woman now, who thinks of
nothing living but herself — all talkee talker ;
I begin to be weary of her. — Miss Edgeworth,
Vivian, ch. x.
A style of language for which the inflated
bulletins of Napoleon, the talkee-talkee of a
North American Indian, and the song of
Deborah might each have 6tood as a model.
— Phillips. Essays from the Times, ii. 280.
Talkful, talkative.
Phrenzie that makes the vaunter insolent,
The talkfull blab, cruel the violent.
Sylvester, The Arke, 611.
Talkingstock, an object of notice or
conversation.
Hee was like much the more for that to
be a talkyng stock to all the geastes. — Vial's
Erasmus** Apophth., p. 96.
Tallage, right of cutting the pro-
duce of the soil.
[The elected chief of every Irish county]
had a generall tallage or cutting high or low,
at his pleasure, upon all the inheritance,
which hee tooke commonly when he made
warre . . . like the villaines of England upon
whom their Lords had power Tallier hart
and bas, as the phrase ox our law is. — Hol-
land's Camden, ii. 141.
Tallat, a hay-loft
I was .... forced to dress in the hny-tallat.
— Iilackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. xix.
I . . . . determined to sleep in the tallat
awhile, that place being cool and airy, and
refreshing with the smell of sweet hay. —
Ibid., ch. xxxi.
Tallish, rather tall.
Miss Amelia Martin was pale, tallish, thin,
and, two-and- thirty. — Sketches by Boz (Mis-
taken Milliner).
Tally, to deal (Fr. toiller) : a term
at basset and pharaoh.
They are just talking of basset ; my lord
Foppington has a mind to tally, if your
Lordship would encourage the table. — Cwber,
Careless Husband, III. i.
" Oh," said she, " for my part you know I
abominate everything but pharaoh." M I am
very sorry, madam," replied he very gravely,
" but I don't know whom your Highness will
get to tally to you ; yon know I am mined
by dealing."— fFalpole to Mann,u 276(174$).
Tallyman. See quotation.
The unconscionable tallyman . . lets them '
have ten-shillings- worth of sorry commodi-
ties, or scarce so much, on security given to
pay him twenty shillings by twelve peace a
TALMUD1GE
(645 )
TANTIVY
week.— Four for a Penny, 1678 (Harl. Misc..
iv. 148).
Talmudige, a Talmudist. Bp. Hall
( Works, viii. 640) speaks of the " Jew-
ish or Mahometan Paradise " dreamed
of by "sensual Turks and Talmudiges."
Talus, a sloping heap of rough
stones.
Taking the profile of the place with its
work to determine the depths and slopes of
the ditches, the talus of the glacis, and the
precise height of the several banquets, para-
pets, &c., he set the corporal to work. —
Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iv. 217.
He reached it at last, and rushed up the
talus of boulders, springing from stone to
stone. — King si ey, Two Years Ago, ch. xxi.
Tambour, to work on a tambour-
frame ; to embroider with sprigs. In
the first extract tambour = tamboured.
With ... a tambour waistcoat, white linen
breeches, and a taper switch in your hand,
your figure, Frankly, must be irresistible. —
i'olman, Man and Wife, Aot I.
She lay awake ten minutes on Wednesday
sight, debating between her spotted and her
tamboured muslin. — Miss Austen, Northanger
Abbey, ch. x.
She sat herring-boning, tambouring, or stitch-
ing.— Ingoldsby Legends (Knight and Lady).
Tambour frame, a frame on which
the silk, canvas, or other material to
be embroidered was stretched tight,
like the skin of a drum.
Mrs. Grant and her tambour frame were
not without their use. — Miss Austen, Mans-
field Park, ch. vii.
Tame ability, capability of being
tamed.
The kingdom is in the hands of an oligar-
chy, who see what a good thing they have
got of it, and are too cunning and too well
aware of the tameability of mankind to give
it up. — Sydney Smith, Letters, 1821.
Tammy, a highly glazed woollen or
worsted stuff.
It [Coventry] drives a very great trade;
the manufacture of Tammies is their chief
employ. — Defoe, Tour thro9 G. Britain, ii. 409.
Tanged, studded (?) or made sting-
ing (?).
But I will have your carrion shoulders goartt
With scourges tangd with rowels.
Sylvester, The Schisme, 122.
Tanging. See extract.
He . . seizing the key and shovel, hurried
out into the garden, beating the two toge-
ther with all his might The process in
question, known in country phrase as " tang-
inj,n is founded upon the belief that bees
will not settle unless under the influence of
this peculiar music. . . . David the consta-
ble was a most sensible and open-minded
man of his time and class, but Kemble or
Akerman, or other learned Anglo-Saxon
scholar, would have vainly explained to him
that "tana" is but the old word for *• to
hold,'1 ana that the object of " tanging " is
not to lure the bees with sweet music of key
and shovel, but to give notice to the neigh-
bours that they have swarmed, and that the
owner of the maternal hive means to hold
on to his right to the emigrants. — Hughes,
Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxiii.
Tannage, tanning ; bronzing.
They should have got his cheek fresh tannage
Such a day as to-day in the merry sunshine.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Tanner, sixpence (slang).
Two people came to see the monument :
they were a gentleman and a lady ; and the
gentleman said, " How much a-piece ? " The
man in the monument replied, " a Tanner"
It seemed a low expression, compared with
the monument. The gentleman put a shil-
ling into his hand. — Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit,
ch. xxxvii.
Tansy, a dish described in N. and H. ;
there were many ingredients in it,
bence perhaps like a tansy came to
signify "perfect," something wherein
all was fitting.
Miss. Look, Lady Answerall, is it not well
mended?
Lady Ans. Ay, this is something like a,
tanzy. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
I would work under your honour's direc-
tions like a hone, and make fortifications
for you something like a tansy with all their
batteries, saps, ditches, anA palisadoes. —
Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 199.
Tantalian, tantalising ; unprofitable
for enjoyment.
Men overtoil'd in Commonwealth affaires
Get much Tantalian wealth by wealthie
paines. — Davits, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 24.
Tantamountingly, equivalently ; in
effect.
Did it not deserve the stab of excommuni-
cation, for any dissenting from her practice,
tantamountingly to give her the lie ? — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. ii. 28.
Tantivy. L. quotes from Macaulay
a passage in which he mentions this as
a nickname for an extreme Tory ; but
no example is supplied from any writer
in whose time the word was current
North implies that the word rose in
Charles II.'s reign : in that case there is
an anachronism in the first quotation.
TANTIVY
< 646 )
TASKER
In the time of Kiug James I-, soon after
his coming into EugTand, one of his own
country thus awostcd him : Sir (*ays he), I
am sorry to see your majesty so dealt with
by your prelatical tantivies. — .Scotland Charac-
terized, 1701 [Marl. Misc^ vii. 380).
Abo at half-a-dozen of the Tantivies were
mounted upon the Church of England, booted
aid sparred, riding it like an old hack Tan-
tivy to Rome.— Nort h, Examen, p. 101.
This trade, then much opposed, naturally
le I to a common use of slighting and oppro-
brious words, such as Yorkist. That served
for meer distinction, but did not scandalise
or reflect enough. Then they came to Tan-
tivy, which implied riding post to Borne. —
Ibid., p. 321.
Tantivy, to hurry off ; to make an
excursion.
Pray, where are they gone tantivyiny ? —
Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. III. ch. viii.
Tantony, a servile follower. The
word is a corruption of St. Anthony
(see Anthony).
Some are such Cossets and Tantanies that
they congratulate their oppressors and flat-
ter their destroyers. — Gauden, Tears of the
i hurcK p. 595.
Tantrums, whims, usually with
an^er connoted.
I am glad here's a husband coming that
will take you down in your tantrums; you
are grown too headstrong and robust for me.
—Foote, The Kniyhts, Act II.
He was but just got out of one of his
tantarums.—Mad. D'Arblay, Camilla, Bk. III.
ch. v.
He has been in strange humours and tan-
trums all the morning.— Lytton, My Novel,
Bk. XI. ch. ii.
Tapen, of tape.
Then his soul burst its desk, and his heart
broke its polysyllables, and its tapen bonds,
and the man of office came quickly to the
man of God. — Reade, Never too late to mend,
ch. xxv.
Tapinophoby. See quotation.
The modern tapino-phoby or dread of
everything that is low, either in writing or
in conversation. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. I. ch. vi.
Tapple vp taile, to die. CI Tat-
tle up heels, *. v. Heels.
Take heed to thy man in his furie and heate,
With ploughstaff and whipetock for maiming
thy neate ;
To thresher for hurting of cow with his flaile,
Or making thy hen to plaie tapple vp taile.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 57.
Tapsterly. Tapsterly terms = pot-
house language.
They impute singularitie to him that slan-
ders priuelie, and count it a great peeee of
arte in an inkhorne man, in any tapstrrhe
tearmes whatsoeuer, to oppose his superiours
to enuie.— T. Nashe, Introd. to Greene's Mena-
phon, p. 9.
Tapwort, the refuse of the tap (?).
See Taplask in L. and N.
A dish of young fryed frogges, sodde houghes
of mealed hoggea,
A cup of small tapworte.
Breton, Toyes of an Idle Head, p. 26.
Tarbreech, contemptuous, for a
sailor. See extract $. v. Qu 1ST RON,
where it is used adjectivally.
Tardidation, delay.
Avoid all snares
Of tardidation in the Lord's affaires.
Herrick, Noble Numbers, p. 405.
Tardigrade, slow stepping.
The soldiers were struggling and fighting
their way after them in such tardigrade
fashion as their hoof-shaped shoes would
allow.— G. Eliot, Romola, ch. xxii.
Tarhood, navy.
_ He has lately had a sea-piece drawn of the
victory for which he was lorded, in which his
own ship in a cloud of cannon was boarding
the French Admiral. This circumstance . . .
has been so ridiculed by the whole tarhootl
that the romantic part has been forced to be
cancelled.— Walpole to Mann, ii. 285 (1749).
Tarl bather, a term of contempt,
applied in the extract to a woman.
Thouse pay for all, thou old tarUther.—
Gammer Gurton's Needle (Hawkin's Eng. Dr-
i. 206).
Tarnation, a minced oath, winch
conies from America.
And there's my timbers straining every bit,
Ready to split,
And her tarnation hull a-growing rounder.
Hood, Sailor's Apology for bow-leys.
Extremely annoyed by the u tarnation whop,*9
as it
'S call'd in Kentuck, on his head and its
opposite
Blogg showed fight.
Inyoldsby Legends (Bagman's Dog).
Tarnish, colouring.
Care is taken to wash over the foulness of
the subject with a pleasing tarnish. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 303.
Tarryrreeks, a rough sailor.
No old tarrybreeks of a seadog.— AVn^sAy,
Westward Ho, ch. xxx.
Tasker, in the first two quotations
= a labourer ; in the last a thresher.
TASK' LORD
( 647 )
TEA
Many poor country vicars for want of other
means ... at last turn taskers, malsters, cos-
termongers, grasiers. — Burton, Democ. to
Header ; p. 10.
He is a good days-man, or journeyman, or
tasker. — Ward, Sermons, p. 105.
Oh, be thou a fan
To purge the chaff, and keep the winnow'd
grain ;
Make clean thy thoughts, and dress thy
mix'd desires ;
Thou art Heaven's tasker, and thy God
requires
The purest of thy flour, as well as of thy
fires. — Quarles, Emblems, II. vii. 4.
Task-lord, task-master.
They labour hard, eat little, sleeping less,
No sooner layd, but thus their task-lords
press. — Sylvester, The Lawe, 137.
Tablet. See quotation, and N. s. v.
lasses.
Thigh-pieces of steel, then called taslets.
— Scott, Legend of Montrose, p. 10.
TASS, a cup.
Big tosses, cups, goblets, candlesticks. —
UrquharVs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. li.
The Laird . . . recommended to the veteran
to add a toss of brandy. — Scott, Legend of
Montrose, p. 55.
Tattered, dilapidated. In the ex-
amples in the Diets, and in general
usage this word is applied to clothes,
flags, &c. The use of it in connection
with anything at all substantial as in
the extracts is peculiar.
An old ill-look'd wrinkled fellow in a
tattered boat.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 3.
He lay a great minister of state in a
tattered brass case.— Ibid., iii. 128.
I do not like ruined, tattered cottages. —
Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility, ch. xviii.
Tatting, edging in silk or cotton
done with a shuttle.
How our fathers managed without crochet
is the wonder ; but I believe some small and
feeble substitute existed in their time under
the name of "tatting." — G. Eliot, Janet's
Repentance, ch. iii.
Tattle-de-moy. See quotation.
A Tattle-de-moy, reader, was a new-fash-
ioned thing in the year of our Lord, 1070,
44 much like a seraband, only it had in it more
of conceit and of humour, and it might
supply the place of a seraband at the end of
a suit of lessons at any time." That simple-
hearted and therefore happy old man, Thomas
Mace, invented it himself, because he would
be a little modish, he said ; and he called it
a tattle-de-moy " because it tattles and seems
to speak those very words or syllables. —
Sou they, The Doctor, ch. xciv.
Tattlement, chatter.
Poor little Li lias Baillie, tottering about
there with her foolish glad tattlement. —
Carlyle, Misc., iv. 239.
Tavern fox. To hunt a tavern fox
= to be drunk ; to be foxed has the
same meaning. See N. s. v. fox.
Else he had little leisure time to waste,
Or at the ale-house huff-cap ale to taste ;
Nor did he ever hunt a tavern fox.
J. Taylor, Life of Old Parr, 1635
(Harl. Misc., vii. 70).
Tavern-token, a token coined by a
tavern-keeper ; so to swallow a tavern-
token = to be drunk ; an euphemistic
expression.
Drunk, sir ! you hear not me say so ; per-
haps he swallowed a tavern-token, or some
such device, sir, I have nothing to do withal.
— Jonson, Every man in his Humour, i. 3.
Tawdered out, dressed in a tawdry
way.
You see a sort of shabby finery, a number
of dirty people of quality tawdered out. —
Lady M. W. Montagu, Letters, Aug. 22, 1710.
Tawdrums, fal-lals ; finery.
No matter for lace and tawdrums. — Re-
venge, or, A Match in Newgate, Act V.
Tawdry, does not seem in the extract
to have its usual depreciatory meaning,
but to signify fine, good.
There is nothing in this world I abominate
worse than to be interrupted in a story, and
I was that moment telling Eu genius a most
tawdry one. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, v. 59.
Tawdryne.
Bynd the fillets, and to be fine, the waste
gyrt
Fast with a tawdryne.
Webbe, Eng. Poetrie, p. 84.
Tawny, to tan.
The Sunne so soone the painted face will
tawny. — Breton, Mother's Blessing, p. 9.
Tawnymoor, a mulatto.
There's a black, a tawnymoor, and a French-
man.— Centlivre, Bold Stroke for a Wife, I. i.
Taxless, without paying taxes.
If Tithe-lesse, Tax-lesse, Wage-lease, Right-
lesse, I
Have eat the Crop, or caused the Owners dye ;
In sted of Barley, and the best of Corn,
Grow nothing there but Thistles, Weeds,
and Thorn.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, iii. 555.
Tea, to drink tea : a vulgarism.
Father don't tea with us, but you won't
miud that I dare say.— Dickens, Nicholas
Nicklelty, ch. iz.
1
TEA-BOARD
( 648 )
TELL URIAN
I can hit on no novelty — none, on mv life,
Unless peradventure you'd M tea " with your
wife.
Ingoldslty Legends {Lord of Thoulouu).
Tea-board, tea-tray.
Shall we be christened tea-boards, varnished
waiters ?— Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 145.
Teach. To teach our dame to spin
= to teach one's grandmother to suck
eggs.
A swine to teach Minerva was a prouerbe
against socbe as . . . being theinselfea of no
kuowledge ne wisdome at all, will take upon
tbeim to teache persones that are excellently
skilled and passing expert, for whiche we saie
in Eoglishe to teache our dame to strinne. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apopfdh., p. 380.
Teagu eland, Ireland.
Dear courtier, excuse me from Teagueland
and slaughter.— T. Brown, Works, iv. 275.
Tbaguelander, Irishman. See ex-
tract S. V. OUTBLUNDER.
Tease. To be upon the tease = to
be uneasy, or fidgety.
Mrs. Sago (in an uneasy air). So not a
word to me ! are these his vows ?
L. Lucy (aside). There's one upon the
teize already.
Centlivre, Basset-Table, Act III.
I left her upon the teaze. — Ibid., Platonick
Lady, Act V.
Tedipy, to become tedious: a word
probably coined by Adams for the sake
of the jingle.
Such, whiles they would intend to edify,
do in event tedify. — Adams, i. 348.
Teeth. To the hard teeth = very
severely. The addition of " hard " to
intensify the meaning is unusual,
though otherwise the phrase is com-
mon enough.
Cicero mocked her to the hard teeth, —
UdaVs Erasmus's "Apophth., p. 355.
Teetotaller, a total abstainer from
intoxicating liquor : the first syllable is
merely the reduplication of the first
letter in total. L. gives the word
without example. Some have thought,
b'it erroneously, that the term refers to
drinking tea instead of wine, beer, &c,
and Thackeray by the way in which he
spells the word . appears to have so
taken it; yet in Lovel the Widower,
ch. iv., he adopts the other orthography.
He had quite a delicate appetite, and was
also a tea-totaller. — Thackeray, Roundabout
Papers, xvii.
Teetotally, completely; out and
out ; a sort of reduplication or empha-
sizing of totally.
An ugly little parenthesis between two
still uglier clauses of a teetotally ugly sen-
tence.— De Quincey, Roman Meals.
Teiqnton-8QDASh, perry. See quota-
tion s. v. St 1 re.
Telegram, a message by telegraph.
This word is discussed in Dr. Hall's
Recent Exemplifications of False Phi-
lology, pp. 41 — 47. There are many
letters on the word in the Times for
Oct. 1857. What will he do with ill
was published in 1856.
I sent a telegram (oh that I should live to
see such a word introduced into the English
language). — Lytton, What teill he da with i: /
Bk. XII. ch. xi.
There is against the exact but surfeiting
telegrapheme our lawless telegram, to which
is strictly applicable the maxim of the
civilians as regards a clandestine marriage.
Fieri non asbttit, sed factum valet. — Hail,
Modern English, p. 158.
Teleity, end ; completion.
When such a number of hot, dry, and moist
atoms cling together, up starts a horse ; the
same may be said of mixta: they differ meerly
accidentally, and have no other form, if I
may say so, than the teleity of the mixture.
— Gentleman Instructed, p. 427.
Telespectroscope. See extract.
These two observers at once directed their
telescope armed with spectroscopic adjuncts
— telespectroscope is the pleasing name of the
compound instrument— to the new comer. —
R. A. Proctor, Myths and Marvels of Astro-
nomy, p. 170.
Tell, tale.
There, I am at the end of my tell ! If I
write on, it must be to ask questions. — Wal-
pole to Mann, i. 265 (1743).
Tell-clock, an idler; one who
dawdles away hour after hour.
Is there no mean between busy - bodies
and tell-clocks, between factotums and fain-
eants ? — Ward, Sermons, p. 131.
Telling-house. See quotation.
The telling-houses on the moor [Exmoor]
are rude cots where the shepherds meet to
tell their sheep at the eud of the pasturing
season. — Blackmore, Lorna Doone, ch. ii. note.
Tell-truth, a veracious or candid
person.
A great many bold tell-truthe are gone be-
fore you. — Tom Brown, Works, iii. 20.
Tellurian, belonging to the earth :
also as a substantive, an inhabitant of
the earth.
TELL URIC
( 649 )
TERRIBLIZE
They absolutely hear the tellurian lungs
wheezing, panting, crying, " Bellows to
m«nd," periodically as the Earth approaches
her aphelion. — De Quincey, System of the
Heavens.
If any distant worlds (which may be the
case) are so far ahead of as Tellurians in
optical resources as to see distinctly through
their telescopes all that we do on earth,
what is the grandest sight to which we ever
treat them ? — Ibid., Joan of Arc.
Telluric, belonging to the earth.
How the Coleridge moonshine comported
itself amid these hot telluric flames . . . must
be left to cou jecture. — Carlyle, Life of Ster-
ling, Pt. I. ch. x.
Temperless, without temper or
moderation.
So swelling-proud, so surly-browd the while,
So temperlesse, tempted with Fortune's smile
Ignoble Natures are too lightly pufft.
Sylvester, Panaretus, 1374.
Templeless, without a church or
temple. See extract s. v. Crommell.
Templify, to make a temple.
That shall we come to, if we can take
order that while we be here, before we go
hence, our bodies, we get them templified, as
I may say, procure they be framed after the
similitude of a Temple, this Temple in the
text [S. John ii. 19J. — Andrews, ii. 361.
Tenant, to fasten as with tenons.
Cf . Tenon.
They be fastened or tenanted the one to the
other. — Andrewes, Sermons, ii. 81.
Tend, tender.
Then Cassivelaunus . . . sent Embassadour
to Caesar by Conius and Arras, tending unto
him a surrendry. — Holland's Camden, p. 37.
Tender, tenderness ; regard.
Tis natural to have a kind of a tender for
our own productions.— Centlivre, The Man's
bewitched (Preface).
I had a kind of a tender for Dolly. — Ibid.
ActV.
Tenderheartedness, compassion.
She little thought
This tender-heartedness would cause her death.
Southey, Grandmother's Tale.
Tkndriled, furnished with tendrils.
Round their trunks the thonBand-tendrtTd
vine wound up. — Southey, Thalalta, Bk. VI.
Tendron, a stalk.
Buds and tendrons appear above ground
from the root. — Holland, Pliny, xix. 8.
Tenner, a ten pound note. Cf.
Fivkr (slang).
" No money ? " " Not much ; perhaps a
tenner." — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch.
xix.
Tenon, to fasten as by a tenon ; which
is the end of a piece of timber cut so
as to fit into another piece. Cf . Tenant.
We tenon both these together as antecedent
and consequent. — Andrewes, Sermons, ii. 86.
Tenticle, a little tent.
They were the tenticles or rather cabins
and couches of their soldiers. — Patten, Ex-
ped. to Scotl., 1548 (Eng. Gamer,u\. 127).
Tentivb, attentive. H. has tentyply
as used by Maundeville.
To question mine give tentive eare. — Pres-
ton, King Cambists (Hawkins, Eng. Dr., i.
278).
Wyth tentiue lystning eeche wight was
setled in hardening. — Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 1.
Teredo, a molluscous animal that
burrows in wood or stone ; damaging
piers, Ac. L. gives the word, but no
example. Adams, it will be seen, in-
flects it as a Latin word.
A better piece of timber hath the more
teredines breeding in it. — Adams, i. 505.
Teretism, rough and unmelodious
verse ; rcp£rur/ia signifies the chirping
of swallows, Ac. ; hence any empty
sound.
Bough-hewn teretismes writ in th' antique
v&jL—Hall, Sat., IV. i. 3.
Terlery-ginck, apparently to speak
nonsense. See N. s. v. terlerie-whiskin.
All these have terlery-ainckt it . . frivol-
ously of they reckt not what. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffe (Uarl. Misc., vi. 159;.
Termagantly, outrageously.
Margaret Cheatly . . by immoderate drink-
ing of strong waters, had got a nose so ter-
magantly rubicund that she outblaz'd the
comet. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 148.
Terminant, termination ; ending.
If one should rime to this word, restore,
he may not match him with doore or poore,
for neither of both are of like terminant,
either by good orthography, or in naturall
sound. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. ch.
ix.
Terresity, earthliness.
Rhenish wine . . . hath fewer dregs and less
terresity or gross earthliness than the Glared
wine hath. — Dean Turner on Wines, 1568
(Eng. Garner, ii. 114).
Terriblizb, to make terrible.
Both Camps approach, their bloudy rage doth
' rise,
And even the face of cowards terriblize.
Sylvester, Tlte location, 271.
TERRICULAMENT ( 650 )
7 HAT
Terrioulamknt. See extract from
Fuller, who, however, uses the Latin ;
but the Eng. form had been employed
as early as 1548. See extract 4. v.
Rattle-bladder. Gauden uses it again
pp. 476, 570.
With these and such -like, either torments
of opinions or terriculaments of expressions
do these new sort of preachers seek ... to
scare and terrifle their silly sectators. — Gau-
den, Tears of the Church, p. 198.
The Proverb is appliable to those who are
not Terriculamenta, but Terrores, no fancy-
formed Bug-bears, but such as carry fear
and fright to others about them. — Fuller,
Worthies, Warwick (ii. 404).
Terrorless, unalarming.
Some human memories and tearful lore
Bender him terrorless.
E. A. Poe, Silence (ii. 39).
Terry, a terrier. See extract s. v.
Intergern.
Test. See quotation from Sou they ;
but the word is not an Americanism.
Not with fond shekels of the tested gold. —
Shakespeare, Meas.for Meas., ii. 2.
She cannot break through a weiUtested
modesty.— Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iii. 187.
You have been sufficiently tested. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 138.
But I will test, (as an American would say,
though let it be observed in passing that I
do not advocate the use of Americanisms.) I
will test Mr. Campbell's assertion. — Southey,
The Doctor, ch. cxlv.
Testamentize, to make a will.
He asked leave of King Edward the First
to make a will . . . because Welsh Bishops
in that age might not Testamentize without
Royal assent. — Fuller, Worthies, Denbigh
(ii. 388).
Testamur, the certificate that a man
has passed an examination at the
University; so called from the words
u Ita testamur,11 which precede the
examiners' signatures.
Outside in the quadrangle collect by twos
and threes the friends of the victims, wait-
ing for the reopening of the door, and the
distribution of the testamurs. The testamurs,
lady readers will be pleased to understand,
are certificates under the hands of the ex-
aminers that your sons, brothers, husbands,
perhaps, have successfully undergone the
torture. — Hughes, Tom Brown1* Schooldays,
ch. xziv.
Martin of Trinity had got his testamur. —
H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xiv.
Testimonials, to present with a
testimonial.
People were testimonialising his wife. —
Thackeray, Nevxomes, ch. lxiii.
Tetch. To take tetch = to take
offence.
This frantic fellow took tetch at somewhat,
and run away into Ireland. — North, Life of
Ld. Guilford, ii. 286.
Tetrasttle, a structure with four
pillars.
An organ of very good workmanship, and
supported by a Tetrastyle of very beautiful
Gothic columns. —Defoe, Tour thro' G. Bri-
tain, i. 373.
Tewkesbury mustard balls.
Tewkesbury was long famous for its
mustard. Falstaff says of Poins, "His
wit is as thick as Tewkesbury Mustard"
(2 Hen. IV., ii. 4). Hence I suppose
Tewkesbury Mustard Balls was a name
given to some explosives from their
burning qualities.
"Why have the gentry never yet flung
Tewkesbury mustard balls into their own
homes ? — Gentleman Instructed, p. 383.
The town [Tewkesbury] was long famous
for its mustard balls, as also for a great
manufacture of stockens. — Defot, Tour thro9
G. Britain, ii. 328.
Tew-taw, to beat or dress hemp or
flax : see extract from Holland *. t\
Brake.
Textlet, little text.
One little textlet from the Gospel of Free-
dom .—CarlyUj Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. xi.
Thankful, pleasant: grateful is stilt
used in this sense.
They of late years have taken this pastime
vp among them, many times gratifying their
ladies, and often times the princes of the
realme with some such thankfull noveltie. —
Puttenham, Eng. Potse, Bk. II. (cancelled
pages).
Thankly, thankfully.
He giueth frankly what we thankly spend.
— Sylvester, Third day, first week, 809.
Thanks, was sometimes used as a
singular.
I hope your service merits more respect
Than thus without a thanks to be sent hence.
Jonson, Poetaster, iv. 5.
"What a thanks I owe
The hourly courtesies your goodness gives me.
Massinger, Very Woman, iii. 5.
Would I beg a thanks, I could tell you that
I have often moved her for you.
Ibid., Bashful Lover, v. 3.
That, such.
This was carried with that little noise that
THAUMATURGIST ( 651 )
THING
for a good space the vigilant Bishop was not
a vak'd with it. — Hacket, Life of Williams,
ii. 07.
She pressed the invitation with that earn-
estness, Theomachas foresaw she would not
return with a denial. — Gentleman Instructed,
p. 241.
Thaumaturqist, wonder-worker.
Cagliostro, thaumaturgist, prophet, and
arch-quack. — Cariyle, Diamond Necklace,
ch. xvi.
Theatewan, an actor.
Players, I mean, theaterians, pouch mouth
stage-walkers. — Dekker, Satiromastix (Haw-
kins, Eng. Dr., iii. 172).
Theatricalise, to cast in a dramatic
f.>nn.
I shall occasionally theatricalise my dia-
logues.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 93.
Theatricality, histrionism; artifi-
ciality.
By art and word he strives to do it ; with
sincerity, if possible ; failing that, with
tlieatricality.— Cariyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. L
ch. ix.
Its exaggeration, its theatricality , were
especially calculated to catch the eve of a
boy. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. vi.
Thema, theine ; thesis : the Angli-
cised form ' theme ' is as old as Gas-
coigne and Shakespeare.
His thema to be maintained is that the
King could not break with the . Kiug of
France because be had sold himself to him for
money. — North, Examen, p. 478.
Theophile, one beloved of God.
Afflictions are the proportion of the best
theophiles. — Howell, Letters, ii. 41.
Theosopher, mystic. The Diets,
give examples of theosophist. L. has
theosophtr, but without illustration.
The great Teutonic theosopher, Jacob Beh-
men. — H. Brooke, Fool of (quality, i. 236.
Therm, a hot bath ; but here = bath
generally. Sylvester (Trophies, 1112)
makes David speak of the "cleer
therms'1 in which BatliHheba was
bathing when he first saw her.
Brittaine . . . having beene so long a pro-
vince of great honour and benefit to the
Roman Empire, could not but partake of the
magnificence of their goodly structures,
thcrmes, aquaducto, high-waies, and all other
their ornaments of delight, ease, and great-
ne*se. — Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 8.
Thersitical, grossly abusive.
There is a pelting kind of thersitical satire,
as black as the very ink 'tis wrote with (and
by the bye whoever says so is indebted to
the muster-master general of the Grecian
army for suffering the name of so ugly and
foul-mouth 'd a man as Thersites to continue
upon his roll, for it has furnished him with
an epithet).— Stem*, Tr. Shandy, vi. 140.
Thiblh, a round stick used for stirring
broth, &c.
The thible ran round, and the . . . handfuls
of meal fell into the water. — E. Bronte,
Wuthering Heights, ch. xiii.
Thick, eventful.
His reign was not onely long for continu-
ance, fifty-six years, but also thick for re-
markable mutations happening therein. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist, III. iv. 24.
Thick, intimate.
Newcome and I are not very thick together.
— Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xxiv.
Thick, a stupid fellow (slang).
What a thick I was to come! — Hughes,
Tom Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I. ch. vii.
THICKY, thick.
It was a very thicky shade
That broad leaves of beech had made.
Greene, p. 304 (from The Mourning
Garment).
Thieftkuusly, thievishly.
Qne little villainous Turkey knob-breasted
rogue came thief teously to snatch away some
of my lardons. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. II.
ch. xiv.
Thieves' Latin, cant terms used by
thieves. See extract «. v. Queer
Cuffin.
Thimble-rigger, a Bwindler who bets
that no one will find out under which
of three thimbles a pea is placed. He
appears to the dupe to put it under one
of them, but he litis really hidden it in
his sleeve or elsewhere by sleight of
hand. See quotation s. v. Cannibalic.
Thing. The thing = what is right
or fashionable.
A bishop's calling company together in
this week is, to use the vulgar phrase, not
the thing. — Johnson, 1781 (BoswelVs Life, viii.
64).
It is quite delightful, ma'am, to see young
people so properly happy, so well suited, and
so much the thing. — Miss Austen, Mansfield
Park, ch. xii.
Thing. H. says this term is con-
stantly applied to a lady in early
metrical romances, but it was also used
of the male sex. One or two examples
may be seen in L., but none quite like
the subjoined.
THINNIFY
( 652 ) THREE TREES
Augustus beyng yet a young thing vnder
marines state.— UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 270.
Thin ni fy, to make thin.
The heart doth in its left side ventricle so
thinnify the blood— Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk.
III. en. iv.
Thirdsman, a third party ; a mediator
or arbitrator.
There should be somebody to come in
thirdsman between Death and my principal.
— Scott, St. Ronan's Well, i. 219.
Thorn, to prick or pierce.
I am the only rose of all the stock
That never thorn1 d him.
Tennyson, Harold, I. i.
Thornless, free from thorns.
Through Youth's gay prime and thornless
paths I went.
Coleridge, Sonnet to Bowles.
One such, I know, who upward from one
cradle
Beside me like a sister— no, thank God ! no
sister ! —
Has grown and grown, and with her mellow
shade
Has blanched my thornless thoughts to her
own hue.— Kingsley, Saints Tragedy, i. 2.
Thorough, a channel.
If any man would alter the natural course
of any water to run a contrary way, he shall
never be able to do it with dams ; for a time
he may well stop it, but when the dam is
full it will either burst down the dam or
overflow it, and so with more rage run than
ever it did before. I will not speak of the
often weesing out, mauger all the diligence
that can be. Therefore the alteration must
be from the head, by making other thoroughs
and devices.— Bradford, i. 303.
Thorough-stitched, complete. To
go through-stitch is not uncommon, and
in illustrated in N.
His book may properly be considered, not
only as a model, but as a thorough-stitched
Digest and regular institute of noses. —
Sterne, Tr. Shandy, iii. 30.
Thought-swift-flying, flying quick
as thought.
In that same myd-daies hower came sayling in
A thought-smft-Jlyina pynnase.
G. Markham, Tragedie of Sir
B. Grenuile, p. 47.
Thowels, the wooden pins that keep
the oar from slipping.
They took us for French ; our boats being
fitted with thoels and grummets for the oars
iu the French fashion. — Marryat, Fr. Mild'
may, ch. v.
With what an unusual amount of noise
the oars worked in the thowels.— Dickens,
Great Expectations, ch. liv.
Thrall, a shelf or stand.
The dairy thralls I might ha' wrote my
name on 'em, when I come downstairs after
my illness.— G. Eliot, Adam Beds, ch. vi.
Th ball- FULL, enslaved.
Also the Lord accepted Job, and staid
His thrall-full state.
Sylvester, Job Triumphant, iv. 686.
Thraskite, a follower of John
Thraske, who in the early part of the
17th century affirmed the Jewish cere-
monial law to be binding on Christians.
See Fuller, Ch. Hist, X. iv: 64.
There is a fourth leaven, ... the mixing
of law with gospel ; I mean ceremonial and
legal rites with the truth of Jesus Christ.
This leaven might well die in forgetf ulnesa,
and have moulded away, if there had not
been a late generation of Thraskites to devour
it as bread. They must ahsiain from swine s
flesh, aud from blood, and that upon con-
science to the ceremonial law.— Adams, u.
343.
Threatless, not threatening.
Threatless their brows, and without braves
their voyce.— Sylvester, The Captawes,20l.
Three-decker, a ship with three
decks.
Before the gentlemen, as they stood at the
door, could . . . settle the number of three-
deckers now in commission, their companions
were ready to proceed.— Miss Austen, Mans-
field Park, ch. xl.
Cataract seas that snap
The threedecker*s oaken spine.
Tennyson, Maud, Pt. II. u. 4.
Three-holes, a game.
I put these here stocks under your care,
and you'll keep off the other boys from
sitting on 'em, and picking off the paint, and
playing three-holes and chuck-farthing.—
Lytton, My Novel, Bk. I. ch. xii.
Three-threads. Half common ale
mixed with stale and double beer.
Ezekiel Driver, of Puddle-dock, carman,
having disordered his pia mater with too
plentiful a morning's draught of three-
threads and old Pharaoh, had the misfortune
to have his cart run over him. — T. Brovn,
Works, ii. 286.
Three trees, the gallows, formed
by a transverse beam on two uprights.
Cf. Triple tree.
For commonly such knaues as these
Doe end their lyves vpon three trees.
Breton, Toyes of an Idle Head, p. 28.
THRENODIAL
( 653 ) THUNDERING
Thrknodial, elegiac.
This was pretty well for a tkrenodial flight,
bat Dr. "Watts went further. When Mr.
How should die (and How was then seventy
years of age) he thought it time that the
world should be at an end. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. cxxxiii.
Thriveless, unsuccessful.
These t reach 'ro us hands, that were so lately
bold
To try a thriveless combat.
(^uarles, Emblems, HI. vi. 10.
Throbless, not throbbing or beating.
Every tongue silent, every eye awed, every
heart quaking ; mine, iu a particular man-
ner, sunk throbless. — Richardson, CI. Har-
lowe, vi. 67.
Throneless, without a throne; de-
posed.
Thou throneless homicide.
Byron, Ode to Napoleon.
Traditions of its having been the landing-
place of a throneless queen were current in
the town. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia1 s Lovers, ch. i.
Throug-handlinq = management
The king (but skiming anything
that came before him) was disciplined to
leave the throug-handling of all to his gentle
wife. — Sidney, Arcadia, p. 177.
Thruncke. H. has thrunk as an
adjective = busy ; thronged ; crowded ;
but in the extract it is a verb: mis-
print for shruncke (?).
Their cariage was but an unwildy trunke,
Wherein to neare their trash was laied their
treasure,
With weight whereof their shoulders often
thruncke,
Before they came vnto their place of pleasure.
Breton, Pilgrimage to Paradise, p. 7.
Thrush -a- thrush, a game, appar-
ently of an active kind.
"What say you, Harry? have you any
play to shew them?" "Yes, sir," said
Harry; "I have a many of them; there's
first leap-frog and thrush-a-thrush.n — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 25.
Thruster, one who thrusts at another.
I was sore thrust at, that I so might fall,
But Thou o'er-threw'st my thrusters.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 34.
Thumb. To be under the thumb of
another is to be under his orders or
influence.
She remembers her late act of delinquency,
so she is obliged to be silent: I have her
under my thumb. — Richardson, Grandison, v.
56.
He is under the thumb of that doctor. —
H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. ix.
Thumb. Bale of thumb = rough or
make-shift. The thumb is used some-
times in order to attain a rough or ap-
proximate measurement.
We never learnt anything in the navy
when I was a youngster, except a little rule'
of -thumb mathematics. — Hughes, Tom Brown
at Oxford, ch. xxi.
Thumb. Of a clumsy person it is
said that " all his fingers are thumbs,"
though to be without thumbs has a
similar meaning. See Thumbless.
Ah, eche finger is a thombe to-day me thinke.
— Udal, Roister Doister, i. 3.
Thumb-bottle, a short thick bottle (?).
The same author speaks of illuminations
on royal anniversaries " by loyal thumb-
bottles displayed " (p. 212).
Whose soul, moreover, of such sort is —
With so much acrimony overflows
As makes him, wheresoe'er he goes,
A walking thumb-bottle of aqua-fortis.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 121.
Thumble, to thumb or paw about:
at least this I suppose to be the mean-
ing if it has any. The speaker is a
country girl.
Well, 111 not stay with her : stay, quotha ?
To be yauld and jaul'd at, and tumbled and
thumbled, and tost and turn'd as I am by an
old hag.— Wily Beguiled {Hawkins, Eng. Dr.,
iii. 317).
Thumbless, clumsy.
When to a house I come and see
The genius wastef ull more than free ;
The servants thumblesse, yet to eat
With lawlesse tooth the floure of wheat.
Merrick Hesperides, p. 333.
Thunderbeat, to beat with thunder-
ing strokes.
So he them thunderbet whereso he went,
That neuer a stroke in vaine his right hand
spent. — Hudson, Judith, v. 397.
Thunderbolt, a celt or fossil belem-
nite. See extract «. v, Dunderbolt.
Thunderbolt, to strike with thunder.
He must ere long be triple beneficed,
Else with his tongue he'll thunderbolt the
world.
Return from Parnassus, iii 2 (1006).
Thundering, used as an intensative
= very fast, large, &c.
He goes a thundering pace that you would
not think it possible to overtake him. —
Adams, ii. 420.
I was drawing a thundering fish out of the
water, so very large that it made my rod
crack again. — T. Brown, Works, i. 219.
THUNDERLESS ( 654 ) TICKLETOBYS MARE
Thundkrless, unattended by thunder
or loud noise. In the second extract
the " Silent Isle " is spoken of.
Witness too the silent cry,
The prayer of many a race, aud creed, and
clime,
Thunderless lightnings striking under sea
From sunset and sunrise of all the realm.
Tennyson, To the Queen.
The long waterfalls
Pour'd in a thunderless plunge to the base of
the mountain walls.
Ibid., Voyage of Maeldune.
Thunder-shot, struck by lightning.
^ His death commonly is most miserable
either burnt as Diagoras, or eaten up with
lice as Pherceydes, or devoured by dogs as
Lucian, or thunder-shot and turn'd to ashes
as Oiimpius. — Fuller, Holy and Profane State,
V. vi. 9.
Thundbb-thump, thunderbolt.
O thou yat throwest the thunder-thumps
From Heauens hye to Hell.
Googe, Eglogs, iv.
Thurify, to cense.
This herring or this cropshin was sensed
and thurified in the smoake. — Nashe, Lenten
Stuffs (Harl. Misc., vi. 176).
The smoak of censing, sraoak of thurifying.
Sylvester, Tobacco Battered, 183.
Thwart, opposition. The word is
not generally used as a substantive : in
thwart = in spite.
A certain disastrous person, who calleth
himself the devil, even now, a id m thwart of
your fair indications, keepeth and detaineth
your irradiant frame in hostile thraldom. —
Mad. D'ArUay, Cecilia, Bk. II. ch. ill.
Thwarted, crossed.
All Knights-Tempi srs make such saltire
cross with their thwarted leggs upon their
monuments. — Fuller, Ch. Hist, IIL iii. 11.
Thwartly, perversely.
Sith man then in judgeinge so thwartly is
bente
To satisfie fansie, and not true intente.
W. Kethe, 1554 {Maitland on Reformation,
p. 113).
Thyrse, the staff twined with ivy
and vine-leaves borne by Bacchus and
the Bacchantes. This Latin word
(thyrsus)^ in an Anglicised form, is
used more than once by Herri ck. See,
besides extract, pp. 3, 41. It occurs
also in Stapyltoris Juvenal, vi. 73,
and is defined in the notes "a speare
wreathed about with vine-leaves and
grapes proper to Bacchus.1
»»
Wild I am now with heat :
O Bacchus ! coole thy raies !
Or frantick I shall eate
Thy thyrse, and bite the bayes.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 84.
Tib of the buttery, gipsy cant for
a goose. See extract s. v. Margery.
Tick, touch ; mark : also, a verb.
See quotation s. v. Foote saunt.
The least tick befalls thee not without the
overruling eye and hand, not only of a wise
God, but of a tender Father. — Ward, Sermons,
p. 34.
Lord, if the peevish infant fights, and fliea
With unpared weapons at his mother's eyes.
Her frowns (half-mixed with smiles) may
chance to show
An angry, \ove-tick on his arm or so.
Quarles, Emblems, III. vi. 42.
Ticker, a watch (slang). See ex-
tract s. v. Fogle.
Ticket, the correct thing.
" She's very handsome and she's very finely
dressed, only somehow she's uot— she's not
the ticket, you see." tfOh, she's not the
ticket," says the Colonel, much amused. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. vii.
Ticket-of-leave. In 1854 a system
was introduced under which convicts
may be liberated, though a portion of
their sentence be unexpired, on a ticket-
of-leave; they are obliged to report
themselves from time to time to the
police, until the period for which they
were sentenced is over, and they are
liable to have the ticket recalled on the
commission of any fresh offence. The
word is often used adjectivally.
They found themselves outlaws, ticket-of-
leave men, or what you will in that line. —
Hughes, Tom Brown's School Days, Pt. I. ch.
ix.
Ticking-shoes, carpet-slippers (?).
The dirtiest trollup in the town must have
her top-knot and tickin-shoes.—Centlivrc, The
Artifice, Act III.
Tickle, we should now say " itch."
The fingers of the Athenians tidecd to aide
and succour Harpalus. — VdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 381.
Tickletoby's mare. See Ribelais,
Bk. IV. ch. xiii. for an account of
Tickletoby'8 (Urquhart's translation of
Tappe-cou) mare.
Let me beg of you, like an unbacked filly,
to frisk it, to squirt it, to jump it, to rear it,
to bound it, and to kick it with long kicks and
short kicks, till, like Tickletoby's mare, yon
break a strap or a crupper, and throw his
TJDDLE
( 655 ) TILLET TREE
worship into the dirt.— Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
iu. 20.
Tiddle, to potter or fidget.
To leave the family pictures from his sons
to you, because you could tiddle about them,
and though you now neglect their examples,
could wipe and clean them with your dainty
hands. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, i. 322.
T idk-coach, a coach that timed its
journeys to or from a seaport so as to
catch the right tide; we now use the
adjective in this way, and speak of a
tidal train.
He took a place in the tide-coach from
Rochester. — Smollett, Roderick Random, ch.
xxiv.
Tideoate, tideway or stream.
Some visible apparent tokens remaine of a
haven . . . though uow it be graveld up, and
the streame or tydegate turned another way.
—Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Hart. Misc., vi. 160).
Tiego, corruption of vertigo (?) ; the
speaker is fuddled.
I am shrewdly troubled with a tiego
Here in my head, madam, often with this
tiego,
It takes me very often.
Massinger, Very Woman, iv. 3.
Tiff. The Diets, give this as mean-
ing some small thin drink, like swipes,
but in the subjoined it seems to be
applied to the measure holding the
liquor or it may = draught.
What say you to a glass of white wine, or
a tiff of punch by way of whet ? — Fielding,
Amelia, Bk. VIII. ch. x.
