Page:Farmer - Slang and its analogues past and present - Volume 3.pdf/223

 cally, old men's teeth); le mobilier (thieves' = furniture); les meules de moulin (popular = millstones); le jeu de dominos (thieves' = dominoes); les osanores (thieves'); les osselets (thieves' = bonelets); les palettes (popular and thieves'); la batterie (= the teeth, throat, and tongue).

German Synonyms.—Krächling (= grinderkin; from krachen = to crush).

Italian Synonyms.—Merlo (= battlement); sganascio; rastrelliera (= the rack).

1597. Hall, Satires, iv., 1. Her grinders like two chalk stones in a mill.

1640. Humphrey Mill, Night's Search, Sect. 39, p. 194 Her grinders white, her mouth must show her age.

1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, bk. IV. Author's Prologue. The devil of one musty crust of a brown George the poor boys had to scour their grinders with.

1690. B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew. Grinder, s.v. The Cove has Rum Grinders, the Rogue has excellent Teeth.

1693. Dryden, Juvenal, x., 365. One, who at sight of supper open'd wide His jaws before, and whetted grinders tried.

1740. Walpole, Correspondence. A set of gnashing teeth, the grinders very entire.

1751. Smollett, Peregrine Pickle, ch. xlv. Like a dried walnut between the grinders of a Templar in the pit.

1817. Scott, Ivanhoe, c. 16. None who beheld thy grinders contending with these peas.

1819. Moore, Tom Crib, p. 23. With grinders dislodg'd, and with peepers both poach'd.

1834. Ainsworth, Rookwood, bk. iv., ch. i. A grinder having been dislodged, his pipe took possession of the aperture.

1836. M. Scott, Cruise of the Midge, p. 83. Every now and then he would clap his head sideways on the ground, so as to get the back grinders to bear on his prey.

1848. Thackeray, Book of Snobs ch. xiii. Sir Robert Peel, though he wished it ever so much, has no power over Mr. Benjamin Disraeli's grinders, or any means of violently handling that gentleman's jaw.

1871. Chambers' Jour., 9 Dec., p. 772. My grinders is good enough for all the wittels I gets.

1888. Sporting Life, 28 Nov. Countered heavily on the grinders.

To take a grinder, verb, phr. (common).—To apply the left thumb to the nose, and revolve the right hand round it, as if to work a hand-organ or coffee-mill; to take a sight (q.v.); to work the coffee-mill (q.v.). [A street boy's retort on an attempt to impose on his good faith or credulity.]

1836. Dickens, Pickwick, ch. xxxi. Here Mr. Jackson smiled once more upon the company; and, applying his left thumb to the tip of his nose, worked a visionary coffee-mill with his right hand, thereby performing a very graceful piece of pantomime (then much in vogue, but now, unhappily, almost obsolete) which was familiarly denominated taking a grinder.

1870. Athenæum, 8 July. 'Rev. of Comic Hist. of United States.' He finds himself confronted by a plumed and lightly-clad Indian, who salutes him with what street-boys term a grinder.

Grinding-house, subs. (old).—1. The House of Correction. For synonyms, see Cage.

1614. Terence in English. The fellow is worthy to be put into the grinding-house.

2. (venery).—A brothel. For synonyms, see Nanny-shop. [Grinding-tool = the penis.]