Heading
1609. Dekker, Guls' Horne-Booke, ch. vi. And to let that clapper (your tongue) be tost so high, that all the house may ring of it.
1633. Massinger, New Way to Pay Old Debts, III., 2. Greedy. Sir Giles, Sir Giles! Over. The great fiend, stop that clapper!
1750. Fielding, Tom Jones, bk. VII., ch. xv. My landlady was in such high mirth with her company that no clapper could be heard there but her own.
1835. Haliburton, Clockmaker, 1 S., ch. xix. I thought I should have snorted right out two or three times . . . to hear the critter let her clapper run that fashion.
1861. Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxford, ch. vi. But old Murdoch was too pleased at hearing his own clapper going, and too full of whiskey, to find him out.
1878. John Payne, tr. Poems of Villon, p. 139. Enough was left me (as warrant I will) To keep me from holding my clapper still, When jargon that meant 'You shall be hung' They read to me from the notary's bill: Was it a time to hold my tongue?
2. (vulgar).—Gonorrhœa; once in polite use. [Origin uncertain; cf., Old Fr. clapoir, bosse, bubo, panus inguinis; clapoire, clapier, 'lieu de débauche,' 'maladie q'on y attrape']. For synonyms, see Ladies' Fever.
1587. Myrr. Mag., Malin iii. Before they get the clap.
1706. Farquhar. The Recruiting Officer. Five hundred a year besides guineas for claps.
1709. Swift. Adv. Relig. Works [1755] II., i. 99, s.v.
1738. Johnson, London, 114. They sing, they dance, clean shoes, or cure a clap.
1881. In Syd. Soc. Lex.
Verb (vulgar).—To infect with clap; see subs. Also figuratively.
1658. Osborn. Jas. I. [1673], 514. Atropos clapt him, a Pox on the Drab!
1680. Butler, Rem. [1759], I. 249. [They] had ne'er been clap'd with a poetic itch.
1738. Laws of Chance. Pref. 9. It is hardly 1 to 10 . . . that a Town-Spark of that Age has not been clap'd.
Clapper-Dudgeon, subs. (old).—A
whining beggar.
1567. Harman, Caveat (1814), p. 26. These Palliards be called also Clapper dogens, these go with patched clokes, and haue their morts with them which they cal wiues.
1625. Jonson, Staple of News, II. Here he is, and with him—what? a clapper-dudgeon! That's a good sign, to have the beggar follow him so near.
1705-7. Ward, Hudibras Redivivus, vol. I., pt. V., p. 10. Says he, there is an old curmudgeon, A hum-drum, preaching, clapperdudgeon.
1863. Sala, Capt. Dang., II., vii., 225. Rogues, Thieves . . . and Clapper-dudgeons . . . infested the outskirts of the Old Palace. [m.]
Clap of Thunder, subs. phr.
(old).—A glass of gin: a variant
of Flash of Lightning (q.v.).
1821. P. Egan, Tom and Jerry [Ed. 1890], p. 79. I have not exactly recovered from the severe effects of the repeated 'flashes of lightning' and strong claps of thunder, with which I had to encounter last night.
Clap-Shoulder, subs. (old).—A
term applied to the officers of
justice who laid their hands upon
people's shoulders when they arrested
them. Cf., Catch-pole.
1630. Taylor, Workes. Clap-shoulder serjeants get the devill and all, By begging and by bringing men in thrall.
Clapster, subs. (vulgar).—An
habitual sufferer from gonorrhœa;
by implication, one much and
often in the way of getting
clapped.
Claras, subs. (Stock Exchange).—Caledonian
Railway Deferred
and Ordinary Stock.
1887. Atkin, House Scraps. For we have our Sarahs and Claras. Our Noras and Doras for fays.
