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W. P. . or WARMING-PAN. A clergyman who holds a living _pro tempore_, under a bond of resignation, is styled a W. P., or WARMING-PAN rector, because he keeps the place warm for his successor. WARMING-PAN was a term first popularly applied to a substitute in the reign of James II.
Wabble . or WOBBLE, to move from side to side, to roll about. Johnson terms it “a low, barbarous word.”
Walk into . to overcome, to demolish; “I’ll WALK INTO his affections,” _i.e._, I will scold or thrash him. “He WALKED INTO the grub,” _i.e._, he demolished it. WALK INTO also means to get into the debt of any one, as “He WALKED INTO the affections of all the tradesmen in the neighbourhood.”
Walk your chalks . be off, or run away,—spoken sharply by any one who wishes to get rid of a troublesome person. _See_ CHALKS.
Walk-over . a re-election without opposition.—_Parliamentary_, but derived from the turf, where a horse which has no rivals WALKS OVER the course. _See_ DEAD HEAT.
Walker . a letter-carrier or postman. From an old song, called, “Walker, the twopenny postman.”
Walker! or HOOKEY WALKER! an ejaculation of incredulity, used when a . person is telling a story which you know to be all gammon, or worse. One explanation of the phrase is this:—“Years ago there was a person named Walker, an aquiline-nosed Jew, who exhibited an orrery, which he called by the erudite name of ‘Eidouranion.’ He was also a popular lecturer on astronomy, and often, telescope in hand, invited his pupils to ‘take a sight’ at the moon and stars. The lecturer’s phrase struck his schoolboy auditory, who frequently ‘took a sight’ with that gesture of outstretched arm and adjustment to nose and eye which was the first garnish of the popular saying. The next step was to assume phrase and gesture as the outward and visible mode of knowingness in general.” This has been denied, however, and a statement made that HOOKEY WALKER was a magistrate of dreaded acuteness and incredulity, whose hooked nose gave the title of “beak” to all his successors; it is also said, moreover, that the gesture of applying the thumb to the nose and agitating the little finger, as an expression of “Don’t you wish you may get it?” is considerably older than the first story would seem to indicate. There are many and various explanations of the term, given according to the development of fancy.—_Notes and Queries_, iv. 425.
Walking the pegs . a method of cheating at the game of cribbage, by a species of legerdemain, the sharper either moving his own pegs forward, or those of his antagonist backward, according to the state of the game.
Wallabee-track . Colonial slang for the tramp. When a man in Australia is “on the road” looking for employment, he is said to be on the WALLABEE-TRACK.
Wallflower . a person who goes to a ball and looks on without dancing, either from choice or through not being able to obtain a partner. From the position.
Wallflowers . left-off and “regenerated” clothes exposed for sale on the bunks and shop-boards of Seven Dials. _See_ REACH-ME-DOWNS.
Wallop . to beat, or thrash. John Gough Nichols derives this word from an ancestor of the Earl of Portsmouth, one Sir John Wallop, Knight of the Garter, who in King Henry VIII.’s time distinguished himself by WALLOPING the French; but it is more probably connected with wheal, a livid swelling in the skin after a blow. _See_ POT-WALLOPER.
Walloping . a beating or thrashing; sometimes used in an adjective sense, as big, or very large.
Wapping . or WHOPPING, of a large size, great.
War-paint . evening dress. When people go out in full costume they are often said to have their WAR-PAINT on. Also, military “full-fig.”
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