subs. (old).—1. A child. Hence, TO KID = to lie in: also = to get with child; KIDDED or WITH KID = pregnant; KID-LEATHER and KID-STRETCHER (q.v.). Also KIDDY.
ENGLISH SYNONYMS. Brat; encumbrance; get; imp; infantry (collectively); kinchin; limb; lullaby cheat; monkey; papoose; youngster.
FRENCH SYNONYMS. Un or une gosse (general: also gossemar); un gluant (thieves’: a sticker); un loupiau or loupiot (popular); un marmousin (popular = little monkey); un mignard (an endearment); un mion (thieves’); un momaque (thieves’); un momard or momignard (popular); un môme (popular); un morbaque (pop. a disagreeable child); un moucheron (popular); un moufflet (popular); un mounin (thieves’).
ITALIAN SYNONYMS. Fantasima; fiacco (= weak); cifo; cifon; pivastro; pivo; smerlo.
1599. MIDDLETON, etc., The Old Law, iii. 2.
| I’m old, you say; | |
| Yes, parlous old, KIDS, and you mark me well! |
c. 1696. B. E., A New Dictionary of the Canting Crew, s.v.
1690. D’URFEY, Collin’s Walk through London and Westminster, iv.
| And at her back a KID that cry’d, | |
| Still as she pinch’d it, fast was ty’d. |
1694. DRYDEN, Love Triumphant, Epilogue, 16.
| What if he taught our sex more cautious carriage, | |
| And not to be too coming before marriage; | |
| For fear of my misfortune in the play, | |
| A KID brought home upon the wedding-day? |
1714. Memoirs of John Hall (4 ed.), p. 12. KID, A child.
1719. D’URFEY, Wit and Mirth; or Pills to Purge Melancholy, i. 321.
| And thus he to an old Midwife ride, | |
| To bring the poor KID to light, Sir. |
1725. A New Canting Dictionary, s.v.
1748. T. DYCHE, A New General English Dictionary (5 ed.). KID (S.) … also a nickname for a child or young person.
1785. GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v.
1811. GROSE and CLARKE, Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v. KID. … The blowen has napped the KID. The girl is with child.
1819. T. MOORE, Tom Crib’s Memorial to Congress, 5. That KID, Master Nap.
1840. THACKERAY, The Comic Almanack, p. 237. ‘Cox’s Diary.’ Carry you, and your KIDS, and your traps etc.
1856. C. READE, It Is Never Too Late to Mend, xxiii. A fig for being drowned, if the KID is drowned.
1859. G. W. MATSELL, Vocabulum; or, The Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v.
1865. H. KINGSLEY, The Hillyars and the Burtons, xxx. Why, that six shillings as you men are asking for, is six shillings off the KIDS’ victuals.
1868. Cassell’s Magazine, 4 Jan., p. 213. If you’d have been as full of her when she was a KID, and not have left her to us so much, it might have been sumfink to brag about.
1870. London Figaro, 19 Oct. ‘After the Fire.’ In this room, sir, said my gallant conductor, lived a bricklayer with his wife and two KIDS. He made that hole in the wall, and got ’em safe through—the whole caboose on ’em; and a jolly good job he did. Ibid., May 13, 1871, p. 4, col. 2. ‘Yer see I knowed ’er, sir, right from a KID, Loved ’er right from a boy.
1882. PAYN, Thicker than Water, i. He thinks how his Missis and the KIDS would enjoy the spectacle, and is half-inclined to fetch them.
1883. Daily Telegraph, 27 March, p. 2, col. 1. They were afraid of being ridiculed and laughed at by their companions for sinking their manhood and going as KIDS to a dame school.
1889. Time, Aug., p. 151. A reminiscence of my father, the which, now I’m not a KID, I see the value of.
1892. KIPLING, Barrack-Room Ballads, ‘Fuzzy-Wuzzy.’ Then ’ere’s to you Fuzzy-Wuzzy, an’ the missus and the KID.
2. (common).—A man.
1811. GROSE and CLARKE, Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v.
1830. BULWER-LYTTON, Paul Clifford, p. 28, ed. 1854. ‘Vy, Paul, my KID, you looks down in the chops; cheer up, care killed a cat.’
