sb. colloq. and slang. [Short for SPECULATION; orig. American, but in English use from c. 1825.]
1. A commercial speculation or venture.
Freq. with qualifying adj. as bad, good.
1794. J. Adams, Wks. (1856), I. 469. Many merchants have already made a noble spec. of the embargo by raising their prices.
1819. W. Faux, Mem. Days Amer. (1823), 37. [They] take their free negroes with them and sell them for slaves, by way of turning a penny, or as they say, of making a good spec. of it.
1824. in Spirit Public Jrnls. (1825), 204.
| And the Hunts—a bad spec., as we venture to tell ye, | |
| Have published some posthumous trash of Byshe Shelly. |
1851. Mayhew, Lond. Labour, I. 378/2. I have already sold enough to pay me well enough for my spec.
1872. A. H. Hutchinson, Try Cracow (ed. 2), v. 93. A Prussian banker … who purchased the property … as a kind of spec to form into a limited company.
transf. 1829. in W. I. Knapp, Life G. Borrow (1899), I. 140. Do not enter the army; it is a bad spec.
1855. Delamer, Kitchen Garden (1861), 177. Sow a few dwarf kidney beans as a spec.
b. On spec, on the chance of obtaining some advantage, gaining some profit, etc.
1832. Marryat, N. Forster, III. ix. 143. Both … came out on spec.
1837. Dickens, Pickw., xxxiii. They said what a wery gen’rous thing it was o’ them to have taken up the case on spec.
1857. Kingsley, Two Y. Ago, xxv. If tradesmen will run up houses on spec in a water-meadow, who can stop them?
2. Winchester slang. A good or enjoyable thing or occasion. Also on spec.
1891. Wrench, Winchester Word-bk. (1901), s.v.
