Glossary

Act The Angora

act the goat, play up, be irrational

Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. Also biscuits.

artificial silk which brought silk stockings within a working class budget

insane

ie two axe-handles across the shoulders, broad in the beam.

Harassed, perstered

Australian usage: a term of familiarity rather than abuse ie "not a bad poor bloody old bastard". However, a Bad Bastard is a person who really should be pushed off the nearest cliff. OR, "It was a bastard" means it was very hard, dirty work.

A form of modelling clay used exclusively by amateurs.

A refreshing lemon drink.

"Miserable as a bandicoot" - very miserable indeed, even though these marsupials are generally considered markedly cheerful.

A very strong ladies' hair lacquer.

Excluded from the pub. A terrible fate indeed.

An obsessional idea.

Mr Justice Beeby was the judge who handed down an iniquitous labour award for longshoremen in Australia in 1928.

A twig broom or an old woman.

Being beaten up by one or more assailants.

Thick embroidery wool used for tapestry fire-screens.

wonderful, excellent.

French for jewel; dainty and precious.

Self-censored form of bloody used in polite company.

Reprehensible person.

England, the Old Country etc

Doing One's Block means to lose one's temper completely.

Can mean almost anything, but mostly an emphatic form of punctuation.

Always a fighting insult, workshy and lazy.

Blue humour is rude, someone called Blue has red hair, to make a blue is to make an error and a blue can also be a fight.

Pentridge (a notoriously rough jail in Melbourne).

A shilling (dime).

Flawed, faulty.

Head.

Completely exhausted, ruined or broken. NEVER used in connection with sodomy.

small sweets, favoured by old ladies

carnival people, proprietors of side shows.

to wash the face, armpits, groin and feet in a kettle of water: also known as an APC (armpits and crotch) which acronym also meant aspirin, phenacetin and coedine, a headache remedy. A fast wash. See 'a lick and a promise'

coloured whitewash, a cheap form of paint.

also called 'tinsel pictures' pictures made of the coloured silver paper from chocolates.

a close fitting felt hat, globular in shape.

a toast: reply to 'mud in your eye'.

a 'white marriage' with no sexual contact.

( inclining to a) respectable gentleman who is growing what, in a working man, would be called a beer belly.

a salad with cold meat

'bloody right'

wonderful

go crook is to complain loudly. A crook is a criminal.

is to be sick. A crook tin of meat has gone bad.

to crown someone is to hit them over the head.

cheek; 'he had the crust so say...' Also 'earn a crust' earn a living.

a mad person

a criminal record

the arch-villain in Guy Boothby's novels. Always seen with his black cat on his shoulder. It sneered.

Australian soldiers

to dob someone in is to inform on them to authority

only a dog dobs someone in

Scottish usage for 'dove'

wrote steaming novels of throbbing passion.

a campaign by Railways Commissoner Clapp to support growers

large silver or china bowl which obstructs cross the table conversation. Usually filled with flowers.

quote from John Buchan's Peter Pienaar. Transvaal Africaans for 'sit down and make a plan'

Chinese gambling game.

a girl who may find herself in trouble; a flirt.

entirely without capital of any kind

a palpably false creature made of a mummified fish and a really dead monkey, foisted on the public by P.T.. Barnum. Who was right about suckers.

originally a schoolgirl with her hair in a braid down her back; later a fashionable woman with short skirts, short hair, and no corset.

methylated spirits(wood alcohol) ginger and brown boot polish, or red wine and methylated spirits. Not recommended. Fitzroy was a slum.

movement towards fresh fruit and vegetables, low fat and salt and no alcohol. Heavy on carrot.

a collection of different fish or meats, set in aspic

A prostitute

horses

money

Chinese slang for white people

a trousseau made by a young woman while she is waiting to be married. Contained all her household linen.

alcohol

'gives me the grues' makes me shiver.

dressed for a party

a coin worth one pound and one shilling.

half-drunk

rhyming slang for 'pinch' to steal

a shot of alcohol to begin the new daya shot of alcohol to begin the new day

Half Drunk

Phryne's very strong Greek coffee

committed to a lunatic asylum rather than jail for as long as necessary; an indefinite sentence.

