1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue

SLUR. To slur, is a method of cheating at dice: also to cast a reflection on any one's character, to scandalize.

SLUSH. Greasy dish-water, or the skimmings of a pot where fat meat has been boiled.

SLUSH BUCKET. A foul feeder, one that eats much greasy food.

SLY BOOTS. A cunning fellow, under the mask of simplicity.

SMABBLED, or SNABBLED. Killed in battle.

TO SMACK. To kiss. I had a smack at her muns: I kissed her mouth. To smack calves skin; to kiss the book, i.e. to take an oath. The queer cuffin bid me smack calves skin, but I only bussed my thumb; the justice bid me kiss the book, but I only kissed my thumb.

SMACKSMOOTH. Level with the surface, every thing cut away.

SMACKING COVE. A coachman.

SMALL CLOTHES. Breeches: a gird at the affected delicacy of the present age; a suit being called coat, waistcoat, and articles, or small clothes.

SMART. Spruce, fine: as smart as a carrot new scraped.

SMART MONEY. Money allowed to soldiers or sailors for the loss of a limb, or other hurt received in the service.

SMASHER. A person who lives by passing base coin. The cove was fined in the steel for smashing; the fellow was ordered to be imprisoned in the house of correction for uttering base coin.

SMASH. Leg of mutton and smash: a leg of mutton and mashed turnips. SEA TERM.

TO SMASH. To break; also to kick down stairs. CANT. To smash. To pass counterfeit money.

SMEAR. A plasterer.

SMEAR GELT. A bribe. GERMAN.

SMELLER. A nose. Smellers: a cat's whiskers.

SMELLING CHEAT. An orchard, or garden; also a nosegay. CANT.

SMELTS. Half guineas. CANT.

SMICKET. A smock, or woman's shift.

SMIRK. A finical spruce fellow. To smirk; to smile, or look pleasantly.

SMITER. An arm. To smite one's tutor; to get money from him. ACADEMIC TERM.

SMITHFIELD BARGAIN. A bargain whereby the purchaser is taken in. This is likewise frequently used to express matches or marriages contracted solely on the score of interest, on one or both sides, where the fair sex are bought and sold like cattle in Smithfield.

SMOCK-FACED. Fair faced.

TO SMOKE. To observe, to suspect.

SMOKER. A tobacconist.

SMOKY. Curious, suspicious, inquisitive.

SMOUCH. Dried leaves of the ash tree, used by the smugglers for adulterating the black or bohea teas.

SMOUS. A German Jew.

SMUG. A nick name for a blacksmith; also neat and spruce.

SMUG LAY. Persons who pretend to be smugglers of lace and valuable articles; these men borrow money of publicans by depositing these goods in their hands; they shortly decamp, and the publican discovers too late that he has been duped; and on opening the pretended treasure, he finds trifling articles of no value.

SMUGGLING KEN. A bawdy-house.

TO SMUSH. To snatch, or seize suddenly.

SMUT. Bawdy. Smutty story; an indecent story.

SMUT. A copper. A grate. Old iron. The cove was lagged for a smut: the fellow was transported for stealing a copper.

SNACK. A share. To go snacks; to be partners.

TO SNABBLE. To rifle or plunder; also to kill.

SNAFFLER. A highwayman. Snaffler of prances; a horse stealer.

TO SNAFFLE. To steal. To snaffle any ones poll; to steal his wig.

SNAGGS. Large teeth; also snails.

SNAKESMAN. See LITTLE SNAKESMAN.

SNAP DRAGON. A Christmas gambol: raisins and almonds being put into a bowl of brandy, and the candles extinguished, the spirit is set on fire, and the company scramble for the raisins.

TO SNAP THE GLAZE. To break shop windows or show glasses.

SNAPPERS. Pistols.

SNAPT. Taken, caught.

SNATCH CLY. A thief who snatches women's pockets.

SNEAK. A pilferer. Morning sneak; one who pilfers early in the morning, before it is light. Evening sneak; an evening pilferer. Upright sneak: one who steals pewter pots from the alehouse boys employed to collect them. To go upon the sneak; to steal into houses whose doors are carelessly left open. CANT.

SNEAKER. A small bowl.

SNEAKING BUDGE. One that robs alone.

