scare the pants off
to frighten someone very much
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scared green
Recognized English idiom; full definition pending editorial review.
scared out of my seven senses
According to ancient teaching the soul of man, or his "inward holy body,** is compounded of the seven properties which are under the influence of the seven planets. Fire animates, earth gives the sense of feeling, water gives speech, air gives taste, mist gives sight, flowers give hearing, the south wind gives smelling. Hence the seven senses are animation, feeling, speech, taste, sight, hearing, and smelling (see Ecclus. xvii, 5).
scared shitless
Extremely frightened
scared to death
extremely frightened
scarlet horse
A high red, hired or hack horse: a pun on the word HIRED.
Scarlet Letter
In the rigid Puritan regime of New England in the early days a scarlet "A," for "adulteress" used to be branded or sewn on a guilty woman's dress. The theme of Hawthorne's novel of this name (1850) is based on this custom.
Scarlet Pimpernel
An elusive intriguer. The phrase comes from the nickname of the hero of several novels by Baroness Orczy. In 1905 The Scarlet Pimpernel told the adventures of a royalist partizan in the French Revolution, who took the pimpernel as his emblem when he saved victims from the guillotine, and played other tricks on the Sansculottes.
scarlet-town
Reading, in Berkshire. As the name of this place is pronounced Redding, SCARLET-TOWN is probably a rude pun upon it.
scarper
To run away; Spanish, ESCAPAR, to escape, make off; Italian, SCAPPARE. "SCARPER with the feeley of the donna of the carzey," to run away with the daughter of the landlady of the house; almost pure Italian, "SCAPPARE COLLA FIGLIA DELLA DONNA DELLA CASA."—Seven Dials and Prison Cant, from the Lingua Franca.
scat
Heroin.
Scat Singing
A form of singing in jazz music in which meaningless syllables and sounds take the place of words, the voice being used rather as a musical instrument. It was invented by the greatest of all jazz musicians, Louis Armstrong, by accident as he was making a record of Heebie Jeebies, about 1926.
Scavenger's Daughter
An instrument of torture invented by Sir William Skevington, lieutenant of the Tower in the reign of Henry
scavey
Sense, knowledge. "Massa, me no scavey;" master, I don't know (NEGRO LANGUAGE) perhaps from the French SCAVOIR.
Scheldt and take Antwerp
The incident is commemorated in the following contemporary epigram : —
scheme
A party of pleasure.
schism monger
A dissenting teacher.
schism shop
A dissenting meeting house.
schism-shop
A Dissenters’ meeting-house.—University.
schloshed
Very drunk.
schmear
To bribe.
schmeck
Heroin.
schmeckle
A penis.
schnozz
Nose.
schnozzola
The nose.
schofel
Bad money. See SHOFUL.
scholar and gentleman
Recognized English idiom; full definition pending editorial review.
school
A knot of men or boys; generally a body of idlers or street gamblers. Also, two or more "patterers" working together in the streets.
school of hard knocks
Experiencing life's difficulties as a means of learning
schroff
A banker, treasurer, or confidential clerk.—Anglo-Indian.
schrödinger's douchebag
Recognized English idiom; full definition pending editorial review.
schwassle box
The street arrangement for Punch and Judy. See SWATCHEL-COVE.
science fiction
Fiction based on imagined future scientific developments
Science Persecuted
Anaxag9ras of Clazom- ense (d. about 430 B.C.) held opinions in natural science so far in advance of his age that he was accused of impiety, thrown into prison, and condemned to death. Pericles, with great difficulty, got his sentence commuted to fine and banishment.
Sciences at St
Petersburg (Leningrad) was established by Catherine I in 1725.
scimmy
A scimitar.
Scio's Blind Old Bard
Homer. Scio is the modern name of Chios, in the ^Egean Sea one of the "seven cities" that claimed the honour of being his birthplace.
scissor sister
A lesbian.
scissors and paste
Compilation, as distin- guished from original literary work. The allusion is obvious.
scissors to grind
Work to do; purpose to serve. / have my own scissors to grind is a way of saying "I've got my own work to do, or my own troubles, and can't be bothered with yours.
scoff
Food.
Scogan's Jests
A popular jest-book in the 16th century, said by Andrew Boorde (who published it) to be the work of one John Scogan, reputed to have been court fool to
sconce
The head, probably as being the fort and citadel of a man: from SCONCE, an old name for a fort, derived from a Dutch word of the same signification; To build a sconce: a military term for bilking one's quarters. To sconce or skonce; to impose a fine. ACADEMICAL PHRASE.
sconce
The head; judgment, sense.—Dutch.
Scooby-Doo
A Subaru automobile.
scoot
A dollar.
scoots
diarrhea
scope out
To carefully observe or investigate something
Scorched Earth
A phrase coined to describe the Chinese policy (as old as war) of retreating before the Japanese and burning the country- side as they went, in the war which began m 1937. It was a phrase much used in World War II.
score
A reckoning, "to run up a SCORE at a public-house," to obtain credit there until pay-day, or a fixed time, when the debt must be "wiped off." From the old practice of scoring a tippler’s indebtedness on the inside of a public-house door.
score off
to gain an advantage by exploiting someone's mistake
scot
A quantity of anything, a lot, a share.—Anglo-Saxon, SCEAT, pronounced SHOT.
scot and lot
A municipal levy on all according to their ability to pay. Scot is the tax, and lot the allotment or portion allotted. To pay scot and lot, therefore, is to pay the general assessment and also the personal tax allotted to you.
scotch
To rape.
scotch bait
A halt and a resting on a stick, as practised by pedlars.
scotch cap
A cloth cap worn in Scotland as part of the national dress.
scotch greys
Lice. The headquarters of the Scotch greys: the head of a man full of large lice.
Scotch mist
A type of fine, steady rain
scotch pint
A bottle containing two quarts.
scotch warming pan
A wench; also a fart.
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