Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface -- Chapter 1. The English Underworld in the 16th-18th Centuries -- Chapter 2. Early Canting Literature -- Chapter 3. The New Canting Terms Reported by Richard Head -- Chapter 4. The Canting Terms of Coles' Dictionary -- Chapter 5. Β.E.'s Innovative Approach -- Chapter 6. The Canting Component of The Ladies Dictionary -- Chapter 7. Alexander Smith's Thieves New Canting Dictionary -- Chapter 8. Lexical Additions in A New Canting Dictionary -- Chapter 9. John Poulter's Canting Expressions -- Chapter 10. Francis Grose's Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue -- Chapter 11. The Evolution of the Concept of Cant in the 17th and 18th Centuries -- Appendices -- Bibliography -- Summaries -- Indexes