Bean. A guinea. Half bean; half a guinea.
Bear. One who contracts to deliver a certain
quantity of
sum of stock in the public funds, on a
future day, and at
stated price; or, in other words, sells
what he has not got,
like the huntsman in the fable, who sold
the bear’s skin
before the bear was killed. As the
bear sells the stock he
is not possessed of, so the bull purchases
what he has not
money to pay for; but in case of any alteration
in the price
agreed on, either party pays or receives
the difference.
Exchange Alley.
Bear-garden jaw or discourse.
Rude, vulgar language,
such as was used at the bear-gardens.
Bear leader. A travelling tutor.
Beard splitter. A man much given to wenching.
Bearings. I’ll bring him to his bearings;
I’ll bring him to
reason. Sea term.
Beast. To drink like a beast, i.e. only when thirsty.
Beast with two backs. A man
and woman in the act of
copulation. Shakespeare in Othello.
Beater cases. Boots. Cant.
Beau-nasty. A slovenly fop; one finely dressed, but dirty.
Beau trap. A loose stone in a pavement,
under which
water lodges, and on being trod upon,
squirts it up, to the
great damage of white stockings; also
a sharper neatly
dressed, lying in wait for raw country
squires, or ignorant
fops.
Becalmed. A piece of sea wit, sported in hot
weather. I
am becalmed, the sail sticks to the mast;
that is, my shirt
sticks to my back. His prad is becalmed;
his horse knocked up.
Beck. A beadle. See HERMANBECK.
Bed. Put to bed with a mattock, and tucked up
with a
spade; said of one that is dead and buried.
You will go up
a ladder to bed, i.e. you will be
hanged. In many country
places, persons hanged are made to mount
up a ladder,
which is afterwards turned round or taken
away, whence the
term, “Turned off.”
Bedfordshire. I am for Bedfordshire, i.e. for going to bed.
BEDIZENED. Dressed out, over-dressed, or awkwardly ornamented.
Bed-maker. Women employed at Cambridge
to attend
on the Students, sweep his room, &c.
They will put their
hands to any thing, and are generally
blest with a pretty
family of daughters: who unmake the
beds, as fast as they
are made by their mothers.
Beef. To cry beef; to give the alarm.
They have cried beef
on us. Cant.—To be in
a man’s beef; to wound him with
a sword. To be in a woman’s
beef; to have carnal
knowledge of her. Say you bought
your beef of me, a jocular
request from a butcher to a fat man. implying
that he
credits the butcher who serves him.