SNEAKSBY. A mean-spirited fellow, a sneaking cur.

SNEERING. Jeering, flickering, laughing in scorn.

SNICKER. A glandered horse.

TO SNICKER, or SNIGGER. To laugh privately, or in one's sleeve.

TO SNILCH. To eye, or look at any thing attentively: the cull snilches. CANT.

SNIP. A taylor.

SNITCH. To turn snitch, or snitcher; to turn informer.

TO SNITE. To wipe, or slap. Snite his snitch; wipe his nose, i.e. give him a good knock.

TO SNIVEL. To cry, to throw the snot or snivel about. Snivelling; crying. A snivelling fellow; one that whines or complains.

TO SNOACH. To speak through the nose, to snuffle.

SNOB. A nick name for a shoemaker.

TO SNOOZE, or SNOODGE. To sleep. To snooze with a mort; to sleep with a wench. CANT.

SNOOZING KEN. A brothel. The swell was spiced in a snoozing ken of his screens; the gentleman was robbed of his bank notes in a brothel.

SNOW. Linen hung out to dry or bleach. Spice the snow; to steal the linen.

SNOUT. A hogshead. CANT.

SNOWBALL. A jeering appellation for a negro.

TO SNUB. To check, or rebuke.

SNUB DEVIL. A parson.

SNUB NOSE. A short nose turned up at the end.

SNUDGE. A thief who hides himself under a bed, in Order to rob the house.

SNUFF. To take snuff; to be offended.

TO SNUFFLE. To speak through the nose.

SNUFFLES. A cold in the head, attended with a running at the nose.

SNUG. All's snug; all's quiet.

TO SOAK. To drink. An old soaker; a drunkard, one that moistens his clay to make it stick together.

SOCKET MONEY. A whore's fee, or hire: also money paid for a treat, by a married man caught in an intrigue.

SOLDIER'S BOTTLE. A large one.

SOLDIER'S MAWND. A pretended soldier, begging with a counterfeit wound, which he pretends to have received at some famous siege or battle.

SOLDIER'S POMATUM. A piece of tallow candle.

SOLDIER. A red herring.

SOLFA. A parish clerk.

SOLO PLAYER. A miserable performer on any instrument, who always plays alone, because no one will stay in the room to hear him.

SOLOMON. The mass. CANT.

SON OF PRATTLEMENT. A lawyer.

SONG. He changed his song; he altered his account or evidence. It was bought for an old song, i.e. very cheap. His morning and his evening song do not agree; he tells a different story.

SOOTERKIN. A joke upon the Dutch women, supposing that, by their constant use of stoves, which they place under their petticoats, they breed a kind of small animal in their bodies, called a sooterkin, of the size of a mouse, which when mature slips out.

SOP. A bribe. A sop for Cerberus; a bribe for a porter, turnkey, or gaoler.

SOPH. (Cambridge) An undergraduate in his second year.

SORREL. A yellowish red. Sorrel pate; one having red hair.

SORROW SHALL BE HIS SOPS. He shall repent this. Sorrow go by me; a common expletive used by presbyterians in Ireland.

SORRY. Vile, mean, worthless. A sorry fellow, or hussy; a worthless man or woman.

SOT WEED. Tobacco.

SOUL CASE. The body. He made a hole in his soul case; he wounded him.

SOUL DOCTOR, or DRIVER. A parson.

SOUNDERS. A herd of swine.

SOUSE. Not a souse; not a penny. FRENCH.

SOW. A fat woman. He has got the wrong sow by the ear, he mistakes his man. Drunk as David's sow; see DAVID'S SOW.

SOW'S BABY. A sucking pig.

SOW CHILD. A female child.

SPADO. A sword. SPANISH.

SPANGLE. A seven shilling piece.

SPANK. (WHIP) To run neatly along, beteen a trot and gallop. The tits spanked it to town; the horses went merrily along all the way to town.

SPANISH. The spanish; ready money.

SPANISH COIN. Fair words and compliments.

SPANISH FAGGOT. The sun.

SPANISH GOUT. The pox.

SPANISH PADLOCK. A kind of girdle contrived by jealous husbands of that nation, to secure the chastity of their wives.

