Dictionary of Americanisms - D-F



D.
DAB, or DABSTER. One who is expert in anything; a proficient. A vulgar
colloquialism in England and America.

One writer excels at a plan, or title-page; another works away at the body
of the book; and the third is a dab at an index.--Goldsmith.

He's sich a dabster at a plough,

Few match'd him nigh or far.--Essex Dialect Poems.

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DADDOCKS. The heart or body of a tree thoroughly rotten.--Ash.

This old word is not noticed by Johnson, Todd, or Webster. It is
introduced by Mr. Worcester in his new dictionary.

The great red daddocks lay in the green pastures, where they had lain year
after year, crumbling away, and sending forth innumerable forms of
vegetable life.--Margaret, p. 215.

DAD, or DADDY. Old and very common words for father.

I was never so bethumpt with words
Since first I call'd my brother's father dad.--Shakspeare.

DAMAGE. The pay or return for service rendered; the cost of any thing.
"What's the damage?" i. e. What's the cost?

Many thanks, but I must pay the damage, and will thank you to tell me the
amount of the engraving.--Lord Byron to Murray, Let. 114.

DANDER. Scurf; dandruff.

DANDER. To get one's dander up, is to get into a passion.

This word is noticed in Barnes's Dorset Glossary. Halliwell says it is
common in various English dialects.

The Department of State did not keep back the letters of Mr. Rives, in
which he boasts that he had outwitted the French. Well, this sort of put
up the dander of the French.--Crockett, Tour, p. 198.

As we looked at the immense strength of the Northumberland's mast, we
could not help thinking that Neptune must have his dander considerably
raised before he could carry it away.--N. Y. Com. Adv.

I felt my dander risin' when the impertinent cuss went and tuck a seat
along side of Miss Mary, and she begun to smile and talk with him as
pleasin' as could be.--Maj. Jones's Courtship, p. 77.

The fire and fury that blazed in her eye gave ocular evidence of her
dander being up.--Pickings from the New Orleans Picayune, p. 163.

DARKY. A common term for a negro.

DARNED. A substitute for the profane word damned, and generally called a
Yankeeism. It is used, however, in England.

If e'er their jars they've made yu feel,
This gude adwise you'll call;
For sich warmin's gripe--or I'll be darned
'Twood soon make ye sing small.--Essex Dialect, Noakes and Styles.

"Buttermilk, by Jingo," exclaimed the disappointed pedagogue. Saint Jingo
was the only saint, and a "darnation," or "darn you," were the only

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oaths, his puritan education ever allowed him to use.--Cooper, Satanstoe,
Vol. I. p. 68.

TO DAWDLE. To loiter, to lounge, especially over one's work. A word much
used by women.

Come, some evening, and dawdle over a dish of tea with me.--Johnson's
Letters.

Looking out of the window, I can see a dozen of these industrious
burghers, dawdling about a bar-room opposite.--Hoffman, Winter in the
West, Let. 35.

A DAWDLE. In women's language, one who loiters over his or her work.

TO DEACON A CALF, is to knock it in the head as soon as it is born.--
Connecticut.

DEADENING. In newly settled parts of the West, where it is designed to
make a "clearing," some of the trees are cut down; the others are girdled,
or deadened, as they say. If the majority of trees are thus girdled, the
field is called a deadening, otherwise it is a clearing.--Carlton, The New
Purchase, Vol I. p.240.

DEAD. This word is vulgarly used in the sense of utter, complete. Ex. "A
dead beat," i.e. a complete beating; "a dead shave, or a dead suck," i.e.
an utter swindle; "dead ripe," fully ripe.

DEAD-ALIVE. Dull, inactive, moping.--Barnes's Dorset Glossary. We often
hear the expression, "He is a dead-alive sort of a man."

DEAD AS A DOOR NAIL. Utterly, completely dead. The figure is that of a
nail driven into wood, and, therefore, perfectly immovable; the word door
is used for the sake of the alliteration. It is sometimes changed with us
into the less appropriate phrase, "As dead as a hammer."

For James, the gentil, suggeth in his bokes,
That faith without fact ys febelere than nouht,
And dead as a door nayle.--Piers Ploughman, p. 22.

If I do not leave you all as dead as a door nail, I pray God I may never
eat grass more.--Shakspeare, Henry VI. p. 2.

DEAR ME, or DEARY ME. An exclamation of surprise, used in the same sense
as "Oh dear!"

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DEATH. To be death for, or go one's death for a thing, is to be in favor
of it or pursue it to the last extremity.

I'm death for the 'Mug,' Mr. Bloater.--Mathews, Puffer Hopkins.

DECEDENT. A deceased person.--Laws of Pennsylvania.

DECENT. Tolerable; middling; fair.

DECENTLY. Tolerably; fairly.

The greater part of the pieces it contains may be said to be very decently
written.--Edinburgh Review, Vol. I. p. 426.

DECLENSION. "We sometimes see this word used in the newspapers, in
speaking of a person's declining to be a candidate for oflice. Ex. In
consequence of a declension of our candidate, we shall be obliged to vote
for a new one.["]--Pickering.

TO DEED. To convey or transfer by deed. A popular use of the word in
America; as, he deeded all his estate to his eldest son.--Webster.

TO A DEGREE. To a great extent. An expression common in all parts of the
country.

We learn that the situation of the inhabitants was distressing to a
degree.--Charleston, S. C. Gaz. Aug. 10, 1813.

DEL. The common abbreviation for Delaware.

DEMIJOHN. A glass vessel or bottle, with a large body and small neck,
protected and strengthened by a covering of wicker-work. Mr. Webster
derives it from the French dame-jeanne, but gives no further explanation.
I met the word in Niebuhr's Travels in Arabia:

But we imprudently put our wine into geeat flasks, called in the East
damasjanes, and large enough each of them to contain twenty ordinary
bottles.--Vol. I. p. 169.

This induced the belief that the word was Arabic; but, on referring to the
Arabic dictionary, no such word could be found. I made inquiry of several
philologists, none of whom could give its origin. One day I asked a
Frenchman who dealt in wines, why the French called them dame-jeannes? He
replied at once, that they were invented in France at a time when large
hoop-dresses were worn at court, and froni the resemblance of those large
bottles to the small waists and

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full dresses of the ladies, they were called dame-jeannes, i. e. Lady
Janes.

DEMORALIZATION. The act of subverting or corrupting morals; destruction of
moral principles.--Webster. A word of modern origin, but of very extensive
use, which, says Mr. D'Israeli, "was the invention of horrid Gapuchin
Chabot."

Demoralization is a long, hard word, which has lately been a good deal
intruded upon us, as expressive of the change that has taken place lately,
not only in the actual morals or manners of the lower orders of people,
but in their feelings.--Arch. Nares, Heraldic Anomalies, p. 218.

The cause [of the crimes of the Creoles] is to be found in the existence
of Slavery; and the inevitable demoralization which this accursed practice
produces, is not checked by any system of religious instruction.--London
Quarterly Rev. Nov. 1810.

TO DEMORALIZE. To corrupt and undermine the morals of; to destroy or
lessen the effect of moral principles on.--Webster. Like the preceding,
this word has a place in Todd's Johnson, where it is noticed as a word of
late introduction into our language. Professor Lyell, who visited Dr.
Webster, says, "When the Dr. was asked how many words he had coined for
his dictionary, he replied,only one, 'to demoralize,' and that not for his
dictionary, but in a pamphlet published in the last century."--Travels in
the U. States, p. 53. Mr. Jodrell, in his "Philology of the English
Language," gives the word a place, and cites as an example, a passage from
a speech by Lord Liverpool, in the House of Lords, March 11, 1817:

They had endeavored to guard and protect the people against the attempts
which were made to corrupt and demoralize them.

The native vigor of the soul must wholly disappear, under the steady
influence and the demoralizing example of profligate power and prosperous
crime.--Walsh, Letters on France.

DEPARTMENTAL. Pertaining to a department, or division.--Webster.

The game played by the revolutionists in 1789 was now played against the
departmental guards, called together for the protection of
revolutionists.--Burke, Pref. to Brissot's Address.

Which it required all the exertion of the departmental force to suppress.--
H. M. Williams, Letters on France.

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TO DEPUTIZE. To depute; to appoint a deputy; to empower to act for
another, as a sheriff.--Webster.

This word is not in any of the English dictionaries except one of the
early editions of Bailey, where it appears in the preface among words in
modern authors, collected after the dictionary was printed. Mr. Pickering
remarks, that "the word is sometimes heard in conversation, but rarely
occurs in writing, ... and that it has always been considered as a mere
vulgarism." Since the publication of Mr. P.'s Vocabulary, this word has
been adopted in general use, and cannot now by any means be considered a
vulgarism.

They seldom think it necessary to deputize more than one person to attend
to their interests at the seat of government.--Port Folio, Jan. 1811.

TO DERANGE. To turn out of the proper place; to disorder, to put out of
order.--Todd's Johnson. Webster.

"About twenty years ago," says Mr. Todd, "this word was condemend as a
Gallicism." The following are among the earliest instances of its use:

That Robespierre might fall without deranging the general system.--British
Critic, Vol. 5. p. 77.

The republic of regicides has actually conquered the finest parts of
Europe; has distressed, disunited, deranged, and broke to pieces all the
rest.--Burke on a Regicide Peace.

DESK. The pulpit in a church, and figuratively, the clerical profession.
The man appears well at the desk. He intends one son for the bar, and
another for the desk.--Pickering. This New England word is not generally
used in other parts of the country.

The pulpit, or as it is here [in Connecticut] called, the desk, was filled
by three if not four clergymen; a number which, by its form and
dimensions, it was able to accommodate.--Kendall's Travels, Vol. I. p.4.

They are common to every species of oratory, though of rarer use in the
desk, &c.--Adams's Lecture on Rhetoric.

DESPERATE, commonly pronounced desput, and used to denote exceedingly; as
"I'm desput glad to see you." Bad as this use and pronunciation of this
word are, they are both to be found in England. Mr. Hamilton notices this
word among the provincialisms of Yorkshire; as, "Thou's desperate
hopeful!"-Nugæ Literariæ, p. 353.

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Waes me! what's this that lugs sae at my heart,

And fills my breast with such a despert smart?--Poems in Westmoreland and
Cumberland Dialect, p. 117.

DEUCE. A euphemism for devil; as, 'The deuce is in it;' 'Deuce take it.'
Common both in England and America.

DEVIL. A kind of expletive, expressing wonder or vexation; a ludicrous
negative, in an adverbial sense; a term for mischief.--Johnson. In these
several senses the word is used in the United States.

The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare;
But wonder how the devil they got there?--Pope.

The devil was well, the devil a monk was he!--A Proverb.

A war of profit mitigates the evil;
But to be tax'd and beaten, is the devil.--Granville.

It is also, says Johnson, a ludicrous expletive of elder times, coupled
with all; implying. after an enumeration of some things, several
understood. Bale was very fond of applying it, in his zeal against popery.
It is yet absurdly retained in low language.

