John Stephen Farmer

“ Commons, subs. (University) .—Rations of bread, butter, and milk, supplied from the buttery. [When a number of men breakfast together, the student whose rooms are the rendezvous tells his scout the names of those in-college men who are coming to breakfast with him. The scout then collects their COMMONS, which thus forms the substratum of the entertainment. The other things are of course supplied by the giver of the breakfast, and are sent in by the confectioner. As to the knives and forks and crockery, the scout produces them from his common stock.] ”

“ THE GAME OF HIGH TOBY [Notes] [1834]
[By W. HARRISON AINSWORTH in Rookwood] .
I Now Oliver puts his black night-cap on, [1]
And every star its glim is hiding, [2]
And forth to the heath is the scampsman gone, [3]
His matchless cherry-black prancer riding; [4]
Merrily over the Common, he flies,
Fast and free as the rush of rocket,
His crape-covered vizard drawn over his eyes,
His tol by his side and his pops in his pocket. [5]
Chorus. ”

“ To get one’s blue, verb. phr. (University) .—To be selected as a competitor in inter-University sports: cf. “to get silk” (of Q.C.’s) . [From the University colours.]
1899. Stonyhurst Mag., Feb., p. 194. The expression “to get a BLUE” is a phrase which is universally recognised as applying to the athletics and games of the sister Universities, Oxford and Cambridge, and to them only. As an ardent Oxford man I do not appreciate his compliment; as an old Stonyhurst boy, I cannot but deplore his servility. ”

“ With belly-go-firsters and kneading the dough,
With tapping of claret, and clipping and gobbing,
Say just what you please, you must own he's the go.
II Spring's the boy for flooring and flushing it,
Hitting and stopping, advance and retreat,
For taking and giving, for sparring and rushing it,
And will ne'er say enough, till he's down right dead beat;
No crossing for him, true courage and bottom all,
You'll find him a rum un, try on if you can;
You shy-cocks, he shows 'em no favour, 'od rot 'em all,
When he fights he trys to accomplish his man ”

“ He goes out with his umbrella rolled up, and he finds he is swaggering; or he carries it by its middle, or under his arm, or he walks on the middle terrace after chapel, or he innocently wears his “blues” open when it is hot, or turns his trousers up when it is wet, and again he is swaggering. Lady visitors sometimes think small boys at Harrow rude. It is not rudeness which leads boys to stick close to the wall, even when coming up covered with mud from football, and shoulder the world into the gutter, it is modesty ”

“ Feeder-cric (Christ’s Hospital) .—See ante. This game got its name from the “feeder,” i.e. the thrower of the ball, and the humble imitation that it was of cricket. The bat was a stick like a “glorified” ruler, but cut away at one end to resemble in some sort a cricket-bat. It was played against a buttress, on which was marked a circle in chalk, which served as a wicket. The ball was soft, with a hole in it; as in rounders the batsman might insist on certain conditions as to the method of “feeding,” and might refuse to recognise a “feed” unreasonable in height. ”

“ His career was a long series of swindling and imposture, very ingeniously carried out, occasionally deceiving people who should have known him well. His restless nature then drove him to embark for Newfoundland, where he stopped but a short time, and on his return he pretended to be the mate of a vessel, and eloped with the daughter of a respectable apothecary of Newcastle on Tyne, whom he afterwards married. He continued his course of vagabond roguery for some time, and when Clause Patch, a king, or chief of the gypsies, died, Carew was elected his successor. ”

“ It is akin to a species of football played at Eton, and is clearly a relic of the past. In matches the sides usually have names: e.g. “French and English,” in the Grand Matches—a significant survival from old continental days; “Federals and Allies” (now obsolete) ; “Pipes and Windows”—a favourite impromptu match, the “Pipes” being those who sit on one side of the old “Study Place,” the “Windows” those who sit on the other. Now that the “Pipes” (hot-water pipes) are on the same side as the windows, the match is more commonly called “Walls and Windows,” but sometimes “Chapel Pipes and Windows.” ”

“ Go wrong you never can.
All fighting coves too you must know
Ben Caunt as well as Bendigo,
And to each mill be sure to go,
And be one of the van.
VIII Things that are found before they're lost,
Be always first to find.
Restore dogs for a pound or two
You'll do a thing that's kind,
And you must sport a blue billy,
Or a yellow wipe tied loosily [9]
Round your scrag for bloaks to see [10]
That you're a Leary Man
IX At knock-'em-downs and tiddlywink,
To be a sharp you must not shrink,
But be a brick and sport your chink [11]
To win must be your plan. ”

“ Brute, in Cambridge University slang, is a man who has not yet matriculated. The play is evident. A “man” in college phrase is a collegian; and as matriculation is the sign and seal of acceptance, a scholar before that ceremony is not a “man,” and therefore only a “BIPED BRUTE.”
Buck, adj. 1. (Winchester: obsolete) .—Handsome.
2. (Felsted) .—Fine; jolly.
1897. Felstedian, July, p. 129. What’s the good of a Præfect? he never gets anybody up, and has never been known to be in time himself. He’s a BUCK lot of use.
To be bucked, verb. phr. (Uppingham) .—To be tired.
To buck down, verb. phr. ”

“ We on the contrary, have scarcely any slang songs of merit. This barreness is not attributable to the poverty of the soil, but to the want of due cultivation. Materials are at hand in abundance, but there have been few operators. Dekker, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Ben Jonson, have all dealt largely in this jargon, but not lyrically; and one of the earliest and best specimens of a canting-song occurs in Brome's 'Jovial Crew;' and in the 'Adventures of Bamfylde Moore Carew' there is a solitary ode addressed by the mendicant fraternity to their newly-elected monarch ”

