language of opium fiends, 1889

[Jonathan Lighter]

Great find for "dope," George. And good also for "right" and singular "people."

  I wonder if "yen-suey" is a phonological variant of the more usual "yen-shee."

  This may be a mere misperception, but for whatever reason the later 1880s seem to have been unusually productive of "new" slang.

  JL

George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: George Thompson
Subject: language of opium fiends, 1889
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SCENES IN AN OPIUM JOINT. *** [on 14th street, in "the old Palm Garden"] "Who's his jags?" sharply queried the door-keeper. "He's all right," announced the stranger. "He was sent here by right people."
*** "Give us a layout and a shell of 'dope,'" ordered the reporter's companion. [The layout includes] a sponge called . . . a "yen-suey;" a long tapering needle . . . called a "yen-hock;" and the opium called "hop-in-yen," "dope," or "hop" for short.
The World, February 10, 1889, p. 20, cols. 5-6.

dope: HDAS: (4b) "illegal stupefying or stimulating drug", 1898-1900, &c.

hop: HDAS: 1886, 1887, 1896, &c

hop-in-yen: OED lists "hop" in the sense of opium under "hop", the plant used in making beer; HDAS gives an etymology of "hop toy", meaning "bliss container", or Mandarin "ho ping", "bliss". Is "hop-in-yen" a possibility?

his jags: HDAS has "jag" (3) "a peculiar or inept fellow", from 1906, or (2) "a drunken person", from a1890-96; here this sounds more like a variant of "his nibs" (which HDAS has from 1848 in the U. S).

shell: didn't see this sense in OED; CDS has from late 19th C, U. S.

yen-hock: OED: 1882

yen-suey: not in OED; CDS has "yen-shee suey", "opium residue dissolved in wine", 1930s-1950s

GAT

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

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