Bellow on Steeplejacks

Someone who climbs and repairs steeples and chimneys.

"'Well, Your Highness,' I said, 'for you it should be easy. You have known these animals all your life. You are bred for this; you are a pro. If there's anything I love to see, it's a guy who's good at his work. Whether it's a rigger or steeplejack or window-washer or any person who has strong nerves and a skilled body... You had me worried when you started that skull dance, but after a minute of it, I would have backed you to my last dime.'"

Saul Bellow, Henderson The Rain King (1958).

Two Raging Tyrants

"So Jupiter, not wanting man's life to be wholly gloomy and grim, has bestowed far more passion than reason--you could reckon the ratio as twenty-four to one. Moreover, he confined reason to a cramped corner of the head and left all the rest of the body to the passions. Then he set up two raging tyrants in opposition to reason's solitary power: anger, which holds sway in the breast and so controls the heart, the very source of life, and lust, whose empire spreads far and wide, right down to the genitals. How far reason can prevail against the combined forces of these two the common life of man makes quite clear. She does the only thing she can, and shouts herself hoarse repeating formulas of virtue, while the other two bid her go hang herself and are increasingly noisy and offensive until at last their ruler is exhausted, gives up, and surrenders."

Erasmus, Praise of Folly (1509)

[translated by Betty Radice, notes by A. H. T. Levi (1993)].

Slaving in a Flour Mill

"Although I was nearly fainting with hunger and weariness, and in great need of refreshment, fear and my old curiosity made me neglect the food they gave me--there was no lack of it--to observe the life at that detestable mill with fascinated horror. Ye gods, what a pack of runts the poor creatures were who looked after us! Their skins were seamed all over with the marks of old floggings, as you could easily see through the holes in their ragged shirts that shaded rather than covered their scarred backs; but some wore only loin cloths. They had letters branded on their foreheads, and half-shaved heads and irons on their legs. Their complexions were frightfully yellow, their eyelids caked with the smoke of the baking ovens, their eyes so bleary and inflamed that they could hardly see out of them, and they were powdered like athletes in the arena, but with dirty flour, not dust."

Apuleius, The Golden Ass, 2nd Century A.D.

[translated by Robert Graves].

The Mississippi Steamboat Pilot

"If I have seemed to love my subject, it is no surprising thing, for I loved the profession far better than any I have followed since, and I took a measureless pride in it. The reason is plain: a pilot, in those days, was the only unfettered and entirely independent human being that lived in the earth. Kings are but the hampered servants of parliament and the people; parliaments sit in chains forged by their constituency; the editor of a newspaper cannot be independent, but must work with one hand tied behind him by party and patrons, and be content to utter only half or two-thirds of his mind; no clergyman is a free man and may speak the whole truth, regardless of his parish's opinions; writers of all kinds are manacled servants of the public. We write frankly and fearlessly, but then we 'modify' before we print. In truth, every man and woman and child has a master, and worries and frets in servitude; but, in the day I write of, the Mississippi pilot had none."

Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi (1883).

Light Horsemen

A light-armed cavalry soldier. Also a name for a particular group of thieves who worked on the Thames River.

"'Light Horsemen' would look out for a lighter having valuable goods on board, and at night, stealing up quietly, would cut her adrift: then following her, as she floated down with the tide, would by-and-by rescue her, and bring her back, claiming salvage."

The Daily News (1899).

The Soldier and the Lawyer

"Such professions as the soldier and the lawyer give ample oportunity for crimes but not much for mere illusions. If you have composed a bad opera you may persuade yourself that it is a good one; if you have carved a bad statue you can think yourself better than Michelangelo. But if you have lost a battle you cannot believe you have won it; if your client is hanged you cannot pretend that you have got him off."

--G. K. Chesterton.

Electo

The captain or leader chosen by a group of mutineers.

"The old souldiers, after the manner of seditions, created a Generall, whom they called the Electo."

Sir Robert Stapylton, Strada's The history of the Low-Countrey Warres (1650).

Gamesters and Highwaymen

“Gamesters and highwaymen are, generally, very good to their whores, but they are very devils to their wives.”

John Gay, The Beggar’s Opera (1728).

Chuckers-Out

“But the bearded bloke’s aim now seemed to be to rush the ceremonies a bit. He hustled R. V. Smethurst off stage rather like a chucker-out in a pub regretfully ejecting an old and respected customer....”

P. G. Wodehouse, Right Ho, Jeeves (1934).

Rhetoricians

"Isocrates was a Rhetorician by profession: the framing of sentences, and turning of periods, was the great business of his long life."

Bishop Connop Thirlwall, A history of Greece (1838).

