(Stock Exchange) a big turn or large profit; and so forth. Hence rasping-shorter (cricketers') = a ball which, blocked by the bat, glides swiftly along the ground instead of rebounding.
1834. Ainsworth, Rookwood, IV. viii. A stiff fence, captain—a reg'lar rasper.
1841. John Mills, Old Eng. Gentleman, xiv. 114 (3rd Ed.). A fence of little less than six feet in height was before their horses' heads. Straight as winged arrows they flew at the leap, and cleared the rasper without touching a shoe.
1858. Dr. J. Brown, Spare Hours, 3 S. 60. You cannot . . . make him keep his seat over a rasping fence.
1881. Century Mag., xxxii. 336. Three-fourths of our fences . . . average somewhat better than four feet in height, with an occasional rasper that will Come well up to five.
1885. Field, 26 Dec. Away over some rasping, big fences.
1888. Sporting Life, 10 Dec Denny . . . occasionally got home a rasper.
Raspin (The), subs. (Old Cant).—Bridewell.
Rat, subs. (common).—1. A renegade:
espec. through self-interest.
Whence (political), a deserter;
or (trades-unionists') a workman
accepting lower than the Union
rate, or working when his mates
have 'struck': also ratter; as
verb., or to do a rat, in all
these senses, whence (loosely) to
change one's views or tactics.
Hence ratting (rattening, or
rattery) = apostacy; rat-shop
(house, or office) = a workshop
where full rates are not
paid; to ratten = to destroy
tools and appliances, to intimidate
fellow workmen, or (masters')
to lock out employees or engage
non-Union (or 'free') labour.—Grose
(1785); Bee (1823).
1822. Sidney Smith, Letters [Ency. Dict.]. The rattery and scoundrelism of public life.
1830. Croker [Croker Papers, ii. 76]. He talked of resigning with his colleagues as a matter of course, but the knowing ones suspect that he will rat.
1838. Lytton, Alice, v. ii. Political faction loves converts better even than consistent adherents. A man's rise in life generally dates from a well-timed rat.
1840. Barham, Ingolds. Leg. (Lay of St. Aloys). Don't give too much credit to people who rat!
1847. Thackeray, Vanity Fair, II. v. He might have been a Peer if he had played his cards better. Mr. Pitt had very nearly made him; but he ratted always at the wrong time.
d. 1859. Macaulay [Trevelyan, I. 275.] I am fully resolved to oppose several of the clauses. But to declare my intention publicly . . . would have the appearance of ratting.
1863. Notes and Queries, 3rd S., iv. 430. We should not now call a man a rat for accepting office under a government of which he had spoken with disapprobation at the circuit table.
1870. Stanhope, Hist. England, vii. 315. The word rat (both the noun and the verb) was just . . . levelled at the converts to the Government of George the First, but has by degrees obtained a wider meaning, and come to be applied to any sudden and mercenary change in politics.
1870. English Gilds [E. E. T. S.], Int. cxxvii. For enforcing payment of entrance-fees . . . as well as of fines the Craft Gilds made use of the very means of much talked of in the case of the Sheffield Trade-Unions, namely rattening: that is, they took away the tools of their debtors.
1878. George Howell, Conflicts of Capital and Labour, viii. 13. Rattening, as defined by the Report of the Royal Commission, is "the abstraction of the workman's tools, so as to prevent him from earning his livelihood until he has obeyed the arbitrary orders of the union.'
1885. Evening News, 21 Sept, 1/6. A master baker can always get rid of an obnoxious or too outspoken unionist journeyman baker, and replace him with one of the numerous rats ever on the look-out for a job.
