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Dict. of Phrase and Fable 98: A blue-apron statesman, a lay politician, a tradesman who interferes with the affairs of the nation. The reference is to the blue apron once worn by nearly all tradesmen, but now restricted to butchers, poulterers, fishmongers, and so on . Dict. of Phrase and Fable (1903) I 80/1: B flats – bugs. The pun is ‘B’ (the initial letter), and ‘flat’, from the flatness of the obnoxious insect. Dict. of Phrase and Fable n.p.: ‘Build.’ A milliner is jestingly called a ‘bonnet-builder’ . Dict. of Phrase and Fable 129: Cabbage is also a common schoolboy term for a literary crib, or other petty theft . Dict. of Phrase and Fable. Phrase and Fable quoted from Daily Tel. 394: Mr. Gathorne Hardy is to look after the gamps and Harrises of the Strand . Dict. of Phrase and Fable . Dict. of Phrase and Fable . Times 14 Aug. in Phrase and Fable (1894) II 1212/1: ‘Telegram.’ They receive their telegrams in cipher to avoid the risk of their being milked by rival journals . Dict. of Phrase and Fable 68: A Bartholomew pig. A very fat person. Dict. Phrase and Fable I 35/1: alls, tap-droppings. The refuse of all sorts of spirits drained from the glasses or spilt in drawing. The mixture is sold in gin-houses at a cheap rate. Dict. of Phrase and Fable 103/1: Batta or Batty (Hindustanee). Perquisites; wages. Properly, an allowance to East Indian troops in the field. Dict. Phrase and Fable I 132/1: Bible-backed Round-shouldered, like one who is always poring over a book. Dict. of Phrase and Fable I 171/2: brandy is latin for goose (or fish), this punning vulgarism appears first in Swift’s Polite Conversation: the pun is on the word answer. Anser is the Latin for goose, which brandy follows as surely and quickly as an answer follows a question. Dict. Phrase and Fable 192/2: Butterfly Kiss (A) A kiss with one’s eyelashes, that is, stroking the cheek with one’s eyelashes. Dict. of Phrase and Fable 249/2: Chops. [...] Down in the chops – i.e. down in the mouth; in a melancholy state. (ref. to early 18C) Dict. Phrase and Fable 588/2: Hawkubites [...] Street bullies in the reign of Queen Anne. [...] ‘From Mohock and from Hawkubite, / Good Lord deliver me.’. Dict. of Phrase and Fable II 861/2: Morocco Men (The), Public-house and perambulating touts for lottery insurances. Their rendezvous was a tavern in Oxford Market, on the Portland estate, at the close of the eighteenth century. Dict. of Phrase and Fable 847/2: Mistress Roper. The Marines, or any one of them; so called by regular sailors, because they handle ropes like girls, not being used to them. Dict. of Phrase and Fable I 372/1: Ride the black donkey To be pigheaded, obstinate like a donkey. Black is added, not so much to designate the colour, as to express what is bad. Dict. of Phrase and Fable (1894) II 1096/2: Salt River To row up Salt River. A defeated political party is said to be rowed up Salt River, and those who attempt to uphold the party have the task of rowing up this ungracious stream. J. Inman says the allusion is to a small stream in Kentucky, the passage of which is rendered both difficult and dangerous by shallows, bars, and an extremely tortuous channel. Dict. Phrase & Fable [ebook] Drover's. breakfast. A leak and a lookaround.