HAND BASKET PORTION. A woman whose husband receives frequent presents from her father, or family, is said to have a hand-basket portion.

HANDLE. To know how to handle one's fists; to be skilful in the art of boxing. The cove flashes a rare handle to his physog; the fellow has a large nose.

HANDSOME.

He is a handsome-bodied man in the face; a jeering commendation of an ugly fellow. Handsome is that handsome does: a proverb frequently cited by ugly women. HANDSOME REWARD. This, in advertisements, means a horse-whipping.

To HANG AN ARSE.

To hang back, to hesitate.

HANG GALLOws Look. A thievish, or villainous appear

ance.

HANG IN CHAINS. A vile, desperate fellow. Persons guilty of murder, or other atrocious crimes, are frequently, after execution, hanged on a gibbet, to which they are fastened by iron bandages; the gibbet is commonly placed on or near the place where the crime was committed.

HANG IT UP. Score it up: speaking of a reckoning.
HANG OUT.

The traps scavey where we hang out; the of

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ficers know where we live. HANGER ON. A dependant. HANGMAN'S WAGES. Thirteen pence halfpenny; which, according to the vulgar tradition, was thus allotted one. shilling for the executioner,and three halfpence for the rope, ---N. B. This refers to former times; the hangmen of the present day having, like other artificers, raised their prices. The true state of this matter is, that a Scottish mark was the fee allowed for an execution, and the value of that piece was settled by a proclamation of James I. at thirteen pence halfpenny.

HANK. He has a bank on him; i. e. an ascendancy over him, or a hold upon him. A Smithfield hank; an ox, rendered furious by overdriving and barbarous treatment. See BULL HANK.

HANKER. To hanker after any thing; to have a longing after or for it.

HANS IN KELDER. Jack in the cellar, i. e. the child in the womb a health frequently drank to breeding women or their husbands.

HARD. Stale beer, nearly sour, is said to be hard. Hard also means severe: as, hard fate, a hard master.

HARD AT HIS A-SE. Close after him.'

HARE. He has swallowed a hare; he is drunk; more probably a hair, which requires washing down.

HARK

HARK-YE-ING. Whispering on one side to borrow money.
HARMAN. A constable. Cant.

HARMAN BECK. A beadle. Cant.
HARMANS. The stocks. Cant.

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HARP. To harp upon; to dwell upon a subject. Have among you, my blind harpers; an expression used in throwing or shooting at random among the crowd. Harp is also the Irish expression for woman, or tail, used in tossing up in Ireland from Hibernia, being represented with a harp on the reverse of the copper coins of that country; for which it is, in hoisting the copper, i. e. tossing up, sometimes likewise called music. HARRIDAN. A hagged old woman; a miserable, scraggy, worn-out harlot, fit to take her bawd's degree: derived from the French word haridelle, a worn-out jade of a horse

or mare.

HARRY. A country fellow. Cant.--Old Harry; the Devil. HARUM SCARUM. He was running harum scarum; said of any one running or walking hastily, and in a hurry, after they know not what.

HASH. To flash the hash; to vomit. Cant.

HASTY. Precipitate, passionate. He is none of the Hastings sort; a saying of a slow, loitering fellow: an allusion to the Hastings pea, which is the first in season.

HASTY PUDDING. Oatmeal and milk boiled to a moderate thickness, and eaten with sugar and butter. Figuratively, a wet, muddy road: as, The way through Wandsworth is quite a hasty pudding. To eat hot hasty pudding for a laced hat, or some other prize, is a common feat at wakes and fairs.

HAT. Old hat; a woman's privities: because frequently felt.

HATCHES. Under the batches; in trouble, distress, or debt. HATCHET FACE. A long thin face.

HAVIL. A sheep. Cunt.

HAVY CAVY. Wavering, doubtful, shilly shally. HAWK. Ware hawk; the word to look sharp, a bye-word when a bailiff passes. Hawk also signifies a sharper, in opposition to pigeon. See PIGEON. See WARE HAWK. HAWKERS. Licensed itinerant retailers of different commodities, called also pedlars; likewise the sellers of news-papers. Hawking; an effort to spit up the thick phlegm, called oysters: whence it is wit upon record, to ask the person so doing whether he has a licence; a punming allusion to the Act of hawkers and pedlars.

TO HAZEL GILD. To beat any one with a hazel stick.

H

HEAD

HEAD CULLY OF THE PASS, or PASSAGE BANK. The top tilter of that gang throughout the whole army, who demands and receives contribution from all the pass banks in

the camp.

HEAD RAILS.

HEARING CHEATS.

HEART'S EASE.

HEARTY CHOAK. He will have a hearty choak and caper sauce for breakfast; i. e. he will be hanged.

HEATHEN PHILOSOPHER. One whose breech may be seen through his pocket-hole: this saying arose from the old philosophers, many of whom depised the vanity of dress to such a point, as often to fall into the opposite extreme. TO HEAVE. To rob. To heave a case; to rob a house. To heave a bough; to rob a booth. Cant. HEAVER. The breast. Cant.

HEAVERS. Thieves who make it their business to steal tradesmen's shop-books. Cant.

HECTOR. A bully, a swaggering coward. To hector; to bully, probably from such persons affecting the valour of Hector, the Trojan hero.

HEDGE. To make a hedge; to secure a bet, or wager, laid on one side, by taking the odds on the other, so that, let what will happen, a certain gain is secured, or hedged in, by the person who takes this precaution; who is then said to be on velvet.

