- lessness; 'A turd for you!' =
'Go to hell and stay there' (also a turd in the mouth!); to chuck a turd = to evacuate, to rear; and so forth. Also Proverbs and Proverbial Sayings, 'Many women many words, many geese many turds'; 'He's fallen into a cow's turd' (of a dirty unkempt man); 'He looks like a cow-turd stuck with primroses'; 'There's not a turd to choose, quoth the good wife, by her two pounds of butter'; 'There's 'struction of honey, quoth Dunkinly, when he lick'd up the hen-turd'; 'A turd's as good for a sow as a pancake' (i.e. 'Good things are not fit for fools': cf. French Truie aime mieux bran que roses, Sp. No es la miel para la boca del asno); 'He that thatches his house with turds shall have more teachers than reachers'; 'He is all honey, or all turd'; 'See how we apples swim, quoth the horse-turd'; 'As rotten as a turd'; 'A humble-bee (or a beetle) in a cow-turd thinks himself a king'; 'Look high and fall into a cow-turd.'
1380. Wyclif, Bible, Luke xii. And he answeringe seide to him, Lord, suffre also this yeer: til the while I delue aboute, and sende toordis [Auth. Ver., till I shall dig about it and dung it].
d. 1529. Skelton, Bouge of Courte [Chalmers, ii. 253. 1]. Fye on this dyce they be not worth a turde.
1567. Harman, Caveat, 86. Gerry gan, the ruffian clye thee. A torde in thy mouth, the deuyll take thee.
1575. Still, Gammer Gurton's Needle, i. 5. Not so much as a hen's turd but in pieces I tare it. Ibid. Fie! it stinks: it is a cat's turd. Ibid., ii. 2. It is twenty pound to a goose-turd my gammer will not tarry.
1614. Jonson, Bartholomew Fair, i. 1. A turd in your little wife's teeth, too . . . 'twill make her spit.
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, i., Prol. A turd for him. Ibid., xxi. Then Panurge said unto her, A turd for you.
1660. A. Brome, Poems, 'The Clown.' 'Tis not a turd to choose.
1678. Cotton, Works (1770), 44. The Rogues threw cow-turds at us. Ibid., 223. Basta! no more, you wrangling Turds.
1694. Motteux, Rabelais, v. vi. They . . . would make us believe that a turd is a sugar loaf. Ibid., xxii. Others made chalk of cheese, and honey of a dog's turd.
c. 1700. Brown, Works, i. 77. Two thousand Flies attack a new-fall'n Turd.
1707. Ward, Hud. Rediv., ii. iv. 19. Like Dung-hill Cocks o'er Stable Turds. Ibid., ii. v. 25. Concluding with, Good Night, you Turd.
1774. Bridges, Burlesque Homer, 12. Nor know, for all your kick and bounce how many * * * *s will make an ounce. Ibid., 213. (Which will turn out not worth a t—.)
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v. Sir Reverence. Human excrement, a t—d.
Turf, subs. (common).—1. Generic
for horse-racing: hence the
turf = (1) the racecourse; and
(2) racing as a profession; on
the turf = making one's living
by racing (Grose): cf. 'in the
City'; turfite (or turfman) =
a racing man; turfy = sporting.
1760. Foote, Minor. [Horses are kept for the turf.]
1783-5. Cowper, Task, ii. 227. We justly boast At least superior jockeyship, and claim The honours of the turf as all our own.
1843. Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, xxvi. It was a . . . horsefleshy, turfy sort of thing to do.
c. 1882. Lord George Bentinck [Annandale]. All men are equal on the turf or under it.
1887. Field, 16 July. The modern turfite, to use a common but by no means elegant expression, has quite enough to do to keep himself posted in the most recent doings of the horses of to-day.
