[.-148 J °- [Avueusr, 
SLANG DICTIONARIES. 
OF slang dictionaries, more than of any other kind of work, it may 
be said, that their glory is transitory. If we know that, in language in 
general, many words are born, many revive, many decay, many entirely 
die, how much more true is it of those repositories of the current phra- 
seology of a society which, in its own generation, is obscure, and in the 
next is forgotten. The language of the vulgar perishes as speedily as the 
fashions of the great, and the succeeding Slang-whanger, as our trans- 
atlantic relations call the proficient inthis dialect, looks upon the quips and 
quiddities of his predecessor with as much contempt as the ton leader of 
to-day looks upon the cut of the coat or the tie of the cravat, that ten 
years before conferred renown upon the ci-devant king of the dandies. 
Yet, it is worth while to look over these books, little available as they 
are for literary purposes. We have heard the study of their dialect 
commended, on the ground of its advantage in understanding the col- 
loquial expressions of our dramatic writings, or the occasional escapades 
of our classical authors, in prose and verse; but we fear that its merits 
here are not very important. The language of Nym, &c. in Shakspeare, 
of the heroes of the Beggar’s Bush, a few stray sentences in Fielding or 
Smollett, and, of late years, some half dozen in Moore or Byron, would 
be found to exhaust the passages in which we should feel any necessity 
to look into a canting dictionary. A glossary of a couple of pages would 
amply suffice to explain the “terms of art,” in this list. We must de- 
fend it upon other grounds. In the first place, these dictionaries can 
be so managed as to be the vehicles of much wit and humour ; and, 
secondly, they frequently afford no small assistance to the antiquary in 
tracing out habits or manners of the lower orders, or the dissipated wits 
of former times. The etymologist even may not be unamused at 
trying the potency of his art on their whimsical vocables,-and may, 
(as could be proved, if the inquiry were worth the trouble) glean out 
of this lowest class of literature, if we may venture so to profane the 
word, every now and then a canon which may serve as a guide, or a con- 
firmation, to his more serious inquiries. 
Among ourselves there has been no dearth of these books. In Har- 
rison’s Description of England (which is prefixed to Hollinshed’s 
Chronicle) we are informed, while speaking of gipsies, &c., “ It is not 
yet fifty years sith (since) this have began ; but how it hath prospered 
sithens (since) that time it is easy so judge ; for they are now supposed, 
of one sexe and another, to amount to above ten thousand persons, as I 
have harde reported. Moreover, in counterfeiting the Egyptian rogues, 
they have devised a language among themselves, which they name cant- 
ing, but others Pedlar’s French, a speech compact, thirty years ago, 
of English, and a great number of odd words of their own deriving, 
without all order or reason ; and yet such it is, as none but themselves 
are able to understand. The first deviser thereof was hanged by the 
neck, as a just reward, no doubt, for his desartes, and a common end 
to all of that profession. 
“A gentleman (Mr. Thomas Harman) also of late hath taken great 
pains to search out the secret practises of this ungracious rabble ; and, 
among other things, he setteth down and describeth twenty-two sorts 
them, whose names it shall not be amisse to remember, whereby eac 
one may gather what wicked people they are, and what villainy remains 
eth in them.” 
