BARNABY. An old dance to a quick movement. See Cotton,
in his Virgil Travesti; where, speaking of Eolus he has
these lines,
Bounce cry the port-holes, out they fly,
And make the world dance Barnaby.
BARNACLE. A good job, or snack easily got: also shellfish growing at the bottoms of ships; a bird of the goose kind; an instrument like a pair of pincers, to fix on the noses of vicious horses whilst shoeing; a nick name for spectacles, and also for the gratuity given to grooms by the buyers and sellers of horses.
BARREL FEVER. He died of the barrel fever; he killed himself by drinking.
BARROW MAN. A man under sentence of transportation; alluding to the convicts at Woolwich, who are principally employed in wheeling barrows full of brick or dirt.
BARTHOLOMEW BABY. A person dressed up in a tawdry manner, like the dolls or babies sold at Bartholomew fair.
BASKET. An exclamation frequently made use of in cock-pits, at cock-fightings, where persons refusing or unable to pay their losings, are adjudged by that respectable assembly to be put into a basket suspended over the pit, there to remain during that day's diversion: on the least demur to pay a bet, Basket is vociferated in terrorem. He grins like a basket of chips: a saying of one who is on the broad grin.
BASKET-MAKING. The good old trade of basket-making; copulation, or making feet for children's stockings.
BASTARD. The child of an unmarried woman.
BASTARDLY GULLION. A bastard's bastard.