Red

subs. and adj. (thieves’).—1.  Gold: also RED-UN: Fr. jaune (= yellow); Ital. rossume (= redness). RED-ROGUE (old) = a gold piece; RED-TOY (or KETTLE) = a gold watch; RED-TACKLE = a gold chain. Cf. RUDDOCK. RED-UN also = a sovereign.

  1617.  FLETCHER, The Mad Lover, v. 4. There’s a RED ROGUE, to buy thee handkerchiefs.

  1879.  J. W. HORSLEY, ‘Autobiography of a Thief,’ in Macmillan’s Magazine, XL. 502. I touched for a RED TOY and RED TACKLE.

  1888.  G. R. SIMS, A Plank Bed Ballad [Referee, 12 Feb.]. A toy and a tackle—both RED-’UNS.

  c. 1886.  The Sporting Times [A Dictionary of Slang, Jargon & Cant]. “There’s a RED-’UN—or in other words ‘a quid.’”

  1901.  Daily Telegraph, 14 May, 11, 5. You have got a fine RED-’UN. Ibid. You just now alluded to your watch as a RED-’UN.—Cooper: I did. And then you explained that “RED-’UN” was thieves’ slang.—So it is.

  2.  (common).—Variously applied to objects red in colour: as (1) a RED HERRING (q.v.); (2) in pl., the menses: whence RED-RAG = the menstrual cloth; TO FLASH THE RED RAG = to have one’s courses; (3) in pl. = blushes: also RED-RAG, whence TO MOUNT THE RED RAG (or FLAG) = to blush; (4) a Red Republican: spec. (France ’93) a violent revolutionary of the established order. See also ADMIRAL, RED-CENT, and RED-COAT.

  COMBINATIONS are numerous.—The RED-ACE (or C) = the female pudendum: see MONOSYLLABLE; RED-BOOK = a book of the officers of State or the Peerage: cf. BLUE-BOOK; RED-BREAST = a Bow-St. runner (they wore red waistcoats); also see infra; RED-CENT (see quot. 1889, NARY and NICKEL); RED-COAT = a soldier: also THE REDS; RED-COCK = an incendiary fire; RED-CROSS (see quot. 1626); RED-DOG (see SHINPLASTER); RED-EEL = a term of contempt; RED-EYE (or RED-HEAD) = fiery whiskey; RED-EYE SOUR = whiskey and lemon; RED-FLANNEL = the tongue: see RAG, 2; RED-FUSTIAN = (1) port, (2) claret (B. E. and GROSE), and (3) porter: also RED-TAPE; RED-GRATE (see RED-LATTICE); RED-HEAD = a red-haired person, a CARROTS (q.v.); RED-HERRING = a soldier: cf. SOLDIER = a red-herring; RED-HORSE = a native of Kentucky; RED-HOT (adj.) = violent, extreme: RED-LETTER DAY = (1) a Church festival (printed in red characters in the Calendar): hence (2) a happy day or lucky occasion (GROSE): whence RED-LETTER MAN = a Roman Catholic (B. E. and GROSE); RED-LINER (see quot. 1851); RED-PETTICOAT (see quot. 1670); RED-RAG (see RAG and RED), and (2) = a source of annoyance or disgust: usually ‘a RED-RAG to a mad-bull’; RED-RIBBON = brandy (GROSE): cf. WHITE-SATIN; RED-SAIL DOCKER = a buyer of stores stolen out of the royal yards and docks (GROSE); RED-SKIN = a North American Indian.

  c. 1485.  Lady Bessy (Queen of Henry VII.) [Percy Society Publication, xx.]. [T. L. KINGTON-OLIPHANT, The New English, i. 396. We now first hear of READE COATES, Lord Stanley’s soldiers; a well-known word in Cromwell’s day, 130 years later].

  1626.  CAPT. JOHN SMITH, Treatise on English Sea Terms [ARBER], 262 [T. L. KINGTON-OLIPHANT, The New English, ii. 66. An English ship is called a RED CROSSE].

  1662.  Rump Songs, ii. 5.

  1670.  RAY, Proverbs [BOHN], 59. The lass in the RED PETTICOAT shall pay for it. Young men answer so when they are chid for being so prodigal and expensive; meaning, they will get a wife with a good portion, that shall pay for it.

  1707.  WARD, Hudibras Redivivus, II. iii., 24. A drum was beaten on the ground By an old RED COAT.

  c. 1720.  Old Song [D’URFEY, Wit and Mirth; or Pills to Purge Melancholy (1720), vi. 325].

  1815.  SCOTT, Guy Mannering, iii. We’ll see if the RED COCK craw not in his bonnie barn-yard ae morning before day-dawning.

  1826.  COOPER, The Last of the Mohicans, i. 114. What might be right and proper in a RED SKIN, may be sinful in a man who has not even a cross in blood to plead for his ignorance.