SPANISH, or KING OF SPAIN'S TRUMPETER. An ass when braying.

SPANISH WORM. A nail: so called by carpenters when they meet with one in a board they are sawing.

SPANKS, or SPANKERS. Money; also blows with the open hand.

SPANKING. Large.

SPARK. A spruce, trim, or smart fellow. A man that is always thirsty, is said to have a spark in his throat.

SPARKISH. Fine, gay.

SPARKING BLOWS. Blows given by cocks before they close, or, as the term is, mouth it: used figuratively for words previous to a quarrel.

SPARROW. Mumbling a sparrow; a cruel sport frequently practised at wakes and fairs: for a small premium, a booby having his hands tied behind him, has the wing of a cock sparrow put into his mouth: with this hold, without any other assistance than the motion of his lips, he is to get the sparrow's head into his mouth: on attempting to do it, the bird defends itself surprisingly, frequently pecking the mumbler till his lips are covered with blood, and he is obliged to desist: to prevent the bird from getting away, he is fastened by a string to a button of the booby's coat.

SPARROW-MOUTHED. Wide-mouthed, like the mouth of a sparrow: it is said of such persons, that they do not hold their mouths by lease, but have it from year to year; i.e. from ear to ear. One whose mouth cannot be enlarged without removing their ears, and who when they yawn have their heads half off.

SPATCH COCK. [Abbreviation of DISPATCH COCK.] A hen just killed from the roost, or yard, and immediately skinned, split, and broiled: an Irish dish upon any sudden occasion.

TO SPEAK WITH. To rob. I spoke with the cull on the cherry-coloured prancer; I robbed the man on the black horse. CANT.

SPEAK. Any thing stolen. He has made a good speak; he has stolen something considerable.

SPECKED WHIPER. A coloured hankerchief. CANT.

SPICE. To rob. Spice the swell; rob the gentleman.

SPICE ISLANDS. A privy. Stink-hole bay or dilberry creek. The fundament.

SPIDER-SHANKED. Thin-legged.

TO SPIFLICATE. To confound, silence, or dumbfound.

SPILT. A small reward or gift.

SPILT. Thrown from a horse, or overturned in a carriage; pray, coachee, don't spill us.

SPINDLE SHANKS. Slender legs.

TO SPIRIT AWAY. To kidnap, or inveigle away.

SPIRITUAL FLESH BROKER. A parson.

SPIT. He is as like his father as if he was spit out of his mouth; said of a child much resembling his father.

SPIT. A sword.

SPIT FIRE. A violent, pettish, or passionate person.

SPLICED. Married: an allusion to joining two ropes ends by splicing. SEA TERM.

SPLIT CROW. The sign of the spread eagle, which being represented with two heads on one neck, gives it somewhat the appearance of being split.

SPLIT CAUSE. A lawyer.

SPLIT FIG. A grocer.

SPLIT IRON. The nick-name for a smith.

SPOONEY. (WHIP) Thin, haggard, like the shank of a spoon; also delicate, craving for something, longing for sweets. Avaricious. That tit is damned spooney. She's a spooney piece of goods. He's a spooney old fellow.

SPOIL PUDDING. A parson who preaches long sermons, keeping his congregation in church till the puddings are overdone.

TO SPORT. To exhibit: as, Jack Jehu sported a new gig yesterday: I shall sport a new suit next week. To sport or flash one's ivory; to shew one's teeth. To sport timber; to keep one's outside door shut; this term is used in the inns of court to signify denying one's self. N.B. The word SPORT was in great vogue ann. 1783 and 1784.

SPUNGE. A thirsty fellow, a great drinker. To spunge; to eat and drink at another's cost. Spunging-house: a bailiff's lock-up-house, or repository, to which persons arrested are taken, till they find bail, or have spent all their money: a house where every species of fraud and extortion is practised under the protection of the law.

SPUNK. Rotten touchwood, or a kind of fungus prepared for tinder; figuratively, spirit, courage.

SPOON HAND. The right hand.

TO SPOUT. To rehearse theatrically.

SPOUTING CLUB. A meeting of apprentices and mechanics to rehearse different characters in plays: thus forming recruits for the strolling companies.

SPOUTING. Theatrical declamation.

