Chapter Diamond Necklace to Dido of D by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Diavolo (Fra). Michele Pozza, an insurgent of Calabria (1760-1806). Scribe wrote a libretto on this hero for Auber.

Dibs or Dibbs. Money.(Compare tips, gifts to schoolboys; and diobolus. Compare also dot with tot, jot, and yod.)
   The huckle-bones of sheep used for gambling purposes are called dibbs; and Locke speaks of stones used for the same game, which he calls dibstones.

Dicers' Oaths False as dicers' oaths. Worthless or untrustworthy, as when a gambler swears never to touch dice again. (Shakespeare: Hamlet, iii. 4.)

Dicilla (in Orlando Furioso). One of Logistilla's handmaids, famous for her chastity.

Dick That happened in the reign of Queen Dick - i.e. never; there never was a Queen Richard.

Dick's Hatband (Richard Cromwell, 1626-1712.)
   (1) Dick's hatband, which was made of sand. His regal honours were "a rope of sand."
   (2) As fine as Dick's hatband. The crown of England would be a very fine thing for anyone to get.
   (3) As queer as Dick's hatband. Few things have been more ridiculous than the exaltation and abdication of the Protector's son.
   (4) As tight as Dick's hatband. The hatband of Richard Cromwell was the crown, which was too tight for him to wear with safety.

Dick = Richard. The diminutive "Dicky" is also common.

"Jockey of Norfolk [Lord Howard], be not too bold,
For Dicky [or Dickon], thy master, is bought and sold."
Shakespeare: Richard III., v. 3. (Dickey or Dickon is Richard III.)

Dickens (See Boz.)
   Dickens is a perverted oath corrupted from "Nick." Mrs. Page says -

"I cannot tell what the dickens his name is." -
Shakespeare: Merry Wives of Windsor, iii. 2.

    The three poets who express a conflagration are "Dickens! How-itt, Burns!"

Dickey or Dicky. A donkey; anciently called a Dick-ass, now termed Jack-ass. It is a term of endearment, as we call a pet bird a dicky-bird. The ass is called Dick-y (little Richard), Cuddy (little Cuthbert), Neddy (little Edward), Jack-ass, Moke or Mike, etc.
   Dickey. The rumble behind a carriage; also a leather apron, a child's bib, and a false shirt or front. All these are from the same root. (Dutch, dekken; German, decken; Anglo-Saxon, thecan; Latin, tego, to cover.)

Dicky (A), in George III.'s time, meant a flannel petticoat. It was afterwards applied to what were called false shirts - i.e. a shirt front worn over a dirty shirt, or in lieu of a shirt. These half-shirts were first called Tommies.

"A hundred instances I soon could pick ye -
Without a cap we view the fair,
The bosom heaving also bare,
The hips ashamed, forsooth, to wear a dicky."
Peter Pindar: Lord Auckland's Triumph.

   So again: -

"And sister Peg, and sister Joan,
With scarce a flannel dicky on ..."
Middlesex Election, letter iv.

   (Hair, whalebone, or metal vestments, called dress-improvers, are hung on women's backs, as a "dicky" is hung on a coach behind.)

Dicky Sam A native-born inhabitant of Liverpool, as Tim Bobbin is a native of Lancashire.

Dictator of Letters François Marie Arouet de Voltaire, called the Great Pan. (1694-1778.)

Didactic Poetry is poetry that teaches some moral lesson, as Pope's Essay on Man. (Greek, didasko, I teach.)