101120 A DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. 'ABBER. v. n. JA idly. We scorn, for want of talk, to jabber Of parties. Jábber. s. Talk of one who jabbers. Swift. Jacamár. s. JACE JABB [Brazilian.] [connected by Wedgwood Bird so called with Gab and Gabber; of which the of the genus Galbula. See extract. slender forms are Gib and Gibber; The jacamars are nearly allied to the kingfishers by their elongated, sharp, quadrangular bill, and by whence Gibe, Jape, and similar congetheir short feet, whose anterior toes are for the most ners and derivatives.] Talk or prate part united; nevertheless, their toes have not the same formation exactly as the kingfisher's; the plumage, moreover, of the jacamars is not so smooth as the kingfishers, and has always a metallic lustre. They live solitarily in humid woods, feed on insects, and build their nests on low branches. ... There are some in the Indian Archipelago, whose bill, shorter, thicker, and a little bent, approximates them to the bee-eaters. The anterior toes are more separated. These are the jacamerops of Le Vaillant. Jacamiciri is the Brazilian name of this bird (Alcedo, Galbula grandis), according to MarcGalbula seems to have meant the Oriole grave. with the Latins: it is Meering who has transferred this name to the jacamar. ... There are some (the Jacamar Alcyon) which have only three toes; they live in Brazil.-Translation of Cuvier's Règne Animal. Is there less probability in my account of the Houyhnhnms or Yahoos, when it is manifest as to the latter, there are so many thousands, even in this country, who only differ from their brother brutes in Houyhnhnmland, because they use a sort of jabber, and do not go naked?-Swift, Gulliver's Travels, Letter to his Cousin Sympson. (Ord MS.) Jabberer. s. One who jabbers. Outcant the Babylonian labourers Butler, Hudibras. Jabbering. verbal abs. Act of a jabberer; talk of one who jabbers. Censynge, Latyne jabberinge, and wawlynge, accordinge to the office of saynt Antoynes personage. -Bale, Yett a Course at the Romyshe Foxe, fol. 43, b: 1543. Jabberment. s. Jabber; jabbering. Rare. We are come to his farewell, which is to be a concluding taste of his jabberment in the law.-Milton, Colasterion. Jabirú. s. [Brazilian.] Bird so called of See extracts. the genus Mycteria. The jabiru and the jabiru guacu are both birds of the crane kind, and natives of Brazil; we know little of them except the general outline of their figure and the enormous bills which are preserved in the cabinets of the curious. Neither of them however are of a size proportioned to their immoderate length of bill. The jabiru guacu is not above the size of a common stork, while the jabiru with the smallest bill exceeds the size of a swan. They are both covered with white feathers, except the head and neck, which are naked; and their principle difference is in the size of the body and the make of the bill.-Translation of Buffon's Natural History: 1797. A strong, trenchant and pointed, but elongated and straight, bill serves to cut and pierce, and characterises many waders preying upon reptiles, fishes, and animals that offer some resistance: such a beak is found in the herons and bitterns. As it becomes more lengthened and attenuated it is adapted to prey of a lower grade of life, and to get at these it is endowed with a specially sensitive apex. In the ibis and curlew such a beak is curved down: in the jabiru it is bent up. Some trenchant bills are so compressed as to resemble the blade of a knife; ... Jacána. s. [Brazilian.] Bird so called of the genus Parra. See extracts. The jacana is found in most of the tropical climates, but is most common in South America. It is remarkable for the length of its toes, and for the wings being armed in front with sharp spurs. There are about ten species, differing in size from that of a common fowl to that of a water-rail. They vary also in their plumage, some brown, some black, some variable. The faithful jacana is a most useful bird at Carthagena, in South America. The natives, who keep poultry in large numbers, have one of these tame, who attends the flock as a shepherd, to defend them from birds of prey. Though not larger than a dunghill cock, the jacana is able, by means of the spurs on his wings, to keep off birds as large as the carrion vulture, and even that bird himself. -Translation of Buffon's Natural History, xiii. 243: 1797. We now come to the family of Macrodactylus. beginning with the jacanas....The chaia of Paraguay has many relations, both with the jacanas and the Palamedeæ. The birds are found near Carthagena, and on the two sides of the river Plata.... The inhabitants rear it up in their poultry-yards, where it becomes the protector of the fowl, feeds along with them, follows them into the fields, and brings them home at the close of night. It is from this circumstance that Latham has named it the Faithful' jacana.-Translation of Cuvier's Règne Animal. The index digit in struthio and the medius digit in apteryx, support each their claw. The claw or spur, when present in other birds, e.g. Syrian blackbird, spur-winged goose, knob-winged dove, jacana, and mound-bird screamer, is developed from the radial side of the metacarpus or from the index digit. -Owen, Anatomy of Vertebrates. these offer least resistance in the swift pursuit of Jacent. adj. [Lat. jacens, -entis, pres. part. fishes, and are seen in the awks, puffins, and coulternebs, in which latter the beak may be as deep as it is long.