SPOUTED. Pawned.

SPREAD. Butter.

SPREAD EAGLE. A soldier tied to the halberts in order to be whipped; his attitude bearing some likeness to that figure, as painted on signs.

SPREE. A frolic. Fun. A drinking bout. A party of pleasure.

SPRING-ANKLE WAREHOUSE. Newgate, or any other gaol: IRISH.

SQUAB. A fat man or woman: from their likeness to a well-stuffed couch, called also a squab. A new-hatched chicken.

SQUARE. Honest, not roguish. A square cove, i.e. a man who does not steal, or get his living by dishonest means.

SQUARE TOES. An old man: square toed shoes were anciently worn in common, and long retained by old men.

SQUEAK. A narrow escape, a chance: he had a squeak for his life. To squeak; to confess, peach, or turn stag. They squeak beef upon us; they cry out thieves after us. CANT.

SQUEAKER. A bar-boy; also a bastard or any other child. To stifle the squeaker; to murder a bastard, or throw It into the necessary house.—Organ pipes are likewise called squeakers. The squeakers are meltable; the small pipes are silver. CANT.

SQUEEZE CRAB. A sour-looking, shrivelled, diminutive fellow.

SQUEEZE WAX. A good-natured foolish fellow, ready to become security for another, under hand and seal.

SQUELCH. A fall. Formerly a bailiff caught in a barrack-yard in Ireland, was liable by custom to have three tosses in a blanket, and a squelch; the squelch was given by letting go the corners of the blanket, and suffering him to fall to the ground. Squelch-gutted; fat, having a prominent belly.

SQUIB. A small satirical or political temporary jeu d'esprit, which, like the firework of that denomination, sparkles, bounces, stinks, and vanishes.

SQUINT-A-PIPES. A squinting man or woman; said to be born in the middle of the week, and looking both ways for Sunday; or born in a hackney coach, and looking out of both windows; fit for a cook, one eye in the pot, and the other up the chimney; looking nine ways at once.

SQUIRE OF ALSATIA. A weak profligate spendthrift, the squire of the company; one who pays the whole reckoning, or treats the company, called standing squire.

SQUIRISH. Foolish.

SQUIRREL. A prostitute: because she like that animal, covers her back with her tail. Meretrix corpore corpus alit. Menagiana, ii. 128.

SQUIRREL HUNTING. See HUNTING.

STAG. To turn stag; to impeach one's confederates: from a herd of deer, who are said to turn their horns against any of their number who is hunted.

TO STAG. To find, discover, or observe.

STAGGERING BOB, WITH HIS YELLOW PUMPS. A calf just dropped, and unable to stand, killed for veal in Scotland: the hoofs of a young calf are yellow.

STALL WHIMPER. A bastard. CANT.

STALLING. Making or ordaining. Stalling to the rogue; an ancient ceremony of instituting a candidate into the society of rogues, somewhat similar to the creation of a herald at arms. It is thus described by Harman: the upright man taking a gage of bowse, i.e. a pot of strong drink, pours it on the head of the rogue to be admitted; saying,—I, A.B. do stall thee B.C. to the rogue; and from henceforth it shall be lawful for thee to cant for thy living in all places.

STALLING KEN. A broker's shop, or that of a receiver of stolen goods.

STALLION. A man kept by an old lady for secret services.

STAM FLESH. To cant. CANT.

STAMMEL, or STRAMMEL. A coarse brawny wench.

STAMP. A particular manner of throwing the dice out of the box, by striking it with violence against the table.

STAMPS. Legs.

STAMPERS. Shoes.

STAND-STILL. He was run to a stand-still; i.e. till he could no longer move.

STAR GAZER. A horse who throws up his head; also a hedge whore.

TO STAR THE GLAZE. To break and rob a jeweller's show glass. CANT.

STARCHED. Stiff, prim, formal, affected.

STARING QUARTER. An ox cheek.

START, or THE OLD START. Newgate: he is gone to the start, or the old start. CANT.

STARTER. One who leaves a jolly company, a milksop; he is no starter, he will sit longer than a hen.

STARVE'EM, ROB'EM, AND CHEAT'EM. Stroud, Rochester, and Chatham; so called by soldiers and sailors, and not without good reason.

