taken at random from the great dramatist’s works. A London costermonger, or inhabitant of the streets, instead of saying “I’ll make him yield,” or “give in,” in a fight or contest, would say, “I’ll make him BUCKLE under.” Shakespere, in his Henry the Fourth (Part 2, Act i., Scene 1) has the word, and Mr. Halliwell, one of the greatest and most industrious of living antiquaries, informs us, that “the commentators do not supply another example.” How strange, then, that the Bard of Avon, and the Cockney costermongers, should be joint partners and sole proprietors of the vulgarism. If Shakespere was not a pugilist, he certainly anticipated the terms of the prize ring – or they were respectable words before the prize ring was thought of – for he has PAY, to beat or thrash, and PEPPER, with a similar meaning; also FANCY, in the sense of pets and favourites, – pugilists are often termed the FANCY. The cant word PRIG, from the Saxon, priccan, to filch, is also Shakesperian; so indeed is PIECE, a contemptuous term for a young woman. Shakespere was not the only vulgar dramatist of his time. Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, Brome, and other play-writers, occasionally put cant words into the mouths of their low characters, or employed old words which have since degenerated into vulgarisms. Crusty, poor tempered; “two of a KIDNEY,” two of a sort; LARK, a piece of fun; LUG, to pull; BUNG, to give or pass; PICKLE, a sad plight; FRUMP, to mock, are a few specimens casually picked from the works of the old histrionic writers.
One old English mode of canting, simple and effective when familiarised by practice, was the inserting a consonant betwixt each syllable; thus, taking g, “How do you do?” would be “Houg dog youg dog?” The name very properly given to this disagreeable nonsense, we are informed by Grose, was Gibberish.
Another Cant has recently been attempted by transposing the initial letters of words, so that a mutton chop becomes a cutton mop, a pint of stout a stint of pout; but it is satisfactory to know that it has gained no ground. This is called Marrowskying, or Medical Greek, from its use by medical students at the hospitals. Albert Smith terms it the Gower-street Dialect.
The Language of Ziph, I may add, is another rude mode of disguising English, in use among the students at Winchester College.
ACCOUNT OF THE HIEROGLYPHICS USED BY VAGABONDS
One of the most singular chapters in a History of Vagabondism would certainly be an account of the Hieroglyphic signs used by tramps and thieves. The reader may be startled to know that, in addition to a secret language, the wandering tribes of this country have private marks and symbolic signs with which to score their successes, failures, and advice to succeeding beggars; in fact, that the country is really dotted over with beggars’ finger posts and guide stones. The assertion, however strange it may appear, is no fiction. The subject was not long since brought under the attention of the Government by Mr. Rawlinson.26 “There is,” he says in his report, “a sort of blackguards’ literature, and the initiated understand each other by slang [cant] terms, by pantomimic signs, and by HIEROGLYPHICS. The vagrant’s mark may be seen in Havant, on corners of streets, on door posts, and on house steps. Simple as these chalk lines appear, they inform the succeeding vagrants of all they require to know; and a few white scratches may say, ‘be importunate,’ or ‘pass on.’”
Another very curious account was taken from a provincial newspaper, published in 1849, and forwarded to Notes and Queries,27 under the head of Mendicant Freemasonry. “Persons,” remarks the writer, “indiscreet enough to open their purses to the relief of the beggar tribe, would do well to take a readily learned lesson as to the folly of that misguided benevolence which encourages and perpetuates vagabondism. Every door or passage is pregnant with instruction as to the error committed by the patron of beggars, as the beggar-marks show that a system of freemasonry is followed, by which a beggar knows whether it will be worth his while to call into a passage or knock at a door. Let any one examine the entrances to the passages in any town, and there he will find chalk marks, unintelligible to him, but significant enough to beggars. If a thousand towns are examined, the same marks will be found at every passage entrance. The passage mark is a cypher with a twisted tail: in some cases the tail projects into the passage, in others outwardly; thus seeming to indicate whether the houses down the passage are worth calling at or not. Almost every door has its marks: these are varied. In some cases there is a cross on the brick work, in others a cypher: the figures 1, 2, 3, are also used. Every person may for himself test the accuracy of these statements by the examination of the brick work near his own doorway – thus demonstrating that mendicity is a regular trade, carried out upon a system calculated to save time, and realise the largest profits.” These remarks refer mainly to provincial towns, London being looked upon as the tramps’ home, and therefore too FLY, or experienced, to be duped by such means.
The only other notice of the hieroglyphics of vagabonds that I have met with, is in Mayhew’s London Labour and London Poor.28 Mayhew obtained his information from two tramps, who stated that hawkers employ these signs as well as beggars. One tramp thus described the method of WORKING29 a small town. “Two hawkers (PALS29) go together, but separate when they enter a village, one taking one side of the road, and selling different things; and so as to inform each other as to the character of the people at whose houses they call, they chalk certain marks on their door posts.” Another informant stated that “if a PATTERER29 has been CRABBED (that is, offended) at any of the CRIBS (houses), he mostly chalks a signal at or near the door.”
Another use is also made of these hieroglyphics. Charts of successful begging neighbourhoods are rudely drawn, and symbolical signs attached to each house to show whether benevolent or adverse.30 “In many cases there is over the kitchen mantel-piece” of a tramps’ lodging-house “a map of the district, dotted here and there with memorandums of failure or success.”31 A correct facsimile of one of these singular maps has been placed as a frontispiece. It was obtained from the patterers and tramps who supplied a great many words for this work, and who have been employed by me for some time in collecting Old Ballads, Christmas Carols, Dying Speeches, and Last Lamentations, as materials for a History of Popular Literature. The reader will no doubt be amused with the drawing. The locality depicted is near Maidstone, in Kent, and I am informed that it was probably sketched by a wandering SCREEVER32 in payment for a night’s lodging. The English practice of marking everything, and scratching names on public property, extends itself to the tribe of vagabonds. On the map, as may be seen in the left hand corner, some TRAVELLER32 has drawn a favourite or noted female, singularly nick-named Three-quarter Sarah. What were the peculiar accomplishments of this lady to demand so uncommon a name, the reader will be at a loss to discover, but a patterer says it probably refers to a shuffling dance of that name, common in tramps’ lodging-houses, and in which “¾ Sarah” may have been a proficient. Above her, three beggars or hawkers have reckoned their day’s earnings, amounting to 13s.; and on the right a tolerably correct sketch of a low hawker, or costermonger, is drawn. “To Dover, the nigh way,” is the exact phraseology; and “hup here,” a fair specimen of the self-acquired education of the tribe of cadgers. No key or explanation to the hieroglyphics was given in the original, because it would have been superfluous, when every inmate of the lodging-house knew the marks from their cradle – or rather their mother’s back.
Should there be no map, “in most lodging-houses there is an old man who is guide to every ‘WALK’ in the vicinity, and who can tell each house on every round, that is ‘good for a cold tatur.’”33 The hieroglyphics that are used are: —
Vol. v., p. 210.
Vol. i., pages 218 and 247.
See Dictionary.