-Owen, Anatomy of Vertebrates. VOL. II. 31 of jaceolie; second element in Adjacent.] Lying at length. Rare. B So laid, they are more apt in swagging down to pierce than in the jacent posture.-Sir H. Wotton, Elements of Architecture. Jácinth. s. [Fr. jacinthe; Lat. hyacinthus.] In Mineralogy. Word for word the same as Hyacinth, the latter being now the commoner term. Obsolete. Jacinths, albeit they differ much from amethysts in some respects, yet in lustre they approach very nere; and this is only the difference between them, that the brave violet colour, which in the amethyst is full and rich, in the jacinth is delaied and weaker. -Holland, Translation of Pliny, b. xxvii. ch. ix. (Rich.) The yellow jacinth, strengthening sense, Drayton, The Muses' Elysium. (Rich.) Hoole, Translation of Tasso, b. xviii. (Rich.) (For another example see Jargon.) Used adjectivally, or as the first element in a compound. And I saw them that sate on them, hauyng firi haburiouns of a iacincte colour.-Apocalypse, c. ix. Bible: 1551. (Rich.) Then drew he forth the brand Excalibur, And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth, And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt; For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks, Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work Of subtlest jewellery. Tennyson, Morte d'Arthur. Jack. s. [abbreviation of Jacob; a name which is generally treated as the Latin and Greek form of James; though, word for word, there is no connection between the two. In French, Jacques has its ordinary meaning, i. e. Jean Jacques John James. In English, however, it is treated as a familiar form of John. As such, it is a proper rather than a common name. secondary meanings, however, which are numerous, make it both. See extract from Tyrrwhitt; also from Addison under Jack Pudding. Upon Tyrwhitt's notice, however, it should be remarked that it is the word John, rather than the word Jack, to which it applies; the distinction between Jack = James (Jacob), and Jack = John being important. Jack, even when a manifest proper name, may easily be extended to cases where the connexion, though not very evident, is still possible; as the extract from Watts, writing on Logic, and (so doing) taking the influence of one who speaks with authority in a matter relating to the import of words, suggests. Yet such an extension may, in certain cases, be illegitimate. 1. Jack may, doubtless, mean a person bearing a common name, and, therefore, a common, or vulgar, person. As contrasted with a gentleman, it may mean an upstart, or anyone not wearing his new honours with propriety. It may suggest vulgar authority in any shape, and everything connected with it; anything, in short, connected with inferiority and insolence. 2. Then, as the name of a male, it may denote sex. 3. Thirdly, it may mean a name applied as an expression of familiarity. 4. Fourthly. Anything that does service, e. g. a piece of machinery, may take a servant's name. See extract from Watts. How far this explanation extends over the whole ground of the English language must be ascertained by the criticism of each individual case. It is certain that it does not cover the whole. Jack=jacket, for one instance, is evidently another word. Now, the criticism lies between these extremes, and the debateable land is wide. At the extremities all is clear; all uncertain the middle. = JACK show that, in the first instance, at least, the word is the French Jacques, rather than the English familiar form of John; Jacques Bonhomme being much the same in French as the English John Bull. In Swedish (at least the Swedish of the islands off the coast of Estonia), we find the name, in its true full form, applied with an import more dyslogistic than with either the French or ourselves; gamla Jacob (old Jacob, or Jack) meaning the devil.] [Foot-boys, who had frequently the common name of jack given them, were kept to turn the spit, or to pull off their masters' boots; but when instruments were invented for both those services, they were both called jacks.-Watts, Logick.] 1. 2. JACK of had the pleasure of seeing the huge jack he had caught served up for the first dish in a most sumptuous mannner.-Spectator, no. 108. (Rich.) Not that he dined at home often. The wretch had become a perfect epicure, and dined commonly at the club with the gormandizing clique there; with old Dr. Maw, Colonel Cramley (who is as lean as a grey-hound, and has jaws like a jack) and the rest of them.-Thackeray, Book of Snobs, ch. xliv. In the following extract jack is probably the second element in a compound, rather than the word meaning pike. If so, the fish meant is the Poor-john, or Hake; and the connexion with jack, the proper name, is evident. Poor-john, itself, is a corruption of Habergeon. Sometimes poor jack and onions are his dish And then he saints those friars who stink of fish. King, Art of Cookery. (Rich.) Low fellow, generally suggesting sauciness Jack. s. [Dutch, jakke.] Leathern cup. of manner or bearing; upstart. Since every Jack became a gentleman, There's many a gentle person made a Jack. Shakespear, Richard III. i. 3. You will perceive that a Jack guardant cannot office me from my son Coriolanus.