1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue eBook

Francis Grose
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 343 pages of information about 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue.

1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue eBook

Francis Grose
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 343 pages of information about 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue.

Diver.  A pickpocket; also one who lives in a cellar.

Divide.  To divide the house with one’s wife; to give her
  the outside, and to keep all the inside to one’s self, i.e. to
  turn her into the street.

Do.  To do any one; to rob and cheat him.  I have done
  him; I have robbed him.  Also to overcome in a boxing
  match:  witness those laconic lines written on the field of
  battle, by Humphreys to his patron.—­’Sir, I have done
  the Jew.’

To do over.  Carries the same meaning, but is not so briefly
  expressed:  the former having received the polish of the
  present times.

DOASH.  A cloak.  Cant.

Dobin rig.  Stealing ribbands from haberdashers early in
  the morning or late at night; generally practised by women
  in the disguise of maid servants.

To dock.  To lie with a woman.  The cull docked the dell
  all the darkmans; the fellow laid with the wench all night. 
  Docked smack smooth; one who has suffered an amputation
  of his penis from a venereal complaint.  He must
  go into dock; a sea phrase, signifying that the person spoken
  of must undergo a salivation.  Docking is also a punishment
  inflicted by sailors on the prostitutes who have
  infected them with the venereal disease; it consists in cutting
  off all their clothes, petticoats, shift and all, close to
  their stays, and then turning them into the street.

Doctor.  Milk and water, with a little rum, and some nutmeg;
  also the name of a composition used by distillers,
  to make spirits appear stronger than they really are, or,
  in their phrase, better proof.

Doctors.  Loaded dice, that will run but two or three
  chances.  They put the doctors upon him; they cheated
  him with loaded dice.

DODSEY.  A woman:  perhaps a corruption of Doxey.  Cant.

Dog buffers.  Dog stealers, who kill those dogs not
  advertised for, sell their skins, and feed the remaining dogs
  with their flesh.

Dog in A doublet.  A daring, resolute fellow.  In
  Germany and Flanders the boldest dogs used to hunt the boar,
  having a kind of buff doublet buttoned on their bodies,
  Rubens has represented several so equipped, so has Sneyders.

Dog.  An old dog at it; expert or accustomed to any thing. 
  Dog in a manger; one who would prevent another from
  enjoying what he himself does not want:  an allusion to
  the well-known fable.  The dogs have not dined; a
  common saying to any one whose shirt hangs out behind.  To
  dog, or dodge; to follow at a distance.  To blush like a
  blue dog, i.e. not at all.  To walk the black dog on any
  one; a punishment inflicted in the night on a fresh prisoner,
  by his comrades, in case of his refusal to pay the usual
  footing or garnish.

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1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.