Grellman; an
English translation of which was published in 1787, by
Roper, in quarto: from those works, Grose principally
compiled his "Lexicon Ballatronicum." In the present day we
have many professors of slang, and in more ways than one,
too many of cant; the greater part of whom are dull
impostors, who rather invent strange terms to astonish the
vulgar than adhere to the peculiar phrases of the persons
they attempt to describe. It has long been matter of regret
with the better order of English sporting men, that the
pugilistic contests and turf events of the day are not
written in plain English, "which all those who run might
read," instead of being rendered almost unintelligible by
being narrated in the language of beggars, thieves, and
pickpockets--a jargon as free from true wit as it is full of
obscenity.
~261~~Keate's{7} learning would not have compensated for under the
peculiar circumstances in which I was placed.
It was now that the mischief was done, and many a sound head was
cracked, and many a courageous heart was smarting 'neath their wounds in
the gloomy dungeons of the castle, or waiting in their rooms the probing
instrument and plasters of Messrs. Wall, or Kidd, or Bourne, that a few
of us, who had escaped tolerably well, and were seated round a bowl of
bishop in the snug _sanctum sanctorum_ of the Mitre, began to inquire
of each other the origin of the fray.
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