Dr. Slash . . . was smoaking his pipe over
a tiff of punch. — Graves, Spiritual Quixote,
Bk. XI. ch. xiv.
Sipping his tiff of braody punch with great
solemnity. — Scott, Guy Mannering, i. 111.
Tiff, to drink.
He tiffd his punch, and went to rest.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. v.
Tiff, a pet ; a slight quarrel.
My lord and I have had another little — tiff,
shall I call it ? it came not up to a quarrel. —
Richardson, Grandison, iv. 291.
There had been numerous tiffs and quarrels
between mother and daughter. — Thackeray,
Shabby Genteel Story, ch. i.
In comparison with such words or gestures,
George IV. 'a quarrel with Brummel was an
ordinary tiff.— Nat. Review (1853). vii. 395.
Tiffany, a thin silk ; hence tiffany
natures = slender- witted natures: taf-
fetas has the same adjectival and figur-
ative use, but is often complimentary.
Cf. Calico.
Tiffany natures are so easily imposed upon.
Centlivre, Beau's Duel, Act II.
Tiger. See quotation.
"A man may have a very good coat of
arms, and be a tiger, my boy," the Major
said, chipping his egg : u that man is a tiger,
mark my word — a low man." — Thackeray,
Pendennis, ch. xix.
Tigerantic, ravenous as a tiger.
In what sheep's-head ordinary have you
chew'd away the meridian of your tygerantic
stomach?— T. Brown, Works, ii. 179.
Tigerkin. "That tiger's miniature
— the cat " (Colman, Poetical Vagaries,
p. 102).
It is only from the attic that you can ap-
preciate the picturesque which belong to our
domesticated tigerkin. The goat should be
seen on the Alps, and the cat on the house-
top.— Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XIV. ch. ii.
•
Tighter, caulker.
Julius Caesar and Pompey were boat-
wrights and tighters of ships. — Urquharl's
Rabelais, Bk. if. ch. xxx.
Tigrish, having the qualities of a
tiger in the sense given above.
Nothing could be more vagrant, devil-me-
carish, and, to use the slang word, tiarish,
than his whole air. — Lytton, My Novel, Bk.
VI. ch. xx.
Tile, a hat (slang). See extract s. v.
Shovel.
John, Lord Kin sale,
A stalwart old Baron, who acting as hench-
man
To one of our early Kings, killed a big
Frenchman :
A feat which his Majesty deigning to smile
on.
Allowed him thenceforward to stand with his
tile on. — Ingoldshy Legends (Auto-da- Fe).
Tiler, pimple or mole (?). The
speaker is an ass.
Our very urine is found to be good against
tilers or morphews in ladies' faces. — Howell,
Parly of Beasts, p. 25.
Till, to. R. has no later example
than from Chaucer of the use of the
word in this sense : L. quotes from Bp.
Fisher, but the subjoined is nearly 150
years later.
He was afterwards restored till his liberty
and archbishoprick. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., IV.
iii. 40.
Tillet tree, the linden.
They use their cordage of date tree leaves
and the thin barks of the Linden or Tillet
tree. — Holland, Pliny, xix. 2.
TILTURE
(«56)
TINE
Tiltubb, husbandry.
Good tilth brings seedes,
Euill tilture weedes.
• Tusser, Husbandries p. 92.
Timber, forty skins of fur were called
a timber.
Having . . . presented them with two timber
of sables, which with much diligence had
been recovered out of the wreck, he was by
them remitted to his lodging. — Heylin, Re-
formation, ii. 202.
Timber -worm, a worm that eats
through wood.
What, o what is it
That makes yee, like vile timber-wormes, to
weare
The poasts sustaining you ?
Davies, Sir T. Overbury, p. 16.
Time, in good time = just so ; well
and good : a la bonne keure. It oc-
curs in Measure for Measure, III. i. and
V. i. : often used ironically.
The magistrate shall have his tribute . . if
so be he carry himself worthily, and as he
ought to do in his place, and so as to deserve
it. In good time ! But I pray you then first
to argue the cause a little with thee, whoever
thou art that thus — glossest! who mayst
judge of his carriage, and whether he deserve
such honour ? — Sanderson, i. 67.
"There, saith he, even at this day are
shewed the ruines of those three tabernacles
built according to Peter's desire." In very
?ood time, no doubt! — Fuller, Pisgah Sight,
I. vi. 27.
Time, to pass the time ; to procras-
tinate.
They timed it out all that spring, and a
great part of the next sommer. — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng., p. 81.
Timeist, one who keeps accurate
time in music.
Those whose musical creed is Time before
Sentiment might have put up with this night-
bird ; for, to do her justice, she was a perfect
timeist ; one crake in a bar the livelong night ;
but her tune — ugh \~Reade, Never too late to
mend, ch. lxiv.
Timeling, a time-server.
They also cruelly compel divers of the
ministers whioh are faint-hearted, and were,
as it seemeth, but timelinas, serving rather
the time (as the manner of the worldings is)
than marrying in Thy fear, to do open pen-
ance before the people. — If earn, III. 235.
Timeservingness, a truckling line of
conduct, a compliance with the varying
temper of the times. North (Life of
Lord Guilford, i. 2) accuses some
people of <( timeservingness and malice."
Timmen, a sort of woollen cloth. See
N. 8. v. tamine.
The inward man struggled and plunged
amidst the toils of broadcloth and timmen. —
Miss Ferrier, Inheritance, iii. 12.
Timidous, timid. I have only met
with this word in North. 8ee another
instance from his Examcn, s. v. Hesita-
tory.
His lordship knew him to be a mere lawyer,
and a timidous man. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, ii. 31.
His timidous manner of creating and judg-
ing abundance of points, some on one side
and some on another, and, if possible, con-
triving that each should have a competent
share, made work for registers, solicitors,
and counsel. — Ibid., ii. 74.
Timish, fashionable ; one up with
the times ?
A timish gentleman acooutered with
sword and peruke, hearing the noise this
man caused in the town, had a great desire
to discourse with him. — Life of Lodouick
Muggleton, 1676 {Marl. Misc., i. 612).
Timonist, a misanthrope.
I did it to retire me from the world,
And turn my muse into a Timonist.
Dekker, Satiromastix {Hawkins, Eng.
Dr., iii. 189).
Timonize, to play the misanthrope.
I should be tempted to Timonize, and
clap a satyr upon our whole species.— Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 306.
Tim-whiskey, a light one-horse
chaise.
Not that I believe he is a jot better than
the apprentices that flirt to Epsom in a TYm-
whiskey.— Walpole, Letters, iii. 256 (1168).
It was a two- wheeled vehicle which claimed
none of the modern appellations of tilbury,
tandem, dennet,or the like, but aspired only
to the humble name of that almost forgotten
accommodation, a whiskey ; or, according to
some authorities, a tim-tchiskcy. — Scott, St.
Ronan's Well, it 233.
It is not like the difference between a
Baptist and an Anabaptist, which Sir John
Danvers said is much the same as that
between a whiskey and a Tim-whiskey, that is
to say, no difference at all. — Houthey, The
Doctor, Interchapter ziv.
Tindery, inflammable, like tinder.
Sir C. Grandison (iv. 158) speaks of
love at first sight as " a tindery fit."
I love nobody for nothing ; I am not so
tindery.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, vi 44.
Tine, " a wild vetch or tare ; a plant
that tines or encloses and imprisons
TINGLISH
( 657 )
TIP-TILTED
other plants" (Payne and Herrtage).
See titters.
The titters or tine
Makes hop to pine.
S >me raketh their wheat
With rake that is great,
So titters and tine
Be gotten out fine.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 109.
Tinglish, sensitive.
They pass ; for them the panels may thrill,
The tempera grow alive and tinglish ;
Their pictures are left to the mercies still
Of dealers and stealers, Jews and the
English.
Browning, Old Pictures in Florence.
Tininq gloves, hedging-gloves : tine
= to repair a hedge.
They pat on tininy gloves, that the thorns
may not prick them.— Adams, ii. 486.
Tink, to tinkle.
Sir after drinking, while the shot is tincking,
Some heds be swinking, but mine will be
sinking.
Heyicood, The Four Fs. (Doddey,
O PL, i. 96).
If the verses do but chime and tinck in the
close it is enough for the purpose. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., II. p. 167.
Tinker dp, to botch ; mend in a
clumsy or imperfect way.
Chronology and Astronomy are forced
to tinker up and reconcile, as well as they
can, these uncertainties. — Walpole, Historic
Doubts on Richard III., Preface.
I am criticised for the expression tinker up
iii the preface. Is this one of those that you
object to? I own I think such a low ex-
pression, placed to ridicule an absurd instance
of wise folly, very forcible. Replace it with
an elevated word or phrase, and to my con-
ception it becomes as flat as possible. — Wal-
pole, Letters, iii. 227 (1768).
Tinkerly, after the manner of a
tinker (see L.) ; and Webbe might
mean a tinkered up verse, but more
probably where he speaks (p. 31) of
" this tynkerly verse which we call
ryme," he means * tinkling.'
Tinkler, a tinker, and so, a vaga-
bond.
"Is there a fire in the library ?n "Yes,
ma'am, but she looks such a tinkler.19 — C.
Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xviii.
TlNTINABULATION, 80Und of bells.
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinabulation that so musically swells
From the bells.
E. A. Poe, The Bells (ii. 23).
Tintinnabulous, pertuining to bell-
ringing. De Quincey (Confessions of
an Opium- Eater, p. 104) speaks of
"the tintinnabulous propensities" of
the College porter, who rang the bell
for early chapel.
Tintless, colourless.
I made myself gardener of some tintless
flowers.— Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xil
Tip, a draught of liquor.
Miss (with a glass in her hand). — Hold
your tongue, Mr. Neverout, don't speak in my
tip.— Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. ii.).
Tip-cheese, a boy's game, in which
a small stick is struck and bit forward
by another.
He forgets the long familiar cry of
" knuckle down ; " and at tip-cheese or odd
and even his hand is out. — Picktcick Papers^
ch. xxxiv.
Tip for tap, tit for tat. The origin-
al has only non responsare. Tap for
tap occurs in 2 Hen. IV., II. i., but
refers there to exchange of taps between
fencers.
Let every young man be persuaded and
keep in memory that his duty is . . . not to
answer tip for tap, but to suffer much and
wink thereat. — Bulling er, I. 283.
Tippler. Latimer and Grindal use
the word of publicans : it usually
means drunkards.
They were but tipplers, such as keep ale-
houses.— Latimer, i. 133.
No inn keeper, ale-house keeper, victualler,
or tipler shall admit or suffer any person or
persons in his house or backside to eat, drink,
or play at cards, tables, bowls, or other games,
in time of Common Prayer. — Grindal, He-
mains, p. 138.
Tipsify, to make tipsy : tipsy is a
milder word than drunk.
The man was but tipsijied when he went ;
happily when he returned, which was very
late, he was drunk. — Carlyley Misc., iv. 95.
She was in such a passion of tears, that
they were obliged to send for Dr. Floss, and
half tipsify her with salvolatile. — Thackeray,
Vanity Fair, ch. i.
Tipt, intoxicated.
Why, they are as jovial as twenty beggars,
drink their whole cups six glasses at a health
your master's almost tipt already. — Marmion,
Antiquary, Act IV.
Tip-tilted, turned up at the end.
u u
TIPTOE
( 658 ) TOBACCANALIAN
For people who are innocent indeed,
Never look down so black, and scratch the
head;
But, tipped with confidence, their noses tilt.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p, 74.
Lightly was her slender nose
Tip-tilted like the petal of a flower.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Tiptoe, to go on tiptoe.
Mabel tiptoed to her door.— Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, vi. 104.
He tiptoed, eager, through the hail,
And seized his torment by the tail.
Cot man, Poetical Vagaries, p. 109.
Tireless, indefatigable.
The tireless pen of St. Jerome was called
into requisition. — Lea, Sacerdotal Celibacy,
p. 70.
Tirology, instruction for beginners :
the editor suggests that it may be a
misprint for pyrology, but the allitera-
tion is in favour of the text.
Some of the papists . . . wheresoever they
find ignis take it for purgatory straight-
ways. O noble doctors of tyrology rather
than of theology. — Becon, ii. 563.
Titaness, giantess.
Truth, . . . Titaness among deities! — Miss
Bronte, Villette, ch. xxxix.
Titheless, without paying tithe.
See extract 8. v. Taxless.
Titteration, fit of giggling.
The holding up of a straw will throw me
into a titteration. — Richardson, Grandison, v.
303.
Titters, a kind of weed. See quota-
tion 8. v. Tine. L. has the following,
but suggests tiller as the meaning,
which apparently makes no sense.
From wheat go and rake out the titters or
tine,
. If eare be not forth, it will rise again fine.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 113.
Titter totter, unsteadily.
Don't stand titter totter, first standing upon
one foot and then upon another. — Baileyys
Erasmus, p. 43.
Tittivate, to spruce up; to make
smart.
Regular as clockwork — breakfast at nine—
dress and tittivate a little. — Sketches by Boz
{Mr. John Bounce).
Call in your black man, and titivate a bit.
— Thackeray, The Virginians, ch. xlviii.
Tittle-tattle, used adjectivally,
chattering ; gossiping.
Syntax, who fear'd all might be known
Throughout the tittle-tattle town,
Thought 'twould be wise for him to go.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. 5.
Titupping, lively.
It would be endless to notice . . . the " Dear
mes " and " Oh laas " of the titupping missex,
and the oaths of the pantalooued or buck-
skinntt beaux.— Scott, St. Ronan's Well,
ch. xiii.
Titcppy, shaky.
Did you ever see such a little tituppy thing
in your life ? There is not a souud piece of
iron about it. — Miss Austen, Northaiger
Abbey, ch. ix.
Tizzy, a sixpence ; perhaps a cor-
ruption of tester.
There's an old 'oman at the lodge who
will show you all that's worth seeing — the
walks and the big cascade— for a tizzy. —
Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. V. ch. i.
Toad-in-the-hole, meat cooked in
batter. The speaker in the extract is
the Princess Augusta.
Mrs. Siddons and Sadler's Wells, said she,
seems to me as illfitted as the dish they call
a toad in a hole, which I never saw, but always
think of with anger— putting a noble sirloin
of beef into a poor paltry batter-puddiug.—
Mad. UArUay, Diary, vi. 153.
Toadling, little toad. The extract
is a speech of Dr. Johnson's to Miss
Burney.
Your shyness, and slyness, and pretending
to know nothing, never took me in, whatever
you may do with others. I always knew you
for a toadling.— Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, i. 189.
To and fro, used substantially for
discussion ; bandying a question to and
fro.
There was muche to and fro, for some
wolde nedes to London, thinkinge that waye
to winne more than to bringe me into Flaun-
ders. And of them which wolde into Foun-
ders some wold to lande for a barrell of
drinke, . . . some feared the commingeof the
mayre and captaiue of the castell. — Vocacyon
of Johan Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc., vi. 459).
Toasting fork or iron, a jocular
name for a sword. Cf. Cheese-
to aster.
I served in Spain with the king's troops,
until the death of my dear friend Zumal-
carreguy, when I saw the game was over,
and hung up my toasting-iron.— Thackeray,
Pendennis, ch, xxii.
If I had given him time to get at his other
pistol, or his toasting-fork, it was all up.—
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xli.
Tobacc A kalian, a smoker.
TOCO
( 659 )
TOM-FOOLISH
We get very good cigars for a bajoccho
and a half — that is, very good for us cheap
tobaccanalians. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch.
xxxv.
Toco, chastisement (slang).
The school leaders come up furious, and
administer toco to the wretched fags. —
Hughes, Tom Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I. ch. v.
Toed, supplied with toes: the feet
referred to in the extract had scorpions
for toes.
They all bowed their snaky heads down to
their very feet which were toed with scor-
pions.— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. SO.
Toer. Nashe applies this word ap-
parently to herring-fishers or herring-
curers. See extract s. v. Rehblere.
Toes. To turn the toes up = to die.
Cf. Heels.
" Several arbalestriers tvrned their toes up,
and I among them." " Killed, Denys ? come
now ! " " Dead as mutton."— Reade, Cloister
and Hearth, ch. xxiv.
Togged, dressed ; equipped. See
Togs.
He was totfd gnostically enough. — Scott,
St. Ronan's Well, i. 68.
Toggery, clothing.
But in Edward the First's days I very much
fear
Had a gay cavalier thought fit to appear
In any such toggery — then 'twas termed
gear—
He'd have met with a highly significant
sneer. — Ingoldsby Legends (St. Romwold).
Toggle. "A pin placed through the
bight of a rope, block-strap, or bolt,
to keep it in its place, or to put the
bight or eye of another rope upon, and
thus secure them both together" (Imp.
Diet.).
The yard-ropes were fixed to the halter by
a toggle in the running noose of the latter. —
Marryat, Fr. Mildmay, ch. viii.
Togs, clothes, from toga. Shakes-
peare has toge (Cor. ii. 2), and toged
(Oth. i. 1), but see N.
Look at his togs ; superfine cloth, and the
heavy swell cut. — Dickens, Oliver Twist,
ch. xvi.
Toil, to weary.
The army was toiled out with cruell tem-
pests.— Holland's Camden, p. 55.
Toil. One who overdoes something
which in moderation might be agree-
able, or who is fussy and anxious in
pursuit of amusement, is said to make
a toil of pleasure. The phrase is at
least as old as. 1603. In the extract
reference is made to hunting and
hawking.
Tyrinp of legges and tearing of throates
with luring and hollowing are nothing pleas-
ing to my humor ; I doo not loue so to make
a toyle of a pleasure. — Breton, Dialogue, full
of pithe ana pleasure, p. 7.
Tolerableness, allowability.
Men flatter themselves, and cozen their
consciences, with a tolerableness of usury,
when moneys be put out for their children's
stocks.— Adams, il 137.
Tolibant, turban.
The country custome maketh things decent
in vse, as . . . the Turke and Persian to weare
great tolibanU of ten, fifteene, and twentie
elles of linnen a peece vpon their heads. —
Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xxiv.
Toll booth. The prison was so
called in Cambridge, as it still is in
Scotland. Corbet uses the word as a
verb, and explains it in a note, " Idem
Siod Boearao apud Oxon." The En#.
icts. give it as meaning custom-house ;
Wiclif so uses the word in Matt. ix. 9.
They might ToU booth Oxford men.
Dp. Corbet on James I?s visit to
Cambridge.
The Maior refused to give them the keys
of the Toll-booth or town-prison. — Fuller,
Hist, of Cambridge, vii. 25.
Tolsey. See extracts. The place
spoken of is Bristol.
The mayor and justices, or some of them,
usually met at their tolsey (a court house by
their exchequer) about noon, which was the
meeting of the merchants, as at the Ex-
change at London ; and there they sat and
did justice business that was brought before
them.— North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 1 16.
The place under it is their Tolsey or Ex-
change, for the meeting of their merchants.
—Defoe, Tour thro' G. Britain, iii. 239.
Toman, a Persian gold coin.
The band-roll strung with tomans,
Which proves the veil a Persian woman's.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
m
Tom-double, a shuffler.
He is for a single ministry, that he may
play the Tom-double under it. — Character of
a Sneaker, 1705 (Harl. Misc., ii. 355).
Tom-poolish, given to joking or
tom-foolery.
A man he is by nature merry,
Somewhat Tom-foolish, and comical, very.'
Sovthey, Nondescripts, viii.
U U 2
TOMLING
( 660 )
T0N1SHNESS
Tomlino, a little Tom (oat).
We are promised, to succeed him, a black
Tomling.—Southey, Letters, 1821 (iii. 244).
Tommy. See extract.
It is placed in antithesis to soft and new
bread, what English sailors call soft tommy.—
De Quincey, Roman Meals.
To-morrow come never, a date that
will never ar-ive. See quotation from
. wif t *. v. Devil.
Ra. He shall have it in a very little time.
Sy. When? To-morrow come never? (ad
Calendas Gracas). — Bailey's Erasmus, p. 42.
Sally. You married to my sister ! When
will that be?
Marc. Very soon, my dear! To-day or
to-morrow perhaps.
Sally. To-morrow come never, I believe.
Colman, Man and Wife, Act III.
Tomring, making a noise. The ex-
tract is from a protestation of the
Lower House of Convocation in 1536.
Item, That the singing or saying of masse,
mattens, or evensong is but a roreing, howl-
ing, whisteling, mumming, tomring, and jug-
ling.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., V. iv. 28.
Tom Towly apparently = Tom
Fool.
What Tom Towly is so simple that wyl
not attempt to be a rithmoure ? — Stanyhurst,
JEneid, Dedic.
Tom Truth, a downright fellow. See
extract s. v. Sarisbury. H. has " Turn-
Tell' Truth, a true guesser."
To-name, a nick-name ; something
added to the proper name.
" They call my kinsman Ludovic with the
scar," said Quentin. " Our family names
are so common in a Scottish house, that
where there is no land in the case we always
give a to-nameP *' A nom de auerre, I sup-
pose you to mean," answered his companion.
— Scott, Quentin Durioard, i. 37.
Tone. In a tone = a\ike; unanimous.
I complained to one and to another, but
all were in a tone ; and so I thought I would
be contented. — Richardson, Grandison, iii.
381.
Toneless, without tone ; unaccentu-
ated.
His voice, heard now for the first time,
was to Grandcourt's toneless drawl, which
had been in her ears every day, as the deep
notes of a violoncello to the broken dis-
course of poultry and other lazy gentry in
the ufternoon sunshine. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. xxix.
Tongs, used as a singular.
He sat by the fireside, . . writing the name
of his mistress in the ashes with an old top /f
that had lost one of its legs. — Irving, Sal-
magundi, No. II.
Tongue. To have a remark on tiu
tip or end of ones tongue = to be on
the point of speaking.
God forgive me ! but I bad a sad lie at my
tongue's end. — Richardson, Pamela, L 205.
Mr*. Norris thought it an excellent pUa.
and had it at her tongue's end, and was on the
point of proposing it when Mrs. Grant spoke.
— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch. viii.
It was ou the tip of the boy's tongue to re-
late what had followed, but he . . checked
himself.— Dickens, M. Chuczlevit, ch. xxix.
Tongue-banger, a scold.
Then Sally she turn'd a tongue-banger, an?
raated me. — Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Tongue- fence, argument.
In all manner of brilliant utterance and
tongue-fence. I have hardly known his fellow.
—Carlyle, Life of Sterling, ch. v.
Tongue-man, speaker.
I am no tongue-man, nor can move with
language ; but if we come to act I'll not be
idle.— Hist, of Edward II., p. 55.
Then come, sweet Prince, Walea wooeth thee
by me,
By me hir sorrie Tongs-man.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 22.
Tongu%-shot, reach of the tongue :
out of tongue-shot = out of earshot.
She would stand timidly aloof out of tongst-
shot.—Reade, Cloister and Hearth r ch. Iii.
T0NGUE8ORE, evil tongue; ill-
speaking.
To one bringyng hym woorde that a cer-
taine feloe did speake euill of hym, and gaa«
him a verie euil report; Marie (qnoth
Socrates) he hath not learned to speake welL
Imputing his tonguesore, not vnto malicious-
ness, but vnto the default of right knowledge.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 24.
Tonguester, chatterer. See quota-
tion from same author s. v. Selfless.
Perhaps in lone Tintagel, far from all
The tonguesters of the court, she had not
heard.— Tennyson, The Last Tour name at.
Tonish, fashionable. See quotation
8. w. Flesher, Hoydenish.
We found Lord Mordaunt son to the Ear'
of Peterborough— a pretty, languid, to**i^
young man. — Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, \. 2»Al
And thus to tonish folks present
The Picturesque of Sentiment.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour I. c. 8.
Tonishness, fashion.
TO NITROUS
( 661 )
TOPSITURN
Mrs. North, who is so famed for tonishness,
exhibited herself in a more perfect undress
than I ever before saw any lady, great or
small, appear in upon a visit. — Mad. DyAr-
blay, Diary, i. 360.
Tonitbous, thundering.
Billingsgate was much outdone in stupend-
ous obscurity, tonit rents verbosity, and malici-
ous scurrility. — T. Brown, Works, iii. 142.
To nob fbo, here nor there ; no
matter.
As it is called a fire, so it is called a worm ;
and it is thought of some not to be a material
worm, that is, a living beast, but it is a meta-
phor ; but that is neither to nor fro : for a
fire it is, a worm it is, pain it is, a torment it
is. — Latimer, ii. 361.
TuNSOB, barber ; a Latin word, some-
times used as an English one.
I want my wig and not your talk :
Go with the tonsor, Pat, and try
To aid his hand and guide his eye.
Comb*, Dr. Syntax, Tour II. c. 2.
Tool, to work or drive horses on a
coach.
He could tool a coach. — Lytton, Caxtons,
Bk. XIII. ch. iv.
Tooth, they that love the, gour-
mands.
Very delicate dainties . . . greatly sought
by them that love the tooth so well. — Holland's
Camden, p. 543.
Toothache, was once supposed to be
caused by a worm in the tooth.
I am troubled
With the toothache or with love, I know not
whether ;
There is a worm in both.
Massinyer, Pari, of Love, i. 5.
Tooth full, full of teeth ; the Diets,
have the word = toothsome or palat-
able, with quotation from Massmger.
Sylvester {Third day, first weeke, 834)
speaks of the seed u beeing covered by
the toothfull harrow."
Toothy-peg, nurses' English for a
tooth.
Turn we to little Miss Kilmansegg,
Gutting her first little toothy-peg.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Top, extreme, used adjectivally ; we
usually say " top of his speed."
Setting out at top speed, he soon overtook
him.— #. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 364.
Top. To top over tail = to turn
head over heels.
To tumble ouer and ouer, to toppe ouer
tayle . . . may be also holesom for the body.
— Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 47.
Top and top-gallant, in full force.
Captains, he cometh hitherward amain,
Top and top-gallant, all in brave array.
Peele, Battle of Alcazar, iii. 3.
Hell be here top and top-gallant presently.
— Merry Devil of Edmonton (Dodsley, O. PI.,
xi. 131).
Top-filled, filled to the top ; the
adjective topfull is not uncommon.
Chapman (Iliad, xvi. 219) speaks of a
coffer " top-filled with vests. '
Topful, very high ; the word usually
= full to the top.
Soon they won
The top of all the topful heav'ns.
Chapman, Iliad, v. 761.
Top-honoubs, top sails.
As our high vessels pass their watery way,
Let all the naval world due homage pay ;
With hasty reverence their top-honours lower.
Prior, Carmen Seculare, 478.
Toppingest, best
The toppingest shop-keepers in the city us'd
now and then to visit me. — T. Brown, Works,
ii. 258.
It is the toppingest thing I ever heard. —
Jarvisys Don Quixote, Pt. I. Bk. III. ch. xi.
Toppingly, highly ; very well.
I mean to marry her toppingly when she
least thinks of it. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt.
II. Bk. III. ch. xviii.
Top-sawyeb, a first-rate hand, or a
great person.
Wasn't he always top-sawyer among you
all ? Is there one of you that could touch
him or come near him on any scent ? —
Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xliii.
He had paid the postboys, and travelled
with a servant like a top-saicyer. — Thackeray,
The Newcomes, ch. xv.
" See-saw is the fashion of England always,
and the Whigs will soon be the topsauyers"
" But," said I, still more confused, " the King
is the top-sawyer according to our proverb ;
how then can the Whigs be ? " — Biackmore,
Lorna Doone, ch. xxxvi.
Topside tubvy, topsy turvy.
With all my precautions how was my
system turned topside turvy ! — Sterne, Trist.
Shandy, iii. 169.
ToPSlTDBN, to upset.
He breaketh in through thickest of his foes,
And by his travail topsi-totrneth them.
Sylvester, The Vocation, 744.
TOPSYTURVEY ( 662 ) TOTNESS IS TURNED
Now Nereus foams, an d no w the furious wanes
All topsie-turned by the JSoliau slaues
T>o mount and ronle.
Ibid., The Schisms, 903.
TOPSY-TURVEY, to upset.
My poor mind is all topty-turvied. — Rich-
ardson, Pamela, ii. 40.
In the topsy-turveying coarse of time Hex-
thorp has become part of the soke of Don-
caster .—Southey, The Doctor, ch. xxxix.
Then is it verily, as in Herr Tieck's drama,
a verheherte welt, or world topsyturvied. — Car-
lyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. x.
Topsyturvyfication, upsetting.
" Valentine " was followed by u Lelia," . .
a regular topsyturvyfication of morality, a
thieves' and prostitutes' apotheosis. — Thacke-
ray, Paris Sketch Book (Madame Sand).
Top dp with, to finish with ; usually
spoken of food or drink.
Four, engage to go half-price to the play
at night, and top up with oysters. — Dickens,
Bleak House, ch. xi.
What'Jl you drink, Mr. Gargery; at my
expense, to top up with?— Ibid., Great Ex~
pectations, ch. x.
Toque, a species of head-dress.
If Mrs. Taunton appeared in a cap of all
the hues of the rainbow, Mrs. Briggs forth-
with mounted a toque, with all the patterns
of the kaleidoscope. — Sketches by Boz (Steam
Excursion).
Out came a lady in a large toque. — Ibid.
(Blootnsbury Christening).
Tor, a hill.
( Seeing a great tor close by, I could not re-
sist the temptation, and went up. — C. Kings-
ley, 1849 (Life, i. 174).
Tori fy, to make a Tory.
He is Liberalizing them instead of their
Torifying him. — Sir G. C. Lewis, Letters, p.
262.
Torpid, a second-class race-boat at
Oxford.
The torpids beiug filled with the refuse of
the rowing men — generally awkward or very
young oarsmen — find some difficulty in the
act of tossing. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Ox-
ford, ch. xxvii.
Torpify, to render torpid.
[Sermons] are not harmless if they torpify
the understanding. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
xxvi.
Tort, stretched. Southey uses the
word again in Curse o/Kehama, v. 15.
To-morrow, and the sun shall brace anew
The slacken 'd cord, that now sounds loose
. and damp ;
To-morrow, and its livelier tone will sing
In tort vibration to the arrow's flight.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. VIII.
Tosh, a projecting tooth. Becon
(iii. 237) says that Gardiner's "teeth
are like to the venomous toshes of the
ramping Hon."
Toss, state of anxiety.
This put us at the Board into a tosse.—
Pevys, June 2, 1666.
Lord what a tosse I was for some time is.
that they could not justly tell where it
[gold that he had buried] was, — Ibid., Oct.
10, 1667.
Toss, expense ; object for which
money is tossed away (?).
For other tosses take
A hundred thousand crowns.
Massinger, The Picture, ii 2.
Toss-up, an even hazard, as when a
coin is tossed up in the air the chances
of heads or tails are equal.
"I haven't the least idea," said Richard
musing, "what I had better be. Bicept
that I am quite sure I dout want to go into
the Church, it's a tou-vp. — Dickens, Bleak
House, ch. xiii.
Tossy, offhand ; careless.
Argemone answered by some tossy com-
monplace.—C. KingsUy, Yeast, ch. vii.
She answered tossily enough. — Ibid.
Tostication, disturbance. H. has
tosticated, tossed about
After all, methinks, I want those tostuv-
tions (thou seest how women and women's
words fill my mind) to be over, happily over,
that I may sit down quietly, and reflect.—
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 183.
Tot, to sum up; to bring out the
total.
These totted together will make a pretty
beginning of my little project. — H. Brooke,
Fool of Quality, ii. 211.
" One thousand eight hundred," said
Hyacinth, tottinq his entries. — Savage, J?.
Medlicott, Bk. III. ch. ii.
The last two tot up the bill.— Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xix.
Total, abrupt ; curt ; putting every-
thing into a small compass.
. . Do you mean my tender ears to sparer
That to my questions you so total are,
When I demand of Phoenix Stella's state,
Ton say (forsooth) you left her well of
late,
O God, think you that satisfies my care ?
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella, st. 92.
ToTNESS IS TURNED Fbench. See
TOTTENHAM
( 663 ) T0VARDILL10S
quotation. Fuller quotes and explain?
this proverb of Tottenham, q. v.
Such prouerbiall speeches as Totness is
turned French, for a strange alteration ;
Skarborow warning for a sodaine command-
ment, allowing no respect or delay to be-
thinke a man of his business. — Puttenham,
Eng. Poesie, Bk. III. ch. xviii.
Tottenham is turned French. See .
extract. Puttenham quotes this pro-
verb of Totness. Fuller says he found
the saying in the Description of Tot-
tenham by Mr. Bed well, one of the
translators of the Bible, but quoted by
him "out of Mr. Heywood."
About the beginning of the Reign of King
Henry the Eighth, French Mechamcks
swarmed in England to the great prejudice
of English Artizans, . . . nor was the City
onely, but Country villages for four miles
about, filled with French fashions and in-
fections. The Proverb is applied to such
who, contemning the custom of their own
Country, make themselves more ridiculous
by affecting forraign humours and habits. —
Fuller, Worthies, Middlesex (ii. 36).
Totter (vb. act.), to shake.
Our God laughed them to scorn, sunk
them, drunk them up with His waves ; tot-
tered, scattered them on the waters. — Adams,
i. 419.
Every little disease, like a storm, totters
us. — Ibid., ii. 29.
Tottery, shaky.
When I looked up and saw what a tottery
performance it was, I concluded to give them
a wide berth. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Ox-
ford, ch. vi.
Touch-and-go. L.. who gives no
example, calls this " A colloquial com-
bination signifying hastiness of temper,
used either substantially, as, ' It is all
touch-and-go with some people,' or ad-
jectivally, as, * A touch-and-go kind of
person.'" It seems in the quotation,
which refers to an ill-assorted couple,
to have this meaning ; it is, however,
often applied also to something, such
as an accident for instance, which had
almost happened.
So it was with Glenroy and his lady. It
had been touch-and-go with them for many a
day, and now, from less to more, from bad
to worse, it ended in a threatened separation.
— Miss Ferrier, Destiny, ch. iii. (1831).
Touch me not. L. (who gives no
example) says, " Plant of the genus
Impatiens (species, noli - me - tangere),
so called from the construction of the
seed-vessel, which being irritated when
touched, and ripe, projects the seeds to
some distance."
Presbytery seeming like the plant called
Touch me not, which flies in the face, and
breaks in the fingers of those that presse it.
— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 19.
Touch pot, touch penny, no credit
given. Swift alludes to this proverb
when describing an usurer, who had his
office at a Dublin tavern.
He touched the pence when others touched
the pot. — Swift, Elegy on Mr. Demur.
We know the custom of such houses, con-
tinues he ; 'tis touch pot, touch penny ; we
only want money's worth for our money. —
Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. III. ch. ii.
Toughish, pretty tough.
So I whips out a toughish end of yarn.
Hood, Sailor's Apology for bow-legs.
Tour, to travel.
He was touring about as usual, for he was
as restless as a hyena. — De Quincey, Murder
as a Fine Art.
Tour, the ring in Hyde Park.
Mr. Povy and I in his coach to Hyde Parke,
being the first day of the tour there ; where
many brave ladies. — Pepus, March 19, 1665.
Took up my wife and Deb., and to the
Park, where being in a hackney, and they
undressed, was ashamed to go into the tour.
—Ibid., March 31, 1668.
The sweetness of the Park is at eleven,
when the Beau-Monde make their tour there.
—Centlivre, The Basset Table, i. 2.
Tourism, travelling for pleasure.
There never have been such things as
tours in Crete, which are mere tourism and
nothing else. — Lord Strangford, Letters and
Papers, p. 98.
Touristic, pertaining to a tour or
tourists.
Curiously enough, there is no such thing
as a record of touristic journeying in Crete.
— Lord Strangford, Letters and Papers, p. 98.
Tournkries, articles nude by the
turning-lathe.
In another roome are such rare tourneries
in ivory as are not to be described for their
curiosity.— Evelyn, Diary, Oct. 22, 1644.
Touth, to tooth or taste, so tooth-
some = dainty.
The Syracusans vsed such varietie of
dishes in their banquets that when they
were sette, and their^ boordes furnished,
they were many times in doubt which they
should touth first or taste last. — Gosson,
Schoole of Abuse, p. 19.
TOVARDILLIOS.
TO WARD
( 664 )
TRAICTISE
Though the air of Artonia be not so hot
as that of her next neighbour Tuinontia, yet
she is more subject to distempers, calentures,
and tovardillios. — Howell, Paxfy of Beasts,
p. 21.
Toward, toward him = on his side,
or o£ his company.
Herod and they that were taoard him,
being all that they were by Caesar, to make
the tribute sure work, they held, that not
oiily tribute, but whatsoever else, was
Caspar's.— Andrewes, v. 128.
Towel. Oaken, towel = a cudgel ;
lead towel = a bullet.
Prankly, shaking his cane, bid him hold
his tongue, otherwise he would dust his
cassock for him. ** I have no pretensions to
such a valet," said Tom ; •' but if you should
do me that office, and over-heat yourself, 1
have here a good oaken towel at your service."
— Smollett, Humphrey Ct inker, i. 83.
Make Nunky surrender his dibs,
Hub his pate with a pair of lead totcete.
J. and H. Smith, Jitjected Addresses,
p. 162.
Towelling, towel.
Let the dame of tho castle prick forth on
her jennet,
And, with water to wash the hands of her
liege
In a clean ewer with a fair towelling.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Town, is often used for London.
The subjoined is an early instance.
Bp. Jenkinson of St. David's (1825—
40) offered a curate in his diocese a
living, and desired him to come to
town to be instituted. The curate ex-
pressed every willingness to obey the
command, but added that his Lordship
had omitted to mention the name of
the town where his presence was
required.
That a letter be directed to the Vice Ad-
miral to desire him to suffer Prince Philip,
brother to the Prince Elector, to come to
town. — Commons' Journals,?. 245 (1648).
Town -box, city chest, or common
fund.
Upon the confiscation of them to their
Town-box or Exchequer, they might well
have allowed Mr. Calvin ... a salary beyond
an hundred pounds.— Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 11.
Town-land, an Irish term explained
in the extract.
Two or three cabins gathered together
were sufficient to constitute a town, and tho
land adjoining thereto is called a town-land.
—Miss Edgeworth, Ennui, ch. viii.
TowNLKr, a small town.
-<Egilsfild and Bradfeld ii townlttUs or vil-
lages.— Leland, Itin., v. 94.
With no other friend than the poor school-
master of a proviocial townlet. — SoutJuy, The
Doctor, ch. cxviii.
Toy, cap, in which sense it is still
used in Scotland.
On my head no toy
But was her pattern.
Two NobU Kinsmen, i. 3.
The flaps of the loose toy depended on
each side of her eager face. — Scott, Pirate,
i. 70.
Toy. To take toy = to start.
The hot horse, hot as fire,
Took toy at this, and fell to what disorder
His power could give his will.
Two Xoble Kinsmen, v. 4.
Shee is indeed one that has taken a toy at
the fashion of religion, and is enamour'a of
the new-fangle.— Earle, Microcosmograpkie
{Shee precise Hypocrite).
Toysome, playful, or, as it seems to
mean in the extract, playfully affec-
tionate.
Two or three toysome things were amid by
my lord (no ape was ever so fond !) and I
could hardly forbear him. — Richardson, Gran-
diton, v. 299.
Toyt-headed, feather-headed.
They will not admit the novel question of
these toyt-headed times, what shall we think ?
— Adams, i. 221.
Trace less, that cannot be traced :
in extract the refere?ice is to a copper
coin worn quite smooth.
On tmceless copper sees imperial heads.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 242.
Tracks. To make tracks = to depart.
You will be pleased to make tracks, and
vanish out of these parts for ever. — Kingdey,
Two Years Ago, ch. xiv.
Tractator, Tractarian.
Talking of the Tractators — so you Mill like
their tone ! and so do 1. — C. Kingslev, 1S42
(Life, i. 58).
Tragelaphi, goat-stags: the name
given by the Greeks to a fantastic
animal represented on Eastern carpets
and the like. See Liddelland Scott, e.v.
In all that follows are Tragelaphi, Satyrs
and Griffins, Cocks and Bulls.— Hacket, Life
of Williams, ii. 49.
Traictise, treatise.
A booke conteinyng a traictise of justice.
—VdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 248.
TRAIL
( 665 ) TRANSLATIVE
Trail. See extract ; we more com-
monly say, to draw out, though this is
sometimes used in a good sense, i. e. of
leading a person to speak on matters
with which he is conversant.
I presently perceived she was (what is
vernacularly termed) trailing Mrs. Dent;
that is, playing on her ignorance ; her trail
might be clever, bat it was decidedly not
goad-natured.— C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch.
xvii.
Traitorism, betrayal.
The loyal clergy . . . are charged with
traitorism of their principles. — North, Exa~
men, p. 323.
He . . . represents the doctrine as well as
law of nonresistance like a dreg of traitorism
and slavery. — Ibid., p. 341.
Traluce, to shine through.
As the bright Sun shines thorough smoothest
glass,
The turning planets' influence doth pass
Without impeachment through the glist'ring
tent
Of the tralucing fiery element.
Sylvester, Second day, first weeke, 380.
Tram ay led, swathed in grave-
clothes (?) ; trammelled (?).
The corps must be sered, tramayled, leded
and chested. — Council Minute on funeral of
Q. /Catherine of Arragon, 1536 (Arch. xvi. 23).
Trancedly, in an absorbed or trance-
like manner.
Then stole I up, and trancedly
Qazed on the Persian girl alone.
Tennyson, Arabian Nights.
Tranoame. In the extract the widow
Blackacre uses this word as a term of
reproach to her son, and applies it also
to trinkets, cat-calls, &c, which he had
in his hand. R. has trangram with a
quotation from Swift, where it seems
to mean much the same as gimcrucks.
But go, thou trangame, and carry back
those trangames which thou has stolen or
purloined. — Wycherley, Plain Dealer, iii. 1.
Trangdillo, apparently a coined
word signifying some musical per-
formance.
Even d'Urfey himself and such merry fellows,
That put their whole trust in tunes and
trangdilloes,
Mav bang up their harps and themselves on
the willows. — T. Brown, Works, i. 62.
Trankums, fallals; ornaments of
drpss.
That shawl must be had for Clara, with
the other trankums of muslin and lace. —
Scott, St. Ronah's Well, ch. xviii.
Tranlace, to transpose.
The same letters being by me tossed and
tranlaced flue hundred times. — Puttenham,
Eng. Poesie, Bk. II. (end of cancelled pages).
Then haue ye a figure which the Latines
call traductio, and I the tranlacer ; which is
when ye turn and tranlace a word into many
sundry shapes. — Ibid., Bk. III. ch. xix.
Tranquillize, to grow tranquil:
usually = to make tranquil.
This unmanageable heart . . will £0 on
with its boundings. I'll try, as I ride m my
chariot, to tranquillize. — Richardson, CI. Har-
lowe, v. 79.
Transake, to ransack.
Suche as have theyr purse full of golde
gyve to the pore not one pece thereof, but
yf they gyve ought, they transake the botome
amonge all the golde, to seke out here an
halfe peny. — Sir T. More, Dialoge, p. 12.
Transcdrsive, rambling. See extract
$. v. Reportory.
Transfrete, to cross the sea.
Have we not hurried up and down, tra-
velled and toiled enough, in being transfreted
and past over the Hircanian sea. — Urquhart's
Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxxiii.
Transfuge, a deserter or fugitive.
The protection of deserters and transfuges
is the invariable rule of every service in the
world. — Lord Stanho}>e, Misc., Second Series,
p. 18.
Transincorporation, change made
by the soul into different bodies ;
metempsychosis.
Its contents are full of curious informa-
tion, more particularly those on the transin-
corporation of souls. — W. Taylor of Norwich
(Memoir, ii. 305).
Translative, tropical; transferring
from one sense or language to another.
The pedantic Mr. Brand in the second
extract need have made no apology,
if he had known of the passage in
Puttenham, who has been saying that
a foot must be able on occasion " to
go, to runne, and to stand still."
And if our feete poeticall want these
qualities, it can not be sayd a foote in sence
translative as here. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie,
Bk. II. ch. iii.
Which [words of Juvenal] suiting the case
so well, you'll forgive me, Sir, for popping
down in English metre, as the translative
impulse (pardon a new word, and yet we
scholars are not fond of authenticating new
words) came upon me uncalled for. — Richard-
son, CI. Harlowe, viii. 62.
TRANSLATOR ( 666 ) TREAT1NG-H0USE
Translator, a cobbler ; a translator
of soles. The word is given without
example in H. and in L.
The cobbler is affronted, if yon don't call
him Mr. Translator.— T. Brown, Works, iii. 73.
Transluce, to shine through.
Serene thy woe-admnb'red front, sweet
Saint ;
Let joy transluce thy Beauties' blandishment.
Davits, Holy Roode, p. 26.
Transmogrify, to change.
The transmoqrijitd Pagan performed his
vow. — IngolJsby Legends (S. Aloys).
Transports ve, excessive ; carrying
beyond bounds.
It is the voice of transportive fury, " I can-
not moderate my anger. — Adams, ii. 315.
Transportment, passion. The word
is in R. and L. with the same quotation
from Beaumont and Fletcher, but there
it means freight, that which is trans-
ported.
There he attack'd me
"With such transportment the whole town had
rung on't,
Had I not run away.
Lord Digby, Elvira, Act IV.
Transpose, transposition.
This man was very perfit and fortunate
iu these transposes. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie,
Bk. II. (cancelled pages).
Transview, look through.
Let vs with eagles eyes without offence
Transview the obscure things that do re-
maine.
Davie*, Mirum in Modum, p. 9.
Transvolve, to transfer.
'Tis he who transvolves empires, tumbles
down monarchies, and cantonizeth them in-
to petty commonwealths. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 110.
