Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction, and the Drama, Vol. 2 (part 1)

An American reprint of “The Reader’s Handbook of allusions, references, plots and stories, by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D., of Trinity Hall, Cambridge,” has been for several years in the hands of cis-Atlantic students.

Too much praise cannot be awarded to the erudition and patient diligence displayed in the compilation of this volume of nearly twelve hundred pages. The breadth of range contemplated by the learned editor is best indicated in his own words:

“The object of this Handbook is to supply readers and speakers with a lucid, but very brief account of such names as are used in allusions and references, whether by poets or prose writers;—to furnish those who consult it with the plot of popular dramas, the story of epic poems, and the outline of well-known tales. The number of dramatic plots sketched out is many hundreds. Another striking and interesting feature of the book is the revelation of the source from which dramatists and romancers have derived their stories, and the strange repetitions of historic incidents. It has been borne in mind throughout that it is not enough to state a fact. It must be stated attractively, and the character described must be drawn characteristically if the reader is to appreciate it, and feel an interest in what he reads.”

All that Dr. Brewer claims for his book is sustained by examination of it. It is nevertheless true that there is in it a mass of matter comparatively unattractive to the American student and to the general reader. Many of his “allusions” are to localities and neighborhood traditions that, however interesting to English people, seem to us trivial, verbose and inopportune, while he, whose chief object in the purchase of the work is to possess a popular encyclopædia of literature, is rather annoyed than edified by even an erudite author when his “talk is of oxen,” fish, flesh and fowl.

Furthermore, the Handbook was prepared so long ago that the popular literature of the last dozen years is unrecorded; writers who now occupy the foremost places in the public eye not being so much as named.

In view of these and other drawbacks to the extended usefulness of the manual, the publishing-house whose imprint is upon the title-page of the present work, taking the stanch foundation laid by Dr. Brewer, have caused to be constructed upon it a work that, while retaining all of the original material that can interest and aid the English-speaking student, gives also “characters and sketches found in American novels, poetry and drama.”

It goes without saying that in the attempt to do this, it was necessary to leave out a greater bulk of entertaining matter than could be wrought in upon the original design. The imagination of the compiler, to whose reverent hands the task was entrusted, recurred continually, while it was in progress, to the magnificent hyperbole of the sacred narrator—“The which, if they should be written, every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.” Appreciation of the honor put upon her by the commission deepened into delight as the work went on—prideful delight in the richness and variety of our national literature. To do ample justice to every writer and book would have been impossible, but the leading works of every author of note have the honorable place. It is hoped that the company of “characters” introduced among dramatis personæ of English and foreign classics, ancient and modern, will enliven pages that are already fascinating. Many names of English authors omitted from the Handbook for the reason stated awhile ago, will also be found in their proper positions.

The compiler and editor of this volume would be ungrateful did she not express her sense of obligation for assistance received in the work of collecting lists of writers and books from “The Library of American Literature,” prepared by Mr. Edmund Clarence Stedman and Miss Ellen Hutchinson.

Besides this, and a tolerable degree of personal familiarity with the leading literature of her own land, her resort has been to the public libraries in New York City—notably, to The Astor and The Mercantile. For the uniform courtesy she has received from those in charge of these institutions she herewith makes acknowledgement in the publisher’s name and in her own.

MARION HARLAND.

CHARACTER SKETCHES OF ROMANCE,

FICTION, AND THE DRAMA.

Falkland, an aristocratic gentleman, of a noble, loving nature, but the victim of false honor and morbid refinement of feeling. Under great provocation, he was goaded on to commit murder, but being tried was honorably acquitted, and another person was executed for the crime. Caleb Williams, a lad in Falkland’s service, accidently became acquainted with these secret facts, but, unable to live in the house under the suspicious eyes of Falkland, he ran away. Falkland tracked him from place to place, like a blood-hound, and at length arrested him for robbery. The true statement now came out, and Falkland died of shame and broken spirit. —W. Godwin, Caleb Williams (1794).

⁂ This tale has been dramatized by G. Colman, under the title of The Iron Chest, in which Falkland is called “Sir Edward Mortimer,” and Caleb Williams is called “Wilford.”

False One (The), a tragedy by Beaumont and Fletcher (1619). The subject is the amours of Julius Caesar and Cleopat´ra.

Falsetto (Signor), a man who fawns on Fazio in prosperity, and turns his back on him when fallen into disgrace.—Dean Milman, Fazio (1815).

Falstaff (Sir John), in The Merry Wives of Windsor, and in the two parts of Henry IV., by Shakespeare. In Henry V., his death is described by Mrs. Quickly, hostess of an inn in Eastcheap. In the comedy, Sir John is represented as making love to Mrs. Page, who “fools him to the top of his bent.” In the historic plays, he is represented as a soldier and a wit, the boon companion of “Mad-cap Hal” (the prince of Wales). In both cases, he is a mountain of fat, sensual, mendacious, boastful, and fond of practical jokes.

In the king’s army, “Sir John” was Captain, “Peto” Lieutenant, “Pistol” ancient [ensign], and “Bardolph” Corporal.

C.R. Leslie says:says: “Quin’s ‘Falstaff’ must have been glorious. Since Garrick’s time there have been more than one ‘Richard,’ ‘Hamlet,’ ‘Romeo,’ ‘Macbeth,’ and ‘Lear;’ but since Quin [1693-1766] only one 'Falstaff,' John Henderson [1747-1786].”

Falstaff, unimitated, inimitable, Falstaff, how shall I describe thee? Thou compound of sense and vice: of sense which may be admired, but not esteemed; of vice which may be despised, but hardly detested. “Falstaff ” is a character loaded with faults, and with those faults which naturally produce contempt. He is a thief and a glutton, a coward and a boaster, always ready to cheat the weak and prey upon the poor, to terrify the timorous and insult the defenceless. At once obsequious and malignant—yet the man thus corrupt, thus despicable, makes himself necessary to the prince by perpetual gaiety, and by unfailing power of exciting laughter.—Dr. Johnson.

Fanciful (Lady), a vain, conceited beauty, who calls herself “nice, strangely nice,” and says she was formed “to make the whole creation uneasy.” She loves Heartfree, a railer against women, and when he proposes marriage to Belinda, a rival beauty, spreads a most impudent scandal, which, however, reflects only on herself. Heartfree, who at one time was partly in love with her, says to her:

“Nature made you handsome, gave you beauty to a miracle, a shape without a fault, wit enough to make them relish ... but art has made you become the pity of our sex, and the jest of your own. There’s not a feature in your face but you have found the way to teach it some affected convulsion. Your feet, your hands, your very finger-ends, are directed never to move without some ridiculous air, and your language is a suitable trumpet to draw people’s eyes upon the raree-show” (act ii. 1).—Vanbrugh, The Provoked Wife (1697).

Fan-Fan, alias Phelin O’Tug, “a lolly-pop maker, and manufacturer of maids of honor to the court.” This merry, shy, and blundering elf, concealed in a bear-skin, makes love to Christine, the faithful attendant on the Countess Marie. Phelin O’Tug says his mother was too bashful ever to let him know her, and his father always kept in the back-ground.—E. Stirling, The Prisoner of State (1847).

Fang, a bullying, insolent magistrate, who would have sent Oliver Twist to prison, on suspicion of theft, if Mr. Brownlow had not interposed on the boy’s behalf.—C. Dickens, Oliver Twist (1837).

The original of this ill-tempered, bullying magistrate was Mr. Laing, of Hatton Garden, removed from the bench by the home secretary.—John Foster, Life of Dickens, iii. 4.

Fang and Snare, two sheriff’s officers.—Shakespeare, 2 Henry IV (1598).

Fanny (Robin). Country girl seduced under promise of marriage by Sergeant Troy. She dies with her child and is buried by Troy’s betrothed, who learns after her marriage the tale of Fanny’s wrongs.—T. Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd (1874).

Fanny (Lord). So John Lord Hervey was usually called by the wits of the time, in consequence of his effeminate habits. His appearance was that of a “half-wit, half-fool, half-man, half-beau.” He used rouge, drank ass’s milk, and took Scotch pills (1694-1743).

Consult Lord Fanny, and confide in Curll [publisher]. Byron, English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809).

Fanny (Miss), younger daughter of Mr. Sterling, a rich City merchant. She was clandestinely married to Lovewell. “Gentle-looking, soft-speaking, sweet-smiling, and affable,” wanting “nothing but a crook in her hand and a lamb under her arm to be a perfect picture of innocence and simplicity.” Every one loved her, and as her marriage was a secret, Sir John Melvil and Lord Ogleby both proposed to her. Her marriage with Lovewell being ultimately made known, her dilemma was removed.—Colman and Garrick, The Clandestine Marriage (1766).

Fan´teries (3 syl.), foot-soldiers, infantry.

Five other bandes of English fanteries. G. Gascoigne, 1535-1577, The Fruites of Warre (1575)

Fantine. Parisian girl, deserted by her lover and left to support her child as best she can. Her heroic self-devotion is one of the most interesting episodes of Les Miserables, a romance by Victor Hugo.

Faquir´, a religious anchorite, whose life is spent in the severest austerities and mortification.

He diverted himself, however ... especially with the Brahmins, faquirs, and other enthusiasts who had travelled from the heart of India, and halted on their way with the emir.—W. Beckford, Vathek (1786).

Farçeur (The), Angelo Beolco, the Italian farce-writer. Called Ruzzante in Italian, from ruzzare, “to play the fool” (1502-1542).

Farina´ta [Degli Uberti], a noble Florentine, leader of the Ghibeline faction, and driven from his country in 1250 by the Guelfs (1 syl.). Some ten years later by the aid of Manfred of Naples, he beat the Guelfs, and took all the towns of Tuscany and Florence. Danté conversed with him in the city of Dis, and represents him as lying in a fiery tomb yet open, and not to be closed till the last judgment day. When the council agreed to raze Florence to the ground, Farinata opposed the measure, and saved the city. Dantê refers to this:

Lo! Farinata ... his brow
Somewhat uplifted, cried ...
“In that affray [i.e. at Montaperto, near the river Arbia]
I stood not singly ...
But singly there I stood, when by consent
Of all, Florence had to the ground been razed,—
The one who openly forbade the deed.”
Dante, Inferno, x. (1300).
Like Farinata from his fiery tomb.
Longfellow, Dante.

Farm-boy.

“Over the hill the farm-boy goes,
His shadow lengthens along the land,
A giant staff in a giant hand.
In the poplar tree above the spring
The katydid begins to sing;
The early dews are falling.
* * * * *
And home to the woodland fly the crows,
While over the hill the farm-boy goes,
Cheerily calling,
‘Co’ boss! co’ boss! co’! co’! co’!’”
J.T. Trowbridge, Evening at the Farm (1857).

Farmer Finch, girl who works her invalid father’s farm for him and makes it pay.—Sarah Orne Jewett, Farmer Finch.

Farm-house (The). Modely and Heartwell, two gentlemen of fashion, come into the country and receive hospitality from old Farmer Freehold. Here they make love to his daughter Aura and his niece Flora. The girls, being high-principled, convert the flirtation of the two guests into love, and Heartwell marries the niece, while Modely proposes to Aura, who accepts him, provided he will wait two months and remain constant to her.—John Philip Kemble.

Farmer George, George III.; so called because he was like a farmer in dress, manners, and tastes (1738-1820).

Farmer’s Wife (The), a musical drama by C. Dibdin (1780). Cornflower, a benevolent, high-minded farmer, having saved Emma Belton from the flames of a house on fire, married her, and they lived together in love and peace till Sir Charles Courtly took a fancy to Mrs. Cornflower, and abducted her. She was soon tracked, and as it was evident that she was no particeps criminis, she was restored to her husband, and Sir Charles gave his sister to Mrs. Cornflower’s brother in marriage as a peace-offering.

Farnese Bull [Far.nay´.ze], a colossal group of sculpture, attributed to Apollõnius and Tauriscus of Trallês, in Asia Minor. The group represents Dircê bound by Zethus and Amphi´on to the horns of a bull, for ill-using their mother. It was restored by Bianchi, in 1546, and placed in the Farnesê palace, in Italy.

Farnese He´rcules [Far.nay´.ze], a name given to Glykon’s copy of the famous statue by Lysippos (a Greek sculptor in the time of Alexander “the Great”). It represents Hercules leaning on his club, with one hand on his back. The Farnesê family became extinct in 1731.

Fashion (Sir Brilliant), a man of the world, who “dresses fashionably, lives fashionably, wins your money fashionably, loses his own fashionably, and does everything fashionably.” His fashionable asservations are, “Let me perish, if ...!” “May fortune eternally frown on me, if ...!” “May I never hold four by honors, if ...!” “May the first woman I meet strike me with a supercilious eyebrow, if ...!” and so on.—A. Murphy, The Way to Keep Him (1760).

Fashion (Tom), or “Young Fashion,” younger brother of Lord Foppington. As his elder brother did not behave well to him, Tom resolved to outwit him, and to this end introduced himself to Sir Tunbelly Clumsy and his daughter, Miss Hoyden, as Lord Foppington, between whom and the knight a negotiation of marriage had been carried on. Being established in the house, Tom married the heiress, and when the veritable lord appeared, he was treated as an impositor. Tom, however, explained his ruse, and as his lordship treated the knight with great contempt and quitted the house, a reconciliation was easily effected.—Sheridan, A Trip to Scarborough (1777).

