"suction about"

[George Thompson]

*

     [coroner's report on John Dowlan, 33, "a poor loafer" who] has a wife
and child living in Grand street and a mother in Mott street.  For several
years past however, he has seldom visited his family, preferring rather to
live by suction about and to sleep in the markets doing errands and small
jobs, thereby earning the scanty means whereby to indulge in his favorite
vice -- inebriety.  ***
     Morning Courier & N-Y Enquirer, July 16, 1840, p. 2, col. 5 *
*I don't believe that this is my typo for "sucking" -- but perhaps.
 Perhaps, also, the editor or typesetter absently connected "sucking" with
"suction" as defied in the OED:*
*b.* Imbibing strong drink, drinking. *slang.*
1817    Scott *Let.<http://ezproxy.library.nyu.edu:31797/view/Entry/193447?rskey=mR7B7l&result=3&isAdvanced=true>
* 11 Aug. (1933) IV. 495   A man‥cannot easily spend much money in liquor
since he must walk three or four miles to the place of action and back
again.
[*a typo in the OED here: "the place of action?" or suction? *
1836    Dickens *Pickwick
Papers<http://ezproxy.library.nyu.edu:31797/view/Entry/193447?rskey=mR7B7l&result=3&isAdvanced=true>
* (1837) xxiii. 237   Wery good power o' suction, Sammy.

GAT
-- 
George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ.
Pr., 1998, but nothing much since then.

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