-Id., Coriolanus, v. 2. A company of scoffers and proud Jacks are commonly conversant and attendant in such places.— Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy, p. 291. I know not how it has happened that. in the principal modern languages, John, or its equivalent, | is a name of contempt, or at least of slight. So the Italians use Gianni, from whence zany; the Spaniards, Juan, as 'bobo Juan,' a foolish John; the French, Jean, with various additions; and in English, when we call a man a John,' we do not mean it as a title of honour. Chaucer uses Jacke fool, as the Spaniards do ‘bobo Juan;' and I suppose Jack ass has the same etymology.-Tyrwhitt, as quoted by Todd. Sorry horse. And one day, at the time he was barrister, asking a merry carman why his fore-horse was so lusty and pampered and all the rest such lean jacks?' the man replied Why the reason is plain, for my fore-horse is the counsellor, and all the rest are his poor clients.-Foss, The Judges of England, Life of Thomas Richardson, Used adjectivally, or as the first element in a compound. a. Jack-bragger, or Jack Brag: (the latter the commoner). b. Jack bragger and his fellow, a vaunter, a cracker. -Withal, Dictionary, p.263: ed. 1608. (Nares by H. & W.) Jack gentleman. Such, especially if they are broken gamesters. I still say are no better than Jack gentlemen.-Bishop Parker, Rehearsal Transprosed, p. 180. c. Jack lord. The chief point to look to is the existence of concurrent etymologies. Jackjacket has just been dealt with. Jack: pike, has, also, an antagonistic etymology suggested for it, which the reader will probably acquiesce in. So has Jack-snipe. This is an important word. The jack-snipe does not breed in England, neither is there any notable difference between the male and the female. This is no valid reason for supposing the prefix to mean male: yet it is a fact that with many it passes for a term to denote, if not an actual male, a snipe with male attributes - hardness, boldness, and the like. On the other hand, jack is, undoubtedly, the name of a certain male hawk. In jack-daw it may denote familiarity; and in jack-ass it may mean male. But jack-asses are, also, called neddies; Ned being, word for word, as good a proper name as Jack. Here, however, it means head, to which it stands, as a word, in the same relation that it does to Edward; i.e. it has an n- prefixed; whilst, in the way of import, it is simply f. Jack sauce. donkey = German dickkopf = thick-head. I met some Jack lords going into my grove, but I think I have nettled them!-Pope, Life of Bishop Ward, p. 47. d. Jack meddler. Again, one of the names for the common prickleback, or stickleback, is Jack Banstickle. Here there is no sex noticed; neither is the stickleback either particularly h. Juck stickler. upstart or particularly familiar. The name, however, is given as a familiar one; but the familiarity is on the side of the giver: besides which, Banstickle looks like a proper name. This way the term is often given, e.g. to Jack Spratt: 'Jack Spratt Had a cat, &c.; and, perhaps, to Jack-the-giant-killer. As animals, then, Jack, the fish; Jack, the snipe; Jack, the ass, or daw, are not all in the same category: yet, all being animals, there is a tendency to place them so. A more minute examination than the editor has undertaken would, probably, Fretillon-a little nimble dwarfe or hop-o-mythumbe, a jacke-of-the-clock-house; a little busiebody, meddler, jack-stickler; one that hath an oare in every man's boat, or a hand in every man's dish. -Cotgrave. Jack. s. In Falconry. Male bird. See ex tract. [The males] of the falcon and goshawk are called tiercels, or tiercelets; that of the jerfalcon, jerkin; that of the merlin, jack; that of the hobby, robbin; that of the sparrow-hawk, musket; and that of the lanner, lanneret.-Rees, Cyclopædia, Hawk. Jack. s. [from German hecht = pike.] Pike (fish). No fish will thrive in a pond where roach or gudgeons are, except jacks.-Mortimer, Husbandry. In the midst of his discourse the bell rung for dinner, where the gentleman I have been speaking | In the middle of this deluge appear the tops of flagons and black jacks, like churches drowned i' the marshes.-Beaumont and Fletcher, Scornful Lady, ii. 1. (Rich.) Body of me. I'm dry still give me the jack, boy, This wooden skilt holds nothing. Id., Bloody Brother, ii. 1. (Rich.) Small jacks we have in many ale-houses of the city and suburbs, tipt with silver. Heywood, Drunkard opened, p. 45; 1635. Dead wine, that stinks of the borrachio, sup Dryden, Translation of Persius. Jack. s. [from N.Fr. jaque; German, jacke; Italian, giacco.] Coat of mail; military coat put over the coat of mail. The residue were on foot, well furnished with jack and skull, pike, dagger, bucklers made of board, and slicing swords, broad, thin, and of an excellent temper.-Sir J. Hayward. Be on one's jack. Be about, be down on, a person, in the colloquial sense of the term. Te ulciscari,' I will be revenged on thee; I will sit on thy skirts; I will be upon your jacke for it.Terence in English: 1614. (Nares by H. & W.) And, our armie joining with the princes, we made a gallant body; which made him sneake to his quarters at Openhan. And as often as he stirred we were on his jack.