Heading
1854. Whyte Melville, General Bounce, ch. xv. His wives, five or six on 'em, was yowlin', and cryin', and kickin' UP THE DEVIL'S DELIGHT.
1863. Chas. Reade, Hard Cash, I., 278. Well then, speak quick, both of you, said Sharpe, or I'll lay ye both by the heels. Ye black scoundrels, what business have you in the Captain's cabin, kicking up THE DEVIL'S DELIGHT?
Devil's-Dozen, subs. (old).—Thirteen;
the original baker's-dozen
(q.v.). [From the number
of witches supposed to sit
down together at a 'Sabbath.'
In Fr. le boulanger (the baker) =
the devil.]
Devil's-Dung, subs. (old).—Asafœtida:
the old pharmaceutical
name. [From the smell.]
Now recognised.
1604. Dekker, Honest Wh., in wks. (1873), ii. 40. Fust. The divel's dung in thy teeth: I'll be welcome whether thou wilt or no.
1759. Sterne, Tristram Shandy, vol. VIII., ch. xi. 'Tis all pepper, garlic, staragen, salt, and devil's dung.
1804. C. K. Sharpe, in Correspondence (1888), i. 203. I devoured loads of devil's dung rounded into pills.
Devil's-dust, subs. (trade).—1.
Old cloth shredded for re-manufacture.
[In allusion both to the
swindle and to the 'dust' or 'flock'
produced by the disintegrating
machine which is called a 'devil.'
The practice and the name are
old. Latimer, in one of his sermons
before Edward the Sixth,
treating of trade rascality, remarked
that manufacturers could
stretch cloth seventeen yards long,
into a length of seven-and-twenty
yards: 'When they have brought
him to that perfection,' he continues,
'they have a pretty feat to
thick him again. He makes me
a powder for it, and plays the
pothicary. They call it flock-powder,
they do so incorporate it
to the cloth, that it is wonderful
to consider; truly a good invention.
Oh that so goodly wits
should be so applied; they may
well deceive the people, but they
cannot deceive God. They were
wont to make beds of flocks, and
it was a good bed too. Now they
have turned their flocks into powder,
to play the false thieves with
it.' Popularised by Mr. Ferrand
in a speech before the House of
Commons, March 4, 1842 (Hansard,
3 S, lxi., p. 140) when he
tore a piece of cloth made from
devil's dust, into shreds to prove
its worthlessness.] Also Shoddy
(q.v.).
1840. Carlyle, Misc., iv., 239. Does it beseem thee to weave cloth of devil's dust instead of true wool, and cut and sew it as if those wert not a tailor but the fraction of a very tailor?
1851. Mayhew, London Lab. and Lon. Poor, II., p. 30.
1864. Times, 2 Nov. It is not many years since Mr. Ferrand denounced the devil's dust of the Yorkshire woollen manufacturers; this devil's dust arises from the grand translation of old cloth into new.
2. (military)—Gunpowder.
1883. Hawley Smart, Hard Lines, ch. i. One looks up at the snow-white walls . . . and then remembers grimly what a mess the devil's dust, as used by modern artillery, would make of them in these days.
Devil's Guts, subs. (old).—A surveyor's
chain.
1785. Grose, Dict. Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
Devil's Own, subs. (military).—1.
The Eighty-Eight Foot. [A
contraction of the devil's own
Connaught boys, a name given
by General Picton for their gallan-
