Page:Farmer - Slang and its analogues past and present - Volume 7.pdf/249

 6. (cricket).—A turn given to the wrist in delivery, so that the ball breaks from the straight. Whence twister = a ball so delivered by the bowler (also, at billiards, a ball that screws or spins along with a twist). Hence (figuratively) = anything that puzzles or staggers.

1857. Hughes, Tom Brown's Schooldays, ii. 8. The cover-point hitter, that cunning man, goes on to bowl slow twisters.

c. 1889. Pop. Science Monthly (Century). He has learned the trick of playing with a straight bat the examiner's most artful twisters.

1898. Marshall, Pomes, 61. That blow was a twister.

1903. Punch's Almanack, 14. 1. Saunders doth next (at twisters who so skilled?) slay ('Bowl' wouldn't rhyme, unfortunately) Tyldesley.

A twist on the shorts, phr. (American Stock Exchange).—A Wall Street phrase, used where the shorts (g.v.) have undersold heavily, and the market has been artificially raised, compelling them to settle at ruinous rates (Medbury).

To twist (or wind) round one's finger, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To control or influence completely, to make submissive: usually of women.

See Tail.

Twit, verb. (originally and still literary).—'To hit in the Teeth' (B. E.); 'to reproach a person or remind him of favours conferred' (Grose). Twitty (colloquial) = cross, ill-tempered.

Twitch. To twitch a twelve, verb. phr. (American university).—To get the highest number of marks.

Twitcher, subs. (provincial).—1. A severe blow.

2. (common).—In pl. = small pincers.

Twitchetty, adj. and adv. (colloquial).—Nervous, fidgety, uncertain: also twitchy.

Twitter. All of a twitter, phr. (colloquial).—Frightened, nervous, fidgety (Grose): also in (or on) the twitters. Twitteration (or twitters) = sexual desire: espec. of women.

1660. Lestrange, Quevedo. A widow which had a twittering towards a second husband took a gossiping companion to manage the job.

1766. Colman, Clandestine Marriage, i. 1. I am all of a twitter to see my old John Harrowby again.

Twitter-light, subs. (old).—Twilight: also twatterlight.

1607. Middleton, Five Gallants, v. 1. Then cast she up Her pretty eye, and wink'd; the word methought was then, 'Come not 'till twitter-light.'

1606. Wily Beguil'd [Hawkins, Eng. Dr., iii. 331]. What mak'st thou here this twatter-light? I think thou'rt in a dream.

Twittle, verb. (old colloquial).—To chatter, babble, tattle. Hence twittle-twat = a chatterbox; twittle-twattle = gabble, idle talk.

1582. Stanihurst, Æneid [Arber], Int., xi. His hystorie twittled tales out of school.

1619. Holland, Plutarch, 85. All that ever he did was not worth so much as the twittle-twattle that he maketh.

1660. Lestrange, Quevedo. Insipid twittletwattles, frothy jests, and jingling witticisms, inure us to a misunderstanding of things.

1660. Rump Songs. Next come those idle twittle-twats, Which calls me many God-knows-whats.