“ Slack, verb (Durham) .—To sell: specifically, to dispose of property to a dealer in second-hand goods. [From the name of a second-hand bookseller in Durham.]
Slave-driver, subs. (Harrow) .—A fag-master: exclusively at cricket.
1890. Great Public Schools, p. 95. The upper ground on these days is given up to practice at the nets for the Eleven and the “Sixth Form” game, and to practice in fielding and catching. Boys below the Removes have to fag for them, and these fags are managed by SLAVE-DRIVERS (three or four boys appointed for the purpose) . ”

“ It must be confessed, however, that the field of English slang verse and canting song, though not altogether barren, has yet small claim to the idiomatic and plastic treatment that obtains in many an Argot- song and Germania-romance; in truth, with a few notable exceptions, there is little in the present collection that can claim literary rank. ”

“ Dickens, Dictionary of Oxford and Cambridge, p. 16. Battels is properly a designation of the food obtained from the College Buttery. An account of this, and of the account due to the Kitchen, is sent in to every undergraduate weekly, hence these bills also are known as BATTELS, and the name, further, is extended to the total amount of the term’s expenses furnished by the College. In some Colleges it is made essential to the keeping of an undergraduates’ term that he should BATTEL, i.e. obtain food in College on a certain number of days each week. ”

“ This ode brings us down to our own time; to the effusions of the illustrious Pierce Egan; to Tom Moore's Flights of 'Fancy;' to John Jackson's famous chant, 'On the High Toby Spice flash the Muzzle,' cited by Lord Byron in a note to 'Don Juan;' and to the glorious Irish ballad, worth them all put together, entitled 'The Night before Larry was stretched.' This is attributed to the late Dean Burrowes, of Cork. [See Note, p. 220 Ed.] . It is worthy of note, that almost all modern aspirants to the graces of the Musa Pedestris are Irishmen. ”

“ For reading purposes the library is as free and as good as the library of the British Museum; with the advantages that you may be seated in front of a window commanding a beautiful garden prospect, that your arm-chair is not disturbed, that books are allowed to accumulate around you, and that you are not obliged to return them to the care of the custodian on leaving the library. ”

“ The points of difference are chiefly these: (1) the balls must be swift, and bowled along the ground; (2) the batsman must hit—“slog” is the term; and (3) the game is played at a single wicket. Bat, ball, and wickets differ in shape and size from those used in cricket proper. In Father Gerard’s Stonyhurst will be found a detailed account of the game, and a connection is traced between it and a crude form once played at Eton. It is in all probability a survival of very primitive cricket which became stereotyped because of the life of the College abroad. ”

“ Good-supper and Good-breakfast. Whence DO-ROOM = the long room in which a DO is held. [As a rule words with the suffix “room” are modern; “PLACE” (q.v.) is the older form.]
Dock, verb (Winchester) .—To erase: as by rubbing out, or by a stroke of the pen; to tear out: as leaves from a book. Also DOCK OUT.
Doctor, subs. (Winchester) .—The Head-master.
c. 1840. Mansfield, School-Life at Winchester College, p. 27. The Head Master, or the Doctor, as he is always called, lives in “Commoners’ buildings.” ”

“ One day a boy was so unlucky as to tear it; and Busby’s known severity left no doubt of the punishment that would follow. The offender was in despair, when a generous schoolfellow volunteered to take the blame upon himself and suffered in his friend’s stead accordingly.... In three year’s time he was sufficiently advanced to be admitted by Busby ABOVE THE CURTAIN—that is, into the fourth class, the lowest in the upper school. Of this class, however, he says the head-master “took little or no care,” but as he rose into the higher forms he found the teaching more satisfactory. ”

“ Those who had been sparing over night to save a portion of the small piece of cheese they had for their supper, pulled it out of their pockets. Sometimes a great fellow would make a little boy always supply him with cheese of mornings, out of the piece the poor fellow had had for his supper the night previous. Beer we had certainly, served out in wooden vessels of an extraordinary shape, called “piggins”; about six of them for four boys to drink out of, but such beer! ”

“ Pascoe, Life in Our Public Schools. Across the two ends of the ground a small trench is dug, about four inches wide and two deep, and a goal is obtained when the ball is fairly kicked across the trench (Wiccamicé WORMS) .
Wrangler, subs. (Cambridge) .—The name given to those who are placed in the first class in the first or elementary portion of the public examination for honours in pure and mixed mathematics, commonly called the Mathematical Tripos, those placed in the second class being known as Senior Optimes, and those in the third class as Junior Optimes. ”

“ Selections from classical authors, ancient or modern, are recited by the Sixth-form boys, who are dressed for the occasion in black swallow-tail coats, white ties, black knee-breeches and buckles, silk stockings, and pumps. Then follows the provost’s luncheon, given in the college hall to the distinguished visitors, while similar entertainments on a smaller scale are going on in the various tutors’ and dames’ houses. At 3 o’clock there is full choral service in chapel. ”

“ Well, a good many do precious little. Still there is this check. All who do not pass their examinations within a certain time must “GO DOWN,” i.e. they must leave. It wholly depends upon ourselves, then, how much work we do; and it is naturally a much more difficult matter to “read” in this way than when one has regular schools and studies.
Goal, subs. (Winchester) .— (1) At football the boy who stands at the centre of each end, acting as umpire; and (2) the score of three points made when the ball is kicked between his legs, or over his head, without his touching it. ”