Green’s Dictionary of Slang

lag of duds n.

[lag n.1 + duds n.1 (1); Harman’s orig. definition is ‘a buck of clothes’, f. SE buck, a washtub, and thus a ‘washtub’s measure of clothes’, buck contemporaneously meant lye, which would be used in the washing process]

a bundle of clothes for washing.

[UK]Harman Caveat for Common Cursetours in Viles & Furnivall (1907) 86: We wyll fylche some duddes of the Ruffemans, or myll the ken for a lagge of dudes.
[UK]Groundworke of Conny-catching [as cit. c.1566].
[UK]Dekker Lanthorne and Candle-Light Ch. 1: We will filch some duddes: we will filch some clothes [...] Or mill the Ken: or rob the house. For a lagge of Duddes: for a buck of clothes.
[UK]Rowlands Martin Mark-all E3: Lagge of dudes, a bucke of clothes.
[UK]Beaumont & Fletcher Beggar’s Bush V i: Tell us, / If it be milling of a lag of duds, / The fetching off a buck of clothes.
[UK]Dekker ‘Canters Dict.’ Eng. Villainies (9th edn).
[UK]R. Holme Academy of Armory Ch. iii item 68c: Canting Terms used by Beggars, Vagabonds, Cheaters, Cripples and Bedlams. [...] Lage of Duds, a Buck of Cloaths.
[UK]B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Lag-a dudds, a Buck of Cloths. As we cloy the Lag of Dudds, come let us Steal that Buck of Cloths.
[UK]A. Smith Lives of Most Notorious Highway-men, etc. (1926) 208: Lag-a-Duds, a buck of clothes; as we cloy the lag of duds, i.e., come let us steal that buck of clothes.
[UK]New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
[UK]Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
[UK]B.M. Carew Life and Adventures.
[UK]Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
[UK]Lex. Balatronicum.
[UK]Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
[UK]Duncombe New and Improved Flash Dict.
[US]Matsell Vocabulum.