Heading
hook; goll (old); oar; paddle; palette; paw; plier; shaker; wing; Yarmouth mitten.
French Synonyms. Les abatis or abattis (popular: a term applied to both hands and feet; properly giblets); l'agrafe (common; hook or clasp); la croche (thieves': properly a quaver; possibly influenced by croc = hook, grapnel, or drag; an allusion to the hooked appearance of the musical note); la cuiller (popular: literally a spoon); les brancards (popular: this expression, like abatis, is also used of the feet; properly = shafts, as of a cart); l'arguemine (thieves'); le battoir (popular: properly a washerwoman's 'bat'); un gigot (popular: a large, thick hand, a 'mutton fist'); le grappin; les harpions (also = feet).
Italian Synonym. Gramoso (properly 'a wretch'); cerra.
1785. Grose, Dict. Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1789. Geo. Parker, Life's Painter, p. 143, s.v.
1819. T. Moore, Tom Crib's Mem. to Cong., p. 23. From this to the finish, 'twas all fiddle-faddle, Poor Georgy, at last, could scarce hold up his daddle. Ibid. With daddles high uprais'd, and nob held back, In awful prescience of th' impending thwack.
1827. Scott, Two Drovers, ch. ii. Ah, this comes of living so long with kilts and bonnets—men forget the use of their daddles.
1842. Punch, vol. III, p. 136. And her daddle link'd in his'n gone to roam as lovers use.
1849. C. Kingsley, Alton Locke, ch. v. 'Tip us your daddle, my boy,' said the second speaker.
Daddy, subs. (general).—1. The
superintendent of a casual ward;
generally an old pauper.
2. (theatrical).—A stage manager.—See quot.
1886. Graphic, 10 April, p. 399. The manager himself is sometimes known as the 'gorger,' and daddy is the stage-manager.
3. (common).—A confederate of 'workers' of mock raffles, lotteries, etc.; generally the person selected to receive the prize.
Daddyism, subs. (American).—Pride
of birth.
1871. Kate Field, in Harper's Bazaar, Aug. An Eastern man commending the services of a young Philadelphian to a Chicago tradesman, said: 'He comes of a very good family; his grandfather was a distinguished man.' 'Was he?' replied the man of Chicago. 'That's of no account with us. There's less daddyism here than any part of the United States. What's he himself.'
Daffy or Daffy's Elixir, subs.
(common).—Gin. [From a popular
medicine sold as early as the
beginning of the eighteenth century:
see advertisements (1709),
in Ashton's Social Life in the
Reign of Queen Anne, i., pp. 7,
8: now known as 'Tincture of
Senna.'] For synonyms, see
Drinks.
1821. The Fancy, vol. I., p. 304. While carrying on his new vocation of publican, Jack did not deny himself the use of drops of daffy.
1841. Leman Rede, Sixteen-String Jack, Act i., Sc. 2. Take some daffy to the back parlour.
1851. H. Mayhew, Lon. Lab. and Lon. Poor, IV., 430. When I goes in where they are a havin' their daffies—that's drops o' gin, sir.
1871. London Figaro, 15 April. [If the baby] should bawl persistently . . . he would . . . thoroughly dose it with daffy.
1882. Punch, vol. LXXXII., 193. They had low foreheads, and wore big buttonholes, for so they termed the flowers, it was 'the thing' to wear. A good many of them, too, had been partaking freely of daffy.
