“Why have you suffer’d me to be imprison’d,
Kept in a dark house, visited by the priest,
And made the most notorious geck[156] and gull,
That e’er invention play’d on? tell me why.”
Twelfth Night, Act v. Sc. 1.
GULL-CATCHERS.
In the same play we find the word “gull” occurring several times in a similar sense, as in Act ii. Sc. 3, and Act iii. Sc. 2;[157] and Fabian, on the entry of Maria (Act ii. Sc. 5), exclaims,—
“Here comes my noble gull-catcher!”
GULL-GROPERS.
When sharpers were considered as bird-catchers, a gull was their proper prey.[158] “Gull-catchers,” or “gull-gropers,” therefore, were the names by which, in Shakespeare’s day, these sharpers were known.