Baptysed bells, bodes, organs, songs, wax-lyghts, pycteres, reliques,
banners, crosses, altars, holye-water, and the devyl and all of soche
idolatrouse beggary.--Bale, Yet a Course at the Romishe Foxe (1543).

DEVILISH. Atrocious, enormous; excessively, exceedingly. Of the latter or
adverbial use of the word Grose says, "It is an epithet, which, in the
English vulgar language, is made to agree with every quality or thing; as,
devilish bad, devilish good; devilish sick, devilish well; devilish sweet,
devilisit sour; devilish hot, devilish cold, &c."--Slang Dictionary.

A devilish knave! besides, the knave is handsome, young, and blithe; all
those requisites are in him that delight.--Shakspeare.

Thy hair and beard are of a different die,
Short of one foot, distorted of one eye;
With all these tokens of a knave complete.
If thou art honest, thou'rt a devilish cheat.--Addison.

DEVIL'S DARNING NEEDLE. A common name for the Dragon-fly.

DEVIL-FISH. (Genus, Sophius. Cuvier.) The common name of the American
Angler, so called from its hideous form. It is also known by the names of
Sea-devil, Fishing-frog,

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Bellows-fish, Goose-fish, Monk-fish, and others.--Storer's Fishes of Mass.

DEVILTRY. Mischief; devilry. Provincial in England.

The office-holding gentry at Washington will meet with their match in an
indignant people, when they come to find out their deviltry.--Crockett's
Speech, Tour, p. 106.

Peter Funk is ready to be employed in all manner of deceit and deviltry.
He cares not who his employers are.--Perils of Pearl Street, p. 51.

DICKENS. A euphemism for devil; used in the same manner as deuce. 'What
the dickens are you about?'

Whence had you this pretty weather-cock?

--I cannot tell what the dickens his name is my husband had him of.--
Shakspeare, Merry Wives of Windsor.

TO DICKER. To barter. Used in the State of New York.

DICK'S HATBAND. This very singular expression I have often heard in Rhode
Island. Mr. Hartshorne calls it "one of those phrases which set
philologists and antiquarians at defiance." It is in general use
throughout Shropshire, where it is applied as a comparison for what is
obstinate and perverse. Ex. "As curst as Dick's hatband, which will come
nineteen times round and wont tie at last;" "As contrary as Dick's
hatband;" "As false as Dick's hatband;" "As cruikit as Dick's hatband;"
"As twisted as Dick's hatband;" "All across, like Dick's hatband;" "As
queer as Dick's hatband."

DIFFICULTED. Perplexed. This is not a common word. Mr. Sherwood has it
among the words peculiar to Georgia, and there are examples of its use to
be found in some of our well-known authors. It is in common use at the
Bar: 'The gentleman, I think, will be difficulted to find a parallel
case.'

There is no break in the chain of vital operation; and consequently we are
not difficulted at all on the score of the relation which the new plant
bears to the old.--Bush on the Resurrection, p. 57.

Dr. Jamieson has the verb to difficult in his Scottish Dictionary.

DIGGING. Dear or costly; as, 'a mighty digging price.' A Southern word.--
Sherwood's Georgia.

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DIG. A poke, punch; and metaphorically, a reproof.

A sly dig like the above in "The Sun" [newspaper] is worth having any day,
when it is a dig on the right side.--N. Y. Tribune.

DIGGINGS. A word first used at the Western lead mines, to denote places
where the ore was dug. Instead of saying this or that mine, it is these
diggings, or those diggings. The phrase these diggings is now provincial
in the Western States, and is occasionally heard in the Eastern, to denote
a neighborhood, or particular section of country.

Mr. Charles F. Hoffman visited the Galena lead mines, and while there was
shown about to the various estates, where the people were digging for ore.
The person who accompanied him said:
Mr.----, from your State, has lately struck a lead, and a few years will
make him independent. We are now, you observe, among his diggings.--Winter
in the West, Let. 25.

Boys, fellars, and candidates, I am the first white man ever seed in these
diggins. I killed the first bar [bear] ever a white skinned in the county,
and am the first manufacturer of whisky, and a powerful mixture it is
too.--Robb, Squatter Life.

He can shoot the closest of any chap, young or old, in these 'are
diggins.--Carlton, The New Purchase, Vol. I. p. 155.

I ain't a vain man, and never was. I hante a morsel of it in my
composition. I don't think any of us Yankees is vain people; it's a thing
don't grow in our diggins.--Sam Slick in England, ch. 24.

Guess they don't often see such an apostle in these diggins.--Ibid.

TO DILL. (Probably the same as to dull.) To soothe. The word is used in
the north of England.

I know what is in this medicine. It'll dill fevers, dry up sores, stop
rheumatis, drive out rattle-snake's bite, kill worms, &c.--Margaret, p.
140.

TO DILLY-DALLY. To delay. A colloquial expression common in the United
States.

The note this verra morning shall be writ,
And gien on Sunday to the parish clerk;
There ne'er comes luck of dilly-dallying work.--Glossary and Poems.

DIME. (Fr. dixme or dime, tenth.) A silver coin of the United States, in
value the tenth of a dollar, or ten cents.

This term, peculiar to our decimal currency, is now in common use at the
South and West; but in the Eastern and

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Northern States, where the Spanish real and half-real have long formed a
large portion of the circulation, and where the dime is only now beginning
to be common, it is usually called a ten-cent piece, and the half-dime a
five-cent piece.

Small articles are sold in the New Orleans markets by the picayune or
dime's worth. If you ask for a pound of figs you will not be understood;
but for a dime's worth, and they are in your hands in a trice.--Sketches
of New Orleans. N. Y. Tribune.

TO DING. To beat, to bang. Used metaphorically to denote tedious
repetition; as, 'Why do you keep dinging that in my ears?'

DING. Excessively. A Southern word.

It was ding hot; so I sot down to rest a bit under the trees.--Chron. of
Pineville.

DINGED. Very. An expletive, peculiar to the South.

You know it's a dinged long ride from Pineville, and it took me most tw
days to get there.--Maj. Jones's Courtship.

TO DISH. To ruin; to frustrate.

She's dished us, too, said the officer. How shall we find out where she's
gone to?--Maj. Downing.

TO DIP SNUFF. A mode of taking tobacco, practised by women in some parts
of the United States, and particularly at the South, may be thus
described: A little pine stick or bit of rattan about three inches long,
split up like a brush at one end, is first wetted and then dipped into
snuff; with this the teeth are rubbed sometimes by the hour together. Some
tie the snuff in a littl bag, and chew it. These filthy practices, which
originate in the use of snuff for cleansing the teeth, seem to be rapidly
going out of use, at least at the North.

DIPPER. A small aquatic bird common throughout the United States; also
called the Water-witch and Hell-diver. (Horned grebe. Nuttall, Ornith.)--
Nat. Hist. of New York.

TO DISREMEMBER. To forget; also, to choose to forget. Used chiefly in the
Southern States.

DOCITY. A low word, used in some parts of the United States to signify
quick comprehension. It is only used in conversation, and generally with a
negative, thus: He has no docity.--

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Pickering. This word is provincial in England, where it means docility,
quick comprehension.--Ash.

DOCTOR. The cook on board a ship; so called by seamen.

DOGS. To go to the dogs. To go to destruction; to be ruined, destroyed, or
devoured.--Johnson.

Had whole Culpepper's wealth been hops and hogs,
Could he himself have sent it to the dogs?--Pope.

TO DOG. To hunt as a dog, insidiously and indefatigably.--Johnson.

I have been pursued, dogged, and way-laid through several nations, and
even now scarce think myself secure.--Pope.

The landlord gets his rents by looking after 'em; he fairly dogs it out of
his tenant. He's as keen as a blood-hound, and will follow them day and
night till he gets it.--Maj. Downing, May-day in N. Y.

DOG'S BANE. (Apocynum androsæmifolium.) The common name of a shrub, which
grows along the road-side and borders of woods. The root is bitter, and
has emetic properties.--Bigelow's Medical Botany.

DOG SICK, or SICK AS A DOG. A common expression, meaning very sick at the
stomach.

He that saieth he is dog sick, or sick as a dog, meaneth doubtless, a sick
dog.--Dyet's Dry Dinner (1599).

DOG CHEAP. Anything exceedingly cheap; or, as Dr. Johnson says, as cheap
as dog's meat.

Good store of harlots, say you, and dog cheap?--Dryden.

I bought fifty green sprigs of the morus multicaulis at a dollar a-piece,
which was dog cheap to what they had been selling.--Knickerbocker Mag.

DOGWOOD. (Rhus vernix.) The popular name of the poison sumac. It grows in
swamps, and from the beauty of its leaves has the appearance of a tropical
plant. It is a violent poison to many when it is handled or even
approached. To others it is harmless. The Dogwood-tree (Cornus Florida) is
a different plant, and is used in medicine.--Bigelow's Flora.

DOLLAR MARK ($). The origin of this sign to represent the dollar has been
the cause of much discussion of late in the newspapers. One writer says it
comes from the letters U. S. (United States) which, after the adoption of
the Federal Constitution, were prefixed to the Federal currency, and which

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afterwards, in the hurry of writing, were run into one another; the U
being made first and the S over it. Another, that it is derived from the
contraction of the Spanish word pesos, dollars, or pesos fuertes, hard
dollars. A third, that it is a contraction of the Spanish fuertes, hard,
to distinguish silver or hard dollars from paper money. The more probable
explanation is, that it is a modification of the figure 8, and denotes a
piece of eight reals, or, as a dollar was formerly called, a piece of
eight. It was then designated by the figures 8/8.

As to my hoat, it was a very good one; and that he saw, and told me he
would buy it of me for the ship's use; and asked me what I would have for
it? I told him that I could not offer to make any price of the boat, but
left it entirely to him; upon which be told me he would give me a note of
hand to pay me eighty pieces of eight for it in Brazil. He offered me also
sixty pieces of eight more for my boy Xury, which I was loath to take; not
that I was not willing to let the Captain have him, but I was loath to
sell the poor boy's liberty, who had assisted me so faithfully in
procuring my own.--Robinson Crusoe, sec. 4.

DONATE. To give as a donation; to contribute. This word is not in the
dictionaries, but has only reached the newspapers and reviews.

There have been received from the Foreign Bible Society $7000, not
including $1000 recently donated.--Baptist Missionary Herald. Rep. 1846.

The display of articles exhibited [at the Fair in Albany] was very
tasteful and attractive; and the friends of the cause in Massachusetts,
and other places, donated liberally.--N. Y. Tribune, Nov. 6, 1846.

DONATION PARTY. A party, consisting of the friends and parishioners of a
country clergyman, assembled together, each individual bringing some
article of food or clothing as a present to him. Where the salary of a
clergyman is small, the contributions at a donation party are very
acceptable. It is also called a giving party.

DONE, instead of did; as, 'They done the business.' A common vulgarism in
the State of New York.

DONE BROWN. Thoroughly, effectually cheated, bamboozled. Of recent origin.

DO DON'T, for do not or don't, is a common expression in Georgia, and not
by any means confined to the uneducated classes.

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DONE FOR. Cheated; taken advantage of.

