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

TOOTH, “he has cut his eye TOOTH,” i.e., he is sharp enough, or old enough, to be so; “up in the TOOTH,” far advanced in age,—said often of old maids. Stable term for aged horses which have lost the distinguishing mark in their teeth.

TOPHEAVY, drunk.

TOPPED, hung or executed.

TOP-SAWYER, the principal of a party, or profession. “A TOP-SAWYER, signifies a man that is a master genius in any profession. It is a piece of Norfolk slang, and took its rise from Norfolk being a great timber county, where the top sawyers get double the wages of those beneath them.”—Randall’s Diary, 1820.

TOPS, dying speeches and gallows broadsides.

TOPSY-TURVY, the bottom upwards. Grose gives an ingenious etymology of this once cant term, viz., “top-side turf-ways,”—turf being always laid the wrong side upwards.

TO-RIGHTS, excellent, very well, or good.

TORPIDS, the second-class race-boats at Oxford, answering to the Cambridge SLOGGERS.

TOSHERS, men who steal copper from ships’ bottoms in the Thames.

TOSS, a measure of sprats.