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CLO

CLICK. A blow. A click in the muns; a blow or knock in the face. Cant.

TO CLICK. To snatch. To click a nab; to snatch a hat. Cant.

CLICKER. A salesman's servant; also, one who proportions out the different shares of the booty among thieves. CLICKET. Copulation of foxes; and thence used, in a canting sense, for that of men and women: as, The cull and the mort are at clicket in the dyke; the man and woman are copulating in the ditch.

CLIMB. To climb the three trees with a ladder; to ascend the gallows.

CLINCH. A pun or quibble. To clinch, or to clinch the nail; to confirm an improbable story by another: as, A. man swore he drove a tenpenny nail through the moon ; a bystander said it was true, for he was on the other side and clinched it,

CLINK. A place in the Borough of Southwark, formerly privileged from arrests; and inhabited by lawless vagabonds of every denomination, called, from the place of their residence, clinkers. Also a gaol, from the clinking of the prisoners' chains or fetters: he is gone to clink. CLINKERS. A kind of small Dutch bricks; also irons worn by prisoners; a crafty fellow.

TO CLIP. To hug or embrace : to clip and cling. To clip the coin; to diminish the current coin. To clip the king's English; to be unable to speak plain through drunken

ness.

CLOAK TWITCHERS. Rogues who lurk about the entrances into dark alleys, and bye-lanes, to snatch cloaks from the shoulders of passengers.

CLOD HOPPER. A country farmer, or ploughman.
CLOD PATE. A dull, heavy booby,

CLOP POLE. The same.

CLOSE. As close as God's curse to a whore's a-se: close as shirt and shitten a-se.

CLOSE-FISTED. Covetous or stingy.

CLOSH. A general name given by the mobility to Dutch seamen, being a corruption of Claus, the abbreviation of Nicholas, a name very common among the men of that nation.

CLOTH MARKET. He is just come from the cloth market, i. e. from between the sheets, he is just risen from bed. CLOUD. Tobacco. Under a cloud; in adversity. CLOVEN, CLEAVE, or CLEFT. A term used for a woman who passes for a maid, but is not one.

CLOVEN FOOT. To spy the cloven foot in any business; to

discover

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discover some roguery or something bad in it: a saying that alludes to a piece of vulgar superstition, which is, that, let the Devil transform himself into what shape he will, he cannot hide his cloven foot.

The mors

To CHUCK. To shew a propensity for a man. chucks; the wench wants to be doing. CLOUT. A blow. I'll give you a clout on your jolly nob; I'll give you a blow on your head. It also means a handkerchief. Cant. Any pocket handkerchief except a silk

one.

CLOUTED SHOON. Shoes tipped with iron.

CLOUTING LAY. Picking pockets of handkerchiefs. CLOVER. To be, or live, in clover; to live luxuriously. Clover is the most desirable food for cattle.

CLOWES. Rogues.

CLOY. To steal. To cloy the clout; to steal the handkerchief. To cloy the lour; to steal money. Cant. CLOYES. Thieves, robbers, &c.

CLUB. A meeting or association, where each man is to spend an equal and stated sum, called his club.

CLUB LAW. Argumentum bacculinum, in which an oaken stick is a better plea than an act of parliament.

CLUMP. A lump. Clumpish; lumpish, stupid.
CLUNCH. An awkward clownish fellow.

TO CLUTCH THE FIST. Toclench or shut the hand. Clutch fisted; covetous, stingy. See CLOSE-FISTED.

CLUTCHES. Hands, gripe, power.

CLUTTER. A stir, noise, or racket: what a confounded clutter here is !

CLY. Money; alsó a pocket. He has filed the cly; he has picked a pocket. Cant.

CLY THE JERK. To be whipped. Cant.

CLYSTER PIPE. A nick name for an apothecary.

COACH WHEEL. A half crown piece is a fore coach wheel, and a crown piece a hind coach wheel; the fore wheels of a coach being less than the hind ones.

TO COAX. To fondle, or wheedle. To coax a pair of stockings; to pull down the part soiled into the shoes, so as to give a dirty pair of stockings the appearance of clean ones. Coaxing is also used, instead of darning, to hide the holes about the ancles.

Cов. A Spanish dollar.

COB, or COBBING. A punishment used by the seamen for petty offences, or irregularities, among themselves: it consists in bastonadoing the offender on the posteriors with a cobbing stick, or pipe staff; the number usually inflicted is a dozen. At the first stroke the executioner repeats

the

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the word watch, on which all persons present are to take off their hats, on pain of like punishment: the last stroke is always given as hard as possible, and is called the purse. Ashore, among soldiers, where this punishment is sometimes adopted, watch and the purse are not included in the number, but given over and above, or, in the vulgar phrase, free gratis for nothing. This piece of discipline is also inflicted in Ireland, by the school-boys, on persons coming into the school without taking off their hats; it is there called school butter.

COBBLE. A kind of boat.

TO COBBLE. To mend, or patch; likewise to do a thing in a bungling manner.

COBBLE COLTER. A turkey.

COBBLER. A mender of shoes, an improver of the understandings of his customers; a translator.

COBBLERS PUNCH. Treacle, vinegar, gin, and water. COCK, or CHIEF COCK OF THE WALK. The leading man in any society or body; the best boxer in a village or district.

COCKALE. A provocative drink.

COCK ALLEY or COCK LANE. The private parts of a wo

man.

