Green’s Dictionary of Slang

beer warmed nearly to boiling, mixed with gin or wormwood (the basis of absinthe), sugar and ginger; a later version substituted gin for the wormwood. Both were considered suitable for a morning pick-me-up; thus purl-royal, a glass of Canary wine with a dash of wormwood; purl-man, a seller of purl; purl-shop, a public house selling purl; also attrib.

1659–60		Pepys Diary 19 Feb. n.p.: Thence forth to Mr. Harper’s to drink a glass of purle.
1683		London Jilt pt 1 4: A young Man, very handsome and spruce, came to our House to drink a Pot of Purle .
1690		D’Urfey Collin’s Walk canto 4 168: Like a Porter could Regale, With Pots of Purle, or Mugs of Ale.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Purl Worm-wood infus’d in Ale. Purl-royal Canary with a dash of Worm-wood.
c.1700		London-Bawd (1705) 75: He pays for his Glass of Purl.
1711		Spectator No. 88 n.p.: My lord bishop swore he would throw her out at window... and my lord duke would have a double mug of purl [F&H].
1720		in D’Urfey Pills to Purge Melancholy VI 226: But one thing must be thought upon, / [...] / A Pot of Purl for Harrison.
1733		Newcastle Courant 1 Dec. 1/2: When to his great Joy the Ale-house at next Door is open, in he bolts [and] calls for a Pint of Purle.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1748		Smollett Roderick Random (1979) 69: We perceived a public house, which we entered; and found a man sitting by the fire, smoaking a pipe with a pint of purl before him.
1755		Proceedings Old Bailey 4–10 Dec. 45/1: I went to a publick house, and had half a pint of purl.
1767		Proceedings Old Bailey 29 Apr. 151/2: We went into an alehouse and had two pots of purl.
1773		Proceedings Old Bailey 21 Apr. 222/2: The prisoner asked me to have some purl; I refused it.
1781		G. Parker View of Society II 164: He watches the ale-houses which sell purl early in the morning, where he looks over the yesterday’s Daily Advertiser, and drinks a penny-worth.
1793		E. Walsh ‘Rapture!’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 490: ‘Nor Gin nor Purl will I receive,’ / (She answer’d with a frown).
1797		Bridges Burlesque Homer (4th edn) I 169: A jug of purl made piping hot.
c.1800		‘The Jolly Butcher’ No. 26 Papers of Francis Place (1819) n.p.: Give me, my girl / But one pot of purl.
1812		‘The Theatre’ in H. Smith Rejected Addresses 108: Pat was the urchin’s name, a red hair’d youth, / Fonder of purl and skittel grounds than truth.
1812		J. Bell Jr. (ed.) Rhymes of Northern Bards 39: The dry man advances / To purl-shop to toss of a gill / [...] The drink, Reason’s monitor quelling, / Inflames both the brain and the eyes.
1817		J.T. Smith Vagabondiana 50: The [...] purl pots of the public houses.
1823		Rambler’s Mag. 1 Mar. 132: She always took her Sunday morning’s whet — No more than a pint of pearl in winter.
1828		Lytton Pelham II 125: He [...] sat himself down with a swagger, and called out, like a lusty royster of the true kidney, for a pint of purl and a pipe.
1837		Comic Almanack Dec. 114: The share of a pint of purl at Mr. John Smith’s.
1841		Dickens Old Curiosity Shop (1999) 430: A quart pot filled with some fragrant compound, which [...] was indeed choice purl.
1857		T. Hughes Tom Brown’s School-Days (1896) 67: Here a fresh-looking barmaid serves them each with a glass of early purl.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor II 94/1: The drink originally sold on the river was purl, or this mixture, whence the title, purl-man. Now [...] what is sold under the name of purl is beer warmed nearly to boiling heat, and flavoured with gin, sugar, and ginger.
1870		Hotten Sl. Dict. 208: Two penn’orth o’ PURL ? / Good ‘early PURL,’ / ’Gin all the world / To put your hair into a curl, / When you feel yourself queer of a mornin’.
1886		Reynold’s Newspaper (London) 12 Dec. 2/2: Two penn’orth o’ purl — Good early purl.
1898		W. Besant Orange Girl I 227: After a mug of purl.