HEDGE ALEHOUSE. A small obscure alehouse.
HEDGE CRREPER. A robber of hedges.

HEDGE PRIEST. An illiterate unbeneficed curate, a patrico.
HEDGE WHORE. An itinerant harlot, who bilks the bagnios
and bawdy-houses, by disposing of her favours on the way-
side, under a hedge; a low beggarly prostitute.
HEELS. To be laid by the heels; to be confined, or put in
prison. Out at heels; worn, or diminished: his estate or
affairs are out at heels. To turn up his heels; to turn up
the knave of trumps at the game of all-fours.

HEEL TAP. A peg in the heel of a shoe, taken out when it is finished. A person leaving any liquor in his glass, is frequently called upon by the toast-master to take off his heel-tap. HELL. A taylor's repository for his stolen goods, called cabbage: see CABBAGE. Little hell; a small dark covered passage, leading from London-wall to Bell-alley. HELL-BORN BABE. A lewd graceless youth, one naturally of a wicked disposition.

HELL CAT. A termagant, a vixen, a furious scolding woman. See TERMAGANT and VIXEN.

HELL

HELL HOUND. A wicked abandoned fellow.

HELL FIRE DICK. The Cambridge driver of the Telegraph., The favorite companion of the University fashionables, and the only tutor to whose precepts they attend. HELTER SKELTER. To run helter skelter, hand over head, in defiance of order.

HEMP. Young hemp; an appellation for a graceless boy. HEMPEN FEVER. A man who was hanged is said to have died of a hempen fever; and, in Dorsetshire, to have been stabbed with a Bridport dagger; Bridport being a place famous for manufacturing hemp into cords.

HEMPEN WIDOw. One whose husband was hanged.
HEN-HEARTED. Cowardly.

HEN HOUSE.

A house where the woman rules; called also a she house, and hen frigate: the latter a sea phrase, originally applied to a ship, the captain of which had his wife on board, supposed to command him.

HENPECKED. A husband governed by his wife, is said to be henpecked.

HEN.

A Woman. A cock and hen club; a club composed of men and women.

HERE AND THEREIAN. One who has no settled place of residence.

HERRING. The devil a barrel the better herring; all equally bad.

HERRING GUTTED. Thin, as a shotten hering.

HERRING POND. The sea. To cross the herring pond at the king's expence ; to be transported.

HERTFORDSHIRE KINDNESS. Drinking twice to the same person.

HICK. A country hick; an ignorant clown. Cant. HICKENBOTHOM. Mr. Hickenbothom; a ludicrous name for an unknown person, similar to that of Mr. Thingambob. Hickenbothom, i. e. a corruption of the German word ickenbaum, i. e. oak tree.

HICKEY. Tipsey; quasi, hickupping.

HIDE AND SEEK. A childish game. He plays at hide and seek; a saying of one who is in fear of being arrested for debt, or apprehended for some crime, and therefore does not chuse to appear in public, but secretly skulks up and down. See SKULK.

HIDEBOUND. Stingy, hard of delivery: a poet poor in invention, is said to have a hidebound muse. HIGGLEDY PIGGLEDY. Confusedly mixed.

HIGH EATING. To eat skyiarks in a garret.

HIGH FLYERS. Tories, Jacobites.

HIGH JINKS. A gambler at dice, who, having a strong
head, drinks to intoxicate his adversary, or pigeon.
HIGH LIVING. To lodge in a garret, or cockloft.
HIGH PAD. A highwayman. Cant.

HIGH ROPES. To be on the high ropes; to be in a passion.
HIGH SHOON, or CLOUTED SHOON. A country clown.
HIGH WATER. It is high water with him; he is full of

money.

HIGHGATE. Sworn at Highgate---a ridiculous custom formerly prevailed at the public houses in Highgate, to administer a ludicrous oath to all travellers of the middling rank who stopped there. The party was sworn on a pair of horns, fastened on a stick the substance of the oath was, never to kiss the maid when he could kiss the mistress, never to drink small beer when he could get strong, with many other injunctions of the like kind; to all which was added the saving cause of "unless you like it best." The person administering the oath was always to be called father by the juror; and he, in return, was to style him son, under the penalty of a bottle. HIKE. To hike off; to run away. HIND-LEG. To kick out a hind leg; to make a rustic bow. HINNEY, MY HONEY. A north country hinney, particularly a Northumbrian: in that county, hinney is the general term of endearment.

Cant.

HISTORY OF THE FOUR KINGS, or CHILD'S BEST GUIDE TO THE GALLOWS. A pack of cards. He studies the history of the four kings assiduously; he plays much at cards. HOAXING. Bantering, ridiculing. Hoaxing a quiz; joking an odd fellow. University wit.

Нов, or HовBINOL, a clown.

HOB OR NOB. Will you hob or nob with me? a question formerly in fashion at polite tables, signifying a request or challenge to drink a glass of wine with the proposer: if the party challenged answered Nob, they were to chuse whether white or red. This foolish custom is said to have originated in the days of good queen Bess, thus: when great chimnies were in fashion, there was at each corner of the hearth, or grate, a small elevated projection, called the hob ; and behind it a seat. In winter time the beer was placed on the hob to warm: and the cold beer was set on a small table, said to have been called the nob; so that the question, Will you have hob or nob? seems only to have meant, Will you have warm or cold beer? i. e. beer from the bob, or beer from the nob. HOBBERDEHOY. Halfa man and half a boy; a lad between both.

HOBELED.