subs. (vagrants’).—See quot.
1823. GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (3rd ed.), s.v. LETTER RACKET, men or women of genteel address, going about to respectable houses with a letter or statement, detailing some case of extreme distress, as shipwreck, sufferings by fire, etc. by which many benevolent, but credulous, persons are induced to relieve the fictitious wants of the impostors.
