1811. Lex. Bal. s.v. Onion hunters, a class of young thieves who are on the look out for gentlemen who wear their seals suspended on a ribbon, which they cut, and thus secure the seals or other trinkets suspended to the watch.
1819. Vaux, Memoirs, ii. 193, s.v.
18[?]. Maginn, Vidocq's Slang Song [Farmer, Musa Pedestris (1896) . . .] When his ticker I set a-going, With his onions, chain, and key.
1834. H. Ainsworth, Rookwood, iv. i. A handsome gold repeater . . . with a monstrous bunch of onions (anglice, seals) depending from its massive chain. Ibid. 'Nix my doll.' My fawnied famms and my onions gay.
Oddish, adv. (popular).—Tipsy:
see Drinks and Screwed.
Oodles, subs. (American).—See
quot. 1869.
1869. Overland Monthly, iii. 131. A Texan never has a great quantity of any thing, but he has 'scads' of it or oodles or dead oodles or scadoodles or 'swads.'
1886. Century Magazine, xxxiii. 846. All you lack's the feathers, and we've got oodles of 'em right here.
Oof (or ooftish), subs. (popular).—Money.
Hence oof-bird = the
goose that lays the golden eggs, the
source of supply; the feathered
oof-bird = money in plenty; to
make the oof-bird walk = to
circulate money; oofless =
poor. See quot. 1870.
c.1870. Sporting Times, 26 Dec., 1891. 1. Ooftish was, some twenty years ago, the East End synonym for 'money,' and was derived from auf tische, 'on the table'—the aristocracy of Houndsditch being in the habit of refusing to play cards, even with their best friends, unless the money were down 'on the table.' Hence ooftish, a word which was freely used by the late Mr. Benson and his companions in the De Goncourt frauds. We—that is to say Gub—met ooftish at a thieves' supper in Little Wylde Street, took the animal home, cut his tail off, and turned him loose. So that oof now swaggers about the mansions of the aristocracy.
1888. Sportsman, 27 Dec. It is a sad and weary time for many, for when the dustman, the man who blacks the boots, and he with the grog-blossom on his nose who does nothing but hold cab-doors open when nobody asks him to have all been paid, the oof bird takes unto itself wings and flies away.
1889. Daily News, 27 Aug., 7, 1. Henry Smith, her coachman, next gave evidence. He said he heard King say he had come after some ooftish.
1897. Pall Mall Gazette, 8 Mar., 7, 3. No splosh, no oof-bird from those blokes.
O.P., phr. (theatrical).—1. See
quot. 1823.
1823. Grose, Vulg. Tongue [Egan], s.v. O.P. and P.S. Theatrical cant, for Opposite the Prompter and Prompt Side.
1836. Dickens, Sketches by Boz, p. 69. That gentleman . . . lounging behind the stage-box in the o.p. side.
1885. Sportsman, 23 June, 2, 1. The limelight mechanic made a gorgeous full moon in a convenient position on the o.p. side.
2. (booksellers').—'Out of print.'
Open. To open the ball, verb.
phr. (colloquial).—To start or
begin anything.
1812. Byron, Waltz, xiii. [Note]. Waltz and the battle of Austerlitz are . . . said to have opened the ball together.
1876. Eton Chronicle, 20 July. He who opened the ball and who saw them all fall, Scarce deserved that defeat in one innings.
1887. Haggard, Allan Quatermain, xi. When the advancing boats were about five hundred yards away, Sir Henry opened the ball by firing at the three-parts grown young one.
To open one's mouth too wide, verb. phr. (Stock Exchange).—To bid for larger amounts of stock than one can pay for.
To open up, verb. phr. (venery).—To spread (q.v.).
Open-arse, subs. phr. (old).—1.
A medlar.