Fashionable Lover (The). Lord Abberville, a young man of 23 years of age, promises marriage to Lucinda Bridgemore, the vulgar, spiteful, purse-proud daughter of a London merchant, living in Fish Street Hill. At the house of this merchant Lord Abberville sees a Miss Aubrey, a handsome, modest, lady-like girl, with whom he is greatly smitten. He first tries to corrupt her, and then promises marriage; but Miss Aubrey is already engaged to a Mr. Tyrrel. The vulgarity and ill-nature of Lucinda being quite insurmountable, “the fashionable lover” abandons her, The chief object of the drama is to root out the prejudice which Englishmen at one time entertained against the Scotch,Scotch, and the chief character is in reality Colin or Cawdie Macleod, a Scotch servant of Lord Abberville.—R. Cumberland (1780).

Fastolfe (Sir John), in 1 Henry VI. This is not the “Sir John Falstaff” of huge proportions and facetious wit, but the Lieutenant-general of the duke of Bedford, and a knight of Garter.

Here had the conquest fully been sealed up
If Sir John Fastolfe had not played the coward:
He being in the vanward ...
Cowardly fled, not having struck one stroke.
Shakespeare, 1 Henry VI. act i. sc. 1 (1589).

From this battell [of Pataie, in France] departed without anie stroke striken, Sir John Fastolfe.... The duke of Bedford tooke from him the image of St. George and his garter.—Holinshed, ii. 601.

Fastra´da or Fastrade, daughter of Count Rudolph and Luitgarde. She was one of the nine wives of Charlemagne.

Those same soft bells at even-tide
Rang in the ears of Charlemagne,
As seated by Fastrada’s side,
At Ingelheim, in all his pride,
He heard their sound with secret pain.
Longfellow, Golden Legend, vi.

Fat (The). Alfonso II. of Portugal (1185, 1212-1223). Charles II. (le Gros) of France (832-882). Louis VI. (le Gros) of France (1078, 1108-1137).

Edward Bright of Essex weighed 44 stone (616 lbs.) at death (1720-1750). David Lambert of Leicester weighed above 52 stone (739 lbs.) at death (1770-1809).

Fata Alci´na, sister of Fata Morga´na. She carried off Astolfo on the back of a whale to her isle, but turned him into a myrtle tree when she tired of him.—Bojardo, Orlando Innamorato (1495); Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Fata Ar´gea (“le reina della Fata”), protectress Floridantê.

Fata Falsire´na, an enchantress in the Adonê of Marini (1623).

Fata della Fonti, an enchantress, from whom Mandricardo obtained the arms of Hector.—Bojardo, Orlando Innamorato (1495).

Fata Morga´na, sister of Arthur, and pupil of Merlin. She lived at the bottom of a lake, and dispensed her treasures to whom she willed. This fairy is introduced by Bojardo in his Orlando Innamorato, first as “Lady Fortune,” but subsequently as an enchantress. In Tasso her three daughters (Morganetta, Nivetta, and Carvilia) are introduced.

⁂ “Fata Morgana” is the name given to a sort of mirage occasionally seen in the Straits of Messi´na.

Fata Nera and Fata Bianca, protectresses of Guido´nê and Aquilantê.—Bojardo, Orlando Innamorato (1495).

Fata Silvanella, an enchantress in Orlando Innamorato, by Bojardo (1495).

Fatal Curiosity, an epilogue in Don Quixote (pt. I. iv. 5, 6). The subject of this tale is the trial of a wife’s fidelity. Anselmo, a Florentine gentleman, had married Camilla, and wishing to rejoice over her incorruptible fidelity, induced his friend Lothario to put it to the test. The lady was not trial-proof, but eloped with Lothario. The end was that Anselmo died of grief, Lothario was slain in battle, and Camilla died in a convent (1605).

Fatal Curiosity, by George Lillo. Young Wilmot, supposed to have perished at sea, goes to India, and having made his fortune, returns to England. He instantly visits Charlotte, whom he finds still faithful and devotedly attached to him, and then in disguise visits his parents, with whom he deposits a casket. Agnes Wilmot, out of curiosity, opens the casket, and when she discovers that it contains jewels, she and her husband resolve to murder the owner, and secure the contents of the casket. Scarcely have they committed the fatal deed, when Charlotte enters, and tells them it is their own son whom they have killed, whereupon old Wilmot first stabs his wife and then himself. Thus was the “curiosity” of Agnes fatal to herself, her husband, and her son (1736).

Fatal Dowry (The), a tragedy by Philip Massinger (1632). Rowe has borrowed much of his Fair Penitent from this drama.

Fatal Marriage (The), a tragedy by Thomas Southern (1659-1746). Isabella, a nun, marries Biron, the eldest son of Count Baldwin. The count disinherits his son for this marriage, and Biron, entering the army, is sent to the siege of Candy, where he is seen to fall, and is reported dead. Isabella, reduced to the utmost poverty, after seven years of “widowhood,” prays Count Baldwin to do something for her child, but he turns her out of doors. Villeroy (2 syl.) proposes marriage to her, and her acceptance of him was “the fatal marriage,” for the very next day Biron returns and is set upon by ruffians in the pay of his brother Carlos, who assassinate him. Carlos accuses Villeroy of the murder, but one of the ruffians confesses, and Carlos is apprehended. As for Isabella, she stabs herself and dies.

Fat Boy (Jo.). Obese page, or foot-boy of Mr. Wardell in Pickwick Papers.—Charles Dickens.

Fates. The three Fatal Sisters were Clo´tho, Lachesis [Lak´.e.sis].[Lak´.e.sis]. and At´ropos. They dwelt in the deep abyss of Demogorgon, “with unwearied fingers drawing out the threads of life.” Clotho held the spindle or distaff; Lachesis drew out the thread; and Atropos cut it off.

Sad Clotho held the rock, the whiles the thread
By grisly Lachesis was spun with pain,
That cruel Atropos eftsoon undid,
With cursëd knife cutting the twist in twain.
Spenser, Faëry Queen, iv. 2. (1595).

Father—Son. It is a common observation that a father above the common rate of men has usually a son below it. Witness King John son of Henry II.; Edward II. son of Edward I.; Richard II. son of the Black Prince; Henry VI. son of Henry V.; Lord Chesterfield’s son, etc. So in French history: Louis VIII. was the son of Philippe Auguste; Charles the Idiot was the son of Charles le Sage; Henri II. of François I. Again, in German history: Heinrich VI. was the son of Barbarossa; Albrecht I. of Rudolf; and so on, in all directions. Heroum filii noxæ is a Latin proverb.

My trust,
Like a good parent, did beget of him
A falsehood, in its contrary as great
As my trust was.
Shakespeare, The Tempest, act i. sc. 2 (1609).

Father Suckled by His own Daughter. Euphrasia, called “The Grecian Daughter,” thus preserved the life of her father Evander in prison. (See Euphrasia.)

Xantippê thus preserved the life of her father Cimonos in prison.

A Father’s Head Nursed by a Daughter after Death. Margaret Roper “clasped in her last trance her murdered father’s head.” (See Daughter.)

Father of His Country.

Cicero, who broke up the Catiline conspiracy (B.C. 106-43).

⁂ The Romans offered the same title to Marĭus after his annihilation of the Teutŏnês and Cimbri, but he would not accept it.

Julius Cæsar, after he had quelled the Spanish insurrection (B.C. 100-44). Augustus, P (B.C. 63-31 to A.D. 14).

Cosmo de Medici (1389-1464).

Andrea Dorea; called so on his statue at Genoa (1468-1560).

Androni´cus Palæol´ogus assumed the title (1260-1332).

George Washington, “Defender and Paternal Counseller of the American States” (1732-1799).

Father of the People.

Louis XII. of France (1462, 1498-1515).

Henri IV. of France, “The Father and Friend of the People” (1553, 1589-1610).

Louis XVIII. of France (1755, 1814-1824).

Gabriel du Pineau, a French lawyer, (1573-1644).

Christian III. of Denmark (1502, 1534-1559).

⁂ For other “Fathers,” see under the specific name or vocation, as Botany, Literature, and so on.

Fathers (Last of the), St. Bernard (1091-1153).

⁂ The “Fathers of the Church” were followed by “the Schoolmen.”

Fatherless. Merlin never had a father; his mother was a nun, the daughter of the king of Dimetia.

Fathom (Ferdinand Count), a villain who robs his benefactors, pillages any one, and finally dies in misery and despair.—T. Smollett, The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom (1754).

(The gang being absent, an old beldame conveys the count to a rude apartment to sleep in. Here he found the dead body of a man lately stabbed and concealed in some straw; and the account of his sensations during the night, the horrid device by which he saved his life (by lifting the corpse into his own bed), and his escape, guided by the hag, is terrifically tragic).

Fatima, daughter of Mahomet, and one of the four perfect women. The other three are Khadîjah, the prophet’s first wife; Mary, daughter of Imrân; and Asia, wife of that Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red Sea.

Fat´ima, a holy woman of China, who lived a hermit’s life. There was “no one affected with headache whom she did not cure by simply laying her hands on them.” An African magician induced this devotee to lend him her clothes and stick, and to make him the fac-simile of herself. He then murdered her, and got introduced into the palace of Aladdin. Aladdin, being informed of the trick, pretended to have a bad headache, and when the false Fatima approached, under the pretence of curing it, he plunged a dagger into the heart of the magician and killed him.—Arabian Nights (“Aladdin or the Wonderful Lamp”).

Fat´ima, the mother of Prince Camaral´zaman. Her husband was Schah´zaman, Sultan of the “Isle of the Children of Khal´edan, some twenty days’ sail from the coast of Persia, in the open sea.”—Arabian Nights (“Camaralzaman and Badoura”).

Fat´ima, the last of Bluebeard´s wives. She was saved from death by the timely arrival of her brothers with a party of friends.—C. Perrault, Contes de Fées (1697).

Fat´imite (3 syl.). The Third Fatimite, the Caliph Hakem B’amr-ellah, who professed to be incarnate deity, and the last prophet who had communication between God and man. He was the founder of the Druses (q.v.).

What say you does this wizard style himself—
Hakeem Biamrallah, the Third Fatimite?
Robt. Browning, The Return of the Druses, v.

Fatme. Beautiful sultana, who, looking down from her lattice into the courtyard wept to see a lamb slaughtered, yet turned from the window to ask in eager hope if the poison administered to her rival had produced the desired effect.—Heine.

Faulconbridge (Philip), called “the Bastard,” natural son of King Richard I. and Lady Robert Faulconbridge. An admirable admixture of greatness and levity, daring and recklessness. He was generous and open-hearted, but hated foreigners like a true-born islander.—Shakespeare, King John (1596).

Faulkland, the over-anxious lover of Julia [Melville], always fretting and tormenting himself about her whims, spirit, health, life. Every feature in the sky, every shift of the wind was a source of anxiety to him. If she was gay, he fretted that she should care so little for his absence; if she was low-spirited, he feared she was going to die; if she danced with another, he was jealous; if she didn´t, she was out of sorts.—Sheridan, The Rivals (1775).

Faultless Painter (The), Andrea del Sarto (1488-1630).—R. Browning, Andrea del Sarto.

Fauntleroy (Little Lord). The story of Cedric Errol, heir to his grandfather, Lord Fauntleroy, by Frances Hodgson Burnett, has been dramatized, Elsie Leslie, a child of rare promise, taking the part of Cedric, and Kathryn Kidder that of his mother. (See Errol).

Faun. Tennyson uses this sylvan deity of the classics as the symbol of a drunkard.

Arise and fly
The reeling Faun, the sensual feast.
In Memoriam, cxviii

Faust, a famous magician of the sixteenth century, a native of Suabia. A rich uncle having left him a fortune, Faust ran to every excess, and when his fortune was exhausted, made a pact with the devil (who assumed the name of Mephistoph´elês, and the appearance of a little grey monk) that if he might indulge his propensities freely for twenty-four years, he would at the end of that period consign to the devil both body and soul. The compact terminated in 1550, when Faust disappeared. His sweetheart was Margheri´ta [Margaret], whom he seduced, and his faithful servant was Wagner.

Goethê has a noble tragedy entitled Faust (1798); Gounod an opera called Faust e Margherita (1859) (See Faustus.)

Faustus (Dr.), the same as Faust; but Marlowe, in his admirable tragedy, makes the doctor sell himself to Lucifer and Mephistophilis.

Favor (Anna). Young Anna Favor, married to Ezra Dalton, conceives the insane idea that her baby is a changeling, and asks her husband to rake open the coals that she may lay it upon them, and the witch shall have her own.

“She’ll come when she hears it crying,
In the shape of an owl or bat,
And she’ll bring us our darling Anna
In place of her screeching brat.”

The delusion is removed and her senses restored in answer to the prayer of her husband.

“Now, mount and ride, my goodman,
As thou lovest thy own soul!
Woe’s me if my wicked fancies
Be the death of Goodwife Cole!”
J.G. Whittier, The Changeling.

W. Bayle Bernard, of Boston, Mass., has a tragedy on the same subject.

Favori´ta (La), Leonora de Guzman, “favorite” of Alfonzo XI. of Castile. Ferdinando fell in love with her; and the king, to save himself from excommunication, sanctioned the marriage. But when Ferdinando learned that Leonora was the king’s mistress, he rejected the alliance with indignation, and became a monk. Leonora also became a novice in the same monastery, saw Ferdinando, obtained his forgiveness, and died.—Donizetti, La Favorita (an opera, 1842).

Faw (Tibbie), the ostler’s wife, in Wandering Willie’s tale.—Sir W. Scott, Redgauntlet (time, George III.).

