The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue dates from 1811 and this is probably the only full, uncensored and searchable version of this dictionary on the internet. All the original crudities have been restored and it offers an interesting perspective on Common English from the time of the Regency and Jane Austen.

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Entries releated to WISE

 

BANDOG		A bailiff or his follower; also a very fierce mastiff: likewise, a bandbox.
COBBLE		To mend, or patch; likewise to do a thing in a bungling manner.
CROP		A nick name for a presbyterian: from their cropping their hair, which they trimmed close to a bowl-dish, placed as a guide on their heads; whence they were likewise called roundheads. See ROUNDHEADS.
CULL		A man, honest or otherwise. A bob cull; a good- natured, quiet fellow.
CUNNING MAN		A cheat, who pretends by his skill in astrology to assist persons in recovering stolen goods: and also to tell them their fortunes, and when, how often, and to whom they shall be married; likewise answers all lawful questions, both by sea and land. This profession is frequently occupied by ladies.
DAMPER		A luncheon, or snap before dinner: so called from its damping, or allaying, the appetite; eating and drinking, being, as the proverb wisely observes, apt to take away the appetite.
GIBBERISH		The cant language of thieves and gypsies, called Pedlars' French, and St. Giles's Greek: see ST. GILES'S GREEK. Also the mystic language of Geber, used by chymists. Gibberish likewise means a sort of disguised language, formed by inserting any consonant between each syllable of an English word; in which case it is called the gibberish of the letter inserted: if F, it is the F gibberish; if G, the G gibberish; as in the sentence How do you do? Howg dog youg dog.
HARP		To harp upon; to dwell upon a subject. Have among you, my blind harpers; an expression used in throwing or shooting at random among the crowd. Harp is also the Irish expression for woman, or tail, used in tossing up in Ireland: from Hibernia, being represented with a harp on the reverse of the copper coins of that country; for which it is, in hoisting the copper, i.e. tossing up, sometimes likewise called music.
HAWKERS		Licensed itinerant retailers of different commodities, called also pedlars; likewise the sellers of news-papers. Hawking; an effort to spit up the thick phlegm, called OYSTERS: whence it is wit upon record, to ask the person so doing whether he has a licence; a punning allusion to the Act of hawkers and pedlars.
HUBBLE-BUBBLE		Confusion. A hubble-bubble fellow; a man of confused ideas, or one thick of speech, whose words sound like water bubbling out of a bottle. Also an instrument used for smoaking through water in the East Indies, called likewise a caloon, and hooker.
KIT		A dancing-master, so called from his kit or cittern, a small fiddle, which dancing-masters always carry about with them, to play to their scholars. The kit is likewise the whole of a soldier's necessaries, the contents of his knapsack: and is used also to express the whole of different commodities: as, Here, take the whole kit; i.e. take all.
KNAVE IN GRAIN		A knave of the first rate: a phrase borrowed from the dyehouse, where certain colours are said to be in grain, to denote their superiority, as being dyed with cochineal, called grain. Knave in grain is likewise a pun applied to a cornfactor or miller.
MALKIN, or MAULKIN		A general name for a cat; also a parcel of rags fastened to the end of a stick, to clean an oven; also a figure set up in a garden to scare the birds; likewise an awkward woman. The cove's so scaly, he'd spice a malkin of his jazey: the fellow is so mean, that he would rob a scare-crow of his old wig.
OLD ONE		The Devil. Likewise an expression of quizzical familiarity, as "how d'ye do, OLD ONE?"
PENNY-WISE AND POUND FOOLISH		Saving in small matters, and extravagant in great.
PHOENIX-MEN		Firemen belonging to an insurance office, which gave a badge charged with a phoenix: these men were called likewise firedrakes.
