To hitch one’s team to the fence, verb. phr. (American).—To settle
down.
Hittite, subs. (pugilists’).—A prize fighter.
English synonyms.—Basher; bruiser; dukester; fistite; knight of the
fist; gemman of the fancy; milling-cove; pug; puncher; scrapper;
slasher; slogger; slugger; sparring-bloke.
1823. Bee, Dict. Turf, s.v. Hittites—boxers and ring-goers
assembled.
1860. The Druid, Post and Paddock. ‘The Fight for the Belt.’ And
the Sherwood Ranger, bold Bendigo, Is on training no more intent;
But the trout full well that ex-Hittite know On a Summer’s eve in
the Trent.
Hive, subs. (venery).—The female pudendum. Cf. Honey. Hence, verbally,
to hive it = to effect intromission.
Verb (American cadet).—To steal. For synonyms, see Prig.
To get hived, verb. phr. (American Cadets’ and popular).—1. To be
caught out in a scrape. Also, to be hidden. To be hived perfectly
frigid = to be caught in flagrante delicto.
Hiver, subs. (Western American).—A travelling bawd.
Hivite, subs. (school).—A student of St. Bees’ (Cumberland).
1865. John Bull, 11 Nov. To be a Hivite has long been considered a
little worse than a ‘literate’.... Of the value of some St. Bees
testimonials we may form an estimate, etc., etc.
Hoaky. By the hoaky, intj. (nautical).—A popular form of adjuration.
Hoax, subs. (old: now recognised).—A jest; a practical joke; a Take-in.
Originally (Grose) University cant. [Probably from Hocus (q.v.).]
1796. Grose, Vulg. Tongue (3rd Ed.), s.v.
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v. Hoaxing. Bantering, ridiculing.
Hoaxing a quiz; joking an odd fellow.—University wit.
1815. Scott, Guy Mannering, ch. iii. Whose humble efforts at
jocularity were chiefly confined to what were then called bites and
bams, since denominated hoaxes and quizzes.
1835–7. Richardson, Dict. Eng. Lang., s.v. Hoax. Malone considers
the modern slang hoax as derived from hocus, and Archdeacon Nares
agrees with him.
Verb. To play a practical joke; to ‘take-in’; to bite (q.v.). See subs.
sense. For synonyms, see Gammon.
1812. Combe, Syntax, Picturesque, xix. An arch young sprig, a
banker’s clerk, Resolv’d to hoax the rev’rend spark.
1854. F. E. Smedley, Harry Coverdale, ch. viii. I thought you were
hoaxing us, and I sat down to play the duet for the amiable purpose
of exposing your ignorance.
Hob (or Hobbinol), subs. (old).—A clown.—Grose.
Hob and Nob (or Hob Nob), verb. (old).—1. To invite to drink; to clink
glasses.
1756. Foote, Englishman from Paris, i. With, perhaps, an occasional
interruption of ‘Here’s to you, friends,’ ‘Hob or nob,’ ‘Your love
and mine.’
1759. Townley, High Life Below Stairs, ii. Duke. Lady Charlotte,
hob or nob. Lady Char. Done, my lord; in Burgundy, if you please.
1772. Graves, Spiritual Quixote, bk. VIII., ch. xxi. (new Ed.,
1808). Having drunk hob or nob with a young lady in whose eyes he
wished to appear a man of consequence, he hurried out into the
summer-house.
1823. Bee, Dict. Turf, s.v. Hob nob—two persons pledging each other
in a glass.
1836. Horace Smith, Tin Trumpet, ‘Address to a Mummy.’ Perchance
that very hand now pinioned flat, Has hob-and-nobbed with Pharoah
glass for glass.
1849. Thackeray, Pendennis, ch. xxx. He would have liked to hob and
nob with celebrated pick-pockets, or drink a pot of ale with a
company of burglars and cracksmen.
1886. R. L. Stevenson, Kidnapped, p. 68. So the pair sat down and
hob-a-nobbed.
2. (old).—To give or take; to hit or miss at random. [Saxon, habban, to
have; nabban, not to have.]
1577–87. Holinshed, Chroncles of Englande, Scotlande, and Irelande
(1807) p. 317. The citizens in their rage shot habbe or nabbe (hit
or miss) at random.
1602. Shakspeare, Twelfth Night, iii., 4. Hob-nob is his word, give
’t or take ’t.
1615. Harington, Epigrams, iv. Not of Jack Straw, with his
rebellious crew, That set king, realm, and laws, at hab or nab.
1673. Quack Astrologer. He writes of the weather hab nab, and as
the toy takes him, chequers the year with foul and fair.
3. (colloquial).—To be on terms of close intimacy; to consort
familiarly together.
1870. Mark Twain, Innocents Abroad, ch. i. They were to hob-nob
with nobility and hold friendly converse with kings and princes.
1892. Hume Nisbet, Bushranger’s Sweetheart, p. 109. I had
hob-nobbed for the last two hours with the most notorious
bushranger in the colony.
