6. slang
an imposition, or a person who imposes upon others. A very
expressive but slang word, synonymous at one time with HUM AND HAW.
Lexicographers for a long time objected to the adoption of this term.
Richardson uses it frequently to express the meaning of other words,
but, strange to say, omits it in the alphabetical arrangement as
unworthy of recognition! In the first edition of this work, 1785 was
given as the earliest date at which the word could be found in a printed
book. Since then HUMBUG has been traced half a century further back, on
the title-page of a singular old jest-book—“_The Universal Jester_; or
a pocket companion for the Wits: being a choice collection of merry
conceits, facetious drolleries, &c., clenchers, closers, closures,
bon-mots, and HUMBUGS,” by Ferdinando Killigrew. London, about 1735-40.
The notorious Orator Henley was known to the mob as ORATOR HUMBUG. The
fact may be learned from an illustration in that exceedingly curious
little collection of _Caricatures_, published in 1757, many of which
were sketched by Lord Bolingbroke—Horace Walpole filling in the names
and explanations. Halliwell describes HUMBUG as “a person who hums,” and
cites Dean Milles’s MS., which was written about 1760. In the last
century, the game now known as double-dummy was termed HUMBUG. Lookup, a
notorious gambler, was struck down by apoplexy when playing at this
game. On the circumstance being reported to Foote, the wit said—“Ah, I
always thought he would be HUMBUGGED out of the world at last!” It has
been stated that the word is a corruption of Hamburgh, from which town
so many false bulletins and reports came during the war in the last
century. “Oh, that is _Hamburgh_ [or HUMBUG],” was the answer to any
fresh piece of news which smacked of improbability. Grose mentions it in
his Dictionary, 1785; and in a little printed squib, published in 1808,
entitled _Bath Characters_, by T. Goosequill, HUMBUG is thus mentioned
in a comical couplet on the title-page:—
“Wee Thre Bath Deities bee,
HUMBUG, Follie, and Varietee.”
Gradually from this time the word began to assume a place in periodical
literature, and in novels written by not over-precise authors. In the
preface to a flat, and most likely unprofitable poem, entitled, _The
Reign of HUMBUG, a Satire_, 8vo, 1836, the author thus apologizes for
the use of the word:—“I have used the term HUMBUG to designate this
principle [wretched sophistry of life generally], considering that, it
is now adopted into our language as much as the words dunce, jockey,
cheat, swindler, &c., which were formerly only colloquial terms.” A
correspondent, who in a number of _Adversaria_ ingeniously traced
bombast to the inflated Doctor Paracelsus Bombast, considers that HUMBUG
may, in like manner, be derived from Homberg, the distinguished chemist
of the court of the Duke of Orleans, who, according to the following
passage from Bishop Berkeley’s _Siris_, was an ardent and successful
seeker after the philosopher’s stone!
“§194.—Of this there cannot be a better proof than the experiment
of Monsieur Homberg, who made gold of mercury by introducing light
into its pores, but at such trouble and expense that, I suppose,
nobody will try the experiment for profit. By this injunction of
light and mercury, both bodies became fixed, and produced a
third different to either, to wit, real gold. For the truth
of which fact I refer to the memoirs of the French Academy of
Sciences.”—_Berkeley’s Works_, vol ii. p. 366 (Wright’s edition).
Another derivation suggested is that of AMBAGE, a Latin word adopted
into the English language _temp._ Charles I. (_see_ May’s translation
of Lucan’s _Pharsalia_), and meaning conduct the reverse of
straightforward. Again, in the (burlesque) _Loves of Hero and Leander_
(date 1642), we find “MUM-BUG, quoth he, ’twas known of yore,” a cant
expression, no doubt, commanding a person to “shut up,” or hold his
tongue, and evidently derived from the game of _mum-budget_ or
_silence_, upon which Halliwell (_Dict. Arch_.) has descanted.
AMBAGE is also used in the sense of “circumlocution.” “Without any
long studie or tedious AMBAGE.”—_Puttenham_, _Art of Poesie_.
“Umh! y’ are full of AMBAGE.”—_Decker’s Whore of Babylon_, 1607.
“Thus from her cell Cumæan Sibyl sings
Ambiguous AMBAGES, the cloyster rings
With the shrill sound thereof, in most dark strains.”
_Vicar’s Virgil_, 1632.
De Quincey thus discourses upon the word:—
“The word HUMBUG, for instance, rests upon a rich and comprehensive
basis; it cannot be rendered adequately either by German or by
Greek, the two richest of human languages; and without this
expressive word we should all be disarmed for one great case,
continually recurrent, of social enormity. A vast mass of villany,
that cannot otherwise be reached by legal penalties, or brought
within the rhetoric of scorn, would go at large with absolute
impunity were it not through the stern Rhadamanthean aid of this
virtuous and inexorable word.”—_Article on “Language.”_
The original collater of these notes purchased the collection of essays
known as the _Connoisseur_ at the sale of Thackeray’s library. At the
end of vol. i. he found a memorandum in the great humourist’s
handwriting—“p. 108, ‘HUMBUG,’ a new-coined expression.” On referring
to that page (in the 3rd edition, 1757) this paragraph was noted:—
“The same conduct of keeping close to their ranks was observed at
table, where the ladies seated themselves together. Their
conversation was here also confined wholly to themselves, and seemed
like the mysteries of the _Bona Dea_, in which men were forbidden to
have any share. It was a continued laugh and whisper from the
beginning to the end of dinner. A whole sentence was scarce ever
spoken aloud. Single words, indeed, now and then broke forth; such
as, odious, horrible, detestable, shocking, HUMBUG. This last
new-coined expression, which is only to be found in the nonsensical
vocabulary, sounds absurd and disagreeable whenever it is
pronounced; but from the mouth of a lady it is ‘shocking,’
‘detestable,’ ‘horrible,’ and ‘odious.’”
The use of this term is almost universal; in California there is a town
called Humbug Flat—a name which gives a significant hint of the
acuteness of the first settler.
Source: The Slang Dictionary, 1864