subs. (old: now recognised).—1. A cheat; an imposter. [An abbreviation of HOCUS-POCUS (q.v.).]
1654. Witt’s Recreations. On Hocas Pocas.
| Here HOCAS lyes with his tricks and his knocks, | |
| Whom death hath made sure as his Juglers box; | |
| Who many hath cozen’d by his leiger-demain, | |
| Is presto convey’d and here underlain: | |
| Thus HOCAS he’s here and here he is not, | |
| While death plaid the HOCAS, and brought him to th’ pot. |
2. (old: now recognised).—Drugged liquor.
1823. BADCOCK (‘Jon Bee’), Dictionary of the Turf, etc., s.v. HOCUS or HOCUS POCUS. … A deleterious drug mixed with wine, etc., which enfeebles the person acted upon.
1725. A New Canting Dictionary, s.v. HOCUS, disguised in Liquor; drunk.
1785. GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v. HOCUS POCUS. … he is quite HOCUS; he is quite drunk.
Verb (old: now recognised).—1. To cheat; to impose upon.
2. (old: now recognised).—To drug; TO SNUFF (q.v.).
1836. DICKENS, Pickwick Papers, ch. xiii., p. 104. ‘What do you mean by HOCUSSING brandy and water?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick. ‘Puttin’ laund’num in it,’ replied Sam.
1836. The Comic Almanack, p. 1. For that we HOCUSS’D first his drink.
1848. THACKERAY, Vanity Fair, II., ch. xxix. Mr. Frederick Pigeon avers that it was at her house at Lausanne that he was HOCUSSED at supper and lost eight hundred pounds to Major Loder and the Honourable Mr. Deucease.
1854. DE QUINCEY, On Murder, Considered as one of the Fine Arts, in Wks., xiii., 119. Him they intended to disable by a trick then newly introduced amongst robbers, and termed HOCUSSING, i.e., clandestinely drugging the liquor of the victim with laudanum.
1859. G. W. MATSELL, Vocabulum; or, The Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v. HOCUS. To stupify. ‘HOCUS the bloke’s lush, and then frisk his sacks,’ put something into the fellow’s drink that will stupify him, and then search his pockets.
1859. The Bulletin, 21 May. An offence which goes by the name of HOCUSSING, and which consists of an evil doer furtively introducing laudanum or some other narcotic into beer or spirits, which the victim drinks and, becoming stupified thereby, is then easily robbed.
1864. DICKENS, Our Mutual Friend, bk. II., ch. xii. I will not say a HOCUSSED wine, but fur from a wine as was ’elthy for the mind.
