ABSTRACT
Jack. See: can’t sleep; come ashore; fuck you, J.; high, low; hit the road; like Jack; sod you; swing that. Jack doesn’t care and Jack loves a fight are C20, mostly RN, c.pp., referring, the former to the seaman’s infectious insouciance, the latter to his love of a scrap, esp. fisticuffs. jack-knife carpenter! is ‘a cry of derision hurled at a man, especially a carpenter, who uses a pocket knife in an emergency. Legend has it that all jack-knife carpenters end up in hell’ (Leechman): Can.: since c. 1910; by 1960, ob. Jack loves a fight. See: Jack doesn’t care. Jack’s come home is a theatrical c.p., applied to a happy-go-lucky, slapdash hotel or boarding house: C20. It occurs in, e.g. Ngaio Marsh, Vintage Murder, 1938. Jackson. See: it’s gone; jammed; steady, J. jails. See: all the jails; forty exits; see you in court; worse in. jake. See: she’ll be j.; that’s jake. jam. See: all jam; d’you want; it’s always; it’s money; kick out; that accounts; what do you want. James. See: home, James. Jameson. See: whoa, J. jammed like Jackson. A late C19-20 RN c.p., used when something leads to disaster or goes less, although still, seriously wrong; rather less common since c. 1945. From one John Jackson who, in 1787, refused to listen to his pilot and consequently went close to wrecking his ship. (F&G.) The earliest record of the c.p. I have occurs in W.N.Glascock, Naval Sketch-Book (chapter II, p. 136), 1826, ‘Jackson’s story is elaborated in the Letters and Papers of Admiral of the Fleet Sir Thomas By am Martin GCB (Navy Records Society, 1903, pp. 106-7)’—as Rear-Adm. P.W.Brock informs me. Cf up Shit Creek. Jane. See: me Tarzan. January. See: molasses in. jar. See: wouldn’t that jar. jaw. See: like a sheep’s. jazz. See: and all that j. jealous. See: you’re jealous. Jeeves. See: carry on. Jericho. See: well, I’ll go. Jerry. See: stick it, J.; walls of. Jerusalem. See: all jam; since Jesus. Jessie. See: more arse. jest. See: I love my j. Jesus. See: since J. Jesus saves, (but) Moses invests is ‘an irreverent answer’ to the over-evangelistic: US: later C20. (Ashley, 1984.) Jesus wants me for a sunbeam, and a bloody fine sunbeam I’ll be is ‘the troops’ [soldiers’] version of a sacred hymn’ (anon., 1978): since the 1930s(?). P.B.: the hymn parodied is by Nellie Talbot; it appears, e.g., as No. 100 in The Methodist School Hymnal (Primary Department and Infant School), where occurs also, as No. 73, ‘Jesus loves me! this I know,/For the Bible tells me so’, altered by ‘the troops’ to Jesus loves me! Yes, I know! So does Ragtime Cowboy Joe. No. 73 is by Anna Warner. Hymnals such as this would, in the days when attendance at Sunday School was much more widespread than it is now, have provided a common background of musical experience for many servicemen. I surmise that the dating of these parodies is earlier than E.P. allows, perhaps pre-WW1. Jew(s). See: cold enough; some of my. jib. See: long may; more wind; never let it. jig is up-the. The game is up-All is discovered: US: c. 1860-1920. George P.Barnham, in his very readable Memoirs, 1872. Jim. See: hello, Jim; I’m worried. Jim Smith. See: I’ll give you.