PIECE		A wench. A damned good or bad piece; a girl who is more or less active and skilful in the amorous congress. Hence the (CAMBRIDGE) toast, May we never have a PIECE (peace) that will injure the constitution. Piece likewise means at Cambridge a close or spot of ground adjacent to any of the colleges, as Clare-hall Piece, etc. The spot of ground before King's College formerly belonged to Clare-hall. While Clare Piece belonged to King's, the master of Clare-hall proposed a swop, which being refused by the provost of King's, he erected before their gates a temple of CLOACINA. It will be unnecessary to say that his arguments were soon acceded to.
POKE		A blow with the fist: I'll lend you a poke. A poke likewise means a sack: whence, to buy a pig in a poke, i.e. to buy any thing without seeing or properly examining it.
POMMEL		To beat: originally confined to beating with the hilt of a sword, the knob being, from its similarity to a small apple, called pomelle; in Spanish it is still called the apple of the sword. As the clenched fist likewise somewhat resembles an apple, perhaps that might occasion the term pommelling to be applied to fisty-cuffs.
QUARTERED		Divided into four parts; to be hanged, drawn, and quartered, is the sentence on traitors and rebels. Persons receiving part of the salary of an office from the holder of it, by virtue of an agreement with the donor, are said to be quartered on him. Soldiers billetted on a publican are likewise said to be quartered on him.
RAP		To take a false oath; also to curse. He rapped out a volley; i.e. he swore a whole volley of oaths. To rap, means also to exchange or barter: a rap is likewise an Irish halfpenny. Rap on the knuckles; a reprimand.
ROUGH		To lie rough; to lie all night in one's clothes: called also roughing it. Likewise to sleep on the bare deck of a ship, when the person is commonly advised to chuse the softest plank.
RUM DUKE		A jolly handsome fellow; also an odd eccentric fellow; likewise the boldest and stoutest fellows lately among the Alsatians, Minters, Savoyards, and other inhabitants of privileged districts, sent to remove and guard the goods of such bankrupts as intended to take sanctuary in those places.
SAVE-ALL		A kind of candlestick used by our frugal forefathers, to burn snuffs and ends of candles. Figuratively, boys running about gentlemen's houses in Ireland, who are fed on broken meats that would otherwise be wasted, also a miser.
SMITHFIELD BARGAIN		A bargain whereby the purchaser is taken in. This is likewise frequently used to express matches or marriages contracted solely on the score of interest, on one or both sides, where the fair sex are bought and sold like cattle in Smithfield.
SQUEAKER		A bar-boy; also a bastard or any other child. To stifle the squeaker; to murder a bastard, or throw It into the necessary house. - Organ pipes are likewise called squeakers. The squeakers are meltable; the small pipes are silver.
TRADING JUSTICES		Broken mechanics, discharged footmen, and other low fellows, smuggled into the commission of the peace, who subsist by fomenting disputes, granting warrants, and otherwise retailing justice; to the honour of the present times, these nuisances are by no means, so common as formerly.
TUMBLER		A cart; also a sharper employed to draw in pigeons to game; likewise a posture-master, or rope-dancer. To shove the tumbler, or perhaps tumbril; to-be whipt at the cart's tail.
TWIST		A mixture of half tea and half coffee; likewise brandy, beer, and eggs. A good twist; a good appetite. To twist it down apace; to eat heartily.
UNCLE		Mine uncle's; a necessary house. He is gone to visit his uncle; saying of one who leaves his wife soon after marriage. It likewise means a pawnbroker's: goods pawned are frequently said to be at mine uncle's, or laid up in lavender.
VAMP		To pawn any thing. I'll vamp it, and tip you the cole: I'll pawn it, and give you the money. Also to refit, new dress, or rub up old hats, shoes or other wearing apparel; likewise to put new feet to old boots. Applied more particularly to a quack bookseller.
WISE		As wise as Waltham's calf, that ran nine miles to suck a bull.
WISE MEN OF GOTHAM		Gotham is a village in Nottinghamshire; its magistrates are said to have attempted to hedge in a cuckow; a bush, called the cuckow's bush, is still shewn in support of the tradition. A thousand other ridiculous stories are told of the men of Gotham.
WISEACRE		A foolish conceited fellow.
WISEACRE'S HALL		Gresham college.