-A. Wilson, Autobiography. (Nares by H. & W.) My lord lay in Morton College; and as he was going to parliament one morning on foot, a man in a faire and civill outward habit mett him, and josseled him. And, though I was at that time behind his lordship, I saw it not; for, if I had, I should have been upon his jacke.-Ibid. (Nares by H. & W.) Jack. s. [? For its doubtful connection with Jack the proper name see Jack from Jacob.] Part of certain instruments, or piece of machinery so called. a. Piece of wood in which were inserted a small quill (the plectrum), and a piece of cloth (the damper), formerly used in the construction of certain musical instruments, i.e. virginals, harpsichords, and spinets. In a virginal, as soon as ever the jack falleth, and Shakespear, Sonnets. It plays on the harpsicon the while, whose jacks are the pebble stones, checking the little waves as strings.-Parthencia Sacra, p.210. b. In Mechanics. See extracts. The ordinary jack, used for roasting of meat, commonly consists but of three wheels.-Wilkins, Mathematical Magick. Some strain in rhyme; the muses on their racks Scream like the winding of ten thousand jacks. Pope, Dunciad, iii. 139. The excellencies of a good jack are, that the jack frame be forged and filed square; that the wheels be perpendicularly and strongly tixed on the squares of the spindle; that the teeth be evenly cut, and well smoothed; and that the teeth of the worm-wheel fall evenly into the groove of the worm.-Moxon, Mechanical Exercises. Jack, in mechanics, is an instrument in common use for raising heavy timber or very great weights of any kind. Jack is also the name of a well-known engine used for turning a spit: the weight is the power applied; the friction of the parts, and the weight with which the spit is charged, are the force to be overcome; and a steady uniform motion is maintained by means of a fly.... A smoke jack is so called from its being moved by means of the smoke or rarefied air, ascending the chimney and striking against the tail of the horizontal wheel, which being inclined to the horizon is moved about the axis of the wheel, together with the pinion which carries JACK the wheel D and E, and E carries F, which turns the spit. The wheel should be placed in the narrowest part of the chimney, where the motion of the smoke is swiftest.-Rees, Cyclopædia. Jack [is] a sort of stool made for sawing or cutting wood upon. . . . Jack is used also for a horse or wooden frame to saw timber upon; for an instrument to pull off a pair of boots; for a great leathern pitcher to drink in; for a small bowl that serves as a mark at the exercise of bowling; and for a young pike.-Ibid. c. In Composition. As the second element. Large kitchens are usually provided with a smokejack, by means of which several spits, if needful, can be kept turning at the same time.... The bottlejack, without the screen, is used in many families very successfully; it is wound up, like a watch, by means of a key, and turns very regularly until it is run down.-Eliza Acton, Modern Cookery, p.155 and note: ed. 1850. Used adjectivally, or as the first element of a compound. a. Jack plane. Plane used by glaziers. The jack and trying planes, similar to those used by carpenters, for planing straight the edges of their sheet lead, when a regular and correct line is requisite.-Gwilt, Encyclopædia of Architecture, 2212. b. Jack rafter. See extract. When a roof slopes each way, the space enclosed between the intersection of the slopes is called a hip; and the longest rafters in it, which are those at the angles, are called hip rafters, and the shorter ones are named jack-rafters.-Gwilt, Encyclopædia | of Architecture, 2035. Jack-rafter is a short rafter such as those which are fixed to the hips of a roof; generally speaking, any timber in a frame, that is cut short of its usual length receives the name of jack.-Glossary of Architecture. Jack. s. [?] Bowl thrown out for a mark to the bowlers. Or if they further venture to attack, Butler, Human Learning, pt. ii. (Rich.) 'Tis as if one should say, that a bowl equally poised, and thrown upon a plain bowling green, will run necessarily in a direct motion; but if it be made with a byass, that may decline it a little from a straight line, it may acquire a liberty of will, and so run spontaneously to the jack.-Bentley. Jack. s. [?] 1. Pennon so called. Nothing was to be seen aloft but ensigns, jacks, streamers, and the heads of sailors.-A. Drummond, Travels through Germany, Italy, and Greece, p. 71. Jack, in a ship, is a sort of flag or colours displayed from a mast erected on the outer end of a ship's bowsprit. In the British navy the jack is nothing more than a small union flag, composed of the intersection of the red and white crosses: but in merchant-ships this union is bordered with a red field.-Rees, Cyclopædia. The apparition of such a force, flying the tricolor and union jack in the bay,... frightened the people. -W. H. Russell, The [Crimean] War, ch. iii. 2. Sailor; jack-tar. 'It all comes of sailing on a Friday,' said a grumbling forecastle Jack.