Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) protracted, (very) lengthy.

1872		C.L. Brace Dangerous Classes of NY 255: I gave them a lecture about a yard long.
1883		Central New Jersey Home News (New Brunswick, NJ) 22 Sept. 4/2: He had some snifty old proffs [sic] there, bet your sweet life. Prof. Switzer could jerk a prayer out of him a yard long.

(Irish) to disparage, to scold.

2021

P Howard Braywatch 42: ‘I heard you giving out yards to them’.

a clay pipe with a notably long stem.

1821		J. Burrowes Life in St George’s Fields 27/2: Yard of clay a tobacco pipe.
1824		J. Wight Mornings in Bow St. 140: The buckish young bricklayer was tbere sitting [...] with a face like a full moon at the rising, and a yard-and-a-half backy-pipe sticking out of the middle of it.
1832		‘On Smoking’ in Quid 196: The light cigar may do by light of day. / But for the night give me a yard of clay.
1846		Carlisle Jrnl 27 June 4/1: Puffing all our cares away, / A fine old thing is a yard of clay.
1854		‘Cuthbert Bede’ Adventures of Mr Verdant Green (1982) II 153: He at the same time placed before the Pet a ‘yard of clay’ and a box of cigars.
1862		Capt. Clutterbuck’s Champagne 142: Domingo, after a yard of clay, was unapproachable.
1872		Grantham Jrnl 28 Dec. 2/2: A fair quantam of nut brown ale was given [...] while to each old person fond of the flagrant weed a ‘yard of clay’ and an ounce of tobacco.
1877		J. Diprose London Life 44: The hat falls and converts his yard of clay into a short dudheen.
1892		Coventry Eve. Teleg. 20 Apr. 3/6: The very best pipe [...] is the ‘yard of clay’ or ‘churchwarden’.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 98: Yard of Clay, a long pipe.

a tall, thin person.

1838		‘Paul Pry’ Oddities of London Life II 320: [She] was as erect and as thin as a ‘yard and a half of pump water’.
1849		Sam Sly 3 Feb. 7/3: [A] long personage, like unto a yard of pump water.
[1886		Gloucester Citizen 10 July 4/1: He’s as straight as a yard of pump water].
1887		H. Caine Deemster I 227: I’m right up and down like a yard o’ pump water, that’s what I am.
1888		Derbyshire Times 5 Dec. n.p.: I met the ‘super’ here [...] He looks like a yard of pump water starched.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

a glass of gin.

1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1882		Sydney Sl. Dict. (2 edn) 7: [A] yard of ‘satin,’ a glass of gin.
1909		J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era 270/2: Yard of satin (Women’s). Glass of gin. Specimen of grim satire, comparing the colour and smoothness of the spirit with a material generally far distant from the fashions of the patronesses of gin.

(UK Und.) a glass of gin.

1822		Tom & Jerry 48: Let tempests whistle as they will , / Our whistling shops will drown them still; / A yard of tape / Will prove the cape, / And drive each thought of care away.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict. 35: Yard of tape – a glass of gin.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open [as cit. 1835].
1854		T. Buckley Sydenham Greenfinch 88: ‘[T]hey likes their bit of gossip and a yard of tape’.