Wall street, it appears, is infested with mock-auction shops,--a country-
man was done for at No. 15, to the tune of twenty-four dollars.--New York
Tribune, Nov. 1, 1845.

DONE DID IT, for has done it, or performed it.--Sherwood's Georgia.

DONE COME. Come. A vulgarism peculiar to the South.

DONE GONE. Ruined; destroyed; rendered useless; entirely gone. A Southern
vulgarism.

The horse and cart is done gone, and everything in it.--Chron. of
Pineville, p. 107.

Oh! she waked me in the mornin', and it's broad day;

I look'd for my canoe, and it's done gone away.--Porter's Tales of the
Southwest, p. 133.

DONE UP. Ruined by gaming and extravagance.--Grose. We use it
colloquially, where a person is ruined in any way, whether by gaming or by
trade.

DON'T. The proper colloquial contraction for do not; and which should
therefore be used only in the first person singular and the plural. Yet we
very often hear it used instead of doesn't for does not; as, 'He don't
tell the truth.'

I DON'T KNOW AS I SHAN'T, for I don't know but I shall. This uncouth
expression, Mr. Hurd says, is very common in the eastern towns of
Massachusetts, near Cape Cod.--Grammatical Corrector.

DOREE. A fish commonly called John Dory with us as in England. This last
name is a corruption of the French jaune dorée, golden yellow, which is
the color of this fish.

DO TELL! A vulgar exclamation common in New England, and synonymous with
really! indeed! is it possible!

A bright-eyed little demoiselle from Virginia came running into the dairy
of a country house in New Hampshire, at which her mother was spending the
summer, with a long story about a most beautiful butterfly site had been
chasing; and the dairy maid, after hearing the story through, exclaimed,
"Do tell!" The child immediately repeated the story, and the good-natured
maid, after hearing it through a second time, exclaimed again, in a tone
of still greater wonder, "Do tell!" A third time the story was told, and
the third time came the exclamation of wonder, "Do tell!" The child's
spirits were dashed, and she went to her mother with a sad tale

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about Ruth's teasing her; while poor Ruth said that 'those daown country
gals were so strange; keep telling me the same thing over and over,--I
never see anything like!"--N. Y. Com. Adv.

DOMESTICS. Used only in the plural. Cotton goods of American manufacture.

TO DOOM. To tax at discretion. A New England term.

When a person neglects to make a return of his taxable property to the
assessors of a town, those officers doom him; that is, judge upon, and fix
his tax according to their discretion.--Pickering.

The estates of all merchants, shop-keepers, and factors, shall be assessed
by the rule of common estimation, according to the will and doom of the
assessors.--Massachusetts Colony Laws, p. 14, ed. 1660.

DOOMAGE. A penalty or fine for neglect. Laws of New Hampshire.--Webster.

DORMAR-WINDOW. A window made in the roof of a house.--Worster. The word
seems formerly to have been dormant, as in the following:

Old dormant windows must confess

Her beams; their glimnering spectacles, &c.--Cleveland.

Here and there was a house with gambled roof and dormer windows.--
Margaret, p. 33.

DOUCHE. A term lately Lntroduced into the language from the French by the
followers of Priessnitz. It technically denotes a jet of water employed as
a remedy.

DOUGH-FACES. A contemptuous nickname, applied to the northern favorers and
abettors of negro slavery.

The Wilmot proviso was lost, and the dough-faces of New York did the
deed.--N. Y. Express, March, 1841.

There is one very probable result, to wit: that there will be "dough-
faces" enough among the Northern Democrats to sustain the policy of
extending the area of African slavery to the shores of the Pacific.--N. Y.
Com. Adv. Jan. 8, 1848.

The truth is, that while the Southerners need and are willing to pay for
the services of the dough-faces, they dislike their persons and despise
their discourse--N. Y. Tribune, April, 1848.

DOUGH-NUT. A small roundish cake, made of flour, eggs, and sugar,
moistened with milk, and boiled in lard.--Webster. Halliwell has donnut in
his Provincial Dictionary, which is no doubt the same word.

p. 121

DOVE. Dived. Very common among seamen.

DOWD. A woman's night-cap, composed of two pieces of cloth, the seam
running from the forehead to the neck. It is sometimes called a "squaw-
shaped cap." New York.

DOWN IN THE MOUTH. Dispirited, dejected, disheartened.--Brockett's
Glossary.

DOWN UPON. To be down upon, is to seize with avidity, as a bird of prey
would pounce down upon its victim. Alluding to the state of the poultry
market, the New York Tribune says:

The boarding-house keepers are down upon geese.

This phrase is also used to express disapprobation, dislike, or enmity; as
"I'll be down upon you," i. e. I'll come up with you or pay you off for
some injury or insult, &c. A common expression at the West is, "I'll be
down upon you like a thousand of brick."

TO DOXOLOGIZE. To give glory to God, as in doxology.--Webster.

No instance is to be found in which primitive Christians doxologized the
spirit of God as a person.--Christian Disciple, Vol. II. p. 295.

Mr. Pickering says he "never met with the word in any other American work,
nor in any English publication; but that it may possibly be a part of the
professional language of divines." Mr. P. farther observes, that he found
it in the early editions of the dictionaries of Ash and Bailey, from which
it was afterwards discarded. Mr. Worcester has inserted the word in his
new dictionary.

TO DRABBLE. To draggle; to make dirty by drawing in dirt and water; to wet
and befoul; as, to drabble a gown or cloak. A word common in New England.--
Webster.

Dr. Jamieson calls drabble a Scottish word. The sense here is the same as
in Scotland.

DRAGGED OUT. Fatigued; exhausted; worn out with labor.

DRAT. A good-humored sort of half oath, as Moor calls it in his Suffolk
Words. It is probably an abbreviation of od rot,

p. 122

and originally God rot. The expression is only heard at the South.

"A wolf! a wolf!" they cry, "have at him!
If he escape us this time, 'drat him!"--Reynard the Fox, p. 69.

Your bag! says Pete, drat your infernal picter, who told you to hang up a
bag, for white folks to get into?--Maj. Jones's Courtship, p. 194.

'Drot it! what do boys have daddies for, any how? 'Taint for nothin' but
jest to beat 'em and work 'em.--Simon Suggs.

DRATTED. A Southern word, derived from the former. It is an expletive, and
means very, exceeding, etc.

I never was so dratted mad; for the fellows were coming in in gangs, and
beginnin' to ca]l for me to come out and take the command.--Maj. Jones's
Courtship, p. 22.

It was about eleven o'clock before the dratted thing came along.--Ibid.

You may thank me that you have got eyes left in yer dratted head to look
for yer blind horse.--Chronicles of Pineville, p. 108.

DREADFUL. Very, exceedingly. This and the words awful, terrible,
monstrous, &c., are indiscriminately used by uneducated people for the
purpose of giving emphasis to an expression.

There was a swod of fine folks at Saratoga, and dreadful nice galls.--Maj.
Downing's Letters, p. 35.

It's a fact, Major, the public has a dreadful cravin' appetite for books.--
Ibid. May-day in N. Y., p. 4.

The young ladies thought Mr. Harley's new storekeeper a dreadful nice
young man, if he hadn't such a horrid nose.--Chronicles of Pineville.

She was a dreadful good creature to work.--Mrs. Clavers.

It is used in the same way in England, in the Westmoreland and Cumberland
dialects:
I send to this an, to tell thee amackily what dreadful fine things I saw
i' th' road tuv at yon Dublin.--Poems and Glossary, p. 125.

TO DRIVE A BARGAIN. To make a bargain. A common colloquial expression, as
old as the language.

This bargain is full drive, for we ben knit;
Ye shal be paied trewely by my troth.--Chaucer, Franklin's Tale.

DRIVER. An overseer of slaves.

DRIVER. He or that which drives; a coachman, a carman.--Worcester. The
English always call a driver of a carriage a coachman.

p. 123

TO BE DRIVING AT. 'What are you driving at?' that is, what are you about?
what object have you in view? A colloquial expression, in very common use.

We eonfess that we are exceedingly puzzled to know exactly what our long-
cherished friend is driving at, in his repeated discussions of the
question above involved.--N. Y. Com. Advertiser.

People ludicrate my situation, and say they don't know what the deuce I'm
driving at.--Neal's Charcoal Sketches.

I have heard enough now, said the Recorder, to know what you and he would
be driving at.--Pickings from the Picayune, p. 135.

TO DRIVE WELL. A Southern phrase, thus explained by Mr. Lavis: This
gentleman applied for a situation as teacher in a college in South
Carolina, when the following dialogue took place:

Planter. Can you drive well, Sir.

Tutor. Drive, Sir, did you say ? I really do not comprehend you.

Planter. I mean, Sir, can you keep your scholars in order?

The phrase, adds our author, is used by the overseer on a plantation, who,
in preserving subordination among the negroes, is said to drive well.--
Davis's Travels in the United States.

DROGER. Lumber droger; cotton droger, etc. A vessel built solely for
burden, and for transporting cotton, lumber, and other heavy articles.

DROUTH, or DROWTH. (Ang. Sax. drugothe.) Dry weather; want of rain;
drought. This is the oldest pronunciation of the word, and is still heard
in some parts of England and in Scotland, as well as amongst us.

Great drouths in summer, lasting till the end of August; some gentle
showers upon them, and then some dry weather.--Bacon.

As torrents in the drowth of summer fail.--Sandys.

He speaks in his drink, what he thought in his drouth.--Scottish Proverb.

DROWNDED, for drowned. Often used by illiterate people in England and
America.--Craven Glossary.

Then rising up he cried amain,
Helpe, helpe! or else I am drownded.--Baffled Knight.

DRUMMING, in mercantile phrase, means the soliciting of customers. It is
chiefly used in reference to country merchants, or those supposed to be
such. Instead of patiently waiting for these persons to come and purchase,
the merchant or his

p. 124

clerk goes to them and solicits their custom. In this manner the sale of
goods is often expedited; and though the practice of drumming is held by
some to be neither very modest nor very dignified, still it must be owned
to add very largely, in certain cases, to the amount of goods sold.
Indeed, without drumming, it is suspected that sundry houses, which make a
remarkable show and noise, would do very little business.

The expenses of drumming amount to no small sum. Besides employing extra
clerks and paying the extra price for their board at the hotels, the
merchant has to be very liberal with his money in paying for wine, oyster-
suppers, theatre tickets, and such other means of conciliating the favor
of the country merchant, as are usually resorted to by drummers.

Another part of the system of mercantile drumming is to "become all things
to all men." Drummers are apt to be exceedingly flexible in matters of
religion, and of morals too--being orthodox with the orthodox, and
heterodox with the heterodox; going to church with those who incline
churchward, and to the theatre with those who prefer the theatre; taking
cold water with those who are opposed to brandy, and drinking brandy with
those who eschew cold water.--Perils of Pearl Street, ch. 9.

DUBERSOME. Doubtful. A vulgarism common in the interior of New England.

I have been studyin' Tattersall's considerable, to see whether it is a
safe shop to trade in or no. But I'm dubersome; I don't like the cut of
the sporting folks here.--Sam Slick in England, ch. 28.