-W. H. Russell, The [Crimean War, ch. iii. On the first day it appeared that in the fulness of his heart and the emptiness of his stomach, Jack Firelock was rather too liberal on board one of the ships to his brother Jack Tar, and gave him an extra allowance.-Ibid. ch. i. JACK the knee, so as to cover a part of the thigh, used chiefly by horse soldiers, but also by persons engaged upon drains and dykes, and for driving in sledges when the feet are exposed to the snow. A man on horseback, with his breeches and jackboots, dressed up in a commode and a night-rail.Spectator. The Duke [of Newcastle] confided the management of the House of Commons to... Sir Thomas Robinson... Sir Thomas Robinson lead us!' said Pitt to Fox. The Duke might as well send his jackboot to lead us.'-Macaulay, Critical and Historical Essays, Thackeray's Life of the Earl of Chatham. Jack-by-the-hedge. s. [see extract from Dr. Prior for a suggested derivation.] Native plant so called, of the natural order Cruciferæ, Erysimum alliaria or Alliaria officinalis; treacle-mustard; sauce alone. The later writers call it Alliaria and Alliaris: of some Rima Maris; it is not Scordium, or Water Germander, which the apothecaries in times past mistooke for this herbe; neither is it Scordii species, or a kinde of Water Germander, whereof wee have written; it is named of some Pes Asininus. It is called in High Dutch, Knoblauch Kraut, Leuchel, and Sasskraut; and in Low Dutch, Loock sonder Loock. You may name it in Latin Allium non bulbosum; in French, Alliagre; in English, Sauce-alone, and Jacke-of-the-Hedge. Jacke-of-the-Hedge is hot and drie, but much lesse than garlick, that is to say, in the end of the second degree, or in the beginning of the thirde.-Gerarde, Herball: 1633. Jack-by-the-Hedge is an herb that grows wild by the hedges, is eaten as other salads are, and much used in broth.-Mortimer, Husbandry. Jack-by-the-Hedge, from jack or jakes, latrina, Here lies, whom hound did ne'er pursue Who, nursed with tender care, Cowper, Epitaph on a Hare. 1. 2. 3. Jack. s. [Carribean] Tree, or fruit of 4. tree, akin to the Breadfruits. The wood of the tree is called jack-wood.—Rees, Cyclopædia. Jack-a-lent. s. [possibly the jack may be the proper name, as it is in Jack in the Green, in the May Day pageantry; it is more likely, however, to be the jack of the game of bowls.] Puppet. Push-pin is too high for him; he is fit for no You little jackalent, have you been true to us ?- Jack-boót. 8. [as connected with boots or As I was thus walking my rounds, up comes a brother of the quill, belonging to the office, who no sooner made his entrance amongst the equitable fraternity, but upstarted every one in his seat, like a Jack-in-a-box, crying out Legit aut non legit?' to which they answered themselves, Non legit, my lord.'-The Infernal Wanderer: 1702. Figuratively. This Jack-in-a-box, or this divell in man's shape, wearing (like a player on a stage) good cloathes on his backe, comes to a goldsmith's stall, to a draper's, a habberdasher's, or into any other shoppe where he knowes good store of silver faces are to be seen.Dekker, English Villanies: 1632. Piece of machinery so called. Jack, called also jack-in-a-box, and handjack, is a portable mechanical instrument consisting of a rack and pinion, or a pair of claws and ratchet bar, moved by a winch handle, for raising heavy weights a little way off the ground.-Ure, Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, and Mines. In Botany. See extract. Hernandia, in Gardening, comprises plants of the exotic evergreen kind, of which the species principally cultivated is the whistling hernandia (Hernandia sonora), which in the West Indies is frequently denominated the Jack-in-a-Box tree.-Rees, Cyclopædia. Jack-in-office. s. Person who overvalues and presumes on the authority with which he is invested: (used adjectivally in extract). ་ There is, we suppose, a certain imperial loftiness in placing' troops at the disposal' of a military commander, to detain if he wants them, and to pass on if he does not, which suits a certain Jack-in-office dignity far better than an offhand question and a 'yes' or 'no' reply.-The Saturday Review, Nov. 10, 1866. As its opposite we have Jack-out-of-office. For liberalitie, who was wont to be a principall officer,... is turned Jack out of office, and others appointed to have the custodie.-Riche, Farewell to the Military Profession: 1581. (Nares by H. & W.) Jack Ketch. See Ketch. Jack-of-all-trades. s. One who can turn his hand to anything. Cleaveland. Jack-of-all-trades, show and sound; An inverse burse, an exchange underground. He [Southey] conceives that the business of the magistrate is, not merely to see that the persons and property of the public are secure from attack, but that he ought to be a jack-of-all-trades, architect, engineer, schoolmaster, merchant, theologian, a Lady Bountiful in every parish, a Paul Pry in every house, spying, eaves-dropping, relieving, admonishing, spending our money for us, and choosing our opinions for us. His principle is, if we understand it rightly, that no man can do anything so well for himself as his rulers, be they who they may, can do it for him, and that a government approaches nearer and nearer to perfection, in proportion as it interferes more and more with the habits and notions of individuals. Macaulay, Critical