Trap, contrivance: so, to be up to
trap or understand trap = to be wide-
awake.
It is almost impossible that all these cir-
cumstances . . . should be collected without
some contrivance for purposes that do not
obviously appear ; and nothing but trap can
resolve them. — Worth, Examen, p. 203.
Some cunning persons that had found out
his foible and ignorance of trap, first put him
in great fright.— Ibid., p. 649.
Our Minor was a little too hasty ; he did
not understand trap, knows nothing of the
game, my dear.— Foote, Tlie Minor, Act II.
His good lady . . understood trap as well
as any woman in the Meams.— Scott, Pirate.
i. 51.
Trapes, a slatternly woman (Hudi-
bras, IIL ii. 467). To trapes is to go
about like a trapes, and so trapes = a
going about.
It's such a toil and a trapes up them two
pair of stairs.— Mrs. H. Wood, The Channinos,
p. 471.
Trapesing, lounging ; slatternly.
The daughter a tall, trapesing, trol loping,
talkative maypole.— Goldsmith, She stoops to
conquer. Act I.
Traps, goods ; baggage.
A couple of horses carry us and our traps.
— Thackeray, Xewcomes, ch. xxx.
On the first hint of disease, pack up your
traps and your good lady, and go and live in
the watch-house across the river. — Kingsley,
Two Years Ago, ch. xiv.
Traps, police. Cf. Bumtrap; see
quot *. v. Lucky.
Dick's always in trouble .... there's a
couple of traps in Belston after him now. —
H. Kingsley, Geo fry Hamlyn, ch. vi.
Trash, money : see H. s, v.
Therefore must I bid him provide trashy
for my master is no friend without money. —
Greene, James the Fourth, III. i.
Nor would Belinus for King Croesus' trash
Wish Amurack to displease the gods.
Ibid., Alphonsus, HI. i.
Traby, a spaniel.
A trasy I do keep, whereby
I please
The more my rural 1 privacie.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 264.
Traveller. To tip the traveller =
to humbug. This slang refers of
course to the wonderful tales of travel-
lers.
" I'd rather see yon dead than brought to
such a dilemma." " Mayhap thou wouldst,"
answered the uncle ; " for then, my lad,
there would be some picking ; aha! 4°**
thou tip me the traveller, my boy?w —
Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. vi.
Tread-behind, a doubling; an en-
deavour to escape in that way.
His tricks and traps and tread-behinds.
Naylor, Reynard the Fox, p. 20.
Treati no-house, a restaurant.
The taverns and treating-houses have eas'd
you of a round income. — Gentleman In-
structed, p. 287.
His first jaunt is to a treating-house ; here
he trespasses upon all the rules of temper-
ance and sobriety. — Ibid., p. 479.
TREBLE
( 667 )
TRESSFUL
Treble, a musical instrument.
Hearing of Frank their son, the miller,
play upon his treble as he calls it, with
which he earnes part of his living, and sing-
ing of a country song, we sat down to
sapper.— Pepys, Sept. 17, 1663.
Tredrille, a game at cards for three
players.
I was playing at eighteen-penny tredrilh
with the duchess of Newcastle and Lady
Browne.— Walpole, Letters, III. 464 (1774).
Tree. Lame as a tree = very lame.
"What a pull," said he, "that it's lie-in-
bed, for I shall be as lame as a tree, I think."
— Hughes, Tom Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I.
ch. vii.
Tree. To be at the top of the tree =
to be pre-eminent.
Master Moses is an absolute Proteus ; in
every elegance at the top of the tree. — Foote,
The Cozeners, Act I.
Tou must needs think what a hardship it
is to me to have him turn out so unlucky,
after all I have done for him, when I thought
to have seen him at the top of the tree, as one
may say. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. IV.,
ch. vi.
Treed, at the end of one's resources ;
in a fix: one in this predicament is
said to be up a tret. The reference is
to a hunted bear or racoon who has at
last gone up a tree, while the dogs and
huntsmen are at the foot.
You are treed and you can't help yourself.
— H. King shy, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. v.
Treeless, without trees.
I arrived in the midst of a dreary treeless
country. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch.
xzviii.
Tree-nail. " In Naval Architecture,
wooden bolt by which the planks of a
ship's bottom are secured to the tim-
bers " (L. who has no example).
My Keel is framed of Crabbed care,
My ribs are all of Ruth,
My planks are nothing else but Plaints,
With tree- nails joined with Truth.
Sir W. Herbert, Boat of Bale {Eng.
Garner, i. 644).
The planks rivetted together with iron,
and fastened to the timbers with oak tree-
nails.—Archad., xx. 554 (1824).
Tremblement, tremor ; quivering.
Small the wood is, green with hazels,
And completing the ascent,
Where the wind blows and sun dazzles
Thrills in leafy tremblement,
Like a heart that after climbing beateth
quickly through content.
Mrs. Browning, The lost bower.
Tremdlation, trembling.
I was struck with such a terrible tremvla-
tion that it was as much as three gulps of
my brandy bottle could do to put my chill 'd
blood into its regular motion. — T. Brown,
Works, ii. 236.
Trencher, a comparison for neatness
and exactness.
Filling vp as trimme as a trencher the space
that stood voide. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 276.
Trencher, is prefixed to several
words. The following are not noted in
the Diets. : trencher-law = regulation
of diet ; he who lays down this law is
a trenclter-critic : a trencher-chaplain
is the domestic chaplain of a private
gentleman. Heylin {Life of Laud, p.
254) uses the same term. Davies
(Muse's Sacrifice, Ep. Ded.) speaks
of trencher- bujfons, i. e. the wags or
butts at a dinner-table.
O lawless paunch, the cause of much despite,
Through ranging of a currish appetite,
When spleenish morsels cram the gaping
maw,
Withouten diet's care or trencher-lav? ;
Tho' never have I Salerne rhymes profess'd
To be some lady's trencher-critic guest.
Hall, Sat. IV., iv. atri.
A gentle squire would gladly entertain
• Into his house some trencher-chapperlain.
Ibid., II. vi. 2.
Trent, trend ; bend course.
The valley of Gehinnon and Jehosaphat,
like two conjoining streames, do trent to the
South. — Sandys, Travels, p. 18$.
Trepan, some engine or instrument
used in a siege.
And there th' Inginers haue the Trepan drest,
And reared vp the Ram me for battrie best.
Hudson's Judith, hi. 107.
Trepane, usually, a surgical instru-
ment for perforating the scull ; here
applied to an instrument used in pierc-
ing or making holes in the walls of a
town.
The boisterous trepane and steel pick-ax play
Their parts apace, not idle night nor day.
Sylvester, The Decay, 994.
Trepid, trembling.
Look at the poor little trepid creature,
panting and helpless under the great eyes. —
Thackeray, The Virginians, ch. lxx.
Tresbfull, having luxuriant hair.
Pharo's faire daughter, wonder of her time,
Then in the blooming of her beautie's prime,
Was queintly dressing of her tressfull head.
Sylvester, 'The Magnificence, 734.
TRESS Y
( 668 )
TRIM-TRAM
Tressy, with tresses ; hanging as
tresses.
The rock half sheltered from my view
By pendent boughs of tresty yew.
Coleridge, Lewti.
Triality, union of three. Dr. Doran
thought he was the inventor of this
word, hut R. supplies an instance from
Holinshed, and L. two more from Skel-
ton and Wharton. In a work published
1581, "dualities, trialities" i.e. holding
two or three benefices, are reckoned
Church abuses (Arber, Marprelate
Controversy, p. 29).
Dr. Wigan. the kinsman of the actor so
named, not only wrote on the duality of mind,
but on the triality (if we may coin a word),
the three-fold excellence of the Brighton
atmosphere. — Dorant Memories of our great
towns, p. 294.
Triarchy, rule by three governors.
Cf. Duarchy.
She [the rational soul] issueth forth her
commands, and dividing her empire into a
triarchy, she governs by three viceroys, the
three faculties. — Howell, Parly of Beasts,
p. 143.
Tribual, pertaining to a tribe. L.
has the word without example.
Surely this proceedeth not from any
natural imperfection in the Parents, whence
probably the Tribual lisping of the Ephraim-
lt^s did arise. — Fuller, Worthies, LeicesUr
(i. 562).
Tribunitian, pertaining to tribunes,
or after the manner of tribunes.
Whose tribunitian not imperatorian power
is immediately founded, as they say, in the
very plebs or herd of people. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 450.
Trick. To know a trick worth two of
that, is to know of some better expedi-
ent, or sometimes merely to decline to
do what was proposed.
" Ah ! " says she, ** it is as I feared ; the key
is gone ! " I was thunder-struck at this news ;
but she said, she knew a trick worth two of
that, and bidding me follow her, . . . she
opened a door into the area. — Graves, Spirit-
ual Quixote, Bk. III. ch. xv.
Hear what he says of you, sir ? Glive, best
be off to bed, my boy — ho! ho! No, no.
"We know a trick worth two of that. We
won't go home till morning, till daylight
does appear. — Thackeray, The Newcomes, ch. i.
Trickleness, transitorines8.
O Time that thus endeerest me to thy lone,
I constantly adore thy Bcklenesse,
That neuer mou'st but dost my sences moue
To mind thy flight, and this life's trickel-
msse. — Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 45.
Tricksinesr, playfulness.
There was none of the latent fun and
tricksiness.—G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. vii.
Tbicksome, full of tricks.
I have been a trieksome shifty vagrant. —
Lyiton, What will he do with it 7 Bk. X. ch. ▼.
Tridental, an epithet of Neptune as
represented with a trident.
The white-mouth 'd water now usurps the
shore,
And scorns the pow'r of her tridental
guide.— Quarles, Emblems, I. ii. 4.
Trio, neat. Jonson (Alch.} iv. 1) has
the substantive = coxcomb. See N.
The younger snooded up her hair, and
now went about the house a damsel so trig
and neat, that some said she was too hand-
some for the service of a bachelor divine.
—Scott, St. Ronan's Well, ii. 137.
Trio, a support
Nor is his suite in danger to be stopt.
Or with the trigges of long demurrers propt.
Stapylton's Juvenal, xvi. 62.
Tbigony, threefold birth or product.
Man is that great Amphybium in whom be
Three distinct souls by way of trigony.
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 140.
Trillil, to drink ; an onomatopaeous
word expressive of the gurgling of
liquor.
In nothing but golden cups he would
drinke or quaffe it ; whereas in wodden
mazers and Agathocles' earthen stuffe they
trillild it off before. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 166).
Trillo, a quaver ; shake in music.
Myself humming to myself (which now-
a-days is my constant practice since I begun
to learn to sing) the trillo, and found by use
that it do come upon me. — Pepys, June 30,
1661.
I shake just like him ; lend your ear,
And Trilh shall with art appear.
D'Urfey, Plague of Impertinence.
Her graces, shakes, slurs, and trillos
ravishing beyond expression ! — Colman,
Musical Lady, Act I.
Trim, to scold.
Fag. So ! Sir Anthony trims my master ;
he is afraid to reply to his father; then
vents his spleen on poor Fag. — Sheridan,
Rivals, II. i.
Trimestral. quarterly ; three month-
ly. See extract s. v. Lombard-Street.
Trim-tram. H. explains this "a
trifle or absurdity," and this is its sense
in extract from Stanyhurst, s. v. Jang-
leby, and from Patton, s. v. Rattle-
TRINDILL
( 669 )
T>.
"RIUMVERIE
bladder ; but Grose gives its meaning,
44 like master, like man.'*
They thought you as great a nincompoop
as your 'squire — trim-tram, like master, like
man. — Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. xiii.
Trindill. See extract
That they take away and destroy all
shrines, covering of shrines, tables, candle-
sticks, trindills, or rolls of wax. — King's In-
junction*, 1547 {Fuller, Ch. Hist., VII. i. 3).
Trindles, dung of goats, &c. It is
goats' dung that is referred to in the
extract
The very trindles drunck iu wine are good
against the jaundise. — Howell, Parly of
Beasts, p. 123.
Trinkery, pertaining to trinkets ;
fine : a word, I suppose, coined by
Stanyhurst for the sake of the jingle.
Cf. MUFFB MAFFE.
Long for thee Princesse thee Moors gentilitye
way ted,
Aa yet in her pincking not pranckt with
trinckerye trinckets,
Stany hurst, JEn., iv. 137.
Trinket, to traffic ; to intrigue.
Had the Popish Lords stood to the interest
of the Crown, as they ought to have done,
and not trinketed with the enemies of that
and themselves, it is probable they had kept
their seats in the House of Lords for many
years longer. — North, Examen, p. 63.
His odious trinkettiny with foreign in-
terests.— Ibid., p. 178.
Trin retry, jewellery ; nick-nacks.
Ear-drop, nor chain, nor arm, nor ankle-ring,
Nor trinketry on front, or neck, or breast.
Southey, Curse of Kehama, xiii.
All kinds of mercery, cloth, furs, and silks,
With trinketry.
Taylor, Ph. van Art., Pt. II. i. 1.
Trin-union, the Trinity, or Three in
One.
But that same onely wise Trin-vnion
Workes miracles, wherein all wonder lies.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 79.
Trin-union hood, Trinity.
Thou art too great for Greatnes ne'er so
Great,
And far too good for Goodness ere so
Good,
Who (were it possible) art more compleate
In Goodnesse than Thine owne Trin-vnion-
hood. — Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 32.
Trip, a short journey: the extract
marks it as a sailor's word, and implies
that it was not in familiar use by others,
though a little further on (vii. 10) it is
employed without qualification. Pope
quoted by Johnson speaks of " a trip
to London.''
It will be but what mariners call a trip to
England. — Richardson, Grandison, v. 255.
Triple tree, the gallows. Cf . Three
Trees.
That very hour from an exalted triple tree
two of the honestest gentlemen in Catchpole-
land had been made to cut a caper on no-
thing.— Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. IV. ch. xvi.
What they may do hereafter under a
triple tree is much expected. — Broome, A
Jovial Crew, Act I.
A wry mouth on the triple tree puts an
end to all discourse about us. — T. Brown,
Works, iii. 63.
Tripod, used adjectivally, and mean-
ing three feet long. Cf. the sesquipe-
dalut verba of Horace.
' The Rambler ' . . . I liked not at all ; its
tripod sentences tired my ear. — Miss Edye-
worth, Helen, ch. vii.
Tripointed, having three points.
For how, alas ! how will you make defence
'Gainst the tripointed wrathfull violence
Of the dead dart?— Sylvester, The La we, 487.
Trisect, to divide into three parts.
Could not I have reduced it a drop a day,
or, by adding water, have bisected or trisected
a drop? — De Quincey, Conf. of an Opium
Eater, p. 129.
Trisulc, three-forked. The Diets.
give the word as a substantive. In
Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xiii.,
we read of " trisulk excommunication."
Jupiter confound me with his trisulk
lightning if I lie ! — Urquharfs Rabelais, Ilk.
II. ch. xxxii.
Tridmph, when used as an active
verb, which is rare, usually means to
triumph over ; in the extract it signi-
fies " cause to triumph."
He hath triumphed the name of His
Christ; He will bless the things He hath
begun. — Jewel, ii. 933.
Triumph. To ride triumph = to be
in full career.
'* Tis some misfortune,'* quoth my uncle
Toby. " That it is," cried my father, 4t to
have so many jarring elements breaking loose,
and ridina triumph in every corner of a gen-
tleman's house. — Sterne, TV. Shandy, iii. 157.
Tridmverie, triumvirate.
Take for thine ayde afflicting Miserie,
Woe, mine attendant, and Dispuyre, my
freend,
All three my greatest great Triumuerie.
G. Markham, Trayedie of Sir R.
Grinuile, p. 55.
TRIVE
( 670 ) TRUELOVE GRASS
Trive, to contrive.
The thriftie that teacheth the thrilling to
thriue,
Teach timelie to traverse the thing that thou
triue. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 137.
Trivet, is a proverbial comparison
indicating stability, inasmuch as it has
three legs to stand on.
He's all right now ; you ain't got nothing
to cry for, bless you ! he's lighter than a
trivet. — Dickens, M. Chuzzlewit, ch. xxviii.
Go home ! you'll find there all as right as a
trivet. — Ingoldsby Legends (S. Romwold).
Trochings, small branches on the
stag's horn. See extract *. v. Spilter.
Troll, repetition ; routine.
The troll of their categorical table might
have informed them that there was some-
thing else in the intellectual world besides
substance and quantity. — Burke on Fr. Rev.,
p. 151.
Trolloll, to troll, or sing in a rollick-
ing way.
They got drunk aud trollolVd it bravely. —
North, Examen, p. 101.
Trollopy, slatternly.
A trollopy-\ook\ng maid-servant, seemingly
in waiting for them at the door, stepped for-
ward.— Miss Austen, Mansfield Park, ch.
xxxvii.
Troop-meal, troop by troop ; meal
radically = measure : so we have drop-
meal, inch-mealy piece-meal.
So troop-meal Troy pursu'd awhile, laying on
with swords and darts.
Chapman, Iliad, xvii. 634.
Trot, usually a contemptuous name
for an old woman, in which sense it is
illustrated in the Diets. ; but sometimes
also used of children, as a term of
endearment.
Ethel romped with the little children, the
rosy little trots.— Thackeray, The Newcomes,
ch. x.
Trot-cozy. See quotation.
The upper part of his form . . . was
shrouded in a large great-coat belted over
his under habiliments, and crested with a
huge cowl of the same stuff, which, when
drawn over the head and hat, completely
overshadowed both, and being buttoned be-
neath the chin was called a trot-cozy.— Scott.
Waverley, i. 318.
Trotter-casks. See quotation.
He applied himself to a process which Mr.
Dawkins designated as " japanning his trot-
ter-cases? The phrase rendered into plain
English signifieth, cleaning his boots. —
Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xviii.
Trouble-house, a disturber of peace
at home.
Ill -bred louts, simple sots, or peevish
trouble-houses.— Urovhert's Rabelais, Bk. I.
ch. lii.
Trouble-rest, a disturber of rest.
Sylvester describes sickness as —
Foul trouble-rest, fantastik greedy-gut. —
Sylvester, The Furies, 328.
Trough, to feed out of a trough ; to
feed grossly.
What miry wallowers the generality of
men of our class are in themselves, and con-
stantly trough and sty with.— Richardson, CI.
Harlow, viii. 108.
Trousered, wearing trousers : Dray-
ton hns trowzed.
The inferior or trousered half of the crea-
tion.— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xdx.
Trout ful, abounding in trout.
Clear and fre*h rivulets of troutful water.
—Fuller, Worthies, Hants (i. 399).
Troutless, without trout.
I catch a trout now and then ... I have
had one or two this year of three and two
pounds, and a brace to-day, so I am not left
troutless.— C. Kingsley, 1865 (Life, ii. 180).
Troutlet, a small trout.
There were some that ran, and some that
leapt,
Like troutlets in a pool.
Hood, Eugene Aram.
Truancy, playing truant.
I had many flattering reproaches for
my late truancy from these parties. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, ii. 312.
Truch. Truckman, or interpreter;
corruption of dragoman is in the Diets.
Latelye toe mee posted from lone thee truch
spirt, or herrald
Of Gods.— Stanyhurst, Mn., iv. 375.
Truckle, to roll, or huddle off.
Tables with two legs and chairs without
bottoms were truckled from the middle to
one end of the room. — Mad. UArUay,
Camilla, Bk. Jfl. ch. adii.
Truckle, the wheel or ball used in
regulating a pulley.
What hinderance, hurt, or harm doth the
laudable desire of knowledge bring to any
man, if even from a sot, a pot, a fool, a stool,
a winter-mitain, a truckle for a pulley, the
lid of a goldsmith '8 crucible, an oil bottle, an
old slipper, or a cane chair?— Sterne, Tr.
Shandy, ii. 200.
Trueloye grass, a plant growing in
TRUE-TABLE
(671 )
TUCK
woods with purplish black berries ;
Paris quadrifolia.
The outside of his doublet was
Made of the foure-leaued truelove grass.
Herrick, Appendix, p. 481.
True-table, a hazard-table (Fr.
trou).
There is also a bowling-place, a tavern, and
a true-table. — Evelyn, Diary, 1646 (p. 193).
TRUFFE, turf.
No holy truffe was left to bide the head
Of holiest men.
Davits, Humours, Heaven on Earth, p. 48.
Trdish, rather true.
They perchance light upon something that
seems truish and newish. — Gauden, Tears of
the Church, p. 198.
Truly. By my truly was a mild
oath = on my word : it is used more
than once by Sirs. Minever in Dekkers
Satiromasttx.
Sbe accounts nothing vices bnt superstition
and an oath, aud thinkes adultery a lesse
sinne then to sweare by my truely. — Earle,
Microcosmographie (Shee precise Hypocrite).
Trummeletts, ringlets (?).
Whose bead beefrindged with beballowed
tresses,
Seemes like Apollo's wben tbe moone hee
blesses ;
Or like Aurora wben with pearle she setts
Her long disheuled rose-crown 'd trumme-
letts. — Herrick, Appendix, p. 433.
Tbumpetry, trumpeting.
Cornbill . . has witnessed every ninth of
November, for I don't know how many cen-
turies, a prodigious annual pageant, chariot,
progress, and flourish of trumpetry. — Thack-
tray, Roundabout Papers, V.
Trush. H. gives the word = to run
about in the dirt ; also, to trash about
= to litter: trush trash is one of
Stanyhurst's jingles (cf. muffe maffe,
&c.) = rubbish.
For to ende I purpose, my troubles wholye
to finish,
And toe put in fyre brands this Troian ped-
lerye trush trash. — Stanyhurst, j£n., iv. 688.
Trusty. See extract ; the speaker is
an Irishman.
" There was a sort of a frieze trusty." u A
trusty! " said Mr. Hill, " what is that, pray ? "
**A big coat, sure, plase your honour." —
Miss Edgeworth, Limerick Gloves, ch. ii.
Tub, to wash.
In spite of all the tubbing, rubbing, scrubbing,
The routing and the grubbing,
The Blacks, confound them ! were as black
as ever. — Hood, A black job.
Tubbish, like a tub.
You look for men whose heads are rather
tubbish,
Or drum-like, better formed for sound than
sense. — Wolcott P. Pindar, p. 136.
He was a short, round, large-faced, tubbish
sort of man.— Sketches by Boz- (Mr. John
Dounce).
Tubby, round-bellied ; like a tub.
We had seen him coming up to Covent-
Garden in his green chaise-cart with the fat
tubby little horse. — Sketches by Boz (Mon-
mouth Street).
Tub-drubber, tub- preacher, q. v.
Business and poetry agree as ill together
as faith aud reason ; which two latter, as has
been judiciously observ'd by the fam'd tub-
drubber of Covent Garden, can never be
brought to set their horses together. — T.
Brown, Works, iii. 198.
Tuberon the West Tndian name for
shark : in the Harl. Misc, the word is
misprinted tuheron.
There waited on our ship fishes as long as
a man, which they call Tuberones. — T. Stevens,
1579 (Eng. Garner, i. 133).
The tuiteron attended with his guard. —
Dennys, Secrets of Angling (Ibid., i. 166).
A shark or tuberon that lay gaping for the
flying fish hard by . . . snapt her up. — Na*he,
Lenten Stuffe (Hart. Misc., vi. 169).
Tuberosity, swelling.
Whether he . . swell out in starched ruffs,
buckram stuffings, and monstrous tuberosi-
ties.— Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. v.
Tub-preacher, a ranting, dissenting
preacher.
Here are your lawful ministers present, to
whom of late you do not resort, I hear, but
to tult-preachers in conventicles. — Hacktt,
Life of Williams, ii. 165.
George Eagles, sirnamed Trudge over the
world, who, of a taylor, became a tuh-
preacher, was indicted of treason. — Semper
iidem, 1661 (Harl. Misc., vii. 401). *
The tub nreachers are very much dissatiffy'd
that you invade their prerogative of hell. —
T. Brown, Works, \. 173.
Tubster, a dissenting preacher.
Brown describes himself as going into
" a Presbyterian Meeting," and hearing
" a vociferous holder- forth : "
He (says tbe tubster) that would be rich
according to the practice of this wicked age
must play the thief or the cheat. — T. Brown,
Works, iii. 68.
Tuck, food, especially sweet-stuff,
pastry, &c. (slang).
The Slogger looks rather sodden, as if he
didn't take much exercise and ate too much
TUCK-SHOP
( 672 )
TURKEN
twk.— Hughes, Tom Brown's Schooldays, Pt.
II. ch. v.
Tuck-shop, a pastrycook's shop: see
extract s. v. Toffy.
Gome along down to Sally HarrowellV,
that's our School-house tuck-shop— she bakes
such stnnuing murphies. — Hughes, Tom
Brown's Schooldays, Pt. i. ch. vi.
Tuck up, to string up ; to hang.
I never saw an execution but once, and
then the hangman asked the poor creature's
pardon, and wiped his mouth as you do, and
pleaded his duty, and then calmly tucked up
the crimiual. — Richardson, Pamela, i. 141.
Tuft, a man of rank ; an Oxford
term ; noblemen there wearing, until
within the last few years, a gold tuft
or tassel to their cap. L. has a quot.
from Thackeray (Book of Snobs, ch.
xxi.) illustrating this use of the word,
but, by an oversight, has not given this
sense, so that the extract is among the
passages which illustrate tuft = cluster ;
plump.
The lad . . . followed with a kind of proud
obsequiousness all the tufts of the University.
— Thackeray, ShaM>y Genteel Story, ch. ii.
He was at no time the least of a tuft-
hunter, but rather had a marked natural
indifference to tufts. — Carlyle, Life of Ster-
ling, Pt. II. ch. in.
Tug. See quotation from Putten-
ham ; but in the Tour thro' G. Britain,
i. 204, the word = the cart itself: "I
have seen one tree on a carriage which
they call there [Sussex] a Tug drawn
by twenty -two oxen." The term is
still in use. See Parish's Sussex Glos-
sary. To hold tug = to stand work ;
to hold him tag = to give him work.
Which word tugge . . . tooke his first
originall from the cart, because it aignifieth
the pull or draught of the oxen or horses,
aud therefore the leathers that beare the
chief stresse of the draught, the carters call
them tugges; and so wee vse to say that
shrewd boyes tugge each other by the eares,
for pull. — Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III.
ch. xxiii.
There was work enough for a curious and
critical antiquary that would hold him tugg
for a whole yeare. — Life of A. Wood, 3 my
18, 1667.
No tankard, flaggon, bottle, nor jugg
Are halfe so good, or so well can hold tugg.
Westminster Drollery, Pt. II. p. 94.
Tulchan. See quotation ; also the
note appended to ch. xxiii. of Ivanhoe,
where the origin of the name is rather
referred to the time of the Reforma-
tion, when some obtained the revenues
of ecclesiastical offices, but had to pay
over the lion's share to some powerful
patron in the back-ground.
[King James I.'s Scotch] Bishops were by
the Scotch people derisively called Tulchan
Bishops. Did the reader ever see or fancy in
his mind a Tulchan ? A Tulchan is, or rather
was,for the thing is long since obsolete, a calf-
skin stuffed in the rude similitude of a calf,
similar enough to deceive the imperfect per-
ceptive organs of a cow. At mil king- time
the Tulchan, with head duly bent, was set
as if to suck ; the fond cow looking round
fancied that her calf was busy, and that all
was right, and so gave her milk freely, which
the cunning maid was straining in whits
abundance into her pail all the while. —
Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 33.
Tulwar, scimitar (an Indian word).
I just caught the flash of his tulwar, and
thought it was all up. — Hughes, Tom Brown
at Oxford, ch. xliv.
Tumble-down, dilapidated.
You will be doing injustice to this boy if
you hang on here in this useless tumble-down
old palace. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hatnlyn,
ch. iii.
T'oud tumbledown place is just a heap o'
brick and mortar. — Mrs. Gaskelf, Sylvia's
Lovers, ch. xxi v.
Tummock, a mound.
Your ghost may sit there on a grass tum-
mock.— Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. xiv.
Tump, clump or low mound.
He stopped his little nag short of the
crest, and got off and looked ahead of him
from behind a tump of whortles. — Blackinore,
Lorna Boone, ch. xxxi.
Tun -belly, a round or pot-belly.
He has swore to her by all that is good
and sacred never to forgive the presumptuous
wretch that should think irreverently of a
double chin and a tun-belly. — T. Brown,
Works, iii. 152.
Turbanto. The extract from tfa&hSs
Lenten Stuffe in which this word occurs
is given s. v. Remblere. Nashe in a
note explains it, " the great lawne roule
which the Turkes weare aboute their
heads ; " in the text, however, it is
used adjectivally.
Turbinaceous, turfy.
The real turbinaceous flavour no sooner
reached the nose of the Captain, than the
beverage was turned down his throat with
symptoms of most unequivocal applause. —
Scott, St. Ronan's Well, i. 226.
Turken, to furbish ; which word is
substituted in later editions of Rogers.
TURKESS
( 673 ) TURPENTINE
The Parker Society edition is that of
1607. Cf. Turkis.
His majesty calleth for subscription unto
articles of religion ; but they are not either
articles of his own lately devised, or the old
newly turkened. — Sogers on 39 Articles, p. 24.
Turk ess, female Turk. See extract
$. v* Boss.
Turkey wheat. See quotation 9. v.
Purkey wheat, from the note on which
place by Messrs. Payne and Herrtage,
the first of the following extracts is
taken.
There grows in several parts of Africa,
Asia, and America, a kind of corn called
Mays, and such as we commonly name
Turkey wheat. They make bread of it which
is hard of digestion, heavy in the stomach,
and does not agree with any but such as are
of a robust and hail constitution. — Treatise
on foods by Mons. L. Lemery, 1704, p. 71.
We saw a great many fields of Indian corn
which . . . goes by the name of Turkey wheat.
— Smollett, France and Italy , Letter 8.
Turkey wood, a species of wood.
See extract 8. v. Sug arch est.
Turkis, to furbish. Cf. Turken.
The subjoined extract is taken from a
note to the Parker Society edition of
Rogers, p. 24.
Tet he taketh the same sentence out of
Esay (somewhat turkised) for his poesie as
well as the rest. — Bancroft, Survey of pre-
tended holy Discipline, 1593, p. 6.
Turk's - head, a long broom for
sweeping ceilings, &c.
Dick was all for sweeping away other
cobwebs, but he certainly thought heaven
and earth coming together when he saw a
great Turk's-head besom poked up at his
own. — Lytton, My Novel, Bk. X. ch. xz.
Turky, turquoise.
They haue . . . diners kinds of precious
stones of inferiour value, amongst which
the emerald and the turky. — Sandys, Travels,
p. 221.
She shows me her ring of a Turky-stone,
set with little sparks of dyamonds. — Pepys,
Feb. 18, 1667—68.
Turn. Ho take a turn is a colloquial
expression meaning to take a short
walk, as round a garden or the like, but
in the following it is applied to a more
extended journey.
Some years ago I took a turn beyond the
seas, and made a considerable stay in those
parts. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 14.
Turnabout, an innovator.
Our modern turnabouts cannot evince us
but that we feel we are best affected, when
the great mysteries of Christ are celebrated
upon anniversary festivals.— Racket, Life of
miliams, ii. 3d.
Turnabout, giddiness ; a disease in
cattle.
The turnabout and murrain trouble cattel.
—Sylvester, The Furies, 610.
Turn and turn about, by regular
turns; vicissim.
" This is my house, and this my little wife."
"Mine too," said Philip, "turn and turn
about."— Tennyson, Enoch Arden.
Turn - broacher, turnspit : turn-
broach is more common.
The king . . . pardoning him his life, gave
him a turn-broactter's place in the kitchen. —
J. Taylor, Life of Old Parr, 1635 (Sari.
Misc., vii. 80).
Turn-down, used adjectivally of a
collar which is laid back instead of
standing upright: these last being
called stick-ups.
The other lad was somewhat taller than
Tom, awkwardly and plainly dressed, but
with a highly-developed Byronic turn-down
collar, and long curling locks. — Kingsley,
Two Years Ago, ch. i.
Turn out. Workmen are said to
turn out when they throw up their
work to go on strike. See extract *. v.
Operant.
Turnpike, the main or turnpike road.
The road is by this means so continually
torn, that it is one of the worst turnpikes
round about London.— Defoe, Tour thro' G.
Britain, ii. 178.
We are off of the turnpike, and the sloughs
are deadly deep about we.— Foote, Moid of
Both, Act II.
Turn-poke, a large game-cock.
The excellency of the broods at that time
consisted in their weight and largeness . . .
and of the nature of what our sportsmen
call shake-bags or Turn-pokes.— Archool., iii.
142 (1775).
Turn-tippet, a time-server ; a turn-
coat.
The priests for the most part were double-
faced, turn-tippets, and flatterers. — Cranmer,
ii. 15, margin.
All turn-tippets, that turn with the world
and keep their livings still, should have no
oifice in Christ's Church.— Pilkington, p. 211.
Turpentine, to rub with turpentine.
Or martyr beat, like Shrove-tide cock, with
bats,
And fired like turpentined poor wasting rats.
JVolcot, P. Pindar, p. 241.
X X
TURPIFIE
( 674)
TWA TTLE
The table-covers are never taken off, ex-
cept when the leaves are turpentined and
bees' waxed.— Sketches by Boz, ch. ii.
Tubpifib, to calumniate ; stigmatize.
O [that] ... a woman . . . should thus tur-
pifie the reputation of my doctrine, with the
superscription of a fool.— Sidney, Wanstead
Play t p. 620.
Turrets. De Quincey in his Essay
on the English Mail Coach speaks of
the coachman examining " the silvery
turrets of his harness ; " and adds in a
note, " As one who loves and venerates
Chaucer ... I noticed with great plea-
sure that the word torrcttes is used by
him to designate the little devices
through which the reins are made to
pass. This same word, in the same
exact sense, I heard uniformly used by
many scores of illustrious mail-coach-
men ... in my younger days." The
passage in Chaucer referred to is Cant.
Tale*) 2164, in which place torrettes =
the rings on the collar of a dog through
which the leash was passed ; they were
so called from the rings turning within
the eye in which they were fastened.
Tubh, a tusk. See Tosh.
Th' hast armed som with poyson, som with
paws,
Som with sharp antlers, som with griping
claws,
Som with keen tushes, som with crooked
beaks. — Sylvester; Sixth day, first week, 226.
It first whetted its tushes so sharply, and
bristled so fiercely against all Episcopacy.—
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 405.
Tush, to use an impatient exclama-
tion. Udal (quoted by R.) had tasking
as a substantive. Cf. Tut.
Oedric tushed and pshawed more than once
at the message, but he refused not obedience.
—Scott, Ivanhoe, ii. 387.
Tut, to use a contemptuous exclama-
tion ; pish and pshaw are used as verbs
in the same way.
In another moment the member of Par-
liament had forgotten the statist, and was
pishing and tutting over the Globe or the
Sun.— Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. VIII. ch. iii.
Tut, a hassock.
Paid for a tut for him that drawes the
bellowes of the orgaines to sit upon. ivd. —
Chwardens Accounts of Cheddle, 1637.
Tutament, protection.
The holy Crosse is the true Tutament,
Protecting all ensheltered by the same.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 19.
Tutorlt, like a tutor; pedagoguish.
The King had great reason to be weary of
the Earl who was grown so infirm, peevish,
and forgetful, as also not a little tutorly in
his Majesty's affairs.— North, Examen, p. 453.
Tutty, a nosegay.
She can wreathes and tuttyes make.
T. Campion, 1613 ( Arher, Eng. Gamer,
iii. 283).
Twaddle, to talk sillily, or tediously;
also the man who does so; also the talk
itself : modern form of twattle.
"The devil take the twaddle! . . . I must
tip him the cold shoulder, or he will be
pestering me eternally." — Scott, St. Ronan's
Well, ii. 188.
An occasion for twaddling had come, and
this good soul seised it, and twaddled into a
man's ear who was fainting on the rack. —
Beade, Never too late to mend, ch. xxiii.
Twaddler, one who proses on in a
silly manner about commonplace mat-
ters.
You will perhaps be somewhat repaid by
a laugh at the style of this ungrammatical
twaddler. — Pickwick Papers, ch. li.
Between conceit and disgust, fancying
myself one day a great new poet, and the
next a mere twaddler, I got . . puzzled and
anxious. — C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. viiL
Tw agger, a lamb. Tusser has twig-
ger (q. v.) = breeder. See extract
8. v. Bunting.
Twanging. To go off twanging, I e.
well or, as we now say, swimmingly.
An old fool to be gulTd thus ! had he died
As I resolve to do, not to be altered,
It had gone off twanging.
Massinger, Roman Actor, ii. 2.
Twangle, to twang, or sound.
Shakespeare has twangling.
The young Andrea bears up gaily, how-
ever ; twangfes his guitar. — Thackeray, Shab-
by Genteel Story, ch. ii.
Twangle, a twanging sound.
Loud, on the heath, a twangle rush'6%
That rung out Supper, grand and big,
From the crack'd bell of Blarneygig.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 111.
Twatter-light, twilight. N. has
twitter-light, with extract from Middle-
ton, and adds, "I know no other in-
stance."
What mak'st thou here this twatter4ight ?
I think thou'rt in a dream.
Wily BeguiPd (Hawkins, Eng. Dr^
iii. 331).
Twattle, " short and twattle " are
TWEEZER
( 675 ) TYBURN STRETCH
only represented by petits in the origi-
nal. The lines referred to have only
four syllables in each.
They show him the short and twattie verses
that were written.— Urquhart, Rabelais, Bk.
III. ch. xviiL
Tweezer, to pluck out (something
minute) as with tweezers. See extract
8. v. Micrology.
Twelve-penny matters, insignificant
things.
That men be not excommunicated for
trifles, and twelve-penny matters. — Heylin's
Hist, of the Presbyterians, p. 371.
Twelves. In twelves = in duode-
cimo.
There has also been a decent Scotch edition
published in twelves. — Life of Lackington,
Letter xxv.
Twenty and twenty, many.
The tallowchandlers such dutiful and loyal
subjects that they don't care if there were
twenty and twenty birthdays in a year, to
help off with their commodity. — T. Brown.
Works, i. 153.
I have hinted it to you twenty and twenty
times by word of mouth. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, ii. 145.
I could satisfy myself about twenty and
twenty things that now and then I want to
know. — Ibid., Grandison, ii. 10.
Twichbr, an instrument used for
clinching the hog-rings.
Strong yoke for a hog with a twicher and
rings. — Tusser, Husbandries p. 38.
Twigsome, full of twigs.
The twigsome trees by the road-side, . . I
suppose never will grow leafy.— Dickens, Un-
commercial Traveller, vii.
Twirb, to curl or twirl. This sense
is not in the Diets.
No sooner doth a young man see his sweet-
heart comming, but he twires his
beard, kc.— Burton, Anatomy, p. 30.
Twitter - boned, having an excres-
cence on the hoof, owing to a contrac-
tion.
His horse was either clapp'd, or spavin'd,
or greaz'd, or he was twitter-ban1 d, or broken-
winded. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, i. 39.
Two. Persons who have quarrelled
are sometimes said to be two ; just as
those who are reconciled are said to be
at one (Acts vii. 26).
Lord Sp. Pray, Miss, when did you see
your old acquaintance, Mrs. Cloudy. You
and she are two, I hear.
Miss. See her ! Marry, I don't care whe-
ther I ever see her again.— Swift, Polite Con-
versation (Conv. i.).
Twopenny. See extracts.
When the Lowlanders want to drink a
chearupping cup, they go to the public-house
called the change-house, and call for a chopin
of twopenny, which is a thin yeasty beverage
made of malt, not quite so strong as the
table-beer of England.— Smollett, Humphrey
Clinker, ii. 69.
There are many things in these kingdoms
which are greatly undervalued ; strong beer
for example in the cider countries, and cider
in the countries of good strong beer ; bottled
twopenny in South Britain, sprats and her-
rings by the rich.— Southey, The Doctor, ch.
cxlii.
Twosome, double (?).
Wine in bumpers ! and shouts in peals !
Till the Clown didn't know his head from
his heels ;
The Mussulman's eyes danced twosome reels,
And the Quaker was hoarse with cheering.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
Twy- formed, two-formed, or two-
fold. In a note to the first extract,
Davies explains the " tuw-formed fab-
ric" to be "Heauen and Earth," and
in another to the second quotation he
tells us that the reference is to "the
9th of Nov., the sun approaching the
signe of Sagitarius."
It that of nothing (onely with a word)
Made this huge twy-form'd fabric which we
see. — Davies, Summa Totalis, p. 22.
The eye of heauen did rowle the house about
Of that fell twi-formfd Archer.
Ibid., Scourge of Folly, p. 23.
Twy-child, in second childhood.
Man growne Twy-childe is at doore 6f death,
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 47.
Twy-forked, bifurcated.
Her flaming head
Twy-fork'd with death has struck my con-
science dead.
Quarles, Emblems, II. xiii. 10.
Twyrk, to twirl. See extract *. v.
Pette. /
•
Tyburn. To preach at Tyburn
Cross = to be hung, alluding to the
penitential speeches made on such oc-
casions. Gascoigne reckons it among
the evils of the age
That soldiours sterue, or prech at Tiborne
crosse. — Steele Glas, p. 55.
Tyburn stretch. To fetch a Tyburn
stretch = to be hung, bee extract s. v.
Rage.
x x 2
TYMPANITIC ( 676 )
UMBRA CLE
Tympanitic, swollen like a dram.
All that he had eaten or drunk or done
had flown to his stomach, producing a tym-
panitic action in that organ. — H. Kingsley,
Kavenshotj ch. xii.
Typarchical, ruling over the type
or press.
Old Mr. Strahan the printer (the founder
of his typarchical dynasty). — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. cii.
Type. H. gives, without example,
" Tipe, a ball or globe," which I sup-
pose to be the meaning here.
Abooe all was a Coupolo or Type, which
seem'd to be scal'd with siluer plates. —
Chapman, Masque of Mid. Temple.
Tyrannequkller, a tyrannicide.
Harmodius and Aristogiton had been tu-
rannequellers. — UdaTs Erasmus's Apophtk.,
p. 129.
Tybanniously, tyrannically.
Manasses then his wife would not oontroule
Tyranniously. .
Hudson, Judith, iv. 224.
IT
Ubiety, whereness. L. does not give
this word by itself, but he follows
Johnson in offering it as an explanation
of whereness.
Thou wouldst have led me out of my way.
if that had been possible, — if my ubiety did
not so nearly resemble ubiquity, that in
Anywhereness and Everywhereness I know
where I am, and can never be lost till I get
out of Whereness itself into Nowhere. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. cxcii.
Ubiquitary, one who holds consub-
stantiation. See extract*, v. Synusiast.
Udderless, motherless.
All ye gentle girls who foster up
Udderless lambs. — Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Uglesome, ugly.
Such an uglesome countenance, such an
horrible visage our Saviour Christ saw of
death and hell in the garden. — Latimer,
i. 220.
When I behold the uglesome face of death
I am afraid. — Ward, Sermons, p. 47.
Uglify, to disfigure ; make ugly.
It defourmeth and ualyfyeth the skinne. —
Touchstone of Complexion, p. 117.
She is certainly, in my eyes, the most
completely a beauty of any woman I ever
saw. I know not even now any female in
•her first youth who could bear the compari-
son. She uglifies everything near her. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, v. 313.
Ugly, to uglify ; to make ugly.
It is impossible I should love him, for his
vices all ugly him over, as I may say. —
Richardson, Pamela, i. 265.
Ugly, a shade fastened on to the
bonnet, and projecting over the face.
The four months Babylon of guides, cars,
chambermaids, tourists, artists, and reading-
parties, camp-stools, telescopes, poetry-books,
blue ualies, red petticoats and parasols of
every hue. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch.
Uglyographise, to write in an un-
couth manner.
How it would have been, as Mr. Southey
would say, uglyographised by Elphinstone
and the other whimsical persons who have
laboured so disinterestedly in the vain
attempt of regulating our spelling by onr
pronunciation, ,1 know not. — Southey, The
Doctor, ch. ccxxiii.
Ulcer, to ulcerate.
He scoffs and makes sport at sacred
things. This by degress abates the rever-
ence of religion, and ulcers mens hearts with
profaneness. — Fuller, Holy and Profane State,
V. vi. 3.
Ululation, wailing ; a howling cry.
If a temporal loss fall on us, we entertain
it with ululations and tears. — Adams, i. 415.
Again the horns were fill'd bv all,
And ululations shook the haU.
Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 119.
The ululation of vengeance . . . ascended
— De Quincey, Murder as a Fine Art, Post-
script.
Umbilical, central. In all the ex-
amples in the Diets, the word is used
literally, = pertaining to the navel.
The Chapter-house is large, supported as
to its arched roof by one umbilical pillar. —
Defoe, Tour thro' O. Britain, ii. 335.
Umbracle, shade. Cf. Virgil, Eclogue,
ix. 42. Daviea applies it to the Cross,
under the shadow of which we take
refuge.
UNABASED
(677 )
UNBAIZED
That Tree (that Soull-refreshing umlracle
Together with oar sinne) His Shoulders
teares. — Davits, Holy Roode, p. 15.
Unabased, not lowered.
They easily preserved . . . the reverence of
Religion unabased. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 274.
Un accountabilities, things that can-
not be accounted for.
There are so many peculiarities and «n-
accountabUities here. — Mad, D'Arblay, Diary,
iii. 252.
Un acknowledging, unthankful.
Your condition shall be never the worse
for Miss Glanville's unacknowledging temper
.... Tou are almost as unacknowedaing as
Sour sister. — Mrs. Lennox, Female Quixote,
k. III. ch. viii.
Unadditioned, without a title. Ful-
ler often uses additioned = graced
with a title. The name of the Knight
referred to is given without miles after
it in the list of Herefordshire Sheriffs.
