"Paul Clifford", Chapter 22, by Edward Bulwer-Lytton

1 year ago
40

Outlaw. Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about you!

Val. Ruffians, forego that rude, uncivil touch!

The Two Gentlemen of Verona.

----

There at the beginning where Clifford asks the woman at the pub "Are Augustus and Ned here?", the text actually has the two names as blanks, and the sentence reads rather:

"Are --- and ---- here?" asked he of the old woman, as he entered, mentioning the cant words by which, among friends, Tomlinson and Pepper were usually known.

But I have no idea how to read blanks like that into a recording, so a nice touch of detail was lost in my reading that those character have other names they go by. Pity. It is not clear why the author feels so compelled to blank out those names right here. To what end? My guess is laziness. It's certainly not lack of creativity, the entire novel stands as a testament to the creative abilities of the author, but apparently there were some details he just couldn't be bothered about, and that's gotta be laziness.

Oliver = the moon

mudger, as best I can tell, is slang for a term too vulgar for me to repeat here. But it seems rather obscure and I could be wrong. One thing is for sure: it is not a complimentary word!

lauk, I believe, is a distinctly British (perhaps even more specifically Cockney?) interjection used instead of "Lord!"

aurigal: of or pertaining to a chariot

horse pistol: a large pistol carried at the pommel of the saddle by a rider In Britain at the time of the setting of this story, horse pistols would have most commonly been either .71 or .65 calibre, that's 18 or 16.5 mm. That's a big pistol!

hunting watch: a watch with a hinged metal lid or case (hunting case) to protect the crystal

potation: a drink. Obvious enough from context, but not a word you hear any more, that's for sure! But, it shares an etymological root with the word you do hear, at least in the context of fantasy role-playing games, of potion. That being the old French word 'potare'.

bowl of bishop: it seems that term was popularly used by Charles Dickens, but I don't specifically recall it myself. It's heated port wine with various seasonings and spices (lemon or orange, clove, mulling spices).

To follow along: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/7735/7735-h/7735-h.htm#link2HCH0022

Loading comments...