Lexicon Balatronicum | Page 6

stick, formerly spelt baston.
BAT. A low whore: so called from moving out like bats in the dusk of the evening.
BATCH. We had a pretty batch of it last night; we had a hearty dose of liquor. Batch originally means the whole quantity of bread baked at one time in an oven.
BATTNER. An ox: beef being apt to batten or fatten those that eat it. The cove has hushed the battner; i.e. has killed the ox.
BATCHELOR'S FARE. Bread and cheese and kisses.
BATCHELOR'S SON. A bastard.
BATTLE-ROYAL. A battle or bout at cudgels or fisty-cuffs, wherein more than two persons are engaged: perhaps from its resemblance, in that particular, to more serious engagements fought to settle royal disputes.
BAWBEE. A halfpenny. Scotch.
BAWBELS, or BAWBLES. Trinkets; a man's testicles.
BAWD. A female procuress.
BAWDY BASKET. The twenty-third rank of canters, who carry pins, tape, ballads, and obscene books to sell, but live mostly by stealing. Cant.
BAWDY-HOUSE BOTTLE. A very small bottle; short measure being among the many means used by the keepers of those houses, to gain what they call an honest livelihood: indeed this is one of the least reprehensible; the less they give a man of their infernal beverages for his money, the kinder they behave to him.
BAY FEVER. A term of ridicule applied to convicts, who sham illness, to avoid being sent to Botany Bay.
BAYARD OF TEN TOES. To ride bayard of ten toes, is to walk on foot. Bayard was a horse famous in old romances,
BEAK. A justice of-peace, or magistrate. Also a judge or chairman who presides in court. I clapp'd my peepers full of tears, and so the old beak set me free; I began to weep, and the judge set me free.
BEAN. A guinea. Half bean; half a guinea.
BEAR. One who contracts to deliver a certain quantity of sum of stock in the public funds, on a future day, and at stated price; or, in other words, sells what he has not got, like the huntsman in the fable, who sold the bear's skin before the bear was killed. As the bear sells the stock he is not possessed of, so the bull purchases what he has not money to pay for; but in case of any alteration in the price agreed on, either party pays or receives the difference. Exchange Alley.
BEAR-GARDEN JAW or DISCOURSE. Rude, vulgar language, such as was used at the bear-gardens.
BEAR LEADER. A travelling tutor.
BEARD SPLITTER. A man much given to wenching.
BEARINGS. I'll bring him to his bearings; I'll bring him to reason. Sea term.
BEAST. To drink like a beast, i.e. only when thirsty.
BEAST WITH TWO BACKS. A man and woman in the act of copulation. Shakespeare in Othello.
BEATER CASES. Boots. Cant.
BEAU-NASTY. A slovenly fop; one finely dressed, but dirty.
BEAU TRAP. A loose stone in a pavement, under which water lodges, and on being trod upon, squirts it up, to the great damage of white stockings; also a sharper neatly dressed, lying in wait for raw country squires, or ignorant fops.
BECALMED. A piece of sea wit, sported in hot weather. I am becalmed, the sail sticks to the mast; that is, my shirt sticks to my back. His prad is becalmed; his horse knocked up.
BECK. A beadle. See HERMANBECK.
BED. Put to bed with a mattock, and tucked up with a spade; said of one that is dead and buried. You will go up a ladder to bed, i.e. you will be hanged. In many country places, persons hanged are made to mount up a ladder, which is afterwards turned round or taken away, whence the term, "Turned off."
BEDFORDSHIRE. I am for Bedfordshire, i.e. for going to bed.
BEDIZENED. Dressed out, over-dressed, or awkwardly ornamented.
BED-MAKER. Women employed at Cambridge to attend on the Students, sweep his room, &c. They will put their hands to any thing, and are generally blest with a pretty family of daughters: who unmake the beds, as fast as they are made by their mothers.
BEEF. To cry beef; to give the alarm. They have cried beef on us. Cant.--To be in a man's beef; to wound him with a sword. To be in a woman's beef; to have carnal knowledge of her. Say you bought your beef of me, a jocular request from a butcher to a fat man. implying that he credits the butcher who serves him.
BEEF EATER. A yeoman of the guards, instituted by Henry VII. Their office was to stand near the bouffet, or cupboard, thence called Bouffetiers, since corrupted to Beef Eaters. Others suppose they obtained this name from the size of their persons, and the easiness of their duty, as having scarce more to do than to eat the king's beef.
BEETLE-BROWED. One having thick projecting eyebrows.
BEETLE-HEADED. Dull, stupid.
BEGGAR MAKER. A publican, or ale-house keeper.
BEGGAR'S BULLETS. Stones. The beggar's bullets began to fly, i.e. they began to throw stones.
BEILBY'S BALL.