Verb (common).—To roll the neck and body from side to side: of horses. Also (American) = to walk unsteadily, to make snakes (q.v.): as a shuttle in a loom: spec. of drunken men: usually with along, about, etc.
1884. Clemens, Huckleberry Finn. He began in earnest too; and went weaving first to one side of the platform and then the other.
Weaving, subs. (gaming).—A card-sharping
trick: cards are kept on
the knee, or between the knee
and the under side of the table,
and used when required by changing
them for cards held in the
hand (Hotten).
Web-foot State, subs. phr.
(American).—Oregon.
Wedding, subs. (old).—Cesspool
emptying: 'because always done
in the night' (Grose).
Wedge, subs. (Old Cant).—1.
Generic for money: spec. silver,
money or plate: see Rhino
(Grose). Hence wedge-feeder
= a silver spoon; wedge-lobb
= a silver snuff-box; wedge-yack
= a silver watch; wedge-hunter
= a thief, spec. one
devoting attention to silver plate,
watches, etc.; to flash the
wedge = to fence (q.v.) the
swag (q.v.).
1832. Egan, Book of Sports. He valued neither cove nor swell, for he had wedge snug in his clie.
1839. Ainsworth, Jack Sheppard [1889], 70. Near to these hopeful youths sat a fence, or receiver, bargaining with a clouter, or pickpocket, for a 'suit,' . . . two 'cloaks,' . . . and a wedge-lobb.
1879. Horsley, Jottings from Jail [Macm., xl. 500]. They told me all about the wedge, how I should know it by the ramp.
1891. Carew, Auto. of a Gypsy, 417. Nat swore I must'er been scammered and 'ad made a mistake in sampling the wedge.
2. (Cambridge University).—The last in the classical tripos (q.v.) list: also wooden wedge: in 1824, on the publication of the first list the position was occupied by a T. H. Wedgewood.
To knock out the wedges, verb. phr. (American).—To desert, 'leave in the lurch' (q.v.), abandon one in a difficulty.
The thin (or small) end of the wedge, subs. phr. (colloquial).—A first move (or a beginning), seemingly trivial, but calculated to lead to important results, 'a finger in the pie,' a manœuvre, shift, artifice.
Wedlock, subs. (old).—A wife.
1601. Jonson, Poetaster, iv. 1. Which of these is thy wedlock, Menelaus? thy Helen, thy Lucrece? that we may do her honour, mad boy.
Wee, adj. (colloquial).—Small,
little, tiny: also weeny (which
also see).
1596. Shakspeare, Merry Wives, i. 4. 22. No, forsooth: he hath but a little wee face, with a little yellow beard, a Cain-coloured beard.
1814. Scott, Waverley, lxxi. I made up a wee bit minute of an ante-nuptial contract.
Weed, subs. (common).—1. A
cigar, a Newtown pippin (q.v.).
Also the weed = tobacco: cf.
Cabbage.
1844. Puck, 14. With his weed in his cheek and his glass on his eye, His cutaway neat, and knowing tie, The milliners' hearts he did trepan My spicy swell small-college man.