Faw´nia, the lady beloved by Dorastus.—R. Greene, Pandosto, The Triumph of Time (1588).

⁂ Shakespeare founded his Winter’s Tale on Greene’s romance.

Fazio, a Florentine, who first tried to make a fortune by alchemy, but being present when Bartoldo died, he buried the body secretly, and stole the miser’s money-bags. Being now rich he passed his time with the Marchioness Aldabella in licentious pleasure, and his wife Bianca, out of jealousy, accused him to the duke of being privy to Bartoldo’s death. For this offence Fazio was condemned to die; and Bianca, having tried in vain to save him, went mad with grief, and died of a broken heart.—Dean Milman, Fazio (1815).

Fea (Euphane), the old house-keeper of the old udaller at Burgh-Westra. (A “udaller” is one who holds land by allodial tenure.)—Sir W. Scott, The Pirate (time, William III.).

Fear Fortress, near Saragossa. An allegorical bogie fort, conjured up by fear, which vanishes as it is courageously approached and boldly besieged.

If a child disappeared, or any cattle were carried off, the frightened peasants said: “The Lord of Fear Fortress has taken them.” If a fire broke out anywhere, it was the Lord of Fear Fortress who must have lit it. The origin of all accidents, mishaps, and disasters, was traced to the mysterious owner of this invisible castle.—L’Epine, Croquemitaine, iii. 1.

Fearless (The), Jean duc de Bourgoigne, called Sans Peur (1371-1419).

Featherhead (John), Esq., an opponent of Sir Thomas Kittlecourt, M.P.—Sir W. Scott, Guy Mannering (time, George II.).

Fedalina. Daughter of the gypsy chief and heroine of The Spanish Gypsy, by George Eliot.

Fee and Fairy. Fee is the more general term, including the latter. The Arabian Nights are not all fairy tales, but they are all fee tales or contes des fées. So again, the Ossianic tales, Campbell’s Tales of the West Highlands, the mythological tales of the Basques, Irish, Scandinavians, Germans, French, etc., may all be ranged under fee tales.

Feeble (Francis), a woman’s tailor, and one of the recruits of Sir John Falstaff. Although a thin, starveling yard-wand of a man, he expresses great willingness to be drawn. Sir John compliments him as “courageous Feeble,” and says to him, “Thou wilt be as valiant as the wrathful dove, or most magnanimous mouse.... most forcible Feeble.”—Shakespeare, 2 Henry IV. act iii. sc. 2 (1598).

Feeder (Mr.), B.A., usher in the school of Dr. Blimber of Brighton. He was “a kind of human barrel-organ, which played only one tune.” He was in the habit of shaving his head to keep it cool. Mr. Feeder married Miss Blimber, the doctor’s daughter, and succeeded to the school.—C. Dickens, Dombey and Son (1846).

Feenix, nephew of the Hon. Mrs. Skewton (mother of Edith, Mr. Dombey’s second wife), Feenix was a very old gentleman, patched up to look as much like a young fop as possible.

Cousin Feenix was a man about town forty years ago; but he is still so juvenile in figure and manner that strangers are amazed when they discover latent wrinkles in his lordship’s face, and crow’s feet in his eyes. But cousin Feenix getting up at half-past seven, is quite another thing from cousin Feenix got up.—C. Dickens, Dombey and Son, xxxi. (1846).

Feignwell (Colonel) the suitor of Anne Lovely, an heiress. Anne Lovely had to obtain the consent of her four guardians before she could marry. One was an old beau, another a virtuoso, a third a broker on ’Change, and the fourth a canting quaker. The colonel made himself agreeable to all, and carried off his prize.—Mrs. Centlivre, A Bold Stroke for a Wife (1717).

Feinai´gle (Gregory de), a German mnemonist (1765-1820). He obtained some success by his aids to memory, but in Paris he was an object of ridicule.

Her memory was a mine ... For her Feinaigle’s was a useless art Byron, Don Juan, i. 11 (1819).

Felice, wife of Sir Guy Warwick, said to have “the same high forehead as Venus.”

Felic´ian (Father), a catholic priest and schoolmaster of Grand Pré, in Acadia (now called Nova Scotia). He accompanied Evangeline in part of her wanderings to find Gabriel, her affianced husband.—Longfellow, Evangeline (1849).

Felicians (The), the happy nation. The Felicians live under a free sovereignty, where the laws are absolute. Felicia is the French “Utopia.”—Mercier de la Rivière, L’Heureuse Nation (1767).

Feliciano de Sylva, Don Quixote’s favorite author. The two following extracts were, in his opinion, unsurpassed and unsurpassable:—

The reason, most adored one, of your unreasonable unreasonableness hath so unreasonably unseated my reason, that I have no reasonable reason for reasoning against such unreasonableness.

The bright heaven of your divinity that lifts you to the stars, most celestial of women, renders you deserving of every desert which your charms so deservedly deserve.—Cervantes, Don Quixote, I. i. 8 (1605).

Félicie, happy French girl, the daughter of Jean and Gabrielle Waldo. Her mother gives her poison by mistake, from the effects of which she is relieved by John of Lugio, summoned from his home many leagues away, “In His Name.”—Edward Everett Hale, In His Name (1887).

Felix, a monk who listened to the singing of a milk-white bird for a hundred years; which length of time seemed to him “but a single hour,” so enchanted was he with the song.—Longfellow, The Golden Legend. (See also Hildesheim.)

Felix (Don), son of Don Lopez. He was a Portuguese nobleman, in love with Violante; but Violante’s father, Don Pedro, intended to make her a nun. Donna Isabella, having fled from home to avoid a marriage disagreeable to her, took refuge with Violante; and when Colonel Briton called at the house to see Donna Isabella, her brother Don Felix was jealous, believing that Violante was the object of his visits. Violante kept “her friend’s secret,” even at the risk of losing her lover; but ultimately the mystery was cleared up, and a double marriage took place.—Mrs. Centlivre, The Wonder (1714).

Felix Holt (See Holt).

Felix (M. Minucius), a Roman lawyer, who flourished A.D. 230; he wrote a dialogue entitled Octavius, which occupies a conspicuous place among the early Apologies of Christianity.

Like Menucius Felix, she believed that evil demons hid themselves in the marbles [statues].—Ouida, Ariadnê, i. 9.

Felix (St.), of Burgundy, who converted Sigbert (Sigebert or Sabert) king of the East Saxons, (A.D. 604).—Ethelwerd, Chronicles, v.

So Burgundy to us three men most reverend bare ...
Of which way Felix first, who in th’ East Saxon reign
Converted to the faith King Sigbert. Him again
Ensueth Anselm ... and Hugh ... [bishop of Lincoln].
Drayton Polyolbion, xxiv. (1622).

Fe´lixmar´te (4 syl.) of Hyrcania, son of Flo´risan and Martedi´na, the hero of a Spanish romance of chivalry. The curate in Don Quixote condemned this work to the flames.—Melchior de Orteza, Caballera de Ubĕda (1566).

Felix (Varian). The Adonis of his circle, who falls in love with a beautiful woman, already the wife of another man. He flies from temptation and does not return until she is the other man’s widow; then woos and weds her.—Miriam Coles Harris, A Perfect Adonis (1875).

Fell (Dr.). Tom Brown, being in disgrace, was sent by Dr. Fell, dean of Christ Church (1625-1686), to translate the thirty-third epigram of Martial.

Non amo te, Zabidi, nec possum dicere quare;
Hoc tantum possum dicere, non amo te.

Which he rendered thus:

I do not like thee, Dr. Fell—
The reason why I cannot tell;
But this I know, and know full well,
I do not like thee, Dr. Fell.

Feltham (Black), a highwayman with Captain Colepepper or Peppercull (the Alsatian bully).—Sir W. Scott, Fortunes of Nigel (time, James I.).

Femmes Savantes (Les), women who go in for women’s rights, science, and philosophy, to the neglect of domestic duties and wifely amenities. The “blue-stockings” are (1) Philaminte (3 syl.) the mother of Henriette, who discharges one of her servants because she speaks ungrammatically; (2) Armande (2 syl.) sister of Henriette, who advocates platonic love and science; and (3) Bélise, sister of Philaminte, who sides with her in all things, but imagines that every one is in love with her. Henriette, who has no sympathy with these “lofty flights,” is in love with Clitandre, but Philaminte wants her to marry Trissotin, a bel esprit. However, the father loses his property through the “savant” proclivities of his wife, Trissotin retires, and Clitandre marries Henriette, the “perfect” or thorough woman.—Moliere, Les Femmes Savantes (1672).

Fenella, alias Zarah (daughter of Edward Christian), a pretended deaf and dumb fairy-like attendant on the countess of Derby. The character seems to have been suggested by that of Mignon, the Italian girl in Goethê’s Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship.—Sir W. Scott, Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).

Let be tableaux vivants, and I will appear as
“Fenella.”
Percy Fitzgerald, Parvenu Family, iii. 224.

Fenella, a deaf and dumb girl, sister of Masaniello the fisherman. She was seduced by Alfonso, son of the Duke of Arcos; and Masaniello resolved to kill him. He accordingly headed an insurrection, and met with such great success that the mob made him chief magistrate of Portici, but afterwards shot him. Fenella, on hearing of her brother’s death, threw herself into the crater of Vesuvius.—Auber, Masaniello (an opera, 1831).

Fenris, the demon wolf of Niflheim. When he gapes one jaw touches the earth and the other heaven. This monster will swallow up Odin at the day of doom. (Often but incorrectly written Fenrir.)—Scandinavian Mythology.

Fenton, clever fellow who makes caricatures while Browning is read, and when called upon for the substance of his notes by the president of the Club, rises with perfect coolness and pronounces opinion upon the poem.—Arlo Bates, The Philistines (1889).

Fenton, the lover of Anne Page, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Page, gentle-folks living at Windsor. Fenton is of good birth, and seeks to marry a fortune to “heal his poverty.” In “sweet Anne Page” he soon discovers that which makes him love her for herself more than for her money.—Shakespeare, Merry Wives of Windsor, act iii, sc. 4 (1601).

Ferad-Artho, son of Cairbre and only surviving descendant of the line of Conar (the first king of Ireland.) On the death of Cathmor (brother of the rebel Cairbar) in battle, Ferad-Artho was placed by Fingal on the throne as “king of Ireland.” The race was thus: (1) Conar (a Caledonian); (2) Cormac I., his son; (3) Cairbre, his son; (4) Artho, his son; (5) Cormac II., his son, (a minor); (6) Ferad-Artho, his cousin.—Ossian, Temora, vii.

Fer´amorz, the young Cashmerian poet who relates poetical tales to Lalla Rookh on her journey from Delhi to Lesser Bucharĭa. Lalla is going to be married to the young sultan, but falls in love with the poet. On the wedding morn she is led to her bridegroom, and finds with unspeakable joy that the poet is the sultan himself.—T. Moore, Lalla Rookh (1817).

Ferda, son of Damman, chief of a hundred hills in Albion. Ferda was the friend of Cuthullin, general of the Irish forces in the time of king Cormac I. Deuga´la (spouse of Cairbar) loved the youth, and told her husband if he would not divide the herd she would no longer live with him. Cuthullin, being appointed to make the division, enraged the lady by assigning a snow-white bull to the husband, whereupon Duegala induced her lover to challenge Cuthullin to mortal combat. Most unwillingly the two friends fought, and Ferda fell. “The sunbeam of battle fell—the first of Cuthullin’s friends. Unhappy [unlucky] is the hand of Cuthullin since the hero fell.”—Ossian, Fingal, ii.

Ferdinand, king of Navarre. He agreed with three young lords to spend three years in severe study, during which time no woman was to approach his court; but no sooner was the agreement made than he fell in love with the princess of France. In consequence of the death of her father, the lady deferred the marriage for twelve months and a day.

... the sole inheritor
Of all perfections that a man may owe [own]
Matchless Navarre.
Shakespeare, Love’s Labor’s Lost (1594).

Fer´dinand, son of Alonso, king of Naples. He falls in love with Miranda, daughter of Prospero, the exiled duke of Milan.—Shakespeare, The Tempest (1609).

Haply so
Miranda’s hope had pictured Ferdinand
Long ere the gaunt wave tossed him on the shore.
Lowell.

Ferdinand, a fiery young Spaniard, in love with Leonora.—Jephson, Two Strings to your Bow (1792).

Ferdinand (Don), the son of Don Jerome of Seville, in love with Clara d’Almanza, daughter of Don Guzman.—Sheridan, The Duenna (1773).

Ferdinan´do, a brave soldier who having won the battle of Tari´fa, in 1340, was created Count of Zamo´ra and Marquis of Montreal. The king, Alfonso XI., knowing his love for Leonora de Guzman, gave him the bride in marriage; but no sooner was this done than Ferdinando discovered that she was the king’s mistress, so he at once repudiated her, restored his ranks and honors to the king, and retired to the monastry of St. James de Compostella. Leonora entered the same monastery as a novice, obtained the pardon of Ferdinando, and died.—Donizetti, La Favori´ta (1842).

Fergus (Derrick). Engineer in the coalpits of Lancashire. “A young son of Anak, brains and muscle evenly balanced and fully developed.” Is interested in Joan Lowrie and at last wins her to a promise “to work an’ strive to make herself worthy of the man she loves.”—Frances Hodgson Burnett, That Lass of Lowrie’s (1877).

