1889. C. Haddon Chambers, In Australian Wilds. He’s sober now, you see; but he managed to get blind drunk before eleven o’clock this morning, and last week he narrowly escaped an attack of the horrors.
1892. Henley and Stevenson, Three Rags, ‘Admiral Guinea,’ iv., 3. It’s the horrors come alive.
2. (common).—Sausages. See Chamber of Horrors and Dog’s-paste.
3. (thieves’).—Handcuffs. For synonyms, see Darbies.
Horse, subs. (common).—1. A five-pound note. See Finnup.
2. (thieves’).—Horsemonger Lane Gaol. Also the Old Horse. Now obsolete.
1851–61. H. Mayhew, Lond. Lab. and Lond. Poor, 1, p. 457. The only thing that frightens me when I’m in prison is sleeping in a cell by myself—you do in the Old Horse and the Steel.
3. (American).—A man: generally in affection. Also Old Hoss, or Hoss-fly.
1838. Haliburton (‘Sam Slick’), The Clockmaker, 3 S., ch. xviii. He is all sorts of a hoss, and the best live one that ever cut dirt this side of the big pond, or t’other side either. [[357]]
1847. Robb, Squatter Life, p. 74. What in the yearth did you do with old Hoss on the road?—He ain’t gin out, has he? Ibid., p. 70. None of your stuck-up imported chaps from the dandy states, but a real genuine westerner—in short, a hoss!