buzzer
A pickpocket. Grose gives BUZ-COVE and, as above mentioned, BUZ-GLOAK.
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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.
by george
An exclamation similar to BY JOVE. The term is older than is frequently imagined—vide Bacchus and Venus (p. 117), 1737. "’Fore (or by) GEORGE, I’d knock him down." Originally in reference to Saint George, the patron saint of England, or possibly to the House of Hanover.
by golly
An ejaculation, or oath; a compromise for "by God." BY GUM is another oblique oath. In the United States, small boys are permitted by their guardians to say GOL DARN anything, but they are on no account allowed to commit the profanity of G--d d----n anything. A manner of "sailing close to the wind" which is objectionable to the honest mind.
by jingo
An oath or exclamation having no particular meaning, and no positive etymology, though it is believed by some that JINGO is derived from the Basque jenco, the devil.
byblow
An illegitimate child.
ca-sa
A writ of capias ad satisfaciendam.—Legal slang.
cab
A brothel. Mother: how many tails have you in your cab? how many girls have you in your bawdy house?
cab
In statutory language, "a hackney carriage drawn by one horse." Abbreviated from the French CABRIOLET; originally meaning "a light low chaise." The wags of Paris playing upon the word (quasi cabri au lait) used to call a superior turn-out of the kind a cabri au crême. Our abbreviation, which certainly smacks of slang, has been stamped with the authority of the Legislature, and has been honoured by universal custom.
cabbage
Cloth, stuff, or silk purloined by laylors from their employers, which they deposit in a place called HELL, or their EYE: from the first, when taxed, with their knavery, they equivocally swear, that if they have taken any, they wish they may find it in HELL; or, alluding to the second, protest, that what they have over and above is not more than they could put in their EYE.--When the scrotum is relaxed or whiffled, it is said they will not cabbage.
cabbage
Pieces of cloth said to be purloined by tailors. Any small profits in the way of material.
cabbage-head
A soft-headed person.
cabby
Popular name for the driver of a cab. This title has almost supplanted the more ancient one of jarvey.
caboose
The galley or cook-house of a ship; a term used by tramps to indicate a kitchen.
cacafeogo
A sh-te-fire, a furious braggadocio or bully huff.
cackle
To blab, or discover secrets. The cull is leaky, and cackles; the rogue tells all. CANT. See LEAKY.
cackling-cove
An actor. Also called a MUMMERY-COVE.—Theatrical.
cad
Or CADGER (from which it is shortened), a mean or vulgar fellow; a beggar; one who would rather live on other people than work for himself; a man who tries to worm something out of another, either money or information. Johnson uses the word, and gives huckster as the meaning, in which sense it was originally used. Apparently from CAGER, or GAGER, the old Cant term for a man. The exclusives at the English Universities apply the term CAD to all non-members.
caddee
A helper. An under-strapper.
cadge
To beg. Cadge the swells; beg of the gentlemen.
cadge
To beg in an artful, wheedling manner.—North. In Scotland to CADGE is to wander, to go astray. See under CODGER.
cadging
Begging, generally with an eye to pilfering when an opportunity occurs. To be "on the cadge" is almost synonymous with "on the make."
cag
To be cagged. To be sulky or out of humour. The cove carries the cag; the man is vexed or sullen.
cag
To irritate, affront, anger. Schoolboy slang.
cag magg
Bits and scraps of provisions. Bad meat.
cage
A minor kind of prison. A country lock-up which contained no offices.
cagg
To cagg; a military term used by the private soldiers, signifying a solemn vow or resolution not to get drunk for a certain time; or, as the term is, till their cagg is out: which vow is commonly observed with the strictest exactness. Ex. I have cagg'd myself for six months. Excuse me this time, and I will cagg myself for a year. This term is also used in the same sense among the common people of Scotland, where it is performed with divers ceremonies.
cagg maggs
Old Lincolnshire geese, which having been plucked ten or twelve years, are sent up to London to feast the cockneys.