Fergus, fourth son of Fingal, and the only one that had issue at the death of his father. Ossian, the eldest brother, had a son named Oscar, but Oscar was slain at a feast by Cairbar “Lord of Atha;” and of the other two brothers, Fillan was slain before he had married, and Ryno, though married, died without issue.

According to tradition, Fergus (son of Fingal) was the father of Congal; Congal of Arcath; and Arcath of Fergus II., with whom begins the real history of the Scots.—Ossian.

Fergus, son of Rossa, a brave hero in the army of Cuthullin, general of the Irish tribes.

Fergus first in our joy at the feast; son of Rossa; arm of death.—Ossian, Fingal, i.

Fern (Fanny) the pseudonym of Sarah Payson Willis, sister of N.P. Willis. She married James Parton, the author. (1811-1872).

Fern (Will), a poor fellow who, being found asleep in a shed, is brought before Alderman Cute. He says emphatically “he must be put down.” The poor fellow takes charge of his brother’s child, and is both honest and kind, but, alas! he dared to fall asleep in a shed, an offence which must be “put down.”— C. Dickens, The Chimes, third quarter (1844).

Fernan Calbal´lero, the pseudonym of Cecilia Böhl de Faber, a Spanish novelist (1797-1877).

Fernando, son of John of Procĭda, and husband of Isoline (3 syl.), daughter of the French governor of Messina. The butchery of the Sicilian Vespers occurred the night after their espousals. Fernando was among the slain, and Isoline died of a broken heart.—S. Knowles, John of Procida (1840).

Fernando (Don), youngest son of the Duke Ricardo. Gay, handsome, generous, and polite; but faithless to his friend Cardenio, for, contrary to the lady’s inclination, and in violation of every principle of honor, he prevailed on Lucinda’s father to break off the betrothal between his daughter and Cardenio, and to bestow the lady on himself. On the wedding day Lucinda was in a swoon, and a letter informed the bridegroom that she was married already to Cardenio; she then left the house privately, and retired to a convent. Don Fernando, having entered the convent, carries her off, but stopping at an inn, found there Dorothea his wife, with Cardenio the husband of Lucinda, and the two parties paired off with their respective spouses.—Cervantes, Don Quixote, I. iv. (1605).

Fernan´do, a Venetian captain, servant to Annophel (daughter of the governor of Candy).—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Laws of Candy (1647).

Fernan´do [Florestan], a State prisoner of Seville, married to Leonora, who (in boy’s attire and under the name of Fidēlio) became the servant of Rocco the jailer. Pizarro, governor of the jail, conceived a hatred to the State prisoner, and resolved to murder him, so Rocco and Leonora were sent to dig his grave. The arrival of the minister of State put an end to the infamous design, and Fernando was set at liberty.—Beethoven, Fidelio (1791).

Ferney (The Patriarch of), Voltaire; so called because he lived in retirement at Ferney, near Geneva (1694-1778).

Ferquhard Day, the absentee from the Clan Chattan at the combat.—Sir W. Scott, Fair Maid of Perth (time, Henry IV.).

Fer´racute, a giant who had the strength of forty men, and was thirty-six feet high. He was slain by Orlando, who wounded him in the navel, his only vulnerable part.—Turpin, Chronicle of Charlemagne.

⁂ Ferracute is the prototype of Pulci’s “Morgante,” in his serio-comic poem entitled Morgante Maggiore (1494).

Fer´ragus, the Portuguese giant, who took Bellisant under his care after her divorce from Alexander, emperor of Constantinople.—Valentine and Orson (fifteenth century).

My sire’s tall form might grace the part
Of Ferragus or Ascapart.
Sir W. Scott.

Fer´ramond (Sir), a knight, whose lady-love was Lucĭda.

Ferrand de Vaudemont (Count), duc de Lorraine, son of René, king of Provence. He first appears disguised as Laurence Neipperg.—Sir W. Scott, Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).

Ferrardo [Gonzaga], reigning duke of Mantua in the absence of his cousin Leonardo. He was a villain, and tried to prove Mariana (the bride of Leonardo) guilty of adultery. His scheme was this: He made Julian St. Pierre drunk with drugged wine, and in his sleep conveyed him to the duke’s bed, throwing his scarf under the bed of the duchess, which was in an adjoining chamber. He then revealed these proofs of guilt to his cousin Leonardo, but Leonardo refused to believe in his wife’s guilt, and Julian St. Pierre exposed the whole scheme of villainy, amply vindicating the innocence of Mariana, who turned out to be Julian’s sister.—S. Knowles, The Wife (1833).

Ferrau, a Saracen, son of Landfu´sa. Having dropped his helmet in a river, he vowed never to wear another till he won that worn by Orlando. Orlando slew him by a wound in the navel, his only vulnerable part.—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Ferraugh (Sir), introduced in bk. iii. 8, but without a name, as carrying off the false Florimel from Braggadoccio. In bk. iv. 2, the name is given. He is there overthrown by Sir Blandamour, who takes away with him the false Florimel, the lady of snow and wax.—Spenser, Faëry Queen (1590, 1596).

Ferret, an avaricious, mean-spirited slanderer, who blasts by innuendoes, and blights by hints and cautions. He hates young Heartall, and misinterprets all his generous acts, attributing his benevolence to hush-money. The rascal is at last found out and foiled.—Cherry, The Soldier’s Daughter (1804).

Ferrex, eldest son of Gorboduc, a legendary king of Britain. Being driven by his brother Porrex from the kingdom, he returned with a large army, but was defeated and slain by Porrex.—Gorboduc, a tragedy by Thom. Norton and Thom. Sackville (1561).

Ferris (Henry). Artist and American consul at Venice. In love with Florida Vervain, but believes her infatuated by an Italian priest who longs to leave his vocation. He learns the truth at the priest’s death-bed. Finds Florida in New York, explains, receives absolution and is married.—W.D. Howells, A Foregone Conclusion (1874).

Ferrol. Northern man of letters who makes “a study” of Louisiana and Louisiana’s father. The honest planter surveys him with curiosity as “‘a littery man. I had an idee that thar was only one on ye now an’ ag’in—jest now an’ ag’in.’ Ferrol did not smile at all. His manner was perfect—so full of interest that Mr. Rogers quite warmed and expanded under it.”—Frances Hodgson Burnett, Louisiana (1880).

Fetnab (“a tormentor of hearts”), the favorite of the Caliph Haroun-al-Raschid. While the caliph was absent in his wars, Zobeidê (3 syl.), the caliph’s wife, out of jealousy, ordered Fetnab to be buried alive. Ganem happened accidentally to see the interment, rescued her, and took her home to his own private lodgings in Bagdad. The caliph, on his return, mourned for Fetnab; but receiving from her a letter of explanation, he became jealous of Ganem, and ordered him to be put to death. Ganem, however, contrived to escape. When the fit of jealousy was over, the caliph heard the facts plainly stated, whereupon he released Fetnab, and gave her in marriage to Ganem, and appointed the young man to a very lucrative post about the court.—Arabian Nights, (“Ganem, the slave of Love”).

Fe´zon, daughter of Savary, duke of Aquitaine. The Green Knight, who was a pagan, demanded her in marriage, but Orson (brother of Valentine), called “The Wild Man of the Forest,” overthrew the pagan and married Fezon.—Valentine and Orson (fifteenth century).

Fiammetta, a lady beloved by Boccaccio, supposed to be Maria, daughter of Robert, king of Naples. (Italian, fiammetta, a little flame).

Fib, an attendant on Queen Mab.—Drayton, Nymphidia.

Fiction. Father of Modern Prose Fiction, Daniel Defoe (1663-1731).

Fiddler (Oliver’s). Sir Roger l’Estrange was so called, because at one time he was playing a fiddle or viole in the house of John Hingston, where Cromwell was one of the guests (1616-1704).

Fiddler Joss, Mr. Joseph Poole, a reformed drunkard, who subsequently turned preacher in London, but retained his former sobriquet.

Fide´le (3 syl.), the name assumed by Imogen, when, attired in boy’s clothes, she started for Milford Haven to meet her husband Posthŭmus.—Shakespeare, Cymbeline (1605).

⁂ Collins has a beautiful elegy on “Fidele.”

Fidelia, “the foundling.” She is in reality Harriet, the daughter of Sir Charles Raymond, but her mother dying in childbirth, she was committed to the charge of a governante. The governante sold the child, at the age of 12, to one Villiard, and then wrote to Sir Charles to say that she was dead. One night, Charles Belmont, passing by, heard cries of distress, and going to the rescue took the girl home as a companion to his sister. He fell in love with her: the governante, on her death-bed, told the story of her birth; and Charles married the foundling.—Ed. Moore, The Foundling (1748).

Fide´lio, Leono´ra, wife of Fernando Florestan. She assumed the name of Fidelio, and dressed in male attire when her husband was a state prisoner, that she might enter the service of Rocco the jailer, and hold intercourse with her husband.—Beethoven, Fidelio (1791).

Fides (2 syl.), mother of John of Leyden. Believing that the prophet-ruler of Westphalia had caused her son’s death, she went to Munster to curse him. Seeing the ruler pass, she recognized in him her own son; but the son pretended not to know his mother, and Fidês, to save him annoyance, professed to have made a mistake. She was put into a dungeon, where John visited her, and when he set fire to his palace, Fidês rushed into the flames, and both perished together.—Meyerbeer, Le Prophete (1849).

Fidessa, the companion of Sansfoy; but when the Red Cross Knight slew that “faithless Saracen,” Fidessa told him she was the only daughter of an emperor of Italy; that she was betrothed to a rich and wise king; and that her betrothed being slain, she had set forth to find the body, in order that she might decently inter it. She said that in her wanderings Sansfoy had met her and compelled her to be his companion: but she thanked the knight for having come to her rescue. The Red Cross Knight, wholly deluded by this plausible tale, assured Fidessa of his sympathy and protection: but she turned out to be Duessa, the daughter of Falsehood and Shame. The sequel must be sought under the word Duessa.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, i. 2 (1590).

Fido, Faith personified, the foster-son of Acŏë (“hearing,” Rom. x. 17); his foster-sister is Meditation. Fully described in canto ix. of The Purple Island (1633), by Phineas Fletcher. (Latin, fidês, “faith.”)

Field of the Forty Footsteps, at the back of the British Museum, once called Southampton Fields. The tradition is that two brothers, in the Monmouth rebellion, took different sides, and engaged each other in fight. Both were killed, and forty impressions of their feet were traceable in the field for years afterwards.

⁂ The Misses Porter wrote a novel called The Field of the Forty Footsteps, and the Messrs. Mayhew took the same subject for a melodrama.

Fielding (Mrs.), a little querulous old lady with a peevish face, who, in consequence of having once been better off, or of laboring under the impression that she might have been, if something in the indigo trade had happened differently, was very genteel and patronizing indeed. When she dressed for a party, she wore gloves, and a cap of state “almost as tall, and quite as stiff as a mitre.”

May Fielding, her daughter, very pretty and innocent. She was engaged to Edward Plummer, but heard that he had died in South America, and consented to marry Tackleton the toy merchant. A few days before the day fixed for the wedding, Edward Plummer returned, and they were married. Tackleton gave them as a present the cake he had ordered for his own wedding feast.—C. Dickens, The Cricket on the Hearth (1845).

Fielding of the Drama, George Farquhar, author of The Beaux’ Stratagem, etc. (1678-1707).

Fielding’s Proverbs. These were in reality compiled by W. Henry Ireland, the Shakespeare impostor, who published Miscellaneous Papers and Instruments, under the hand and seal of William Shakespeare, including the tragedy of King Lear and a small fragment of Hamlet, from the original, 1796, folio, £4 4s. The whole was a barefaced forgery.

Fierabras (Sir) [Fe.ā´.ra.brah], a Saracen of Spain, who made himself master of Rome, and carried away the crown of thorns and the balsam with which the Lord had been embalmed. His chief exploit was to slay the giant who guarded the bridge of Mantible, which had thirty arches, all of black marble. Bal´and of Spain assumed the name of Sir Fierabras.

Balsam of Fierabras, the balsam used in embalming the body of Christ, stolen by Sir Fierabras. It possessed such virtues that one single drop, taken internally, sufficed to heal the most malignant wound.

Fierabras of Alexandria, the greatest giant that ever walked the earth. He possessed all Babylon, even to the Red Sea, was seigneur of Russia, lord of Cologne, master of Jerusalem, and of the Holy Sepulchre. This huge giant ended his days in the odor of sanctity, “meek as a lamb, and humble as he was meek.”

Fierce (The), Alexander I. of Scotland, so called from the impetuosity of his temper (*, 1107-1124).

Fiesco, the chief character of Schiller’s tragedy so called. The poet makes Fiesco to be killed by the hand of Verri´na the republican; but history says his death was the result of a stumble from a plank (1783).

Fig´aro, a barber of extraordinary cunning, dexterity, and intrigue.—Beaumarchais, Barbier de Séville (1775).

Fig´aro, a valet, who outwits every one by his dexterity and cunning.—Beaumarchais, Mariage de Figaro (1784).

⁂ Several operas have been founded on these two comedies: e.g. Mozart’s Nozze di Figaro (1786); Paisiello’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia (1810); Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia (1816).

Fig´aro, the sweetheart of Susan (favorite waiting-woman of the Countess Almaviva). Figaro is never so happy as when he has two or three plots in hand.—T. Holcroft, The Follies of a Day (1745-1809).

Fighting Prelate (The), Henry Spencer, bishop of Norwich. He opposed the rebels under Wat Tyler with the temporal sword, absolved them, and then sent them to the gibbet. In 1383 he went to assist the burghers of Ghent in their contest with the count of Flanders.