STAR LAG. Breaking shop-windows, and stealing some article thereout.

STASH. To stop. To finish. To end. The cove tipped the prosecutor fifty quid to stash the business; he gave the prosecutor fifty guineas to stop the prosecution.

STATE. To lie in state; to be in bed with three harlots.

STAY. A cuckold.

STAYTAPE. A taylor; from that article, and its coadjutor buckram, which make no small figure in the bills of those knights of the needle.

STEAMER. A pipe. A swell steamer; a long pipe, such as is used by gentlemen to smoke.

STEEL. The house of correction.

STEEL BAR. A needle. A steel bar flinger; a taylor, stay-maker, or any other person using a needle.

STEENKIRK. A muslin neckcloth carelessly put on, from the manner in which the French officers wore their cravats when they returned from the battle of Steenkirk.

STEEPLE HOUSE. A name given to the church by Dissenters.

STEPHEN. Money. Stephen's at home; i.e. has money.

STEPNEY. A decoction of raisins of the sun and lemons in conduit water, sweetened with sugar, and bottled up.

STEWED QUAKER. Burnt rum, with a piece of butter: an American remedy for a cold.

STICKS. Household furniture.

STICKS. Pops or pistols. Stow your sticks; hide your pistols. CANT. See POPS.

STICK FLAMS. A pair of gloves.

STIFF-RUMPED. Proud, stately.

STINGRUM. A niggard.

STINGO. Strong beer, or other liquor.

STIRRUP CUP. A parting cup or glass, drank on horseback by the person taking leave.

STITCH. A nick name for a taylor: also a term for lying with a woman.

STITCHBACK. Strong ale.

STIVER-CRAMPED. Needy, wanting money. A stiver is a Dutch coin, worth somewhat more than a penny sterling.

STOCK. A good stock; i.e. of impudence. Stock and block; the whole: he has lost stock and block.

STOCK DRAWERS. Stockings.

STOCK JOBBERS. Persons who gamble in Exchange Alley, by pretending to buy and sell the public funds, but in reality only betting that they will be at a certain price, at a particular time; possessing neither the stock pretended to be sold, nor money sufficient to make good the payments for which they contract: these gentlemen are known under the different appellations of bulls, bears, and lame ducks.

STOMACH WORM. The stomach worm gnaws; I am hungry.

STONE. Two stone under weight, or wanting; an eunuch.

Stone doublet; a prison. Stone dead; dead as a stone.

STONE JUG. Newgate, or any other prison.

STONE TAVERN. Ditto.

STOOP-NAPPERS, or OVERSEERS OF THE NEW PAVEMENT. Persons set in the pillory. CANT.

STOOP. The pillory. The cull was served for macing and napp'd the stoop; he was convicted of swindling, and put in the pillory.

STOP HOLE ABBEY. The nick name of the chief rendzvous of the canting crew of beggars, gypsies, cheats, thieves, &c. &c.

STOTER. A great blow. Tip him a stoter in the haltering place; give him a blow under the left ear.

STOUP. A vessel to hold liquor: a vessel containing a size or half a pint, is so called at Cambridge.

STOW. Stow you; be silent, or hold your peace. Stow your whidds and plant'em, for the cove of the ken can cant'em; you have said enough, the man of the house understands you.

STRAIT-LACED. Precise, over nice, puritanical.

STRAIT WAISTCOAT. A tight waistcoat, with long sleeves coming over the hand, having strings for binding them behind the back of the wearer: these waistcoats are used in madhouses for the management of lunatics when outrageous.

STRAMMEL. See STAMMEL.

STRANGER. A guinea.

STRANGLE GOOSE. A poulterer.

To STRAP. To work. The kiddy would not strap, so he went on the scamp: the lad would not work, and therefore robbed on the highway.

STRAPPER. A large man or woman.

STRAPPING. Lying with a woman. CANT.

STRAW. A good woman in the straw; a lying-in woman. His eyes draw straw; his eyes are almost shut, or he is almost asleep: one eye draws straw, and t'other serves the thatcher.

STRETCH. A yard. The cove was lagged for prigging a peter with several stretch of dobbin from a drag; the fellow was transported for stealing a trunk, containing several yards of ribband, from a waggon.

