A Dictionary of Slang, Cant, and Vulgar Words / Used at the Present Day in the Streets of London; the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge; the Houses of Parliament; the Dens of St. Giles; and the Palaces of St. James.

by John Camden Hotten

SPRINGER-UP, a tailor who sells low-priced ready made clothing, and gives starvation wages to the poor men and women who “make up” for him. The clothes are said to be SPRUNG-UP, or “blown together.”

SPRY, active, strong, manly.—Americanism.

SPUDDY, a seller of bad potatoes. In Scotland, a SPUD is a raw potato; and roasted SPUDS are those cooked in the cinders with their jackets on.

SPUNGING-HOUSE, the sheriff’s officer’s house, where prisoners, when arrested for debt, are sometimes taken. As extortionate charges are made there for accommodation, the name is far from inappropriate.

SPUNK, spirit, fire, courage, mettle.

“In that snug room, where any man of SPUNK

Would find it a hard matter to get drunk.”

Peter Pindar, i., 245.

Common in America. For derivation see the following.

SPUNKS, lucifer matches.—Herefordshire; Scotland. Spunk, says Urry, in his MS. notes to Ray, “is the excrescency of some tree, of which they make a sort of tinder to light their pipes with.”