Green’s Dictionary of Slang

whispering gallery n.

[a play on the more respectable Whispering Gallery encircling the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral, and from the less well-off patrons whispering ‘Can you lend me…?’]

the bar of the Gaiety Theatre.

Show quotations
[UK]J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era 263/2: Whispering gallery (Theatrical, 1883). The then Gaiety Bar [...] Said in satire of the poorer actors ‘out of a ship’, who frequented that hostelry, and whispered to any one of their more fortunate brethren brethren – as, ‘Could you lend me half a dollar?’.