STRETCHING. Hanging. He'll stretch for it; he will be hanged for it. Also telling a great lie: he stretched stoutly.

STRIKE. Twenty shillings. CANT.

STRIP ME NAKED. Gin.

STROKE. To take a stroke: to take a bout with a woman.

STROLLERS. Itinerants of different kinds. Strolling morts; beggars or pedlars pretending to be widows.

STROMMEL. Straw. CANT.

STRONG MAN. To play the part of the strong man, i.e. to push the cart and horses too; to be whipt at the cart's tail.

STRUM. A perriwig. Rum strum: a fine large wig. (CAMBRIDGE) To do a piece. Foeminam subagitare. CANT.

To STRUM. To have carnal knowledge of a woman; also to play badly on the harpsichord; or any other stringed instrument. A strummer of wire, a player on any instrument strung with wire.

STRUMPET. A harlot.

STUB-FACED. Pitted with the smallpox: the devil ran over his face with horse stabs (horse nails) in his shoes.

STUBBLE IT. Hold your tongue. CANT.

STULING KEN. See STALLING KEN. CANT.

STUM. The flower of fermenting wine, used by vintners to adulterate their wines.

STUMPS. Legs. To stir one's stumps; to walk fast.

STURDY BEGGARS. The fifth and last of the most ancient order of canters, beggars that rather demand than ask CANT.

SUCCESSFULLY. Used by the vulgar for SUCCESSIVELY: as three or four landlords of this house have been ruined successfully by the number of soldiers quartered on them. IRISH.

SUCH A REASON PIST MY GOOSE, or MY GOOSE PIST. Said when any one offers an absurd reason.

SUCK. Strong liquor of any sort. To suck the monkey; see MONKEY. Sucky; drunk.

To SUCK. To pump. To draw from a man all be knows. The file sucked the noodle's brains: the deep one drew out of the fool all he knew.

SUCKING CHICKEN. A young chicken.

SUDS. In the suds; in trouble, in a disagreeable situation, or involved in some difficulty.

SUGAR STICK. The virile member.

SUGAR SOPS. Toasted bread soked in ale, sweetened with sugar, and grated nutmeg: it is eaten with cheese.

SULKY. A one-horse chaise or carriage, capable of holding but one person: called by the French a DESOBLIGEANT.

SUN. To have been in the sun; said of one that is drunk.

SUNBURNT. Clapped; also haying many male children.

SUNDAY MAN. One who goes abroad on that day only, for fear of arrests.

SUNNY BANK. A good fire in winter.

SUNSHINE. Prosperity.

SUPERNACOLUM. Good liquor, of which there is not even a drop left sufficient to wet one's nail.

SUPOUCH. A landlady of an inn, or hostess.

SURVEYOR OF THE HIGHWAYS. One reeling drunk.

SURVEYOR OF THE PAVEMENT. One standing in the pillory.

SUS PER COLL. Hanged: persons who have been hanged are thus entered into the jailor's books.

SUSPENCE. One in a deadly suspence; a man just turned off at the gallows.

SUTRER. A camp publican: also one that pilfers gloves, tobacco boxes, and such small moveables.

SWABBERS. The ace of hearts, knave of clubs, ace and duce of trumps, at whist: also the lubberly seamen, put to swab, and clean the ship.

SWAD, or SWADKIN. A soldier. CANT.

To SWADDLE. To beat with a stick.

SWADDLERS. The tenth order of the canting tribe, who not only rob, but beat, and often murder passenges. CANT.

Swaddlers is also the Irish name for methodist.

SWAG. A shop. Any quantity of goods. As, plant the swag; conceal the goods. Rum swag; a shop full of rich goods. CANT.

SWAGGER. To bully, brag, or boast, also to strut.

SWANNERY. He keeps a swannery; i.e. all his geese are swans.

SWEATING. A mode of diminishing the gold coin, practiced chiefly by the Jews, who corrode it with aqua regia. Sweating was also a diversion practised by the bloods of the last century, who styled themselves Mohocks: these gentlemen lay in wait to surprise some person late in the night, when surrounding him, they with their swords pricked him in the posteriors, which obliged him to be constantly turning round; this they continued till they thought him sufficiently sweated.