subs. (common).—A great eater; a glutton; specifically a sharper who subsists at the expense of hotels, restaurants, or oyster bars. [From one DANDO, a ‘bouncing, seedy swell,’ hero of a hundred ballads, notorious for being ‘charged’ at least twice a month with bilking.]
18[?]. THACKERAY, The Professor. ‘What a flat you are,’ shouted he in a voice of thunder, ‘to think I’m agoing to pay! Pay! I never pay—I’m DANDO.’
1850. MACAULAY, Journal in Life, by Trevelyan, ch. xii., p. 539 (1884), April 27.—To Westbourne Terrace, and passed an hour in playing with Alice … I was DANDO at a pastry cook’s and then at an oyster shop.
1885. Illustrated London News, 15 Aug., p. 154, col. 3. One day we are told the couplet should be:—Oysters, you’ll find, are best by far In every month which ends with an r. Next day this is pooh-poohed, and we are to read, instead:—Oysters, you’ll find, are best by far In every month which contains an r. Spiritualists might be kind enough to consult DANDO, who would, no doubt, have the true version at his finger’s ends, so as to rap it out on the instant.
