Oh, the Rabelaisian banquet
that is the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar
Tongue! Here’s a sampling of some of the less salty words that might amuse you:
Clanker: A great lie. (Don’t try to tell a clanker like that to
Mama; she can sniff out the tiniest lie at fifty paces.)
Tears of the tankard: The drippings of liquor on a man’s waistcoat.
(My younger brother Robert came home from
his club insisting that he hadn’t had a drop to drink, but he was sporting quite
a display of tankard tears.)
Juniper lecture: A round scolding bout. (Mama gave him quite the juniper lecture for his clumsy clanker.)
Looby: A awkward, ignorant
fellow. (Robert is a good boy at heart,
but he can be the veriest looby at times.)
Trap sticks: Thin legs, gambs; from the sticks with which boys play
at trap-ball. (Old Sir Matthew always
wears padded stockings to cover up his trap sticks and make the ladies think he
still sports a fine calf.)
Jessamy: A smart jimmy fellow, a fopling. (Of course, he’s been wearing them for the last sixty years, ever since
he was a young jessamy just out on the town.)
Bienly: Excellently. (Our governess
is teaching us to speak French most bienly; I am quite fluent already, don’t you
think?)
What’s your favorite word or phrase this time?
I'm rather taken with tears of the tankard myself. ☺
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