> My collection of Borrow are passed down and were bought by my great
> grandmother - sadly she didn't pick up this apparently obscene Cabinet. I
> really want to read it as well now. Can it surpass Purcell's catch songs?

This is all I know about it.  (I was directed to this by Rictor Norton.)

542  "BLOWEN'S, the, cabinet of choice songs." A Beautiful. . . Collection
of... Smutty Ditties . . . Contains, inter alia : "The Great
Plenipotentiary/'
"Oh, Miss Tabitha Ticklecock," "The Magical Carrot of the Parsley Bed,"
"Katty O'More or the Root," "My Mot's in the Luck," "Roger in all his
Glory," "My Woman is a Rummy Whore," "The Pego Club--The Invisible
Tool." pp. 48, sm. 8vo. W. Weft, 57 Wych St., Strand, n.d. (c. 1830).

Asbbeel, 133-7; B.A. 384.
41

            http://www.immortalia.com/html/bibliography/1936-rose-registry-of-erotic-books/part-01.htm

> to clear up the various typical behaviours of a Blowen, other than blowing
> I suppose, the Grose 1811 dictionary puts it all in context:
>
> "The blowen kidded the swell into a snoozing ken, and shook him of his
> dummee and thimble"
>
> Edmund

This is actually the fourth editon of Captain Francis Grose's +Classical
Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue+ (as enlarged by a member of the Whip Club).
The first edition, in which the term "blowen" is first recorded in this
spelling, appeared in 1785, and there was a further expansion by Pierce Egan
in 1823.

The 1811 edition is available from Gutenburg:

        http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext04/dcvgr10.txt

[The earliest key text for the term, where it's spelled "blowing", is Thomas
Shadwell's +Squire of Alsatia+ (1688)]

One of the most comprehensive sets of definitions is in Eric Partridge, +A
Dictionary of the Underworld+.  As this isn't that easy to come by (and I
recently transcribed it) I'll append what Partridge says there.

Another text with lots of blowens in it is John Farmer's anthology, +Musa
Pedestris+

         www.gutenberg.org/etext/8466

Robin

bloss. (See also blowen, blower.)  ‘A Thief or Shop-lift,’ B.E., 1698; 1725,
A New Canting Dict.; 1785, Grose ; a sense that, if genuine, was  obs.  by
1810.  It is suspect.  The next sense, or perhaps sense 3, is the original
one ; and sense 3 is prob. the basic one.--2. A pimp's or a bully's
'pretended Wife, or Mistress, whom he guards, and who by her Trading
supports him,' B.E„ 1698; 1725, A Canting Dict.; 1785, Gross; by 1859,
current in U.S.A. for any mistress (Matsell's Vocabulum) ; by 1870  obs.  in
England, and by 1900  obs. in U.S.A. ; 1890, F & H. Perhaps short for
blossom--3. Hence, any whore:  1698, B.E. ; 1725, A Canting Dict. ; 1741,
The Amorous Gallant's Tongue; 1797, Potter; 1823, Bee; obs. by 1880.--4.
(Prob. ex sense 3.) In U.S.A., a woman; a girl: 1859, Matsell, Vocabulum ;
1889, B & L ; obs. by 1920.

