subs. (old cant).—1. ‘Wine or strong Drink’ (B. E. and GROSE). Also (2) a small draught: see quot. 1625. Hence RUM-SUCK = excellent tipple; SUCKY = drunkish; SUCK-SPIGOT (-PINT, -POT, -BOTTLE, or -CAN) = a confirmed tippler: also SUCKER; SUCKERDOM = the world of topers; SUCK-CASA = a public house. As verb = to tipple, to SOAK (q.v.). Also TO SUCK ONE’S FACE = ‘to delight in drinking’ (B. E.); SUCTION = BOOZE (q.v.): hence TO LIVE ON SUCTION = to drink hard; POWER OF SUCTION = capacity for BOOZING.
1585. FLEMING, The Nomenclator. Ebriosus … A dronkard: a SUCKSPIGGET: a great drinker.
1611. COTGRAVE, Dictionarie, s.v. Humeur, a SUCKE-PINTE or swill-pot, a notable drunkard.
c. 1696. B. E., A New Dictionary of the Canting Crew, s.v. SUCK. We’ll go and SUCK OUR FACES, but if they toute us, we’ll take rattle and brush, c. let’s go to Drink and be merry, but if we be Smelt, by the People of the House, we must Scower off.
c. 1709. WARD, Terræ Filius, ii. 9. Out upon you, for a Damn’d Derby-Ale Sot … such a Swill-Belly SUCK-BOTTLE.
1836. DICKENS, Pickwick Papers, xxiii. Wery good power o’ SUCTION, Sammy.
1862. New York Tribune [BARTLETT]. In resisting the tax on whiskey, it has been shown that one distiller in Ohio, who makes 8,000 gallons a day, would pay into the treasury $375,600 a year, if SUCKERDOM continued thirsty.
2. (old).—A breast pocket (GROSE).
1625. MASSINGER, A New Way to Pay Old Debts, i. 1. ‘No house? nor no tobacco?’ ‘Not a SUCK, sir; nor the remainder of a single can.’
3. (university).—A toady: cf. SUCKER. Whence TO SUCK UP TO = to insinuate into one’s good graces: cf. BUMSUCKER.
1900. KIPLING, Stalky & Co., 43. That little swine Manders … [is] always SUCKIN’ UP TO King.
4. (common).—A cheat; a trick: also SUCK-IN. TO SUCK IN = to TAKE IN (q.v.); and SUCKER (q.v.) = a greenhorn, a dupe: see SUCKING.
d. 1758. RAMSAY, The General Mistake, in Wks. (at sup.), II. 339.
| This SUCKER thinks nane wise, | |
| But him that can to immense riches rise. |
1842. CAROLINE M. KIRKLAND, Forest Life, I. xiii. ‘I a’n’t bound to drive nobody in the middle of the night,’ said Mr. Butts, ‘so don’t you try to SUCK me in there.’
1841. E. G. PAIGE (‘Dow, Jr.’), Short Patent Sermons, xxii. I can’t help saying it confidentially, and before man alone, that life is all moonshine—a monstrous humbug—a grand SUCK-IN.
1887. F. FRANCIS, Jun., Saddle and Moccasin, ix. 174. Such men always take it for granted that an Englishman is a ‘SUCKER.’
1887. New York Semi-Weekly Tribune, 11 Jan. The … SUCKERS … despite … oft-repeated warnings, swallowed the hook so clumsily baited.
1888. Cincinnati Enquirer. The goldasted … mugwump has made SUCKERS of us again with his cracks about coming into the league.
1896. LILLARD, Poker Stories, 54. A SUCKER had no more chance against those fellows than a snowball has in a red-hot oven. Every deck was marked.
1900. R. H. SAVAGE, Brought to Bay, v. Anyone who will get those French and English SUCKERS to invest good money out here, ought to live!
Verb. (common).—1. To extract ideas or money; TO PUMP (q.v.): e.g., TO SUCK ONE’S BRAINS = to find out all one knows (GROSE). See SUCKER, subs. 1.
TO TEACH ONE’S GRANDMA (or GRANNIE) TO SUCK EGGS, verb. phr. (common).—To instruct an expert; to talk old to one’s elders (RAY, Lexicon Balatronicum). See GRANDMOTHER and add the following quotation and analogous PHRASES:—TO TEACH one’s GRANNIE to grope her ducks, to sup sour milk, to sard or to spin; to TEACH ONE’S FATHER to get children. Also Il ne faut pas apprendre aux poissons à nager—You must not TEACH FISH to swim.
1897. MARSHALL, Pomes, 23. Some buds of youthful purity … Were engaged TO LECTURE GRANDMAS ON THE ART OF SUCKING EGGS.
See MONKEY and SUGAR-STICK.
