net around the end of the row, which is thus brought together, and dragged to any part of the field.

etc.

2. To decoy, viz., into a mock-auction establishment, a gambling-house,

ROPER IN. One who acts as a decoy for a gambling-house, in the patent safe game, etc.

Mr. A complained to the police that a young man at his hotel, who turned out to be a roper in of a gambling house, had enticed him away, and by whose means he had lost all his money. - Police Report, N. Y. Tribune.

ROSIN WEED. (Silphium laciniatum.) A plant, called also the Compass Plant, because its leaves are supposed by the voyageurs to point north and south, and thus to serve as a guide to the traveller over the prairies. Ross. The rough, scaly matter on the surface of the bark of certain trees. -Webster. A term much used in New England, as well as in the Middle States. It is provincial in England.

ROSTER. 1. In Massachusetts, a list of the officers of a division, brigade, regiment, etc., containing, under several heads, their names, rank, corps, place of abode, etc. These are called division rosters, brigade rosters, regimental or battalion rosters.

2. The word is frequently used instead of Register, which comprehends a general list of all the officers of the State, from the commanderin-chief to the lowest in the commission, under the same appropriate heads, with an additional column for noting the alterations which take place.-W. H. Sumner.

ROUGH AND TUMBLE. A rough and tumble fight is said to be one in which all the laws of the ring are discarded, and biting, kicking, gouging, etc., are perfectly admissible.

ROUGHSKINS. A gang of Baltimore bullies.

ROUGH-SCUFF. The lowest people; the rabble.

ROUND.

"To come or get round one," in popular language, is to gain advantage over one by flattery or deception.-Webster.

ROUND OF THE PAPERS. To say that an article is " going the rounds of the papers," meaning that it is being copied into many newspapers, is called an Americanism in England.

ROUND-RIMMERS. Hats with a round rim; hence, those who wear them. In the city of New York, a name applied to a large class of dissipated young men, by others called Bowery Boys and Soap-locks.

All over the region of East Bowery is spread-holding it in close subjection—the powerful class of round rimmers; a fraternity of gentlemen who, in round crape

bound hats, metal-mounted blue coats, tallow-smoothed locks, etc., carry dismay and terror wherever they move. - C. Mathews, Puffer Hopkins, p. 261. ROUSER. Something very exciting or very great. Thus an eloquent speech or sermon, a large mass-meeting, or a big prize-ox, is a rouser. ROWDY. A riotous, turbulent fellow.

All around the oyster and liquor stands was a throng of low, shabby, dirty men, some horse-dealers, some gamblers, and some loafers in general; but alike in their slang and rowdy aspect. — Upper Ten Thousand, p. 239.

The rowdy nomenclature of the principal cities may now be classified as follows:

NEW YORK.-"Dead Rabbits," "Bowery Boys," "Forty Thieves," "Skinners," "Robin Hood Club," 66 Huge Paws," "Short Boys," "Swill Boys," "Shoulder-hitters," "Killers." PHILADELPHIA. "" Killers," Schuylkill Annihilators," Moyamensing Hounds," "Northern Liberty Skivers," and "Peep-of-Day Boys." BALTIMORE. "Plug Uglies," "Rough Skins," ""Double Pumps," "Tigers," "Black Snakes," 'Stay Lates," "Hard Times," "Little Fellows," "Blood Tubs," "Dips," "Ranters," "Rip-Raps," and " Gladiators."

A convention of the Baltimore rowdies above mentioned, under the name of the "American Clubs," was held in that city in Sept., 1857, under the plea of rallying for some political campaign; in commenting on which, the "Baltimore Clipper" of Sept. 8 says: "Should not every true-hearted American blush to acknowledge that any portion of his countrymen glory in such barbaric and degrading names?"

To Row UP. To punish with words; to rebuke. It is an essential Westernism, and derived from the practice of making refractory slaves or servants row up the heavy keel-boats of early navigation on the Western rivers, against the current, without being frequently relieved. It was thus regarded as a punishment.

