Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also dumpie) a small coin or small sum of money; thus phr. down with the dumps, a request to pay out some money, e.g. for a drink.

[1788		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (2nd edn) n.p.: Dumps are [...] small pieces of lead, cast by schoolboys in the shape of money].
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1788].
1822		Hobart Town Gazette 14 Dec. n.p.: Government Public Notice. – The Quarter Dollars, or ‘Dumps,’ struck from the centre of the Spanish Dollar, and issued [...] in the year 1813, at One Shilling and Threepence each, will be exchanged for Treasury Bills at Par, or Sterling money.
1837		‘Nights At Sea’ Bentley’s Misc. June 626: The hands were a jolly jovial set, with dollars as plentiful as boys’ dumps, and they pitched ’em away at the lucky, and made all sneer again.
1837		Comic Almanack Sept. 102: Mr. Merryman was sad, for people would not down with the dumps.
[1843		Sydney Morn. Herald 6 Dec. 4/4: In the time of General Macquarie there was a circulation issued by him, called the dump, and the holy dollar; the dump was a piece stamped out of the centre of the dollar, and passed for 1s. 3d.].
1846		Bell’s Life in Sydney 4 July 3/1: [She] called upon Peggy to down with the dumps.
1849		A. Harris Emigrant Family II 151: He used to go around hawking tapes [...] carrying a bottle of rum in his pocket and selling it in the bush at a dump (1s. 3 d.) a glass .
1852		J. West Hist. of Tasmania II 141: Tattered promissory notes [...] fluttered about the colony; dumps, struck out from dollars, were imitated by a coin prepared without requiring much mechanical ingenuity.
1879		W.J. Barry Up and Down 5: The coin current in those days (1829) consisted of ring-dollars and dumps, the dump being the centre of the dollar punched out to represent a smaller currency.
1879		H. Hartigan Stray Leaves (2nd ser.) 38: [I]t was not easy [...] to get a coin with either head or tail on, nearly all that came into the soldier’s hands were ‘dumpies’.
1886		Sporting Times 1 May 5/2: The ruffian was sloping [...] without putting down his dump. ‘I beg your pardon,’ [the barmaid] replied, ‘ you have forgotten that last sixpence’.
1893		(ref. to 1819–25) Daily News (London) 11 May 4: The metallic currency was then chiefly Spanish dollars [...] and they had the current value of 5s. But there were too few of them, and therefore the centre of them was cut out and circulated under the name of ‘dumps’ at Is. 3d.
1912		Bulletin (Sydney) 12 Sept. 14/4: One hundred years ago the Australian circulating medium was of a very mixed character. Rum, which varied in price with the quantity on the market, promissory notes and IOU’s for sums from threepence up to £1, the holey dollar, the dump, and the Spanish or Mexican dollar, were denominated ‘currency,’ while the guinea and the silver and copper coins of Great Britain were ‘sterling.’.

2. a button, often as sold by a street-hawker; thus not care a dump, not care at all.

1840		R. Barham ‘Lay of the Old Woman Clothed in Grey’ Ingoldsby Legends (1842) 265: His Holiness not only gets the ‘cold shoulder,’ / But Nick rumps him completely, and don’t seem to care a / Dump – that’s the word – for his triple tiara.
1842		‘The Man About Town’ Nobby Songster 18: He cares not a dump, / Who kisses the rump, / Of Sarah the blowen!
1886		W. Newton Secrets of Tramp Life Revealed 9: Dumps ... Buttons.
1908		Bulletin (Sydney) 17 Dec. 18/1: The barmaids had gone out on strike, / They would not pull the pump – / For threats of Bung and wheedlings / They did not care a dump.
1912		Leamington Spa Courier 20 Sept. 7/1: His real business in life is selling mohair ‘stretchers’ (laces), lead-backed ‘dumps’ (buttons) and ‘dud snails’ (common needles).

3. a marble.

1858		Bell’s Life in Sydney 25 Sept. 3/3: A brace of the juvenile Bedouins who are suffered to eke out their wretched existences in the streets, playing dumps.
1959		G. Hamilton Summer Glare 77: Dumps are marbles.

4. a bill or fare.

1967		‘Whisper All Aussie Dict.’ in Kings Cross Whisper (Sydney) xxxiv 4/4: dump: [...] the fare.
1983		R. Aven-Bray Ridgey-Didge Oz Jack Lang 11: He paid his dump at the Cat and Fiddle hotel.