"party screws", 1854?

[Wilson Gray]

On Sat, Apr 7, 2012 at 3:59 PM, Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com> wrote:
> "an instrument of torture formerly in use, designed to compress the thumbs of a prisoner in order
> to extort a confession"

And here I was, thinking that _thumbscrew_ was the only name for that
instrument!

Youneverknow.

Thanks, Victor! A wholly-new semantic complex has now been made
manifest unto me.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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