He was a Knight, howsoever it cometh
to passe he is here unadditioned. — Fuller,
Worthies (i. 465).
Unadmitted, not admitted.
The unadmitted flames play powerlessly.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. IX.
Unadoptable, incapable of being
adopted.
The good [prayers] were found adoptable
by men ; were gradually got together, well-
edited, accredited: the bad found inappro-
priate, unadoptable, were generally forgotten,
disused, and burnt. — Carlyle, Past and Pre-
sent, Bk. II. ch. xvii.
Unalarming, not frightening.
Breaking the matter to our father by
unalarming degrees. — H. Brooke, Fool of
Quality, i. 331.
Nor bless I not the keener sense
Aud unalarming turbulence
Of transient joys that ask no sting
From jealous fears.
Coleridge, Sappy Husband.
Un anchor, to loose from anchor.
The Diets, only have the past parti-
ciple.
Kate will have free elbow-room for un-
anchoring her boat. — De Quineey, Spanish
Nun, sect. 5.
Unanimately, unanimously.
To the water foulei unanimately they
recourse. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Hart. Misc.,
vi. 170).
Unanswebadility, incapability of
being answered.
The beauty of these exposes must lie in
the precision and unanswerability with which
they are given. — E. A. Foe, Marginalia, cii.
Unapplausive, unapplauding.
Instead of getting a soft fence against the
cold, shadowy, unapplausive audience of his
life, had he only given it a more substantial
presence ? — G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. xx. '
Unapprehensiveness, want of ap-
prehension.
Unthinking creatures have some comfort
in the shortness of their views ; in their
unapprehensiveness. — Richardson, d. Harlowe,
iii. 5.
Unark, to disembark from an ark.
Sith thou on wealth and wisdome's flouds
maiste floate,
(Flowing from him) till thou be left vpon
Th' Armenian mount of safety, joy, and
rest;
Where when thou art, thou maist thyself
vnarke
Or make thy seate vpon that mountaine's
crest. — Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 39.
Unascendable, not to be ascended ;
very steep.
He . . . confined the Royal progeny with-
in high and vnascendable mountains. — Sandys,
Travels, p. 171.
Impending crags, rocks unascendible.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. VII.
Unattainted, clear ; impartial.
Go thither, and with unattainted eye
Compare her face with some that I shall
show,
And I will make thee think thy swan a
crow. — Romeo and Juliet, i. 2.
Unattibe, to undress.
We both left Mrs. Schwellenberg to «n-
attire. — Mad. DfArblay, Diary, v. 209.
Unaudienced, not admitted to an
audience.
Cruel to send back to town unaudienced,
unseen, a man of his business and import-
ance [—Richardson, CH. Harlowe, v. 183.
Unauthorise, to renounce ; treat as
spurious.
He hath vnauthoryshed his owne natnrall
King Edwarde the syxte, notynge hym an
vsurper. — Bale, Declaration of Bonner*s
Articles (Art. XIX.).
Unautoritied, unauthorised.
Nor to do thus are we unautoritied either
from the moral precept of Solomon to answer
him thereafter that prides him in his folly,
nor from the example of Christ. — Milton,
Animadv. on Remonst. (Preface).
Unbaized, not covered with baize.
VNBANK
(678 )
UNBLADE
It slid down the polixhcd slope of the
Tarnished and unbailed desk. — Miss Bronte,
Villette, ch. xxviii.
Unban k, to open, as by levelling or
removing banks.
Unbank the hours
To that soft overflow which bids the heart
Yield increase of delight.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, L 5.
Unbarbarized, civilised.
Of these original Irish, most of the per-
sons of quality understand English, and lead
a life totally unbarbariz'd. — Misson, Travels
in Eng., transl. by Ozell, p. 150.
Unbarbered, unshaven : unbarbed
occurs in Coriolanus, iii. 2.
We'd a hundred Jews to larboard,
Unwashed, uncombed, unbarbered.
Thackeray, White Squall.
Unbarricade, unbar. R. has un-
barricadoed with extract from Burke.
Fill up the fosse*, unbarricade the doors.
Sterne, Sent. Journey, The Passport.
Unbear, to take off or relax the
bearing-rein.
Unbear him half a moment to freshen him
up. — Dickens, Bleak House, ch. lvi.
Unbeavered, uncovered ; with the
hat off.
Brethren unbeaver*d then shall bow their
head. — Gay, The Espousal.
Unbedded, applied to a bride whose
marriage had not been consummated.
K. and L. have unbed = to raise from
a bed.
We deem'd it best that this unbedded bride
Should visit Chester, there to live recluse.
Taylor, Edwin the Fair, iii. 8.
Unbedinned, not made noisy.
A princely music unbedinned with drums.
Leigh Hunt, Rimini, c. i.
Unbegilt, ungilded ; unrewarded
with gold.
Sire, the sense
Of loyal service done is, unbegilt,
Worth what you say, the ransom of a king.
Taylor, Virgin Widow, v. 5.
Unbeginnino, having no beginning,
like a circle. Sylvester calls the world
An vnbeginning, midless, endles Ball.
First day,Jirst week, 343.
Unbeoirt, not encircled.
A finger vnbegirt with gold.
Deeble to Dairies (Microcosmos,
p. 104).
Unbelievabilitt, incredibility.
Boiling mud-oceans of Hypocrisy and F»-
believabiTity.—Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. I.
ch. xv.
Unbelt, to unfasten a belt.
The officers would have unbelted their
swords. — De Quincey, Soman Meals.
Un benevolence, ill- will : the adjec-
tive is in L.
I'm sorry to see such marks of unbencxo-
lence. — Jeremy Collier, Further Defence of
Reasons for restoring first Pr — bk. of Ed v.
VI., p. 79 (1720).
Unbenumb, to restore circulation.
The fire
Dries his dank cloaths, his colour doth refresh
And vnbenums his sinews and his flesh.
Sylvester, Handie-Crafu, 237.
Unbereaven, not bereft R. has
unbereft.
Arms, empty of her child, she lifts
With spirit unbereaven —
«God will not all take back His gifts
My lily's mine in Heaven.''
Mrs. Browning, Child's Grate
at Florence.
Unbespeak, to put off.
Pretending that the corps stinks, they
will bury it to night privately, and so will
unbespeak all their guests. — Pepys, Oct. 30*
1661.
To Whitehall to look, among other things,
for Mr. May, to unbespeak his dining with me
to morrow. — Ibid., April 13, 1669.
I can immediately run back and unbespeak
what I have ordered. — Garrick, Lying J aid,
Act I. (1741).
I unbespeak not my monitor. — Richardson,
Grandison, i. 17.
Unbethink, to change one's mind :
in the extract it is used of those who
did something contrary to their usual
practice.
The Lacedaemonian foot (a nation of all
other the most obstinate in maintaining their
ground) . . . unbethought themselves to dis-
perse and retire. — Cotton, Montaigne's Essays,
ch. xi.
Unbirdly, unlike or unworthy of a
bird : a word coined on the model of
unmanly.
Even to the universal tyrant Love
You homage pay but once a year :
None so degenerous and unbirdly prove,
As his perpetual yoke to bear.
None but a few unhappy household fowl.
Cowley, Of Liberty.
Un blade, to take out of the number
of blades (q. v.) or roaring boys.
UNBLESTFULL ( 679 )
UNCERTIFIED
And I shall take it as a favour too,
If, for the same price yoa made him valiant,
You will unblade him.
Shirley, The Gamester, Act V.
Unble8TFull, unhappy. See extract
*. v. Pest full.
Unblind, to open the eyes : also an
adjective = clear.
It is not too late to unblind some of the
people.— Racket, life of William*, ii. 196.
Keep his vision clear from speck, his inward
sight unblind.
Keats, Birthplace of Burns.
Unblissful, unhappy.
And from within me a clear under-tone
Thrilled thro1 mine ears in that unblissful
clime.
Tennyson, Dream of Fair Women, xxi.
Unboding, not anticipating.
I grew in worth, and wit, and sense,
Unboding critic-pen.
Tennyson, Will Waterproof ', vi.
Unbodkined, unfastened.
Calm she stood; unbodkined through,
Fell her dark hair to her shoe. —
Mrs. Browning, Duchess May.
Unbooklearned, illiterate. Fuller
uses the word again, Worthies, North-
ampton.
Un-book-learnyd people have conn'd by
heart many psalms of the old translation. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., VII. i. 32.
Unbuckbamed, not starched or. stiff.
Thence I appeal, for judgement on my Pen,
To moral, but unbuckram'd Gentlemen.
Colman, Vagaries Vindicated, p. 211.
Unbudded, not yet opened into bud.
See extract «. v. Labyrinth.
Unbundle, to open ; to declare.
Unbundle your griefs, madam, and let us
into the particulars. — Jarvis's Don Quixote,
Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. vi.
Unburiable, that cannot be buried.
A yet warm corpse, and yet unburiable.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Unburnished, not brightened or
cleaned.
Their bucklers lay
Unburnished and defiled.
Southey, Joan of Are, Bk. VII.
Unburrow, to unearth.
He can bring down sparrows and unburrow
rabbits. — Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, x.
Unbdry, to exhume.
The hours they are not at their beads,
which are not a few, they .employ in speaking
ill of us, unburying our bones, and burying
our reputations. — Harris's Don Quixote, Pt.
II. Bk. III. ch. v.
Unbusy, idle ; leisurely. Uhbusied
is in the Diets.
My mother . . . continued looking into a
drawer among laces and linen, in a way
neither busy nor unbusy. — Richardson, C*.
Harlowe, i. 132.
Hickman is a sort of fiddling, busy, yet,
to borrow a word from you, unbusy man. —
Ibid., ii. 5.
Uncanny, not right; mysterious;
eerie.
What does that inexplicable, that uncanny
turn of countenance mean ? — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xxiv.
He . . . rather expected something "un-
canny " to lay hold of him from behind.— C.
Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xxi.
Uncardinal, to divest of the car-
dinalate.
Borgia . . . quickly got a dispensation to
uncardinal himself. — Fuller, Holy and Pro-
fane State, V. vii. 2.
Uncarnate, to divest of flesh or
fleshliness. u The uncarnating of a
Christian " is one of the phrases of the
sectaries ridiculed by Qauden {Tears
of the Church, p. 198). Sir T. Browne,
quoted by R., speaks of the " uncarnate
Father " as distinguished from the in-
carnate Son.
Uncart, to unload a cart.
He carted and uncarted the manure with a
sort of flunkey grace. — G. Eliot, Amos Bar-
ton, ch. ii.
Uncastle, to deprive of a castle.
He uncastled Roger of Salisbury, Alex-
ander of Lincoln, and Nigellus of Ely. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. ii. 39.
Uncatechizednesb, want of instruc-
tion.
What means the Uncatechizedness, the
Sottishness, Profaneness, Impudence and
Irrehgion which are so much spreading and
prevailing?— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
619.
Uncentre, to throw off the centre ;
to upset.
Let the heart be uncentred from Christ, it
is dead. — Adams, ii. 258.
Uncertified, not certified; having
no certificate.
The mercy of the legislature in favour
of insolvent debtors is never extended to
uncertified bankrupts taken in execution. —
Smollett, L. Greaves, ch.
UNCHALLENGEABLE ( 680 ) UNCOMPANIONABLE
Unchallengeable, secure \. not to be
challenged.
His title and his paternal fortune . . .
might be rendered unchallengeable. — Scott,
St. Ronan's Well, ch. zzxiii.
Unchaplain, to dismiss from a chap-
laincy.
Dr. Hackwel, for opposing the Spanish
Match, was unchaplaind and banish'd the
Court.— Fuller, Worthies, Dorset (i. 312).
Uncheckable, incapable of being
checked or examined.
His lordship used him in his most private
and uncheckable trusts. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, ii. 286.
Unchildish, not fit for children.
Webbe speaks of some of the classics
as " unchildish 6tuffe," i. e. not fit for
children (Eng. Poetrie, p. 46).
Unchivalrous, wanting in chivalry,
or honour.
Such a bad pupil, monsieur ! so thankless,
cold - hearted, unchivalrous, unforgiving. —
Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xxxv.
Morally, it [gambling] is unchivalrous and
unchristian. — C. Kingstey {Life, ii. 275).
Uncholeric, even-tempered.
His Excellent was not uncholeric. — Carlyle,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. II. ch. iv.
Unchristiness, unchristianess. which
word is given by L., with extract from
Eikon nasiliht. Strype (Life of
Cranmer, Bk. II. ch. viii.) says that in
1648, or thereabouts, Edward VI. put
forth a proclamation, complaining that
Churches were made " a den or sink. of
all unchristiness"
Uncipher, to decipher.
We had further intelligence this day con-
cerning a letter in ciphers from Mr. Ash-
burnham to the King at Holmby; which
letter was intercepted by Captain Abbots, a
Captain of Dragoons in the army, and is now
unciphered. — Rushworth, Hist. Coll., Pt. IV.
vol. I. p. 491(1647).
Un-city, to deprive of the status of
a city.
Some questioned its charter, and would
have had it un-Citied, because un-Bishoped
n our Civil Wars. — Fuller, Worthies, Glou-
cestershire (i. 398).
Uncle. My uncle = the pawn-
broker (the corresponding phrase in
French is ma tante). All the extracts
are plays upon this sense.
We find him making constant reference
to an uncle, in respect of whom he would
seem to have entertained great expecta-
tions, as he was in the habit of seeking to
propitiate his favour by presents of plate,
jewels, books, watches, and other valuable
articles. — Dickens, Martin Chuszlewit, ch. L
Brothers, wardens of City Halls,
And uncles, rich as three golden balls
From taking pledges of nations.
Hood, Miss Kilmanseyg.
"Dine in your frock, my good friend,
and welcome, if your dress -coat is in the
country/' "It is at- present at an uncle's"
Mr. Bayham said with great gravity. —
Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xii.
Unclose, unreserved; babbling.
Knowen designs are dangerous to act,
And th' vnclose chief did never noble fact.
Sylvester, The Captaines, 1075.
Unclubable, ungenial; unfitted to
be a good member of a club. The
" master of languages " was, of course,
Dr. Johnson.
"Sir John was a most unclubable man!"
How delighted was I to hear this master of
languages so unaffectedly and socially and
good-naturedly make words, for the pro-
motion of sport and good-humour. — Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, i. 41.
Uncolted, deprived of a colt or
horse. Colt = to befool: hence the
pun in the extract addressed to Falstaff,
who cannot find his horse.
Foist. What a plague mean ye to colt me
thus?
Prince. Thou liest; thou art not col ted,
thou art uncolted. — 1 Henry IV., ii. 2.
Uncommixed, unmingled ; separate
from.
The Thracian quarter lies
Utmost of all, and uncommixed with Trojan
regiments. — Chapman, Iliad, x. 369.
Uncommunicative, not liberal: its
usual meaning is reserved in speech,
though communicate is used in the
New Testament for " give " (Heb. xiii.
16, &c), Clarissa Harlowe, speaking
of her parents, uses the term as pro-
bably the softest she could find.
Excepting in one point, I know not any
family which lives more up to their duty
than the principals of ours. A little too w»-
communicative for their great circumstances
—that is all. — Richardson, Cl. Harlowe, ii. 90.
Uncommunicativeness, reserve.
I might justify my secresy and uncommum-
cativeness.— Richardson, Cl. Harlowe, iv. 291.
Uncompanionable, unsociable, or un-
fitted to make a companion of.
UNCOMPANIONED ( 68 1 )
UNCULAR
Here is a Mrs. K. too, sister to the Duchess
of M., who is very uncompanionable indeed,
and talks of Tumbridge. — Mad. IfArblay,
Diary, i. 415.
Uncompanioned, unique; having no
fellow.
She is the mirror of her beauteous sex,
UnparallelPd and uncompanion'd.
Mackin, Dumb Knight, Act I.
Uncompassed, unbounded.
Can clouds encompasse Thy vncompast Great-
ness ? — Davits, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 13.
Uncompliant, opposed; inflexible.
Be justly opposite and uncompliant to
those erroures. — Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 305.
Uncompobeable, not to be allayed.
A difference raised between the House of
Lords and the House of Commons about
judicature, ... at length flamed so high as
to be uncomposeable. —North, Examen, p. 63.
Unconcerned, sober. Cf. Con-
cerned.
Mowbray and Tourville grew very noisy
by one, and were carried off by two. Wine
never moves Mr. Lovelace, notwithstanding
a vivacity which generally helps on over-gay
spirits. As to myself, the little part I had
taken in their gaiety kept me unconcerned.—
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, viii. 309.
Unconcurrent, disagreeing.
A league consisting of seuerall nations,
emulous and vnconcurrent in their courses. —
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 49.
Unconfidence, hesitation ; doubt.
He never raised his style higher when he
wrote than with Ifs and suppositive uncon-
fidence.— Hacket, Life of Williams, i. 124.
Unconformist, nonconformist.
Fuller (Ch. Hist., X. ii. 1) speaks of
Abp. Whitfpf t fearing u an assault of
UnconformisU on Church discipline."
Unconoeal, to relax ; to become un-
frozen. The Diets, only give the past
participle.
When meres begin to uncow/eal.
Tennyson, Two Voices.
Unconqealable, incapable of being
frozen.
A road whose white intensity
Would now make platioa uncongealable
Like quicksilver. — Southey, Nondescripts, III.
Unconsumeable, inexhaustible.
There are an unconsumeable number. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 127.
Uncontainablb, irrepressible.
His uncontainable poison would soon burst
him. — Adams, i. 73.
Unconvenable, unfitting.
He vsed commonly to saie that there was
nothing more vnconuenable for a perfecte
good capitaine then ouer moche hastyng and
vnauisednesse. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 286.
Uncoquettish, not coquettish or
anxious to attract notice.
So pure and uncoquettish were her feelings.
— Miss Austen, Nort hanger Abbey, ch. vii.
Uncordial, cold ; wanting in hearti-
ness.
A little proud-looking woman of uncordial
address. — Miss Austen, Sense and Sensibility,
ch. xxxiv.
Uncorrespondency. Gauden says
that he is unable to join in those
associations among ministers, popular
with the Presbyterians and others,
though having regard to the characters
of many individuals among them, he
regrets "this uncorrespondency11 to
which he feels compelled (Tears of the
Churchy p. 469).
Uncorrespondent, not answering to.
Vicious extremes . . are contrary to each
other, and yet uncorrespondent with that
vertue from which they are divided. — Gau-
den, Tears of the Church, p. 303.
Uncourtierlike, unlike a courtier.
I acted but an uncourtierlike'pait. — Mail.
D'Arblay, Diary, ill. 103.
Uncoveted, not longed after.
Uncoveted wealth came pouring in upon
me. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 353.
Uncrased, sound ; form.
Shortly after dies Geffery Fits Peter,
justiciar of England . . . who m that broken
time only held unerased, performing the part
of an euen consellour and officer betweene
the Sling and Kingdome. — Daniel, Hist, of
Eng., p. 119.
Uncredit, to discredit.
It was Kilvert his designe to uncredit the
testimony of Pregion by charging him with
several accusations. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI.
ii. 82.
Uncritical, lacking in judgment.
We are not so rude understanders or un-
criticall speakers. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 24.
Uncular, avuncular ; g. v.
The grave Don owned the soft impeach-
ment, relented at once, and clasped the
young gentleman in the Wellington trousers
UNCUSTOMARY ( 682 )
UNDERMINE
to his uncular and rather angular breast —
De Quincey, Spanish Nun, sect. vi.
Uncustomary, unusual.
The universal insurrectionary abrogation
of law and custom was managed in a most
unlawful uncustomary manner. — Carlyle,
Misc., iv. 128.
Uncuted, not mixed with cuit, q. v.;
i. e. with sweet wine.
That which principally enricheth this
countrey is their muscadines and malraesiea
. . . wines that seldome come vnto vs vncuted,
but excellent where not. — Sandys, Travels,
p. 224.
Undamnified, uninjured.
The riders . . . might save themselves un-
damnified.— Caius on Dogs, transl. by Fleming
1576 {Eng. Gam. UL 238).
Undadghterly, unbecoming to
daughters.
I would not on any account have it
thought that, in my last disposition, any-
thing undaughterly, unsisterly, or unlike a
kinswoman, should have had place. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vii. 412.
Undean, to deprive of a deanery or
of decanal standing.
Mr. Thome gave him a look which undeaned
him completely for the moment. — Trollope,
Barchester Towers, ch. xlvi.
Un defecated, un purged ; thick.
Mine was pure, simple, undefecated rage. —
Godwin, Mandtville, h. 115.
Undelectable, unpleasant.
The genial warmth which the chestnut
imparted was not undelectable. — Sterne, Tr.
Shandy, iii. 209.
Ux deliverable, incapable of being
delivered.
Fix thyself in Dandyhood, undelt'verable :
it is thy doom. — Carlyle, Past and Present,
Bk. II. ch. xvii.
Undelved, undug.
Welcome, ye wild plains
Unbroken by the plough, undelved by hand
Of patient rustic.
Southey, Botany Bay Eclogues, I.
Undeniable, excellent.
The daylight, furnished gratis, was cer-
tainly M undeniable " in its quality. — De
Quincey, Roman Meals.
He meant to marry a well-educated young
lady (as yet unspecified) whose person was
good, and whose connections, m a solid
middle-class way, were undeniable. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. xli.
Under-aid, to belp secretly.
Robert . . \ is said to haue under-aided
Boul secretly.— Daniel, Hist, of Eng-, p. 23.
Underboabd, underhand: above
board = frank or honest, is common.
Secret pensions, which flow from foreign
princes . . . are most mischievous. The
receivers of such will plnyunder-board at the
Counsell-table— Fuller, Holy State, IV. v. 16.
I scorn to act under-board.
T. Brown, Works, n. 305.
Undercot, to coast under ; to creep
insidiously.
To Medciners the medcine vailed not,
So sore the poisond plague did vndercot.
Hudson's Judith,'u. 182.
Undercrest, to support. The addi-
tion referred to is the surname Coriol-
anus, just bestowed on Caius Marcius.
I mean to stride your steed, and at all times
To undercrest your good addition
To the fairness of my power.
Coriolanus, i. 9.
Under-degreed, of inferior rank.
The reputation of persons of birth most
not lie at the mercy of every under-degreed
sinner. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 48.
Underdoer, one who does less than
is necessary: see extract *. v. Over-
doer.
Under-earthly, subterranean. Syl-
vester (The Arke, 281) speaks of " un-
der-earthly caves."
Underfeed, to feed insufficiently.
The Fanaticks strive to underfeed and
starve it.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
363.
Undergore, to pierce underneath.
The dart did undergore
His eyelid by his eye's dear roots.
Chapman, Iliad, xiv. 408.
Under-hung. A person whose lower
jaw projects is said to be under-hung.
He . . . must lament his being very much
under-hung, a defect which time seemed to
have increased. — Miss Austen, Persuasion,
ch. xv.
He . . . had got the trick which many
underhung men have of compressing his
upper lip. — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
on. ii.
Under-match, one unequal to some
one else.
He was no contemptible Historian ; but I
confesse an undermatch to Doctor Hackwell.
—Fuller, Worthies, Denbigh (ii. 689).
Undermine, cave.
There are many undermines or caves. —
Holland's Camden, p. 650.
UNDERNICENESS ( 683 ) UNDISSEVERED
Underniceness, defect in delicacy.
Ovcrniceness maybe underniceneas. — Rich-
ardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 8.
Underpeer, to peep under.
To make the people wonder are set forth
great and vglie gyants, marching as if they
were aline, and armed at all points, but
within they are stuffed fall of browne paper
aud tow, which the shrewd boys vnderpeering
do guilefully diseouer and turne to a great
derision.— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk. III.
ch. vi.
Underpull, to do work without
appearing in it
His lordship, while he was a student, and
during his incapacity to practise aboveboard,
was contented to underpull, as they call it,
and managed diverse suits for his country
friends and relations. — North, life of Lord
Guilford, i. 35.
Under-rate, inferior.
If He has no punishments in reserve for
such profligate offenders, under-rate trans-
gressors may expect a recompence. — Gentle-
man Instructed, p. 322.
These under-rate mortals are as incapable
to be moved by kindness as to practise it. —
Ibid., p. 508.
Underset, sublet.
These middle-men will underset the land,
and live in idleness, whilst they rack a parcel
of wretched under-tenants. — Miss Edge-
worth, Ennui, ch. viii.
Undershoot, to shoot short of a
mark.
At Fishtoft in this County no Mice or
Bats are found. ... I believe they over-shoot
the mark who make it a Miracle ; they under-
shoot it who make it Magick. — Fuller, Wor-
thies, Lincoln (ii. 5).
Underspend, to fall short in expend-
iture ; to spend less than another.
When his friend in travell called for two
Faggots, Mr. Sutton called for one ; when
his friend for half a pint of wine, Mr. Sutton
for a gill, underspending him a moity. —
Fuller, Worthies, Lincoln (ii. 23).
Under - stair, ' subordinate : back-
stair* is now used something in the
same way.
Living in some under-stair office, when he
would visit the country, he borrows some
gallant's cast suit of his servant, and therein,
player-like, acts that part among his besotted
neighbours. — Adams, i. 500.
Understrapping, subservient.
I . . . have as great a share (whilst it lasts)
of that understrapping virtue of discretion
as the best of you. — Sterne, Tr. Shandy, iv.
202,
Understumble, a jocular word for
understand, still in use.
Miss. I understumble you, gentlemen.
Nev. Madam, your humblecumdumble.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Oonv. i.).
Underwing, lower wing.
The admiring girl surveyed
His out-spread sails of green ;
His gauzy underwings.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. III.
Underwitted, silly ; half-witted.
Oupid ... is an under-witted whipster. —
Kennel's Erasmus, Praise of Folly, p. 19.
Timotheus, the Athenian commander, in
all his expeditions was a mirror of good luck,
because he was a little underwitted. — Ibid.,
p. 134.
Undescendable, unfathomable. Ten-
nyson (Harold, I. i.) speaks of " the
undescendable abysm."
Undesevered, unseparated; ur.dis-
severed, q. v.
All theyr workes be vndiuyded and unde-
teuered.—Bp. Fisher, i. 332.
Undeskanted, untalked of.
Leaue Princes affaires undeskanted on. —
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 23.
Undeviled, delivered from a devil.
The boy having gotten a habit of counter-
feiting . . . would not be undeviled by all their
exorcisms.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. iv. 54.
Undifferencing, not marking any
difference.
Some Sciolists will boast to distinguish
bones of Beasts from Men by their porosity,
which the Learned deride as an undifferencing
difference.— Fuller, Worthies, Essex (i. 339).
Undiked, not furnished or fortified
with a ditch.
The Greeks found time to get
Beyond the dike and th' undiked pales.
Chapman, Iliad, xv. 311.
Undiscoursed, silent.
We would submit to all with indefinite
and undiscoursed obedience. — Hacket, life of
Williams, i. 130.
It is fit to serve kings in things lawful
with undiscoursed obedience. — Ibid., ii. 217.
Undiscreetness, indiscretion.
He grauely restreigned and staied the
heddie vndiscretenesse of the Oratours. —
UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 328.
Undispunged, unexpunged. #
The defence should remain undispunged. —
Hacket, Life of Williams, ii. 120.
Undisseverbd, united. Cf. Unde-
severed.
UNDIVESTEDLY ( 684 ) UNEXPECTANT
If they do assail undissevered, no force can
well withstand them. — Patten, Exped. to
Scotland, 1548 (Eng. Garner, iii. 110).
Undivkstedly, without ; free from.
Yon will (aa undivestedly as possible of
favour or resentment) teu me what you
would have me do. — Richardson, CJ. Harlowe,
u. 64.
Undivideable, that which cannot be
divided.
Reducing the undivideaUes into money, he
shared it among his company. — Jarvis's Don
Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. ix.
Undomestic, not caring for home
life or duties.
Their wives and daughters were never
more faulty, more undomestic than at present.
— Richardson, Grandison, vi. 397.
The undomestic Amazonian dame.
Cumberland, Epilogue to Foote's
Maid of Hath.
Undomesticate, to estrange from
home life and habits.
I believe there are more bachelors now in
England by many thousands than there were
a few years ago. . . . The luxury of the age
will account a good deal for this ; and the
turn our sex take in undomesticatina them-
selves, for a good deal more. — Richardson,
Grandison, ii. 11.
Undrainable, inexhaustible.
Mines undrainable of ore.
Tennyson, (Enont.
Unduke, to deprive of a dukedom.
He hath letters from France that the king
hath unduked twelve dukes. — Pepys, Dec. 12,
1663.
Undulant, waving ; undulating.
And on her deck sea-spirits I descried
Gliding and lapsing in an undulant dance.
Taylor, St. Clement's Eve, ii. 2.
Undulous, undulating.
He felt the undulous readiness of her
volatile paces under him. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doone, ch. lxv.
Unebriate, unintoxicating ; also, un-
intoxicated.
There were . . . unebriate liquors, pressed
from cooling fruits. — Lytton, My Novel, Bk.
IV. ch. xvii.
Forth, unebriate, unpolluted, he came from
the orgy. — Ibid., Bk. VI. ch. xxii.
Unvested, undischarged (at the
natural vents).
The former crudities undigested, unegested,
having the greater force, turn the good
nutriment into themselves. — Adams, ii. 476.
Unemotional, free from emotion.
Lapidoth had travelled a long way from
that young self, and thought of all that this
inscription signified with an unemotional
memory. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. brii.
Unemotioned, impassive. In GW-
urins MandevMe, iii. 98, a man is
described as detailing anecdotes in a
44 dry, sarcastic, unemotioned way."
Un enabled, not empowered.
No eye of mortal man
If unenabled by enchanted spell,
Had pierced those fearful depths.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. V.
Unendly, endless.
Mortal disdain, bent to unendly revenge.
Sidney, Arcadia, p. 234.
Unentering, not entering ; making
no impression.
The evening sun
Pour'd his unentering glory on the mist.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. IX.
Unentire, not whole. To make
unintire = to dissolve.
The Elements, though still at warre in mee,
Do yet, in firme accord, mine ende con-
spire;
For it they hasten, sith they disagree,
Which well agrees to make me vnintire.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 50.
Unentranced, awaked from a dream
or visionary state : disentranced is the
more common form.
His heart was wholly unentranced.
Taylor, Ph. van AH. (The Lay of
Elena).
Un episcopal, without bishops. The
word now would rather imply " unbe-
coming a bishop."
He never set up any sovereign and unepis-
copal Presbytery as an Idol or Moloch. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 11.
Unevident, obscure.
We conjecture at unevident things by that
which is evident. — Racket, Life of Williams,
i. 197.
Unexpectable, not to be looked for.
The homicide [in a duel] sins deadly, and
the slain, without unexpectable mercy , perish-
eth eternally. — Adams, ii. 322.
Unexpectant, not expecting or look-
ing for anything. The Church Quar-
terly Reweio (April, 1878) in a notice
of Mr. Torrens's Life of Lord Mel'
bourne marks this as among other
strange words used by the author.
The word seemed quite familiar to me,
but it is not in the Diets. Mr. Torrens,
UNEXPRESS
( 685 ) UNFINISHABLE
however, did not introduce it, as the
extracts will show. Cf. Inexpectant.
There was the black and grey flock of
monks and secular clergy with bent unex-
peetant faces. — G. Eliot ', Romola, ch. Iv.
" La, mamma ! as if there was any like-
ness between Lady Western and me/1 cried
Phoebe, lifting a not unexpectant face across
the table. — Mrs. Oliphant, Salem Chapel,
ch. iv.
Un express, informal ; casual.
The express schoolmaster is not equal to
much at -present, while the unexpress, for
?;ood or for evil, is so busy with a poor little
ellow.— Carlyle, Life of Sterling, Pt. I.
ch. iv.
Unfabled, unmixed with fable ;
real.
They are more amusing than plain un-
fabled precept. — Sydney Smith, Works, i. 176.
What did she think of the few kind words
scattered here and there — not thickly, as
the diamonds were scattered in the valley
of Sindbad, but sparely, as those gems lie in
unfabled beds? — Miss Bronte, VUlette, ch.
xx vi.
Unface, to expose.
Unface these, and they will prove as bad
cards as any in the pack. — Rushworth, Pt. II.
vol. ii. p. 917.
Unfadging, not going right.
The potter may err in framing his vessel,
and so in anger dash the unfadging clay
against the walls.— Adams, iii. 122.
Un faith, distrust.
In love, if love be love, if love be oars,
Faith and unfaith can ne'er be equal powers:
Unfaith in aught is want of faith in all.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Unfardle, to unpack.
Thither our fisherman set the best legge
before, and unfardled to the King his whole
sachel of wonders. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 171).
Unfarrowed, without a farrow — the
reference is to a sow who had all her
pigs taken away.
She was left alone
Upon her tower, the Niobe of swine,
And so returned unf arrow1 d to her sty.
Tennyson, Walking to the Mail.
Unfastnkss, porousness.
The philosopher saith, It is not the intent
of kina that trees should be sharp with
prickles and thorns, but he would have it
caused by the insolidity and unfastness of the
tree. — Adams, ii. 478.
Un fatigue able, unweariable ; never
tired.
Those are the unfatigueable feet
That traversed tne forest tract.
Southey, Huron's Address to the Dead.
Unfearfully, bravely.
In latter times they entred the lists
naked ; their skill in defence not so much
regarded or praised, as the vndaunted giuing
or receiuing of wounds ; and life vnfearfully
parted with. — Sandys, Travels, p. 270.
Unfeather. To strip of feathers:
the Diets, have only the past participle.
Ay, ay, well unfeather the whole nest in
time. — Colman, The Oxonian in Town, Act I.
Unfeltly, insensibly.
A banefull age, whose strength vnfeltly
flowes
Through all his veins.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 107.
Unfetched, not to be fetched or
carried.
Our friends by Hector slain
(And Jove to friend) lie unfetch'd off.
Chapman, Iliad, xix. 196.
Unfeudalise, to divest of feudal
rights or character.
The Austrian Kaiser answers that his
German Princes for their part cannot be
unfeudalised.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk.
V. ch. v.
Unfighting, not fighting ; cowardly.
Their general gone, the rest like lightning
fly,
A cheap unfighting herd, not worth the
victory.
T. Brown, Works, iv. 31.
Un fillet ed, not tied together.
The hand
Holds loosely its small handful of wild-
flowers
UnjUleted, and of unequal lengths.
Coleridge, The Picture.
Unfine, shabby.
The birthday was far from being such a
show ; empty and unfine as possible. — WaU
pole, Letters, ii. 362 (1762).
Unfingered, having no fingers.
Not haire, but golden wire drawne like the
twist
The Spider spins with her vnfimfred fist.
Davits, An Extasie, p. 91.
Unfinishable, not to be finished.
The reference in the text is to an
author who " left half told " an adven-
ture of a famous Knight errant.
He commended in his author the conclud-
ing his book with a promise of that un-
finishable adventure. — Jarvis's Don Quixote,
Pt. I. Bk. I. ch. i.
VNFIST
( 686 )
UNGODDESS
Unpist, to unhand ; release.
You goodman Brandy face, unfist her.
How durst you keep my wife— your sister ?
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 85.
Unflame, to cool.
Fear
Unfiames your courage in pursuit.
Quarles, Emblems, III. Introduction.
Unfleshly, spiritual ; incorporeal.
Her tears fell on his arm the while, un-
heeded— except by those unfleshlv eves, with
with which they say the very air is thronged.
— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. L
Un fleshy, bare of flesh. Da vies
(Muse's Sacrifice, p. 13) speaks of
"gastly Death 6 wnfletky feet.
Un fluent, unready in speech.
Pour vpon my faint vnjluent tongue
The sweetest honey of th' Hyantian fount.
Sylvester, Sixth day, first week, 29.
Unfolded, not penned in the fold.
So long we dispute of loue and forget our
labours, that both our flockes shall be vn~
folded. — Greene, Menaphon, p. 44.
Un foresee, not to anticipate.
The Lord keeper did not unforesee how far
this cord might be drawn. — Hacket, life of
Williams, i. 171.
Un forgive able, unpardonable.
This is what it would have been the
unforgiveable sin to swerve from and desert.
Carlyle, Life of Sterling, ch. vii.
Unforgiver, an implacable person.
I hope, however, that these unforgivers
(my mother is among them) were always
good, dutiful, passive children to their
parents. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, vii. 26.
Unforgivingnbss, implacability.
What punishment are they not treasuring
up against themselves in the heavy reflections
which their rash censures and unforgiving-
ness will occasion them! — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, vii. 287.
Unformalized, not made formal.
He listened so kindly, so teachably ; un-
formalized by scruples lest so to bend his
bright handsome head, to gather a woman's
rather obscure and stammering explanation
should imperil the dignity of his manhood. —
Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xix.
Unfortunacy, misfortune.
The king he tacitely upbraids with the
unfortunactes of his reign by deaths and
plagues. — Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 331.
Unfractured, unbroken.
Its huge bulk lies unfractured. — Defoe,
Tour thro1 G. Britain, i. 310.
Unfrankable, incapable of being
franked, so as to go post-free.
Your pencils are on my chimney-piece, and
the next question is how to transport them
to yours, for they are of an unfrankable
shape and texture.— Southey, Letters, 1819
(iii. 106).
UNFBEE,"not free.
But yet thou saist, Why staid He not man's
will?
How should He then haue made his will
bin free ?
Better unfree (saist thou) than be so ill,
But 'tis not ill at libertie to bee.
Davies, Mirum in Modum, p. 18.
Unfreeze, to thaw.
Loue's firy dart
Gould neuer vnfriese the frost of her chaste
hart.— Hudson's Judith, iv. 196.
Unfbet, to relax.
To Joppa will I fly,
And for a while to Tharsus shape my course,
Until the Lord unfret His angry brows.
Greene, Looking Glass for London, p. 129.
Unfbightful, not terrifying or re-
pulsive.
Not unf rightful it must have been ; ludicro-
terriflc, and most unmanageable. — Carlyle,
Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. VII. ch. iv.
Unfuelled, without fuel.
Blazing unfuelVd from the floor of rock,
Ten magic flames arose.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. II.
Unfull, imperfect. See extract s. v.
NUMBERY.
Ungarmented, unclothed.
And round her limbs ungarmented the fire
Ourl'd its fierce flakes.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. IV.
Ungentleman, to make rude or
clownish.
Some tell me home-breeding will ungentle-
man him. — Gentleman Instructed, p. 545.
Ungive, relax, or fail.
That religion which is rather suddenly
parched up than seasonably ripened, doth
commonly ungive afterwards. — Fuller. Ch.
Hist., II. ii. 40.
He was over-frozen in his northern rigour,
and could not be bhaw'd to ungive anything
of the rigidnease of his discipline. — Ibid.,
Hist, of Camb. Univ., vii. 2.
Ungoddess, to divest of the attributes
or appearance of a goddess. Donne,
as quoted by R. and L., uses ungod in
this way. Carlyle (Fr. Rev., Vt. III.
Bk. V. ch. iv.) speaks of Mrs. Momoro
who enacted the part of the Goddess
UNGORED
(687 )
UNHOPING
of Reason, being " ungoddeued " when
the day was over.
Ungored, unbloodied. In Hamlet,
V. ii.,the word is a different one, though
identical in spelling, and = unpierced,
uninjured.
Helms of gold
Vngoard with bloud.
Sylvester, The Vacation, p. 288.
Ungorgeous, unhandsome ; ill-look-
ing.
It sweeps along there in most ungorgeous
pall.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. viii.
Unqrave, to exhume. Surrey, quoted
by R., has ungraved for unburied.
Richard Fleming, Bishop of Lincolne,
Diocesan of Lutterworth, sent his officers
(vultures with a quick sight scent at a dead
carrion) to unyrave him accordingly. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., IV. ii. 53.
Ungrave, light ; quick. R. and L.
five the adverb with extract from
hakespeare (CorioL, ii. 3).
Now thinke, o thinke, thou seest those
hounds of hell,
(That yelp out blasphemies about their
pray)
With vngrauc gate to runne doe Him compell.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 7-
Ungreening, a ceremony used at
Ley den University, when a student
ceased to be a freshman. See extract
s. v. Gbeenib.
Ungdard, to render defenceless.
Some well-chosen presents from the philo-
sopher so softened and unguarded the girl's
heart, that a favourable opportunity became
irresistible.— Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk. V.
ch. v.
Unguidably, incapable of being
guided. See extract 8. v. Demount.
Un-hallow-washed, not sprinkled
with holy water.
Bo th' Hypocrite, through superstitious error,
Thinks hee hath done some sin of hainous
horror,
When, by mis-heed or by mis-hap, hee corns
Un-hallow'washt into the Sacred Rooms.
Sylvester, Panareius, 196.
Unharbour, dislodge; bring out of
retreat.
Let us unharbour the rascal.
Foote, Devil upon Two Sticks,
Act I.
Unharmino, doing no injury.
At once Dunois on his broad buckler bears
The unharming stroke.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. VIL
Unhaunst. H. gives " Haunce, to
raise ; to exalt ; " hence unhaunst would
= not raised on, i. e. not admitted to
heaven. " The ungodly shall not stand
in the judgement
Therefore in houre iudicial
The vngodlye shal vnhaunst remayne.
Stanyhurst, Psalm 1.
Unhead, to decapitate. In the second
extract effigies are spoken of.
Tou . . . did not only dare to uncrown, but
to unhead a monarch. — T. Broun, Works, ii.
216.
Legs and arms lay scattered about, heads
undressed, and bodies unheaded. — North,
Examen, p. 580.
Unheaven, to leave heaven, or de-
prive of heaven.
Vnheau'n your selues, ye holy Cherubins,
And giue attendance on your Lord in Earth.
Davies, Holy Roode, p. 28.
O how should all men, all Christians, all
Churches, be unchurched, unchristened, un-
sainted, unheavened, ... if these men might
not have tbeir wills. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 242.
Unheppen, ungainly ; awkward.
An1 Lucy wur laame o' one leg, sweet-arts
she niver fed none.
Strange an' unheppen Miss Lucy ! we naamed
her •' Dot an* gaw one."
Tennyson, The Village Wife.
Unheritable, barred from inherit-
ance. The extract is from the Council's
letter to Q. Mary, 1553.
Thereby you [are] justly made illegitimate
and unheritable to the crown imperial of this
realm. — Heylin, Reformation, ii. 207.
Unheroism, that which is not heroic.
Search not for the secret of heroic ages,
which have done great things in this earth,
among their falsities, their greedy quackeries
and unheroisms. — Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 65.
Unhideable, that cannot be obscured.
See extract «. v. Passe-man.
Unhighted, uncared for.
Through the chinks of an unhighted flesh
we may read a neglected souL — Adams, lit.
143.
Unhooded, without a hood or head-
covering. See extract s. v. Uxhosed.
R. has unhood, to remove a hood (as
from the eyes of a falcon).
Unhopino, not expecting.
Tour flight is no doubt the very thing they
aimed to drive you to, by the various attacks
UNHORSE
( 688 )
UNISTYLIST
they made upon you, unhoping (as they must
do all the time) the success of their schemes
in Solmes's behalf. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
iii. 40.
Unhorse, to take the horses out of a
carriage.
Maidens wave
Their kerchiefs, and old women weep'for joy:
While others, not so satisfied, unhorse
The gilded equipage, and, turning loose
His steeds, usurp aplaoe they well deserve.
Cowper, Winter Walk at Noon, 701.
Un hosed, without hose or greaves.
A rude coat of mail
Unhosed, unhooded.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. VII.
Unhospital, inhospitable*
The Blacke Sea . . . first called Axenus,
which siguifieth vnhospitall ; by reason of
the coldnesse thereof, and inhumanity of
the bordering nations. — Sandys, Travels, p.
89.
Unhusranded, unmarried. The
Diets, have it = neglected.
She bore unhusbanded a mother's pains.
Southey, Hannah.
Unic, a unique thing.
Sir Charles Mordaunt's gold medal, mean
as it is in workmanship, is extremely curious,
and may be termed an unic, being the only
one of the kind that has come to our know*
ledge.— Archaol., iii. 374 (1775).
Unicorn, a carriage and pair with a
third horse in front ; as in the case of
tandem, the name applies properly to
the arrangement of the horses, but is
also used, of the whole equipage.
"Let me drive you out some day in my
unicorn. . . . Bid my blockhead bring my
unicorn." She, her unicorn, and her block-
head were out of sight in a few minutes. —
Miss Edgeworth, Belinda, ch. zvii.
Unidea'd, empty-pated.
Pretty unidea'd girls . . seem to form the
beau ideal of our whole sex in the works of
some modern poets. — Mrs. Hemans (Me-
morials by Chorley, i. 99).
Uniform, make conformable ; con-
form.
Thus must I uniform my speech to your
obtruse conceptions. — Sidney, Wanstead Play,
p. 622.
Nor would the Duke have time delayed,
In getting new corrections made,
But needs must have it, good or bad,
To hinder peoplo's running mad,
And uniform the multitude
Iu prayer, and join the jarring crowd.
Ward, England's Reformation, Cant. i. p. 64.
Uniformal, uniform ; symmetrical.
Her comlye nose with uniformall grace,
like purest white, stands in the middle place.
Herriek, Appendix, p. 433.
Unillumed, not lighted up.
And her full eye, now bright, now unillumed,
Spake more than Woman's thought.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Unillusory, undeceiving ; disen-
chanting.
When a philosopher has made up his mind
to marry, it is better henceforth to be short-
sighted, nay, even somewhat purblind, than
to be always scrutinizing the domestic feli-
city to which he is about to resign himself,
through a pair of cold unillusory barnacles.
— Lytton, My Novel, Bk. III. ch. zxiL
Unimbattled, without battlements.