The bishop of Norwich, the famous “Fighting Prelate,” had led an army into Flanders.—Lord Campbell.

Filch, a lad brought up as a pick-pocket. Mrs. Peachum says, “He hath as fine a hand at picking a pocket as a woman, and is as nimble-fingered as a juggler. If an unlucky session does not cut the rope of thy life, I pronounce, boy, thou wilt be a great man in history” (act i. 1).—Gay, The Beggar’s Opera (1727).

Fi´ler, a lean, churlish man, who takes poor Toby Veck’s tripe, and delivers him a homily on the sinfulness of luxury and self-indulgence.—C. Dickens, The Chimes (1844).

Filia Doloro´sa, the Duchess d’Angoulême, daughter of Louis XVI. Also called “The Modern Antig´onê” (1778-1851).

Fillan, son of Fingal and Clatho, the most highly finished character in the poem of Tem´ora. Fillan was younger than his nephew Oscar, and does not appear on the scene until after Oscar’s death. He is rash and fiery, eager for military glory, and brave as a lion. When Fingal appointed Gaul to command for the day, Fillan had hoped his father’s choice might have fallen to his own lot. “On his spear stood the son of Clatho ... thrice he raised his eyes to Fingal; his voice thrice failed him as he spoke ... He strode away; bent over a distant stream ... the tear hung in his eye. He struck at times the thistle’s head with his inverted spear.” Yet showed he no jealousy, for when Gaul was in danger, he risked his own life to save him. Next day was Fillan’s turn to lead, and his deeds were unrivalled in dash and brilliancy. He slew Foldath, the general of the opposing army, but when Cathmor, “Lord of Atha,” the commander-in-chief, came against him, Fillan fell. His modesty was then as prominent as his bravery. “Lay me,” he said to Ossian, “in that hollow rock. Raise no stone above me ... I am fallen in the first of my fields, fallen without renown.” Every incident of Fillan’s life is beautiful in the extreme.—Ossian, Temora, v.

Filippo (Don). In love with Camilla, heroine of Signor Monaldini’s Niece. His wife is insane, and he suffers himself toto become enamored of this young girl, who repels him with holy, heroic words. His conscience comes to his aid when she appeals to him. While he hesitates to speak the words of parting, she springs into a pool beside them, and is to all appearance drowned. While she lies unconscious, a telegram is brought, saying that his wife is dead. Camilla revives, after a long period of insensibility, and all is well.—Mary Agnes Tincker, Signor Monaldini’s Niece, (1879).

Fillpot (Toby), a thirsty old soul, who “among jolly topers bore off the bell.” It chanced as in dog-days he sat boosing in his arbor, that he died “full as big as a Dorchester butt.” His body turned to clay, and out of the clay a brown jug was made, sacred to friendship, mirth, and mild ale.

His body, when long in the ground it had lain,
And time into clay had resolved it again,
A potter found out in its covert so snug,
And with part of fat Toby he formed this brown jug,
Now sacred to friendship, to mirth, and mild ale.
So here’s to my lovely sweet Nan of the vale.
Rev. Francis Fawkes (1721-1777).

⁂ The two best drinking songs in the language were both by clergymen. The other is, I Cannot Eat but Little Meat, by John Still, bishop of Bath and Wells (1534-1607).

Filome´na (Santa). At Pisa the church of San Francisco contains a chapel lately dedicated to Santa Filomena. Over the altar is a picture by Sabatelli, which represents Filomena as a nymph-like figure floating down from heaven, attended by two angels bearing the lily, the palm, and a javelin. In the fore-ground are the sick and maimedmaimed, healed by her intercession.

Nor ever shall be wanting here
The palm, the lily, and the spear:
The symbols that of yore
St. Filomena bore
Longfellow, St. Filomena.

⁂ Longfellow calls Florence Nightingale “St. Filomena” (born at Florence, 1820).

Finality John, Lord John Russell (afterwards “Earl Russell”), who maintained that the Reform Bill of 1832 was a finality (1792-1878).

Finch (Margaret), queen of the gypsies, who died aged 109, a.d. 1740. She was born at Sutton, in Kent, and was buried at Beckenham, in the same county.

Finch (Lucilla). Blind girl whose sight is restored for a little while. The man she has loved while blind has received injuries that make him repulsive to the eye. His crafty brother contrives that the girl shall mistake him for her betrothed. A series of complications has a climax in the return of Miss Finch’s blindness, after which matters resume the former course and she marries the right man.—Wilkie Collins, Poor Miss Finch.

Fine-ear, one of the seven attendants of Fortunio. He could hear the grass grow, and even the wool on the sheep’s back.—Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales (“Fortunio,” 1682).

⁂ In Grimm’s Goblin’s is the same fairy tale (“Fortunio”).

Fin´etor, a necromancer, father of the Enchantress Damsel.—Vasco de Lobeira, Amadis de Gaul (thirteenth century).

Finetta, “the cinder girl,” a fairy tale by the Comtesse D’Aunoy (1682). This is merely the old tale of Cinderella slightly altered. Finetta was the youngest of three princesses, despised by them, and put to all sorts of menial work. The two sisters went to balls, and left Finetta at home in charge of the house. One day she found a gold key, which opened a wardrobe full of most excellent dresses; so arraying herself in one, she followed her sisters to the ball, but she was so fine that they knew her not, and she ran home before them. This occurred two or three times, but at last, in running home, she lost one of her slippers. The young prince resolved to marry her whose foot fitted the slipper, and Finetta became his wife. Finetta was also called Auricula or “Fine-ear.”

Fingal (or Fion na Gael).

His father was Comhal or Combal, and his mother Morna.

(Comhal was the son of Trathal, king of Morven, and Morna was the daughter of Thaddu.)

His first wife was Roscrana, mother of Ossian. His second was Clatho, mother of Fillan, etc.

(Roscrana was the daughter of Cormac I. third king of Ireland).

His daughter was Bosmi´na, and his sons Ossian, Fillan, Ryno, and Fergus. (The son of Ossian was Oscar.)

(Fillan was younger than his nephew Oscar, and both, together with Ryno, were slain in battle before Fingal died.)

His bard and herald was Ullin. His sword Luno, so called from its maker, Luno of Locklin (Denmark).

His kingdom was Morven (The northwest coast of Scotland); his capital Semo; his subjects were Caledonians or Gaels.

After the restoration of Ferad-Artho to the throne of Ireland, Fingal “resigned his spear to Ossian,” and died A.D. 283.

Fingal, an epic in six books, by Ossian. The subject is the invasion of Ireland by Swaran, king of Lochlin (Denmark) during the reign of Cormac II. (a minor), and its deliverance by the aid of Fingal, king of Morven (northwest coast of Scotland). The poem opens with the overthrow of Cuthullin, general of the Irish forces, and concludes with the return of Swaran to his own land.

Finger. “Little finger tell me true.” When M. Argan wishes to pump his little daughter Louison, respecting a young gentleman who pays attentions to her elder sister, he says to the child, “Prenez-y bien garde au moins; car voilà un petit doigt, qui sait tout, qui me dira si vous mentez.” When the child has told him all she knows, he puts his little finger to his ear and says, “Voilà mon petit doigt pourtant qui gronde quelque chose. Attendez! Hé! Ah, ah! Oui? Oh, oh! voila mon petit doigt, qui me dit quelque chose que vous avez vu et que vous ne m’avez pas dit.” To which the child replies, “Ah! mon papa, votre petit doigt est un menteur.”—Molière, Le Malade Imaginaire, ii. 11 (1673).

Finis Poloniæ. These words are attributed (but without sufficient authority) to Koscziusko the Pole, when he lay wounded by the balls of Suwaroff’s troops on the field of Maciejowieze (October 10, 1794).

Percé de coups, Koscziusko s’écria en tombant “Finis Poloniæ.”—Michaud, Biographie Universelle.

Finlayson (Luckie), landlady of the lodgings in the Canongate of Edinburgh.—Sir W. Scott, Guy Mannering (time, George II.).

Fin´niston (Duncan), a tenant of the laird of Gudgeonford.

Luckie Finniston, wife of Duncan.—Sir W. Scott, Guy Mannering (time, George II.).

Fion (son of Comnal), an enormous giant, who could place one foot on Mount Cromleach, in Ulster, and the other on Mount Crommal, close by, and then dip his hand in the river Lubar, which ran between.

With one foot on the Crommal set and one on Mount Cromleach,
The waters of the Lubar stream his giant hand could reach.
Translation of the Gaelic.

Fiona, a series of traditionary old Irish poems on the subject of Fion M’Comnal and the heroes connected with him.

Fionnua´la, daughter of Lir. Being transformed into a swan, she was doomed to wander over the lakes and rivers of Ireland till the Irish became Christians, but the sound of the first mass bell in the island was to be the signal of her release.

Silent, O Moyle, be the roar of thy water [County Tyrone] ...
While murmuring mournfully Lir’s lonely daughter
Tells to the night-star her tale of woes.
When shall the “Swan,” her death-note singing,
Sleep with wings in darkness furled?
When will heaven, its sweet “bell” ringing,
Call my spirit from this stormy world?
T. Moore, Irish Melodies, iv. (“The Song of Fionnuala”).

Fips (Mr.), a sedate, mysterious personage, living in an office in Austin Friars (London). He is employed by some unknown benefactor (either John Westlock or old Martin Chuzzlewit) to engage Tom Pinch at a weekly salary as librarian to the Temple Library.—C. Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit (1844).

Fir-bolg (i.e. bowmen, from bolg, “a quiver”), a colony of Belgæ from Britain, led by Larthon to Ireland and settled in the southern parts of the island. Their chief was called “lord of Atha” (a country of Connaught), and thence Ireland was called Bolga. Somewhat later a colony of Caledonians from the western coast of Scotland settled in the northern parts of Ireland, and made Ulster their headquarters. When Crotha was “lord of Atha” he carried off Conlama (daughter of the Cael chief) by force, and a general war between the two races ensued. The Cael were reduced to the last extremity, and sent to Trathal (grandfather of Fingal) for aid. Trathal accordingly sent over Conar with an army, and on his reaching Ulster he was made “king of the Cael” by acclamation. He utterly subdued the Fir-bolg, and assumed the title of “king of Ireland;” but the Fir-bolg often rose in insurrection, and made many attempts to expel the race of Conar.—Ossian.

Fire-Brand of France (The) John duke of Bedford, regent of France (1389-1435).

John, duke of Bedford, styled the “Firebrand of France.”

Drayton, Polyolbion xviii. (1613.)

Firouz Schah, son and heir of the king of Persia. One New Year’s Day an Indian brought to the king an enchanted horse, which would convey the rider almost instantaneously anywhere he might wish to go to; and asked as the price thereof, the king’s daughter for his wife. Prince Firouz, mounting the horse to try it, was carried to Bengal, and there fell in love with the princess, who accompanied him back to Persia on the horse. When the king saw his son arrive safe and sound he dismissed the Indian discourteously; but the Indian caught up the princess, and, mounting the horse, conveyed her to Cashmere. She was rescued by the sultan of Cashmere, who cut off the Indian’s head and proposed marriage himself to the princess. To avoid this alliance, the princess pretended to be mad. The sultan sent for his physicians, but they could suggest no cure. At length came one who promised to cure the lady; it was Prince Firouz in disguise. He told the sultan that the princess had contracted enchantment from the horse and must be set on it to disenchant her. Accordingly, she was set on the horse, and while Firouz caused a thick cloud of smoke to rise, he mounted with the lady through the air, saying as he did so, “Sultan of Cashmere, when you would espouse a princess who craves your protection, first learn to obtain her consent.”—Arabian Nights (“The Enchanted Horse”).

First Gentleman of Europe, George IV. (1762, 1820-1830).

Louis d’Artois of France was so called also.

The “First Gentleman of Europe” had not yet quite lost his once elegant figure.—E. Yates, Celebrities xvii.

First Grenadier of France. Latour d’Auverge was so called by Napoleon (1743-1800.)

First Love, a comedy by Richard Cumberland (1796.) Frederick Mowbray’s first love, being dowerless, marries the wealthy Lord Ruby, who soon dies leaving all his fortune to his widow. In the meantime, Frederick goes abroad, and at Padua falls in with Sabina Rosny, who nurses him through a severe sickness, for which he thinks he is bound in honor to marry her. She comes with him to England, and is placed under the charge of Lady Ruby. Sabina tells Lady Ruby she cannot marry Frederick, because she is married already to Lord Sensitive, and even if it were not so, she could not marry him, for all his affections are with Lady Ruby; this she discovers in the delirium of the young man, when his whole talk was about her ladyship. In the end Lord Sensitive avows himself the husband of Sabina, and Frederick marries his first love.

Fish.

He eats no fish, that is “he is no papist,” “he is an honest man or one to be trusted.” In the reign of Queen Elizabeth papists were the enemies of the government, and hence one who did not eat fish, like a papist, on fast days was considered a Protestant and a friend of the government.

I do profess ... to serve him truly that will put me in trust ... and to eat no fish.—Shakespeare, King Lear, act i. sc. 4 (1605).

Fish and the Ring.

1. Polycrătês, being too fortunate, was advised to cast away something he most highly prized, and threw into the sea an engraved gem of great value. A few days afterwards a fish came to his table, and in it was this very gem.—Herodotus, iii. 40.