and Historical Essays, Southey's Colloquies on Society. Jack-of-the-buttery. S. Plant so called. Jack-of-the-Buttery, a ridiculous name that seems to be a corruption of Bot-theriacque, to Buttery Jack, the plant having been used as a treacle or Anthelmintic, and called Vermicularis from its supposed virtue in destroying intestinal worms.Dr. Prior, Popular Names of British Plants. Jack-of-the-clock-house. s. [Fr. jacquelet.] Figure in the old clocks, generally of a man with a club or hammer, who struck the hours on a bell; the well-known figures at St. Dunstan's Church long served as examples. My time Beaumont and Fletcher, Coxcomb. (For another example see J a ck, Jack-stickler.) Jack-on-both-sides, s. One who sides with both parties. Reader, John Newton, who erst plaid The Jack on both sides, here is laid. Witt's Recreations: 1654. Jack-out-of-doors. s. Jack out of office. Neque pessimus neque primus:' not altogether Jack out of doors, and yet no gentleman.-Withal's Dictionary, p. 569: ed. 1634. (Nares by H. & W.) Jack-pudding. s. Zany; merry Andrew. Every jack-pudding will be ridiculing palpable weaknesses which they ought to cover. - Sir R. L'Estrange. In fine, turn pettifogger, canonist, Be all but poet, and there's way to live. A buffoon is called by every nation by the name of the dish they like best: in French jean potage, and in English Jack-pudding.-Guardian. Jack-pudding in his party-colour'd jacket, Tosses the glove, and jokes at every packet. Gay. The manner of Addison is as remote from that of Swift as from that of Voltaire.... His tone is never that either of a Jack Pudding or of a cynic. It is that of a gentleman, in whom the quickest sense of the ridiculous is constantly tempered by good nature and good breeding. - Macaulay, Critical and Historical Essays, Life and Writings of Addison. If we were to form our opinion of his eminent contemporaries from a general survey of what he [Horace Walpole] has written concerning them, we should say that Pitt was a strutting, ranting, mouthing actor, Charles Townshend an impudent and voluble jack-pudding, Murray a deinure, coldblooded, cowardly hypocrite,... Secker an atheist who had shammed Christian for a mitre, Whitefield an impostor who swindled his converts out of their watches.-Ibid., Walpole's Letters to Sir Horace Mann. Jack's-alive. s. Game so called: (now of cards, originally of forfeits). See extract. A piece of paper or a match is handed round a circle, he who takes hold saying, Jack's alive, he'se no die in my hand.' He in whose hand it dies, or is extinguished, forfeits a wad; and all the wads are recovered only by performing something under the notion of a penance, though generally of an agreeable or mirthful description.-Jamieson, Scottish Dictionary. Jack-sinker. s. See extract. The needles or hooks being all properly fitted, the next part of the stocking-frame to which attention ought to be paid, is the machinery for forming the loops; and this consists of two parts. The first of these, which sinks between every second or alternate needle,... is one of the most important parts of the whole machine. It consists of two moving parts; the first being a succession of horizontal levers moving upon a common centre and called jacks, a term applied to vibrating levers in various kinds of machinery as well as the stocking-frame. On the front, or right hand part of the jack, is a joint suspending a very thin plate of polished iron, which is termed a sinker, one of these jacks and sinkers allotted for every second or alternate cowhouses without any sign of fear; and when they cannot meet with any thing better they will devour boots, shoes, harnesses, &c., and what they have not time to consume they will take away with them.Translation of Buffon's Natural History: 1797. [see extract from Todd.] Ape; coxcomb. needle. The form of the sinker will appear at and in order that all may be exactly uniform in shape, they are cut out and finished between two stout pieces of iron, which serve as moulds and gauges to direct the frame-smith.... The jacksinkers being only used for every alternate or se-Jackanapes. s. cond needle, in order to complete this part of the apparatus, a second set of sinkers is employed. These are in form and shape every way the same as the jack sinkers, but they are pointed at the top with pieces of tin, all of which are screwed to the sinker bar; and thus a sinker of each kind descends between the needles alternately.-Ure, Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, and Mines. Jack-snipe. s. [Welsh, giach.] Small species of snipe so called (Scolopax gallinula), smaller, and more truly a bird of passage than the common snipe. Mr. C. Girdlestone offered a sovereign to any one who would bring him a specimen of this bird shot n summer. In 1822, he had one brought to him in June; and in the same month, in 1821, he himself saw a pair on Bradwell Common; about two years after another specimen was shot.... Mr. Miller says he had had jack snipe's eggs brought to him; they were smaller, and of a more elliptical shape than those of the common snipe, which they otherwise exactly resembled. Paget, Natural History of Yarmouth. Lord Garvagh has in his collection a nest of the jack snipe with four eggs, taken in Ireland.