Child Laborers in 19th Century England

“Tommy knew he was fortunate to be going to school with the Fairlie boys. If he forgot, his father could remind him that lads his age worked hand looms from sunup till dark and thanked the Lord for the work. Other boys sweated through twelve-hour shifts in smoky factories. One government report found a young nail-maker paying a high price for doing shoddy work: ‘Somebody in the warehouse took him and put his head down on an iron counter and hammered a nail through his ear, and the boy has made good nails every since.’”

Kevin Cook, Tommy’s Honor (2007).

Laborer

Someone who works, usually at some manual labor.

"His poor clothes piled in the sad attic of Frisco joyous hamburg-sizzling suppertime dusks of summer and manual labor; good Cody; a man who works is good, this is a maxim among the old people and one that you can't gainsay--and the book, the book, it's got a 1935 date on it, what is it doing, like that old green jalopy hungup in this attic, this town so far from its cra-- "But in the afternoon, especially late, around four, how the red sun illuminates these dusty objects of Cody's life, how mutely and yet eloquently they lie there, unattended, left and thrown there, still-life geometrical images of Cody's poor attempt to stay alive and strong beneath the skies of catastrophe."

Jack Kerouac, Visions of Cody (1951).

Free Lance

A mercenary soldier who owns a lance and no overriding commitment to fight for one side or another in a war. Knights in the Middle Ages, who offered their services for money or on commission, i.e. for plunder. A condottiere.

"I offered Richard the service of my Free Lances."

Sir Walter Scott, Ivanhoe (1820).

Trencher-man

A cook or caterer. A parasite at someone’s table.

“He had alreadie bene more fed to his liking, then hee could bee by the skilfullest trencher-men of Media.”

Sir Philip Sidney, The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia (1586).

Dummerer

A beggar who pretends to be deaf and dumb.

“Uhl was a dummerer who had lost his store. Five years before, he had been sitting on the world. Any day on which his sad face, his package of pins, and his I am deaf and dumb sign didn’t take twenty dollars out of the office buildings along his route was a rotten day. His big card was his ability to play the statue when skeptical people yelled or made sudden noises behind him. When the Dummy was right, a gun going off beside his ear wouldn’t make him twitch an eyelid. But too much heroin broke his nerves until a whisper was enough to make him jump. He put away his pins and his sign—another man whose social life had ruined him.”

Dashiell Hammett, Dead Yellow Women (1924).

Boatmen

"Strange, battered little boats, piled high with brush and wattles, made their way up and down the river, each boatman pursuing his own sad, small livelihood at the uncertain mercy of the waters. 'It is the same with all of us,' thought Kaoru to himself. 'Am I to boast that I am safe from the flood, calm and secure in a jeweled mansion?'"

Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji (10th Century).

Translated by Edward G. Seidensticker.

Batman and a King's Qualifications

Batman: Someone who serves a cavalry officer in the military.

"But nowadays we see some princes who aspire to anything except the one thing which would make them deserve the name of prince; and stupid subjects, who look for everything in their kings except the one thing needful. 'He is young'; that would recommend him as a bridegroom to a bride, not as a prince to the state. 'He is good-looking'; that is the right praise for a woman. 'He is broad-shouldered'; if you were praising an athlete, that would be the way to do it. 'He is strong and can stand hard toil'; that is a testimonial for a batman or a houseboy. 'He has a large store of gold'; you are describing an active moneylender. 'He is eloquent'; that's what dazzles me in a sophist. 'He sings well, he dances well'; that is the way to praise flute-players and actors, not kings. 'He has no equal in drinking'--for former princes actually delighted in this commendation! It would be fitter praise for a sponge. 'He is tall, and stands head and shoulders above the rest'; that's splendid, if one wants to reach something down from a high place. As for saying 'He's a skilled dice player, he's good at chess', that is praise shared with the lowest idlers, and a prince should be ashamed of it. You may heap up everything--public adoration, gold and jewels, statues, a pedigree drawn from Hercules (or from Codrus or Cecrops if you prefer), but unless you tell me of a mind far removed from vulgar foolishness, free from sordid desires for worthless things, and from the prejudices of the herd, I have not heard any praise worthy of a king."

Erasmus, Adages ("Aut fatuum autregem nasci oportere") (1515).

[translated by Margaret Mann Phillips (1967)].

Regraters

Those who buy up food supplies and resell them at higher prices. Those who buy commodities wholesale from the producer and sell them in the market. Retailers.

"The poore shall curse thee, Oh thou regrater, Thou engrosser of corne, and raiser of prices."

Daniel Rogers, Naaman the Syrian, his disease and cure (1642).

Wise Women

A midwife, a sorceress, a woman doctor.

"In his extremity he sought the assistance of a wisewoman, Alison Pearson, who treated him so successfully that he completely recovered. His enemies ascribed his cure to witchcraft."

Arthur H. Bullen, Dict. Nat. Biog. (1885).