  1830.  BULWER-LYTTON, Paul Clifford, 80. A tumbler of blue ruin fill, fill for me, RED TAPE those as likes it may drain.

  1834.  W. H. AINSWORTH, Rookwood, I. ix. Famous wine this—beautiful tipple—better than all your RED FUSTIAN.

  1848.  RUXTON, Life in the Far West, 8. Jest then seven darned RED HEADS top the bluff. Ibid., ii. Being as a REDSKIN, thirsting for their lives.

  1848.  THACKERAY, The Book of Snobs, xxv. A woman who was intimate with every duchess in THE RED BOOK.

  1851.  H. MAYHEW, London Labour and the London Poor, ii. 564. The RED LINERS, as we calls the Mendicity officers, who goes about in disguise as gentlemen, to take up poor boys caught begging.

  c. 1852.  HALIBURTON (‘Sam Slick’), ed. Traits of American Humour, II. 114. With their furniture, and the remains of a forty-two gallon ‘RED-HEAD.’

  1852.  BRISTED, The Upper Ten Thousand, 144. He must have a million of dollars left, and a man with that is not poor in any country—certainly it was a great catch for Miss Lewison, without a RED CENT of her own.

  1861.  MACAULAY, The History of England, iii. “Oliver’s REDCOATS had once stabled their horses there.”

  1871.  DE VERE, Americanisms, 215. “Salted provisions and RED-EYE to boot” is the refrain of many a rude song, and if the latter is fiery and raw it is none the less welcome.

  1883.  C. MARVIN, The Russians at the Gates of Herat, 98. These opinions cannot but be so many RED RAGS to English Russophobists.

  1889.  Century Dictionary, s.v. RED. The copper cent is no longer current, but the phrase RED CENT remains in use as a mere emphatic form of cent: as it is not worth a RED CENT.

  1888.  Detroit Free Press, 15 Dec. When I got up on election morning I hadn’t a blamed RED in my pockets.

  1892.  HUME NISBET, The Bushranger’s Sweetheart, 33. Who would take her for twenty-five, and an old traveller, to see her MOUNTING THE RED RAG like a girl of fourteen?

  1896.  CRANE, Maggie, a Girl of the Streets, ix. Not a cent more of me money will yehs ever get—not a RED.

  1899.  R. WHITEING, No. 5 John Street, xxi. ’Tilda. Won’t it be fine to see the sojers on ’orseback? I hope it ’s THE REDS.

  1892.  KIPLING, Barrack-Room Ballads, ‘Tommy.’ The publican ’e up an’ sez, ‘We serve no RED-COATS here.’

  1892.  Globe, 28 Sept. 6, 1. On his journey he gathers the anathemas of those to whom the literary picture is the RED RAG.

  NEITHER FISH, FLESH, FOWL, NOR GOOD RED-HERRING, phr. (old).—Nondescript; neither one thing nor another; neither hay nor grass.—RAY.

  1528.  ROY and BARLOW, Rede me and be nott wrothe, I. iij. b. Wone that is NETHER FLESSHE NOR FISSHE.

  1530.  TYNDALE, Works [Parker Society, i. 299]. We know not whether they be good or bad, or whether they be FISH or FLESH.

  1546.  HEYWOOD, Proverbs, I. x. Shee is NEITHER FISH, NOR FLESH, NOR GOOD RED HERRING.

  1598.  SHAKESPEARE, 2 Henry IV., iv. 3. She’s NEITHER FISH NOR FLESH; a man knows not where to have her.

  1656.  The Muses Recreation [HOTTEN], 94. They are NEITHER FISH, FLESH, NOR GOOD RED HERRING.

  1857.  J. B. MARSDEN, Dictionary of Christian Churches and Sects, i. 267. They were neither parsons, nor vicars, nor stipendiary curates; in fact, says Heylyn, “they were NEITHER FISH NOR FLESH, NOR GOOD RED HERRING.”

  1682.  DRYDEN, Epilogue to the Duke of Guise, 39.

  TO PAINT (or VARNISH) THE TOWN RED (or CRIMSON), verb. phr. (American).—See quot.

  1889.  Detroit Free Press, 9 March. PAINTING THE TOWN RED undoubtedly originated among the cowboys of western Texas, who, upon visits to frontier towns, would first become very drunk, or pretend to be so, and then mount their bronchos, gallop up and down the principal street, shooting at anything, and signifying their intention to PAINT THE WHOLE TOWN RED if any opposition to their origies was attempted. It was a mere extravagant threat: one constable could usually put the whole band in the calaboose.

  1891.  LEHMANN, Harry Fludyer at Cambridge, 105. Now, do come … to see us row. We’ve got a good chance of going head, and if we do, my eye, won’t we PAINT THE WHOLE PLACE RED on Tuesday night!

  1892.  Pall Mall Gazette, 17 Oct., 2, 3. He appears here as the typical Johnnie … whose aid is sought by young men who are desirous of PAINTING THE TOWN RED.