N
NABBED. Arrested.
NABCHEAT. A hat.
NABGIRDER. A bridle.
NABS. Coxcombs.
NACKY. Ingenious.
NAIDER. Nothing; can't have it.
NAILED. Fixed; secured; taken; arrested.
NAMASED. Ran away; got out of sight; ran.
NAP. To cheat.
NAPPER. A cheat; a thief; the head.
NARP. A shirt.
NARY. Not. "I frisked the joskin's sacks, but nary red was there," I searched the countryman's pockets, but not a cent was there.
NASK. A prison.
NATTY KIDS. Young thieves; smart, well-dressed youngsters.
NATURAL. Not fastidious; a liberal, clever fellow. "The bloke is very natural," the fellow is very liberal.
NAZY. Drunken.
NAZY COVES. Drunken fellows.
NAZY NOBS. Drunken coxcombs or fops.
NEB. The face.
NECKWEED. Hemp.
NED. A ten-dollar gold piece.
NEDDY. A slung-shot.
NEGLIGEE. A woman with nothing on but her shift.
NEMAN. Stealing.
NERVE. Courage; endurance; staunch.
NESCIO. No; I know not; can't say.
NETTLED. Diseased.
NEW LIGHT. New coin; new money.
NIB. The mouth.
NICK. To cut. "The knuck nicked the bloke's kicks into the bottom of his poke, and the dummy fell into his mauley," the pickpocket cut through the man's pants into the bottom of his pocket, when the pocket-book dropped into his hand. This mode of stealing is only practised by the artists of the fraternity.
NICKEY. The devil; "Old Nick."
NIDERING. Bad; without mitigation of any kind.
NIG. To clip.
NIL. Nothing.
NIM. To steal.
NIPPER-KIN. A tumbler; a drinking vessel.
NIPPERED. Turning a key in the inside of a door, from the outside, with a peculiar pair of forceps or nippers. Hotel-thieves use nippers to enter rooms after the inmates have gone to sleep.
NIPPERS. An instrument for turning a key on the outside of the door, used by hotel-thieves.
NIQUE. Contempt; don't care.
NISH. Keep quiet; be still.
NIX. Nothing.
NOB. One who stands at the head; a king; a man of rank.
NOBLERS. Confederates of thimble-riggers, who appear to play, to induce the flats to try their luck with the "little joker."
NOCKY BOY. A simpleton.
NOD. Asleep. "Gone to the land of Nod," gone to sleep.
NODDLE. An empty-pated fellow; a fool; the head of an animal.
NONSENSE. Melting butter in a wig.
NOOSED. Married.
NOPE. A blow.
NOSE. A spy; one who informs. "His pal nosed, and the bene cove was pulled for a crack," his partner informed against him, and the good fellow was arrested for burglary.
NOSEMY. Tobacco.
NOTCH. A pocket.
NOTE. A singer.
NOUSE-BOX. The head.
NOZZLE. A chimney.
NUB. The neck.
NUBBING. Hanging.
NUBIBUS. In the clouds. "Blow a nubibus," make a smoke.
NUG. Dear. "My nug," my dear.
NULL. To flog.
NYPPER. A cut-purse, so called by a person named Wotton, who in the year 1585, kept in London an academy for the education and perfection of rogues in the art of abstracting purses and pocket-books. At that period persons wore their purses at their girdles. Cutting them was a branch of the light-fingered art, which is now out of use, though the name remains. Instruction in the practice of this art was given as follows: A purse and a pocket were separately suspended, attached to which, both around and above them, were small bells; each contained counters, and he who could withdraw a counter without causing any of the bells to ring, was adjudged to be a "Nypper." A nypper was a pick-purse; a pick-pocket was called a "Foyster."