The walls on the inside not aboue sixe
foote high, unimbattald, and sheluing on the
outside. — Sandys, Travels, p. 233.
Unimmured, unfortified or un walled .
The Jewes, returning from that captauity,
began to reedifie the same ; which yet was
vmmmured for threescore and three years
after. — Sandys, Travels, p. 155.
U nim peach ABLENE88, correctness;
purity which cannot be gainsaid.
He was offended with the insinuations
they threw out against the unimpeachabUness
of his motives. — Godwin, Mandeville, iii 188.
Unimpressible, apathetic ; not sensi-
tive.
Clara was honest and quiet; but heavy,
mindless, unimpressible. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xxvii.
Unindented, unmarked by any
wrinkle, &c.
The rest of the countenance was perfectly
smooth and unindented. — Lytton, Pelham, ch.
lxix.
Unindwellable, uninhabitable.
The Introduction from which the ex-
tract is taken is by Stanley Lane Poole.
A vast desert plateau, bleak, inhospitable,
to all but Arabs unindwellable. — E. W. Lane,
Selections from the Kuran, Introd., p. 13.
Uninvite, to put off guests. Cf.
Unbespeak.
I made them uninvite their guests. — Pepys,
Nov. 26, 1665.
Uniquity, singularity; uniqueness.
As rarities a collector would give ten
times more for them; and uniquity will
make them valued more than the charming
poetry.— Walpole, Letters, iv. 477 (1789).
Unistylist, one who uses one stylus
or pen. Poe, however, is I supposo
UNIVERSITYLESS ( 689 )
UNLESS
playing on the word, and means one
whose style is monotonous.
The author of '* Cromwell " does better as
a writer of ballads than of prose. ... He is
as thorough an unistylist as Cardinal Chigi,
who boasted that he wrote with the same
pen for half a century. — E. A. Poe, Mar-
ginalia, cxlii.
Universittless, without an univer-
sity.
As for Scotland, it was universityless, till
Laurence Lundores and Richard Corvel, Doc-
tors of Civil Law, first professed learning at
St. Andrew's.— Fuller, Hist, of Camb. Univ..
ii. 11. J
Unjacobitized, detached from the
Jacobite cause.
They begin to be unjacobitiz'd. — Misson,
Travels in Eng., transl. by Ozell% p. 138.
Unjarrino, harmonious ; agreeing.
Adams (ii. 294) speaks of the "unjar-
ring harmony of truth. "
Unjesuited, uninfluenced by Jesuits.
The unjesuited Papists could have found
in their hearts (as many did) to apply to
that Reformation of Religion. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 346.
Unkindbedly, not behaving like
kindred; unnatural.
What an implacable as well as unjust set
of wretches are those of her unkindredly kin.
— Richardson, CI. Harlow e, vi. 381.
Unkingship, abolition of monarchy.
Unkingship was proclaim'd, and his Ma-
jesty's statues thrown down. — Evelyn, Diary ,
May 30, 1649.
Unkinsman, not a relation. In the
extract the word = incestuous.
With an unkinsman's kisse (unloving Lover)
The Brother shall his Sister's shame dis-
cover.— Sylvester, The Trophies, 1216.
UN knighted, not knighted.
I . . . can hardly suspect him to be the
Cromwell of that Age, because only addi-
tioned Armiger. Indeed, I . . cannot believe
that he was unkniyhted so long. — Fuller,
WoHhies, Cambridge (i. 177).
Unknownest, most unknown : see
extract 5. v. Known est.
Unlabouring, easy going.
A mead of mildest charm delays the «n-
labouring feet.
Coleridge, To Cottle.
UNLAMrooNED, unattacked by lam-
poons.
And give thenceforth thy dinners unlam-
pooned.
Southey, To A. Cunningham.
Unland, to deprive of lands.
One Bishop (Anthony Kitchin by name)
more unlanded Landaff in one, than all bis
Predecessors endowed it in four hundred
years. — Fuller, Worthies, Monmouth, ii. 117.
Unlashed, un chastised.
Actors, unlash'd themselves, may lash man-
kind.— Churchill, Bosciad, 500.
Unlaw ed. See quotation.
The disabling dogs, which might be neces-
sary for keeping flocks and herds, from run-
ning at the deer, was called lowing, and was
in general use. The Charter of the Forest,
designed to lessen these evils, declares that
inquisition or view for lowing dogs shall be
made every third year, and shall be then
done by the view and testimony of lawful
men, not otherwise ; and they whose dogs
shall be then found unlatced, shall give three
shillings for mercy ; and for the future no
man's ox shall be taken for lowing. Such
lowing also shall be done by the assize com-
monly used, and which is, that three claws
shall be cut off without the ball of the right
foot. — Scott, Ivanhoe, note to ch. i.
Unleaded, stripped of lead. .
As for the Bishop's Palace, it was formerly
a very fair structure, but lately unleaded, and
new covered with tyle. — Fuller, Worthies,
Norwich (ii. 154).
Unlearnability, inability to learn.
Tou will learn how to conduct it [the
camera] with the pleasure of correcting my
awkwardness and unlearnability. — Walpole,
Utters, iv. 85 (1777).
Unleave, to strip of leaves.
The good gardiner . . . vnleaues his bonghes
to let in the sunne. — Puttenham, Poesie, Bk.
III. ch. 25.
Amorous myrtles and immortal bays
Never vnleau'd. — Sylvester, Eden, 122.
Sometimes they do the far-spread gourd
vnleave. — Ibid., Handy-Crafts, p. 136.
Unled, without guidance or support.
They will quaff e freely when they come to
the house of a Christian ; insomuch as I
haue seene but few go away vnled from the
embassadors table. — Sandys, Travels, p. 06.
Unleft, not left.
Yet were his men unleft. — Chapman, Iliad,
ii. 622.
Unless, lest.
I fear unless we shall be ready of our own
free will to run headlong into hell-fire, before
the terrible sentence of damnation be given ;
our conscience shall so condemn us. — Beam,
i. 366.
Presume not, villain, further for to go,
Unless you do at length the same repent.
Greene, Alphonsus, Act L
Y Y
UNLE VEL
( 690 ) VNMARVELLOUS
Tis best for thee to hold thy tattlingtongue,
Unless I send some one to scourge thy breech.
Ibid., Act II.
Beware you do not once the same gainsay,
Unless with death he do your rashness pay.
Ibid., Act V.
Unlevel, not level : the poet in the
extract seems to mean that Judith's
nose was not flat.
Tween these two sunnes and front of equall
sise,
A comely figure formally did rise,
With draught unleuell, to her lip descend.
Hudson, Judith^ iv. 349.
Unlidded, uncovered ; opened.
Not a paper bat was glanced over, not a
little box but was unlidded. — Miss Bronte,
VUlette, ch. xiii.
Unline, to empty ; take out con-
tents.
It vnlines their purse.
Davies, Bienvenu, p. 6.
Unlingerinq, hasty ; immediate.
The Roman [Caesar] by the word u sudden "
means unlingering ; whereas the Christian
Litany by '* sudden death" means a death
without warning, consequently without any
available summons to religious preparation. —
De Quineey, Eng. Mail-Coach.
Unlisted, not catalogued.
The names of many are yet unlisted. — God
appearing for the Parliament, 1644, p. 5.
Unliturgize, to deprive of a liturgy.
These were to Directorise, to Unlituraize,
to Catechize, and to Disciplinize {heir
Brethren. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p.
609.
Unlive, to kill ; unless unliving in
the extract simply = death.
Nor livest thou by the unlyving or evis-
cerating of others, as most fishes do. —
Nashe, Lenten Stuffs (Harl. Misc., vi. 179).
Unlogical, illogical.
All heartily laughed at his unlogical reason.
"Fuller, Worthies, Kent (i. 487).
Unlook, to recall a look.
He .... now turned his eyes towards
me, then from me, as if he would unlook his
own looks. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 215.
Unlove, to cease to love.
I had learnt to love Mr. Rochester; I
could not unlove him now. — C. Bronte, Jane
Eyre, ch. xviii.
Unloverlike, unlike a lover.
Astonished and shocked at so unloverlike
a speech, she was almost ready to cry out. —
Mist Austen, Sense and Sensibility, ch. — :~
Unlucknt, dull; not bright.
Havoc and anarchy everywhere; a com-
bustion most fierce but unlueent. — Carlyle,
Fr. Bev., Pt. IL Bk. V. ch. iii.
Unlcckfull, untoward ; mischiev-
ous; unlucky is still so used, at least
as a provincialism.
O Pallas, ladie of citees, why settest thou
thy delite in three the moste vnlucktfull
beastes of the worlde, the oulette, the dra-
gon, and the people ? — UdaVs Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 375.
Unluminous, without light
A tragical combustion, long smoking and
smouldering unluminous, has now burst into
flame.— Carlyle, Fr. Bev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. iii.
Unlycanthropize, to change a man,
who had been turned into a wolf, back
into a man again.
She is ready to unlycanthropize you from
this wolfish shape to your former condition.
— Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 114.
Unmacadamized, unpaved on Ma-
cadam's principle.
For so she gathered the awful sense
Of the street in its past unmacadamized
tense,
As the wild horse overran it.
Hood, Miss Kilmanstffg.
Unmaidbn, to deflower.
He unmaidened his sister Juno. — Urqu-
harfs Rabelais, Bk. III. ch. iii.
Un manliness, want of manliness;
effeminacy.
Tou and yours make piety a synonym for
unmanliness. — C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. ii.
Unmarketable, that cannot be traf-
ficked with, or cannot meet with a sale.
That paltry stone brought home to her
some thought, true, spiritual, unmarketable.
— Kingsley, Hypatia, ch. xix.
His own ill-favoured person, which was
quite unmarketable, escaped without injury,
but poor Wildfire, unconscious of his price,
turned on his flank, and painfully breathed
his last. — G. Eliot, Silas Marner, ch. iv.
Unmarttb, to strike out of the list
of martyrs.
All the amends which is made to the
memory of Scotus is that he was made a
martyr after his death. . . . But since, Ba-
ronius hath unmartyred him. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., II. iv. 36.
Unmarvellous, ordinary; not won-
derful.
Thy soul delights in wonder, pomp, and
bustle,
Mine is th' unmarvellous and placid scene.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 187.
UNMATCHABLENESS ( 691 ) UNMUSCULAR
Unmatchablene8S, invincibility.
The holy story never records any bat a
barbarous Philistine to make this offer, and
that in the presumption of his vnmatchable-
nesse.—Bp. Hall, Epistles, Dec. IV. Ep. ii.
Unmatchedness, incomparableness.
Which affirmation of his clear unmatched-
ness in all manner of learning I make. —
Ohapman, Iliad, Preface.
Unmatronlike, unlike a matron.
I wonder I could not distinguish the be-
haviour of the unmatronlike jilt, whom thou
broughtest to betray me, from the worthy
lady whom thou hast the honour to call thy
aunt.— Richardson, CI. Harloice, v. 359.
Unmaze, to disentangle ; relieve from
terror or bewilderment.
This new man Tully, this poor Arpinate, •
Late made at Rome a Country-gentleman,
Set guards where e're the line of danger ran,.
Unma£d us, and took pains for all the town.
Stapylton's Juvenal, viii. 312.
Unmeaningn ess, want of intention or
design.
Indiana, . . with apparent unmeaningness,
but internal suspicion of their giver, had
trampled upon them both.— Mad. D'Arblav,
Camilla, Bk. III. ch. i.
Unmechanize, to throw out of gear.
Paley, quoted by R., uses the past par-
ticiple = not formed by mechanism.
What one misfortune or disaster in the
book of embryotic evils that could uw
mechanize thy frame, or entangle thy fila-
ments, which has not fallen upon thy head,
or ever thou earnest into the world ?— Sterne,
Trist. Shandy, iii. 167.
Unmedicinable, should mean (as in
the second quotation) that cannot be
cured by medicine : in the first extract,
however, it seems to signify "power-
less to cure."
Away with his vnmedcinable balme,
Of worded breath : forbear, friends, let me
rest.— Chapman, Gentleman Vsfier, iv. 1.
But these, much - med'eine - knowing men,
physicians, may recure,
Thou yet unmedicinable still.
Ibid., Iliad, xvi. 24.
Unmentionables, a euphemism for
trousers. Cf. Indescribables.
The knees of the unmentionables, and the
elbows of the coat, and the seams generally,
soon began to get alarmingly white.—
Sketches by Boz (Shabby-Genteel People).
Unmetaphorical, unfiguraiive.
I am got, I know not how, into a cold
unmetaphorical vein of infamous writing.—
Sterne, Trist. Sftandy, vi. 135.
Unmeted, unmeasured.
Surely those near me must have felt some
little of the anxiety I felt in degree so un-
meted.— Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xuix.
Unmew, to release.
But let a portion of ethereal dew
Fall on my head, and presently unmeto
My soul. — Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Unmistrusting, unsuspicious; con-
fiding.
There was a plainness and simplicity of
thinking with . . an unmistrusting ignorance
of the plies and foldings of the heart of
woman. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, v. 21.
Unmodernised, old-fashioned; not
altered to a modern fashion.
The mansion of the squire with its high
walls, great gates, and old trees, substantial
and unmodernised.— Miss Austen, Persuasion,
ch. v.
Unmopifiableness, inflexibility.
When this attaching force is present in a
nature not of brutish unmodifiaUeness, but
of a human dignity that can risk itself safely,
it may even result in a devotedness not unfit
to he called divine in a higher sense than the
ancient. — G. Eliot, Daniel Deronda, ch. lviii.
Unmonkish, not given to, or sym-
pathising with, monasticism.
A singular condition of Schools and High-
schools, which have come down . . . from
the monkish ages into this highly unmonkish
one.—CarlyUy Life of Sterling, Pt. I. ch. iv.
Unmortised, unfixed ; out of order ;
broken.
In a dark nook stood an old broken-bot-
tomed cane-couch, without a squab or cover-
lid, sunk at one corner, and unmortised by
the failing of one of its worm-eaten legs. —
Richardson, CI. Harloice, vi. 304.
The feet unmortised from their ankle-bones.
Tennyson, Merlin and Vivien.
Unmunitioned, unfurnished with mu-
nitions of war.
Cadiz, I told them, was held poor, un-
manned, and unmunitioned. — Peeke, Three to
One, 1626 (Eng. Garner, i. 634).
Unmuscled, flaccid.
Then what wry faces will they make! —
their hearts and their heads reproaching each
other! — distended their parched mouths! —
sunk their unmuscled cheeks! — dropt their
under jaws \—Richardson,Cl.Harlowe,vi. 362.
Unmusculab, not muscular ; physic-
ally weak.
Shallow women that have neither read nor
suffered have an unmuscular barbarity of
their own. — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. Iii.
Y Y 2
VNMUSTERED
( 692)
UNPASS10NED
Unmustered = having never per-
formed military service.
Indeed the Roman laws allowed no person
to be carried to the wan, but he that was in
the souldier's roul. And therefore though
Gato misliked his unmustered person, he mis-
liked not his work. — Sidney, Defence of
Poesie, p. 558.
Unmystery, to mike clear.
He hath unmytteried the mysterie of
Heraldry. — Fuller, Worthies, Hereford (i.
453).
Unnameablk, that cannot be named ;
indescribable.
By slow degrees oar sickness, and dizzi-
ness, and horror, become merged in a cloud
of unnameable feeling. — E. A. Poe, Imp of
the Perverse.
Unnapkined, without a napkin or
handkerchief.
No pandar's withered paw
Nor an unnavkin'd lawyer's greasy fist
Hath onee slubber d thee.
Beaum. and FL, Woman-Rater, i. 3.
Unnear, distant.
And where the Earth was couer'd with her
Floud,
Now Cities stand vnneere the Ocean's brim.
Davits, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 51.
Unnest, to turn out of a nest ; to
dislodge.
The eye unnested from the head cannot
see. — Adams, ii. 258.
UNNE8TLE, to take or rouse out of
the nest.
Unnestling of sparrows, taking of quails,
and fishing for frogs and crabs. — Urquharfs
Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxiv.
Lucifer . . . will go about to unnestle and
drive out of heaven all the gods. — Ibid., Bk.
III. ch. iii.
Unnetted, not protected by nets.
The unnetted black-hearts ripen dark,
All thine, against the garden wall.
Tennyson, The Blackbird,
Unniggard, liberal.
That sumptuous canapy
The which th' vnniggard hand of Maiesty
Poudred so thick with shields so shining
cleer.
Sylvester, Fourth day, first veeke, 375.
Unnosed, stripped of a nose ; applied
to one who has taken off a false nose.
"Is not this Tom Cecial, my neighbour
and gossip ? " " Indeed am I," answered the
unnosed squire. — Jar vis's Don (Quixote, Pt. II.
3k. I. ch. xiv.
Unnotify, to contradict a previous
statement
I notified to you the settlement of the
ministry, and, contrary to the late custom,
have not to unnotify it again. — Waipole to
JSfaan, iii. 231 (1757).
Unold, to make young.
There ripes the rare cheer-cheek myrobalan,
Minde-giadding fruit, that can vnolde a man.
Sylvester, The Schisms, 697.
Unorder, to counterorder.
I think I must unorder the tea ... if I am
to be responsible for any mischief from your
drinking it. — Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk.
VIII. ch. iii.
He had sent to unorder a new pipe of
Madeira, saying he would go without. — Ibid*,
Camilla, Bk. X. ch. vi.
Unorthodoxy, unsoundness in faith ;
^heterodoxy, which is the commoner
word.
Oalvin made roast-meat of Servetns at
Geneva for his unorthodoxy. — T. Broken,
Works, iii. 104.
Unovercome, unconquered. Chap-
man, Iliad, xvi. 92.
Unovertaken, not come up with.
The sun is upon his back behind him, and
his shadow is still unovertaken before him. —
Adams, ii. 301.
Unpacifiable, unappeasable; irre-
strainable.
Oh the unpacifiable madness that this
world's music puts those into who will dance
after its pipe.— Adams, ii. 409.
Unpacker, one who unpacks.
By the awkwardness of the unpacker the
statue's thumb was broken. — Miss Edgetcorth,
Ennui, ch. iii
Unpannel, to unsaddle. Cf . Pannel.
Sancho, observing all this, said, God's
peace be with him who saved us the trouble
of unpannelling Dapple; for in faith he
should not have wanted a slap on the but-
tocks, nor a speech in his praise : but if he
were here, I would not consent to his being
unpannelled. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt. I.
Bk. III. ch. xi.
Unparrotted, not repeated by rote
like a parrot. Cf. Parrot.
Her sentiments were unparrotted and un-
studied.— Godwin, JfandevtUe, i. 207.
Unpassioned, undisturbed by passion.
And you, o you vnpassiond peacefull Harts,
That with me Hue secure in meane estate,
Be joyf ull, though you play but simple parts.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 48.
UNPATHWAYED ( 693 )
UNPROMISE
Unpathwayed, having no track.
Shakespeare ( Winter's Tale, IV. iii.)
has unpathed.
She roves through St. John's Vale
Along the smooth unpathwayed plain.
Wordsworth, The Waggoner, c. iv.
Unpeppered, unseasoned.
Ye Novel-Readers, such as relish most
Plain Nature's feast, unpepper'd with a Ghost.
Colman, Vagaries Vindicated, p. 203.
Unpebmanent, transitory; not last-
ing.
Who would not, to preserve so many es-
sentials, give up so light, so impermanent a
pleasure ? — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 36.
Unpersuadableness, fixity in resolu-
tion ; resistance to persuasion.
Resentment and unpersuadableness are not
natural to you. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
ii.64.
Unpersuasive, unable to persuade.
I bit my unpersuasive lips. — Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, v. 215.
Unpervert, to recover a pervert ; to
reconvert.
His wife could never be unperverted again,
but perished in her Judaism. — Fuller, Ch.
Hist., X. iv. 64.
I had the credit all over Paris of unner-
verting Madame de V . She affirmed to
Monsieur D and the Abbe M that
in one half hour I had said more for revealed
religion than all their Encyclopaedia had said
against it. — Sterne, Sent. Journey, Paris.
Unpicturesque, deficient in pictur-
esqueness.
She hated everything straight, it was so
formal and unpicturesque. — Miss Edgeworth,
Absentee, ch. vi.
Unpiked, not dressed out; in slovenly
array. See N. s. v. picked.
He brought them foorth vnkembed and
vnpiked, without cotes, bare foote and bare-
leggued. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 90.
Unpilled, unpillaged.
Their merchantlike ships, many or few,
great or small, may in our seas and some-
what further, pass quietly unpilled, unspoiled,
and tin taken by pirates. — Dr. Dee, Petty Navy
Royal, 1576 (Eng. Garner, ii. 62).
Unpiloted, unguided.
Tou see me . . . unpiloted by principle or
faith. — Miss Bronte, ch. xxxv.
Unpleasable, not to be pleased.
What a change have I made to please my
unpleasable daughter ! — Burgoyne, The Heir-
ess, Act II. sc. ii.
Unpleasanti8H, somewhat un-
pleasant.
And in truth 'tis a rather unpleasantish job.
Hood, Etching Moralised.
Unpleat, to smooth.
Droope not for that (man), but vnpleate thy
browes. — Dames, Eclogue, p. 19.
Unpolish, to deprive of politeness.
The Diets, only have the past participle.
How anger unpolishes the most polite! —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, v. 286.
Unpractisedness, want of practice.
He ascribes all honestie to an vnpractisfd-
nessein the world. — Earle, Microcosmographie
{ WorlcTs wise man).
Unpreach, to recant what had been
preached.
The clergy their own principles denied ;
Unpreach' d their non-resisting cant.
Defoe, True-Born Englishman, Pt. II.
Unprelated, deposed from the epis-
copate.
The Archbishop thought not himself ab-
solute till this man was unprelated. — Racket,
Life of Williams, ii. 120.
Unpremeditable, not to be premedi-
tated ; unlooked for.
A capf ull of wind . . . comes against you
. . . with such unpremeditable puffs. — Sterne,
Sent. Journey, The Fragment.
Unprettines8, uncomeliness.
She says it is not pretty in a young lady
to sigh ; but where is the unprettiness of it ?
— Richardson, Grandison, iii. 51.
Unpretty, ugly.
His English is blundering, but not unpretty.
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, ii. 155.
Unprince, to divest of royal charac-
ter or authority.
Queen Mary, though drenched, not
drowned, in Popish Principles, would not
unprince herself to obey his Holiness. —
Fuller, Worthies, Warwick, ii. 408.
Unprinciple, to corrupt.
The press has not only effeminated the
mind but unprincipled the understanding.—
Gentleman Instructed, p. 234.
They have been principled, or rather un-
principled, by such tutors. — H. Brooke, Fool
of Quality,!. 111.
Unpromise, to revoke a promise.
Promises are no fetters ; with that tongue
Thy promise past, vn promise it againe.
Chapman, All Fooles, II. i.
UNPROPORTlONABLENESS,Un8uitabiHty.
These considerations of the xmproportion-
ableness of any other Church-government
UNPROSEL YTE ( 694 ) UNREMORSEFUL
than a right Episcopacy to the temper of
Eugland, moved the supercilious, yet very
learned Salmasius in his advice to the Prince
Elector.— Graven, Tear* of the Church, p.
686.
Unproselyte, to win back some who
were inclined to be perverts.
This text . . . happily unproselyted some
inclinable to his opinions.— Fuller, Ch. Hist.,
X. iv. 8.
UNrROTESTANTizE, to divest of the
Protestant character.
To Romanize the Church is not to reform
it. To unprotestantize is not to reform it. — C.
Kingsley, 1851 (Life, i. 204).
Unpucker, to smoothe ; relax.
Let but Teufelsdrockh open his mouth,
Heuschrecke's also unpuckered itself into a
free doorway. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk.
I. ch. iii.
Unpuff, to humble.
We might vnpuff oar heart, and bend our
knee,
T'appease with sighs God's wrathfull Ma-
iestie.
Sylvester, Fourth day, first weeke, 526.
Unpunctilious, not particular.
Lovers, aaid she, are the weakest people in
the world ; and people of punctilio the most
unpunctilious. — Richardson. Grandison, iii.
257.
Unquakerlike, unlike a quaker.
A fair round cosy girl with a most un-
quakerlike expression of mirth in her eye. —
Savage, Reuben Jfedlicott, Bk. I. ch. iii.
Unqualifiable, unable to qualify
(for office by taking the oaths).
He would not put the seals to any com-
missions to persons unqualifiable, with a non
obstante to the test laws.— North, Life of
Lord Guilford, ii. 222.
Unquestionabilitt, that which can-
not be doubted.
Our religion is ... a great heaven-high
Unquestionability.— Carlyle, Past and Present,
Bk. II. ch. vi.
Unquestionless, unquestionable or
questionless. See quotation from Cow-
ley, s. v. unremorseless, in R. for a
similar instance.
Your knowledge in the profession, Mr.
Rightly, is as unquestionless as your integrity.
—Buryoyne, The Heiress, v. 1.
Unquizzable, not obnoxious to ridi-
cule ; correct.
Each was dressed out in his No. 1 suit, in
most exact and unquizzable uniform.— Mar-
ryat, Fr. Mild may, ch. xv.
Unquod, untold. See quotation $. v.
Exterminion.
Csssar, heeyng moued with the vnquod
maner of crueltee, commaunded . . . the boie
to be let go. — XJdaVs Erasmus's Apophih.,
p. 289.
Unraveller, one who untwists, and
so, explains.
Mythologists are indeed very pretty fel-
lows, and are mighty unraveilers of the
fables of the old Ethnicks, discovering all the
Old Testament concealed in them. — T.
Brown, Works, iii. 279.
Un razed, not razed or destroyed.
Onely three towers ... he left vnrazed. —
Sandys, Travels, p. 155.
Unrealize, to divest of reality ; to
present in an ideal form.
In Mr. Shelley's case . . . there seems to
have been an attempt to unrealize every
object in nature, presenting them under
forms and combinations in which they are
never to be seen through the mere medium
of our eyesight. — Sir H. Taylor, Preface to
Ph. van Artevelde.
Un recovered, irrecoverable : sscuebv
ijfxap is the original.
Consider these affairs in time, while thou
mayst use thy pow^,
And have the grace to turn from Greece
fate's unrecover'd hour.
Chapman, Iliad, ix. 347.
Unrecumbent, not lying down.
The cattle mourn in corners, where the fence
Screens them, and seem half-petrified to
sleep
In unrecumbent sadness.
Cowper, Winter Morning Walk, 29.
Un referring, without reference.
In the institution thereof he neither had
any insolent relation to his own conquest,
nor opprobrious reflection on his enemies'
captivity, but began the innocent order of
the Garter, unreferring to any of his former
achievements. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. ix. 5.
Unrelentingness, implacability.
Such in its unrelentingness was the perse-
cution that overmastered me. — De Qutncey,
Autob. Sketches, i. 363.
Unrememberable, not memorable or
to be remembered.
The leafy blossoming Present Time springs
from the whole Past, remembered and unre-
memberable.— Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 6.
Unremorseful, unsparing ; pitiless.
Unremorseful fate
Did work the falls of those two princes dead.
Niccols, Sir T. Overbury's Vision,
1616 (Harl. Misc., vii. 179).
UNREPAIRABLE ( 695 )
UNSAINTL Y
Wrapt
In unremorseful folds of rolling fire.
Tennyson, Holy Grail.
Unrepairable, irreparable ; past
mending.
The vnrepairable breaches abroad were such
as could giue the king no longer assured-
ness© of quiet than the attempters would.—
Daniel, Hist, of Eng., p. 48.
Unrepliable, unanswerable.
Against which adventurous Sin many
learned and worthy men . . . have wrote by
most unrepliable demonstrations from the
law of Nature and Nations. — Gauden, Tears
of the Church, p. 329.
Unrepulsable, not to be repulsed;
persistent.
Fanny . . . was trying by everything in the
power of her modest, gentle nature to re-
pulse Mr. Crawford, and avoid both his looks
and inquiries; and he, unrepulsable, was
persisting in both. — Miss Austen, Mansfield
Park, oh. xxxiii.
Unrepulsing, not repelling; pass-
ively yielding.
I kissed her unrepulsing hand. — Richard-
son, CI. Harlowe, iv. 254.
Unrequest, to withdraw a request.
When that I perceived my request for
jurisdiction made before unto you, upon
further deliberation I thought it good to
unrequest that again. — Hooper to Cecil, 1552.
Unrequisite, un^cessary.
The Melancholy's mestiue, and too full
Of fearefull thoughts, and cares vnreguisit.
Davies, Microcosmos, p. 81.
Unresolve, to change or give up a
resolution.
Tost by contrary thoughts, the man
Resolv'd and unresolved again.
Ward, England?* Reformation,
c. iv. p. 387.
Un respect able, disreputable.
Let those of the respectable press who are
without sin cast the first stone at the unre-
spectable.:—C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch.
Unresponsal, irresponsible : so hos-
pital for hospitable, &c.
A tithe or a crop of hay or corn which are
ready to be carried away by force by unre-
sponsal men. — Racket, Life of Williams, p.
106.
Unresponsible, irresponsible : given
in L. without example.
His unresponsable memory can make us no
satisfaction. — Fuller, Worthies, Essex (i. 370).
Uniiested, out of the rest.
Sir Launcelot, perceiving his rival's spear
unrested, had just time to throw up the point
of his own. — Smollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. xix.
Unrestingness, absence of repose or
quiet.
"The Everlasting Jew:" — The German
name for what we in English call the Wan-
dering Jew. The German imagination has
been most struck by the duration of the
man '8 life, and his unhappy sanctity from
death ; the English by the unrestingness of
the man's life, his incapacity of repose. — Be
Quincey, Roman Meals.
Unreturnable, impossible to be re-
paid.
The obligations I had laid on their whole
family, whatever were the success, were un-
returnable.— Richardson, Graiidison, iv. 307.
She declined accepting a present which
would lay her under an unreturnable obliga-
tion.— Mrs. Lennox, Henrietta, Bk. I. ch. vii.
Unrideably, not capable of being
ridden. See extract 8. v. Rough-rider.
Unrivalable, inimitable.
The present unique, unrivalled, and un-
rivalable production. — Southey, The Doctor,
ch. i. A i.
Unroyalist, one not of the royal
family.
He is so privileged a favourite with all the
royal family that he utters all his flights to
them almost as easily as to unroyalists. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Diary, iv. 56.
Unrude. R. gives the word, but
remarks that the un is augmentative,
not privative, as is the case no doubt
in the two passages from Jonson which
he cites, but in the subjoined unrude
= polished.
Manners knowes distance, and a man unrude
Wo'd soon recoile and not intrude
His stomach to a second meale.
Herrick, Hesperides, p. 156.
Unsacrament, deprive of sacramental
virtue. The extract gives one of the
fositions of the Donatists as stated by
'uller.
The profaneneas of a bad man administring
it doth unsacrament Baptisme itself, making
a nullity thereof. — Holy and Prof. State,Y. xi.
Unsage, foolish.
And with their wicked hands, and words
vnsage.
They did our sacred messengers outrage.
Hudson, Judith, v. 305.
Unsaintlt, unholy; unlike a saint.
What (I pray) can be more unsaintly than
to desire, yea, delight and glory, as some in
UNSANITARY ( 696 )
UNSHELL
England now do, in most unjust and un-
charitable actions? — Gauden, Tear* of the
Churchy p. 209.
Unsanitary, unhealthy; having no
regard to the laws of health.
The friend's stable had to be reached
through a back street where you might as
easily have been poisoned without expense
of drugs as in any grim street of that un-
sanitary period.— G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch.
• • •
XIlll.
Unsappep, not undermined or secretly
attacked.
They seemed to be two upright vestal
sisters, unsapped by caresses, unbroke in upon
by tender salutations.— Sterne, Sent. Journey,
Act of Charity.
Unsavoury, tasteless : now applied
to that which has a bad taste. Cf. Job
vi. 6.
Oholer is bitter, of the nature of Gall :
Phlegme, unsavery as water, and without all
qualitie.— Touchstone of Complexions, p. 87.
Unsceptred, deprived of his sceptre ;
unkinged.
So, with his daughters three, the unscepter'd
Lear
Heaved the loud sigh, and pour'd the glister-
ing tear.— Poetry of Anti jacobin, p. 138.
Unscholar, no scholar.
But here you wyll come in with temporal
man and scholer : I tell you plainlye, scholer
or vnscholer, yea if I were xx scholers, I wolde
thinke it were my dutie, bothe with exhort-
inge men to shote,and also with shoting my
selfe, to set forwarde that thing which the
Kinge, his wisedome, and his counsell, so
greatlye laboureth to go forwarde.— Ascham,
Toxophilus, p. 38.
Unseize, to release. In the first ex-
tract unseize thee = relax thy hold.
What, never filTd? Be thy lips screw'd so
To th' earth's full breast? for shame, for
shame, unseize thee. mm
Quarles, Emblems, I. xn. 2.
He, at the stroke, unseized me, and gave
back.— Tuke, Adventures of Five Hours, Act
III.
Un-self-delicious, not self-indulg-
ent.
Such were not yerst Oincinnatus, Fabricius,
Serranus, Curius, who vn-self ■-delicious,
With crowned coultars, with imperiall hands,
With ploughs triumphant plough'd the
Roman lands.
Sylvester, Third day, first weeks, 1057.
Unsensualize, to purify; elevate
from the dominion of the senses.
Hence the soft couch, and many-coloured
robe,
The timbrel, and arched dome, and costly
feast,
With all the inventive arts that nursed the
soul
To forms of beauty, and by sensual wants
Unsensualized the mind, which in the means
Learned to forget the grossnessof the end,
Best pleasured with its own activity.
Coleridge, Religious Musings.
Unsentenced, not definitively pro-
nounced : now only applied to persons.
The King . . . privately marrieth her within
few days after his return, the divorce being
yet unsentenced betwixt him and the Queen.
— Heylin, Reformation, ii. 61.
Unsentimental, matter of fact ; not
sentimental.
Never man had a more unsentimental
mother than mine.— Miss Bronte, VilUttt,
ch. xx.
Unsequestered, free ; untamed.
His unsequestred spirit so supported him
that some of his adversaries frowned because
he could smile under so great vexations. —
Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. iii. 4.
Unservice, want of service ; idleness.
You tax us for unservice, lady.
Massinger, Pari, of Love, i. 5.
Unserv icelike, unlike those who
would render service ; disrespectful.
They see how unsMrice-like our service is !
— A ndrewes, ii. 341.
Unseven, a curious expression of
Fuller's to denote the reduction of the
seven sacraments to a less number.
As for confirmation of the children of
English Catholiques, he much decryed the
necessity thereof, though not so far as to
unseven the Sacraments of the Church of
Rome.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. ii. 9.
Unsexual, not belonging to the sex.
As in the extract women are referred
to, unsexual = masculine.
In the last (but still more in the penulti-
mate) generation, any tincture of literature,
of liberal curiosity about science, or of en-
nobling interest in books, carried with it an
air of something unsexual, mannish, and (as
it was treated by the sycophantish satirists
that for ever humour the prevailing folly) of
something ludicrous.— De Quincey, Autob.
Sketches, i. 357.
Unshell, to give birth to ; also, to
release. R. has nnshelled, with quota-
tion from Sheridan.
Of him and none but him . . . have I took,
sent, or come in the wind of, that ever Yar-
UNSHENT
( 697 )
UNSPELL
mouth unshelled or ingendred. — Nashe, Leiden
Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 157).
There I remained [behind a nailed-up
chimney-board] till half-past seven the next
morning, when the housemaid's sweetheart,
who was a carpenter, unsheUed me. — Sketches
by Boz (Watkins Tottle).
Unshent, unblamed.
Ho ! all ye females that would live unshentf-
Fly from the reach of Cyned's regiment.
Hall, Satires, IV. i. 130.
For in our deeds, which Reason might re-
proue,
We scape vnshent if they were done in loue.
£>avies, Holy Roods, p. 25.
Unshiftablr, shiftless ; helpless.
These fools, while they live in health and
prosperity, never think of the evil day ; and
when away they see they must go, how unr
shif table are they ! — Ward, Sermons, p. 67.
Unshot, not fired. The Diets, have
the word = not hit by shot, with quota-
tion from Waller.
The Scots fled from their ordnance, leav-
ing them unshot. — Expedition into Scotland,
1544 (Eng. Garner, i. 125).
Unshutter, to take down or put
back the shutters.
He unshuttered the little lattice-window. —
Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xvii.
Unshy, confident
It would be doing Mr. Solmes a spite to
wish him such a shy, unshy girl ; another of
your contradictory qualities ; I leave you to
make out what I mean by it. — Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, ii. 50.
Unsimplicitv, cunning.
Eustace . . . went home flattering himself
that he had taken in parson, clerk, and
people; not knowing in his simple unsim-
plicity and cunning foolishness that each
good wife in the parish was savin? to the
other, "He turned Protestant! the devil
turned monk ! " — Kingsley, Westward Ho,
ch. iv.
Unsing, to recant what hud been
sung.
They soon their new deliverer despise ;
Say all their prayers back, their joys disown,
Unsiny their thanks, and pull their trophies
down.
Defoe, True-Born Englishman, Pt. II.
Unsister, to sever the sisterly rela-
tion. Cf. Sister.
1st Gent. The Queen (tho' some say
they be much divided) took her hand, call'd
her sweet sister, and kiss'd not her alone,
but all the ladies of her following.
2nd Gent. Ay, that was in her hour of
joy ; there will be plenty to sunder and un-
sister them again. — Tennyson, Queen Mary,
Li.
Unsisterly, unbecoming a sister.
See extract 5. v. Undadghterly.
UN8KILL, ignorance.
Even light Pirrhon's wavering fantasies
Reave him the skill his vnskill to agnize.
Sylvester, Eden, p. 277.
Unsleek, rough; dishevelled.
Then she that saw him lying unsleek, un-
shorn,
Gaunt as it were the skeleton of himself,
Utter'd a little tender dolorous cry.
Tennyson, Lancelot and Elaine.
Unslumbrous, sleepless.
How sickening, how dark the dreadful leisure
Of weary days made deeper exquisite.
By a foreknowledge of unslumbrous night.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Unsmutty, not obscene.
The expression of his Theodore was
altogether unsmutty. — Collier, English Stage,
p. 54.
Unsoulclooged, not weighed down
in spirit.
Learned men vn'Soule-clogd, (as it were,)
With servile giues of Kings imperious fear.
Sylvester, the Captaines, p. 1022.
Unsoundy, unsound; a form that
may be supposed to be due to the
exigencies of rhyme.
Her eyne gowndy
Are full vnsoundy.
Skelton, Elynour Rummtn (Harl. Misc.,
i. 416).
Unspared, indispensable.
No physician then cures of himself, no
more than the hand feeds the mouth Tho
meat doth the one, the medicine doth the
other ; though the physician and the hand
be unspared instruments to their several
purposes. — Adams, i. 381.
Unspectacled, without spectacles.
Many a nose spectacled and unspectacled
was popped out of the adjoining windows. —
Scott, S. Ronan*s Well, ch. xiv.
Unspeedy, slow.
The water being ever thicke, as if lately
troubled, and passing along with a mute and
vnspeedy current. — Sandys, Travels, p. 117.
Unspell, to release from enchant-
ment or to reverse an incantation. The
lines in the second extract are from
that part of the poem which was writ-
ten by Tate.
Her. Sure w'are enchanted, and all we
see's illusion.
UNSPOIL
(698)
UNSUJT
Cam. Allow me, Henrique, to unspell these
charms. — Take, Advent, of Five Hours,
ActV.
Such practices as these, too gross to lie,
Long unobserved by each discerning eye,
The more judicious Israelites unspeued,
Though still the charm the giddy rabble
held. — Absalom and Achitophel, Pt. II. 117.
Unspoil, to correct the injury done
by over indulgence: the Diets, have
only the past participle.
"lam quite spoiled I believe," said Helen,
" you must unswril me, Bsther."— Miss Edge-
worth, Helen, en. xliii.
Unsportful, melancholy.
" A Republic ! " said the Seagreen, with
one of his dry, husky, unsportful laughs,
44 what is that ? n—Carlyle, Fr. Rev* Pt. H.
Bk. IV. ch. iv.
Unsportsmanlike, unlike a sports-
man. In the first extract it is printed
as two words.
On which he to his comrades cried, See, ho !
Then jumped unsportsman like upon his hare.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 63.
" Garry it with the muzzle to the ground,"
replied Mr. Pickwick. ** It's so unsportsman-
like," reasoned Winkle.— Pickwick Papers,
ch. xix.
Unspread, not diffused.
" I have sinned," she said,
w Unquickened, unspread
My fire dropt down, and I wept on my
knees." — Mrs. Browning, Confessions.
Unstabled, disestablished, and so
freed ; also, not put up in a stable.
Our hearts be unstabled of these bestial lusts.
Adams, i. 326.
Behold the branchless tree, the unstabled
Bosinante ! — C. Bronte, Villette, eh. mix.
Unstanched, is used rather peculiarly
in the extract = not weather-tight.
The elements . . came pouring from un-
stanched roofs. — H. Brooke, Fool of Quality,
i. 378.
Unstarch, to relax.
He cannot unstarch his gravity. — Kennet*s
Erasmus, Praise of Folly, p. 35.
Un8TARtled, calm ; unalarmed.
The 'ploughman following sad his meagre
team
Turned up fresh sculls unstartled.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Unstationed, having no fixed sta-
tion.
Though I eould give their ships informa-
tion how to avoid our squadrons, yet they
fell into the hands of unstationed privateers.
— Johnston, Chrysal, i. 23.
Unsteel, to disarm ; soften.
Whv then should this enervating pity
unsteel my foolish heart? — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, v. 310.
Unstercorated, unmanured. See
extract s. v. Stercorated.
Unstick, to loose or disengage.
The other [foot] riveted to its native earth,
bemired . . beyond the possibility of unstick-
ing itself.— Richardson, CZ. Harlow, vii. 3S0.
Unstout, weak.
A Lacedemonian taken prisoner was asked
of one at Athens, whether they were stoute
fellowes that were slayne or no, of the
Lacedemonians: he answered nothing els
but this: Make moche of those shaftes of
youres, for they knowe neyther stoute nor
vnstoute ; meanynge thereby that no man
(though he were neuer so stout) came in
their walke, that escaped without death. —
Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 75.
Unstowed, emptied ; like the hold of
a ship which has discharged its cargo.
When they found my hold unstowed, they
went all hands to shooling and begging. —
Smollett, Rod. Random, ch. xli.
Unsubduable, invincible.
Stern patience unsubduable by pain.
Southey, Kehama, xviii. 5.
A monster unsubduable
Of any save of him for whom I calTd.
Tennyson, Garetk and Lynette.
UN-sub-presbytery, a curious com-
pound of Gauden's; meaning a pres-
bytery not subject to Bishops.
Factions, confusions are the genuine
fruites of an un-sub-Presbytery, as indeed of
all Government which is made up with
parity or equality. — Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 449.
Unsubscribed, unsigned.
A call for supper makes me leave my
paper unsubscribed. — Richardson, Grandison,
vi. 333.
Unsubstantiality, that which is
temporary or shadowy.
Something of unsubstantiality and un-
certainty had beset my hopes. — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xxiv.
Unsued, unasked.
Gillias . . . rewarded deserts unsued to. —
Adams, i. 483.
Unsuit, to unfit.
The sprightly twang of the melodious lute
Agrees not with my voice ; and both unsuit
My untuned fortunes.
Quartet, Emblems, TV. xv. 4.
UNSUNNY ( 699 ) UNTRENCHED
Unsunny, gloomy.
We marvel at thee much,
O damsel, wearing this unsunny face
To him who won thee glory.
Tennyson, Pelleas and Ettare.
Unsuperscribed, undirected.
This angry letter was accompanied with
one from my mother, unsealed, and un»
superscribed also. — Richardson, CI. Marlowe,
i. 181.
Unsuspectednkss, state of not being
suspected.
By transferring the fact on the then most
innocent Puritans, they hoped not onely to
decline the odium of so hellish a designe,
but also (by the strangeness© of the act, and
unsuspeetednesse of the actors) to amuze all
men. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., X. ii. 27.
Untackle, to unharness. Tusser
says, in relation to cattle,
But vse to vntackle them once in a day.
Husbandrie, p. 62.
Untalented, not clever.
This is the sort of stuff you must be
satisfied with from a poor untalented girl. —
Richardson, Grandison, vii. 6.
Untame, wild. Chapman (Iliad, viii.
41) calls M. Ida "nurse of beasts
untame"
Untappice, to drive out of cover :%
a hunting term. N. quotes Massinger,
Very Woman, III. v., where it is used
as a neuter verb, and means to come
out of concealment, and says he has
not met with it elsewhere.
What, sir, do you mean at the unkennell-
ing, untapeziny, or earthing of the fox? —
Return from Parnassus, ii. 5 (1606).
Untemper, to relax; to destroy the
temper or virtue of anything. The
Diets, only have the past participle.
The study of sciences does more soften
and untemper the courages of men than any
way fortifie and incite them. — Cotton, Mon-
taigne's Essays, ch. xix.
Untenant, to evict ; dislodge.
He gets possession of their affections,
whence all the power of man cannot un~
tenant him. — Adams, i. 202.
Those blind omniscient*, those almighty
slaves
Untenanting creation of its God.
Coleridge, Destiny of Nations.
Unterripic, not terrifying.
Not unterrifc was the aspect ; but we
looked on it like brave youths. — Carlyle,
Sartor ResaHus, Bk. II. ch. lii.
Unthinker, a thoughtless person.
Thinkers and unthinkers by the million
are spontaneously at their post, doing what
is in them.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk. IV.
ch. 1.
Unthirsty, not thirsty.
Your thriving softness and your clustered
kisses growing on the lips of love devour'd
with an unthirsty infant's appetite ! O forbid
it, Love ! — Cibber, Love makes a man, Act II.