We should really like, of all things, to row up the majority of Congress as it deserves in regard to the practice. — N. Y. Tribune, Dec. 10, 1845.

The most spicy part of the proceedings in the Senate was the rowing up which Mr. Hannegan gave Mr. Ritchie of the Union newspaper.-N. Y. Tribune, Jan. 30, 1846. To Row UP SALT RIVER is a common phrase, used generally to signify political defeat. The distance to which a party is rowed up Salt river depends entirely upon the magnitude of the majority against its candidates. If the defeat is particularly overwhelming, the unsuccessful party is rowed up to the very head waters of Salt river.

It is occasionally used as nearly synonymous with to row up, as in the following example, but this example is rare:

Judge Clayton made a speech that fairly made the tumblers hop. He rowed the Tories up and over Salt river. Crockett, Tour Down East, p. 46.

To row up Salt river has its origin in the fact that there is a small

stream of that name in Kentucky, the passage of which is made difficult and laborious, as well by its tortuous course as by the abundance of shallows and bars. The real application of the phrase is to the unhappy wight who has the task of propelling the boat up the stream; but in political or slang usage it is to those who are rowed up · the passengers, not the oarsman. — [J. Inman.]

ROW TO HOE. To have a long (or hard) row to hoe, is a common figurative expression, meaning that one has a long or difficult task to perform. The allusion is to hoeing corn or potatoes.

Hosea Bigelow has a ballad on the Mexican war, in which he portrays the efforts of the recruiting officer to entice a young man to enlist, who declines on account of his wife. He says:

TO RUB OUT.

Western.

She wants me for home consumption,

Let alone the hay 's to mow,

If you're arter folks o' gumption,
You've a darned long row to hoe.

Biglow Papers.

To obliterate; and figuratively, to destroy, to kill.

However quickly the buffalo disappears, the red man goes under more quickly still, and the Great Spirit has ordained that both shall be rubbed out from the face of nature at the same time. — Ruxton, Life in the Far West, p. 117.

That nation [the Camanche] is mad a heap mad with the whites, and has dug up the hatchet to rub out all who enter his country. — Ibid. p. 191.

The swift current [of the Jordan] would seize us and send us off at a salient angle from our course, as if it had been lurking behind the point like an evil thing. if for the purpose of rubbing us out. — Lynch, Dead Sea Exp., p. 216.

RUBBER.

RUBBERS.

India rubber, caoutchouc.

Overshoes made of India rubber.

.. as

RUFFED GROUSE. (Tetras umbellus.) A bird which extends over the whole breadth of the continent, northward as far as the fifty-sixth parallel, and southward to Texas, and probably still further. It is called Partridge in Connecticut, and Pheasant at the South and West.

RUGGED. Hardy; robust; healthy. Colloquial in the United States.Worcester.

Why it's an unaccountable fact that Mr. Bedott had n't seen a well day in fifteen year, though when he was married I should n't desire to see a ruggeder man than he was. Widow Bedott Papers, p. 22.

RUINATIOUS. A vulgar substitute for ruinous.

The war was very ruinatious to our profession (said the barber). — Margaret, p. 210.

RULLICHIES. (Dutch, rolletje, little roll.) Chopped meat stuffed into small

bags of tripe, which are then cut into slices and fried. An old and favorite dish among the descendants of the Dutch in New York.

RUM-BUD. A grog blossom; the popular name of a redness occasioned by the detestable practice of excessive drinking. Rum-buds usually appear first on the nose, and gradually extend over the face. This term seems to have reference to the disease technically defined to be unsuppurative papule, stationary, confluent, red, mottled with purple, chiefly affecting the face, sometimes produced and always aggravated by the use of alcoholic liquors, by exposure to heat, etc. Rush.

RUM-HOLE. See Groggery.

RUM-SUCKER. An habitual drinker, a toper.