-Yarrell, British Birds. The bird weighs about two ounces, the four eggs are more than an ounce and a half. The great egg of the guillemot is one eighth of the weight of the bird; the eggs of the jack-snipe weigh nearly as much as it does itself.-Hewitson, Coloured Illustrations of British Birds' Eggs. In regard to the incubation of the jack snipe, we may say that attempts to discover its nest in this country have hitherto been unavailing. Mr. Yarrell has been at pains to collect all the information and evidence upon the subject.... They are, however, a very late bird in leaving us, and are regularly seen with the London poulterers in the first week in April. In an excursion to Sutherlandshire some years since, we thought we had found a breeding station for this bird near Tongue.... Our search, however, was fruitless.... Out of Europe Colonel Sykes considers the species of the Dukhan to be identical.-Sir W. Jardine, Naturalist's Library. The jack snipe. is the smallest of the species to which it belongs,... though much less numerous than the common species; it is always to be met with during the winter over the British Islands, and sometimes in considerable numbers. During its stay in this country it does not congregate in small companies like the common snipe, but appears to be nearly solitary in its habits; nor does it range from place to place much. . . . It is conjectured that it may breed in some parts of Great Britain, but no well-authenticated instance of its doing so has, we believe, been made known. It retires in spring to other regions to incubate, and is said to breed plentifully near St. Petersburg. The eggs are reported to bef our in number.-Laishley, British Birds' Eggs. Jack-with-a-lantern, Jack-o'-lantern. 'Will-o'-the-wisp; ignis fatuus. 8. Plenty of inflammable sulphureous matter in the air, such as ignes fatui, or jack-a-lanterns, and the meteors which are called falling stars.-Stephen Hales, On Earthquakes, p. 10: 1750. He has played Jack with a lantern, he has led us about like an ignis fatuus, by which travellers are decoyed into the mire.-Johnson, Note on Shakespear's Tempest. Simply Jack. Monster, your fairy, which you say is a harmless fairy, has done little better than played the Jack with us.-Shakespear, Tempest, iv. 1. Jackal. s. [Persian, shakal.] Carnivorous animal, closely akin to the dogs and wolves, so called; Canis aureus, lion's-provider. The Belgians tack upon our rear, And raking chase-guns through our sterns they send: Close by their fireships, like jackals, appear, Dryden, Annus Mirabilis, lxxxii. The mighty lion, before whom stood the little jackal, the faithful spy of the king of the lions.Arbuthnot and Pope. Though the species of the wolf approaches that of the dog, yet the jackal finds a place between them both. The jackal, or adil,' as Belon remarks, is an animal between the wolf and the dog.' With the ferocity of the wolf he joins a little of the familiarity of the dog; his voice is a kind of howl mixed with barking and groaning. He is more noisy than the dog, and more voracious than the wolf. He never stirs out alone, but always in flocks of twenty, thirty, or forty. They collect together every evening to go in search of their prey. They live principally on small animals, and make themselves formidable to the most powerful by their number. They attack every kind of cattle or poultry even in the presence of men. They boldly enter stables, sheepfolds, and He grins and he gapes, As it were Jack Napes. Skelton, Poems, p. 160. He played Jack-a-Napes, swearynge by his tenne bones.-Bale, Fett a Course at the Romyshe Foxe, p. 92: 1543. Down, Jack-an-apes, from thy feign'd royalty. Marston, Scourge of Villany, b. iii. sat. ix: 1599. I believe he hath robb'd a jackanapes of his gesture; marke but his countenance; see how he mops, and how he mowes, and how he strains his lookes! -Riche, Faults, &c., p. 7: 1606. Which is he? That jackanapes with scarfs. Shakespear, All's well that ends well. iii. 5. People wondered how such a young upstart jackanapés should grow so pert and saucy, and take so much upon him.-Arbuthnot. A fellow passing presently by, Adams ask'd him if he could direct him to an ale-house. The fellow who had just left it, and perceived the house and sign to be within sight, thinking he had jeered him, and being of a morose temper, bade him follow his nose and be d-n'd. Adams told him he was a saucy jackanapes: upon which the fellow turned about angrily, but perceiving Adams clench his fist, he thought proper to go on without taking any farther notice.-Fielding, Adventures of Joseph Andrews, ch. ii. Ha ha! ha! anything to please mademoiselle my wife, since I must be a jackanapes, and have a French tailor.-O'Keefe, Fontainebleau, iii. 2. This [i.e. the extracts from Skelton, Bale, and Marston] naturally refers us to the tricks of the ape; and the corruption of Jack Napes is easily accounted for by the various writing or pronunciation of that word.-Todd. Jackass. s. [a compound rather than two words in the present language. In the extract from Arbuthnot, according at least to the spelling, two words rather than a compound. The explanation of it in Johnson is the male of animals.' See, however, Jack (snipe).] Male ass. A jack ass, for a stallion, was bought for three thousand two hundred and twenty-nine pounds three shillings and fourpence.