cagmag
Bad food, scraps, odds and ends; or that which no one could relish. Grose give CAGG MAGGS, old and tough Lincolnshire geese, sent to London to feast the poor cockneys. Gael., French, and Welsh, CAC, and MAGN. A correspondent at Trinity College, Dublin, considers this as originally a University slang term for a bad cook, κακὸς μάγειρος. There is also a Latin word used by Pliny, MAGMA, denoting dregs or dross.
cake
A "flat;" a soft or doughy person, a fool.
cakey-pannum-fencer
Or PANNUM-FENCER, a man who sells street pastry.
calaboose
A prison.—Sea slang, from the Spanish.
calculate
A word much in use among the inhabitants of the Western States U.S., as "I CALCULATE you are a stranger here." New Englanders use the word "guess" instead of CALCULATE, while the Virginians prefer to say "reckon."
calf-skin fiddle
A drum. To smack calf's skin; to kiss the book in taking an oath. It is held by the St. Giles's casuists, that by kissing one's thumb instead of smacking calf's skin, the guilt of taking a false oath is avoided.
calibogus
Rum and spruce beer, American beverage.
california
Or CALIFORNIANS, money. Term generally applied to gold only. Derivation very obvious.
call
A notice of rehearsal, or any other occasion requiring the company’s presence, posted up in a theatre. "We’re CALLED for eleven to-morrow morning."
call-a-go
In street "patter," is to leave off trying to sell anything and to remove to another spot, to desist. Also to give in, yield, at any game or business. Probably from the "GO" call in cribbage.
calle
A cloak or gown. CANT.
calves
His calves are gone to grass; a saying of a man with slender legs without calves. Veal will be cheap, calves fall; said of a man whose calves fall away.
calves head club
A club instituted by the Independents and Presbyterians, to commemorate the decapitation of King Charles I. Their chief fare was calves heads; and they drank their wine and ale out of calves skulls.
cambrade
A chamber fellow; a Spanish military term. Soldiers were in that country divided into chambers, five men making a chamber, whence it was generally used to signify companion.
cambridge
Gradus ad Cantabrigiam; or, a Dictionary of Terms, Academical and Colloquial, or Cant, which are used at the University, with Illustrations, 12mo. Camb., 1803.
cambridge fortune
A wind-mill and a water-mill, used to signify a woman without any but personal endowments.
camden-town
A brown,—vulgar term for a halfpenny.
cameronians
THE, the Twenty-sixth Regiment of Foot in the British Army.
camesa
A shirt or shift. CANT. SPANISH.
camesa
Shirt or chemise.—Span. See its abbreviated form, MISH, from the ancient Cant, COMMISSION. Probably re-introduced by the remains of De Lacy Evans’s Spanish Legion on their return. See Somerville’s account of the Span. Leg., for the curious facility with which the lower classes in England adopt foreign words as slang and cant terms. Italian, CAMICIA.
camister
A preacher, clergyman, or master.
camp candlestick
A bottle, or soldier's bayonet.
campbell's academy
The hulks or lighters, on board of which felons are condemned to hard labour. Mr. Campbell was the first director of them. See ACADEMY and FLOATING ACADEMY.
canary
A sovereign. From the colour. Very old slang indeed.
canary bird
A jailbird.
candlesticks
Bad, small, or untunable bells. Hark! how the candlesticks rattle.
cane
To lay Cane upon Abel; to beat any one with a cane or stick.
canister
The head.—Pugilistic.
cannibals
The training boats for the Cambridge freshmen, i.e., "CANNOT-PULLS." The term is applied both to boats and rowers.—See SLOGGERS. Torpids is the usual term for the races in which these men and machines figure.
cannikin
A small can: also, in the canting sense, the plague.
cannikin
A small can, similar to PANNIKIN. "And let the CANNIKIN clink."
cannister
The head. To mill his cannister; to break his head.
cant
An hypocrite, a double-tongue palavering fellow. See PALAVER.