2. A certain queen, having formed an illicit attachment to a soldier, gave him a ring which had been the present of her husband. The king, being apprised thereof, got possession of the ring while the soldier was asleep, threw it into the sea, and then asked his queen to bring it him. In great alarm, she went to St. Kentigern and told him everything. The saint went to the Clyde, caught a salmon with the ring in its mouth, and gave it to the queen, who thus saved her character and her husband. This legend is told about the Glasgow arms.

3. The arms of dame Rebecca Berry, wife of Sir Thomas Elton, Stratford-le-Bow, to be seen at St. Dunstan’s Church, Stepney. The tale is that a knight, hearing the cries of a woman in labor, knew that the infant was destined to become his wife. He tried to elude his destiny, and, when the infant had grown to womanhood, threw a ring into the sea, commanding the damsel never to see his face again till she could produce the ring which he had cast away. In a few days a cod-fish was caught, and the ring was found in its mouth. The young woman producing the ring, the marriage was duly solemnized.—Romance of London.

Fisher (Ralph), assistant of Roland Græme, at Avenel Castle.—Sir W. Scott, The Abbot (time, Elizabeth).

Fishers (The). Grandpa and Grandma Fisher live with daughter-in-law and two grandchildren in “The Ark” at Cedar-swamp. Grandpa is a retired sea-captain with a talent for tedious stories and a temper that is occasionally frayed. Grandma’s face has, “besides large physical proportions, generosity, whole-heartedness and a world of sympathy.” Both sleep in church, but grandma wakes up first, and arouses her husband with an adroit pin. He starts and looks guilty. She “opens her eyes at regular intervals,” as though she had merely been closing them to engage in a few moments of silent prayer.—Sally Pratt McLean Green, Cape Cod Folks (1881).

Fitz-Boo´dle (George), a pseudonym assumed by Thackeray in Frazer’s Magazine (1811-1863).

Fitz-Fulke (Hebe, duchess of), a “gracious graceful, graceless grace” (canto xvi. 49), staying with Lord and Lady Amundeville (4 syl.), while Don Juan “the Russian envoy” was their guest. Don Juan fancied he saw in the night the apparition of a monk, which produced such an effect on his looks and behavior as to excite attention. When the cause of his peturbation was known, Lady Adeline sang to him a tale purporting to explain the apparition; but “her frolic grace” at night personated the ghost to carry on the joke. She was, however, discovered by Don Juan, who was resolved to penetrate the mystery. With this discovery the sixteenth and last book of Don Juan ends.—Byron, Don Juan (1824).

Fitzurse (Lord Wildemar), a baron in the suite of Prince John of Anjou (brother of Richard Cœur de Lion).—Sir W. Scott, Ivanhoe (time, Richard I.).

Five Kings of France, the five directors (1795).

The five kings of France sit in their curule chairs with their flesh-colored breeches and regal mantles.—Atalier du Lys, ii.

Flaccus, Horace the Roman poet, whose full name was Quintus Horātius Flaccus (B.C. 65-8).

Fladdock (General), a friend of the Norris family in America, and, like them, devoted to titles, and aristocracy.—C. Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit (1844).

Flam´berge (2 syl.), the sword which Maugis took from Anthe´nor the Saracen admiral, when he attacked the castle of Oriande la Fée. The sword was made by Weyland, the Scandinavian Vulcan.—Romance of Maugis d’Aygremont et de Vivian son Frère.

Flamborough (Solomon), farmer. A talkative neighbor of Dr. Primrose, vicar of Wakefield. Moses Primrose marries one of his daughters.

The Misses Flamborough, daughters of the farmer. Their homeliness contrasts well with the flashy pretenders to fashion introduced by Squire Thornhill.—Goldsmith, Vicar of Wakefield (1766).

Flame (Lord), Johnson the jester and dramatist, author of Hurlo-Thrumbo, an extravaganza (1729).

Flammer (The Hon. Mr. Frisk), a Cantab, nephew to Lord Totterly. He is a young gentleman with a vivid imagination, small income, and large debts.—C. Selby, The Unfinished Gentleman.

Flammock (Wilkin), a Flemish soldier and burgess at the Castle of Garde Doloureuse.

Rose or Roschen Flammock, daughter of Wilkin Flammock, and attendant on Lady Eveline.—Sir. W. Scott, The Betrothed (time, Henry II.).

Flanders (Moll), a woman of extraordinary beauty, born in Old Bailey. She was twelve years a harlot, five years a wife, twelve years a thief, and eight years a convict in Virginia; but ultimately she became rich, lived honestly, and died a penitent in the reign of Charles II.—Defoe, The Fortunes of Moll Flanders.

Flash (Captain), a blustering, cowardly braggart, “always talking of fighting and wars.” In the Flanders war he pretended to be shot, sneaked off into a ditch, and thence to England. When Captain Loveit met him paying court to Miss Biddy Bellaw, he commanded the blustering coward to “deliver up his sword,” and added:

“Leave this house, change the color of your clothes and fierceness of your looks; appear from top to toe the very wretch thou art!”—D. Garrick, Miss in Her Teens (1753).

Fla´vius, the faithful, honest steward of Timon the man-hater.—Shakespeare, Timon of Athens (1600).

Fle´ance, in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, is the son of Banquo, one of Duncan’s trusted generals, and beloved and honored by Macbeth until the witches’ prophecy promises him the crown for which Macbeth has murdered the king. Macbeth resolves to destroy Banquo and his son, but while the father is murdered the son escapes, and the death-blow is given to Macbeth’s hope of an undisputed succession. Thus far the play; the chronicle makes Fleance become in time the Lord High Steward (Stewart, Stuart) of Scotland, and the ancestor of the House of Stuart which gave James I. to the English throne. James was very proud of this descent from Shakespeare’s Banquo, whose character was evidently drawn to flatter the king, since the Banquo of Holinshed’s Chronicle, from which the main of the play is drawn, is Macbeth’s partner in the murder of Duncan.

Flecknoe (Richard), poet-laureate to Charles II., author of dramas, poems, and other works. As a poet his name stands on a level with Bavius and Mævius. Dryden says of him:

... he reigned without dispute
Thro’ all the realms of nonsense absolute.
Dryden, M’Flecnoe (1682).

(It was not Flecknoe but Shadwell that Dryden wished to castigate in this satire. The offence was that Dryden was removed from the post of laureate, and Shadwell appointed in his place. The angry ex-laureate says, with more point than truth, that, “Shadwell never deviates into sense.”)

Fleda. A winning child who grows into the lovely heroine of Susan Warner’s novel Queechy (1852). Her simple faith and unaffected piety lead Mr. Carleton, a skeptical Englishman, into the right path. After many years and vicissitudes the two meet again in New York and are married in England.

Fledge´by (2 syl.), an over-reaching, cowardly sneak, who conceals his dirty bill-broking under the trade name of Pubsey and Co. He is soundly thrashed by Alfred Lammle, and quietly pockets the affront.—C. Dickens, Our Mutual Friend (1864).

Fleecebump´kin (3 syl.), bailiff of Mr. Ireby, the country squire.—Sir W. Scott, The Two Drovers (time, George III.).

Fleece´em (Mrs.), meant for Mrs. Rudd, a smuggler, thief, milliner, matchmaker and procuress.—Sam. Foote, The Cozeners.

Fleetwood or The New Man of Feeling, the hero of a novel so named by W. Godwin (1805).

Flemings (The Farmer). Yeoman-farmer of Kent, dull, honest plodder.

Dahlia. Lovely girl, who goes off with Edward Blancove, believing herself married to him. Discovering the deception, she returns to the farm, and resumes her old life. When the penitent lover seeks her and would marry her, she refuses. “She has left her heart among the ashes of the fire” that consumed her youth and honor.

Rhoda. Devoted sister who seeks Dahlia until she is found, and cherishes her tenderly through life. Rhoda marries a farmer, and Dahlia lives for seven years as her housemate. George Meredith, Rhoda Fleming (1888).

Flem´ing (Archdeacon), the clergyman to whom old Meg Murdockson made her confession.—Sir W. Scott, Heart of Midlothian (time, George II.).

Fleming (Sir Malcolm), a former suitor of Lady Margaret de Hautlieu.—Sir W. Scott, Castle Dangerous (time, Henry I.).

Fleming (Lady Mary), one of the maids of honor to Mary Queen of Scots.—Sir W. Scott, The Abbot (time, Elizabeth).

Fleming (Rose), niece of Mrs. Maylie. Rose marries her cousin Harry Maylie.

She was past 17. Cast in so slight and exquisite a mould, so mild and gentle, so pure and beautiful, that earth seemed not her element, nor its rough creatures her fit companions. The very intelligence that shone in her deep blue eye ... seemed scarcely ... of the world, and yet the changing expression of sweetness and good-humor, the thousand lights that played about the face ... above all the smile, the cheerful, happy smile, were made for home and fireside peace and happiness.—C. Dickens, Oliver Twist, xxix. (1837).

Flemish School (The), a school of painting commencing in the fifteenth century, with the brothers Van Eyck. The chief early masters were Memling, Van der Weyden, Matsys, and Mabuse. The chief of the second period were Rubens, Vandyck, Snyders, Jordæns, Gaspar de Crayer and the younger Teniers.

Flemming (Paul), scholarly hero of Longfellow’s Hyperion. Among the storied ruins of the Old World, he wins his bride by weaving to her stories from his own imagination (1839).

Fleshly School (The), a class of British poets of which Swinburne, Rossetti, Morris, etc., are exponents; so called from the sensuous character of their poetry.

⁂ It was Thomas Maitland [i.e. R. W. Buchanan] who first gave them this appellation in the Contemporary Review.

Fletcher (Dick), one of the crew of a pirate vessel.—Sir W. Scott, The Pirate (time, William III.).

Fletcher (Philip), fine gentleman, suitor of Christie, in Louisa M. Olcot’s novel “Work.”

Fleur de Marie, the betrothed of Captain Phœbus.—Victor Hugo, Notre Dame de Paris (1831).

Fleurant, an apothecary. He flies into a rage because Bérald (2 syl.) says to his brother, “Remettez cela à une fois, et demeurez un peu en repos.” The apothecary flares out, “De quoi vous mêlez vous de vous opposer aux ordonnance de la medicine ... je vais dire à Monsieur Purgon comme on m’a empêché d’executer ses ordres.... Vous verrez, vous verrez.”—Molière, La Malade Imaginaire (1673).

Flib´bertigib´bet, the fiend that gives man the squint eye and harelip, sends mildews and blight, etc.

This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet ... he gives the web and the pin [diseases of the eye], squints the eye, and makes the hare-lip; mildews the white heat, and hurts the poor creature of earth.—King Lear, act iii. sec. 4 (1605).

⁂ Shakespeare got this name from bishop Harsnett’s Declaration of Popish Impostures, where Flibberdigibet is one of the fiends which the Jesuits cast out of Mr. Edmund Peckham.

Flib´bertigib´bet, or “Dickie Sludge,” the dwarf grandson of Gammer Sludge (landlady of Erasmus Holiday, the schoolmaster in the vale of Whitehorse). In the entertainment given by the earl of Leicester to Queen Elizabeth, Dickon Sludge acts the part of an imp.—Sir W. Scott, Kenilworth (time, Elizabeth).

Flint (Lord), chief minister of state to one of the sultans of India. He had the enviable faculty of a very short memory when he did not choose to recollect. “My people know, no doubt, but I cannot recollect,” was his stock phrase. Mrs. Inchbald, Such Things Are (1786).

Flint, jailer in The Deserter, a musical drama by Dibdin (1770).

Flint (Sir Clement), a very kind-hearted, generous old bachelor, who “trusts no one,” and though he professes his undoubted belief to be “that self is the predominant principle of the human mind,” is never so happy as when doing an unselfish and generous act. He settles £2000 a year on the young Lord Gayville, his nephew, that he may marry Miss Alton, the lady of his choice; and says, “To reward the deserving, and make those we love happy, is self-interest in the extreme.”—General Burgoyne, The Heiress (1781).

Flint Jack, Edward Simpson, who used to tramp the kingdom, vending spurious flint arrow-heads, celts, and other imitation antiquities. In 1867 he was imprisoned for theft.

Flippan´ta, an intriguing lady’s-maid. Daughter of Mrs. Cloggit. She is in the service of Clarissa, and aids her in all her follies.—Sir John Vanbrugh, The Confederacy (1695).

Flite (Miss), a poor crazed, good-hearted woman, who has lost her wits through the “law’s delay.” She is always haunting the Courts of Chancery with “her documents,” hoping against hope that she will receive a judgment.—C. Dickens, Bleak House, iv. (1852).

Flock´hart (Widow), landlady of the lodgings in the Canongate where Waverley and M’Ivor dine with the baron of Bradwardine (3 syl.).—Sir W. Scott, Waverley (time, George II.).

Flogged by Deputy. The Marquis de Leganez forbade the tutor of his son to use rigor or corporal punishment of any kind, so the tutor hit upon this device to intimidate the boy: he flogged a lad named Raphael, brought up with young Leganez as a playmate, whenever that young nobleman deserved punishment. This produced an excellent effect; but Raphael did not see its justice and ran away.—Lesage, Gil Blas, v. i. (1724).

Flollo or Flollio, a Roman tribune, who held the province of Gaul under the Emperor Leo. When King Arthur invaded Gaul, the tribune fled to Paris, which Arthur besieged, and Flollo proposed to decide the quarrel by single combat. To this Arthur agreed, and cleft with his sword Caliburn both the helmet and head of his adversary. Having made himself master of all Gaul, King Arthur held his court at Paris.—Geoffrey, British History, ix. 11 (1142).