LAME DUCK. A Wall-street phrase for a Broker or Stock Jobber, who is
unable to pay his losses or differences. He is short in his payments; he
is a lame duck. It is among the rules of the Stock Exchange, that a broker
ceases to be a member when he cannot or will not meet his engagements.

The same phrase is employed at Exchange Alley in London, where the
delinquent is said to "waddle out of the Alley, not to appear again till
his debts are paid; should he attempt it, he would be hustled out by the
fraternity."--Grose, Slang Dictionary.

DUDS. (Gaelic, dud.) Rags; old clothes. A common word,

p. 125

which is used in the same sense in various parts of England and the United
States.

Sae I pack'd up my duds when my quarter was out,
And wi' weage i' my pockut, I sunter'd about.--Westmorland and Cumb.
Dialect, p. 226.

Give a man time to take off his duds, and then lick him if you can.--
Crockett's Tour, p. 193.

DUG-OUT. The name in the Western States for a canoe or boat, hewn or dug
out of a large log. They are common in all the rivers and creeks of the
United States and Canada. In the latter country they are called log
canoes.

After a fashion I got to my dug-out, with no weapon along but the paddle.
Snags were plenty. I felt strong as a hoss, too; and the dug-out hadn't
leaped more'n six length afore--co-souse I went--the front eend jest
lifted itself agin a sawyer and emptied me into the element.--Robb,
Squatter Life.

DULL MUSIC. A term applied to anything tedious.

DUMB-FOUNDED. Stupefied; struck dumb with fear and confusion. This word is
in the English provincial glossaries and in Webster's Dictionary.

DUMMY. A dumb, i.e. silent person; a stupid person. We use the word most
frequently to denote a silent partner at cards. To play dummy, is to play
with one person less than the requisite number.

Auld Gabbi Spec wha was sae cunning,

To be a dummie ten years running.--Allan Ramsay.

TO DUMP. To unload wood, coal, &c. from a cart by tilting it up. A word
very common in New York, and probably of Dutch origin.

Why, nothing in all creation can come up to blackberrying, but gettin'
dumped out of a sleigh into a snow-bank.--Lafayette Chronicle.

DUMPS. Sorrow; melancholy; sadness.--Johnson. We say of a person who is
dull or sad, 'He has the dumps,' or 'is in the dumps.'

Sudden dumps, and dreary sad disdain
Of all worlds' gladness, more my torment feed.--Spenser.

Edwin, thus perplexed with troubled thonghts, in the dead of the night,
sate solitary under a tree in dumps, musing what was best to be done.--
Speed. Chronicle.

p. 126

DUMPISH. Sad; melancholy.--Johnson.

The life which I live at this age is not a dead, dumpish, and sour life;
but cheerful, lively, and pleasant.--Herbert.

But I fear now I have overcharged the reader's mind with doleful, dumpish,
and uncomfortable lines.--Camden, Remains.

DUMPY. Short and thick. Provincial in various parts of England, where, as
with us, it is generally applied to a person who is both short and fat.

Whenever he was wih me, his short, dumpy, gouty, crooked fingers, were
continually teazing my spinnet, to his own harmonious croaking.--Student,
2, 225.

TO DUN. (Ang. Sax. dynan, to clamor.) To urge for payment; to demand a
debt in a pressing manner.--Johnson.

But you have something to add, Sancho, to what I owe your good will also
on this account, and that is to send me the subscription money, which I
find a necessity of dunning my best friends for before I leave town.--
Sterne, Works, Let. 94.

DUNDERHEAD. Blockhead; dolt. The same as the English provincialisms dunder-
knoll and dummer-head.

DUNFISH. (From dun, a dark yellow color.) Codfish cured in a particular
manner, by which they retain a dun color. They command a higher price, and
are much superior to those cured in the ordinary way.

DUNNING. A peculiar operation for curing codfish.--Webster. Fish for
dunning are caught early in the spring, and often in February. At the
Isles of Shoals, off Portsmouth, in New Hampshire, the cod are taken in
deep water, split and slacksalted; then laid in a pile for two or three
months, in a dark store, covered, for the greatest part of the time, with
salt hay or eel-grass, and pressed with some weight. In April or May they
are opened and piled as close as possible in the same dark store, till
July or August, when they are fit for use.--J. Haven.

DUST. 'To kick up a dust,' is to make a row, to cause a great disturbance.
A phrase common in England and the United States.

DUTIABLE. Subject to the imposition of duties or customs.--Webster. This
is a very convenient word, and is in common

p. 127

use, both by the officers of the customs, and by merchants having
transactions with them. Instead of saying that certain articles of
merchandise are subject to duty, the common terms are dutiable and free.

DYED IN THE WOOL. Ingrained; thorough.

The Democrats, on the authority of Mr. Cameron's letter, are beginning to
claim General Taylor as a democrat dyed in the wool, as a democrat of the
Jeffersonian order of 1798.--N. Y. Com. Adv. May 24,1847.



E.
EAGLE. A gold coin of the United States, of the value of ten dollars.

EARS. To be by the ears. A familiar and very old phrase, denoting to
quarrel or fight. It alludes to the practice of dogs, which, when
fighting, seize each other by the ears.

Poor naked men belabored one another with shagged sticks, or daily fell
together by the ears, at fisty-cuffs.--More.

She used to carry tales from one to another, till she had set the
neighborhood together by the ears.--Arbuthnot.

EASY. A word in common use among merchants and bankers. 'Our bank is easy,'
meaning that its loans are not extended, or that money is plentiful. 'The
money market is easy;' i. e. loans of money may easily be procured.

TO EAT, v. a. To supply with food. A Western sense of the word. Comp.
Subsist.

Hooshier. Squire, what pay do you give?
Contractor. Ten bits a day.
Hooshier. Why, Squire, I was told you'd give us two dollars a day and eat
us.--Pickings from the Picayune, p. 47.

TO EDGE. To move sideways; to move gradually.--Webster.

Well, says I, I must be a goin'; I can't think of paying eighty dollars.
And I began to edge along a little.--Maj. Downing, May- day.

I danced with her at some on the balls, and thar I gin to edge up and talk
tender at her, but she only laughed at my sweetnin'.--Robb, Squatter Life.

EDUCATIONAL. Pertaining to education; derived from education; as,
educational habits.--Webster. The authority cited by Webster for the use
of this word is "Smith"--a rather

p. 128

indefinite one. Mr. Pickering says the word was new to him until he saw it
in the following extract:

It is believed that there is not an individual of the college who would,
if questioned, complain that he has, in any instance, felt himself pressed
with opinions which interfered with his educational creed.--Dr. Grant's
Report to the College of New Jersey, 1815.

EEL-GRASS. (Zostera marina.) A plant thrown ashore in large quantities by
the sea. It is also called Sea-wrack.

EEL-SPEAR. A sort of trident for catching eels.

E'EN A'MOST, for almost. A vulgarism.

The repudiation of debts by several of our States, has lowered us down
e'en a'most to the bottom of the shaft.--Sam Slick in England, ch. 14.

He knows the Catechism, and has got the whole Bible eeny most by heart.--
Margaret, p. 113.

The village boys would raise a party of gals, and start off early in the
morning for Toad-hill, where the blackberries was e'en a'most as plentiful
as mosquitoes in these diggings.--Lafayette Chronicle.

LEND, for end. A vulgar pronunciation of the word. It is also common in
various parts of England.

ELBOW-GREASE. Persevering exercise of the arms, exciting perspiration;
hard rubbing.--Glossaries of Brockett and Carr.

These were the manners, these the ways,
In good Queen Bess's golden days;
Each damsel owed her bloom and glee
To wholesale elbow-grease and me.--Smart, Fable 5.

TO ELECT. To prefer, to choose, to determine in favor of.--Webster. This
sense of the word is not noticed by Johnson or Todd. It is not common with
us. President Polk used it thus:

In pursuance of the joint resolution of Congress, "for annexing Texas to
the United States," my predecessor, on the third day of March, 1845,
elected to submit the first and second sections of that resolution to the
Republic of Texas, as an overture, on the part of the United States, for
her admission as a State into our Union. This election I approved.--
Message to Congress, Dec. 1, 1845.

TO ENERGIZE. To give strength or force to; to give active vigor to.--
Webster. To excite aciion.--Todd. This word is not found in Johnson's
Dictionary, and is of modern origin. Mr. Pickering says, the use of it in
the British Spy, published

p. 129

in Virginia, was censured in the Monthly Anthology, as unauthorized.

Instead of aiding and energizing the police of the college.--British Spy.
Bishop Horsley uses the word energizing; also Harris:
As all energies are attributes, they have reference, of course, to certain
energizing substances.--Harris, Hermes, i. 9.

ENLIGHTENMENT. Act of enlightening; state of being enlightened or
instructed.--Webster. Used by the Quarterly Review, Oct. 1837.

ESQUIRE. In England this title is given to the younger sons of noblemen,
to officers of the king's courts and of the household, to counsellors at
law, justices of the peace while in commission, sheriffs, and other
gentlemen. In the United States, the title is given to public officers of
all degrees, from governors down to justices and attorneys. Indeed, the
title, in addressing letters, is bestowed on any person at pleasure, and
contains no definite description. It is merely an expression of respect.--
Webster.

The New York Commercial Advertiser, in an article on the subject of
titles, had the following remarks on esquire: "In our own dear title-
bearing, democratic land, the title of esquire, officially and by
courtesy, has come to include pretty much everybody. Of course everybody
in office is an esquire, and all who have been in office enjoy and glory
in the title. And what with a standing army of legislators, an elective
and ever-changing magistracy, and almost a whole population of militia
officers, present and past, all named as esquires in their commissions,
the title is nearly universal."

EULOGIUM. On this word Mr. Pickering has the following remarks: "A writer
in the Monthly Anthology (Vol. I. p. 609) observes that 'eulogium is not
an English word.' But the writer is certainly mistaken. It is in common
use with all the English and Scottish reviewers; and occurs much oftener,
I think, than the Anglicized term eulogy."--Pickering's Vocabulary.

It is singular that this word is not to be found in either edition of
Johnson's Dictionary, nor in the additions of Mr. Todd, or Mason. Walker
did not insert it until his fourth

p. 130

edition in 1806. Mr. Jodrell has inserted the word in his Philology on the
English Language, and gives examples of its use; it may also be found in
the 9th edition (1840) of Knowles's English Dictionary.

The epitaph on Cragg's monunent, in Westminster Abbey, is an eulogium on
that statesman, taken from Pope's Epistle to Addison.--Sir John Hawkins,
Life of Johnson, p. 538.

I cannot make a higher eulogium of Mrs. Stanley, than to say that she is
every way worthy of the husband whose happiness she makes.--Cœlebs, Vol.
I. p. 142.

To prevent posterity being deceived by the pompous eulogiums bestowed on
this bridge, which has been styled the wonder of the world, &c.--London
and Environs, Vol. IV. p. 143. (1761).

TO EVENTUATE. To issue; to come to an end; to close; to terminate.--
Webster. This word is not in any of the English dictionaries, except
Knowles's 9th edition, London, 1840; and Mr. Pickering says, "it is
rarely, if ever, used by English authors."