Varlets

A boy or man who is a servant, menial, groom, or attendant.

"She calls out to the varlets she doth keep: Braine the dog's master first, and then the cur."

Sir Robert Stapleton, Juvenal's sixteen satyrs (1647).

Snudge

"Snudge, one that lurks under a Bed, to watch an opportunity to Rob the House."
B. E., A new dictionary of the terms ancient and modern of the canting crew (1700).

"So, thinks I, I'll go and search them rooms. Upstairs the hall was dark, but I found the duke's room, and started to paw around it with my hands; but I recollected it wouldn't be much like the king to let anybody else take care of that money but his own self; so then I went to his room and begun to paw around there. But I see I couldn't do nothing without a candle, and I dasn't light one, of course. So I judged I'd got to do the other thing--lay for them and eavesdrop. About that time I hears their footsteps coming, and was going to skip under the bed; I reached for it, but it wasn't where I thought it would be; but I touched the curtain that hid Mary Jane's frocks, so I jumped in behind that and snuggled in amongst the gowns, and stood there perfectly still. They came in and shut the door; and the first thing the duke done was to get down and look under the bed. Then I was glad I hadn't found the bed when I wanted it. And yet, you know, it's kind of natural to hide under the bed when you are up to anything private."

Mark Twain, Huckleberry Finn (1884).

Police, Costermongers, and Prostitutes

Costermonger: an appleseller, a fruiterer, especially one that sold his fruit in the open street. A barrowman.

"He had no illusions about the London police. Indeed, he was collecting evidence of their malpractices; and those costermongers, not allowed to stand their barrows in the streets; and prostitutes, good Lord, the fault wasn't in them, nor in young men either, but in our detestable social system and so forth; all of which he considered, could be seen considering, grey, dogged, dapper, clean, as he walked across the Park to tell his wife that he loved her."

Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (1925).

Puffers

Someone who bids up the price at an auction on behalf of the seller.

"It is only slipping a puffer or two at them and they may be raised to any price."

C. Johnston, Chrysal: or the adventures of a guinea (1760).

Surgeons

"The sick in soul insist that it is humanity that is sick, and they are the surgeons to operate on it. They want to turn the world into a sickroom. And once they get humanity strapped to the operating table, they operate on it with an ax."

--Eric Hoffer

Mufti

A Mohammedan priest or expounder of the law.

"A mufti was essentially a private scholar known for his learning and his ability to give rulings on disputed questions by means of the exercise of ijtihad. The opinions (fatwa) given by famous muftis could be incorporated in authoritative books of fiqh after a time, but the activity of giving fatwas had to continue. From perhaps the thirteenth century onwards rulers appointed official muftis, who might receive salaries, but the private scholar, who was paid a fee by those who sought a ruling from him, and was under no obligation to the the ruler, had a position of special respect in the community."

Albert Hourani, A History of the Arab Peoples (1991).

Pollinctor

In antiquity, someone who washed, anointed, and otherwise prepared cadavers for embalming or burning on the funeral pile.

"What is delivered by Herodotus concerning the Aegyptian Pollinctors, or such as anointed the dead."

Sir Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica (1646).

A Caster in Plaster

Someone who works with plaster; someone who plasters buildings; someone who manufactures figures from plaster.

"...I to my wife, and with her to the plaisterer's at Charing Cross that casts heads and bodies in plaister, and there I had my whole face done; but I was vexed first to be forced to daub all my face over with pomatum: but was pretty to feel how soft and easily it is done on the face, and by and by, by degrees, how hard it becomes, that you cannot break it, and sits so close that you cannot pull it off, and yet so easy that it is as soft as a pillow, so safe is everything where many parts of the body do bear alike. Thus was the mould made; but when it came off there was little pleasure in it as it looks in the mould nor any resemblance, whatever there will be in the figure when I come to see it cast off, which I am to call for a day or two hence, which I shall long to see."

Samuel Pepys, Diary (February 10, 1669).

Exploitation of the Fear of Death

Friar: a kind of monk; of the various orders of religious "brothers" or friars, the most important were the Franciscans, the Dominicans, the Augustines, and the Carmelites.

"The evangelical humanists were often bitterly opposed by the friars who had a virtual and lucrative preaching monopoly, and it is certain that the exploitation of the fear of death in later medieval religious practice was partly nourished by the economic needs of the clergy."

Erasmus, Praise of Folly (1509)
[translated by Betty Radice, notes by A. H. T. Levi (1993)].

The Cook and the Tyrant

"Because my cook ruined the mutton
I thrashed him. You protested: 'Glutton!
Tyrant! The punishment should fit
The crime--you can't assault a man
For a spoilt dinner.' Yes, I can.
What worse crime can a cook commit?"

Martial, The Epigrams, (85 AD).