blowen; blowing. 'Blowing, Natural, Convenient, Tackle, Buttock, Pure,
Purest Pure. Several Names for a Mistress, or rather a Whore,' Thomas
Shadwell, The Squire of Alsatia, 1688; 1698, B.E. (mistress; whore) ; 1788,
Grose,  ‘Blower or Blowen A mistress or whore of a gentleman of the scamp'­
i.e., of a highwayman; 1812, J. H- Vaux ;  1818, J. J. Stockdale, Modern
Belles, 'He . …  Must sport a blowing in the park, / To imitate a richer
spark ' ; 1823, Byron, Don Juan, XI (blowing) ; 1823 Egan's Grose; 1830, E.
Lytton Bulwer, Paul Clifford ; 1834, W. H. Ainsworth, Rookwood ; 1838, Table
Book, Wm Hone, ‘Blowin--" an unfortunate girl" … This is derived from
blühen, German, to bloom or blossom’;  1841, Tait's Magazine, April,
‘Flowers of Hemp’ ; by 1848 current in U.S.A. as ` a prostitute' (The
Ladies' Repository); 1848, Sinks of London; 1859, H ; by 1859, current in
New York as ‘a thief's mistress’ (Matsell, Vocabulum) ; by 1880,  obs.
except literarily.   Origin problematic; but if bloss is taken along with
blowen, it would appear possible that both words mean a flower (a blossom, a
blowing).--2. Hence, a woman, or girl: 1789, George Parker, Life's Painter
of Variegated Characters; 1821, D. Haggart, ‘Blone, a girl’; 1823, Egan's
Grose (id.) ; 1837, E. Lytton Bulwer, Ernest Maltravers ; 1848, G. W.
Reynolds, The Mysteries of London  I ; 1889, B & L ; by 1900,  obs. except
literarily.--3. A shoplifter (female: 1797, Potter;  obs. by 1870. Prob. ex
sense 1 ; cf. bloss, 1. -- 4. A wife: U.S.A. (-- 1794) : 1807, Henry Tufts,
A Narrative;  obs. by 1920.

blowen, rum. See rum blowen

blower. A whore: 1676, Coles, ‘Blower, c. A Quean’ ;  ‘Blower, c. a
Mistress, also a Whore,' B.E., 1698; 1725, A New Canting Dict ; 1785, Grose
; 1839, Brandon, ` Blower--a girl; a contemptuous name in opposition to
jomer'; 1859, H ;  obs. by 1887 (Baumann, Londonismen).  Perhaps cognate
with blowen …

blowing, n., is a variant of blowen, q.v. E.g., T. Shadwell, 1688; J. J.
Stockdale, 1818; Byron, 1823; 1848, Sinks of London;  obs. by 1890 …

blowse A whore ;  rarely, a kept mistress: 1701, D'Urfey, The Bath,'
Goodb'w'e to the Knight, was bubl'd last Night; That keeps a Blowse, and
beats his Spouse' ; 1726, A New Canting Dict. at  clicketting;  app. obs. by
1700 or so, for Grose, 1785, does not give this sense at all, but makes
blowse synonymous with Blowsabella, ‘a woman whose hair is dishevelled and
hanging about her face, a slattern’.  Orig. a corruption or a 'disguise ' of
bloss, possibly on blowen (or blower) : though cf. S.E. Blowsabella

*blowser.   ‘A prostitute, especially an elderly, or a dirty, dishevelled
one,' IA, 1931: throughout  C. 20.  The same semantics as for blowse.

rum blowen.    A pretty woman : 1789, G. Parker, Life's Painter of
Variegated Characters (glossary) ; 1797, Potter (r. blowing);  1801, Col.
George Hanger;  1809, Andrewes ;  1811, Lex. Bal., ‘A handsome wench’; 1859,
Matsell (U.S.A.);  obs. by , 1900.         Ex rum, ‘excellent’, and blowen,
2. --2. A gentlewoman:  U.S.A. (-- 1794) :      1809, Henry Tufts, A
Narrative;  obs. by 1880. Ex rum adj.  obs. blowen, 2.   The English c, is
rum mort.

rum blower.     ‘Rum-blower, c. a very Handsom Mistress, kept by a
particular Man ', B.E., 1698; repeated in A New Canting Dict., 1725;  obs.
by 1830.  See rum, adj. ; blower is a disguise-variation of blowen. --2.
Hence, 'a handsome wench', i.e., whore: 1785, Grose ;  obs. by 1860.

rum blowing.   A variant of rum blowen.         Potter, 1797 ; Sinks of
London, 1848.