COCK AND A BULL STORY. A roundabout story, without head or tail, i. e. beginning or ending.

COCK OF THE COMPANY. A weak man, who from the desire of being the head of the company associates with low people, and pays all the reckoning.

COCK-A-WHOOP, Elevated, in high-spirits, transported with joy.

COCK BAWD. A male keeper of a bawdy-house.
COCK HOIST. A cross buttock,

/ COCKISH. Wanton, forward. A cockish wench; a forward coming girl.

COCKLES. To cry cockles; to be hanged: perhaps from the noise made whilst strangling. Cant.---This will rejoice the cockles of one's heart; a saying in praise of wine, ale, or spirituous liquors.

COCK PIMP. The supposed husband of a bawd.
COCK ROBIN. A soft, easy fellow.

COCK-SURE. Certain a metaphor borrowed from the cock of a firelock, as being much more certain to fire than the match,

COCK YOUR EYE, Shut one eye: thus translated into apothecaries Latin.---Gallus tuus ego.

COCKER. One fond of the diversion of cock-fighting. COCKNEY. A nick name given to the citizens of London,

or

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or persons born within the sound of Bow bell, derived from the following story: A citizen of London being in the country, and hearing a horse neigh, exclaimed, Lord! how that horse laughs! A by-stander telling him that noise was called neighing, the next morning, when the cock crowed, the citizen to shew he had not forgot what was told him, cried out, Do you hear how the cock neighs? The king of the cockneys is mentioned among the regulations for the sports and shows formerly held in the Middle Temple on Childermas Day, where he had his officers, a marshal, constable, butler, &c. See Dugdale's Origines Juridiciales, p. 247.---Ray says, the interpretation of the word Cockney, is, a young person coaxed or conquered, made wanton; or a nestle cock, delicately bred and brought up, so as, when arrived at man's estate, to be unable to bear the least hardship. Whatever may be the origin of this appellation, we learn from the following verses, attributed to Hugh Bigot, Earl of Norfolk, that it was in use in the time of king Henry II.

Was I in my castle at Bungay,

Fast by the river Waveney,

I would not care for the king of Cockney;

i. e. the king of London.

COCKSHUT TIME. The evening, when fowls go to roost.
Con. A cod of money: a good sum of money.

CODDERS, Persons employed by the gardeners to gather

peas.

CODGER. An old codger; an old fellow.

COD PIECE. The fore flap of a man's breeches. Do they bite, master? where, in the cod piece or collar?---a jocular attack on a patient angler by watermen, &c. Cons. The scrotum. Also a nick name for a curate: a rude fellow meeting a curate, mistook him for the rector, and accosted him with the vulgar appellation of Bol---ks the rector, No, Sir, answered he; only Cods the curate, at your service.

COD'S HEAD. A stupid fellow.

COFFEE HOUSE. A necessary house. To make a coffeehouse of a woman's ****; to go in and out and spend nothing.

COG. The money, or whatsoever the sweeteners drop to draw in a bubble.

COG. A tooth. A queer cog; a rotten tooth. How the cull flashes his queer cogs; how the fool shews his rotten teeth.

To Cou. To cheat with dice; also to coax or wheedle. To cog

COL

cog a die; to conceal or secure a die. To cog a dinner; to wheedle one out of a dinner.

COGUE. A dram of any spirituous liquor,

COKER. A lie.

COKES. The fool in the play of Bartholomew Fair: perhaps a contraction of the word coxcomb.

COLCANNON. Potatoes and cabbage pounded together in a mortar, and then stewed with butter: an Irish dish. COLD. You will catch cold at that; a vulgar threat or advice to desist from an attempt. He caught cold by lying in bed barefoot; a saying of any one extremely tender or careful of himself.

COLD BURNING. A punishment inflicted by private soldiers on their comrades for trifling offences, or breach of their mess laws; it is administered in the following manner: The prisoner is set against the wall, with the arm which is to be burned tied as high above his head as possible. The executioner then ascends a stool, and having a bottle of cold water, pours it slowly down the sleeve of the delin quent, patting him, and leading the water gently down his body, till it runs out at his breeches knees: this is repeated to the other arm, if he is sentenced to be burned in both. COLD COOK. An undertaker of funerals, or carrion hunter. See CARRION HUNTER.

COLD IRON. A sword, or any other weapon for cutting or
stabbing. I gave him two inches of cold iron into his beef.
COLD MEAT.
A dead wife is the best cold meat in a man's

house. COLD PIG. To give cold pig is a punishment inflicted on sluggards who lie too long in bed: it consists in pulling off all the bed clothes from them, and throwing cold water upon them.

COLD PUDDING.

This is said to settle one's love. COLE. Money. Post the cole: pay down the money. COLIANDER, or CORIANDER SEEDS. Money. COLLAR DAY. Execution day.

COLLEGE. Newgate, or any other prison. New College; the Royal Exchange. King's College: the King's Bench prison. He has been educated at the steel, and took his last degree at college; he has received his education at the house of correction, and was hanged at Newgate. COLLEGE COVE. TheCollege cove has numbered him,and if he is knocked down he'll be twisted; the turnkey of Newgate has told the judge how many times the prisoner has been tried before, and therefore if he is found guilty,he certainly will be hanged. It is said to be the custom of the Old Bailey for one of the turnkeys of Newgate to give information to

the

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