Queen’s tobacco-pipe

the kiln in which all contraband tobacco seized by the Custom-house officers is burned. Queer , an old cant word, once in continual use as a prefix, signifying base, roguish, or worthle ,—the opposite of RUM , which signified good and genuine. Queer , in all probability, is immediately derived from the cant language. It has been mooted that it came into use from a quære (?) being set before a man’s name; but it is more than probable that it was brought into this country, by the gipsies, from Germany, where QUER signifies “cro ” or “crooked.” At all events it is believed to have been first used in England as a cant word.