[Ads-l] Query: Slang "insect promenade"

[Robin Hamilton]

Gerald's suggestion could operate as an overall sub-text , but still leave the
specific sense of "insect promenade" as "bed" intact. 

While the buzz/thief/steal link goes back to Charles Hitchin in _The Regulator_
in 1718, and is confirmed by Vaux a hundred years later, it's not the commonest
of terms for this person/activity at any time.

Cakes.  Having.  Eating.

Anyone got any ideas for, "But I fired him out of the Rory quick" in stanza 3?
 I floated this up-thread, but no one bit, and I still can't quite get my head
around it.

Robin

> 
>     On 21 January 2017 at 20:36 Peter Reitan <pjreitan at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> 
>     Personally, I find the bed suggestion more convincing. Why would anyone
> close their eyes while "in" a pickpocketing excursion?
> 
>     Also, I find it interesting that the annotations define "raspberry tart"
> as "heart" and not "fart", which calls into question, perhaps, the presumptive
> etymology of "razz".
>     ________________________________
>     From: Cohen, Gerald Leonard<mailto:gcohen at MST.EDU>
>     Sent: ‎1/‎21/‎2017 8:24
>     To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU<mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>     Subject: Re: Query: Slang "insect promenade"
> 
>     ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
>     Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>     Poster: "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at MST.EDU>
>     Subject: Re: Query: Slang "insect promenade"
> 
>    -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
>     First, thanks for the replies to my query. In the meantime, I think I
> 
>     see what the poet had in mind by writing my insect promenade.
> 
>     Last night I remembered that buzz is a criminal slang term (as a noun
> 
>     it means thief, esp. a pickpocket, and as a verb to buzz a person is
> 
>     to pick his pocket; see Eric Partridge, Dictionary of the Underworld.)
> 
> 
>     Now, in the poem the author had been walking around a bit that
> 
>     night (that's the promenade) and had just stolen all the money
> 
>     from the victim's pockets (i.e., he buzzed him). Once we get
> 
>     buzz into the picture, the rationale for insect becomes clear.
> 
> 
>     The insect promenade therefore refers to a buzzing excursion, or
> 
>     more specifically, to an excursion in which the opportunity for
> 
>     buzzing unexpectedly arose.
> 
> 
>     Gerald Cohen
> 
> 
> 
>     ________________________________
>     From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of
> Cohen,=
>     Gerald Leonard
>     Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2017 6:36 PM
>     To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>     Subject: Query: Slang "insect promenade"
> 
>     ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -------------------=
>     ----
>     Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>     Poster: "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at MST.EDU>
>     Subject: Query: Slang "insect promenade"
> 
>    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------=
>     ----
> 
>     A poem titled "The Rhyme of the Rusher" (1892) is marked by rhyming slang
> 
>     and cant. One particular item is unclear to me: "insect promenade." What
> i=
>     =3D
>     n
> 
>     the world does that mean?
> 
> 
>     The relevant lines are (and btw, mince pies =3D eyes]:
> 
>     And I smiled as I closed my two mince pies
> 
>     In my insect promenade.
> 
> 
>     Any help would be much appreciated.
> 
> 
>     Gerald Cohen
> 
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