Untied, dissolute ; relaxed from re-
straint: the use of the word in the
extract is rather peculiar.
There were excesses to many committed
in a time so vntied as this was. — Daniel,
Hist, of Eng., p. 114L
Untimeous, untimely. R. has un-
timeously, with a quotation from Kenil-
worth, ch. xv. Is the word peculiar to
Soott ?
It required all the authority supported by
threats which Quentin could exert over him,
to restrain his irreverent and untimeous
jocularity. — Quentin Durward, i. 304.
Un-Titaned, sunless.
Thy torch will burn more clear
In night's un-Titan'd hemisphere ;
Heaven's scornful names and thine can
never co-appear.
Quarles, Emblems, ii. 1.
Untoned, relaxed ; put out of tone.
The extract is from a poem quoted at
length in Nares's Thinks I to Myself,
Is there a hope that o'er this unton'd frame
Awakened Health her wonted glow shall
spread ?—Tfu Suicide.
Untongue, to silence.
Such who commend him in making, con-
demn him in keeping such a diary about him
in so dangerous days. Especially he ought
to untongue it from talking to his prejudice.
—Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. ix. 77.
Untorturbd, not tormented. See
extract *. v. Undistressed.
Untragic, not tragic ; and so, ludi-
crous.
Emblems not a few of the tragic and the
untragic sort. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk.
V. ch. xii.
Untrrmulous, steady.
Here was the seal, round, full, deftly
dropped by untremulous fingers. — Miss
Bronte, Vxllette, ch. xxi.
Un trenched, intact.
Let him fetch some sage, honest policy,
and such as may stand with an untrenched
conscience. — Adams, ii. 467.
UNTRIPED
( 7oo )
UNWHIRLED
Untriped, disembowelled.
Those . . had escaped out of the broil and
defeat wherein Tripet was untriped. — Urqw
hart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. zliii.
Untruism, a false statement.
A preaching clergyman can revel in plati-
tudes, truisms, and untruisms. — Trollope,
Barchester Towers, ch. vi.
Untrumpktkd, not famed or made
much of.
[They] lived untrumpeted, and died un-
sung.— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. i.
Untrunked, cut off from the trunk.
See extract *. v. Harsh.
Untumultuated, undisturbed.
They were left to their free votes and un-
tumultuated suffrages.— Gauden, Tears of the
Church, p. 107.
Unturbaned, without a turban.
Unturbaned and unsandall'd there
Abdaldar stood.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. II.
Ununderstood, not comprehended.
Fuller says that in most parishes of
Wales English was " utterly ununder-
stood" (Ch. Hist, IX. i. 50).
Un university, to deprive of an
university.
Northampton was ununiversitied, the schol-
ars therein returning to the place from whence
they came. — Fuller, Hist, of Camb. Univ.,
i. 50.
Unusuality, unwontedness ; eccen-
tricity.
It is to be said of Sallust, far more plaus-
ibly than of Carlyle, that his obscurity, his
unusuality of expression, and his Laconism
. . bore the impress of his genius, and were
but a portion of his unaffected thought. —
E. A. Foe, Marginalia, lvi.
Unutterability, that which cannot
be spoken.
They come with hot unuiterabilities in their
heart.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. I. ch. in.
Unvaluable usually means inestim-
able, but in the extract = worthless.
If nature . . deny health, how unvaluable
are their riches. — Adams, i. 424.
Unvariant, unchanging.
His mynd vnuariant doth stand.
Stanyhurst, JEn., iv. 472.
Unvenomous, not poisonous. R. has
vnvenomed.
Their error is not solitary, nor the sting
of their schisme either soft, or blunt, or
unvenomous.— Gauden, Tears of the Church,
p. 297. J
Unvebacity, untruthfulness.
Lord Clarendon, a man of sufficient «a-
veracity of heart, to whom indeed whatsoever
has direct veracity of heart is more or less
horrible, speaks always in official language.
— Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 62.
Unvicar, to deprive of a vicar's
position.
If I had your authority, I would be so bold
to unvicar him. — 8trype> Oranmer, Bk. II.
eh. vii.
Unvoidable, irreversible.
He will from on high pronounce that un-
voidable sentence.— Bailey, Erasm. Colloq^ p.
X73.
Un voluptuous, free from volup-
tuousness.
He had written stanzas as pastoral and
unvoluptuous as his flute-playing. — G. Eliot,
Middlemarch, ch. xziii.
Un vowed, not vowed.
If vnuowed to another Order, ... he vows
in this order.— Sandys, Travels, p. 229.
Unwalkable, unfit for walking.
How teased I am, my dearest Padre, by
this eternal unwalkable weather. — Mad.
JfArblay, Diary, vii. 7.
Unwalkino, not given to walking.
I am so unwalking that prospects are more
* agreeable to me when framed and glazed,
and I look at them through a window. —
Walpole, Letters, iv. 486 (1789).
Unwallet, to take out of a wallet
The lacquey laughed, unsheathed his cala-
bash, and unwaUeted his cheese. — Jarvis's
Don.Quixote, Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. adv.
Unwaning, not fading or diminish-
ing.
Hope sprang forth like a full-born Deity,
"With light unwanina on her eyes.
Coleridge, To Wordsworth.
Unwarnedly, without notice.
They be suddenly and unwarnedly brought
forth to be apposed of their adversaries.—
Bale, Select Works, p. 68 (Exam, of W.
Thorpe).
Unwealthy, poor.
My father vnwelthy mee sent, then a prittye
page, hither.— Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 98.
Unwhirled, not whirled or hurried.
To make an example of him as the first
Shandy unwhirVd about Europe in a post-
chaise, and only because he was a heavy lad,
would be using him ten times worse than a
Turk,— Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iii. 237.
UNW1LD
( 701 )
UPDIVE
Unwild, to tame.
Abel desirous still at hand to keep
Sis milk and cheese, vnwildes the gentle
sheep.— Sylvester, HandU Crafts, 277.
Unwilful, undesigned.
We are ever ready to make excuses, when
in good humour with ourselves, for the per-
haps not unwilful slights of those whose
approbation we wish to engage.— Richardson,
CI. Harlowe, i. 8.
Unwilled, deprived of volition;
relaxed.
Now, your will is all unwilled.
Mrs. Browning, Duchess May.
Unwinnino, unconciliatory.
He lost their affections, pride being an
* nwi nni ng quality. — Fuller, Ch. Hist. ,11. ii. 7.
Un wonder, to explain an apparent
marvel ; unwcmdering = not wonder-
ing.
Whitest Papists crie up this his incredible
continency, others easily unwonder the same,
by imputing it partly to his impotence
afflicted with an infirmitie, partly to the dis-
taste of his wife.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., II. vi. 17.
Here I must admire one thing, and shall
be thankful to such who cure my wonder by
shewing me the cause of that I wonder at.
[In the margin] Unwonder me this wonder .—
ibid., Hist, of Camb. Univ., i. 18.
When on the moon he first began to peep,
The wondering world pronounced the gazer
deep;
But wiser now, the unwondcring world, alas !
Gives all poor Herschel's glory to his glass.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 236.
Unworth, unworthiness. R. has it
as an adjective.
Those superstitious blockheads of the
twelfth century had reverence for Worth,
abhorrence of Unworth. — Carlyle, Past and
Present, Bk. II. ch. ix.
Unwrathfully, patiently; without
anger.
This' historic . . might well be rekened in
the nombre of thinges vnwrathfully and
prudently doen. — Udal's Erasmus's Apophth.,
p. 316.
Unyieldingness, obstinacy ; inflexi-
bility.
Upon the haughtinesse of King William,
looking to be satisfied in all his demaunds,
and the vnyeeldingnesse of King Malcolm,
.... nothing was effected. — Daniel, Hist, of
Eng., p. 47.
Up and down, in every respect. Cf.
the modern slang " down to theground."
He [Phocion] was eaen Socrates vp and
downe in this pointe and behalfe, that no
man ener sawe hym either laughe or weepe.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 324.
Upaventurk, in case.
They bade me that I should be busy in all
my wits to go as near the sentence and the
words as I could, both that were spoken to
me and that I spake, upaventure this writing
came another time before the archbishop
and his council.— Bale, Select Works, p. 66
(Exam, of W. Thorpe).
Up-blaze, to burn or flash up.
The solitary hermit prunes
His lamp's long undulating flame :
And now its wavy point
Up-blazing rose.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. VI.
UPBOTCH,to patch up, or put together.
Stanyhurst (Conceites, p. lo7) describes
Vulcan's three smiths as "vpbotching
... a clapping f yrebolt. "
Upbraid. Food which produces
flatulence and eructation is sain to up-
braid or reprove the eater. See Abraid.
Midas, unexperienst of the nature of it
[the herring] (for he was a foole that had
asses eares), snappt it up at one blow, and
because in the boyling or seathing of it in
his maw he felt it commotion a little and
upbraide him, he thought he had eaten golde
indeede. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe {Harl. Misc.,
vi. 166).
Upbraid, a reproach.
S[e] . . . . with his mind had known
uch better the upbraids of men.
Chapman, Iliad, vi. 389.
Upbringing, education.
Let me not quarrel with my upbringing. —
Carlyle, Sartor Besartus, Bk. II. ch. ii.
Upbuoyance, support ; lifting up.
Me rather, bright guests, with your wings of
upbuoyance
Bear aloft to your homes, to your banquets
of joyance. — Coleridge, Visit of the Gods.
Upcurl, to wreathe or curl upwards.
High — high in heaven upcurVd
The dreadful sand-spouts mov'd.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. IV.
And thro* the wreaths of floating dark up-
curVd,
Rare sunrise flow'd.
Tennyson, The Poet.
Updive, to dive up ; rise to the sur-
face.
Plunge thee ore head and eares in Helicon,
Dyue to the bottome of that famous tiudd,
Although it were as deepe as Acheron,
Thence make thy fame vp-dive, although
withstood
With weedes of Ignorance, and En vie 'a
mudd. — Davies, Jlicrocosmos, p. 81.
UP-FLOW ( 702 )
UPSTART
Up-flow, to ascend ; stream tip.
No eye beheld the fount
Of that up-jlowinq flame.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. II.
Uphasp, to hasp or fasten up.
St any hurst (JSn., iv. 254) speaks of
Mercury as "bye Death eyelya vphasp-
WIJ7.
Uphilt, to plunge to the hilt
Hi« blad he with thrusting in his old
dwynd caress vphilted.
Stanyhurst, JEn^ ii. 577.
Upholder, broker.
We forthwith began to class and set apart
the articles designed for sale under the direc-
tion of an upholder from London. — Smollett,
Humphrey Clinker, ii. 190.
Upholstered, furnished ; decked by
upholsterers.
Farewell thou old Chateau, with thy up-
holstered rooms ! — Carlylc, Misc., iv. 97.
Uphubl, to toss up violently.
Thee wals God Neptune with mace three-
forcked vphurleth.
Stanyhurst, JEn., ii. 633.
Uplat, to overturn. R. and L. have
the word = to lay up in store, with
quotation from Donne.
Then dyd I marck playnely thee castel of
Ilion vplayd,
And Troian buyldings quit topsy turuye
remooued. — Stanyhurst, ^£n., ii. 648.
Uppeak, to rise in a peak.
Thee shoare neere setled apeered,
And hilfl vppeaking.
Stanyhurst, -J?n., iii. 209.
Uppiled, heaped up.
A mount, not wearisome and bare and steep,
But a green mountain variously uppiled.
Coleridge, To a Young Friend.
Rock above rock, and mountain ice up-piVd
On mountain. — Southey, Thalaba, Bk. II.
Uppino. The swan companies an-
nually used to take up the swans for
the purpose of marking them — the
term is now often corrupted to swan-
hopping.
The master of the game, or his deputy, is
to have a penny for upping every white swan,
and two pence for every cygnet. — Laws and
Customs of Swans, 1631 (Harl. Misc., iii. 377).
Uppish, arrogant. Johnson calls it
a low word, and gives no example. L.
only reproduces Johnson. Mrs. Trol-
lope spells it with one p.
Half-pay officers at the parade very uppish
3x>n the death of the King of Spain.— 7*.
rown, Works, i. 154.
It seems daring to rail at informers, pro-
lectors, and officers was not uppish enough,
but his Lordship must rise so high as daring
to limit the power and revenue of the Crown.
— North, Examen, p. 48.
She is a bedridden woman, and ought to be
in the workhouse ; but she's upish, and cant
abide it. — Mrs. TroUopex Michael Armstrong,
ch. iii.
Uproar, to make an uproar. Shake-
speare, as quoted by R. and L., has it
as an active verb (Macbeth, IV. iii.):
" uproar the world.1'
The man Danton was not prone to show
himself ; to act or uproar for his own safety.
— Carlyle, Fr. Bet., Pt. III. Bk. VI. ch. ii.
Uprush, to rush upwards.
But ever the uprushinq wind
Inflates the wings above.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. XII.
Upseek, to seek or strain upward*.
Upseeking eyes suffus'd with transport-tears.
Southey, Thalaba, Bk. XII.
Upsides. To be upsides with = to
be even with.
Nay, 'twarnt altogether spite, tho' I wont
say but what I might ha* thought o' bein*
upsides {pT them. — Hughes, Tom Brown at
Oxford, ch. uxiz.
UrsiTTiNG, the sitting up of a woman
to see her friends after her confine-
ment ; the feast held on such an occa-
sion.
We will have such a lying-in, and such a
christening ; such upsitting and gossiping. —
Broome, Jovial Crew, Act II.
Upsnatch, to take up quickly or
violently.
Snap the tipstaffe which came and vp-
snached him. — Edwards, Damon and Pithas
(Dodsley, O. PL, i. 246).
Upsoaked, exhausted (?),or thorough-
ly possessed (?).
Lyke rauening woolfdams vpsoackt and
gaunted in hunger.
Stanyhurst, JEn.t ii. 306.
Upspear, to root up ; destroy ; also,
to spring up in a point.
Adam by hys pryde ded Paradyse vpspeare.
—Bale, Enterlude of Johan Bapt., 153$ (Harl.
Misc., i. 114).
The bents
And coarser grass, upspearing o'er the rest.
Coicper, ff inter Morning Walk, 23.
Upstart. See extract for jocular
derivation. Startups were high shoes
UPSY-TURVY ( 703 )
UXORIAL
-worn by the peasantry. Cf. High
shoes.
In faith, goodman goosecap, you that are
come from the startups, and therefore is
called an up* start, quasi start up from clouted
ehoone. — Greene, Quip for an Upstart Courtier
(Harl. Misc., v. 402).
Upsy-turvy, topsy-turvy.
There found I all was upsy-turvy turned.
Greene, James the Fourth, iii. 3.
Uptails ALL, confusion ; high jinks.
In the first extract uptails all = good
fellows; revellers.
Feel, my upt ails-all, feel my weapon.
Dekker, Satiromastix (Hawkins,
Eng. Dr., iii. 170).
Love he doth call
For his uptailes all.
Hemck, Hesperides, p. 265.
Upthunder, to send up a loud noise
like thunder.
Central fires through nether seas upthunder-
ing. — Coleridge, To the departing Year.
Uptrill, to sing or trill in a high
voice.
But when the long-breathed singer's uptrilled
strain
Burets in a squall, they gape for wonder-
ment.— Coleridge, In a Concert-Boom.
Up with, to raise. H. notices this
use of the adverb, but in the extract
" up " is inflected like a verb — not an
uncommon colloquial usage still.
So saying, she ups with her brawny arm
and gave Susy ... a douse on the side of the
head.— H. Brooke, Fool of Quality, \. 82.
Urchin, used adjectivally as a term
of contempt = trumpery.
Our Bishop . . . made himself merry with
the conceit how eaaie it was to stride over
such urchin articles. No man would find
leisure to read the whole 36, they are so
frivolous.— Racket, Life of Williams, ii. 91.
Usherless, freely ; without cere-
mony. Sylvester speaks of a " homely
cottage,"
Where vsherless, both day and night, the
North,
South, East, and "West windes enter and goe
forth.— Handie Crafts, 88.
USURARY, usurious.
How odious and severely interdicted tisu-
rary contracts have been in all times. — Bp.
Hall, Works, vii. 373.
Usurpant, usurping.
Some factious and insolent Presbyters
ventured to be extravagant and usurpant. —
Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 473.
Usurpature, usurpation.
For first she had shot up a full head in
stature,
And her step kept pace with mine nor fal-
tered,
As if age had foregone its usurpature.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Usurpress, female usurper.
She is a double usurpresse in detaining
not onely Elaina from her right, but the very
fish of the sea also from their habitation. —
Howell, Dodona's Grove, p. 19.
Utopianiser, former of an Utopia ;
a builder of castles in the air.
like most Utopianisers, the legislator of
this Columbia had placed his absolute King
and his free people under such strict laws
. . . that the duties of the legislative body
were easy indeed. — Southey, The Doctor, ch.
ccxli.
Utterable, capable of being uttered.
When his woe became utterable, he wrung
his hands, and groaning aloud, called out,
Art thou gone so soon? — Mad. DArlHay,
Cecilia, Bk. X. ch. viii.
Uttermore, outer or further ; comp.
of utter, uttermost.
Foure huge stones, of pyramidall forme.
. . . The two pyramids in the middest . . .
did almost touch one another : the uttermore
stand not farre off, yet almost in equal 1 dis-
tance from these on both sides. — Holland's
Camden, p. 701.
Uvularly, with a thick voice, as
when the uvula is too long.
Number Two laughed (very uvularly), and
the skirmishers followed suit. — Dickens, Un-
commercial Traveller, iii.
Uxorial, pertaining to a wife. In
the second quotation it rather =* uxori-
ous.
Favorinus . . . calls this said stata forma
the beauty of wives, the uxorial beauty£-
Lytton, My Novel, Bk. IV. ch. i.
Biccabocca, the wiliest and most relentless
of men in his maxims, melted into absolute
uxorial imbecility at the sight of that mute
distress.— Ibid., Bk. VIII. ch. xii.
VACILLATORY ( 704 )
VAPOUR
Vacillatory, vacillating; uncertain.
If ever such vacillatory accounts of affaire
of state, kings, and monarchies were given
in print before, I am mistaken. — North,
Examen, p. 25.
Vagabond, to wander like a vaga-
bond.
Why is he not in my counting-house at
Amsterdam, instead of vagabonding it out
yonder ? — Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. lvi.
Vagabondize, to wander like a vaga-
bond.
How much earlier he would have found
her by staving quietly at Tergou, than by
vagabondizing it all over Holland. — Reade,
Cloister and Heafth, ch. liii.
Then vagabondising came natural to you
from the beginning ? — Dickens, Bleak House,
ch. xxi.
Vacancy, extravagance; a passing
beyond settled limits.
Our happiness may orb itself into a thou-
sand vacancies of glory and delight. — Milton,
Reason of Church Government, ch. i.
Vagarish, errant.
Although his mouth was most devout,
His eyes were oft vagarish.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 306.
Vagary, to wander; to wind.
The marishes and lower grounds, lying
upon the three rivers that vagary up to her,
. . . are encreased in value more than halfe.
— Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 166).
Vainfull, vain; empty. Tusser
(Husbandi-ie, p. 10) says that the
country is "not so vainfull" as the
city.
Valanche, avalanche, q. v. Cf. Vol-
LENGK.
The great danger of travelling here when
the sun is up proceeds from what they call
the valanches. . . . Scarce a year passes in
wj}ich some mules and their drivers do not
perish by the valanches. — Smollett, France
and Italy, Letter xxxviii.
Vale, to descend as a valley.
Heer vales a valley, there ascends a mountain.
Sylvester, Seventh day, first weeke, 63
Valet, to attend as a valet.
He wore an old full-bottomed wig, the
gift of some dandy old Brown whom he had
valeted in the middle of last century. —
Hughes, Tom Brown's Scfiooldays, Pt. I. ch. ii.
Valrtitdinoub, sickly.
Af righted with the valetudinous condition
of King Edward, .... he returned to Ger-
many.— Fuller, Hist, of Camb., vii. 36.
Valiant, strong; powerful (applied
to a smell).
The scent thereof [garlic] is somewhat
valiant and offensive. — Fuller, Worthies,
Cornwall (L 206).
Valla r, the crown given to the sol-
dier who first scaled the enemy's rani-
part.
Oarlandes, vallarts and muralles . . (as
touchyng honour) were farre aboue the
other thynges. — UdaVs Erasmus** Apophth-
p. 284.
Valleylet, little valley.
The infinite ramification of stream and
valley, streamlet and valleylet. — Greenwood,
Rain and Rivers (1866), p. 188.
Valuables, things of value.
But, inclining (with my usual cynicism) to
think that he did steal the valuables, think
of his life for the month or two whilst he
still remains in the service. — Thackeray,
Roundabout Papers, xxxii.
Vampoose, to decamp (slang).
Has he vampoosed with the contents of a
till? — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. i.
Vahpyrism, conduct like that of
vampires.
Treason, delusion, vampyrism, scoundrel-
ism from Dan to Beersheba. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. III. ch. ii.
Vanitied, affected with vanity. Cf.
Modestied in the same writer.
I am exasperated against your foolish,
your \ow-vanity'd Lovelace. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, iv. 86.
Vaporiftc, steamy ; misty.
He has come in person, as he periodically
does; vaporiftc, driven by his fixed-idea. —
Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch. vi.
Vaporobitt, vapourousness ; misti-
ness.
He is here with his fixed-idea and volcanic
vapor osity. — Carlyle, Diamond Necklace, ch.. v.
Vapour, to dispirit; make melan-
choly.
She has lost all her sprightliness, and
vapours me but to look at her. — Mad.
D*Arblay, Camilla, Bk. V. ch. vi.
VAPOURISHNESS ( 705 )
VEND
Vapourishness, melancholy.
You will not wonder that the vapourish-
ness which has laid hold of my heart should
rise to my pen. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
iv. 41.
Vardi, an affected pronunciation
of verdict, apparently fashionable in
Swift '8 time, and ridiculed by him.
Lord Sp. Well, I fear Lady Answerall
can't live long ; she has so much wit.
Nev. No, she can't live, that's certain ; but
she may linger thirty or forty years.
"Miss. Live long ! ay, longer than a cat, or
a dog, or a better thing.
Lady A ns. O, Miss, you must give your var-
di too. — Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
Varift, to vary.
And yet three seuerall functions to Them
Three
Themselues assigne, their works to varifie.
Davits, Summa Totalis, p. 17.
May is seen
Suiting the lawns in all her pomp and pride
Of liuely colours louely varifitd.
Sylvester, The Magnificence, 661.
Varletess, female varlet: a con-
temptuous term.
Making such a confounded rout about
losing this noble varletess. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, i. 218.
0 thou lurking varletess, Conscience! —
Ibid., iv. 245.
Varsal, a vulgar corruption of uni-
versal.
1 believe, there is not such another in the
varsal world. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
Here was flying without any broom-sticks
or thing in the varsal world. — Smollett,
Humphrey Clinker, i. 125.
Vassalate, to reduce to a state of
vassalage or dependence.
Clergymen shall vassalate their consciences
to gratifte any potent party and novell fac-
tion.— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 496.
Vastatb, wasted.
The vastate ruins of ancient monuments. —
Adams, iii. 19.
Vastator, devastator.
The cunning Adversaries and Vastator s of
the Church of England drive a lesser trade.
— Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 86.
Vast ell bread. See quotation. The
Diets, have the word under the more
usual form wa&tel.
Sometimes the Abbot on great solemnities
graced them with his presence, when he had
vasteltum, that is, not common bread, but
vastell bread or simnels, for his diet. — Fuller,
Ch. Hist., vi. p. 285.
Vatical, prophetic.
Even that very ass, whereon thou rodest,
was prophesied of; neither couldst thou
have made up those vatical predictions with-
out this conveyance. — Bp. Hall, Works, ii.
550.
Vaticinatress, prophetess.
[There] was shown unto them the house
of the vaticinatress. — Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk.
III. oh. xvii.
Vehiculate, to convey.
Fiction, Imagination, Imaginative Poetry,
&c., &c., except as the vehicle for truth or
fact of some sort — which surely a man
should first try various other ways of
vehiculating and conveying safe — what is it ?
— Carlyle, Past and Present, Bk. II. ch. i.
Vehiculatory, designed for carry-
ing.
He would accumulate formidable appara-
tus, logical swim-bladders, transcendental
life-preservers, and other precautionary and
vehiculatory gear for setting out. — Carlyle,
Life of Sterling, ch. viii.
Veilless, without a veil.
He drove the dust against her veilless eyes.
Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
Veinlet, a little vein.
The work an unknown good man has done
is like a vein of water flowing hidden under-
ground, secretly making the ground green ;
it flows and flows, it joins itself with other
veins and veinltts; ene day it will start
forth as a visible perennial well. Ten dumb
centuries had made the speaking Dante; a
well he of many veinlets. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 206.
Veinous, veined; with the veins
prominent.
He .... covered his forehead with his
large brown veinous hands. — Dickens, Great
Expectations, ch. xxxix.
Veize. .See extract; also R. *. v.
pheeze.
Some have confidently affirmed in my
hearing that the word to veize (that is, in the
West, to drive away with a Witness) had
its original] from his [Up. Vesey of Exeter]
profligating of the lands of his Bishoprick ;
but I yet demurre to the truth hereof. —
Fuller, Worthies, Warwick (ii. 410).
Velvety, soft like velvet.
The beautiful velvety turf of the gardens.
— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxv.
Vend, sale.
She . . . has a great vend for them, and
for other curiosities which she imports. —
Richardson, CI. Harlowe, iv. 165.
Z Z
VENDUE
( 7o6)
VERSABILITY
Vendue, a sale.
I went ashore, and having purchased a
laced waistcoat, with some other cloaths, at
a vendue, made a swaggering figure. — Smol-
lett, Rod. Random, ch. xxxvi.
Veneres, hunter.
Our venerers, prickers, and verderers.
Browning, Flight of the Duchess.
Venery, game ; also, kennelf or hunt-
ing dogs.
They must have swine for their food, to
make their veneries or bacon of ; their bacon
is their venison, for they shall now have
hangum tuum if they get any other venison ;
so that bacon is their necessary meat to feed
on, which they may not lack. — Latimer, i.
249.
The venery, where the beagles and hounds
were kept. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. lv.
Vendible, great. L. has it = re-
vengeful, but in the extract it = great ;
as we say, a great hand at doing this or
that.
Paulus .... was a vengible fellow in link-
ing matters together. — Holland's Camden,
p. 78.
Venisonivorous, devouring venison.
People are very venisonivorous. — Sir G. C.
Lewis, Letters (1828), p. 10.
Ventless, without a vent or outlet
Like to a restlesse, venUesse flame of fire,
That faine would finde the way straight to
aspire. — Davits, Microcosmos, p. 61.
Ventriloque, ventriloquous ; speak-
ing from within.
And oft indeed the inward of that gate,
Most ventriloque, doth utter tender squeak.
Hood, Irish Schoolmaster.
Ventriloquial, speaking inwardly
as a ventriloquist does : the adjective in
the Diets, is ventriloquous.
The symphony began, and was soon after-
wards followed by a faint kind of ventrilo-
quial chirping. — Sketches by Boz (Mistaken
Milliner).
Veranda. See extract. In 1787 the
word seems to have been an unfamiliar
one in this country. Forty years later
[Miss Austen died in 1817] both name
and thing were common.
The other gate leads to what in this coun-
try [India] is called a veranda or feranda,
which is a kind of piazza or landing-place
before you enter the hall or inner apart-
ments.— Archaol., viii. 264 (1787).
Uppercross Cottage, with its veranda,
French windows, and other prettinesses was
. . likely to catch the traveller's eye. — Miss
Austen, Persuasion, oh. v.
Verbarian, word-coiner.
In The Doctor, Southey gives himself frfe
scope as a verbarian — Hall, Modern English,
p. 21. •
Verdinoale, a farthingale.*
And busks, and verdingales about their hips.
Hall, Satires, IV. vi. 10.
Above that went the taffaty or tabby
vardingale. — Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. L ch.
lvi.
Verdure is used peculiarly in the
extract = taint or corruption ; the idea
seems to be that of the green rust on
copper, &c, verdigris, or perhaps of
meat turning colour.
Something they must have to complain of.
that shall give an unsavoury verdure to their
sweetest morsels. — Bp. Hall, Works, ii. 248.
Verdured, covered with verdure-
One small circular island, profusely ver-
dured, reposed upon the bosom of the stream.
— E. A. Poe, Island of the Fay.
Veridical, veracious.
Who shall read this so veridical history. —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. zxviii.
At Paris, by lyin£ rumour which proved
prophetic and veridical, the fall of Verdun
was known some hours before it happened. —
Ibid., Fr. Rev., Pt. III. Bk. I. ch. iv. ■
Veriment, truth. H. has the word,
with examples as an adverb.
Tell unto you
What is veriment and true.
Greene, Friar Bacon, p. HM.
In verament and sincerity, I never crouded
through this confluent Herring-faire. — ATaske,
Lenten Stvffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 102).
Verisimilar, like the truth; pro-
bable. The Diets, have verisimiloug.
How verisimilar it looks. — Carlyle, Misc.,
iv. 69.
Vermin, to clear from vermin.
Get warrener bound
To vermin thy ground.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 72.
Verrinus seems from the context
to have been a superior kind of tobacco.
But all the day long you do us the wrong.
When for Verrinus jou bring us Mundungus ;
Tour reckonings are lar^e, your bottles are
smalL — Merry Drollerie, p. 12.
Versability, versatility.
The use of auxiliaries is at once to set the
soul a going by herself upon the materials
as they are brought her ; and by the t*r-
sab i lit y of this great engine round which
they are twisted, to open new tracks of
enquiry, and make every idea engender
millions. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy, iv. 137.
VERSANT
( 707 )
VICE-BITTEN
Versant, versed.
The Bishop of London is . . thoroughly
versant in ecclesiastical law. — Sydney Smith,
I'yirst Letter to Archd. Singleton.
Verse, to turn ; revolve.
Who, versing in his mind this thought, can
keep his cheeks dry ? — Adams, i. 344.
Verse. Nares says verser " seems to
have been an occasional name for some
kind of gaming sharper. One gambler
says of another, evidently meaning to
be witty, on being asked whether he
can verse, ' Ay, and set too, my lord.
He's both a setter and a verser ' (Chap-
man, Mons. UOlive, iv. 1). Setter is
easily understood ; . . . what a verser
was to do is not so clear." The extract
may throw some light on this ; at least
the verb seems to be used of a cheat-
ing parasite; one who turns with his
patron's humour (?).
We goe so neate in apparell, so orderly in
outward appearance, some like lawyers'
darks, others like serving-men, that attend
there about their masters' businesse, that we
are hardly smoakt; versina upon all men
with kind courtesies and faire wordes, and
yet being so warily watchfull that a good
purse can not be put up in a faire but we
sigh if we share it not amongst us. — Greene,
Theeves falling out, 1615 (Harl. Misc., viii.
384).
Versute, changeable ; unsettled.
A person of very supercilious gravity, also
of versute and vertigenous policy. — Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 132.
Vert. See extract, which is from
an article that appeared in the Union
Review for May 1864, afterwards re-
printed separately. The writer had
gone over from the Anglican to the
Roman Church. The word is now not
uncommon in colloquial use, or in
some religious newspapers. It is often
printed without any apostrophe denot-
ing that the prefix has been cut off.
I belong to that strange category about
whose prepositional affix opinions are divided
in England. Old friends call me a pervert :
new acquaintances a convert : the other day
I was addressed as a 'vert. It took my fancy
as offending nobody, if pleasing nobody. . . .
This term " 'vert " I have every reason to
believe has been only just coined. — Experi-
ences of a " Vert"
Vertugal. The poet is speaking of
the effeminate Sardannpalus, who wore
women's clothes. Vertugal may there-
fore mean farthingale, or, as Bp. Hall
and others write it, verdingale.
Amongst his vertugals for ayde he drew
From his Lieutenant, who did him pursew,
And wan his scepter.
Hudson, Judith, v. 215.
Vertumnal. Vertumnus was an
Etruscan Deity, presiding over the
revolving seasons. In the extract
Adams, having perhaps the first syllable
chiefly in his mind, seems to use it =
spring.
Her smiles are more reviving than the
vertumnal sunshine. — Adams, ii. 333.
Vesicatory, blister.
A vesicatory of devil's dung was applied to
my costern.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 209.
Vestural, pertaining to clothes.
This is one of the words which Sterling
blames Carlyle for inventing. See
extract 3. v. Environment.
How then comes it, may the reflective
mind repeat, that the grand Tissue of all
Tissues, the only real Tissue, should have
been quite overlooked by Science, — the ves-
tural Tissue, namely, of woollen or other
cloth. — Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. i.
Vesuvian, a cigar-light.
Not all the vesuvians in the world could
have kept his cigar alight. — Black, Adven-
tures of a Phaeton, ch. six.
Vexedlt, with a sense of annoyance.
My heart is vexedly easy; if I may so
describe it; vexedly, because of the appre-
hended interview, ... or else I should be
quite easy. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, ii. 165.
Vexedness, vexation.
My teasing uncle broke out into a loud
laugh, which, however, had more of vexedness
than mirth in it. — Richardson, Grandison,
vi. 74.
Vexillart, a standard-bearer. " Near
Brampton runs the little river Gelt; on
the bank of which, in a rock called
Helbeck, is this gaping inscription set
up by an ensign of the second legion,
caird Augusta, under Agricola the pro-
praetor " (Gibson's Camden, p. 1037).
The inscription begins Vex. Leg.
And Gareth lookt and read,
In letters like to those the vexillary
Hath left crag-carven o'er the streaming Gelt.
Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Vicaress, female vicar.
Mother Austin was afterwards Vicaress
several years. — Arch., xxviii. 198 (1840).
Vice-bitten, a prey to vice. Cf.
Hunger-bitten (Job xviii. 12).
/ z 2
V1CT0RIAL
( 7o8)
VIRTUED
0 my dear, what a paltry creature is a man
vice-bitten. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 181.
Victorial, victorious ; or, rather,
pertaining to a victory.
Pantagruel, for an eternal memorial, wrote
this victorial ditton. — Urquhart's Rabelais,
Bk. II. ch. xxvii.
Victorino boys, roaring boys (?).
To runne through all the pamphlets and the
toyes
Which I haue seene in hands of Victoring
Boyes.
A. Holland (Davies, Scourge of Folly,
p. 80).
Victrix, conqueres*. Ben Jonson
has victrice.
t In his victrix he required all that was here
visible. — Miss Bronte, Villette, ch. xzzii.
Victualaqk, food ; provision.
1 could not proceed . . . with my cargo of
victualage. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
Viduous, widowed.
She gone, and her viduous mansion, your
heart, to let, her successor the new occupant
. . . finds her miniature. — Thackeray, New-
comes, ch. Lxvi.
Viewer. See extract: "you" are
Cornish miners.
The door-keepers were summoned before
the overseer, or, as you call him, the viewer.
— Miss Edgeworth, Lame Jervas, ch. i.
Vioorize, to invigorate. Davies
(Microcosmos, p. 29) says that the
veins and arteries meet together
" thereby to vigorize the vitall band."
Vile, a vile thing.
Which soeuer of them I touche is a vyle.
— Gossan, Schoole of Abuse, p. 25.
Villanel, a ballad (Pr. villanelle).
One of Sidney's Sonnets (p. 535) is
directed to be sung " to the tune of a
Neapolitan villanel."
The vulgar and purely natural poesie has
in it certain proprieties and graces, ... as is
evident in oar Gascon villanels and songs. —
Cotton's Montaigne, ch. xli.
Vinaigrous, sour, like vinegar.
Lafayette, detestable though he be, is their
saviour for once ; even the ancient vinaigrous
Tantes admit it.— Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. I. Bk.
VII. ch. ix.
Vincibility, capability of being con-
quered.
I don't know what to say to the vincibility
of such a love. — Richardson, Grandison, vi. 49.
Vinew, mouldiness.
Soon would it catch a vinew, begin **-< 1
putrifie, and so continue but a while. — J2W-
land, Pliny, xix. 3.
Vint, to make wine.
I wouldn't give a straw for the best wine
that ever was vinted. — Trollope, Barchestrr
Towers, ch. xxi.
Vintnery, the trade of a vintner.
The father of him did, in an unexception-
able manner, perform cookery and vintnery
in the village of Ouarville. — Carlyle, Fr.
Rev., Pt. II. Bk. V. ch. iL
V10LENTO, a violent man. Cf. Ftri-
oso, Glorioso, &c.
In the Raign of Queen Mary he fled beyond
the Seas, and was no flolento in the Troubles
of Francford, but, with all meekness, to his
might, endeavoured a pacification. — Fuller,
Worthies, Cumberland (i. 236).
Violin, to play on the violin.
Was not Madam W. plaid out of her
reputation, and violin* d into a match below
her quality Y — Gentleman Instructed, p. 136.
Violist, player on the viol.
He was a violinist, and the two former
violists.—Life of A. Wood, Feb. 12, 1658-9.
Viorne, the way-faring tree: a
French word, but used in extract as an
English one.
Inter viburna Oupressus, that is, the
Cypresse-tree amongst the viornes. — Hol-
land's Camden, p. 421.
Viparious, life-producing.
A cat the most viparious is limited to nine
lives. — Lytton, Caxtons, Bk. XII. ch. ii.
Viperes8, female viper.
Pontia did confesse.
My sons I would have poyson'd. Viperesu '
Stapylton, Juvenal, vi. 675.
Virgin-head, virginity.
Thither must I
To see my love's face, the chaste virgin-head
Of a dear fish, yet pure and undeflower'd,
Not known of man.
Beaumont and Fletcher, Woman-Hater, i. 3.
Unlike it is
Such blessed state the noble flowr should
miss
Of Virgin-head. — Sylvester, Eden, 66*2.
Two foes of honord name in Honor's bed
(The field) desirde (like virgins newly wiues)
To lose their valour's lusty virgin-head
Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 23.
Virtu ed, endued with virtue.
But hath the virtued steel a power to movp ?
Or can the untouch'd needle point aright ?
Quarles, Emblems, V. iv. 3
VIRTUOUS
( 709 ) VOCIFEROSITY
Virtuous, strong ; valorous: a Latin-
ism. The "virtuous engine" in the
first extract is the golden chain which
Zeus lets down from heaven; there is
no word corresponding to virtuous in
the original.
Then will I to Olympus' top our virtuous
engine bind,
And by it ev'ry thing shall hang.
Chapman, Iliad, viii. 22.
My Lord, I know too well your vertuous
spirit ;
Take heede for God's loue if you rowse the
bore
You come not neere him, but discharge
aloofe
Your wounding pistoll, or well aymed dart.
Ibid., Gentleman Vsher, i. 1.
Vis-a-vis. This French word is
naturalized among us; it signifies a
carriage to hold two persons, one
opposite the other instead of side by
.«ide ; also a person standing opposite
jin other in a quadrille. Sterne {Trist.
Shandy, ii. 219) contrasts " a single-
horse chair and Madam Pompadour's
vis-a-vis"
Gould the stage be a large vis-a-vis,
Reserved for the polished and great,
Where each happy lover might see
The nymph he adores tete-a-tete ;
No longer I'd gaze on the ground,
And the load of despondency hug,
For I'd book myself all the year round
To ride with the sweet Lady Mugg.
H. and J. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 105.
Miss Blanche was indeed the vis-a-vis of
Miss Laura, and smiled most killingly upon
bcr dearest friend, and nodded to her, and
talked to her when they met during the
quadrille evolutions. — Thackeray, Pendennis,
ch. xxvii.
Vision, to see as in a vision.
We in the morning eyed the pleasant fields
Vision'd before.
Souihey, Joan of Arc, Bk. VIII.
Such guessing, visioning, dim perscrutation
of the momentous future ! — Carlyle, Past
and Present, Bk. II. ch. viii.
Visitbess, female visitor.
Keenly, I fear, did the eye of the visitress
pierce the young pastor's heart. — C. Bronte,
Jane Eyre, ch. xxxii.
Visort, visual ; having power of
vision.
- The optic nerves and the visory spirits are
corrupted. — Adams, ii. 379.
Visto, view. Visto is past part, of
Sp. vedere, to see. We generally adopt
the Italian vista.
Then all beside each glade and Visto
You'd see Nymphs lying like Calisto.
Gay, To a Young Lady.
Visualised, made visible. Sterling
objects to this word. See extract 3. v.
Environment.
Who am I ? What is this Me ? A Voice,
a Motion, an Appearance — some embodied,
visualised Idea in the Eternal Mind. — Carlyle,
Sartor Resartus, Bk. I. ch. viii.
Visuality, sight ; glimpse.
We must . . . catch a few more visualities.
— Carlyle, Misc., iv. 242.
We have a pleasant visuality of an old
summer afternoon in the Queen's Court two
hundred years ago. — Ibid., Cromwell, i. 90.
ViTIAL, vicious.
There is nothing on it [earth] that is of it
which is not become more vitiat than vital. —
Adams, i. 337.
Vitbioline, vitriolic.
In a moorish boggy ground ariseth a
Spring of a vitriofine Tast and Odour. —
Fuller, Worthies, Wilts (ii. 493).
Vividitt, liveliness.
Vicious humours gnaw and suck the con-
science of all vividity. — Adams, i. 484.
Vivi-sepulture, burying alive.
Pliny . . . speaks of the practice of «'«'■
sepulture as continued to his own time.—
Dean Liddell, 1863 {Archaol., xl. 243).
Vixenish, cross ; ill-tempered.
A short, thin, squeezed-up woman with a
vixenish countenance. — Dickens, Oliver Twist,
ch. iv.
Vizor, to cover with a vizor: the
past participle vizored is used by
Traheron, Milton, &c.
u Ugh ! " cried the Sun, and vizoring up a red
And cipher face of rounded foolishness,
Push'd horse across the foamings of the
ford. — Tennyson, Gareth and Lynette.
Vociferant, clamorous.
For all His Wounds, with voice vociferant,
Grie out they can more than supply each
want. — Davits, Holy Roode, p. 19.
The most vociferant vulgar, who most cry
up this their Diana, like the riotous rabble
at Ephesus, do least know what the matter
is. — Gauden, Tears of the Church, p. 114.
Vociferositt, clamorousness ; voci-
feration.
Shall we give poor Buffiere's testimonial
in mess-room dialect, in its native twanging
vociferosity ? — Carlyle, Misc., iv. 91.
VOCULAR
( 7»o )
VULGARIAN
Vocular, vocal.
He turned angrily round, and inquired
what that young cur was howling for, and
why Mr. Bumble did not favour him with
something which would render the series of
vocular exclamations so designated an in-
voluntary process. — Dickens, Oliver Twist,
ch. vii.
Void, the last course or remove ;
the dessert.
There was a void of spice-plates and wine.
— Coronation of Anne Boleyn, 1533 (Eng.
Garner, ii. 50).
Voided, cleaned (?).
Socrates beyng bidden to a supper by one
Agatho, was going with trick voided shoes on
his f eete, and perfumed with sweete sauoura.
— UdaVs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 32.
Volant. This French word =
shuttlecock is applied by North to a
Jack-of-both-sides: one who Jlies from
one to the other ; the adjective = giddy,
unrestrainable, flying.
And so they kept the volant a good while,
and did not declare on which side they would
fall. — North, Examen, p. 63.
The Dutch had acted the volant, and done
enough on the one side or the other to have
kept the fire alive. — Ibid., p. 474.
Yes, my volant, my self-conducted quill,
begin with the sister. — Richardson, Grand*'
son, i. 274.
The eddying smoke, quick flame, and volant
spark. — Poetry of Antijacobin, p. 129.
Volcanian, volcanic.
A deep volcanian yellow took the place
Of all her milder-mooned body's grace ;
And, as the lava ravishes the mead,
Spoilt all her silver mail, and golden brede.
Keats, Lamia,
Volcanoism, eruptiveness.
Blaze out, as wasteful volcanoism to scorch
and consume. — Carlyle, Past and Present,
Bk. II. ch. x.
Volently, willingly.
Into the pit they run against their will,
that ran so volently, so violently, to the
brink of it. — Adams, i. 237.
Volge, the vulgar ; the mob.
One had as good be dumb as not speak
with the volge.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. viii. 32.
We must speak with the volge, and think
with the wise. — Ibid., Worthies, London.
Vollenoe, avalanche. Cf. Va-
LANCHE.
The vollenge which overwhelms a whole
village was at first but a little snow-ball. —
W. Taylor, Survey of German Poetry, ii. 456.
Volution, rolling; revolution. The
reference in extract is to a water-spout.
The swift volution and the enormous train,
Let sages versed in nature's lore explain.
Falconer, Shipwreck, ii. 43.
Volve, to turn. R. has this word,
with a quotation from Berners's Frois-
mrt; the subjoined extract is nearly
250 years later.
I have been volving and revolving in my
fancy some time, but to no purpose, by what
clean device or facete contrivance I might
. . modulate them. — Sterne, Trist. Shandy,
v. 109.
Vorago, abyss. A Latin word, but
used by Evelyn as English, otherwise
he would have written voragines.
The voragos of subterranean cellars, wells,
and dungeons, formerly warehouses, still
burning in stench and dark clowds of smoke.
—Evelyn, Diary, Sept. 7, 166U
Votal, wishful.
He is not like those debtors that have
neither means nor meaning to pay. But
though he wants actual, he hath votal retri-
bution.— Adams, i. 100.
Votist, vower.
A poore woman, votist of reuenge.
Cftapman, Reuenge of Hussy D*Amboisy
Act III.
Vouchment, solemn assertion.
Their vouchment by their honour in that
tryal is not an oath.— Hacket, Life of Wil-
liams, i. 77.