And after these ...
At Paris, in the lists [Arthur] with Flollio fought;
The emperor Leon’s power to raise his siege that brought.
Drayton, Polyolbion, iv. (1612).

Flor and Blancheflor, the title of a minnesong by Conrad Fleck, at one time immensely popular. It is the story of two children who fall in love with each other. There is a good deal of grace and tenderness in the tale, with an abundance of trash. Flor, the son of Feinix, a pagan king, is brought up with Blancheflor (an enfant volé). The two children love each other, but Feinix sells Blancheflor to some Eastern merchants. Flor goes in quest of Blancheflor, whom he finds in Babylon, in the palace of the sultan, who is a sorcerer. He gains access to the palace, hidden in a basket of roses; but the sultan discovers him, and is about to cast both into the flames, when, touched with human gentleness and love, he sets them free. They then return to Spain, find Feinix dead, and marry (fourteenth century).

Flo´ra, goddess of flowers. In natural history all the flowers and vegetable productions of a country and locality are called its flora, and all its animal productions its fauna.

Flora, the waiting-woman of Donna Violante. In love with Lissado, the valet of Don Felix.—Mrs. Centlivre, The Wonder (1714).

Mrs. Mattocks’s was the most affecting theatrical leave taking we ever witnessed. The part she chose was “Flora,” to Cook’s “Don Felix,” which she played with all the freshness and spirit of a woman in her prime.—The New Monthly (1826).

Flora, the niece of old Farmer Freehold. She is a great beauty, and captivates Heartwell, who marries her. The two are so well assorted that their “best love is after their espousals.”—John Philip Kemble, The Farm-house.

Floranthe (Donna), a lady beloved by Octavian. Octavian goes mad because he fancies Floranthê is untrue to him, but Roque, a blunt, kind-hearted servitor, assures him he is mistaken, and persuades him to return home.—G. Colman, Octavian (1824).

Flor´delice (3 syl.), the mistress of Bran´dimart (king of the Distant Islands).—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Flordespi´na, daughter of Marsiglio.—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Florence (Vane). The lost love eulogized in Philip Pendleton Cooke’s poem of that name.

“Thou wast lovelier than the roses
In their prime;
Thy voice excelled the closes
Of sweetest rhyme;
Thy heart was as a river
Without a main.
Would I had loved thee never,
Florence Vane!”
(185-).

Florence, Mrs. Spenser Smith, daughter of Baron Herbert, the Austrian ambassador in England. She was born at Constantinople, during her father’s residence in that city. Byron made her acquaintance in Malta, but Thomas Moore thinks his devotion was more imaginary than real. In a letter to his mother, his lordship says, he “finds her [Florence] very pretty, very accomplished, and extremely eccentric.”

Thou mayst find a new Calypso there
Sweet Florence, could another ever share
This wayward, loveless heart, it would be thine.
Byron, Childe Harold, ii. 30 (1810).

Florence (The German), Dresden, also called “The Florence of the North.”

Florence (Weir). A beautiful girl committed to the care of a young man who expects to meet a child. Although hardly released from an engagement to another girl he falls in love with his charge, when his former flame recalls him, but generously resigns him to her younger rival.—Ellen Olney Kirk, One too Many (1889).

Florent, the nephew of “the emperor,” is condemned to death, but is offered his life if he can solve a certain riddle. An old deformed hag promises him the solution if he will agree to marry her afterward. He keeps faith with his deliverer, and on the wedding-night she is transformed into a beautiful woman.—Gower, Confessio Amantis, I.

Chaucer puts this story into the mouth of “The Wife of Bath,” Canterbury Tales. He does not name the hero, but makes him a bachelor of King Artour’s court. The story is much older than Gower, and is found in the legends of several countries, but Chaucer probably borrowed it from him while changing it in details.

Florentine Diamond (The), the fourth largest cut diamond in the world. It weighs 139-1/2 carats, and was the largest diamond belonging to Charles “the Bold,” duke of Burgundy. It was picked up by a Swiss peasant, who sold it to a priest for half a crown. The priest sold it for £200 to Bartholomew May, of Berne. It subsequently came into the hands of Pope Julius II., and the pope gave it to the Emperor of Austria. (See Diamonds.)

Flores or Isle of Flowers, one of the Azores (2 syl.). It was discovered in 1439 by Vanderburg, and is especially celebrated because it was near this isle that Sir Richard Grenville, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, fought his famous sea-fight. He had only one ship with a hundred men, and was opposed by the Spanish fleet of fifty-three men-of-war. For some hours victory was doubtful, and when Sir Richard was severely wounded, he wanted to sink the ship; but the Spaniards boarded it, complimented him on his heroic conduct, and he died. As the ship (The Revenge) was on its way to Spain, it was wrecked, and went to the bottom, so it never reached Spain after all. Tennyson has a poem on the subject (1878).

Flo´res (2 syl.), the lover of Blanchefleur.—Boccaccio, Il Filocopo (1340)

⁂ Boccaccio has repeated the tale in his Decameron, x. 5 (1352), in which Flores is called “Ansaldo,” and Blanchefleur “Diano´ra.” Flores and Blanchefleur, before Boccaccio’s time, were noted lovers, and are mentioned as early as 1288 by Matfre Ermengaud de Beziers, in his Breviaire d’Amour.

Chaucer has taken the same story as the basis of the Frankeleine’s Tale, and Bojardo has introduced it as an episode in his Orlando Innamorato, where the lover is “Prasildo” and the lady “Tisbina.” (See Prasildo.)

The chroniclers of Charlemagne,
Of Merlin, and the Mort d’Arthure,
Mingled together in his brain,
With tale of Flores and Blanchefleur.
Longfellow.

Flores´ki (Count), a Pole, in love with Princess Lodois´ka (4 syl.). At the opening of the play he is travelling with his servant Verbel to discover where the princess has been placed by her father during the war. He falls in with the Tartar chief Kera Khan, whom he overpowers in fight, but spares his life, and thus makes him his friend. Floreski finds the princess in the castle of Baron Lovinski, who keeps her a virtual prisoner, but the castle being stormed by the Tartars the baron is slain, and the princess marries the count.—J.P. Kemble, Lodoiska.

Flo´rez, son of Gerrard, king of the beggars. He assumes the name of Goswin, and becomes, in Bruges, a wealthy merchant. His mistress is Bertha, the supposed daughter of Vandunke the burgomaster.—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Beggars’ Bush (1622).

Flor´ian, the “foundling“foundling of the forest,” discovered in infancy by the Count De Valmont, and adopted as his own son. FlorianFlorian is light-hearted and volatile, but with deep affection, very brave, and the delight of all who know him. He is betrothed to his cousin, Lady Geraldine, a ward of Count De Valmont.—W. Dimond, The Foundling of the Forest.

Florida (Vervain), American girl with her mother in Venice. She takes Italian lessons from Don Ippolito, a young priest, who has mistaken his calling. The girl’s pity for him and her desire to see him freed from a false position and in a different profession in America are misunderstood by her lover, Henry Ferris. Separation and sorrow ensue. Ippolito’s death-bed confession to Ferris clears up the mystery.

“If it is a little shocking, it is nevertheless true, and true to human nature that they spoke of Don Ippolito as if he were a part of their love.”—W.D. Howells, A Foregone Conclusion, (1874).

Flor´imel, “the Fair,” courted by Sir Sat´yrane, Sir Per´idure, and Sir Cal´idore (each 3 syl.), but she herself “loved none but Mar´inel,” who cared not for her. When Marinel was overthrown by Britomart and was reported to be dead, Florimel resolved to search into the truth of this rumor. In her wanderings, she came weary to the hut of a hag, but when she left the hut the hag sent a savage monster to bring her back. Florimel, however, jumped into a boat and escaped, but fell into the hands of Proteus (2 syl.), who kept her in a dungeon “deep in the bottom of a huge great rock.” One day, Marinel and his mother went to a banquet given by Proteus to the sea-gods; and as Marinel was loitering about, he heard the captive bemoaning her hard fate, and all “for love of Marinel.” His heart was touched; he resolved to release the prisoner, and obtained from his mother a warrant of release, signed by Neptune himself. Proteus did not dare to disobey, the lady was released, and became the happy bride of her liberator.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, iii. 4, 8, and iv. 11, 12 (1590-1596).

⁂The name Florimel means “honey-flower.”

Florimel (The False), made by a witch of Riphæ´an snow and virgin wax, with an infusion of vermilion. Two burning lamps in silver sockets served for eyes, fine gold wire for locks, and for soul “a sprite that had fallen from heaven.” Braggadoccio, seeing this false Florimel, carried “her” off as the veritable Florimel; but when he was stripped of his borrowed plumes, this waxen Florimel vanished into thin air, leaving nothing behind except the “golden girdle that was about her waist.”—Spenser, Faëry Queen, iii. 8, and v.3 (1590-1596).

Florimel’s Girdle, a girdle which gave to those who wore it, “the virtue of chaste love and wifehood true;” if any woman not chaste or faithful put it on, it immediately “loosed or tore asunder.” It was once the cestus of Venus, but when that queen of beauty wantoned with Mars, it fell off and was left on the “Acidalian mount.”—Spenser, Faëry Queen, iv. 2 (1596).

One day Sir Cambel, Sir Triamond, Sir Paridel, Sir Blandamour, and Sir Ferramont agreed to give Florimel’s girdle to the most beautiful lady; when the previous question was moved, “Who was the most beautiful?” Of course, each knight, as in duty bound, adjudged his own lady to be the paragon of women, till the witch’s image of snow and wax, made to represent Florimel, was produced, when all agreed that it was without a peer, and so the girdle was handed to “the false Florimel.” On trying it on, however, it would in no wise fit her; and when by dint of pains it was at length fastened, it instantly loosened and fell to the ground. It would fit Amoret exactly, and of course Florimel, but not the witch’s thing of snow and wax.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, iv. 5 (1596).

⁂ Morgan la Fée sent King Arthur a horn, out of which no lady could drink “who was not to herself or to her husband true.” Ariosto’s enchanted cup possessed a similar spell.

A boy showed King Arthur a mantle which no wife not leal could wear. If any unchaste wife or maiden put it on, it would either go to shreds or refuse to drape decorously.

At Ephesus was a grotto containing a statue of Diana. If a chaste wife or maiden entered, a reed there (presented by Pan) gave forth most melodious sounds; but if the unfaithful or unchaste entered, the sounds were harsh and discordant.

Alasnam’s mirror remained unsullied when it reflected the unsullied, but became dull when the unchaste stood before it. (See Caradoc, p. 160.)

Florin´da, daughter of Count Julian, one of the high lords in the Gothic court of Spain. She was violated by King Roderick; and the count, in his indignation, renounced the Christian religion and called over the Moors, who came to Spain in large numbers and drove Roderick from the throne. Orpas, the renegade archbishop of Sev´ille, asked Florinda to become his bride, but she shuddered at the thought. Roderick, in the guise of a priest, reclaimed Count Julian as he was dying, and as Florinda rose from the dead body:

Her cheek was flushed, and in her eyes there beamed
A wilder brightness. On the Goth [Roderick] she gazed.
While underneath the emotions of that hour
Exhausted life gave way.... Round his neck she threw
Her arms, and cried “My Roderick; mine in heaven!”
Groaning, he claspt her close, and in that act
And agony her happy spirit fled.
Southey, Roderick, etc., xxiv. (1814).

Flo´ripes (3 syl.), sister of Sir Fierabras [Fe.ā´.ra.brah], daughter, daughter of Laban, and wife of Guy, the nephew of Charlemagne.

Florisan´do (The exploits and adventures of), part of the series of Le Roman des Romans, or those pertaining to Am´adis of Gaul. This part (from bk. vi. to xiv.) was added by Paez de Ribēra.

Florise, (The lady), attendant on Queen Berengaria.—Sir W. Scott, The Talisman, (time, Richard I.)

Flor´isel of Nice’a (The exploits and adventures of), part of the series called Le Roman des Romans, pertaining to Am´adis of Gaul. This part was added by Feliciano de Silva.

Flor´ismart, one of Charlemagne’s paladins, and the bosom friend of Roland.

Florival (Mdlle.), daughter of a French physician in Belleisle. She fell in love with Major Belford, while nursing him in her father’s house during a period of sickness. Her marriage however was deferred, from the great aversion of the major’s father to the French, and he went to Havana. In due time he returned to England and Colonel Tamper with him. Now Colonel Tamper was in love with Emily, and wishing to try the strength of her affection, pretended to be severely mutilated in the wars. Florival was a guest of Emily at the time, and, being apprised of the trick, resolved to turn the tables on the colonel, so when he entered the room as a maimed soldier, he found there Florival, dressed as an officer, and, under the name of Captain Johnson, flirting most desperately with Emily. The colonel was mad with jealousy, but in the very whirlwind of his rage, Major Belford recognized Mdlle. Florival, saw through the trick, and after a hearty good laugh at the colonel all ended happily.—Colman, sen., The Deuce is in Him (1762).

Flor´izel, son of Polixenês, king of Bohemia. In a hunting expedition, he saw Perdita (the supposed daughter of a shepherd), fell in love with her, and courted her under the assumed name of Dor´icles. The king tracked his son to the shepherd’s house, and told Perdita that if she gave countenance to this foolery he would order her and the shepherd to be put to death. Florizel and Perdita then fled from Bohemia, and took refuge in Sicily. Being brought to the court of King Leontês, it soon became manifest that Perdita was the king’s daughter. Polixenês, in the mean time, had tracked his son to Sicily, but when he was informed that Perdita was the king’s daughter, his objection to the marriage ceased, and Perdita became the happy bride of Prince Florizel.—Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale (1604).

