bugaboe
A scare-babe, or bully-beggar.
English · UK & Ireland 1634
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Where will you be? Anywhere UK & IrelandUnited StatesOnline slangBusiness jargon
Expressions you’ll hear in Britain and Ireland — distinctly British usage first, then widespread staples.
bugaroch
Comely, handsome. IRISH.
bugger
A blackguard, a rascal, a term of reproach. Mill the bloody bugger; beat the damned rascal.
buggy
A gig, or light chaise. Common term in America and in India, as well as in England.
build
Applied in fashionable slang to the make or style of dress, &c. "It’s a tidy BUILD, who made it?" A tailor is sometimes called a "trousers’ BUILDER."
bulger
Large; synonymous with BUSTER.
bulk and file
Two pickpockets; the bulk jostles the party to be robbed, and the file does the business.
bulker
One who lodges all night on a bulk or projection before old-fashioned shop windows.
bull
An Exchange Alley term for one who buys stock on speculation for time, i.e. agrees with the seller, called a Bear, to take a certain sum of stock at a future day, at a stated price: if at that day stock fetches more than the price agreed on, he receives the difference; if it falls or is cheaper, he either pays it, or becomes a lame duck, and waddles out of the Alley. See LAME DUCK and BEAR.
bull
One who agrees to purchase stock at a future day, at a stated price, but who simply speculates for a rise in public securities to render the transaction a profitable one. Should stocks fall, the BULL is then called upon to pay the difference. See BEAR, who is the opposite of a BULL, the former selling, the latter purchasing—the one operating for a fall, the other for a rise.
bull calf
A great hulkey or clumsy fellow. See HULKEY.
bull hankers
Persons who over-drive bulls, or frequent bull baits.
bull the cask
To pour hot water into an empty rum puncheon, and let it stand until it extracts the spirit from the wood. The mixture is drunk by sailors in default of something stronger.—Sea.
bull's feather
A horn: he wears the bull's feather; he is a cuckold.
bull-beef
A term of contempt; "as ugly as BULL-BEEF," "go to the billy-fencer, and sell yourself for BULL-BEEF." Sometimes used to indicate full size of anything. "There was he, as big as BULL-BEEF."
bulldogs
The runners who accompany the proctor in his perambulations, and give chase to runaways.—University.
bullet
To discharge from a situation. To shake the BULLET at anyone, is to threaten him with "the sack," but not to give him actual notice to leave. To get the BULLET is to get notice, while to get the instant BULLET is to be discharged upon the spot. The use of the term is most probably derived from a fancied connexion between it and the word discharge.
bullfinch
A hunting term for a large, thick, quickset hedge, difficult alike to "top" or burst through. Probably a corruption of BULL-FENCE, a fence made to prevent cattle straying either in or out.
bully
A cowardly fellow, who gives himself airs of great bravery. A bully huff cap; a hector. See HECTOR.
bully
A braggart; in the language of the streets, a man of the most degraded morals, who protects fallen females, and lives off their miserable earnings.—Shakspeare, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, uses the word in its old form, as a term of endearment. This epithet is often applied in a commendable sense among the vulgar; thus—a good fellow or a good horse will be termed "a BULLY fellow," "a BULLY horse;" and "a BULLY woman" signifies a right, good motherly old soul.
bully back
A bully to a bawdy-house; one who is kept in pay, to oblige the frequenters of the house to submit to the impositions of the mother abbess, or bawd; and who also sometimes pretends to be the husband of one of the ladies, and under that pretence extorts money from greenhorns, or ignorant young men, whom he finds with her. See GREENHORN.
bully cock
One who foments quarrels in order to rob the persons quarrelling.
bully ruffians
Highwaymen who attack passengers with paths and imprecations.
bully trap
A brave man with a mild or effeminate appearance, by whom bullies are frequently taken in.
bullyrag
To abuse or scold vehemently; to swindle one out of money by intimidation and sheer abuse.
bulwer’s
(Sir Edward Lytton) Paul Clifford. V. D.
bum
The breech, or backside.
bum
The part on which we sit.—Shakspeare. BUMBAGS, trousers; Gael. BUN, a base or bottom; Welsh, BON, the lowest or worst part of anything.
bum bailiff
A sheriff's officer, who arrests debtors; so called perhaps from following his prey, and being at their bums, or, as the vulgar phrase is, hard at their a-ses. Blackstone says, it is a corruption of bound bailiff, from their being obliged to give bond for their good behaviour.