Vulgar, a vulgar person ; one of the
lower classes.
The budding rose is set by.
But stale, and fully blown, is left for vulgars
To rub their sweaty fingers on. 1
Marmion, Antiquary, Act IV.
It would be as low to accept the challenge
of a vulgar as to refuse it to an equal.—
Burgoyne, Lord of the Manor, II. i.
Tet are those feats what vulgars term a bore.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 239.
Vulgarian, a vulgar person. Den-
hain has it as an adjective.
With a fat vulgarian sloven,
Little Admiral John
To Boulogne is gone.
Denham, To Sir J. Mentis.
The latter .... voted him a profound
bore and vulgarian — Thackeray, Shabby Gen-
teel Story, ch. viii.
If some indiscreet vulgarian (a favourite
word with both the Pompleys) asked point-
blank if he meant "my lord Digby," tie
Colonel with a lofty air answered, fcTbe
elder branch, sir." — Lytton, My Hotel, Bk. V
ch. viii.
VULGARITY
( 7" )
WAGGONETTE
Vulgarity, commonalty; mob.
The meere vulgarity (like swine) are prone
to cry out more for a little bite by the eare
than for all the sordidnesse of sin.— Gauden,
Tears of the Church, p. 3 (Preface).
Vulnerable, wounding : its proper
meaning is, liable to be wounded.
The male children practise to ride great
horses, to throw the vulnerable and inevitable
darte. — Ambassy of Sir B. S her ley, 1609
(Harl. Misc., v. 440).
Vulnerate, to wound. The Diets,
give only the past participle.
Thou thy chastitie didst vulnerate.
Davies, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 17.
Hedged in with cares as with an hedge of
thorne,
Whose piercing prickes the mind doe
vulnerate. — Ibid., Muse's Sacrifice, p. 10.
Vulturine, pertaining to a vulture.
The vulturine nose, which smells nothing
but corruption. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago,
ch. x.
Vulturish, pertaining to a vulture.
See extract *. v. Accipitral (the Diets,
have vulturous).
Vulturism, rapacity. See extract
*. v. Owlism.
w
Waddie, Indian club. See extract
*. v. Gin.
Wadling, a wattled fence.
To arbor begun and quicksetted about,
No poling nor wadling till set be far out.
Tusser, Musbandrie, p. 83.
Wadmus, a thick coarse kind of
woollen cloth. See H. s. v. wadrnol.
Tusser (Husbandrie, p. 37) recommends
" 'sedge collers for ploughhorse," to
which Tusser Redivivus appends the
following note :
Lightest and coolest, but indeed not so
comly as those of wadmus.
Wafrie, pastry.
He sent a ladde aforehand about to euery
of his frendes then present, and bid theim to
keepe a corner of their stomakes for the
tartes, wafrie, and jounkettes that wer to be
serued and to com in after the meat. — VdaVs
Erasmus's Apophih., p. 192.
Wag, to go ; to move.
Pinch. Sir, go, we'll follow you.
Spark. I will not way without you.
Wycherley, Country Wife, iv. 4.
They made a pretty good shift to wagg
along. — Pilgrim's Progress, ii. 183.
Gome, neighbours, we must wag.
Cowper, Yearly Distress.
Wageless, in the extract *. v. Tax-
less = without paying wages; it
should rather mean not receiving
wages.
Wageling, a hireling.
These are the very false prophets, the
instruments of Satan, the deceivers, wolves,
wagdings, Judases, dreamers, liars. — Bale,
Select Works,?. 439.
Wages-less, without wages.
Some intrusive, ragamuffin, 'wages-less
lackey. — Lytton, Pelham, ch. xlix.
Wage- work, labour for which money
is paid.
Old folk beside their fires.
For comfort after their wage-work is done.
Tennyson, Coming of Arthur.
Waggon-borough, the part of the
camp in which the waggons and bag-
gage are kept (?).
"We . . . entrenched our carriages and
waggon-borough. — Patten, Exped. to Scotl.,
1548 {Eng. Gamer, iii. 103).
Waggoner. The application of the
word in the extract is curious.
Elias was a waggoner in the air, mounted
through the clouds in a chariot.— A dams,
iii. 139.
Waggoness, female driver. Iris is
" she that paints the air."
He granted, acd his chariot (perplex'd with
her late harm)
She mounted, and her waggoness was she
that paints the air.
Chapman, Iliad, v. 348.
That she might serve for waggoness, she
pluck'd the wagg*ner back,
And up into his seat she mounts.
Ibid., v. 838.
Waggonette, a carriage with seats
along the sides instead of back and
front.
There was a large waggonette of varnished
oak, and a pair of small powerful horses
waiting for him there. — Black, Princess of
Tkule, oh. i.
WAGPASTIE
( 7i2 )
WAPPINGER
Wagpastie, a rogue ; urchin.
M. Mery. Maide, with whom are
ye so hastie ?
Tib. Not with you, sir, but with a little
wagpastie,
A deceiuer of folkes by subtill craft and guile.
Udal, Roister Doister, iii. 2.
Wag- tail, to flutter.
Euen as a payr of busie chattering pies,
Seeing some hardie tercell from the skies
To stoop with rav'nous seres, feele a chill
feare,
From bush to bush wagtayling here and there.
Sylvester, The Trophies, p. 137.
Waine, to fetch in a wain.
Then, neighbours, for God's sake, if any you
see
Good seruant for dairie house, waine her to
mee. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 107.
Wainman, waggoner. Sylvester ap-
plies it to Charles of the Wain.
Besides these twelue, toward the Artik side,
A flaming Dragon doth two Bears diuide ;
After, the Wainman comes, the Crown, the
Spear,
The Kneeling Touth, the Harp, the Ham-
perer.
Sylvester, Fourth day, first weeke, 290.
Divers abuses on the Lords-day were re-
strained: all cariers, carters, waggoners,
wainmen, drovers of cattell forbidden to
travell thereon.— Fuller, Ch. Hist., XI. i. 64.
Waist, girdle.
I might have given thee for thy pains
Ten silver shekels and a golden waist ?
Feele, David and Bethsabe, p. 481.
Waistcoating, stuff to be made into
waistcoats.
Mrs. Carver bespoke from him two pieces
of waistcoating.—Miss Edgeworth, The Dun,
p. 315.
Wakerife, quite awake.
And wakerife through the corpsgard oft he
past.— Hudson's Judith, iii. 89.
Wake-Robin, the plant "which in
E^ypt they call Aron" (Holland,
Pliny, xix. 5).
Walkers, feet.
And with them halted down
(Proud of his strength) lame Mulciber, his
walkers quite misgrown.
Chapman, Iliad, xx. 36.
Walking, moving : used rather pe-
culiarly in extract, but see quotation
s. v. Standard.
Wine was walking on every side. — R.
Smith, 1555 (Maitland on Reformation, p.
527).
Wallow, to dirty.
All dirt and mire some wallow bed, as span-
niels vse to doo.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 191.
Waltham's calf is said to have
run nine miles to suck a bull : hence,
as wise as Waliham's calf = very silly.
Some running and gadding calves, wiser
than Waltham's calfe that ranne nine miles
to sucke a bull. — Disclosing of the great Bull,
1567 (Harl. Misc., vii. 535).
Wand, to enclose with wands or
palings.
Now make and wand in
Trim bower to stand in.
Tusser y Husbandrie, p. 74.
Wanly, wastingly.
An extream fever vext the Virgin's bones,
(By one disease to cause two deaths at once)
Consum'd her flesh, and wanly did displace
The rose-mixt lillies in her louely face.
Sylvester, Fifth day, first weeke, 1028.
Wanter, one who is deficient, or in
need.
What should I think of courage ? if it wants,
The warders are despis'd of God and men.
Davies, Scourge of Folly, p. 21.
Want-grace, a reprobate.
And rather than they should not die by force,
Or want a Want-Grace to performe the
deede,
Their Vncle and Protector must perforce
Their crowne from head, and head from life
diuorce. — Davies, Microeosmos, p. 57.
Wantoning, a wanton.
But since, I saw it painted on fame's wings
The Muses to be woxen wantonings.
Hall, Satires, I. ii. 34.
Wap, twist or binding (?).
You must looke that youre bowe be well
nocked for fere the sharpnesse of the home
shere a sunder the strynge: and that
chaunceth ofte when, in bending, the string
hath but one wap to strengthe it wyth all. —
Ascham, Toxophtlus, p. 111.
Wappineers, people of Wapping.
In kennel sowc'd o'er head and ears
Amongst the crowding Wappineers.
VUrfey, Collin's Walk, canto ii.
Wapping, barking: so a cur was
called a whappet. See N. s. v.
The harmless wapping of a curs'd curre
may stir up a fierce mastiffe to the worrying
of sheep.— Fuller, Holy and Profane State,
V. iii. 1.
Wappinger, a man of Wapping.
Cf . Wappineer,
WAR
( 7i3 )
WAR WOLF
He was a thorough-paced traitor, and
looked upon to be paymaster of the mob ; a
Wappinger, and good at mustering seamen.
— Northy Examcn, p. 585.
War. A8cham suggests a curious
etymology for this word, as though it
came from waur or worse.
There is nothing worse then war, whereof
it taketh his name. — Toxophilus, p. 62.
Warble, to shake ; quaver ; wobble.
In all the examples in the Diets, the
word is used of sound.
It but floats in our brains — we bnt warble
about it; but we believe it not. — Andrewes,
i. 15.
War-craft, science of war.
He had Officers who did ken the War-
craft. — Fuller, Worthies, Lancashire (i. 558).
Wardenry. The district on the bor-
ders of England and Scotland was
called a wardenry, and was under the
care of a warden, whose duty it was to
prevent incursions.
In this steward lyeth all the safetie of the
west part of the wardenrie. — Document, 1590
(Archaol., xzii. 163).
They may not tamely see
All through the western wardenry,
Your law-contemning kinsmen ride,
And burn and spoil the Border-side.
Scott, Lay of Last Minstrel, c. iv.
Wardrober, keeper of the wardrobe.
In the Accounts of Elizabeth Princess
Palatine, 1613 (Arch., xxxv. 10), a
charge is made for "two wardrobers
and theire servants for theire boorde
wages goeing and returninge."
Ware, to expend.
They shall fynde it bothe lesse charge and
more pleasure to ware at any tyme a couple
of shyflynges of a new bo we, than to bestowe
xd. of peacynge an olde bowe. — Ascham,
Toxophilus^ p. 122.
He would: not ware the spark of a flint
for him, if they came with the law. — Scott,
Waverley, i. 191.
I grabb'd the munny she maade, and I wedrd
it o' liquor, I did.
Tennyson, Northern Cobbler.
Ware -trash, "sedge, turfe, and
reed." It was objected by some that
if the Cambridgeshire fens were drained,
there would be a deficiency of these.
Fuller answers, " Provision may be
made that a sufficiency of such ware-
trash may still be preserved " (Hist,
of Camb. Univ.t v. 3). Trash pertain-
ing to a weir or stream (?) ; or has it
to do with Ware- water, q. v. ?
Ware- water. The New River com-
pleted in 1613 is supplied from springs
in the neighbourhood of Ware in Hert-
fordshire.
Another, in imitation of their aqueducts
and sluces and conveyance of waters abroad,
brought Ware-water through London streets.
— Ho welly Forraine Travtll, sect. 16.
War, Horse, seems to be an exclam-
ation enjoining caution ; perhaps such
as coachmen or carters addressed to
their cattle.
Mon. Tour goodness, Madam, is —
Flip (aside to Mon.). War, Horse. No
fine speeches ; you'll spoil all.
Vanbrugh, Confederacy, Act V.
Warning, notice to quit ^iven by an
employer to a servant, or wee versd.
We'll both give warning immediately, and
we'll give up the month's wages to the poor
devils out of mere charity. — Colman, Man of
Business, Act IV.
Warning-piece, a warning gun, and
so, anything that warns.
Being returned to the ships, about ten of
the clock a warning-piece was given, and
about two hours after they weighed. — Tres-
well, Journey of the Earl of Nottingham, 1604
(Harl. Misc., lii. 428).
It was the wisest way to strike sail betimes,
upon the shooting of the first warning-piece
to bring them in. — Hcylin, Reformation, 1. 79.
Warp. H. gives "warp, four of
fish : " perhaps, therefore, a warp of
weeks = a month.
Cerdicus . . . was the first May-lord or
captaine of the Morris-daunce that on those
em benched shelves stampt his footing, where
cods and dog-fish swomme not a warp of
weeks forerunning. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe
(Harl. Misc., vi. 150).
Warrish, militant.
I know the rascals have a sin in petto,
To rob the holy lady of Loretto ;
Attack her temple with their guns so warrish.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 296.
Warty, rough, as though covered
with warts.
Dean-bourn, farewell ; I never look to see
Deane, or thy warty incivility.
Herrick, Hespcrides, i. 27.
Warwolf, some military engine.
The rooms here . . . were made use of for
placing the catapultas, balistas, wancolfs, and
other various instruments of war. — Archaol.,
iv. 379 (1777).
WASHABLE
( 714 ) WATER-FURROW
The war-wolfs there
HurPd their huge stones.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. VIII.
Washable, capable of being washed.
Washable beaver hats that improve with
rain. — Dickens, Oliver Twist, ch. xxxvii.
A good expanse of washable linen over the
upper- works of the coat. — Carlyle, Cromwell,
i. 88.
Washered. " Washer, an iron hoope
which serves to keepe the iron pin at
the end of the axel-tree from wearing
the nave " (Florio, p. 94, quoted in H.).
I had worked myself up, as I always do,
in the manner of heavy men ; growing hot
like an i\\-washered wheel revolving, though
I start with a cool axle. — Blackmore, Lorna
Doom, ch. lxx.
Wassebman.
The puffin . . . bewrayed this conspiracie to
Proteus heards, or the fraternity of fishes,
which the greater giants of Russia and
Island, as the whale, the sea-horse, the norse
[morse?], the wasserman, the dolphin, the
grampoys, fleered and geered at as a ridicu-
lous danger. — Nashe, Lenten Stuffe (Marl.
Misc., vi. 170).
Waste-good, a spendthrift
This first is a wast-good and an
unthrift. — Greene, Quip for Upstart Courtier
(Harl. Misc., v. 420).
Wasteless, inexhaustible.
Those powers above that can requite,
That from their wasteless treasures heap
rewards
More out of grace than merit on us mortals.
May, The Heir, Act IV.
Wastbye, destructive.
The pope and his wastrye workers . . were
no fathers but cruel robbers and destroyers.
—Bale, Select Works, p. 138.
Wast-time, an idle employment: a
play on the word pastime.
" As mad as the Baiting Bull of Stamford ."
. . . Some think that the Men must be mad
as well as the Bull, who can take delight in
so dangerous a Wast-time. — Fuller, Worthies,
Lincoln (ii. 6).
Watch - bibth, midwife ( ? ) ; de-
liverer (V). Sylvester, after describing
the triple division of the temple, com-
pares Solomon's books, Proverbs, Ec-
clesiastes, and the Song of Songs, to
the Porch, Holy Place, and Holy of
Holies respectively, and introduces the
comparison thus :
This pattern pleased thee, so th' hast framed
by it
Th' eternall Watch-births of thy sacred wit.
The Magnificence, 1197.
Watch-clock, alarum.
Pourfull Need (Art's ancient dame and
keeper,
The early watch - clock of the sloathfull
sleeoer^
Sylvester, Handle Crafts, 105.
Watchment, state of vigilance.
My watchments are now over, by my mas-
ter's direction. — Richardson, Pamela, i. 207.
Water. Where the water slicks =
the point in dispute.
I will reduce his discourse into a logical
form, that the reader may see clearly -where
ttie water sticks between us. — BramhaU, ii.
366.
Water-baylagk. See quotation.
Water-baylaqe, a tax demanded upon all
goods by the City, imported and exported. —
Pepys, Jan. 20, 1668-9.
Water-bed, a bed on board ship:
the word is now common as meaning
an india-rubber bed filled with water,
to make it easy for sick people.
To his house I repaired, with hope of some
refreshment after my wearisome voyage ; but
he then from home, I was forced to returne
to my water-bed; there being no Innes for
entertainment throughout inhospitall Turkic
— Sandys, Travels, p. 27.
Water - bewitched, any very weak
liquid.
Your ladyship is very sparing of your tea ;
I protest the last dish I took was no more
than water bewitcht. — Swift, Polite Conversa-
tion (Conv. i.).
As for the broth, it was nothing but a lit-
tle water bewitched (mera aqua), — Bailey's
Erasmus, p. 376.
Another book of Noble's called lives of
the Regicides ... is of much more stupid
character ; nearly meaningless indeed, mere
water bewitched. — Carlyle, Cromwell, i. 13.
Waterfall, a neckcloth or scarf that
comes down over the breast. Miss Fer-
rier (Inheritance^ Vol. I. ch. xi.) speaks
of " a drooping Fall of FoyersJooking
neckcloth."
He was suddenly confronted in the walk
by Benjamin, the Jew money-lender, smoking
a cigar, and dressed in a gaudy figured satin
waistcoat and waterfall of the same material.
>— Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. xxvi.
Water-flint. See extract.
The third flat stone is a quartzose boulder
of the kind known as water^ftints in this part
of Somersetshire.— ArcheoC, xlii. 208 (1863).
Water-furrow, to drain by drawing
furrows across the ridges in the lowest
part of the ground
WATER IN SHOES ( 715 )
JVA Y-DOOR
Seede husbandly sowen, water-furrow thy
ground
That raine when it commeth may run away
round. — Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 48.
Water in shoes, a proverbial ex-
pression for something disagreeable.
They caressed his lordship very much as a
new comer, whom they were glad of the
honour to meet, and talked about a time to
dine with him ; all which (as they say) was
water in his shoes. But after dinner he got
himself clear, and was as careful not to be so
complimented any more. — North, Life of
Lord Guilford, i. 295.
Waterish, the colour of water, not,
as now, watery or diluted. See extract
s. v. Blunkette.
Water-lade, gutter; drain.
The chanels were not skoured . . . for
riverets and Brookes to passe away, but the
water-lades stopped up either through negli-
gence or depopulation. — Holland?* Camden,
p. 741.
Water my chickens come clock, a
game similar to one called hen and
chickens, where a number of children
form in a row behind a leader, and it is
the endeavour of others to catch some
of these " chickens."
One fault brought me into another after
it, like Water my chickens come clock. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 272.
Waternixie, water-elf or fairy.
The shallowness of a waternixie'a soul may
have a charm until she becomes didactic. —
G. Eliot, Middlemarch, ch. briv.
Wateroloqer, one who tells a man's
disease by inspection of urine.
You must either pretend to be waterologers
or star-wizards. — Quack's Academy,
1678 (Harl. Misc., ii. 34).
Water-quake, a disturbance of water
produced by volcanic action.
"Wittlesmere doth sometimes in
Galmes and faire weather sodainly rise tem-
pestuously, as it were, into violent water'
quakes to the danger of the poore fishermen.
—Holland's Camden, p. 600.
Water-stock, a stoup for holy water.
They brought forth their coopes, candel-
stickes, holy waterstocke, cross, and sensers.
— Vocacyon of Johan Bale, 1553 (Harl. Misc.,
vi. 452).
Water-weak, very feeble; weak as
water.
If merrie now, anone with woe I weepe,
If lustie now, forthwith am water-weak.
Davits, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 10.
Wattle-faced, Ian thorn - jawed ;
thin; bony; like wattles or hurdles.
I scorn thee,
Thou wattle-fac'd sindg'd pig !
Middleton, Mayor of Quinborough,
Act III.
Waugh, to bark like a small dog.
The elder folke and well growne . . .
barked like bigge dogges; but the children
and little ones wauahed as small whelpes. —
Holland's Camden, ii. 188.
Waveless, still ; not waving.
The banner'd blazonry hung waveless as a
pall.
Ingoldsby Legends (Fragment in
Westminster Abbey).
Wavelet, a little wave.
But forth one wavelet , then another, curled.
Browning, Pippa Passes.
The chain-pier, as everybody knows, runs
intrepidly into the sea, which sometimes in
fine weather bathes its feet with laughing
wavelets. — Thackeray y Newcomes, ch. ix.
In a million wavelets tipp'd with gold
Leapt the soft pulses of the sunlit sea.
Taylor, St. Clements Eve, ii. 2.
Wax, a rage (schoolboys' slang).
She's in a terrible wax, but she'll be all
right by the time he comes back from his
holidays. — H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. v.
Waxy, angry (slang).
It would cheer him up more than anything
if I could make him a little waxy with me :
he's welcome to drop into me right and left,
if he likes. — Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xxiv.
Wat-beaten, way-worn ; tired.
The way-beaten couple, master and man,
sat them down. — Jarvis's Don Quixote, Pt.
II. Bk. IV. ch. vii.
Waybit or Weabit, a considerable
though indefinite addition to a mile,
known ScotticS as a bittock.
In the North parts . . . there is a wea-bit to
every mile. — Howell, Letters, iv. 28.
I nave heard him prefer divers, and very
seriously, before himself, who came short a
mile and a way-bit. — Hacket,Life of Wil-
liams, i. 59.
"An Yorkshire Way-bit.n That is, an
Over-plus not accounted in the reckoning,
which sometimes proveth as much as all the
rest. — Fuller, Worthies, Yorkshire (ii. 494).
Generall Leslie, with his Scottish, ran
away more than a Yorkshire mile and a Wee
bit. — Ibid., ii. 535.
Way-door, street-door.
He must needs his posts with blood em-
brew,
And on his way-door fix the horned head.
Hall, Satires, III. iv. 7.
WA YLEA VE
( 7* )
WEEDS
Wayleave, a right of way.
Another thing that is remarkable is their
wnyleaves; for when men have pieces of
ground between the colliery and the river,
they sell leave to lead coals over their ground.
— Xorth, Life of Lord Quilford, i. 206.
Way-post, direction-post.
Tou have more roads than a way-post. —
Col man, The Spleen, Act I.
You came to a place where three cross-roads
divide,
Without any way-post stuck up by the side.
IngoLlsby Legends (St. Romwold).
Waywarden, surveyor of highways.
Mr. George Chapman, the wayicarden, . . .
had frequently observed that the cattle
resorted to a particular spot to rest. —
Archaol., xxiii. 398 (1831).
Woodcutter. Had'st best repent and mend
thy ways.
Peasant. The way-warden may do that : I
wear out no ways ; I go across country. —
Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, ii. 6.
Waywiser, ua mathematical in-
strument fitted to the great wheel of a
chariot to show how far it goes in a
day " (Bailey's Diet.).
He had ... a way-wiser, a thermometer, a
monstrous magnet. — Evelyn, Diary, July 13,
1654.
I went to see Col. Blount, who shewed me
the application of the way-wiser to a coach,
exactly measuring the miles, and shewing
them by an index as we went on. — Ibid.,
Aug. 6, 1655.
Weal (?).
A beryl is a kind of crystal that hath a
weal tincture of red. — Aubrey, Misc., p. 154.
Wealful, happy. Da vies is speak-
ing of our Lord' 8 Passion.
To tell the jerkes with joy, that joy do bring,
Is both a wealefull and a wofull thing.
Dawes, Holy Roode, p. 13.
Weasel-monger, rat-catcher or mole-
catcher. See extract s. v. Cony-gat.
Weather-blown, exposed ; weather-
beaten.
Strong Enispe that for height is ever weather-
blown. — Chapman, Iliad, ii. 532.
Weathergage. To get the weather-
gage = to get to windward. L. notes
this sense, but has no example.
Take a turn round the back o' the hill to
gain the wind on them ; and when thou'st
got the weathergage thou mayst drive them
before thee. — Scott, Ivanhoe, i. 13.
Weather-hardened, weather-beaten,
which is the more usual expression.
The peat fire shining upon a countenance
which, weather-hardened as it was. might have
given the painter a model for a Patriarch. —
Southey, The Doctor, ch. U.
Weather-headed, silly. In the ex-
tract Valentine is referring to Fore-
sight, a foolish old man, full of super-
stition in connection with astrology,
&c.
Sir, is this usage for your son ? — for that
old weather-headed fool, I know how to laugh
at him ; but you, Sir—. — Congreve, Love for
Love, ii. 7.
Weathering-stock, a post to which
hawks are tied, and whence they can
get some limited exercise.
E'en like the hawk (whose keeper's wary
hands
Have made a prisoner to her weathering
stock),
Forgetting quite the pow'r of her fast bands,
Makes a rank bate from her forsaken
block ;
But her too faithful leash doth soon retain
Her broken flight, attempted oft in vain ;
It gives her loins a twitch, and tugs her back
again. — Quarles, Emblems, V. ix. 5.
Weaver, roarer ; one whose broken
wind sounded like the weaver's shuttle
going to and fro (?).
T' horse was a weaver, if iver one was, as
any one could ha' told as had come within a
mile on him. — Mrs. Gasket I, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xi.
Weavere88, female weaver.
He found two looms alone remaining at
work in the hands of an ancient weaver and
weaveress.—J. H. Blunt, Hist, of Durslev, 222
(1877). ^
Weazen, shrunk; withered. See
Wizen.
From this venerable piece of furniture,
with which his shadowy figure and dark
weazen face so admirably accorded, he was
dealing out strange accounts of the popular
superstitions.— Irving, Sketch Book (Christ-
mas Dinner).
A tall weazen-faced man with an impedi-
ment in his speech. — Sketches by Boz (The
Last Cabdriver).
Webless, without webs : applied to
looms standing idle.
O'er still and webless looms
The listless craftsmen through their elf-locks
scowled. — Kingsley, Saint's Tragedy, ii. 4.
Weeds. This word was once com-
mon in the sense of clothes, especially
outer clothing, such as coat, gown, &c. :
it now only survives in the expression,
" widow's weeds." The latest example
WEEHEE
( 7i7 ) WELSH-RABBIT
of its old sense in the Diets, is from
Paradise Regained, i. 314. Mr. Jer-
ram, however, in the Glossary to his
edition of that poem (1877), says that
" bridal weeds " occurs in the Braes of
Yarrow. Mr. Tennyson also speaks
of a " beggar-woman's weeds ; " but
the subjoined is a late prose example.
The weeds referred to were a porter's
frock, belt, and apron.
I gave her twopence, reassumed my former
garb, and left my weeds in her custody. — H,
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 191.
Weehee, a neigh.
To discourse him seriously is to read ethicks
to a monkey, or make an oration to Caligula's
horse, whence you can only expect a weehee
or a jadish spurn. — Character of a Coffee
House, 1673 (Hart. Misc., vi. 489).
Weely, coarse ; dirty (?).
This river hath his head and springeth
first in a weely and barren ground named
Exmore. — Holland's Camden, p. 203.
Sheepe, long-necked and square of bulke
and bone, by reason (as it is commonly
thought) of the weally and hilly situation of
their pasturage. — Ibid., p. 364.
Weeper, a white border on the sleeve
of a mourner's coat.
Mourners clap bits of muslin on their
sleeves, and these are called weepers. Weep-
ing muslin ; alas, alas, very sorrowful truly !
These weepers then it seems are to bear the
whole burthen of the distress. — Goldsmith,
Citizen of the World, Letter xcv.
The young squire was even then very
handsome, and looked remarkably well in his
weepers. — Sinollett, Sir L. Greaves, ch. iii.
If anybody was to marry me, flattering
himself as I should wear those hi jeous weepers
two years for him, he'd be deceived by his
own vanity, that's all. — G. Eliot, Middle-
march, ch. lxxx.
Weep Irish. H. explains this, to
scream, to yell ; but it seems to signify
feigned grief, crocodile's tears : pro-
bably referring to "the people making
a noise " at an Irish wake.
Surely the Egyptians did not weep-Irish
with faigned and mercenary tears. — Fuller,
Fisifah Sight, II. xii. 15.
What the devil can be the matter ? why
all this noise ? here's none but friends ; I
don't apprehend that anybody can overhear
you ; this is something like the Irish cry. —
Centlivre, Bickerstaff's Burying.
Weese, to ooze. See extract &. v.
Thorough, and cf . Woos.
Weesel, weasand.
The mastives of our land shall worry ye,
And pull the weesels from your greedy
throats.
Peele, David and Bethsabe, p. 465.
There be divers grievances ... (to omit all
other which pertaine to eyes and eares, nos-
trills, gums, teeth, mouth, palate, tongue,
wesel, chops, face, &c.) belonging properly to
the brain. — Burton, Anatomy, p. 7. » j M
Weily, well nigh. Sir John Linger
means that he has eaten so much as to
be near bursting.
Well, I'm weily brosten, as they sayn
in Lancashire. — Swift, Polite Conversation
(Conv. ii.).
Well a fine, to good purpose. Tus-
ser married a Mistress Anne Moone.
I chanced soone to find a Moone
Of cheerful hew,
Which well a fine methought did shine.
Tusser, p. 100.
Wellingtons, a kind of boots that
came up the calf of the leg. Cf.
Bluchers.
Miss's comb is made a pearl tiara,
And common Wellingtons turn Romeo boots.
Keats, Modern Love.
His gaiters, with dust covered o'er,
Were seen upon his legs no more,
But when he rode his top-boots shone,
Or hussar'd a la Wellington.
Combe, Br. Syntax, Tour III. c. v.
Well-to-do, prosperous.
John Thornton, then a servitor at Christ
Church, fell in love with pretty Jane Hick-
man, whose father was a well-to-do farmer. —
H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. ii.
There was a well-to-do aspect about the
place. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. vi.
Welsh main, a phrase taken from
cock-fighting, explained in the first
extract. See quotation s. v. Battle-
boyal.
As if he were backing a Welsh main, where
all must fight to death. — Scott, Fair Maid of
Berth, ii. 71.
His make evinces such decided marks of
strength and courage, that if cat-fighting were
as fashionable as cock-fighting, no cat would
stand a fairer chance for winning a Welsh
main. — Southey, Doctor {Cats of Greta Hall).
Welsh-rabbit, toasted cheese served
on toast. The fondness of the Welsh
for cheese is often jested at. See ex-
tract from Howell s. v. Moon.
Go to the tavern, and call for your bottle,
and your pipe, and your Wthh-rabbit. —
Graves, Spiritual Quixote, Bk. VII. ch. ix.
A desire for welsh-rabbits and good old
glee-singing led us to the Cave of Harmony.
— Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. i.
WELTED
( 7i8)
WHEELBAND
Welted, ropy, or Btringy ; contain-
ing "the motherings." In Middlesex
the word = flabby, not crisp, and is
specially used of stale cucumbers.
Her coodn't lave 'ouze by raison of the
Chirstsmas bakkon comin' on, and zome o'
the cider welted. — Blacktnore, Lorna Doone9
ch. ii.
Weh, stomach. In the first extract
Cotton is speaking of the Trojan horse.
He bad his gang therefore command us,
(Tho' Heaven did sure enough withstand us)
To probe its went with wedge and beetle.
Cottony Scarronides, p. 7.
For two and thirty days they satisfy'd the
decree of the oracle, without being oblig'd to
expose any human creature to the monster's
wem. — Misson, Travels in Eng., p. 105.
Werishness, insipidity. The Diets.
give the adjective wearish or weerish.
Beetea is an herbe called in Greek fiXirot,
in Latin beta, of whose exceding werishnes
and vnsauerines, euen of old antiquitee, daw-
cockes, lowtes, cockescombes, and block-
hedded fooles were, in a prouerbial speaking,
said, betizare, to be as irerishe and as vnsauery
as beetes. — UdaVs Erasmus's Apaphth., p. 118.
Wet, a euphemism for drunken: a
wet night = one of hard drinking.
When my lost lover the tall ship ascends,
With music gay, and wet with jovial friends,
The tender accents of a woman's cry
Will pass unheard, will unregarded die.
Prior, Celia to Damon.
As he knew he should have a wet night , it
was agreed that he might gallop back again
in time for church on Sunday morning. —
Thackeray, Vanity Fair, ch. xi.
Wet-Quaker, a Quaker who is not
very strict in the observances of his
sect.
Would you buy any naked truth, or light
in a dark lanthorn? Look in the Wet-
Quaker's walk. — T. Brownt Works, iii. 26.
Socinians and Presbyterians,
Quakers, and Wet-Quakers or Merry-ones.
Ward, England's Reformation, c. ii. p. 175.
Whack, a share (slang).
This gay young bachelor had taken his
share (what he called " his whack ") of
pleasure. — Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story,
ch. v.
Whack, a hard blow.
A blow descended, such as we must borrow
a term from the Sister Island adequately to
describe— it was a whack. — Ingoldsby Legends
{Lady Rohesia).
Whacker, anything very large
(slang). Cf. WnorPER.
" Look what whackers, Cousin Tom," said
Charley, holding out one of his prizes by
its back towards Tom, while the indignant
cray -fish flapped its tail. — Hughes, Tom
Brown at Oxford, ch.
Wharl. See extract. Cf. Bur.
The natives of this Country [Northumber-
land] of the antient original Race or Fami-
lies, are distinguished by a Shibboleth upon
their Tongues in pronouncing the Letter R,
which they can not utter without a hollow
Jarring in the Throat, by which they are as
plainly known as a Foreigner is by pro-
nouncing the Th. : this they call the North-
umberland R or Wharle: and the Natives
value themselves upon that Imperfection,
because, forsooth, it shows the Antiquity of
their Blood.— Defoe, Tour thro* G. Britain,
iii. 233.
•
Wharling, guttural speech. Puller
refers to the Carleton people again in
Ch Hist, II. v. 6, and in his Worthies
among the wonders of Leicestershire.
[The inhabitants of Carleton have] an ill-
favoured, untunable, and harsh manner of
speech, fetching their words with very much
adoe deepe from out of the throat, with a cer-
taine kind of wharling. — Holland's Camden,
p. 517.
It is observed in a village at Charleton in
Leicestershire that the people therein are
troubled with wharling in their utterance. —
Fuller, Pisgah Sight, II. ix. i.
What is what. To know what's
what = to have good taste or judg-
ment. See extract s. v. Ea.
To vs that knowe what is what, those
thinges onely are honest whiche be honest
of themselfes. — Udal's Erasmus's Apopluh.,
p. 239.
Ah, sir, mary nowe I see you know what is
what. — Ibid., Roister Doister, i. 2.
«
Our wyts be not so base,
But that we know as well as you
What's what in every case.
Googe, Eglogs, vii.
Wheat-ear, a bird: the extracts
are given for the sake of the derivation,
the last of which is the correct one.
Wheat-ears is a Bird, . . so called because
fattest when Wheat is ripe, whereon it feeds.
—Fuller, Worthies, Sussex (ii. 382).
There is . . . great plenty of the birds so
much admired at Tunbridge under the name
of wheat-ears. By the by, this is a pleasant
corruption of white-a—e, the translation of
their French name cul blancy taken from
their colour, for they are actually white
towards the tail. — Smollett, Travels, Letter
111.
Wheelband, the tire of a wheel.
WHEELBARROW ( 719 )
WHIFF
The chariot tree was drown'd in blood, and
th' arches by the seat
Dispurpled from the horses' hoofs, and from
the wheelbands' beat.
Ckapmatiy Iliad, xi. 466.
Wheelbarrow, one of the many
comparisons for a drunken person.
Besides, if he such things can do,
When drank as drum or wheelbarrow.
What would not this God of October
Perform, I prithee, when he's sober.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque,
p. 243.
Wheelbarrow. To go to heaven in
a wheelbarrow is a euphemism to ex-
press going in the other direction. In
the painted glass at Fairford, Glouces-
tershire, the devil is represented as
wheeling off a scolding wife in a
barrow.
This oppressor mast needs go to heaven !
what shall hinder him ? But it will be, as
the by- word is, in a wheelbarrow; the fiends,
and not the angels, will take hold on him. —
Adams, i. 144.
Wheelery, circumgyration.
With curlings and twistings, and twirls and
wheeleries,
Down they drop at the gate of the Tuileries.
Ingoldsby Legends (The Truants).
Wheelless, without wheels.
The carpet . . was already strewed with
headless dolls, tailless horses, wheelless carts,
&c. — Miss Ferrier, Inheritance, i. 296.
Wheels within wheels, a com-
plication of motives or influences. See
quotation *. v. Formaliser.
Bat, sir, is there not danger of their being
provoked by such an attack to say something
improper, and that they who made the con-
tracts with them may do you an ill office on
another occasion ? There are wheels within
wheels. — Johnston, Chrysal, ii. 196.
** And a birdcage, sir,'9 said Sam ; " reels
vithin reels, a prison in a prison. " — Pickwick
Papers, ch. zl.
Whelp, a species of ship. For the
second quotation I am indebted to a
correspondent of N. and Q. (I. i. 106),
who suggests that the name may be a
punning allusion to a bark.
At the return of this fleet two of the
whelps were cast away, and three ships more.
— Howell, Letters, I. v. 8.
25 July, 1635. About six hour I went
aboard one of the king's ships called the
ninth whelp, which is in the king's books
215 ton and tonnage in king's books. She
carries sixteen pieces of ordinance. . . This
ship is manned with sixty men. — Brereton,
Travels, p. 164.
Whelpless, childless; bereft of
whelps.
The old lion glaring with his whelpless eye.
Tennyson, Princess, vi.
Whereof, wherefore: this vulgar-
ism is sometimes heard. In the follow-
ing extracts Walpole italicizes the word
to show that he uses it in a peculiar
way.
Our Duke goes with his lord and father —
they say to marry a princess of Prussia,
whereof great preparations have been making
in his equipage and in his breeches. — Wal-
pole to Mann, i. 208 (1742).
Mr. N. has offered to be postman to you ;
whereof, though I have nothing, or as little
as nothing, to say, I thought as how it would
look kinder to send nothing in writing than
by word of mouth. — Ibid., Letters, iv. 498
(1790).
Wherve. R. cites Holland (Plinie,
xi. 24^, and says, "There is no corre-
sponding word in the original, nor has
the word occurred elsewhere ; but it is
probably derived from A.S. hweorfan,
volvere" He is mistaken in supposing
that the word does not occur elsewhere.
The corresponding term in Virgil (jEn.,
viii. 430), as rendered by Stany hurst, is
radios ; in Rabelais, vertoil. H. gives
" Wherve, a joint. Somerset" Bailey
has " Whirle or Whern (wirvel,T%x\t. ), a
round piece of wood put on the spindle
of a spinning wheel. C" [ountry
word! Stany hurst describes, as among
the elements of an unfinished thunder-
bolt lying in Vulcan's workshop —
Three wheru's fyerd glystring, with Sout-
wynds rufflered huffling. — Stanyhurst, Con-
c cites, p. 137.
Wouldst thou . . . blunt the spindles, join
the wkerves, slander the spinning-quills . . .
of the weird Sister-Parca r — Urquhart's Ra-
belais, Bk. III. ch. xxviii.
Whetten, to sharpen.
My mynd was greedelye whetned
Too parle with the Regent.
Stanyhurst, Mn., iii. 306.
Whey-faced, pallid. Macbeth (V.
iii.) uses whey-face as a substantive.
His pious dame with a ruff about her neck,
and as many whey-faced girls, all kneeling
behind her. — Richardson, d. Uarlowe, vi
Ul.
I helped you in prosecuting (or persecut-
ing) your tutor, whey-faced Mr. Vining. —
C. Bronte, Jane Eyre, ch. xvii.
Whiff, to drink.
In this season we might press and mako
WHIFFLE
( 7»o )
WHIPPER
the wine, and in winter whiff it up. — Urqu-
hart's Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxvii.
Gargantua whiffed the great draught. —
Ibid., Bk. I. ch. xxxix.
Whiffle, to drink.
Constrain an easy, good-natured fellow to
whiffle, quaff, carouse. — Urouhart's Rabelais,
Bk. III. ( Author's Prologue).
Whim, a sort of capstan.
We went back to the pit's mouth; the
men were tearing round the whim faster
than horses could 'a done it. — H. Kinysley,
Geoffry Hamlyn, ch. xxxvi.
Whimbrel, a bird of the curlew
kind: raimenius phoeopus.
"Hear that?" "Only a whimbrel, isn't
it ? " said George. " That's somethir g worse
than a whimbrel, I'm thinking," said the other.
— H. Kinysley, Geoffry Hainlyn, ch. v.
Whimsy-board, an instrument or
table uBed in some game of chance. A
correspondent of N. and Q. (III. vi.
208) says that in looking over some
Churchwardens' Accounts of the date
1684 he found the note of an applica-
tion to the magistrates for permission
to remove the whinisey -board, because
" it had become the resort of loose and
disorderly characters, and some of the
servants had taken their masters' money
to play away."
I am sometimes a small retainer to a
billiard-table, and sometimes, when the
master of it is sick, earn a penny by a
whimsy-board. — T. Brown, Works, ii. 17.
Whinstone, the toadstone, according
toH.
We found good verdure, and some curious
whin-rocks, or collections of stones, like the
ruins of the foundations of old buildings. —
Boswell, Life of Johnson, iv. 167.
The swift, sharp hound, once fit to be
Diana's, breaks his old teeth now, gnawing
mere whinstones. — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. III.
Bk. I. ch. ii.
Whip, an interjection = immedi-
ately.
You all talk it well affore you get in, but
you are no sooner chose in but whip ! you are
as proud as the devil. — Centlivre, Gotham
Election.
Wheu I came, whip was the key turned
upon the girls. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe,
viii. 207.
Whip, a coachman or driver.
Major Benson, who was a famous whip,
took his seat on the box of the barouche. —
Jliss Edyeworth, Absentee, ch. viii.
You're la wery good whip, and can do
what you tike with your horses. — Pickwick
Papers, ch. xiii.
Whip-belly-vengeanck, swipes, as
having an unpleasant effect on the
intestines. Cf. Rot-gut, Whistle-
BELLY-VENGEANCE.
I believe the brewer forgot the malt, or
the river was too near him. Faith, it's meer
whip-belly-vengeance.— Swift, Polite Conversa-
tion (Conv. ii.).
Whipcan, boon companion ; tippler :
a literal translation of fetse-pinte in
the original.
He would prove an especial good fellow,
and singular whipcan. — Urquhart's Rabelais,
Bk. I. ch. viii.
Whipcat, drunken.
With whipcat bowling they kept a myrry
carousing. — Stany hurst, JEn., iii. 367.
Whip-handles. See quotation. Ra-
belais is speaking of pigmies.
These little ends of men and dandiprats
fwhom in Scotland they call whiphandles
(tnanches d'estrilles), and knots of a tar-
barrel) are commonly very testy and choleric.
— Urquhart's Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxvii.
Whipjack, u a vagabond who begged
for alms as a distressed seaman," and
so a term of reproach generally.
Albeit one Boner (a bare whippe Jacke) for
lucre of money toke vpon him to be thy
father, and than to mary thy mother, yet
thou wast persone Savage's bastarde. — Bp.
Ponet (Maitland on Reformation, p. 74).
Sir Charles Grandison is none of your
gew-gaw whip-jacks that you know not
where to have. — Richardson, Grandison, vi.
156.
Whip-king, a ruler of kings ; king-
maker.
Richard Nevill, that whip-king (as some
tearmed ahim), . . . going about .... to turn
and translate scepters at his pleasure. —
Holland's Camden, p. 571.
Whipmaster, flogger: the word in
the original is flagellaior. Cf. Floq-
master.
Woe to our backsides, he is a greater
whipmaster than Busby himself. — Bailey's
Erasmus, p. 56.
Whipper, something superexcellent ;
something that whips all rivals, as an
American might say.
Mark wel this, this relique heer is a whipper.
My freend unfayned, this is a slipper
Of one of the seven slepers, be sure.
Heywood, Four P'« (DodsUy, 0. PL, i. 103).
WHIPPER-SNAPPER ( 721 ) WH1RLY-BATS
Whipper-snapper, a contemptuous
term for an insignificant fellow : used
also adjectivally.
A parcel of whipper-snapper sparks. —
Fielding, Jos. Andrews, Bk. IV. ch. vi.
The dog was frequently detected in all its
varieties, from the lap-dog, who had passed
into the whipper-snapper petit-mattre, and the
turn-spit who was now the bandy-legged
baker's boy, to the Squire's eldest son, who
had been a lurcher. — Souther/, Doctor, ch.
cxxvii.
Whippincrust. Dr. Wagner in his
edit, of Faustus (London series of Eng.
Classics) Bays, u Whippincrust is not
found in any dictionary accessible to
the present editor. The German trans-
lator, Dr. A. v. d. Velde, expresses it
by Prwjdruster, and adds that this
was suggested to him by the first part
of this apparently compounded word.
But cannot whippincrust be a kind of
pie-crust which contained eggs beaten
or whipt into it ? or even a drink con-
taining whipt eggs and bread?" So
people used to speak of a toast and
tankard. The scene in which it occurs
does not seem to be from Marlowe's
hand, not being found in the two old
editions.
I'll give thee white wine, red wine, claret
wine, sack, muskadine, malmsey, and whip-
pi ncmst. — Doctor Faustus, ii. 3.
Whipping-cheer, chastisement; flog-
ging-
Since there is no remedy but that whip-
piny -cheer must close up my stomach, I
would request a note from your grace to the
carman to intreat him to drive apace ; I shall
never endure it else. — Davenport, City Night-
Cap, Act IV.
Hell is the place where whipping - cheer
abounds.
Herrick, Noble Numbers, p. 398
(see also p. 427).
For better fare thou shalt find here
Than that same sowre-sauc'd whipping-cheer.
Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque, p. 187.
Whipping-snapping, diminutive; in-
significant : the participial form is rare.
Though they had seven - leagued boots,
you remember all sorts of whipping-snapping
Tom Thumbs used to elude and outrun them.
— Thackeray, Roundabout Papers, xv.
Whipping the snake (?).
