1811 Dictionary in the Vulgar Tongue, by Francis Grose is part of HackerNoon’s Book Blog Post series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here: [LINK TO TABLE OF LINK]. Section D
Section E
EARNEST. A deposit in part of payment, to bind a bargain.
EARTH BATH. A Grave.
EASY. Make the cull easy or quiet; gag or kill him. As easy as pissing the bed.
EASY VIRTUE. A lady of easy virtue: an impure or prostitute.
EAT. To eat like a beggar man, and wag his under jaw; a jocular reproach to a proud man. To eat one's words; to retract what one has said.
TO EDGE. To excite, stimulate, or provoke; or as it is vulgarly called, to egg a man on. Fall back, fall edge; i.e. let what will happen. Some derive to egg on, from the Latin word, AGE, AGE.
EIGHT EYES. I will knock out two of your eight eyes; a common Billingsgate threat from one fish nymph to another: every woman, according to the naturalists of that society, having eight eyes; viz. two seeing eyes, two bub-eyes, a bell-eye, two pope's eyes, and a ***-eye. He has fallen down and trod upon his eye; said of one who has a black eye.
ELBOW GREASE. Labour. Elbow grease will make an oak
table shine.
table shine.
ELBOW ROOM. Sufficient space to act in. Out at elbows;
said of an estate that is mortgaged.
said of an estate that is mortgaged.
ELBOW SHAKER. A gamester, one who rattles Saint Hugh's
bones, i.e. the dice.
bones, i.e. the dice.
ELLENBOROUGH LODGE. The King's Bench Prison. Lord
Ellenborough's teeth; the chevaux de frize round the top
of the wall of that prison.
Ellenborough's teeth; the chevaux de frize round the top
of the wall of that prison.
ELF. A fairy or hobgoblin, a little man or woman.
EMPEROR. Drunk as an emperor, i.e. ten times as drunk as a lord.
ENGLISH BURGUNDY. Porter.
ENSIGN BEARER. A drunken man, who looks red in the face, or hoists his colours in his drink.
EQUIPT. Rich; also, having new clothes. Well equipt; full of money, or well dressed. The cull equipped me with a brace of meggs; the gentleman furnished me with. a couple of guineas.
ESSEX LION. A calf; Essex being famous for calves, and
chiefly supplying the London markets.
chiefly supplying the London markets.
ESSEX STILE. A ditch; a great part of Essex is low marshy
ground, in which there are more ditches than Stiles.
ground, in which there are more ditches than Stiles.
ETERNITY Box. A coffin.
EVES. Hen roosts.
EVE'S CUSTOM-HOUSE, where Adam made his first entry.
The monosyllable.
The monosyllable.
EVES DROPPER. One that lurks about to rob hen-roosts;
also a listener at doors and windows, to hear private
conversation.
also a listener at doors and windows, to hear private
conversation.
EVIL. A halter. Cant, Also a wife.
EWE. A white ewe; a beautiful woman. An old ewe, drest lamb fashion; an old woman, drest like a young girl.
EXECUTION DAY. Washing day.
EXPENDED. Killed: alluding to the gunner's accounts, wherein the articles consumed are charged under the title of expended. Sea phrase.
EYE. It's all my eye and Betty Martin. It's all nonsense, all mere stuff.
EYE-SORE. A disagreeable object. It will be an eye-sore as long as she lives, said by a limn whose wife was cut for a fistula in ano.
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Grose, Francis. 2004. 1881 Dictionary in the Vulgar Tongue. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved April 2022 from https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5402/pg5402.html
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