a

A WA ARTHUP; KING ARTHUR. A game used at sea, when near

the line, or in a hot latitude. It is performed thus: A man who is to represent king Arthur,ridiculously dressed, having a large wig made out of oakum, or some old swabs, is seated on the side, or over a large vessel of water. Every person in his turn is to be ceremoniously introduced to him, and to pour a bucket of water over him, crying, hail,king Arthur! if during this ceremony the person introduced laughs or smiles (to which his majesty endeavours to excite him, by all sorts of ridiculous gesticulations), he changes place with, and then becomes, king Arthur, till relieved by some brother tar, who has as little command

over his muscles as himself. ARTICLES. Breeches; coat, waistcoat, and articles. ARTICLE. A wench. A prime article. A handsome girl.

. She's a a prime article (Whip slang), she's a devilish good

piece, a hell of a goer. Ask, or Ax My A--E. A common reply to any question;

still deemed wit at sea, and formerly at court, under the

denomination of selling bargains. See BARGAIN. Assig. An assignation. ATHANASIAN WENCH, or QUICUNQUE VULT. A forward

girl, ready to oblige every man that shall ask her. Aunt. Mine aunt; a bawd or procuress: a title of eminence for the senior dells, who serve for instructresses,midwives,

&c. for the dells. Cant. See Dells. AVOIR DU POIS LAY. Stealing brass weights off the coun

ters of shops. Cant. AUTEM. A church. AUTEM BAWLER. A parson. Cant. Auten CACKLERS. S'Dissenters of every denomination. AUTEM PRICKEARS. Cunt. AUTEM CACKLE TUB. A conventicle or meeting-house for

dissenters. Cant. AUTEM DIPPERS. Anabaptists. Cant. AUTEM DIVERS. Pickpockets who practice in churches; also church wardens and overseers of the poor.

Cant. 'AUTEM GOGLERS. Pretended French prophets. Cant. AUTEM MORT. A married woman; also a female beggar

with several children hired or borrowed to excite charity.

Cant. AUTEM QUAVERS. Quakers. AUTEM QUAVER TỤk. A Quakers' meeting-house. Cant. AWAKE. Acquainted with, knowing the business. Stow the

books, the culls are awake; hide the cards, the fellows know what we intended to do.

2

BABES BAL

L BABES IN THE W00D. Criminals in the stocks, or pillory BABBLE. Confused, unintelligible talk, such as was used at

the building the tower of Babel. BACK BITER. One who slanders another behind his back,

i. e, in his absence. His bosom friends are become his back

biters, said of a lousy man. BACKED. · Dead. He wishes to have the senior, or old

square-toes, backed: he longs to have his father on six

men's shoulders ; that is, carrying to the grave. BACK UP. His back is up, i. e. he is offended or angry ; an

expression or idea taken from a cat; that animal, when angry, always raising its back. An allusion also sometimes used to jeer a crooked man ; as, So, Sir, I see somebody

has offended you, for your back is up. Bacon. He has saved his bacon ; he has escaped He has a

good voice to beg bacon ; a saying in ridicule of a bad voice. BACON-FACED). Full-faced. BACON FED.

rat, greasy. BACK GAMMON PLAYER. A sodomite. Back Door (USHER, or GENTLEMAN OF THE). The same. BAD BARGAIN. One of his majesty's bad bargains; a

worthless soldier, a malingeror. See MALINGEROR. BADGE. A term used for one burned in the hand. He has got

his badge, and piked; he was burned in the hand, and is

at liberty. Cant. BADGE-Coves. Parish Pensioners. Cant. BADGERS. A crew of desperate villains who robbed near

rivers, into which they threw the bodies of those they

murdered. Cant. Bag. He gave them the bag, i, e. left them. BAG OF NAILS. He squints like a bag of nails ; i. e.

his eyes are directed as many ways as the points of a bag of nails. The old Bag of NAILS at Pimlico; originally

the BACCHANALS. BAGGAGE. Heavy baggage; women and children. Also a

familiar epithet for a woman; as, cunning baggage,

wanton baggage, &c.' Bakers Dozen. Fourteen; that number of rolls being al

lowed to the purchasers of a dozen. BAKER-KNEE'D. One whose knees knock together in

walking, as if kneading dough. BALDERDASH. Adulterated wine. BALLOCKS. The testicles of a man or beast ; also a vulgar

nick name for a parson. His brains are in his ballocks,

a cant saying to designate a fool. BALUM RANCUM. A hop or dance, where the women'are

ali prostitutes.' N.B. The company dance in their birthday suits.

BALSAM,

BAR BALSAM. Money. BAM. A jocular imposition, the same as a humbug. See

HUMBUG. To Bam. To impose on any one by a falsity ; also to

jeer or make fun of any one. To BAMBOOZLE. To make a fool of any one, to humbug or

impose on him. BANAGHAN. He beats Banaghan; an Irish saying of one

who tells wonderful stories. Perhaps Banaghan was a

minstrel famous for dealing in the marvellous. BANDBOX. Mine a-se on a bandbox; an answer to the

offer of any thing inadequate to the purpose for which

it is proffered, like offering a bandbox for a seat. BANBURY STORY OF A COCK AND A BULL. A round,

about, nonsensical story. BANDOG. A bailiff or his follower; also a very fierce

mastiff: likewise, a bandbox, Cant. BANG UP. (Whip.) Quite the thing, hellish fine. Well

done. Compleat. Dashing. In a handsome stile, A bang up cove; a dashing fellow who spends his money freely. To bang up prime: to bring your horses up in a dashing or fine style: as the swell's rattler and prads are bang up prime; the gentleman sports an elegant carriage

