Fwd: 13.406, Qs: "English words" Quote--Author, James D. Nicoll?

[Jonathon Green]

Mr Nicholl eludes me but for LH's information a 'cribhouse' is a brothel.
Thus

1932 (context 1917-19) Dos Passos _Nineteen Nineteen_ (in _USA_) 385 The
doors of all the cribhouses were open.

As I recall this is set in Paris during/just after World War I.

_Cribhouse_ extends _crib_, which starts off as standard English 'small
house or narrow room' in 16C and has become cant for a cheap, rough brothel
or 'low' saloon by early 19C. Crib, of course, has various other slang
meanings, the majority based around living spaces.

Jonathon Green