1892. A. K. Green, Cynthia Wakeham’s Money, p. 5. Each tree looks
like a spectre hob-nobbing with its neighbour.
Hobbes’s-voyage, subs. (old).—A leap in the dark.
1697. Vanbrugh, Provoked Wife, v., 6. So, now, I am in for Hobbes’s
voyage; a great leap in the dark.
Hobbinol, subs. (old).—A countryman. For synonyms, see Joskin.
1663. Killigrew, The Parson’s Wedding, ii., 3 (Dodsley, Old Plays,
4th ed., 1875, xiv., 396). Who, Master Jeffrey? Hobbinol the
second! By this life, ’tis a very veal, and licks his nose like
one.
Hobble. In a hobble (or Hobbled), adv. phr. (colloquial).—In trouble;
hampered; puzzled. Also (thieves), committed for trial. Fr., tomber
dans la mélasse (= to come a cropper), and faitré (= booked (q.v.)).
Hobbled upon the legs = transported, or on the hulks.
1777. Foote, Trip to Calais (1795), ii., p. 39. But take care what
you say! you see what a hobble we had like to have got into.
1789. Geo. Parker, Life’s Painter, p. 163. A term when any of the
gang is taken up and committed for trial, to say, such a one is
hobbled.
1811. Poole, Hamlet Travestie, iii., 5. Horatio, I am sorry for
this squabble; I fear ’twill get me in a precious hobble.
1819. Vaux, Cant. Dict., s.v. Hobbled, taken up, or in custody; to
hobble a plant, is to spring it.
1838. Haliburton, Clockmaker, 2nd S., ch. xvii. A body has to be
cautious if he don’t want to get into the centre of a hobble.
1849. Punch, Fortune-Tellers’ Almanack. To dream that you are lame
is a token that you will get into a hobble.
1892. Milliken, ’Arry Ballads, p. 44. I got into a ’obble.
Verb (venery).—See quot.
1688. Sempill, ‘Crissell Sandilands’ in Bannatyne MSS. (Hunterian
Club, 1879–88), p. 354, lines 21–2. Had scho bene undir, and he
hobland above, That were a perellous play for to suspect them.
Hobbledehoy, subs. (old, now colloquial).—A growing gawk: as in the
folk-rhyme, ‘Hobbledehoy, neither man nor boy.’ [For derivation, see
Notes and Queries, 1 S., v., 468, vii., 572; 4 S., ii., 297, viii.,
451, ix., 147; 7 S., iv., 523, and v., 58.]
1557. Tusser, Husbandrie, ch. 60, st 3, p. 138 (E. D. S.). The
first seuen yeers bring vp as a childe, The next to learning, for
waxing too wilde. The next keepe vnder sir hobbard de hoy, The next
a man no longer a boy.
1738. Swift, Polite Convers., Dial 1. Why, he is a mere
hobbledehoy, neither a man nor a boy.
1785. Grose, Vulg. Tongue, s.v.
1837. Barham, Ingoldsby Legends, ‘Aunt Fanny.’ At the epoch I speak
about, I was between a man and a boy, A hobble-de-hoy, A fat,
little, punchy concern of sixteen.
1848. Thackeray, Vanity Fair, ch. iv. He remembered perfectly well
being thrashed by Joseph Sedley, when the latter was a big,
swaggering, hobbadyhoy, and George an impudent urchin of ten years
old.
Hence Hobbledehoyish and Hobbledehoyhood.
1812. Colman, Poetical Vagaries, p. 12 (2nd Ed.). When Master Daw
full fourteen years had told, He grew, as it is term’d,
hobbedyhoyish; For Cupidons and Fairies much too old, For Calibans
and Devils much too boyish.
1839. Thackeray, Fatal Boots, Apr. From boyhood until
hobbadyhoyhood (which I take to be about the sixteenth year of the
life of a young man).
1848. Thackeray, Book of Snobs, ch. xlii. A half-grown, or
hobbadehoyish footman, so to speak, walked after them.
Hobbledejee, subs. (old).—A pace between a walk and a run; a jog-trot.
1811. Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v.
Hobbler, subs. (nautical).—A coast-man, half smuggler, half handyman;
an unlicensed pilot. Also a landsman acting as tow-Jack.—Smyth. Also
(Isle of Man), a boatman.
1887. T. E. Brown, The Doctor, p. 226. An’ the hobblers there was
terr’ble divarted.
Hobby, subs. (old).—A hackney; a horse in common use.
1606. Return from Parnassus, ii., 6 (Dodsley, Old Plays, 4th ed.,
1875, ix., 151). An’t please you, your hobby will meet you at the
lane’s end. Idem (p. 154). Is not my master an absolute villain
that loves his hawk, his hobby, and his greyhound more than any
mortal creature? Idem (p. 145). Sirrah, boy, hath the groom saddled
my hunting hobby?