One of the best things that can be applied to a rocky pasture infested with bushes, briars, or weeds, is salt. Salt them every week while wet with rain or dew, and let the stock look to that source alone for a supply of this luxury, which they run after with an acquired appetite as strong as that of a rum-sucker. — N. Y. Tribune, July 9,

1858.

RUN. A small stream, or rivulet. A word common in the Southern and Western States, and sometimes heard at the North.

There is no house in the main road between this and the run; and the run is so high, from the freshes, that you will not be able to find it. - Davis's Travels in the United States in 1797.

The hills bordering the Ohio, at the mouth of the Yellow Creek, contain six workable beds of coal, while there are at least two others which lie beneath the bed of the river. Of those exposed, the fourth in the ascending series contains the fishes and reptiles; it is known on Yellow Creek as the "big run," being nearly eight feet in thickness. Silliman's Journal, March, 1858.

TO RUN, or RUN UPON. To quiz, to make a butt of.

He is a quiet, good-natured, inoffensive sort of a chap, and will stand running upon as long as most men, but who is a perfect tiger when his passions are roused. -Southern Sketches, p. 137.

TO RUN ONE'S FACE. To make use of one's credit. for a thing is to get it on tick.

To run one's face

Any man who can run his face for a card of pens, a quire of paper, and a pair of scissors, may set up for an editor; and by loud, incessant bragging, may secure a considerable patronage. N. Y. Tribune.

TO RUN INTO THE GROUND. To carry to excess, to overdo a thing, and thereby mar it. Probably a hunter's phrase, to express the earthing of a fox or other game.

The proposition to prohibit the enlistment of foreigners in the army is running Know Nothingism into the ground. — Providence Journal.

The advocates of temperance have run it into the ground by their extreme measures connected with the Maine Law.-N. Y. Herald.

RUN OF STONES. A pair of mill-stones is called a run of stones when in

operation or placed in a mill. The Rochester flouring mills have each ten or twenty run of stones.

RUNNER. A person whose business it is to solicit passengers for steamboats and railroads. Numbers of these men are always found about the wharves, shipping, railroad stations, and hotels of our principal cities, trying to induce travellers or emigrants to travel by the routes they recommend, and for which they often have tickets for sale.

RUSH. Spirit, energy. "To go it with a rush, or with a perfect rush," is to do a thing energetically, with spirit.

TO RUSH IT. To do a thing with spirit; as, "The old negro is rushing it with his fiddle."

RUSTY DAB. (Genus, Platessa. Cuvier.) The popular name of the Rusty Flat-fish, a fish found on the coast of Massachusetts and New York in deep water.

S.

SABBADAY. Sabbath day, Sunday. So called in the interior of New England.

Newman. You look better; I hope you feel better, and are better?

Doolittle. Why, I expect I do, and I guess I be, all three. I know I be, as to the first particular, changing my old shabby duds for these new Sabbaday clothes, for a go-to-meeting day, anywheres.-D. Humphreys, The Yankee in England, p. 29. My hearers, there is nothing irregular in nature; because it is round, as I told you last Sabbaday: it rolls evenly round, and is bound to come regularly around. Dow's Sermons, Vol. I. p. 194. SACATRA. The name given in Louisiana to the offspring of a griffe and a negress.

SACHEM. (Abenaki Ind.) An American Indian chief or prince.

The Sachems, although they have an absolute monarchy over the people, yet they will not conclude of aught that concerns all, either laws, or subsidies, or wars, unto which the people are averse, and by gentle persuasion cannot be brought.-R. Williams, Key to the Indian Language.

SACHEMDOM, or SACHEMSHIP. The government or jurisdiction of a sachem.

King Philip's war was attended with exciting an universal rising of the Indian tribes, not only of Narragansett and the Sachemdom of Philip, but of the Indians through New England, except the Sachemdom of Uncas, at Mohegan. Stile's History of the Judges of Charles I. p. 109.

TO SADDY. To bob up and down; to curtsy like a child. Probably a child's corruption of Thank ye, applied to the curtsy which accompanies the phrase.