1834. W. H. AINSWORTH, Rookwood, ‘The Double Cross,’ ii.
| Two milling coves, each vide avake, | |
| Vere backed to fight for heavy stake: | |
| But in the mean time, so it vos, | |
| Both KIDS agreed to play a cross. |
1892. HUME NISBET, The Bushranger’s Sweetheart, p. 118. He is like all colonial KIDS, don’t know when he is well off.
3. (thieves’).—See quot.
1879. J. RUTHERFORD (‘Thor Fredur’), Sketches from Shady Places, p. 105. Their ancient terror, the ‘Bobby,’ ‘copper,’ ‘KID,’ ‘blue-bottle,’ ‘Peeler,’ a policeman.
4. (old).—A thief: specifically a young thief. Also KIDDY.—MATSELL (1859). See quot. 1823.
1823. BADCOCK (‘Jon Bee’), Dictionary of the Turf, etc., s.v. KID, KIDDY, and KIDLING—implies youth; but an old evergreen chap may be dressed KIDDLY (q.v.). People who imagine that all KIDS are thieves, carry the joke too far.
1859. G. W. MATSELL, Vocabulum; or, The Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v. KIDSMAN. The KIDSMAN accompanies the KID.
5. (American).—A kidnapper.
6. (common).—See quots. Cf. verb. sense 1.
1876. C. HINDLEY, ed. The Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack, p. 169. One of these brother boys was well known for his ‘KID,’ that is gammon and devilry. Ibid., p. 3. The rarest chaps at ‘KID.’
1883. Punch, 28 July, p. 38, col. 1. ‘At a Fancy Fair.’
| If you’d only bin with me last night! I was ‘in it,’ old man, and no KID, | |
| As a chap of my form can be in it, if ready to blue arf a qusid. |
1883. GREENWOOD, Tag, Rag, & Co., ‘From London to York.’ In his opinion, it was all ‘KID.’
1885. Punch, 31 Jan., p. 60, col. 1. ‘’Arry on ’onesty.’ The world’s coming round to my views, Charlie, fast, there ’s no KID about that.
7. In pl. (common).—Kid gloves: e.g., ‘KIDS cleaned for 2d. a pair.’
1889. Illustrated Bits, 13 July, p. 1. ‘I want to see some gloves.’ ‘Certainly, miss. Can I show you some undressed KIDS?’ ‘Young man! I only require gloves.’
Verb. (common).—1. To quiz; to wheedle; to cheat.
1811. GROSE and CLARKE, Lexicon Balatronicum, s.v. TO KID. To coax or wheedle. To inveigle. To amuse a man or divert his attention while another robs him.
1872. Daily News, 5 Jan., p. 2, col. 1. A stern man and a strong, he was not to be blinded, by emphatic expostulators against KIDDING, to the fact that the clamourers against that species of throwing dust in a fellow mortal’s eyes were in fact themselves KIDDING with the greatest activity. Comfort is a relative term.
1879. Macmillan’s Magazine, xl. 505. I thought they were only KIDDING at first.
1880. GREENWOOD, At Flyfaker’s Hotel, in ‘Odd People in Odd Places,’ p. 55. ‘Why, you don’t mean to say that you’ve been KIDDED to expect a bed for your fourpence,’ said he; ‘a regler turn-in, I mean, with sheets and that?’
1884. R. JEFFERIES, in Longman’s Magazine, IV. 255. While the fisherman was telling me this woeful story, I fancied I heard voices from a crowd of the bigger boys collected under a smack, voices that said, ‘Ho! ho! Go on! you’re KIDDING the man!’
1889. Answers, 2 March, p. 218, col. 1. ‘One and tuppence a day,’ said the bootblack, sarcastically; ‘’E’s on’y a KIDDIN’ on yer. Arsk that there copper whether he don’t take ’is four or five bob a day.’
1892. MILLIKEN, ’Arry Ballads, 33. He wos KIDDING me.
TO KID ON, verb. phr. (common).—To lead on by gammon or deceit.
1851. H. MAYHEW, London Labour and the London Poor, i. p. 473. ‘At the same time he KIDS them ON by promising three times more than the things are worth.’
1888. J. RUNCIMAN, The Chequers, p. 186. I was KIDDIN’ him on.
1889. Licensed Victuallers’ Gazette, 4 Jan. He KIDDED—who had just come in for his father’s brass—to let him have the lot.
TO KID ONESELF, verb. phr. (common).—To be conceited.
HARD KID, subs. phr. (common).—Hard lines; bad luck; HARD CHEESE (q.v.).