The noble and antient recreation of round
robin, hey-jinks, and whipping the snake, in
great request with the merry sailors in Wap-
ping. — T. Brown, Works, i. 160.
Whipsnake, a venomous snake, so
called from its resemblance to a whip-
lash.
He wished it had been a whipsnake instead
of a magpie. — H. Kingsley, Geoffry Hamlyn,
ch. rxvii.
Whip-stitch, to stitch slightly.
In making of velvet breeches . . there is
required silke lace, cloth of golde, of silver,
and such costly stuff e, to welt, guard, whip-
stitch, edge, face, and draw out. — Greene,
Quip for Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v.
404
I
Whirl-about, a great fish of the
whale species. In the quotation taken
by itself the word might seem to mean
waterspout, but the context shows that
it is a tish of some sort, like the whirl-
pool mentioned ten lines lower down,
or the whirl-whale, q. v.
Shall I omit the monstrous whirl-about,
Which in the sea another sea doth spout ?
Sylvester, Fifth day, first weeke, 98.
Whirlblast, whirlwind. See quota-
tion 8. v. Myrrhy.
The whirl-blast comes, the desert-sands rise
up. — Coleridge, Night-Scene.
A whirl-blast from behind the hill
Kushed o'er the wood with startling sound.
Wordsworth, Poems of Fancy, iii.
How easily might these, dashing out on
Lafayette, snatch off the Hereditary Repre-
sentative, and roll away with him after the
manner of a whirlblast, whither they listed.
—Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt. II. Bk. IV. ch. i.
Whirle, a spinning-wheel.
Nourse, medle you with your spindle and
your whirle. — Udal, Roister Doister, i. 3.
Whirlery, wheeling flight (?), or
noise (?).
Thee gulligut harpeys
From mountayns flitter, with gagling whirl-
erye flapping
Theyr wings. — Stanyhurst, JEn., iii. 249.
Whirl-fire, electric fluid.
The smoaking storms, the whirl-fire's crack-
ling clash. — Sylvester, Tfie La we, 1011.
Whirl-whale, a large whale, some-
times called a whirlpool (Job xli. 1,
margin). Cf. Whirl-about.
Another swallowed in a whirl-whaleys womb,
Is layd aliue within a liuing tomb.
Sylvester, The Lawe, 732.
Whirly-bats, in the original ccestnum
certamen. The cwstus was a sort of
gauntlet of bull's hide with leaden or
iron bosses. See L. s. v. whirl-bat,
3 a
WHIRRICK
( 722 )
WHITE-MAIL
Lou. Running is a more noble exercise, for
JSneas in Virgil proposed this exercise.
Vi. Very true ; and he also proposed the
fighting with whirly-bats too, and I do not
like that sport.— Bailey's Erasmus, p. 48.
Whirrick, a blow. N. has whirret.
Harry . . . gave master such a whirrick
that his cries instantly sounded the ne plus
ultra to such kind of diversions.— H. Brooke,
Fool of Quality, i. 21.
Whiskerandoed, having busby whis-
kers.
To what follies and what extravagancies
would the whiskerandoed macaronies of Bond
Street and St. James's proceed, if the beard
once more were, instead of the neckcloth, to
** make the man."— Southey, The Doctor, ch.
clvi.
Whiskeypied, bemused with whiskey.
The two whiskeyfied gentlemen are up with
her, however. — Thackeray, The Virginians,
ch. xxxviii.
This person was a sort of whiskifed Old
Mortality, who claimed to have cut all man-
ner of tombstones standing around. — Black,
Adventures of a Phaeton, ch. xxviii.
Whisky-frisky, flighty.
As to talking in such a whisky -frisky
manner that nobody can understand him,
why it's tantamount to not talking at all. —
Mad. D'Arblay, Cecilia, Bk. IX. ch. iii.
WHI8PER0USLY, whisperingly.
The Duchess in awe of Carr Vipont sinks
her voice, and gabbles on whisperously. —
Lytton, What will he do with xt? Bk. V.
ch. viii.
Whister, to whisper.
Then returneth she home unto the sicke
party, .... and whistereth a certaine odde
praier with a Pater Noster into his eare —
Holland's Camden, ii. 147.
Oft fine whistring noise shall bring sweete
sleepe to thy sences.— Webbe , Eng. Poetrie,
p. 75.
Whistersnefet, a buffet
A good whistersnefet truelie paied on his
eaxe.— UdaTs Erasmus's Apophth., p. 112.
Whistle. To go whistle = to be
discomfited or disappointed. See quot-
ation s. v. Fat. The extract from
Johnston explains the origin of the
phrase.
Your fame is secure, bid the critics go whistle.
Shenstone, The Poet and the Dun.
"Do you not desire to be free?" "De-
sire ! aye, that I do ; but I may whistle for
that wind long enough before it will blow."
. — Johnston, Chrysal, ii. 184.
If Measter Cholmley don't do what I ax
him, he may go whistle for my vote, he may.
— Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers, ch. iv.
Whistle = whim, or fancy, in the
phrase u pay for one's whistle"
I wouldn't destroy any old bits, bat that
notion of reproducing the old is a mistake, I
think ; at least, if a man likes to do it, he
must pay for his whistle. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. xxxv.
Whistle-belly vengeance, swipes;
bad liquor. Cf. Whip-belly ven-
geance.
"I thought you wouldn't appreciate the
widow's tap," said East, watching him with
a grin : " regular whistle-belly vengeance, and
no mistake." — Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford,
ch. xli.
Whistle-drunk, completely drunk.
He was indeed, according to the vulgar
phrase, whistle-drunk; for before he had
swallowed the third bottle, he became so en-
tirely overpowered, that though he was not
carried off to bed till long after, the parson
considered him as absent. — Fielding, Tom
Jones, Bk. XIL ch. ii.
Whiteboys, Irish rioters, so called
because they wore white frocks over
their coats. Walpole uses the term of
London rioters.
Those black dogs, the whiteboys or coal-
heavers, are dispersed or taken. — Walpole,
Letters, iii. 260 (1768).
Whitechapel shave. See extract.
Blue-bearded though they were, and bereft
of the youthful smoothness of cheek which
is imparted by what is termed in Albion a
u Whitechapel Shave" (and which is, in fact,
whitening judiciously applied to the jaws
with the palm of the hand), I recognised
them. — Dickens, Uncommercial Traveller, xxv.
White horses, a name given to the
tossing, white-topped waves.
The bay is now curling and writhing iu
white horses under a smoking south-wester.
— C. Kingsley, 1849 (Life, i. 168).
White lie, a pious fraud. The first
quotation is a speech of George IIl.'s
when insane.
Sir George has told me a lie— a white lie,
he says, but I hate a white lie; if you will
tell me a lie, let it be a black lie.— Mad.
D'Arblay, Diary, iv. 289.
I wish that word fib was out of the Eng-
lish language, and white lie drummed out
after it.— Miss Edgeworth, Helen, ch. vi.
White-mail. Black-mail was a tax
paid to a powerful chieftain or robber
by which the payer compounded for
security for the rest of hia property ; to
WHITE MOORS ( 723 )
WHOLE
white-mail is to levy this sort of tax
for a good purpose.
He spent much of his gains, however, in
sovereign herbs and choice drugs, and would
have so invested them all, but Margaret
white - mailed a part. — Beade, Cloister and
Hearth, ch. lii.
White Moors, a name given to the
Genoese.
It is proverbially said, there are in Genoa
mountames without wood, sea without fish,
women without shame, and men without
conscience, which makes them to be termed
the white Moores. — Howell, Forraine Travell,
sect. 7.
Whites, a name given to certain
manufactured cloths. See extract
from Fuller s. v. Medley.
Salisbury has .... Long Cloths for the
Turkey trade, called Salisbury Whites. —
Defoe } Tour thro' G. Britain, i. 324.
This Town [Burstall] is famed for Dying,
and there is made here a sort of Cloth in
imitation of Gloucester Whites, which, tho'
they may not be so fine, yet their colours
are as good. — Ibid., iii. 146.
Whites, whites of the eyes.
And he, poor heart, no sooner heard my
news,
But turns me up his whites, and falls flat
down. — Grim the Collier, Act III.
The tradesman, lifting up both his hands
and whites to Heaven, calls upon the company,
saying, "Dearly beloved brethren, let us
praise God better.1*— Barnard, Life of Hey-
tin, p. clxxx.
Whites, white vestments. The
second extract is from the instructions
of Charles I. as to what was to be ob-
served in the Chapel Royal at Holyrood.
You clothe Christ with your blacks on
earth, he will clothe you with his glorious
whites in heaven. — Adams, ii. 174.
That the Dean of our chap pel that now is,
and so successively, come duly thither to
prayers upon Sundaies and such Holidaies
as the Church observes, in his whites, and
preach so whensoever he preach there. —
Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 262.
White-witch, a wizard or witch,
not of a malicious kind. See quotation
s. v. Yarbs.
The common people call him a wizard, a
white-witch, a conjuror, a cunning-man, a
necromancer.— Addison, The Drummer, Act
II.
He was what the vulgar call a white-iritch,
a cunning-man, and such lika— Scott, Kenil-
worth, i. 170.
When he had warts or burns, he went to
the white-witch at Northam to charm them
away.— Kingslcy, Westward Ho, ch. i.
Whiting's eye. See quotation.
I saw him just now give her the languish-
ing eye, as they call it, that is, the whiting's
eye, of old called the sheep's eje.— Wycher-
ley, Gentleman Dancing Master, iv. 1.
Whitson-lord, the president of a
Whitsun-cde, q. v. in N.
A cooper's wit, or some such busy spark,
Illumining the high constable and his clerk,
And all the neighbourhood from old records
Of antique proverbs, drawn from Whitson-
lords.— Jonson, Tale of a Tab (Prologue).
Whitster, a bleacher of linen. This
word is in the Diets., but all have one
and the same quotation {Merry Wives
of Windsor, III. iii.). N. says', " I do
not know that the word is even now
out of use ; but the authorities for it
are few."
So home, and my wife and maids being
gone over the water to the whitster's with
their clothes, this being the first time of her
trying this way of washing her linen. —
Bepys, Aug. 12, 1667.
Whittaw. See quotation; also H.
s. v. whittawer.
Men are busy there mending the harness,
under the superintendence of Mr. Goby the
whittaw, otherwise saddler.— G. Eliot, Adam
Bede, ch. vi.
Whittie-whattie, to whisper.
u What are ye whittie-whattieing about, ye
gowk ? " said his gentle sister, who suspected
the tenor of his murmurs.— Scott, Pirate* i.
101.
Whittle, explained in a note to be
" a cant word for confessing at the
gallows."
I must speak to the people a little,
But I'll see you all damn'd before I will
whittle.— Swift, Clever Tom Clinch.
Whitwall, a bird.
No sound was heard, except from far
away
The ringing of the whitwalVs shrilly laughter,
Or, now and then, the chatter of the jay,
That Echo murmur'd after.
Hood, Haunted House.
Whizle, to whistle.
Rush do the winds forward through perst
chinck narrolye whizliny.
Stanyhurst, JEn., i. 92.
Whole. By the whole = wholesale.
If the currier bought not leather by the
whole of the tanner, the shoemaker might
have it at a more reasonable price.— Greene,
Quip for Upstart Courtier (Harl. Misc., v.
411).
3 A 2
WHOLE-HOGGERY ( 7*4 ) WIDOW-BEWITCHED
Whole-hoooery, a thorough-going
clique or party. See quotation from
Southey s. v. Blue-ruin, where it seems
to mean the extreme reformers.
Whole-ones, bumpers (?) ; full
meals (?).
You use to gourmandize it upon full
gtomacks, to force carowses and Whole-ones
until you be full up to the very throat. —
Howell, Parly of Beasts, p. 27.
Whoop. " Cotgrave says it is a sort
of dunghill cock that loves to nestle in
man's ordure, and hath a great crest or
tuft of feathers on its head. M. le
Duchat (quoting Belon, of birds) says
it is a silly bird almost without any
tongue, and by its ill-articulated voice
it resembles that of matin-mumblers "
(note in loc.).
To the same place came his orison-mutterer,
impaletocked or lapped up about the chin,
like a tufted whoop {comme une duppe). —
Urquharfs Rabelais, Bk. I. ch. xxL
Were they as copped and high-crested as
marish whoops, ... it is all one to me. —
Ibid., Bk. II. ch. xii.
Whopper, anything big (slang). Cf .
Whacker.
This is a whopper that's after us. — Marryat,
Pr. Mildmay, ch. xx.
There's a- whopper rising not more than ten
yards below the rail. — Hughes, Tom Brown
at Oxford, ch.xlvii.
Whore's-bird, a vulgar term of abuse.
The word will also be found in Clarissa
Harlowe, v. 215. In the extract from
Hughes it is in a provincial form ; the
speaker is supposed to be a Berkshire
man.
They'd set some sturdy whore's-bird to meet
me, and beat out ha'f a dozen of my teeth. —
Plautus made English, p. 9 (1094).
Damn you all together for a pack of
whoresJ-birds as you are. — Graves, Spiritual
Quixote, Bk. IV. ch. ix.
"Imp'dent old wosbird!" says he, "HI
break the bald head on un." — Hughes, Tom
Brown's Schooldays, Pt. I. ch. ii.
Whorl. L. defines it "turn of the
spire of a univalve shell," but gives
no example.
See what a lovely shell,
Small and pure as a pearl,
Lying close to my foot ;
Frail, but a work divine,
Made so fairily well
With delicate spire and whorl.
Tennyson, Maud, Pt. II. ii.
Whortles, whortleberries. See ex-
tract 8. v. Tump.
Whurre, hurry. In Pericles IV. i.,
as quoted by L., whir = to hurry.
No haste but good, Madge Mumblecrust, for
whip and whurre,
The old prouerbe doth say, neuer made good
furre. — Udal, Roister Doister, L 3.
Why- not. To have at a why-not =
to have at a stand or in a dilemma.
Now, dame Sally, I .have you at a why-not,
or I never had. — Richardson, Grandisonj vi.
156.
Wicker, a wicker basket.
Each having a white wicker, overbrimmed
With April's tender younglings.
Keats, Endymion, Bk. I.
Wicket, mouth.
With hir that will clicket make daunger to
cope,
Least quickly hir wicket seeme easie to ope.
Tusser, Husbandrie, p. 169.
Wide, wide of the mark, and so,
bad.
God eyther denyes or defers the grant of
our requests for our good ; it were wide for
us if our suites should be euer heard. — Hall,
Contempt. (Aaron and Miriam).
It would be wide with the best of us if the
eye of God should looke backward to our
former estate. — Ibid. (Rahab).
Wide awake, keen ; sharp.
Our governor's wide awake, he is: Fll
never say nothin' agin him nor no man, but
he knows what's o'clock, he does; un-
common.— Sketches by Boz ( Watkins Tottle).
" Your aunt is a woman who is uncommon
wide awake, I can tell you." ** I always
knew, sir, that my aunt was perfectly aware
of the time of day," says Barnes, with a low
bow. — Thackeray, Newcomes, ch. xx.
Wide-awake, a soft felt hat with
broad brim.
" Then the fairy knight is extinct in Eng-
land?" asked Stangrave, smiling. a No man
leBS ; only he . . . has found a wide-awake
cooler than an iron kettle." — C. Kingslty, Two
Years Ago, Introduction.
She was one of the first who appeared in
the Park in a low-crowned hat — a wide-awake.
— H. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, ch. xliii.
Widow-bewitched, a woman separ-
ated from her husband. In the ori-
ginal there is nothing answering to this
phrase in the first extract. ,
They should see you divorced from jour
husband— a widow, nay, to live (a *ndotc
bewitched) worse than a widow ; for widows '
may marry again. — Bailey's Erasmus, p.
136.
Who'd ha' thought of yo*r husband, him
as was so slow and sure, steady Philip, as we
lasses used to ca' him, makin' a moonlight
WIDOWS MAN ( 72S )
WIND
fltttin', and leavin' to' to be a widow
bewitched! — Mrs. Gastell, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xxxix.
Widow's man. The extracts give
different meanings to this expression.
As to Square, who was in his person what
is called a jolly fellow, or a widow's man, he
easily reconciled his choice to the eternal
fitness of things. — Fielding, Tom Jones, Bk.
III. ch. vi.
Widow's men are imaginary sailors, borne
on the books, and receiving pay and prize
money, which is appropriated to Greenwich
Hospital. — Marryat, Peter Simple, ch. vii.,
note.
Wift, flag (?) ; weft ; something
woven (?).
Having held off the enemy some two
houres, and given a signe to the Towne by
hanging oat a wift that he was in distress©.
— Observable Passages in late siege of Ply-
mouth, 1644, p. 5.
Wigoery, used in the first extract for
empty formalities or red-tapeism ; in
the second for false hair.
There is yet in venerable wigged Justice
some wisdom amid such mountains of wig-
qeries and folly. — Carlyle, Past and Present,
Bk. II. ch. xvii.
She was a ghastly thing to look at, as well
from the quantity as from the nature of the
wiggeries that she wore. She had not only a
false front, but long false curls. — Trollope,
Last Chronicle of Bar set, ch. xxiv.
Wig less, without a wig.
Though wigless, with his cassock torn, he
bounds
From some facetious Squire's encouraged
hounds.
Colman, Vagaries Vindicated, p. 206.
Wig-wag, writhing ; wriggling. The
serpents attacking Laocoon are de-
scribed as
His midil embracing with icig-wag circuled
hooping. — Stanyhurst, JE/u, 11. 230.
Wild-brain, a harebrain.
I must let fly my civil fortunes, turn wild-
brain, lay my wits upo' th* tenters, you ras-
cals.— Middleton, A mad world, my masters,
I. i.
Wilderedly, wildly; bewilderedly.
Thou speak'st so wilderedly.
Taylor, Isaac Commenus, ii. 2.
Wilderment, bewilderment.
So in wilderment of gazing I looked up, and I
looked down.
Mrs. Browning, The Lost Bower.
Wilding, growing wild.
And here had falPn a great part of a tower,
Whole, like a crag that tumbles from the
cliff,
And like a crag was gay with wilding flowers.
Tennyson, Geraint and Enid.
Wildish, rather wild.
He is a little wildish, they say. — Ricliard-
son, Pamela, i. 129.
Wild-wind, a hurricane.
There happened an Hirecano or wild-wind.
—Fuller, Worthies, Essex (i. 338).
Wiles, wealds (?).
The earth is the Lord's and all the corners
thereof ; He created the mountaines of Wales
as well as the wiles of Kent. — Howell, For-
raine Travell, sect. 5.
Wilfulling, wilfulness. See extract
8. v. Bay.
Will-less, involuntary ; without will
of one's own.
All may be done, and the world be taught
further to admire you for your blind duty
and wil-less resignation. — Richardson, CI.
Harlowe, L 99.
Willo, trap forfiBh: vattl is the usual
form.
We behold, as it were, fishes of all sorts in
a fisher's trunk or willo.— Philpot, p. 385.
Willy-nilly, nolens volens; also,
vacillating.
If I thought myself bound to doctor the
man willy-nilly, as you do, I would certainly
go to him. — Kingsley, Two Years Ago, ch. x.
Some one saw thy willy-nilly nun
Vying a tress against our golden fern.
Tennyson, Harold, v. 1.
Winchester. The Winchester pint
equalled a quart. Skelton, complaining
of the short measure given by public-
ans, and reverting to the days of Henry
VIII., says —
Full Winchester gage
We had in that age.
Elynour Rummin (Harl. Misc.,
l 415).
Where [have youl squandered away the
tiresome minutes of your evening leisure
over seal'd Winchesters of three-penny guz-
ale?— T. Brown, Works, ii. 180.
Wind. /* the wind in that door ? =
is that the case ? sits the wind in that
quarter ?
u Why," quoth Pompeius, a is the winde in
this doore, that except Lu cull us were a man
geuen to delices, Pompeius might in no
wise continue alive ?"— Udal's Erasmus's
Apophth., p. 318.
WIND
( 726 )
WINDMILL Y
Thras. I am come to entreat you to stand
my friend, and to favour me with a longer
time, and I will make you sufficient consider-
ation.
Usurer. Is the wind in that door ? If thou
hast my money, so it is : I will not defer a
day, an hour, a minute. — Greene, Looking-
Glass for London, p. 121.
The wind is gotten into the other door since
we were prosecuted and decried as Pelagians
and enemies of grace. — Bramhall, iii. 507.
Wind. To take wind = to be known ;
to transpire.
If the lords had sat in the morning, the
design to be executed at one o'clock might
have taken wind. — North, life of Lord Guil-
ford, i. 101.
Wind. To raise the wind = to pro-
cure money.
So when to raise the wind some lawyer tries,
Mysterious skins of parchment meet our
eyes.
J. and H. Smith, Rejected Addresses,
p. 136.
Fortune at present is unkind,
And we, dear sir, must raise the wind.
Combe, Dr. Syntax, Tour III. c. iii.
Windage. L. defines this, " Differ-
ence in guns between the diameter of
the bore and that of the shot : " he gives
no example. In the extract this cannot
be the meaning; it seems rather to
signify the wind caused by the close
and rapid passage of the shot.
The last shot flying so close to Captain
Portar that with the windage of the bullet
his very hands had almost lost the sense of
feeling, being struck into a sudden numbness.
— Peeke, Three to One, 1625 (Arber, Eng.
Garner, i. 626).
Wind and water. Between wind
and water = full in the midst; the
exact wave-line of a ship. L. has the
phrase with extract from Macaulay.
The extract is of the date 1627.
He had hit his desires in the master-vein,
and struck his former jealousie between wind
and water, so that it sunk in the instant. —
Hist, of Edward II, p. 11.
Windball, a ball inflated with air.
Generally the high stile is disgraced and
made foolish and ridiculous by all wordes
affected, counterfait, and puffed vp, as it
were a windball carrying more countenance
than matter.— Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, Bk.
III. ch. vi.
Windbroach, a fiddle of an inferior
kind ; vielle.
Nero, a base blind fiddler, or player on
that instrument which is called a windbroach.
— Vrquhart's Rabelais, Bk. II. ch. xxx.
For an old man to pretend to talk wisely
is like a musician's endeavouring to fumble
out a fine sonata upon a wind-broach ; though
the time be good, the instrument is imper-
fect.— T. Brown, Works, ii. 234.
Winder, wither.
The herb Laserpitium there growing is of
so sauage and churlish a nature that ... if
one should goe about to tend and cherish it,
it would . . . winder away and die. — Holland,
Pliny, xix. 3.
Windlace. See quotation, where a
peculiar use of the word is noted.
The arblast was a cross-bow, the windlace
the machine used in bending that weapon. —
ScUt, Ivanhoe, ii 93.
Windlass, to bend. L. has it as a
verb neuter = to act indirectly ; in the
second extract it = to raise by a wind-
lass.
Your words, my friend (right healthful cans-
ticks), blame
My young mind mart, whom Love doth
windlas so,
That mine own writings like bad servants
shew
My wits quick in vain thoughts, in virtue
lame.
Sidney, Astrophel and Stella, st. 21.
"But the truth is all I want to get at,**
said Beauclerc. " Let her rest, my dear sir,
at the bottom of her well ; there she is, and,
there she will be for ever and ever, and
depend upon it, none of our windlassing will
ever bring her up.— Miss Edgeworth, Helen,
ch. xiv.
Windlatch, windlass or windlace,
q. v. in N. : metaphorically, contrivance.
The former are brought forth by a wind-
latch of a trial to charge the latter with the
foulest of crimes.— North, Examen, p. 307.
Windle, a machine on which yarn is
wound. See H. R. has windle as a
verb = to wind.
Speak her fair and canny, or we will have
a ravelled hasp on the yam-windles.Scott,
Pirate, i. 86.
Windlift, a windlass.
The Author intends no good in all this, but
brings it in as a windlift to heave up a gross
scandal— North, Examen, p. 354.
Windmills, vain projects ; castles in
the air. See extract *. v. Concord.
Windmilly, connected with wind-
mills.
A windmilly country this, though the wind-
mills are so damp and rickety. — Dickens,
Uncommercial Traveller, xxv.
W1ND0 W
( 7*7 )
WINTER-LOVE
Window, a blank space in a writing.
I will therefore that you send unto me a
collection thereof, and that your said collec-
tion have a window expedient to set what
name I will therein. — Cranmer, ii. 249.
Window - dropper, one who drops
from a window, though strictly it would
mean one who drops a window.
Mild, sedate convenience is better than a
stark, staring-mad passion. The wall-climb-
ers, the hedge and ditch-leapers, the river-
f orders, the window ~ droppers, always find
reason to think so. — Richardson, Grandison,
vi. 47.
Windowless, without windows.
It is usual ... to huddle them together
into naked walls and windowless rooms. — H.
Brooke, Fool of Quality, i. 377.
One would think he had spent his whole
life in the Younger Pliny's windowless study.
—J. Sterling, 1836 (Carlyle's Life, Pt. II.
ch. iv.)
I stood still at this end, which, being win-
dowless, was dark. — C. Bronte, Jane Eyre,
ch. xvii.
Windshake, a flaw in wood, caused
by violence of wind. See L. s. v.
windshock.
If you come into a shoppe, and fynde a
bowe that is small, long, heauy and strong,
lyinge streyght, not windyng, not marred
with knot, gaule, wyndcshake, wem, freate,
or pynche, bye that bowe of my warrant. —
Ascham, Toxophilus, p. 114.
Windy-footed, swift as the wind.
Chapman (Iliad, xv. 163) calls Iris
"the windy-footed dame."
Wine, the university abbreviation
for a wine-party.
He gave me my meals hospitably enough,
but disappeared every day about four to
" hall " ; after which he did not reappear
till eight, the interval being taken up, he
said, in " wines n and an hour of billiards. —
C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. xiii.
Winesop, a sort of flower. N. and
H., s. v. sops-in-wine, say the pink, but
it seems to be distinguished from this
in the extract.
Bring the pinckes therewith many gellifloures
Hweexe,
And the cullambynes ; let us haue the wyne-
sops. — Webbe, Eng. Poetrie, p. 84.
Wing. Mr. Singer notes on the fol-
lowing extract, "These are terms in
the noble art of kerving. In that
curious list of 'the dewe termys to
speak of brekynge or dressy nge of
dyvers beestys and foules' printed in
the Boke of St. Albans (I quote from
the fac-simile of the edition of 1496),
the proper terms appear to be a quayle
wynggyd, a plover mynsyd. "
Good man ! him list not spend his idle meals
In quinsing plovers, or in winging quails.
Hall, Satires, IV. ii. 38.
Wing, applied to the front leg or
shoulder of some quadrupeds.
If Scotish-men tax our language as im-
proper, and smile at our wing of a Rabbit,
let us laugh at their shoulder of a Capon. —
Fuller, Worthies, Norfolk (ii. 124).
Wingle. H. says, " to heckle flax,"
but it seems distinguished from heckle
in the extract from Howell «. v. Brake.
Winglet, little wing.
When he took off the winglets either wholly
or partially, the buzzing ceased. — Kirby and
Spence, Entomology, ii. 382.
Wing-post, See extract.
Probably our English would be found as
docible and ingenious as the Turkish Pigeons,
which carry letters from Aleppo to Babilon,
if trained up accordingly. But such prac-
tices by these Wing-posts would spoil many
a Foot-post.— Fuller, Worthies, Northampton
(ii. 158).
Wink-all-hid, a game mentioned by
Davies in the extract, and again in the
same work, p. 16.
He did
Driue them from dancing unto Winck-aU-hid.
Humour's Heauen on Earth, p. 30.
Winking. Like winking == very
much or quickly, from the rapidity of
a wink.
Both my legs began to bend like winkin*.
Hood, Sailor* 's Apology for bow-legs.
Nod away at him, if you please, like wink'
ing. — Dickens, Great Expectations, ch. xxi.
WlNNOW (?).
How solemnly the pendent ivy-mass
Swings in its winnow.
Coleridge, To the Departing Year.
Winterbourne. See extract.
From the graveyard itself burst up one of
those noble springs known as winterbournes
in the chalk ranges.— C. Kingsley, Yeast, ch. i.
Winter-love, cold or conventional
love-making (V).
What a deal of cold business doth a man
mis -spend the better part of life in! in
scattering compliments, tendering visits,
gathering and venting news, following feasts
and plays, making a little winter -love in a
dark corner. — B. Jonson, Discoveries (Joe-
tura vita).
WIPE
( 728)
WITH- CHILD
Such a passion as this makes love in a
continual fervour— makes it all alive. The
happy pair, iubtead of sitting dozing and
nodtliug at each other in opposite chimney-
corners in a winter eveuing, and over a
wintry love, always new to each other, and
having always something to say. — Richard-
son, VI. Harlowe, iii. 317.
Wipe, a handkerchief. See quotation
8. v. Clyfaking. Ben Jonson (Masque
of Owls) has " wipers for their noses."
" And what have you got, my dear ? "
said Fa gin to Charley Bates. " Wipes?
replied Master Bates, at the same time pro-
ducing four pocket-handkerchiefs. — Dickens,
Oliver Twisty eh. ix.
This here warment's prigged your wipe.
Ingoldsby Legends ( The Forlorn One).
Wisdom-tooth. Two double teeth
at the back of the mouth are called
wise or wisdom teeth, because coining
late, when persons are at years of dis-
cretion.
A double tooth
Is Wisdom's adopted dwelling.
Hood, Miss Kilmansegg.
He's noane cut his wisdom- teeth yet ; but
for that matter there's other folks as far fra'
sense as he is. — Mrs. Gaskell, Sylvia's Lovers,
ch. xxi.
Wise man, a conjurer. See quota-
tion from Latimer *. v. Witch.
I pray you tell where the wise man the
conjuror dwells. — Peele, Old Wives' Tale, p.
449.
Wise woman, a witch.
Supposing, according to popular fame,
Wise Woman and Witch to be the same.
Hood, Tale of a Trumpet.
Wish fulness, longing.
The natural infirmities of youth,
Sadness and softness, hopefulness, wishful-
ness.
All pangs for which we do not see good
cause,
Let's take no count of.
Taylor, Isaac Comnenus, iii. 1.
Wishy-washy, weak. See extract
s. v. Guinea-pig.
If you are a Coffin, you were sawn out of
no wishy-washy elm-board, but right heart-
of-oak. — Kingsley, Westward Ho, ch. viii.
Wisker, a lie.
Suppose I tell her some damned wisker;
why that's but m' old Dog-trick. — Plautus
made English, p. 9 (16*94).
Wisp, or Whisp, a disease in bul-
locks.
To cure a bullock that hath the whisp,
(that is) lame between the clees. Take the
impression of the bullock's foot in the earth
where he hath trod; then dig it up, and
stick therein five or seven thorns on the
wrong side, and then hang it on a bush to
dry, and as that dries, so the bullock heals.
This never fails for wisps. From Mr. Pacy,
a yeoman in Surry. — Aubrey, Misc., p. 138.
Wisp, an ignis fatuus; a Will o' the
wisp.
We did not know the real light, but chased
The wisp that flickers where no foot can
tread. — Tennyson, Princess, iv.
Wistles8, unknowing.
So saying, from his belt he took
The encumbering sword. I held it, listening
to him,
And, wist less what I did, half from the
sheath
Drew the well-temper'd blade.
Southey, Joan of Arc, Bk. I.
Wit, to joke ; to put wittily.
Burton doth pretend to wit it in his pulpit-
Kbell.—Heylin, Life of Laud, p. 260.
Witch, a wizard. See quotation
from Carlyle under next entry : perhaps
in second extract it = charm.
When we be in trouble, or sickness, or
lose anything, we run hither and thither to
witches or sorcerers whom we call wise men.
■ — Latimer, i. 534.
If a man but dally by her feet,
He thinks it straight a witch to charm his
daughter. — Greene, Geo-a-Greene, p. 262.
Pythagoras was part philosopher, part
magician, or part witch. — Burton, Danoc. to
Reader, p. 21.
The Maltese* took St. Paul for a witch. —
Howell, Letters, iii. 23.
Witch. To be no witch is to be
rather stupid. Cf. Conjuror.
Their judgement was upon the whole,
That Lady is the dullest soul ;
Then tipt their forehead in a jeer,
As who should say, She wants it here ;
She may be handsome, young, and rich,
But none will burn her for a wit*rh.
Swift, Cadenus and Vanessa.
The Editor is clearly no witch at a riddle.
— Carlyle, Misc., iii. 51.
Witch-wolf. See extract.
Those whom the Greeks call \vicdi>dpteirou?
. . . abound in Ardenna, called by the inhab-
itants lougarous; in English, witch-wolves,
witches that had put on the form of those
cruel beasts. — Adams, ii. 119.
Wit ful, wise ; sensible. See extract
8. v. Sight ful.
With-child, to get with child. In
the second quotation the reference is
WITHDRAUGHT ( 729 )
WOLF'S FOOT
also to the heavenly bodies. For to
be with child = to long. See *. v.
Child.
The lusty Heav'n with Earth doth company,
And with a fruitfull seed which lends all life,
With-childs each moment his owne lawfull
wife.
Sylvester, Second day, first weeke, 390.
Their order orderless and peacefull braul
Witft-childs the world, file sea, and earth,
and all. — Ibid., The Uolumnes, 000.
Withdraught, withdrawal.
May not a withdraught of all God's favours
... be as certainly foreseen and foretold ? —
Ward, Sermons, p. 145.
Withie-winde, bindweed. The ex-
tract is a translation of Gandidior
folio nivei Galatea ligustri.
Whiter Galet then the white withie-winde.
— Burton, Anatomy, p. 517.
Withoutside, outside. L. has with-
inside.
Why does that lawyer wear black ? does
he carry his conscience withoutside? — Con-
greve, Loss for Love, iv. 6.
But when I came witlioutside, I saw nobody
there. — Centlivre, Marplot, Act II.
Mr. Betham, late minister of the place, is
baried under the North wall of the Chancel
withoutside. — Defoe, Tour thro7 G. Britain, i.
288.
Wit- jab, head. Cf. Knowledge-box.
Dr. Hale, who was my good Astolf o (you
read Ariosto, Jack), and has brought me back
my wit-jar, had much ado ... to effect my
recovery. — Richardson, CI. Harlowe, viii. 249.
Witsape, to vouchsafe.
To this did I, ev'n from my tender youth,
Witsafe to bring thee up.
Sackville, Duke of Buckingham, st. 55.
Would'st thou witsafe to slide adowne
And dwell with vs !
Puttenham, Eng. Poesie,
Bk. III. ch. xix.
Witstand. To be at a witstand =
to be at wits' end, not to know what
to do.
They were at a witstand, and "could reach
no further.— Socket, Life of Williams, i. 188.
Wittified, clever.
Diverse of these were . . . dispersed to
those wittified ladies who were willing to
come into the order. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, i. 59.
Wittol, to make a wittol or con-
tented cuckold of a man.
He would wittol me
With a consent to my own horns.
Davenport, City Match, I. i.
Wit- wanton, over subtle; exercising
the wit or understanding in wanton or
extravagant speculations.
How dangerous it is f or wit-wanton men to
dance with their nice distinctions on such
mysticall precipices. — Fuller, Ch. Hist., X
iv. 4.
Wizen, shrivelled ; withered. Cf.
Weazen.
He is a gay little wizen old man in appear-
ance from the eastern climate's dilapidations
upon his youth and health. — Mad. D'Arblay,
Diary, v. 269.
I'll hold him quit of all else, so he'll but
quit me of that wizen little stump. — Ibid.,
Camilla, Bk. VII. ch. viii.
Wizened, withered.
There entered an old man, venerable at first
sight, but on nearer view, keen and wizened.
— Reade, Cloister and Hearth, ch. liii.
In God's liberal blue air
Peter's dome itself looks wizened.
Mrs. Browning, Ragged Schools.
He found his friend .... with a face
looking worn and wizened. — G. Eliot, Daniel
Deronda, ch. lxvii.
Woaded in the first quotation =
extracted from woad, the set up blues
being made with an adulterated dye ;
in the second quotation = stained with
woad.
The set up blues have made strangers
loathe the rich wooded blues. — Ward, Ser-
mons, p. 77.
Man
Tattoo'd or woaded, winter-clad in skins.
Tennyson, Princess, ii.
Wolf. To have a wolf by the ears
was a proverbial expression sufficiently
explained by the quotations.
He that deals with men's affections hath
a wolf by the ears ; if we speak of peace,
they wax wanton ; if we reprove, they grow
desperate. — Adams, iii. 249.
He found himself so intrigued that it was
like a wolf by the ears ; he could neither hold
it, nor let it go ; and, for certain, it bit him
at last. — North, Life of Lord Guilford, ii. 2.
Wolfkin, young wolf.
"Was this your instructions, wolfkin? n
(for she called me lambkin). — Richardson,
Pamela, i. 175.
Wolfling, a young wolf.
Toung children were thrown in, their
mothers vainly pleading: M Wolfiings" an-
swered the Company of Marat, " who would
grow to be wolves." — Carlyle, Fr. Rev., Pt.
III. Bk. V. ch. iii.
Wolf's foot, the club-moss : literal
WOMAN
( 730 )
WOODENL Y
trannlation of lycopodium. See quota-
tion S. V. ClIP-MObS.
»>
Woman, to call a person " woman
in an abusive way.
She called her another time fat-face, and
womaned her most violently. — Richardson,
Pamela, ii. 268.
Womb - brother, a brother on the
mother's side, but by a different father:
uterine brotlier is the more common
expression.
Edmund of Haddam . . . was Son to Queen
Katherine by Owen Theodor, her second
husband, Womb-lrrother to King Henry the
Sixth, and Father to King Henry the Seventh.
—Fuller, Worthies, Hartford (1. 427).
Wonder, to surprise.
She has a sedateness that wonders me still
more. — Mad. DfArblay, Diary, iv. 273.
Wonderland, the land of marvels.
The word is familiar to us now from
the popular book, Alice in Wonderland.
Lo, Brace in wonderland is quite at home.
Wolcot , P. Pindar, p. 186.
WoNDER-MAZE, to astonish. Mirum
in Modum was the title of one of
Duvies's works.
Hee taught and sought Bight's mines to
repaire,
Sometimes with words that wonder-mazed
men,
Sometimes with deedes that Angels did
admire. — Davits, Wittes Pilgrimage, p. 51.
Mirum in Modum men did wonder-maze.
J. James to Davits (Microcosmos, p. 7).
Wonder-rap, to rape or seize with
wonder : unless it be wonder- wop.
O sight of force to wonder-rap all eyes.
Davies, Muse's Sacrifice, p. 27.
Wont, to accustom.
These that in youth have wonted them-
selves to the load of less sins want not
increase of strength according to the increase
of their burdens. — Adams, i. 354.
Wood. N. says, " Jonson uses wood
in the same way the Latin sylva is used,
for a collection of anything. See The
Alchemist, iii. 2. * Salute the sisters,
entertain the whole family or wood of
'em.1 — Silent Woman, ii. 2." This
usage, however, is not peculiar to Jon-
son.
And though my buckler bore a wood of darts,
Yet left not I, hut with audacious face
I brauely fought. — Hudson, Judith, v. 500.
So many banners streaming in the ayre,
glittering armours, motions of plumes, woods
of pikes and swords, variety of colours. —
Burton, Democ. to Reader, p. 32.
Having a wood of widows of upright con-
versation, must you needs gather one crooked
with superstition to be pattern to all the rest ?
—Fuller, Holy State, L xi. 1.
Wooded, stripped of wood. Fielding,
having used the expression "well-
wooded forest of Hampshire," adds in a
note —
This is an ambiguous phrase, and may mean
either a forest well clothed with wood, or well
stripped of it. — Tom Jones, Bk. V. ch. xi.
Wooden, mad. •
A dog in the wood or a wooden dog! oh
comfortable hearing! — Pule, Old Wives1
Tale,\. 1.
Wooden horse, a ship. Cf. Plautus,
Rudens, I. v. : —
Nempe equo ligneo per vias caruleas
Estis vecUs.
They are glad on their wodden horses to
post after him [the herring]. — Nashe, Lenten
Sttrffe (Harl. Misc., vi. 161).
Vpon a wodden horse he rides through the
world, and in a merry gale makes a path
through the seas. — Breton, Good and Bad,
p. 9.
After she had well refresh'd herself and
ber little son (as yet a stranger to the riding
of so long a journey upon a wooden horse)
. . . she is waited on to Paris. — Hist, of
Edward II., p. 95.
Milford Haven, the chief stable for his
wooden horses. — Fuller, Worthies, ch. vi.
Wooden-horse, an erection made of
planks nailed together so as to form a
sharp ridge on wnich soldiers were set
astride, as a punishment, with muskets
tied to their feet. This penalty has
been long discontinued, having been
found to injure the men, producing
rupture in some cases.
Two new listed souldiers . . . were this day
tryed by a Court Martial, and sentenced to
ride the Wooden-Horse. — Rushworth Hist.
Coll., Pt. IV. Vol. II. p. 1369 (1648).
At her command they build a 'War-horse,
Bigger by far than Coach or Car-horse ;
Like that foot-souldier mounts upon,
When he turns Trooper or Dragoon ;
With Muskets ty'd for Spurn to heels,
And tho' he kicks, it never feels.
Cotton, Scarronides, p. 3.
Woodenly, awkwardly.
Diverse thought to have some sport in
seeing how woodenly he would excuse him-
self .—Sorth, Life 0/ Lord Guilford, ii. 22.
WOODEN-SHOES ( 731 )
WORMISH
Wooden-shoes, a name for French-
men, referring to the sabots. See
quotation s. v. Low-boy.
Hound-heads and Wooden-shoes are standing
jokes. — Prologue to Addison's Drummer.
Let Paris be the theme of Gallia's muse,
Where slav'ry treads the street in wooden
shoes. — Gay, Trivia, i. 86.
Virtue is cosmopolite, and may exist
among wooden-shoed Papists as well as honest
Church-of -England men. — Thackeray, Paris
Sketch Book, ch. vi.
Woodless, without timber.
Here are . . Meddows and Pasture, and
Arable and "Woody, and (generally) woodless
land.— Fuller, Worthies, Norfolk (ii. 124).
Wood-sale time, time for selling
wood ; by great of course = wholesale.
A sort of lusty bil-men set
In wood-sale time to sell a cops by great.
Sylvester, The Captaines, p. 243.
Woodsere, " loose, spungy ground "
(Lisle, Obs. in Husbandry, 1757, E. D.
S. ) ; sometimes spelt wood-sour. The
word also means the month or season
for cutting wood (Tusser, pp. Ill,
119).
The soil ... is a sour woodsere land, very
natural for the production of oaks especially.
— Aubrey, Misc., p. 211.
Woodwoses, madmen; wood who-
sos (?).
Some went naked, some roamed like
woodwoses, none did anything by reason. —
Wilson, Art of Rhetoric, 1554 (Eng, Garner t
i.464).
Wool. More squeak than wool =
more noise than sunstance ; a form of
the old proverb, *4 Great cry and little
wool,11 the story connected with which
will be seen in the last extract.
For matter of title he thought there was
more squeak than wool. — North, Life of Lord
Guilford, ii. 17.
The stir about the sheriff of London . . .
was much squeak and no wool, but an imper-
tinent contention to no profit. — Ilrid., ii. 326.
Tet thou may'st bluster like bull-beef so big ;
And, of thy own importance full,
Exclaim, " Great cry and little wool! "
As Satan hollaed when he shaved the pig.
Wolcot, P. Pindar, p. 135.
Woose, ooze ; marshy ground. The
Diets, have the adjective woosy. Howell
{Vindication of himself, 1677, Uarl.
misc., vi. 129) speaks of "the aguish
woose of Kent and Essex."
Word and a blow, immediate action :
also used adjectivally.
Nev. Pray, Miss, why do you sigh ?
Miss. To make a fool ask, and you are the
first.
Nev. Why, Miss, I find there is nothing but
a word and a blow with you.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. i.).
My Cousins are grieved : they did not ex-
pect that I would be a word and a blow, as
they phrase it. — Richardson, Grandison, iv.
206.
Mr. Joseph Parsons had a Napoleon-like
promptitude of action, which the unlearned
operatives described by calling him " a word-
and-a-blow man."— Mrs. Trollope, Michael
Armstrong, ch. iv.
Wordspite, abusive.
A silly yet ferocious wordspite quarrel. —
Palgrave, Hist. Norm, and Enq., ii. 661
(1857). *
Wordstrife, dispute about words.
The earliest instance of logomachy, as
an English word given in the Diets., is
froin Bp. Hairs Answer to Smectym-
nuus's Vindication, 1641, six years
after the date of Hacket's work ; un-
less a quotation in L. from Howell,
without further reference, be earlier.
The end of this Xoyo^avia or word-strife.
—Socket, Life of Williams, ii. 107.
Workful, full of work, or designed
for work.
You saw nothing in Coketown but what
was severely workful.— Dickens, Hard Times,
ch. v.
Worksome, industrious.
So through seas of blood to equality,
frugality, worksome blessedness. — Carlvle^ Fr.
Rev., Pt. III. Bk. VI. ch. vi
World. The world and his wife =
every one.
Miss. Pray, Madam, who were the com-
pany?
Lady Sm. Why there was all the world and
his wife.
Swift, Polite Conversation (Conv. iii.).
How he welcomes at once all the world and
his wife,
And how civil to folk he ne'er saw in his life.
New Rath Guide, Letter xiii.
All the world and his wife and daughter
leave cards. Sometimes the worltfs wife has
so many daughters that her card reads
rather like a miscellaneous lot at an auction.
—Dickens, Our Mutual Friend, Bk. I. ch. xvii.
Worm-eat, to impair, as by the
gnawing of worms.
Leave off these vanities which icorm-eat
your brain. — Jarvis*s Don Quixote, Pt. H.
Bk. IV. ch. x.
WoiiMisH, worm-like.