Holy-father, subs. (Irish).—See quot.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v. Holy Father, A butcher's boy of St. Patrick's Market, Dublin, or other Irish blackguard; among whom the exclamation, or oath,, by the Holy Father (meaning the Pope), is common.
Holy Iron. See Holy Poker.
Holy Joe, subs. phr. (colloquial).—A
pious person, whether hypocritical
or sincere. Also (nautical),
a parson.
Holy Jumping Mother of Moses.
See Moses.
Holy-lamb, subs. (old).—A
thorough-paced villain.—Grose.
Holy-land (or ground), subs.
(old).—1. St. Giles's; Palestine
(q.v.).
1819. Moore, Tom Crib's Memorial to Congress, p. 7. For we are the boys of the holy ground, And we'll dance upon nothing and turn us round.
1821. The Fancy, i., p. 250. The Holy-land, as St. Giles's has been termed, in compliment to the superior purity of its Irish population.
1821. Egan, Tom. and Jerry, ch. ii. At Mammy O'Shaughnessy's in the back Settlements of the Holy Land.
1823. W. T. Moncrieff, Tom and Jerry, ii., 5. Let's have a dive among the cadgers in the back slums, in the Holy Land.
1843 Punch's Almanack, 1 Sept. St. Giles. The Marquis of Waterford makes a pilgrimage to his shrine in the Holy Land.
1859. Sala, Twice Round the Clock, one a.m., par. 28. Unfaithful topographers may have told you that the Holy Land being swept away and Buckeridge Street being pulled down, St. Giles's exists no more.
1891. Licensed Vict. Gaz., 3 Apr. p. 215, col. 1. It would be hard to say whether the Irishmen of the Holy Land or the Hebrew scum of Petticoat Lane showed the finest specimens of 'looped and windowed raggedness.'
2. (common).—Generic for any neighbourhood affected by Jews; specifically, Bayswater, and Brighton. Cf., New Jerusalem, and Holy of Holies.
Holy Moses. See Moses.
Holy of Holies, subs. phr. (common).—1.
The Grand Hotel at
Brighton. [Which is largely tenanted
by Jews: cf., Holy Land
(sense 2), and New Jerusalem.]
2. (colloquial).—A private room; a sanctum (q.v.).
1891. N. Gould, Double Event, p. 215. Fletcher did not venture into that holy of holies.
1893. Westminister Gaz., 31 Jan., p. 3, c. 2. The Cabinet Council is the holy of holies of the British Constitution, and as Mr. Bagehot long ago regretted, no description of it at once graphic and authentic has ever been given.
3. (venery).—See Hole, sense 1, and for synonyms, Monosyllable.
Holy Poker (or Iron), subs. phr.
(university).—The mace carried
by an esquire bedel (of Law,
Physic, or Divinity) as a badge of
authority. [The term, which is
applied to the bedels themselves,
is very often used as an oath.]
1840. Comic Almanack, 'Tom the Devil,' p, 214. A hotel's the place for me! I've thried em all, from the Club-house at Kilkinny, to the Clarendon, and, by the holy poker, never wish mysilf worse luck than such cantonments!
1870. London Figaro, 8 Oct., p. 2, col. 2. The bedels of a University are very important persons, although derisive undergraduates familiarly term them holy pokers.
1886. R. L. Stevenson, Kidnapped, p. 169. I swear upon the holy iron I had neither art nor part.
2. (venery).—The penis (by a play upon words). Cf., Hole, sense 1, Holy of Holies, sense
