O. P. Publishers’ reply to an inquiry for a book or paper that is OUT OF PRINT.
Open the ball, to commence anything.
Oracle, “to work the ORACLE,” to plan, manœuvre, to succeed by a wily stratagem.
Orate, an Americanism, which means, to speak in public, or make an oration.
Organ-grinder, an itinerant who is supposed to “GRIND” music out of a barrel-organ.
Originator, an inventor of plans for the formation of joint-stock companies. The originator submits his schemes to the promoter, who accepts or rejects them.
Otter, eightpence. Italian, OTTO, eight.—Lingua Franca.
Ottomy, a thin man, a skeleton, a dwarf. Vulgar pronunciation of ANATOMY. Shakspeare has ATOMY.
Out, a dram glass. These glasses are two-OUT (half-quartern), three-OUT, and four-OUT. An habitué of a gin-shop, desirous of treating a brace of friends, calls for “a quartern of gin and three OUTS,” by which he means three glasses which will exactly contain the quartern. Really, the word glasses is understood. The man actually means, and one or more three-OUT glasses.