whip-jack, a sham sailor who begs. Middleton, Roaring Girl, v. 1 (Moll); used as a term of reproach generally, ‘One Boner, a bare whippe Jacke for lucre of money toke upon him to be thy father’, Bp. Ponet in Maitland on Reformation, p. 74. [‘Sir Charles Grandison is none of your gew-gaw whip-jacks that you know not where to have’, Richardson, Grandison, vi. 156.] See Davies.
whipstock, the handle of a whip. Twelfth Nt. ii. 3. 28; Two Noble Kinsmen, i. 2. 95. Also, a carter; as a term of abuse, Tomkis, Albumazar, iv. 4 (end). The equivalent term whipstalk occurs in the Spanish Tragedy (Nares).
whirlbat, a ‘cestus’, or weighty boxing-glove. Dryden, Pref. to Fables, § 3 from end. Chapman, tr. of Odyssey, viii. 285; written whoorlbat, id., Iliad xxiii, 538. See Davies (s.v. Whirly-bat).
whirlpit, a whirlpool. Chapman, tr. of Iliad, xxi. 223; Sandys, Paraph. Exod. xv; Marmyon’s Fine Companion; Holland, tr. Ammianus (Nares).
whirlpool, a sea-monster of the whale kind; perhaps the cachalot or sperm-whale, which is distinguished from other whales by its peculiar manner of blowing; ‘A whale or a whirlepoole’, Bible, Job xli. 1 (marginal rendering of Leviathan); Spenser, F. Q. ii. 12. 23; ‘Tinet, the Whall tearmed a Horlepoole or Whirlepoole’, Cotgrave; Holland’s Pliny, bk. ix, ch. 3; spelt wherlpoole, Drayton, Pol. xx. 100; wherpoole, id., xxv. 174. See Wright, Bible Word-Book.
whirry, to whirl along, to whirl away, to hurry off, Stanyhurst, tr. Aeneid, iii. 611; wherry, Dekker, O. Fortunatus, iv. 2 (Agripyne); whurry, Taylor’s Works (Nares); whorry, Herrick, To Bacchus, a Canticle. See EDD. (s.v. Whirry, vb. 3).
whisket, a pandaress, The London Chanticleers, sc. 2 (Jenniting).
whiskin, a wanton person, Ford, Fancies Chaste, iv. 1 (Secco); a pandaress, Shirley, Lady of Pleasure, iv. 2 (Steward). See [pimp-whiskin].
whist, to keep silence; ‘They whisted all’, Surrey, tr. Aeneid, ii. 1; ‘They whusted all’, Phaer, tr. Aeneid, ii. 1; put to silence, ‘So was the Titanesse put downe and whist’, Spenser, F. Q. vii. 7. 59; as adj., still, silent, ‘Where all is whist and still’, Marlowe, Hero and L. (Nares); ‘All the companie must be whist’, Holinshed, Desc. of Ireland (ed. 1808, p. 67); ‘The winds with wonder whist’, Milton, Hymn Nat. 64; whistly, silently, Arden of Feversham, iii. 3. 9. ME. whist! (Wyclif, Judges xviii. 19). See [whust].
whister, a blow; Whisterpoop, a smart blow or smack on the ear or ‘chops’, London Prodigal, ii. 1. 68 [A Linc., Somerset, and Devon word (EDD.)]; Whistersnefet, Udall, tr. Apoph., Diogenes, § 72 [Cp. whistersniff, a Hampshire word (EDD.)]. See Davies.