-Arbuthnot, Tables of ancient Coins, Weights, and Measures. Meer Jallier regarded him [Clive] with slavish I could not move a thistle; Tennyson, Amphion. Jackback. s. [Pas to Jack.] See extract. When the operation of mashing is finished, the wort or extract is drained down from the malt into the vessel called the under back, immediately below the mashtun, of like dimensions, and situated always on a lower level, for which reason it has reached the name. Here the wort does not remain longer than is necessary to drain off the whole of it from the tun above.... When the ebullition has continued a sufficient period to coagulate the grosser part of the extract, and to evaporate part of the water, the contents are run off through a large cock into the jack-back, which is a vessel of sufficient dimensions to contain it, and provided with a bottom of cast-iron plates, perforated with small holes, through which the wort drains and leaves the hops. -Ure, Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, and Mines, Beer. Jackdaw. s. [? as to Jack.] Species of the crow; Corvus monedula. Not all unlyke unto Esope's chough, whom we commonly call Jackedawe.-Bale, Yett a Course at the Romyshe Foxe, p. 87: 1543. To impose on a child to get by heart a long scroll of phrases, without any ideas, is a practice fitter for a jackdaw than for any thing that wears the shape of man.-Watts. Jacket. s. [Fr. jaquette.] close waistcoat. Short coat; In a blue jacket, with a cross of red. JACO And hens and dogs and hogs are feeding by; And here a sailor's jacket hangs to dry. Pope, Imitations, Spenser. Dust one's jacket. Give a beating to any one. She fell upon the jacket of the parson, who stood gaping at her.-Sir R. L'Estrange. Jacksmith. s. Maker of jacks, i.e. engines so called. Tompion, the celebrated watchmaker, was originally a jacksmith.-Malone, Note on Dryden. Jácobin. s. [Fr. from Jacobus, which, word for word, is Jacob; but, name for name, is treated as if it were the Latin or Greek for James. Hence, Jacobin having reference to, connected with, or named after, St. James. Generally applied to the friars of the order of St. Dominic; and, as such, a proper, rather than a common, name. In its secondary meanings, however, it is common rather than proper.] a. b. c. Applied to a friar of the order of St. This king went in danger of his life, a long while sought by a capuchin; ... who at length was taken and executed, together with another Jacobine for the same crime.-Sir E. Sandys, State of Religion. Applied to a member of the Jacobin club, which, during the first French Revolution, met at a monastery of the Jacobin friars. With the Jacobins of France, vague intercourse is without reproach; marriage is reduced to the vilest concubinage; children are encouraged to cut the throats of their parents; mothers are taught that tenderness is no part of their character.—Burke, Thoughts on a Regicide Peace. We are not to conclude that all who are not Jacobins are conscientiously attached to the established church.-Bishop Horsley, Charge. Radical, republican, or levelling politician of the character of the French Jacobin. Used adjectivally. They knew from the beginning that the Jacobin party was not confined to that country.—Burke, Thoughts on a Regicide Peace. Jacobin. s. Fancy pigeon with a high tuft so called. A complete novelty appears in the shape of some wholly black Jacobins, Times Newspaper, December 3, 1866: Birmingham Fat Stock, Poultry and Dog Shows. Jacobínic. adj. Jacobinical. He knows by rote the Jacobinic creed.-Mathias, Pursuits of Literature. Jacobínical. adj. Having the character of Jacobinism, or a Jacobin: (commoner than Jacobinic, but less common than Jacobin, used adjectivally). The triumph of Jacobinical principles was now complete.-Sir W. Scott, Life of Napoleon. Jácobinism. s. System of Jacobin principles. When to these establishments of regicide, of jacobinism, and of atheism, you add the corre spondent system of manners, no doubt can be left on the mind of a thinking man, concerning their determined hostility to the human race.-Burke, Thoughts on a Regicide Peace. May the more recent spirit of jacobinism have a still quicker termination.-Mason, Isis, note. Even in the heavy quietude of the Austrian monarchy, jacobinism, and the repugnance of newlyconquered countries to a master of strange speech and soil, are felt to be demands on all the suspicion of the cabinet.-Croly, England and Europe, Historicul Sketches, Speeches, and Characters. Jacobinize. v. a. Convert to, actual or approximate, Jacobinism. France was not then jacobinized.-Burke. Jacobite. s. [from Jacobus, the Latin name of James Stuart, i.e. James II., king of England.] In its primary sense, and, as a proper rather than a common term, one attached to the cause of king James the second after his abdication, and to his line. In tumults and treasons the Jacobites cry, The king's a fanatic; I'll tell you for why; Because he is not of a church they call high, Which nobody can deny, &c. What church 'tis they mean, 'tis plain we can tell, A church that the Jacobites know very well, The true church of Rome, that makes knaves to rebell, Which nobody can deny, &c. Whig Song, circa 1714. |