1602. Dekker, Honest Whore [Dodsley, Old Plays (Reed), iii. 257]. God's my life, he's a very mandrake; or else (God bless us) one of these whiblins, and that's worse.
2. (old).—A sword.
1653. Brome, Lovesick Court, v. 1. Come, sir, let go your whiblin [snatcheth his sword from him].
Whid, subs. (Old Cant).—1. A
word (Harman, B. E., and
Grose): in pl. (modern) = patter,
talk, jocular speech. Also (2)
(Scotch) = a lie, fib; (3) (provincial)
= a dispute or quarrel.
As verb (Scots) = to lie. Also to
cut whids = to talk, to speak;
to cut bien whids = to talk
fairly, softly, kindly; to cut
queer whids = to abuse, swear,
bullyrag (q.v.); also whiddle
= to talk, tell or discover (B. E.
and Grose): spec. to reveal
secrets, or give the game away:
hence whiddler = an informer.
1567. Harman, Caveat, 116. What! stowe your bene, cofe, and cut benat wydds.
1622. Head, English Rogue. This doxie dell can cut bien whids, And drill well for a win.
1787. Burns, Death and Doctor Hornbook. Even ministers they have been kenn'd In holy rapture, A rousin' whid at times to vend, And nail 't wi' Scripture.
1821. Scott, Kenilworth, x. Credit me, the swaggering vein will not pass here; you must cut boon whids.
1834. Ainsworth, Rookwood (1864), 230. Here I am, pal Peter; and here are my two chums, Rust and Wilder. Cut the whid.
1876. Hindley, Life of a Cheap Jack. The whids we used to crack over them.
Whiddle. See Whid and
Oliver.
Whiff, subs. (colloquial).—1. A
smell; as verb = to smell: e.g.
How it whiffs.
[1783. Cowper, Task, iv. 459. A whiff Of stale debauch, forth issuing from the sties That Law has licensed.]
2. (old).—A draught, a drink, a go (q.v.): as verb = to drink: also whiffle.
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, i. vi. I will yet go drink one whiff more. Ibid., i. xxvii. In this season we might press and make the wine, and in winter, whiff it up. Ibid., i. xxxix. Gargantua whiffed the great draught. Ibid., iii. Prol. Constrain an easy, good-natured fellow to whiffle, quaff, carouse.
Whiffet, subs. (American).—Anything
or anybody worthless or
insignificant, a whipper-snapper
(q.v.).
1883. Philadelphia Times, 1 Aug. The sneaks, whiffets, and surface rats.
Whiffle, verb (old).—1. Generic
for trifling: to hesitate, talk idly,
prevaricate, waver. Hence
whiffler = a trifler, a fickle or
unsteady person; whifflery
(whiffling or whiffle-whaffle)
= levity, nonsense;
whiffling, adj. = uncertain.
1607. Dekker, Northward Hoe, ii. 1. Your right whiffler indeed hangs himself in St. Martin's, and not in Cheapside.
1671-94. Tillotson, Sermons, xlv. Every man ought to be stedfast . . . and not suffer himself to be whiffled . . . by an insignificant noise.
d. 1745. Swift, Works [Century]. Every whiffler in a laced coat . . . shall talk of the constitution.
1741. Watts, Improvement of the Mind, i. ix. 27. A person of a whiffling and unsteady turn of mind.
c. 1834. Carlyle [Froude, Life in London, iii.]. Life is no frivolity, or hypothetical coquetry or whiffling.
