1885. Cuthbert Bede, in N. and Q., 6 S., xi. 414. Another word is Sues, for swine. This is applied to the bridge leading from the old courts to the new, familiarly known as the BRIDGE OF SIGHS from its slight similarity to the Venetian example, but also known as the ISTHMUS OF SUEZ. This word Suez was then transformed to Suez, swine, to adapt it to its Johnian frequenters.
Jack. See Black-jack.
Jackdaw, subs. (Christ’s Hospital).—Hertford for a London Blue (q.v.): obsolete.
c. 1800-29. The Blue-Coat Boy [More Gleanings from The Blue, 203]. Hertford boys called the London boys “JACKDAWS,” and those in London called those at Hertford “Hedgehogs.”
Jack-o’-Lantern, subs. (Eton and Harrow: obsolete).—A nocturnal form of “Hare and Hounds.”
1867. Collins, The Public Schools, p. 312. But there was an ancient form of it [“Hare and Hounds”] at Harrow, so especially attractive as being pursued at unlawful hours and under unusual difficulties, that it deserves special mention. It was known also in former days at Eton, and in both schools went by the name of JACK O’ LANTERN. About seven o’clock on winter evenings, when it was quite dark, the boys, by sufferance on the part of the authorities, were let out from their several boarding-houses into the fields below the school. A stout and active runner started in advance, carrying a lantern, by the light of which the rest pursued him in full cry. He showed or concealed his light from time to time, and a great point of the sport was to entice the hounds into some pool or muddy ditch (which “Jack” himself has carefully avoided) by showing the light exactly in a line on the other side.
1885. Thornton, Harrow School, p. 276. Jack-o’-lantern was abolished by Dr. George Butler, but re-appeared in Dr. Longley’s time as one of those forbidden pleasures so dear to youth. Always played in the evening, and originally by sufferance of the authorities, the game in question was simply a run across country after a lantern carried by a swift-footed boy. Oftentimes would the luckless hounds be enticed into some slough of despond, and the performers return in a condition of mud which may find its equal on a wet football day or a paper-chase forty years later, but yet present no adequate idea of the confusion caused by the return from JACK-O’-LANTERN, of thirty or forty boys at night when in ordinary clothes. It is one of the most distinct evidences that no discipline existed when we read of such a proscribed saturnalia having occurred after lock-up in Dr. Longley’s time. But the fact has been communicated to us by Harrow men whose word is indisputable.
Jambi, subs. (Harrow).—Greek Iambics; an exercise in the Upper School.
Janny, subs. (Royal High School, Edin.).—A janitor.