large sized packet or bottle for household use

'before you can say Jack Robinson' means instantly, immediately. As even Brewer isn't sure where it came from, your imagination can range freely, as mine did.

police

pink, black and silver, green, black and gold. Usually in stripes.

as worn by G B Shaw, a 'hygenic' suit. Looked tweedy.

a fish which when dried can be modelled into the frightful underwater denizen of your choice.

a ' freak' working for P T Barnum; his face was covered with hair.

fell over slowly.

was used for domestic heating and lighting, so a kerosene tin was part of the furniture, and was used, for example, as the wicket in every street game of cricket.

a dandy

the one beautiful punch which ends the fight.

a popular shampoo which, if used once a month, instilled coconut oil into dry hair.

disposable sanitary pads

a lair is an apprentice villain with too much hair oil and no brains; a mug lair is a gullible one.

slide shows.

A lady who might be 'fast'

a curved heel, very elegant but not high. Perhaps an inch.

very mad indeed.

very significant male relationship. Your mate would die for you. Without asking.

brew the tea.

very skilled English stage magician.

similar to the vapours. Need to go and lie down for an hour.

'she's mental' she's insane'.

good solid dose of fast acting soporific in a drink.

a domestic cleaner.

dolls; used of children.

very stout canvas trousers, usually to be found standing at the foot of a worker's bed.

a gullible fool

shove yourself bodily into a conversation or situation

rhyming slang 'deaf'

screaming and panic, used esp of massed female expostulations; derived perhaps from a fox in the hen house.

potatoes

an informer

a 'natural' is a child with some congenital cognition fault; also used as emphasis ' a natural-born bastard'

sewage

an inquisitive person

the fight in the pub has just included the barman.

disapproving glare.

father, husband or boss.

over proof rum, much stronger than usual.

from the best families

An Irish person. Also, a fit of bad temper.

boots on high rings to keep feet out of mud or water.

rhyming slang; on my own, alone.

petticoat pockets, separate from the garment, or the slits in skirts made so that they could be reached

an informer ( from phiz, face, gig, to look; one who looks at people and tells the police what they have been doing.)

rhyming slang: feet

to swear or jeer (19th century usage and aboriginal word)

a spirit stove for boiling a kettle without lighting the main stove.

a person who wagers money on anything - also called a mug.

'on the QT' means quietly, without attracting notice.

to 'queer our pitch' is to foil our plan

one pound - a note.

a carnival or side show

literally a mad person, but can be affectionate.

a communist (because of the red flag)

ruby port and methylated spirits.

for a student, sent down for a term.

an honest deal. 'rye buck' means 'good'

killing insult even today. One who breaks a strike.

a person who entices the crowd to try, ie, a shooting gallery.

angry

a bank note

totally broke

famous neon sign advertising vinegar.

a rich person.

when the pubs closed at six, there was a rush to down as much as possible before the doors closed. This explained why sly grog (q.v) flourished until the licencing hours were relaxed.

illegal sales of alcohol outside drinking hours.

urinating ( agricultural) 

those who extract money by threats of arson or injury

starting price bookmakers - very illegal.

A fight

the body, but 'he beat the soul case out of him' is a very bad beating indeed.

suspicious 

calico sacks, used for clothing the poor. 

a swagman, a tramp. 

one who carries a rolled blanket 'drum' and walks from farm to farm, seeking work and handouts. 

sixpence 

'a touch of the tar brush' implies black or coloured ancestry. 

offers a game with three cups and a ball which you cannot win.

also known as find the lady; guess which one of these cards is the queen. See 'thimble rigger' for your chances of success.

'Tommy' the name for any English soldier.

excellent.

not a reliable source of information.

spun sugar or fairy floss.

alcohol, implies alcoholism or a Fitzoy cocktail (q.v.)

student song 'caviar comes from the virgin sturgeon, the virgin sturgeon's a very fine fish. The virgin sturgeon needs no urgin', that's why caviar's a very rare dish'.

the wallaby's track - tramping the outback (see swaggie)

an unsuccessful venture.

a longshoreman.

an urban legend about young women going, i.e. into a theatre toilet and later waking up confined to a Turkish brothel.  

WW1 slang for high explosive shells. 

a cheap and nasty knitted material for underclothes, etc. 

the counter in a French bistro