EVERLASTING. Very; exceedingly.

New York is an everlasting great concern.--Maj. Downing, May-day in New
York.

EVERY-DAY. Common; usual.

Men of genius forget things of common concern, which make no slight
impression on every-day minds.--Shenstone.

EVERY NOW AND THEN. Repeatedly, at intervals. This phrase is common with
us, and is used also in England.

[The young woman] looks demurely on the ground, a smile playing on her
lips, every now and then turning on her swain such sparkling glances from
her bright eyes.--Kingston, Lusitanian Sketches.

EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE. A singular though very common expression,
signifying the same as every now and then.

EVIDENTIAL. Affecting evidence; clearly proving.--Webster.

Dr. Webster cites Scott as his authority, but gives no example. Mr.
Pickering has the following example from an English work:
Equivalent to that belief itself, and evidential of it.--Christian
Observer, Vol. XIII. p. 765.

p. 131

TO EVOKE. To call forth.--Todd. Webster. Several newspapers criticised the
use of this word hy the Hon. J. Q Adams in a letter to the Hon. H. G.
Otis:

Every phantom of jealousy and fear is evoked.

The following examples will show that it has been used by English writers.
Mr. Todd says, it is in Cockeram's old Vocabulary, but that he has not
found it in use till near a century later.

I had no sooner evoked the name of Shakspeare from the rotten monument of
his former editions, &c.--Bp. Warburton to Hurd (1749), Let 6.

The only business and use of this character, is to open the subject in a
long prologue, to evoke the devil, and summons the court.--Warton, Hist.
of Eng. Poetry.

He was so subjugated by them, as frequently to pass many hours of the
night inchurchyards, engaged in evoking and attempting to raise
apparitions.--Wraxall, Hist. Memoirs, Vol. I. p. 178.

EXCHANGEABILITY. The quality or state of being exchangeable.--Webster.

Though the law ought not to be contravened by an express article admitting
the exchangeability of such persons.--Washington.

THE EXECUTIVE. The officer, whether king, president, or other chief
magistrate, who superintends the execution of the laws; the person who
administers the government; executive power or authority in government.--
Webster.

TO EXPECT, instead of suspect. To suppose, think, imagine. A very common
corruption.

In most parts of the world people expect things that are to come. But in
Pennsylvania, more particularly in the metropolis, we expect things that
are past. One man tells another, he expects he had a very pleasant ride,
&c. ...... I have heard a wise man in Gotham say, he expected Alexander,
the Macedonian, was the greatest conqueror of antiquity.--Port Folio,
1809.

Nor is it confined to ourselves. It is not only provincial in England, but
we are even startled at meeting with it in the London Athenæum. In an
article on the Penny Cyclopedia, a writer says:
The most sustained departments are those of mathematics, classical
literature, astronomy, geography, topography, geology, materia medica, and
agriculture. In the articles on these subjects we expect that one hand has
written or one head has guided the whole series, and thus completeness has
been obtained.--Athen. No. 858.

p. 132



F.
FACTORY. (Contracted from manufactory.) This word is not in Johnson's
Dictionary or in any other before his time. It is now common both in
England and the United States, and is applied to a place where anything is
made.

FAGGED OUT. Fatigued; worn out.

FAIR SHAKE. A fair trade; a satisfactory bargain or exchange. A New
England vulgarism.

FALL. The fall of the leaf; autumn; the time when the leaves drop from the
trees.--Todd's Johnson. Webster.

This beautifully picturesque expression, which corresponds so well to its
opposite spring, has been said to be peculiar to the United States. Mr.
Pickering notices the following remark in Rees's Cyclopedia: "In North
America the season in which the fall of the leaf takes place, derives its
name from that circumstance, and instead of autumn is universally called
the fall."--ART. Deciduous Leaves. It is used, however, in England in the
same sense, though autumn is as generally employed there, as fall is in
the United States.

What crowds of patients the town doctor kills,
Or how last fall he raised the weekly bills.--Dryden's Juvenal.

Hash worked the farm, burnt coal in the fall, made sugar in the spring,
drank, smoked, &c.--Margarel, p. 13.

TO FALL. To fell, to cut down; as, 'to fall a tree.'--Webster. This use of
the word is now common in America, although it has been condemned as a
barbarism. It is found in the English dictionaries of Ash, Sheridan,
Walker, and Knowles; but many others leave it out. Besides the
dictionaries, there are other authorities for the use of this word,
sufficient to elevate it above the rank of a barbarism. For a fuller
account of it, see Mr. Pickering's Vocabulary.

FANCY STOCKS. A species of stocks which are bought and sold to a great
extent in New York. Unlike articles of merchandise, which may be seen and
examined by the dealer, and which always have an intrinsic value in every
fluctuation

p. 133

of the market, these stocks are wholly wrapped in mystery; no one knows
anything about them, except the officers and directors of the companies,
who, from their position, are not the most likely men to tell you the
truth. They serve no other purpose, therefore, than as the representative
of value in stock gambling. Nearly all the fluctuations in their prices
are artificial. A small fluctuation is more easily produced than a large
one; and as the calculations are made on the par value, a fluctuation of
one per cent. on stock worth $20 a share, is just five times as much on
the amount of money invested, as it would be on a par stock. Consequently,
if a "Flunkie" can be drawn in, he may be fleeced five times as quick in
these, as in good stocks.--Week in Wall St. p. 83.

FARZINER. A vulgar contraction of far-as-I-know, extensively used through
New England and New York, including Long Island.

FEAST. (A corruption of the Dutch vies, nice, fastidious.) 'I am feast of
it,' is a literal translation of the Dutch Ik ben 'er vies van, i. e. I am
disgusted with, I loathe it. A New York phrase, mostly confined to the
descendants of the Dutch.

FEAT. Ready, skilful.--Johnson. This word is now only known as a
provincialism in England and America.

Never master had a page so kind, so diligent;
So feat, so nurse-like.--Shakspeare, Cymbeline.

The following will illustrate its use in New England:
She was so feat and spry, and knowing, and good-natured, she said she
could be of some use to somebody.--Margaret, p. 21.

TO FEATHER ONE'S NEST. To collect riches together; alluding to birds which
collect feathers, among other materials, for making their nests.--Johnson.

Tradition says he feathered his nest
Through an agricultural interest,
In the Golden Age of Farming.--Hood's Miss Killmansegg.

FEDERAL CURRENCY. The legal currency of the United States. Its coins are
the gold eagle of ten dollars, half and quarter eagles of proportionate
value. The silver dollar of one hundred cents, its half, quarter, tenth,
and twentieth parts. The coin of ten cents value is called a dime, that of
five cents, a half-dime. The lowest coin in common use is the

p. 134

copper cent. Half-cent coins have been made, but none of late years. In
the commercial cities and along the sea-board, Spanish coins of a dollar
and the fractional parts of a dollar are very common, and pass currently
for their original value, except at the Custom Houses and Post Offices,
where, by a recent ordinance, the quarter dollar and its parts are only
received at twenty-five per cent. discount.

Previous to the adoption of our Federal currency, pounds, shillings, and
pence were used. But this currency became unstable, in consequence of the
great depreciation which took place in the paper money issued by the
colonies.

In the year 1702, exchange on England was 33 1/3 per cent. above par; and
silver and gold bore the same relative value to paper money. The
depreciation in the latter continued to increase until, in the year 1749,
£1100 currency was only equal to £100 sterling, or eleven for one. In
1750, a stop was put to the farther depreciation of the money of the
province of Massachusetts by a remittance from England of £183,000
sterling, in Spanish dollars, to reimburse the expense the province had
been at in the reduction of Cape Breton in the old French war. The
depreciated money was then called in, and paid off at the rate of a
Spanish dollar for 45 shillings of the paper currency. At the same time a
law was made fixing the par of exchange between England and Massachusetts
at £133 1/3 currency for £100 sterling, and 6 shillings to the Spanish
dollar.

The difference of exchange, or depreciation of the paper money, regulated
in the same manner the currencies of the other colonies. Throughout New
England, as has been before stated, it was 6s. to the dollar of 4s. 6d.
sterling. In New York, 8s., or about 75 per cent. depreciation.
Pennsylvania, 7s. 6d., or about 66 per cent. depreciation. In some of the
Southern States it was 4s. 6d. to the dollar, and accordingly no
depreciation. In Halifax currency, including the present British
provinces, it was 5s. to the dollar, or about 11 per cent., etc. etc. The
old system of reckoning by shillings and pence is continued by retail
dealers generally; and will continue, as long as the Spanish coins remain
in circulation.

p. 135

In consequence of the above named diversity in the colonial currencies, in
New England the Spanish real of 1/8 of a dollar or 12 1/2 cents is called
ninepence; in New York, one shilling; in Pennsylvania, elevenpence or a
levy; and in many of the Southern States, a bit. The half real of 1/16 of
a dollar is called in New York a sixpence; in New England, fourpence
ha'penny, or simply fourpence; in Pennsylvania, a fip; and at the South, a
picayune.

FEDERALIST. An appellation in America given to the friends of the
Constitution of the United States, at its formation and adoption; and to
the political party which favored the administration of President
Washington.--Webster.

TO FEDERALIZE. To unite in compact, as different States; to confederate
for political purposes.--Webster.

FEEZE. 'To be in a feeze,' is to be in a state of excitement.

When a man's in a feeze,' there's no more sleep that hitch.--Sam Slick in
England, ch. 2.

FELLOW-COUNTRYMEN. This word is often used by public speakers. It is
improper, as the last word expresses the meaning of both. Mr. Pickering
however mentions an example of the use of the word by Southey in his Life
of Nelson.

FELLOWSHIP. Companionship; consort; society.--Johnson. With us it is often
used in religious writings and discourses instead of the word communion,
to denote "mutual intercourse or union in religious worship, or in
doctrine and discipline."

TO FELLOWSHIP. A verb formed from the preceding noun. To fellowship with,
is to hold communion with; to unite with in doctrine and discipline. This
barbarism now appears with disgusting frequency in the reports of
ecclesiastical conventions, &c., and in the religious newspapers
generally. Mr. Pickering, in the Supplement to his Vocabulary, says he had
just become acquainted with the word. The following is the first example
which he gives:

We considered him heretical, essentially unsound in the faith; and on this
ground refused fellowship with him.--Address to the Christian Public,
Greenfield, 1813.

If the Christian Alliance could not fellowship with the Southern
slaveholders for gain, they ought to say so outright.--Speech at the
Christian Alliance Conference, May 8, 1847.

p. 136

ON THE FENCE. In politics, to be on the feace, is to be neutral, or to be
ready to join the strongest party, whenever it can be ascertained which is
so. A man sitting on the top of a fence, can jump down on either side with
equal facility. So with a politician who is on the fence; selfish motives
govern him, and he is prepared at any moment to declare for either party.

FETCH. (Ang. Sax. facen, fraud, trick, deceit.) A trick, or invention to
deceive.--Grose. This word is in several of the English glossaries. In the
United States it is never heard except colloquially.

An envious neighbor is easy to find,
His cumbersome fetches are seldom behind;
His fetch is to flatter, to get what he can;
His purpose once gotten, a pin for thee then.--Tusser, Husb.