bum boat
A boat attending ships to retail greens, drams, &c. commonly rowed by a woman; a kind of floating chandler's shop,
bum fodder
Soft paper for the necessary house or torchecul.
bum trap
A sheriff's officer who arrests debtors. Ware hawke! the bum traps are fly to our panney; keep a good look out, the bailiffs know where our house is situated.
bum-bailiff
A sheriff’s-officer—a term, some say, derived from the proximity which this gentleman generally maintains to his victims. Blackstone says it is a corruption of "bound bailiff." A BUM-BAILIFF was generally called "bummy."
bum-curtain
An old name for academical gowns when they were worn scant and short, especially those of the students of St. John’s College.—Camb. Univ. Any ragged or short academical gown.
bumble
To muffle. BUMBLE-FOOTED, club-footed, or awkward in the gait.
bumble-puppy
A game played in public-houses on a large stone, placed in a slanting direction, on the lower end of which holes are excavated, and numbered like the holes in a bagatelle-table. The player rolls a stone ball, or marble, from the higher end, and according to the number of the hole it falls into the game is counted. It is undoubtedly the very ancient game of Troule-in-madame.
bumbles
Coverings for the eyes of horses that shy in harness.
bumbo
Brandy, water, and sugar; also the negro name for the private parts of a woman.
bumbrusher
An usher at a school.
bumclink
In the Midland counties the inferior beer brewed for haymakers and harvest labourers. Derivation obvious.
bumfiddle
The backside, the breech. See ARS MUSICA.
bumkin
A raw country fellow.
bummer
Literally one who sits or idles about; a loafer; one who sponges upon his acquaintances. In California, men who profess to be journalists, and so obtain free dinners and drinks, are called "literary BUMMERS." Although the term is not much in use in this country, the profession of bumming, both literary and otherwise, is freely practised.
bumper
A full glass; in all likelihood from its convexity or bump at the top: some derive it from a full glass formerly drunk to the health of the pope--AU BON PERE.
bumper
According to Johnson from "bump," but probably from French BON PÈRE, the fixed toast in monastic life of old, now used for "full measure." A match at quoits, bowls, &c., may end in a "BUMPER game," if the play and score be all on one side. BUMPER is used in sporting and theatrical circles to denote a benefit which is one in reality as well as in name.
bumping
A ceremony performed on boys perambulating the bounds of the parish on Whit-monday, when they have their posteriors bumped against the stones marking the boundaries, in order to fix them in their memory.
bumptious
Arrogant, self-sufficient. One on very good terms with himself is said to be BUMPTIOUS.
bun
A common name for a rabbit, also for the monosyllable. To touch bun for luck; a practice observed among sailors going on a cruize.
bunce
Costermongers’ perquisites; the money obtained by giving light weight, &c.; costermongers’ goods sold by boys on commission. In fact anything which is clear profit or gain is said to be "all BUNCE." Probably a corruption of bonus; BONE, or BONER, being the slang for good. BUNCE, Grose gives as the cant word for money.
bundle
"to BUNDLE a person off," i.e., to pack him off, send him flying.
bundling
A man and woman sleeping in the same bed, he with his small clothes, and she with her petticoats on; an expedient practised in America on a scarcity of beds, where, on such an occasion, husbands and parents frequently permitted travellers to bundle with their wives and daughters. This custom is now abolished. See Duke of Rochefoucalt's Travels in America,
bundling
Men and women sleeping together, where the divisions of the house will not permit of better or more decent accommodation, with all their clothes on. BUNDLING was originally courting done in bed, the lovers being tied or bundled up to prevent undue familiarities. The practice still obtains in some parts of Wales.
bung
The landlord of a public-house. Much in use among sporting men.
bung upwards
Said of a person lying on his face.
bung your eye
Drink a dram; strictly speaking, to drink till one's eye is bunged up or closed.
bunk
To decamp. "BUNK it!" i.e., be off.
bunkum
An American importation, denoting false sentiments in speaking, pretended enthusiasm, &c. The expression arose from a speech made by a North Carolina senator named Buncombe.
bunter
A low dirty prostitute, half whore and half beggar.
bunter
A prostitute, a street-walking female thief.
burerk
A lady, a showily-dressed woman.