[This and the accompanying CABBAGE v.2 appear in the 17th c. Herrick (1648), uses garbage and carbage, apparently for ‘shreds and patches used as padding.’ If this was a genuine use at the time, carbage may easily have been further corrupted to cabbage.
Herrick, Hesper. (Hazl.), I. 79. Upon some Women, Pieces, patches, ropes of haire, In-laid garbage ev’rywhere. II. 325. Upon Lupes, His credit cannot get the inward carbage for his cloathes as yet.
(Among other guesses as to its origin, are that it is, in some unexplained way, identical with CABBAGE sb.1; or to be referred to OF. cabuse imposture, trick, cabuser to deceive, cheat; or to F. cabas rush-basket, Sp. cabacho, also OF. cabas cheating, theft, F. cabasser to pack up, to cheat, steal, cabasseur deceiver, thief; but evidence is wanting.)]
1. Shreds (or larger pieces) of cloth cut off by tailors in the process of cutting out clothes, and appropriated by them as a perquisite.
1663. Butler, Hud., II. III. 56 (L.).
| For as Taylors preserve their Cabbage, | |
| So Squires take care of Bag and Baggage. |
1719. D’Urfey, Pills (1872), IV. 50. The Taylor we know he is loth To take any Cabbage at all.
1812. Southey, Omniana, II. 37. Those philosophers who have a taylorlike propensity for cabbage.
1831. Carlyle, Sart. Res., III. xi. Living on Cabbage.
† 2. slang. A tailor. Obs.
1690. B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew, Cabbage, a Taylor, and what they pinch from the Cloaths they make up.
1708. Motteux, Rabelais, IV. lii. (1737), 212. Poor Cabbage’s Hair grows through his Hood.
1725. New Cant. Dict., Cabbage; Taylors are so called, because of their … Love of that Vegetable. The Cloth they steal and purloin … is also called Cabbage.
3. Schoolboy slang. A ‘crib’ or key whence a pupil surreptitiously copies his exercise; a ‘cab.’