It is a fetch of wit;
You laying these slight sullies on my son,
As 'twere a thing a little soil'd i' th' working.--Shakspeare.

FETTICUS.}
VETTIKOST.} Vulg. Fáttikow. (Bot. Valerianella; Fedia olitoria. Fr.
Doucette, mache.) Corn-salad, or lamb's-lettuce. A word used in New York.

TO FETCH UP. To stop suddenly. This sense of the word is not noticed in
the English dictionaries, nor by Webster. We often hear the phrase 'He
fetched up all standing,' that is, he made a sudden halt. It is a nautical
vulgarism, the figure being that of a ship which is suddenly brought to,
while at full speed and with all her sails set.

FEVER BUSH. (Laurus benzoin.) An aromatic shrub with a flavor resembling
Benzoin.--Bigelow's Flora Bostoniensis.

FID OF TOBACCO. A chtw, or quid of tobacco. A word only used by those who
make use of the weed. It is also used in England, according to Grose.

TO HANG UP ONE'S FIDDLE, is to desist from any labor or project; a
metaphor derived from a musician, who, when he ceases playing, is supposed
to hang up his fiddle.

FIDDLE FADDLE. Trifling discourse; nonsense.--Grose. Johnson. Also used
adjectively and as a verb.

p. 137

She said that her grandfather had a horse shot at Edgehill, and their
uncle was at the siege of Buda; with abundance of fiddle faddle of the
same nature.--Spectator.

She was a troublesome fiddle faddle old woman, and so ceremonious that
there was no bearing of her.--Arbuthnot.

---- Ye may as easily
Outrun a cloud, driven by a northern blast,
As fiddle faddle so.--Ford, The Broken Heart, Act I. Scene 3.

FIDDLER. A kind of small crab, with one large claw and a very small one.
It lives on the salt meadows, where it makes its burrows. Used in New York
and New Jersey.

TO PLAY SECOND FIDDLE, is to take an inferior part in any project or
undertaking. A metaphor borrowed from a musical performer who plays the
second or counter to the one who plays the first or the "air."

On the question of removing the seat of government from Kiiigston to
Montreal, the population of which is chiefly French, a paper in the former
city observes that--
We had rather become a portion of the United States, much as we detest
that government, and rank with the Western States of Michigan and Iowa,
than play second fiddle to the French.

FIDGET. Restless agitation. 'He has the fidgets,' is said of one who
cannot sit long in a place.--Todd. Grose.

Why, who can the Viscountess mean?
Cried the square hoods in woeful fidget;
The times are altered quite and clean.--Gray, Long Story.

But sedentary weavers of long tales
Give me the fidgets, and my patience fails.--Cowper, Con.

I was in a fidget to know where we could possibly sleep.--Mrs. Clavers, A
New Home, p. 13.

FIDGETING, or FIDGETY. Restless; impatient. A low word.--Todd.

Fungus is one of those fidgeting, meddling quidnuncs with which this
unhappy city is pestered.--Paulding, Salmagundi, Vol. 1. p. 40.

Peter seemed monstrous fidgety, and bimeby he allowed it was time to go.--
Maj. Jones's Courtship, p. 191.

TO FIDGET. To be restlessly active.--Richardson.

It was evident that there was something on his mind, as he fidgetted
before the glass.--J. C. Neal, P. Ploody, p. 21.

p. 138

FIGURE. Amount of a reckoning. 'What's the figure?' a flash expression
for, What is to pay?--Grose.

BIG FIGURE. See Big.

FILLIPEEN or PHlLLIPINA. (Germ. Vielliebchen.) There is a custom common in
the Northern States at dinner or evening parties when almonds or other
nuts are eaten, to reserve such as are double or contain two kernels,
which are called fillipeens. If found by a lady, she give sone of the
kernels to a gentleman, when both eat their respective kernels. When the
parties again meet, each strives to be the first to exclaim, Fillipeen!
for by so doing he or she is entitled to a present from the other.
Oftentimes the most ingenious methods are resorted to by both ladies and
gentlemen to surprise each other with the sudden exclamation of this
mysterious word, which is to bring forth a forfeit.

In a recent book on German life and manners, entitled "A Bout with the
Burschens, or, Heidelberg in 1844," is an account of the existence of this
custom in Germany, which at the same time furnishes us with the etymology
of the word:
Among the queer customs and habits of Germany, there is one which struck
me as being particularly original, and which I should recommend to the
consideration of turf-men in England ; who might, perhaps, find it nearly
as good a way of getting rid of their spare cash as backing horses that
have been made safe to lose, and prize fighters who have never intended to
fight. It is a species of betting, and is accomplished thus: Each of two
persons eats one of the kernels of a nut or almond which is double. The
first of the two who, after so doing, takes anything fiom the hand of the
other, without saving Ich denke, 'I think,' has to make the other a
present, of a value which is sometimes previously determined, and
sometimes left to the generosity of the loser. The presents are called
Vielliebchens, and are usually trifles of a few florins value; a pipe,
riding-whip, or such like.

FILLS. A common pronunciation for thills, the shafts of a waggon or
chaise.

FINDINGS. The tools and materials which a journeyman shoemaker is to
furnish in his employment.--Webster.

TO FIND ONE'S SELF. To provide for one's self. When a laborer engages to
provide himself with victuals, he is said to find himself, or to receive
day wages.--Craven Glossary.

p. 139

In the advertisements of our steamboats and ships, it is stated that
passengers are taken for so much and found, that is, provided with their
meals.

The singing master's proposals were to keep twenty evenings for twenty
dollars and found or for thirty and find himself.--Maj. Downing, p. 109.

FINEFIED. Made fine; dandified.

If this new judge is the slicked up, finefied sort on a character they
pictur' him, I don't want to see him.--Robb, Squatter's Life, p. 73.

FINICAL. Nice; foppish; pretending to superfluous elegance.--Johnson.

Be not too finical, but yet be clean;
And wear well-fashioned clothes like other men.--Dryd. Ov. Art of Love.

At nineteen he painted his own portrait, in the finical manner of Denner,
and executed the heads of an old man and woman in the same style
afterwards.--Walpole, Anecdotes of Painting, Vol. IV.

FIPPENNY BIT, or contracted, FIP. Fivepence. In the State of Pennsylvania,
the vulgar name for the Spanish half-real. (See Federal Currency.)
Fippence, for fivepence is also provincial in England.

TO FIRE. To fling with the hand, as a stone or other missile.

TO HAVE ONE'S FAT IN THE FIRE, is to have one's plans frustrated. A vulgar
expression borrowed from the vocabulary of the kitchen.

But take care that you don't, like the Paddy, touch off your machine at
the wrong end; for the consequence, being unlooked for, might be bad,
perhaps fatal, and then the fat would be in the fire, and you would be
where the devil could give more reliable information about you than any
other of your near relations.--N. Y. Herald.

TO FIRE AWAY. To begin; to go on. An expression borrowed from the language
of soldiers and sailors.

A well-known auctioneer in Pearl street, when putting up an article, says:
"Come gentlemen, give us a bid, fire away;" that is, go on.

The Chairman rose and said: "We are not ready yet, we must go on in
order." Calls for Mr. H---. Mr. H--- from the midst of the audience said,
'Gentlemen, I beg to be excused, I came here to listen, not to speak."
(Loud cries of 'Go ahead," Out with it," "Fire away.") Whereupon he
commenced.--N. Y. Herald, Sketch of a Political Meeting.

TO FIRE INTO THE WRONG FLOCK, is a metaphorical


p. 140

expression used at the West, denoting that one has mistaken his object, as
when a sportsman fires at a different flock from what he intended.

I said, when General J--- cocked his gun and began his war upon the
Senate, he would find he had fired into the wrong flock.--Crockett's
Speech, Tour, p. 81.

FIRE-NEW. New from the forge; brand-new.--Johnson. This old and nearly
obsolete expression is sometimes used by us.

You should then have accosted her; and with some excellent jests, fire-new
from the mint, you should have banged the youth into darkness.--
Shakspeare, Twelfih Night, III. 2.

The Democracy of Washington, both in and out of Congress, huzzaed, sang,
flaunted torches, held mass-meetings, to exult over the liberation of the
French; they virtually insisted that this was all their thunder, and that
Whigs had no business to participate in their rejoicings; but when the
liberaton of Americans from a much severer and more abject bondage came
under consideration, they were and are ferocious for the punishment, by
law or violence, not of the enslavers, but of the liberators! Instantly
they are seized with a fire-new reverence for the Constitution and laws!--
as if the French Revolution had not been effected in defiance of the
constituted authorities--as if the serfs of Metternich and Esterhazy were
not as rightfully and truly theirs as those of Calhoun, Hope Slatter, and
Mrs. M---.--N. Y. Tribune, April 25th, 1848.

FIRST RATE. Of the first class or order; superior; superexcellent. An
expression now in very common use, applied, as most superlatives are in
the United States, with very little discrimination. It was formerly said
of large and important things, as 'a first rate ship.' Now we hear of
'first rate pigs,' 'first rate liquors,' 'first rate lawyers.' It is also
used adverbially; thus if we ask a person how he is, he replies, 'I am
first rate,' i. e. in excellent health, very well.

The first rate importance of the subject, and the real merits of the work,
are deserving of a portion of our space.--Westminster Rev. July, 1847.

A young woman wants a situation as a chambermaid. She is a first rate
washer and ironer, and plain sewer.--Adv. in N. Y. Tribune.

Well, there's some men whose natural smartness helps them along first
rate.--Major Jones's Courtship, p. 31.

Mary liked all the speakers first rate, except one feller who gin the
galls all sorts of a shakin.--Ibid. p. 168.

p. 141

FIRSTLY. Mr. Pickering remarks that this adverb is frequently used by
American writers. It is not noticed by Dr. Webster or any of the English
lexicographers. The following is the only instance where Mr. P. found it
in an English work:

They will in some measure be enabled to determine, firstly, &c.--British
Critic, Vol. XLIV. p. 577.

FIRST-SWATHE. First quality; first chop. A New York word.

Nothing'll serve you but a first-swathe mug, about twenty-three years
old.--C. Mathews, Puffer Hopkins.

FISH. 'To have other fish to fry,' is a common colloquial expression
denoting that a person has other occupations, or other objects which
require his attention.

But as it seems they were more wary,

They'd other fish to fry than tarry.--Maro, p. 62.

FISH FLAKE. A frame covered with faggots for the purpose of drying fish.--
New England.

FIT. Any short return after intermission; a turn; a period or interval.--
Webster.

The houses in many parts of Italy are unprepared for winter; so that when
a fit of cold weather comes, the dismayed inhabitant presents an awkward
image of insufficiency and perplexity.--Hunt's Indicateor, ch. 3.

BY FITS AND STARTS. At short and sudden intervals interruptedly.

As prayer is a duty of daily occurrence, the injunction implies that it is
ready to be imparted to Christians, not by fits and starts, or at distant
intervals, but in a stated regular course.--Robert Hall, Works, Vol. I. p.
445.

