Glossary

[oildrip]

The Nuisance's mode of speech is not always precisely straightforward. The following list has been compiled from J. Redding Ware's Passing English of the Victorian Era: a Dictionary of Heterodox English, Slang and Phrase, published 1909.

A
All a treat - perfection of enjoyment
All right up to now - smiling, serene
Arer - Moreso: intensifier of "are"
Away - euphamism for "in prison"

B
Banded - Hungry
Bang through the Elephant - finished a course of dissipation
Batty-fang - to thrash thoroughly
Biteytite - appetite (also drinkitite - thirst)
Block a quiet pub - spend a long time in a tavern
Blue Damn - evasive swearing
Blue o'clock in the morning - pre-dawn, may be rhyming for two AM
Body lining - bread
Brim - a fearless woman
Bull - a second brew of tea, or a teapot containing used leaves suitable for such
Bully-fake - an adventageous result

C
Carriwitchet - a puzzling question
Chivy - knife; a chivy duel is a knife fight
Chonkey - a meat pie, the filling of which is a mystery you probably don't want solved
Christen a jack, to - to change the name engraved on a stolen watch
Chucker-out - bouncer (chucker-in-chief is a particularly effective or well known bouncer)
Chucking-out time - half-past twelve, when taverns traditionally close
Church a jack, to - to remove the works from a watch and put them in another watchcase, in order to hide or obscure stolen property
Cold cook - undertaker
Constant-screamer - concertina
Couldn't speak a threepenny bit - temporarily incapable of speech, often on account of drunkenness
Crack - a narrow passage of houses

D
Ditto, Brother Smut - your tongue is as coarse as you say mine is
Dolly mop - an overdressed servant girl
Dookin - fortune-telling, specifically palmistry
Dossy - Elegant
Drapery Miss - a girl of doubtful character who dresses flamboyantly

E
Eat vinegar with a fork - to speak very sharply

F
Farthing-taster - a very small portion of low-quality ice-cream, a street food
Feeding birk - cookshop
Flash - grand, splendid
Flimsy - copy on very thin tracing paper; seems to be primitive carbon paper?
Full as a goat - drunk

G
Gal-sneaker - a man devoted to seduction
Git the sads - to have the vapors
Glow - blush
Go out foreign - to emigrate under shady circumstances
God-forbids - kids, a cynical way of describing children by a person who does not want any
Got a collar on - stuck up
Got the woefuls - miserable, wretched, in the dumps
Gray-mare the better horse - praise for a wife who is more capable than her husband
Grey - silver and, figuratively, money
Grin like a Cheshire cat - fearfullest grin of all

H
Harlequin Jack - a man who shows off in manner and dress
Hidgeot - idiot
Hug center - popular place for public sex

I
Ichabod - an expression of lamentation

J
Jack up - to quit, especially in love affairs
Jobanjeramiah - maunderer (combination of the two doleful patriarchs)
Juggins's boy - the sharp and inpudent son of a stupid and easily ridiculed father

K
Kee gee - go, vigor
Keep the boiler clean - watch your stomach, in reference to health
Keep up, old queen - valediction from common women to a sister being escorted into a prison van
Knocker on the front door - respectability
Kypher - to dress hair (from French "coiffer")

L
Lardy-dardy - affected
Leaky - talkative when drunk
Lemoncholy - melancholy
Lend us your breath to kill Jumbo - objection to bad breath
Little go - first imprisonment
Little whack - small quantity of spirits
Looking as if he hadn't got his right change - appearing mad or wild
Lump o' jaw on - talkative

M
Make leg - to become prosperous
Mash that - hold your tongue
Mawwormy - fault-finding, dismally anticipating wretchedness
Meater - coward, from a dog that only bites meat and thus will not fight, then applied to cowardly men
Middle cuts - the prime cuts of fried fish at fried fish shops

N
Nail a strike - to steal a watch
Nattermy - a thin human being (or similar, presumably, in the Fifth City)
Neck oil - beer
No grease - lacking in social graces
Not up to Dick - not well; ill and wretched

O
Old Whiskers - a working man whose whiskers are a little wild and grey. The Nuisance uses it in reference to aging L.B.s, as well.
Oolfoo - fool
Otamies - surgical operations of all kinds

P
Paper trunk and twine lock - the least possible amount of luggage: a paper package tied with string
Peas in the pot - rhyming, meaning hot as in erotic
Petticoat interest - those portions of fiction referring to womankind (presumably what we'd now call chick lit)
Piebald eye - black eye
Pill-pusher - doctor
Pint o' mahogany - coffee
Podsnappery - wilful determination to ignore the objectionable or inconvenient, at the same time assuming airs of superior virtue and noble resignation
Portable property - easily stolen or pawned valuables
Pyrotechnic pleasantries - dynamite explosions of a feeble and harmless character. Probably the work of stupid anarchists.

Q
Quarter stretch - three months' imprisonment

R
Rag-stick - umbrella in poor repair
Receipt of fernseed - invisibility
Reddings - watches, probably from name of a fence who gave good prices
Robbing the barber - wearing long hair
Rortyness - vitality
Rushlight - very thin man

S
Scaffold-pole - the fried potato chip sold with fried fish
Screaming gin and ignorance - bad newspaper writing
Spring like a ha'penny knife - floppy, dumpy, no resilience. in reference to the lack of quality of cheaply-made penknives.

T
Tap - to give a bloody nose through violence
Teck - detective
Timbers - matches
Tom - a masculine woman
Totty all colors - a girl whose outfit includes most of the colors of the rainbow

U
Umble-cum-stumble - thoroughly understood

W
Weighing the thumb - cheating in weight by pressing down the scale with the thumb
Whoa, bust me - a expression of protest
Wriggle off - take one's departure

Z
Zeb - best