sticks
Furniture, or household chattels; "pick up your STICKS and cut!" summary advice to a person to take himself and furniture away.
English · UK & Ireland 2057
All languages English Tiếng Việt
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.
stiff
Paper, a bill of acceptance, &c.; "how did you get it, STIFF or hard?" i.e., did he pay you cash or give a bill? "To do a bit of STIFF," to accept a bill. See KITE.
stiff-fencer
A street-seller of writing paper.
stills
Undertakers’ slang term for STILL-BORN children. The fee paid by nurses and others for their disposal is usually 2s. 6d. A separate coffin is never given; the STILLS are quietly introduced into one containing an adult about to be buried. STILLS are allowed to accumulate at an undertaker’s until they sometimes number as many as a dozen. Some little time back a very bulky coffin was opened, and found to contain a large quantity of small corpses packed carefully round a large corpse.
stilton
"that’s the STILTON," or "it’s not the STILTON," i.e., that is quite the thing, or that is not quite the thing;—affected rendering of "that is not the CHEESE," which see.
stingo
Strong beer, or other liquor.
stingo
Strong liquor.—Yorkshire.
stink
A disagreeable exposure. "To stir up a STINK" is to make a disclosure which is generally unpleasant in its effect.
stinkomalee
A name given to the then New London University by Theodore Hook. Probably because some cow-houses and dunghills stood on the original site. Some question about Trincomalee was agitated at the same time. It is still applied by the students of the old Universities, who regard it with disfavour from its admitting all denominations.
stipe
A stipendiary magistrate.—Provincial.
stir
A prison, a lock-up; "in STIR," in gaol. Anglo-Saxon, STYR, correction, punishment.
stir-up sunday
The Sunday next before Advent, the collect for that day commencing with the words, "Stir up." Schoolboys, growing excited at the prospect of the vacation, irreverently commemorate it by stirring up—pushing and poking each other. "Crib-crust Monday" and "tug-button Tuesday" are distinguished by similar tricks; while on "pay-off Wednesday" they retaliate small grudges in a playful facetious way.
stirrup cup
A parting cup or glass, drank on horseback by the person taking leave.
stitch
A nick name for a taylor: also a term for lying with a woman.
stiver-cramped
Needy, wanting money. A stiver is a Dutch coin, worth somewhat more than a penny sterling.
stock
A good stock; i.e. of impudence. Stock and block; the whole: he has lost stock and block.
stock
"To STOCK cards" is to arrange cards in a certain manner for cheating purposes.
stock jobbers
Persons who gamble in Exchange Alley, by pretending to buy and sell the public funds, but in reality only betting that they will be at a certain price, at a particular time; possessing neither the stock pretended to be sold, nor money sufficient to make good the payments for which they contract: these gentlemen are known under the different appellations of bulls, bears, and lame ducks.
stockdollager
A heavy blow, a "finisher." Italian, STOCCADO, a fencing term. Also (in a general sense), a disastrous event.—Americanism.
stodge
To surfeit, gorge, or clog with food. STODGE is in some places bread and milk.
stoll
To understand.—North Country Cant.
stomach
To bear with, to be partial to. Mostly used in a negative character,—as, "I can’t STOMACH that."
stomach worm
The stomach worm gnaws; I am hungry.
stone
Two stone under weight, or wanting; an eunuch. Stone doublet; a prison. Stone dead; dead as a stone.
stone jug
A prison.
stoobs
Boots. } after them, if desired, and, as may be seen, some
stook
A pocket-handkerchief. A STOOK-HAULER, or "buzzer," is a thief who takes pocket-handkerchiefs.
stoop
The pillory. The cull was served for macing and napp'd the stoop; he was convicted of swindling, and put in the pillory.
stop hole abbey
The nick name of the chief rendzvous of the canting crew of beggars, gypsies, cheats, thieves, &c. &c.
storrac
Carrots. } take it doubly.
story
A falsehood,—the soft synonym for a lie, allowed in family circles and boarding-schools. A Puritanism that came into fashion with the tirade against romances, all novels and stories being considered as dangerous and false.
stot
A young bullock. In Northumberland the term STOT means to rebound.
stoter
A great blow. Tip him a stoter in the haltering place; give him a blow under the left ear.
stotor
A heavy blow, a settler.—Old Cant.
stoup
A vessel to hold liquor: a vessel containing a size or half a pint, is so called at Cambridge.
stow
Stow you; be silent, or hold your peace. Stow your whidds and plant'em, for the cove of the ken can cant'em; you have said enough, the man of the house understands you.
stow
To leave off, or have done; "STOW it, the gorger’s leary." Leave off, the person is looking. See STASH, with which it is synonymous.—Ancient Cant.
stow faking!
Leave off there, be quiet! FAKING means anything that may be going on.
straight
An American phrase peculiar to dram-drinkers; similar to our word NEAT, which see.
strait waistcoat
A tight waistcoat, with long sleeves coming over the hand, having strings for binding them behind the back of the wearer: these waistcoats are used in madhouses for the management of lunatics when outrageous.
strait-laced
Precise, over nice, puritanical.
strap
A barber. From Roderick Random.
strapper
A large man or woman.
strapping
Lying with a woman. CANT.
straw
A good woman in the straw; a lying-in woman. His eyes draw straw; his eyes are almost shut, or he is almost asleep: one eye draws straw, and t'other serves the thatcher.
straw
Married ladies are said to be "in the STRAW" at their accouchements. The phrase is a coarse metaphor, and has reference to farmyard animals in a similar condition. It may have originally been suggested to the inquiring mind by the Nativity.
strawing
"selling" straws in the streets (generally for a penny), and "giving" the purchaser a paper (indecent or political) or a gold (!) ring,—neither of which, the patterer states, he is allowed by Act of Parliament to sell.
streak
To decamp, run away.—Saxon. In America the phrase is "to make STREAKS," or "make TRACKS."
streaky
Irritated, ill-tempered. Said of a short-tempered man who has his good and bad times in STREAK.
street-pitchers
Negro minstrels, ballad-singers, long-song men, men "working a board" on which have been painted various exciting scenes in some terrible drama, the details of which the STREET PITCHER is bawling out, and selling in a little book or broadsheet (price one penny); or any persons who make a stand—i.e., a pitch—in the streets, and sell articles or contribute entertainments for a living.
stretch
A yard. The cove was lagged for prigging a peter with several stretch of dobbin from a drag; the fellow was transported for stealing a trunk, containing several yards of ribband, from a waggon.
stretch
Abbreviation of "STRETCH one’s neck," to hang, to be executed as a malefactor. As, "The night before Larry was STRETCHED."
stretcher
A falsehood; one that requires a STRETCH of imagination or comprehension.
stretcher-fencer
One who sells braces.
stretching
Hanging. He'll stretch for it; he will be hanged for it. Also telling a great lie: he stretched stoutly.
stretching match
An execution. Often called a "hanging match."
strike
Twenty shillings. CANT.
strike a jigger
To pick a lock, or break open a door.
strike me lucky!
An expression used by the lower orders when making a bargain, derived from the old custom of striking hands together, leaving in that of the seller a LUCK PENNY as an earnest that the bargain is concluded. In Ireland, at cattle markets, &c., a penny, or other small coin, is always given by the buyer to the seller to ratify the bargain.—Hudibras. Anciently this was called a "God’s penny."
strills
Cheating lies.—North Country Cant.