FIX. A condition; predicament; dilemma.

Some feller jest come and tuck my bundle and the jug of spirits, and left
me in this here fix.--Chron. of Pineville, p. 47.

The gentleman must be stronger in the faith than ourselves, if he does not
find himself in an awkward fix.--N. Y. Com. Adv. Oct. 18, 1845.

Are you drunk too? Well, I never did see you in that fix in all my live-
long born days.--Georgia Scenes, p. 163.

TO FIX. In popular use, to put in order; to prepare; to adjust; to set or
place in the manner desired or most suitable.--Webster.

p. 142

Mr. Lyell, in his late book of Travels in North America, chap. iii. has
the following remarks on this word: "At one of the stations where the
train stopped, we heard one young woman from Ohio exclaim, 'Well, we are
in a pretty fix!' and found their dilemma to be characteristic of the
financial crisis of these times, for none of their dollar notes of the
Ohio banks would pass here. The substantive 'fix' is an acknowledged
vulgarism; but the verb is used in New England by well-educated people, in
the sense of the French 'arrange,' or the English 'do.' To fix the hair,
the table, the fire, means to dress the hair, lay the table, and make up
the fire; and this application is, I presume, of Hibernian origin, as the
Irish gentleman, King Corney, in Miss Edgeworth's tale of Ormond, says,
'I'll fix him and his wounds.'"

In Upper Canada this word is equally common, where it was probably
introduced by the American settlers:
One of their most remarkable terms is to fix. Whatever work requires to be
done must be fixed. 'Fix the room,' is to set it in order. 'Fix the table,
' 'Fix the fire,' says the mistress to her servants and the things are
fixed accordingly.--Backwoods of Canada, p. 82.

FIX IT. A vulgarism of recent origin, but now very common. It is heard in
such phrases as, 'I will not do so and so any how you can fix it,' or
still worse, 'no how you can fix it,' i. e. not in any way that you can
arrange it; not by any means.

A wet day is considerable tiresome, any way you can fix it.--Sam Slick in
England, ch. 2.

If I was an engineer, I'd clap on steam--I'd fire up, I tell you; you
wouldn't get me to stop the engine, no way you could fix it.--Pickings
from the Picayune.

The master called them up, and axed them the hardest questions he could
find in the book, but he couldn't stump 'em no how he could fix it.--Maj.
Jones's Courtship, p. 36.

Workin' aint genteel nor independent, no how you can fix it.--Pickings
from the Picayune, p. 74.

TO FIX ONE'S FLINT, is a phrase taken from backwoods life, and means the
same as to settle; to do for; to dish.

"Take it easy, Sam," says I, "your flint is fixed; you are wet through;"
and I settled down to a careless walk quite desperate.--Sam Slick in
England, ch. 2.

p. 143

The Bluenose haute the tools; and if he had, he couldn't use them. That's
the reason any one a'most can "fix his flint for him."--Ibid.

FIXED FACT. A positive or well established fact.

The Boston Post, in speaking of the trial of Capt. Stetson for piratically
running away with a ship and cargo, says:
That he did dispose of a large quantity of oil, and afterwards desert from
the vessel, are fixed facts.--June, 1847.

FIXINGS. A word used with absurd laxity, especially in the South and West,
to signify arrangements, embellishments, trimmings, garnishings of any
kind.

A man who goes into the woods as one of these veteran settlers observed to
me, has a heap of little fixin's to study out, and a great deal of
projecting to do.--Judge Hall, Letters from the West, Let. 18.

The theatre was better filled, and the fixings looked nicer than in
Philadelphia.--Crockett, Tour down East, p. 38.

All the fellows fell to getting grapes for the ladies; but they all had
their Sunday fixins on, and were afraid to go into the brush.--Maj.
Jones's Courtship, p. 42.

"Ah!" exclaimed the teamster [to a gentleman who had a good deal of
luggage], "what anybody on earth can want with such lots of fixins, I'm
sure's dark to me."--Mrs. Clavers, Forest Life, Vol. I. p.97.

One half of the country is overflowed in the winter, and t'other half,
which is a darned sight the biggest, is covered with cane, pimento, and
other fixins.--Porter's South-western Tales, p. 123.

The following advice was given to the editor of a new Western paper:
Advertise our doins in gineral, such as we got to sell, and throw yourself
wide on the literary fixins and poetry for the galls; and, Mister, if you
do this with spirit, the whole town will take your paper.--Robb, Squatter
Life, p. 31.

For a use of the term as applied to food, see Chicken Fixings.

TO FIZZLE OUT. To be quenched, extinguished; to prove a failure. A
favorite expression in Ohio.

The factious and revolutionary action of the fifteen has interrupted the
regular business of the Senate, disgraced the actors, and fizzled out!--
Cincinnati Gazette.

Is the new hotel [one called the Burnet House] to be given up, or to go
on? To go on. It cannot be possible, after all that has been said and done
about a "splendid hotel," that our enterprising business men will let it
fizzle out.--Ibid.

p. 144

FLAP-JACK. A fried cake; a pan-cake; a fritter. A word used alike in
England and the United States, where it is also called slap-jack. See
Chicken fixings.

We'll have flesh for holidays, fish for fasting-days, and moreo'er,
puddings and flap-jacks.--Pericles, II. 7, Supplement to Shakspeare.

Until at last, by the skill of the cook, it is transformed into the form
of a flap-jack, which, in our translation, is called a pancake.--Taylor's
Jack-a-lent, I. p. 115.

TO FLARE UP. To blaze out; to get excited suddenly; to get into a passion.

It is expected that this grand discussion will take place soon; and then,
if any member of the Cabinet chooses to flare up, he will have a fair
chance, and may anticipate by resignation the ostracism of the Senate.--N.
Y. Com. Adv. Nov. 20, 1847.

TO FLASH IN THE PAN. To fail of success. A metaphor borrowed from a gun,
which, after being primed and ready to be discharged, flashes in the pan.

FLAT. In cant language, a foolish fellow; a simpleton.--Worcester.


The London Times, of Sept. 5, 1847, in speaking of the letters of Mr.
Tyler and Gen. Houston, showing by what means Texas was annexed to the
United States, says:
Oh! Messrs. Tyler, Donelson, and the rest, what flats you are all made to
appear, by this revelation from the man in the blanket coat!

FLAT. In America this word is applied to low alluvial lands. "The Mohawk
flats" is a term universally applied to the valley of the Mohawk river, on
either side of which are alluvial lands. See Bottom Lands. It is also
applied to river shoals, where they are of much extent.

FLAT. A species of flat-bottomed boat, used on the Mississippi and other
rivers.

TO FLAT OUT. To collapse; to prove a failure. A Western phrase applied to
a political meeting, as, 'The meeting flatted out.'

FLAT-FOOTED. Firm-footed, resolute; firmly, resolutely. A term belonging
to the Western political slang with which the halls of Congress, as well
as the newspapers, are now deluged.

p. 145

Col. M--- attempted to define his position, but being unable, exclaimed:
I'm an independent, flat-footed man, and am neither for nor against the
mill-dam.--Tennessee Newspaper.

Mr. Pickens, of South Carolina, has come out flat-footed for the
administration--a real red-hot democrat, dyed in the wool--denounces Mr.
Calhoun--and is ready now to take any high office. But the mission to
England is beyond his reach.--N. Y. Herald, June 30, 1846.

A Washington correspondent of the New York Commercial Advertiser, in
speaking of the opinions to be advanced by President Polk in his Message,
says:
The ground taken is to be flat-footed for the Sub-Treasury--flat-footed
for the repeal of the Tariff of 1842, and the substitution of a 20 per
cent. maximum, &c.

FLEA-BANE. (Erigeron Canadense.) One of the most hardy and common weeds.
It propagates itself rapidly, and since the discovery of America, has been
introduced and spread through most countries in Europe.--Bigelow's Flora
Bost.

This plant is sold by the Shakers for its medicinal properties, which are
astringent and diuretic.

FLINDERS. Shreds; splinters; broken pieces.--Brockett. Used also in New
England.

Smate with sic fard, the airis in flendris lap.--Douglas, Virgil.

The tough ash spear, so stout and true,
Into a thousand flinders flew.--Lay of the Last Minstrel, ch. 3, 6.

Sure enough, when the General came to take off his boots, there was his
best gold-rim specs, all broke to flinders.--Maj. Downing's Letters, p.
125.

Old Harley skeered the horse, upset the cart, and like to mashed every
thing all to flinders.--Chronicle of Pineville, p. 122.

FLING. A sneer; a contemptuous remark.--Todd's Johnson.

No little scribbler is of wit so bare,
But has his fling at the poor wedded pair.--Addison.

Nay, if that had been the worst, I could have borne it; but he had a fling
at your ladyship too, and then I could not hold; but, faith, I gave him
his own.--Congreve, The Way of the World, Act 3.

FLITTER. A corruption of the word fritter, a pan-cake.

FLOOR. Used in Congress, in this expression, to get the floor; that is, to
obtain an opportunity of taking part in a debate. The English say, to be
in possession of the House.--Pickering's Vocabulary.

p. 146

FLOP. (Another form of the word flap.) Souse; plump; flat. Ex. 'His foot
slipped, and down he came flop.'--Forby's Vocabulary.

TO FLOP. To flap.

Fanny, during the examinition, had flopped her hat over her eyes, which
were also bathed in tears.--Fielding, Joseph Andrews.

TO FLOUR. To grind and bolt; to convert into flour.--Webster. A word used
in those parts of the country where there are mills for grinding wheat.
Ex. 'This mill can flour two hundred barrels a day,' i. e. it can make so
many barrels of flour.

FLOURING-MILL. A grist mill.

FLUFF. Any light, feathery, downy substance; flue.

FLUFFY. Covered with fluff or flue.

FLUMMERY. (Welsh, llymru.) A kind of food made by coagulation of wheat-
flour or oat-meal; and hence, flattery.--Johnson. We use it only in the
latter or figurative sense.

I allow of orange and buttermilk possets, of roasted apples, flummery, or
any other light and cooling thing they call for.-- Boyle, Works.

In wrath the king: "Cease, hypocrite!
Your flummery helps you not a whit!"--Reynard the Fox.

TO FLUMMUX. To perplex; embarrass; put to a stand. A very common
vulgarism.

Prehaps Parson Hyme didn't put it into Pokerville for two mortal hours;
and prehaps Pokerville didn't mizzle, wince, and finally flummix right
beneath him.--Field, Drama in Pokerville.

TO FLUNK OUT. To retire through fear; to back out.

Why, little one, you must be cracked, if you flunk out out before we
begin.--J. C. Neal.

FLUNKY. A servant in livery. A term now used contemptuously.-- Jamieson.

Our laird gets in his racked rents,
His coals, his kain, and a' his stents;
He rises when he likes himsel';
His flunkies answer at the bell.--Burns, iii. 3.

FLUNKY. A class of people, who, unacquainted with the manner in which
stocks are bought and sold, and deceived by appearances, come into Wall
street without any know-

p. 147

ledge of the market. The consequence is, they make bad investments, or
lose their money. These the brokers call flunkies.--A Week in Wall Street,
p. 81.