and fine horses. To Bang, To beat. BANGING. Great; a fine banging boy. BANG STRAW. A nick name for a thresher, but applied

to all the servants of a farmer. BANKRUPT CART. A one-horse chaise, said to be so

called by a Lord Chief Justice, from their being so frequently used on Sunday jaunts by extravagant shop

keepers and tradesmen, BANKS's HORSE. A horse famous for playing tricks, the

property of one Banks. It is mentioned in Sir Walter Raleigh's Hist. of the World, p. 178; also by Sir Ke

nelm Digby and Ben Jonson. BANTLING. A young child. BANYAN DAY, A sea term for those days on which no

meat is allowed to the sailors: the term is borrowed from the Banyans in the East Indies, a cast that eat no

thing that had life. BAPTIZED, OR CHRISTENED. Rum, brandy, or any other

spirits, that have been lowered with water. BARBER's CHAIR, She is as common as a barber's chair, in

which a whole parish sit to be trimmed; said of a pros

titute, BARBER'S SIGN. A standing pole and two wash balls.

BARGAIN

BAS BARGAIN. To sell a bargain; a species of wit, much in

vogue about the latter end of the reign of Queen Anne, and frequently alluded to by Dean Swift, who says the maids of honour often amused themselves with it. It consisted in the seller naming his or her hinder parts, in answer to the question, What? which the buyer was artfully led to ask. As a specimen, take the following instance: A lady would come into a room full of company, apparently in a fright, crying out, It is white, and follows me! On any of the company asking, What? she sold

him the bargain, by saying, Mine a--e. BARGEES. (Cambridge.) Baige-men on the river. BARKER. The shopman of a bow-wow shop, or dealer in

second hand clothes, particularly about Monmouth-Street, who walks before his master's door, and deafens every passenger with his cries of---Clothes, coats, or gowns --what d'ye want, gemmen ?---what d'ye buy? See Bow-wow

Shop. BARKSHIRE. A member or candidate for Barkshire, said of

one troubled with a cough, vulgarly styled barking. BARKING IRONS. Pistols, from their explosion resembling

the bow-wow or barking of a dog. Irish. BARN. A parson's barn; never so full but there is still room

for more. Bit by a barn mouse, tipsey, probably from an

allusion to barley. BARNABY. An old dance to a quick movement. See Cotton,

in his Virgil Travesti; where, speaking of Eolus he has these lines,

Bounce'cry the port-holes, out they fly,

And make the world dance Barnaby. BARNACLE. A good job, or snack easily got: also shellfish

growing at the bottoms of ships; a bird of the goose kind; an instpument like a pair of pincers, to fix on the noses of vicious horses whilst shoeing; a nick name for spectacles, and also for the gratuity given to grooms by the

buyers and sellers of horses. BARREL FEVER. He died of the barrel fever; he killed

himself by drinking. BARROW Man. A man under sentence of transportation ;

alluding to the convicts at Woolwich, who are principally

employed in wheeling barrows full of brick or dirt. BARTHOLOMEW BABY. A person dressed up in a tawdry

manner, like the dolls or babies sold at Bartholomew fair. BASKET. An exclamation frequently made use of in cock

pits, at cock-fightings, where persons refusing or unable to pay their losings, are adjudged by that respectable as.

sembly B EA sembly to be put into a basket suspended over the pit,there to remain during thai day's diversion : on the least demur to pay a bet, Basket is vociferated in terrorem. He grins like a basket of chips: a saying of one who is on the broad

grin. BASKET-MAKING. The good old trade of basket-making;

copulation, or making feet forchildren's stockings.
BASTARD. The child of an unmarried woman.
BASTARDLY GULLION. A bastard's bastard.
TO BASTE.

To beat. I'll give him his bastings, I'll beat
him heartily.
BASTING. A beating.
BASTONADING. Beating any one with a stick; from baton,

a stick, formerly spelt baston. BAT. "A low whore: so called from moving out like bats in

the dusk of the evening. BATCH. We had a pretty batch of it last night; we had a

hearty dose of liquor. Batch originally means the whole

quantity of bread baked at one time in an oven. BATTNER. An ox: beef being apt to batten or fatten those

that eat it. The cove has hushed the battner; i, e. has kill

ed the ox. BATCHELOR'S FARE. Bread and cheese and kisses. BATCHELOR's Son. A bastard. BATTLE-ROYAL. A battle or bout at cudgels or fisty-cuffs,

wherein more than two persons are engaged: perhaps from its resemblance, in that particular, to more serious engage

ments fought to settle royal disputes.
BAWBEE. A halfpenny. Scotch.
BAWBELS, or BAWBLES. Trinkets; a man's testicles.
BAWD.

A female procuress.
BAWDY BASKET. The twenty-third rank of canters, who

carry pins, tape, ballads, and obscene books to sell, but live

mostly by stealing. Cant. BAWDY-HOUSE BOTTLE.' A

very small bottle; short measure being among the many means used by the keepers of those houses, to gain what they call an honest livelihood: indeed this is one of the least reprehensible; the less they give a man of their infernal beverages for his money, the kinder

they behave to him. BAY FEVER. A term of ridicule applied to convicts, who

sham illness, to avoid being sent to Botany Bay. BAYARD OF TEN Toes. To ride bayard of ten toes, is to

walk on foot. Bayard was a horse famous in old romances. BEAK. A justice of peace, or magistrate. Also a judge or

chairman who presides in court. I. clapp'd my peepers full of tears, and so the old beak set me free; I began to

BEAN weep, and the judge setme free.

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