Slang Words
- Abigail: A lady's waiting maid
- Ace of Spades: A widow
- To Baste: to beat. I'll give him his bastings, I'll beat him heartily.
- Black-guard: A shabby, mean fellow
- Blunt: Money
- Butter box: A Dutchman
- Canting: Preaching with a whining, affected tone.
- Captain Queernabs: A shabby, ill-dressed fellow
- Cauliflower: A large shite wig, such is commonly worn by the dignified clergy, and was formerly by physicians. Also the private parts of a woman.
- Codger: An old fellow
- Cow juice: Milk
- Dear joys: Irishmen
- To dock: to lie with a woman
- Facer: A violent blow on the face
- Flam: A lie or sham story
- Gamon: to humbug or deceive
- Gin spinner: A distiller
- Grog: Rum and water
- Havy cavy: Wavering, doubtful, shilly shally
- Hot Pot: ale and brandy made hot
- Jack in an office: An insolent fellow in authority
- Jolly dog: A merry, facetious fello, a bon vivant.
- King's plate: fetters
- Kiss mine a-se: An offer, as Fielding observes, very frequently made, but never, as he could learn, literrally accepted.
- Land Pirates: Highwaymen
- Lawful blanket: a wife
- Lobster: nickname for a soldier, from the color of his clothes
- Maccaroni: A fop (from the Maccaroni Club, instituted by some of the most dressy traveled gentlemen about town, who led the fashions).
- Martinet: A strict disiplinarian
- Moon men: Gypsies
- Murphies: Potatoes
- Mushroom: A person or family suddenly rasied to richesa nd eminence.
- Nacky: Ingenious
- Natty lads: Youth thieves or pickpockets
- Noddy: Simpleton or fool
- Penance board: the pillory
- Pig-headed: obstinate
- Pin money: An allowance settled on a married woman for her pocket expenses.
- Post Master General: The prime minister, who has the patronage of all posts and places.
- Powder monkey: A boy on board a ship of war, whose business is to fetch powder from the magazine.
- Queen Dick: That happened in the reign of Queen Dick; i.e., never.
- Rake, Rakehell, or Rakeshame: A lewd, debauched fellow
- Receiver General: A prositute
- Resurrection men: Persons employed by the students of anatomy to steal dead bodies out of church yards.
- To ring a peal: To scold, chiefly applied to women. His wife rung him a fine peal!
- Rout: a modern card meeting at a private house; also an order from the Secretary at War, directing the march and quartering of soldiers.
- St. Geoffrey's Day: Never (there is no saint of that name).
- Scratch Land: Scotland
- Sea crab: Sailor
- Short-heeled wench: A girl apt to fall on her back.
- Sly boots: cunning fellow
- Spliced: Married, an allusion to joining two rope ends by splicing.
- Starve'em, Rob'em, and Cheat'em: Stroud, Rochester and Chatham; so called by soliders and sailors and not without good reason.
- Toad eater: a poor female relation, and humble companion, or reduced gentlewoman, in a great family, the standing butt, on whom all kinds of practical jokes are played off and all ill humors vented.
- Vice Admiral of the Narrow Seas: A drunken man that pisses under the table into his companions' shoes
- To Vowel: A gamester who does not immediately pay his losings is said to vowel the winner (IOU).
- Wet Quaker: One of that sect who has no objection to the spirit derived from wine.
- To have a white feather: to be a coward.
- Zounds: God's wounds, an exclamation
These terms come from the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue: A Dictionary of Buckish Slang, University Wit, and Pickpocket Eloquence. Published by Digest Books, Inc., Northfield, Illinois.