A broker who had met with heavy losses, exclaimed, "I'm in a bear-trap--
this won't do. The dogs will come over me. I shall be mulct in a loss. But
I've got time I'll turn the scale, I'll help the bulls operate for a rise
and draw in the flunkies."--Ibid. p. 90.

FLUSH. Full of, abounding in; applied especially to money.

Lord Strut was not very flush in ready, either to go to law, or clear old
debts; neither could he find good bail.--Arbuthnot.

FLUSTER. Heat; glow; agitation; confusion; disorder.--Webster.

When Caska adds to his natural impudence the fluster of a bottle, that
which fools called fire when he was sober, all men abhor as outrage when
he is drunk.--Tattler, No. 150.

The parish need not have been in such a fluster with Molly. You might have
told them, child, your grandmother wore better things new out of the
shop.--Fielding's History of a Foundling.

FLUSTERED. Heated with liquor; agitated; confused.--Webster.

---- He pretended to grow flustered, and gave the Barmecide a good box on
the ear.--Addison, Guardian, No. 162.

FLUSTERATION. Heat; hurry; confusion.--Brockett's Glossary. A vulgar word
also heard among ourselves.

TO FLY AROUND. To stir about; to be active. A very common expression.

Come, gals, fly round, and let's get Mrs. Clavers some supper.--A New
Home, p. 13.

TO FOB OFF. To delude by a trick.--Johnson.

A low word now seldom used, though we have good authority for it.
You must not think to fob off our disgrace with a tale.--Shakspeare,
Othello.

In speaking of the retirement of Mr. Buchanan from the Cabinet, the New
York Tribune observes:
Pennsylvania insists on having a representative in the Cabinet, and will
not be fobbed off with a six months' taste of honors.

FOGY. A stupid fellow; as, 'He is an old fogy.'

p. 148

FOLKS. This old word is much used in New England instead of people or
persons. 1. For the persons in one's family; as in this common phrase,
'How do your folks do?' that is, your family. 2. For people in general; as
in expressions of this kind: 'What do folks think of it?' &c. Dr. Johnson
observes that "it is now only used in familiar or burlesque language."--
Pickering.

Old good man Dobson of the green
Remembers he the tree has seen,
And goes with folks to shew the sight.--Swift.

FOOL-FISH. (Genus, monocanthus. Cuvier.) The popular name of the long-
finned file-fish. "Our fishermen apply to it the whimsical name of Fool-
fish," says Dr. DeKay, "in allusion to what they consider its absurd mode
of swimming with a wriggling motion, its body being sunk, and its mouth
just on a level with the water."--A Nat. Hist. of New York.

FORE-HANDED. To be fore-handed is to be in good circumstances; to be
comfortably off. The expression is much used in the interior parts of the
country.

Many of the new houses which have been built, have been built by
mechanics, fore-handed men, as we say in New England, who have accumulated
small sums.--Providence Journal.

Mrs. Ainsworth made so long a visit among her Eastern friends, who are now
fore-handed folks, that she has come back imbued most satisfactorily with
a loving appreciation of the advantages of civilization.--Mrs. Clavers,
Forest Life, Vol. I. p. 50.

TO FORK OVER. To hand over; to pay over, as money. A common expression in
colloquial language.

He groaned in spirit at the thought of parting with so much money. There
was, however, no help for it, so he forked over the five dollars.--
Knickerbocker Mag.

A would-be prophet down South, lately said in one of his sermons, that "he
was sent to redeem the world and all things therein." Whereupon a native
pulled out two five dollar bills of a broken bank, and asked him to fork
over the specie for them.--Newspaper.

We want money in our treasury; and as you are making a small sprinklin'
off the place with your panorama, you might as well leave a little on it
behind; so fork over the license money.--Newspaper.

FORKS. In the plural, the point where a road parts into two; and the point
where a river divides, or rather where two

p. 149

rivers meet and unite in one stream. Each branch is called a fork.--
Webster.

FORNENT. Opposite to. This Scottish word is now much used in Pennsylvania
and the Western States.

FORTED IN. Intrenched in a fort.

A few inhabitants forted in on the Potomac.--Marshall's Washington.

FORTINER. (For-aught-I-know.) This remarkable specimen of clipping and
condensing a phrase, approaches the Indian method of forming words. The
word is very common through New England, Long Island, and the rest of New
York. See Farziner.

TO FOURFOLD. To assess in a fourfold ratio. Mr. Pickering quotes this word
from Webster's Dictionary, and observes that it is peculiar to the State
of Connecticut. Dr. Webster afterwards expunged it.

FORWARDING MERCHANT. One whose business it is to receive and forward goods
for others. The internal navigation and trade of the United States, with
the great extent of our country, requires forwarding merchants in all the
principal towns.

TO FOX BOOTS. To foot boots, i. e. to repair boots by adding new soles,
and surrounding the feet with new leather.--Worcester. Of American origin;
at least it does not appear in the English glossaries.

FOXED. A common term among booksellers. A book is said to be foxed when
the paper, owing to some fault in its manufacture, becomes spotted with
light brown or yellow spots. Many books printed in England between the
years 1802 and 1812 have become spotted in this manner.

FOXY. A term applied in Maine to timber partially rotten.

FREESTONE. Red sandstone, so called from the ease with which it is cut and
wrought.

FRENCH LEAVE. 'To take French leave,' is to depart without taking leave;
to run away.

And Love, who on their bridal eve
Had promised long to stay,
Forgot his promise--took French leave--
And bore his lamp away.--Halleck's Poems, Domestic Happiness.

p. 150

FRESHET. A flood or overflowing of a river, by means of heavy rains or
melted snow; an inundation.--Webster.

This word is used in the Northern and Eastern States. That it is an old
English word is evinced by the following extract from the Description of
New England, written and published in England, in 1658:
Between Salem and Charlestown is situated the town of Lynn, next to a
river, whose strong freshet at the end of the winter filleth all her
banks, and with a violent torrent vents itself into the sea."--p. 29.

This word appears to be ncw confined to America; but the word fresh is
still used in the north of England and in Scotland in precisely the same
sense.

FROE. An iron wedge. New England.

The shingle-maker stands with froe in one hand and mallet in the other,
endeavoring to rive a billet of hemlock on a block--Margaret, p. 159.

"He beat his head all to smash with a froe," said one. "No, it was with an
axe," said another.--Ibid. p. 323.

FROST-FISH. (Genus, morrhua.) A small fish which abounds on our coast
during the winter months. It is also called tom-cod.--Storer, Fishes of
Massachusetts.

FROSTWORT. (Cistus Canadensis.) A medical plant prepared by the Shakers
and used for its astringent and tonic properties.

FROUGH.}
FROUGHY.} Frough is provincial in the north of England, and means anything
loose, spongy, or easily broken; often applied to wood, as brittle is to
mineral substances.--Brockett's Glossary. 'Froughy butter,' is rancid
butter.

The latter of these words is in common use in many parts of New England.
It is doubtless a corruption of frough, which is sometimes used here.--
Pickering.

FROWCHEY. (Dutch, vrouw, a woman.) A furbelowed old woman. Local in New
York and its vicinity.

FRUMP. To mock; to insult. A very old word, occurring in the dictionaries
of Cotgrave and Minshew.

I was abas'd and frump'd, sir.--Beaumont and Fletcher.

This old word, though long out of use in England, still lin-

p. 151

gers among the descendants of the first settlers in New England.

The sleighs warped from side to side; the riders screamed, cross-bit,
frumped, and hooted at each other.--Margaret, p. 174.

FUDDLED. Tipsy; drunk. This word is common in England and the United
States, but is only heard in familiar language.

I am too fuddled to take care to observe your orders.--Steele, Epist.
Corresp.

The table floating round
And pavement faithless to the fuddled feet.--Thomson.

Mull'd yell and punch flew round lyke steyfe,
The fiddlers a' got fuddled.--Westmoreland Dialect, p. 147.

FUDGE. An expression of contempt, usually bestowed on absurd or talking
idlers; common in colloquial language.--Todd.

I should have mentioned the very impolite behavior of Mr. Burchard, who,
during this discourse, sat with his face turned to the fire, and, at the
conclusion of every sentence, would cry out fudge!--Vicar of Wakefield.

FUFFY. Light; puffy; soft. Used in Yorkshire, England, and preserved in
some parts of New England.

She mounted the high, white, fuffy plain; a dead and unbounded waste lay
all about her.--Margaret, p. 168.

FULL BUTT. With sudden collision. The figure is taken from the violent
encounter of animals, such as rams or goats, which butt with their heads.

He and the babler, or talker, I told ye of, met full butt; and after a
little staring one an other in the face, upon the encounter, the babler
opened.--L'Estrange, Tr. of Quevedo.

FULL CHISEL. At full speed. A modern New England vulgarism.

Oh yes, sir, I'll get you my master's seal in a minute. And off he set
full chisel.--Sam Slick in England, ch. 2.

The moose looked round at us, shook his head a few times, then turned
round and fetched a spring right at us full chisel.--John Smith's Letters.

At that the boys took arter them full chisel, and the galls run as if a
catamount had been arter them.--Downing, May-day in New York, p. 46.

FULL DRIVE. At full speed. A very common and very old phrase.

p. 152

This bargain is full-drive, for we ben knit;
Ye shul be paied trewely by my troth.--Chaucer, Franklin's Tale.

Joe Dobson ran off tappy-luppy; an' just as he turned the nook of
Anderson's byre, he came full-drive against owd Babby Bell.-- Westmoreland
Dialect, p. 352.

FULL SPLIT. With the greatest violence and impetuosity.--Craven Glossary.
In common use in the United States in familiar language.

I after him full-split,--he was clippin it across the orchard, so you
might put an egg on his coat-flap, and it wouldn't fall off.--Maj.
Downing, Let.

FULL SWING. Full sway; complete control.

If the Loco-Focos have full swing, they will involve the country in war
for the small strip in dispute in Oregon.--N. Y. Tribune.

FUNKIFY. To frighten; to alarm. New England.

Scared! says he, serves him right then; he might have knowed how to feel
for other folks, and not funkify them so peskily.--Sam Slick in England,
ch. 8.

TO MAKE THE FUR FLY. To claw; scratch; wound severely. Used figuratively.

Mr. Hannegan was greatly excited, which proved most conclusively that Mr.
B. had made the fur fly among the 54 40 men.--N. Y. Tribune.

FUSSY. Bustling about as if much was to be done and was doing;
consequential; very nice or particular in household or other matters. Used
in familiar conversation with us as 'a fussy fellow.' It is provincial in
England.--Hunter's Glossary.

You see the fussy European adopting the East, and calming his restlessness
with the long Turkish pipe of tranquillity.--Eöthen.

FUZZY. Rough and shaggy.--Forby's Vocabulary.

I inquire, whether it be the thin membrane, or the inward and something
soft and fuzzy pulp that it contains, that raises and represents to itself
these arbitrarious figments and chimeras.--Dr. Henry More.

FYKE. (Dutch, fuyk, a weel, bow-net.) The large bow-nets in New York
harbor, used for catching shad, are called shadfykes.