_Bus-napper_, a constable.
_Bus-napper"s kenchin_, a watchman.
_Bye-blow_, a b.a.s.t.a.r.d.
_Calle_, a cloak or gown.
_Cank_, dumb.
_Canniken_, the plague.
_Cap_, to swear.
_Captain Queernabs_, a fellow in poor clothes.
_Caravan_, a good round sum of money about a man.
_Case_, a house, shop, or warehouse.
_Ca.s.sun_, cheese.
_Caster_, a cloak.
_Calfskin fiddle_, a drum. To smack calfskin; to kiss the book in taking the oath. It is held by the St. Giles"s casuists, that by kissing one"s own thumb instead of smacking calfskin, the guilt of taking a false oath is avoided.
_Canticle_, a parish clerk.
_Canting_, preaching with a whining affected tone, perhaps a corruption of chaunting; some derive it from Andrew Cant, a famous Scotch preacher, who used that whining manner of expression. Also, a kind of gibberish used by thieves and gipseys, called, likewise, pedlar"s French.
_Catamaran_, an old scraggy woman; from a kind of float, made of spars and yards lashed together, for saving shipwrecked persons.
_Catch Club_, a member of the catch club; a b.u.m bailiff.
_Chanticleer_, a c.o.c.k.
_Charactered_, or _Lettered_, burnt in the hand. They have palmed the character upon him, they have burned him in the hand.
_Charm_, a picklock.
_Chates_, the gallows.
_Chats_, lice.
_Chanter culls_, grub-street writers, who compose songs and carrols for ballad singers.
_Cherubims_, peevish children, because cherubim and seraphim continually do cry.
_Cheat-the-devil_, a d.i.c.ky.
_Chife_, a knife, file, or saw.
_Chosen Pells_, highwaymen who rob in pairs, in the streets and squares of London; to prevent being followed by the sound of their horses" shoes on the stones, they shoe them with leather.
_Chuck farthing_, a parish clerk.
_Clank napper_, a silver tankard.
_Clickman Toad_, a watch; also, an appellation for a west-countryman, said to have arisen from the following-a westcountryman, who had never seen a watch, found one on a heath near Pool, which, by the motion of the hand, and the noise of the wheels, he concluded to be a living creature of the toad kind; and, from its clicking, he named it a clickman toad.
_Clowes_, rogues.
_Cloy_, thief, robber, &c.
_Cloyes_, thieves, robbers, &c.
_Cly_, money; also, a pocket. He has filed a cly; he has picked a pocket.
_Cold burning_, a punishment inflicted by private soldiers, on their comrades, for any trifling offences of their mess laws; it is administered in the following manner-the prisoner is set against the wall, with the arm which is to be burned tied as high above his head as possible; the executioner then ascends a stool, and having a bottle of cold water, pours it slowly down the sleeve of the delinquent, patting him, and leading the water gently down his body, till it runs out at the bottom of his trowsers-this is repeated to the other arm, if he is sentenced to be burned in both.
_Cloak_, a silver tankard.
_Coach wheel_, or _a fore coach wheel_, half-a-crown; _a hind coach wheel_, a crown.
_Cobblecotter_, a turnkey.
_Collar day_, execution day.
_Colquarron_, a man"s neck.
_Comefa_, a shirt, or shift.
_Commission_, a shirt.
_Comfortable impudence_, a wife.
_Cooler_, a woman.
_Costard_, the head.
_Court card_, a gay fluttering c.o.xcomb.
_Cow"s baby_, a calf.
_Cow-handed_, awkward, not dextrous.
_Crab sh.e.l.ls_, shoes.
_Cramp word_, sentence of death pa.s.sed on a criminal by a judge:-he has just undergone the cramp word; sentence has just been pa.s.sed upon him.