2. (old).—A man whose wife insists on accompanying him to a public house.
1690. B. E., Dict. of the Canting Crew, s.v. 1785. Grose, Dict. of the Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
Free-lance, subs. (common).—An habitual adulteress.
c. 1889. (Quoted from Spectator in ‘Slang, Jargon, and Cant’). Sooner than be out of the fashion they will tolerate what should be most galling and shaming to them—the thought that by these they are put down among the free-lances.
Also said of a journalist attached to no particular paper.
Freeman, subs. (venery).—A married woman’s lover.
Freeman of bucks, subs. phr. (old).—A cuckold. [In allusion to the horn.] Grose.
To freeman, or to make a freeman of, verb. phr. (schoolboys’).—To spit on the penis of a new comer. Also To Freemason.
Freeman’s Quay. To drink, or lush, at freeman’s quay, verb. phr. (old).—To drink at another’s expense. [Freeman’s Quay was a celebrated wharf near London Bridge, and the saying arose from the beer that was given to porters, carmen, and others going there on business.]
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v.