Florizel, the name assumed by George IV. in his correspondence with Mrs. Robinson (actress and poetess), generally known as Per´dita, that being the character in which she first attracted his attention when prince of Wales.

⁂ George IV. was generally nicknamed “Prince Florizel.”

Flower of Chivalry, Sir William Douglas, knight of Liddesdale (*-1353). Sir Philip Sidney, statesman, poet, and soldier, was also called “The Flower of Chivalry” (1554-1586). So was the Chevalier de Bayard, le Chevalier sans Peur et sans Reproche (1476-1514).

Flower of Kings. Arthur is so called by John of Exeter (sixth century).

Flower of Poets, Geoffrey Chaucer (1328-1400).

Flower of the Levant´. Zantê is so called from its great beauty and fertility.

Zante! Zante! flor di Levanti.

Flower of Yarrow (The), Mary Scott, daughter of Sir William Scott of Harden.

Flowers (The Death of the). In the poem bearing this title William Cullen Bryant thus names the American flowers that have been called “the crown-jewels of the year.”

“On the hill the golden-rod
And the aster in the wood,
And the yellow sunflower by the brook,
In autumn beauty stood,
Till fell the frost from the clear, cold heaven
As falls the plague on men
And the brightness of their smile was gone
From upland, glade and glen.”
The Death of the Flowers (1821-1834).

Flowerdale (Sir John), father of Clarissa, and the neighbor of Colonel Oldboy.—Bickerstaff, Lionel and Clarissa.

Floyd (Ireson).

“Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart
Tarred and feathered, and carried in a cart
By the women of Marblehead.”

The punishment was inflicted because he had refused succor to a leaking ship, lost in consequence of his inhumanity.—J.G. Whittier, Skipper Ireson’s Ride (1877).

Floyds (The). Artist and wife summering in Broughton, Mass. He is self-indulgent and careless of her; she proud, passionate and morbid. Convinced that her husband is weary of her, and beset by the importunities of another man, she drowns herself.—Bliss Perry, The Broughton House (1890).

Fluel´len, a Welsh captain and great pedant, who, amongst other learned quiddities, drew this parallel between Henry V. and Alexander the Great: One was born in Monmouth and the other in Macedon, both which places begin with M, and in both a river flowed.—Shakespeare, Henry V. act iv. sc. 7 (1599).

Flur, the bride of Cassivelaun, “for whose love the Roman Cæsar first invaded Britain.”—Tennyson, Idylls of the King (“Enid”).

Flute (The Magic), a flute which has the powers of inspiring love. When given by the powers of darkness, the love it inspires is sensual love; but when bestowed by the powers of light, it becomes subservient to the very holiest ends. In the opera called Die Zauberflöte, Tami´no and Pami´na are guided by it through all worldly dangers to the knowledge of divine truth (or the mysteries of Isis.)—Mozart, Die Zauberflöte (1791).

Flutter, a gossip, fond of telling a good story, but, unhappily, unable to do so without a blunder. “A good-natured, insignificant creature, admitted everywhere, but cared for nowhere” (act i. 3).—Mrs. Cowley, The Belle’s Stratagem (1780).

Fly. Dainty butterfly of fashion who falls heir to the heroine’s rejected lover in Elizabeth Stuart Phelps’s novel, The Silent Partner.

Fly-gods, Beelzebub, a god of the Philistines, supposed to ward off flies. Achor was worshipped by the Cyrēneads for a similar object. Zeus Apomy´ios was the fly-god of the Greeks.

On the east side of your shop, aloft,
Write Mathlai, Tarmael, and Baraborat;
Upon the north part, Rael, Velel, Thiel.
They are the names of those mercurial sprites
That do fright flies from boxes.
B. Jonson, The Alchemist, i. (1610).

Flying Dutchman (The), a phantom ship, seen in stormy weather off the Cape of Good Hope, and thought to forebode ill luck. The legend is that it was a vessel laden with precious metal, gained by murder and piracy on the high seas. In punishment, the plague broke out among the crew; no port would admit them, and the ship must sail the seas till doomsday.

Another legend is, that a Dutch captain, homeward-bound, driven back by continued storms off the Cape, swore that he would double the Cape if he sailed till the day of doom. Taken at his word, he must now sail the seas forever.—Captain Marryat, The Phantom Ship.

Richard Wagner’s opera, Der Fliegende Holländer, adds a loftier motive to the legend. The doomed captain cannot find rest until some woman consents to share his fate. Elsa, moved by pity, makes the sacrifice and saves him from perdition.

Flying Highwayman. William Harrow, who leaped his horse over turn-pike gates as if it had been furnished with wings. He was executed in 1763.

Flynn (Tom), of Virginia.

“Thar in the drift, back to the wall,
He held the timbers ready to fall
Then, in the darkness I heard him call:—
“Run for your life, Jake! run for your wife’s sake
Don’t wait for me!”
And that was all
Heard in the din,
Heard of Tom Flynn,—
Flynn of Virginia!”

Story told by the miner whose life he saved.—Bert Harte, In the Tunnel (1874).

Flyter (Mrs.), landlady of the lodgings occupied by Frank Osbaldistone in Glasgow.—Sir W. Scott, Rob Roy (time, George I.).

Fog (Amos). Dreamy fisherman, hunter and wrecker, builder and owner of Castle Nowhere, in Constance Fennimore Woolson’s tale of that name.

Foible, the intriguing lady’s maid of Lady Wishfort, and married to Waitwell (lackey of Edward Mirabell). She interlards her remarks with “says he,” “he says, says he,” “she says, says she,” etc.—W. Congreve, The Way of the World (1700).

Foi´gard (Father), one of a gang of thieves. He pretends to be a French priest, but “his French shows him to be English, and his English shows him to be Irish.”—Farquhar, The Beaux’ Stratagem (1705).

Folair´ (2 syl.), a pantomimist at the Portsmouth Theatre, under the management of Mr. Vincent Crummles.—C. Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby (1838).

Foldath, general of the Fire-bolg or Belgæ in the south of Ireland. In the epic called Tem´ora, Cathmor is the “lord of Atha,” and Foldath is his general. He is a good specimen of the savage chieftain; bold and daring, but presumptuous, overbearing, and cruel. “His stride is haughty, and his red eye rolls in wrath.” He looks with scorn on Hidalla, a humane and gentle officer in the same army, for his delight is strife, and he exults over the fallen. In counsel Foldath is imperious, and contemptuous to those who differ from him. Unrelenting in revenge; and even when he falls with his death-wound dealt by Fillan the son of Fingal, he feels a sort of pleasure that his ghost would hover in the blast, and exult over the graves of his enemies. Foldath had one child, a daughter, the blue-eyed Dardu-Le´na, the last of the race.—Ossian, Temora.

Fon´dlewife, an uxorious banker.—Congreve, The Old Bachelor (1693).

When Mrs. Jefferson [1733-1776] was asked in what characters she excelled the most, she innocently replied,—“In old men, like ‘Fondlewife’ and ‘Sir Jealous Traffic.’”

⁂ “Sir Jealous Traffic” is in The Busy-Body, by Mrs. Centlivre.

Fondlove (Sir William), a vain old baronet of 60, who fancies himself a schoolboy, capable of playing boyish games, dancing, or doing anything that young men do. “How marvellously I wear! What signs of age have I? I’m certainly a wonder for my age. I walk as well as ever. Do I stoop? Observe the hollow of my back. As now I stand, so stood I when a child, a rosy, chubby boy. My arm is as firm as ’twas at 20. Oak, oak, isn’t it? Think you my leg is shrunk?—not in the calf a little? When others waste, ’tis growing-time with me. Vigor, sir, vigor, in every joint. Could run, could leap. Why shouldn’t I marry?” So thought Sir William of Sir William, and he married the Widow Green, a buxom dame of 40 summers.—S. Knowles, The Love-Chase (1837).

Fool. James I. of Great Britain was called by Henri IV. of France, “The Wisest Fool in Christendom” (1566-1625).

Fool (The), in the ancient morris-dance, represented the court-jester. He carried in his hand a yellow bauble, and wore on his head a hood with ass’s ears, the top of the hood rising into the form of a cock’s neck and head, with a belt at the extreme end. The hood was blue, edged with yellow and scolloped, the doublet red, edged with yellow, the girdle yellow, the hose of one leg yellow and of the other blue, shoes red. (See Morris-Dance.)

Fool’s Prayer (The). A king calls upon his jester to “kneel down and make a prayer!” The fool obeys in words so full of pregnant truth that—

“The room was hushed. In silence rose
The King and sought his gardens cool,
And walked apart, and murmured low
‘Be merciful to me, a fool!’”
Edward Rowland Sill, The Fool’s Prayer (1883).

Fools, Jesters and Mirthmen. Those in italics were mirthmen, but not licensed fools or jesters.

Adelsburn (Burkard Kasper), jester to George I. He was not only a fun-maker, but also a ghostly adviser of the Hanoverian.

Aksakoff, the fool of Czarina Elizabeth of Russia (mother of Peter II.). He was a stolid brute, fond of practical jokes.

Angély (L.) jester to Louis XIV., and last of the licensed fools of France. He is mentioned by Boileau in Satires i. and viii.

Aopi (Monsignore), who succeeded Soglia as the merryman of Pope Gregory XVI.

Armstrong (Archie), jester in the courts of James I. and Charles I. One of the characters in Scott’s novel, The Fortunes of Nigel. Being condemned to death by King James for sheep-stealing, Archie implored that he might live till he had read his Bible through for his soul’s weal. This was granted, and Archie rejoined, with a sly look, “Then de’il tak’ me ’gin I ever read a word on’t!”

Berdic, “joculator” to William the Conqueror. Three towns and five caracutes in Gloucestershire were given him by the king.

Bluet d’Arbéres (seventeenth century), fool to the duke of Mantua. During a pestilence he conceived the idea of offering his life as a ransom for his countrymen, and actually starved himself to death to stay the plague.

Bonny (Patrick), jester to the regent Morton.

Borde (Andrew), usually called “Merry Andrew,” physician to Henry VIII. (1500-1549).

Brusquet. Of this court fool Brantôme says: “He never had his equal in repartee” (1512-1563).

Caillet (Guillaume), who flourished about 1490. His likeness is given in the frontispiece of the Ship of Fools (1497).

Chicot, jester of Henri III. and Henri IV. Alexandre Dumas has a novel called Chicot the Jester (1553-1591).

Colquhoun (Jemmy), predecessor of James Geddes, jester in the court of Mary queen of Scots.

Coryat, “prince of non-official jesters and coxcombs.” Kept by Prince Henry, brother of Charles I.

Coulon, doctor and jester to Louis XVIII. He was the very prince of mimics. He sat for the portraits of Thiers, Molé, and Comte Joseph de Villèle (died 1858).

Da´gonet (Sir), jester to King Arthur. He was knighted by the king himself.

Derrie, a court jester to James I. Contemporary with Thom.

Dufresnoy, poet, playwright, actor, gardener, glass-manufacturer, spendthrift, wit, and honorary fool to Louis XIV. His jests are the “Joe Millers” of France.

Geddes (James), jester in the court of Mary, queen of Scots. He was daft, and followed Jemmy Colquhoun in the motley.

Glorieux (Le), jester of Charles le Hardi of Burgundy.

Gonella, domestic jester of the duke of Ferrara. His jests are in print. Gonella used to ride a horse all skin and bone, which is spoken of in Don Quixote.

Hafod (Jack), a retainer in the house of Mr. Bartlett, of Castlemorton, Worcestershire. He died at the close of the eighteenth century, and has given birth to the expression “As big a fool as Jack Hafod.” He was the ultimus scurrarum in Great Britain.

Heywood (John) author of numerous dramatic works (1492-1565).

Jean (Seigni), or “Old John;” so called to distinguish him from Jean or Johan, called Le Fol de Madame, (fl. 1380).

Johan, Le Fol de Madame mentioned by Marot in his epitaphs.

Johnson (S.), familiarly known as “Lord Flame,” the character he played in his own extravaganza of Hurlo-Thrumbo (1729).

Kgaw (General), a Saxon general, famous for his broad jests.

Killigrew (Thomas), called “King“King Charles’s jester” (1611-1682).

Longely, jester to Louis XIII.

Narr (Klaus), jester to Frederick, “the Wise,” elector of Prussia.

Patch, court fool of Elizabeth, wife of Henry VII.

Patche, Cardinal Woolsey’s jester. The cardinal made Henry VIII. a present of this “wise fool,” and the king returned word that “the gift was a most acceptable one.”

Patison, licensed jester to Sir Thomas More. He is introduced by Hans Holbein in his famous picture of the lord chancellor’s family.

Paul (Jacob), Baron Gundling. This merryman was laden with titles in ridicule by Frederick William I. of Prussia.

Pearce (Dickie), fool of the earl of Suffolk. Dean Swift wrote an epitaph on him.

Rayère, court jester to Henry I. of England.

Rosen (Kunz von der), private jester to the emperor Maximilian I.

Scogan, court jester to Edward IV.

Soglia (Cardinal), the fun-maker of Pope Gregory XVI. He was succeeded by Aopi.

Somers (Will), court jester to Henry VIII. The effigy of this jester is at Hampton Court. And in Old Fish Street was once a public-house called Will Somers’s tavern (1490-1560).

Stehlin (Professor), in the household of czarina Elizabeth of Russia. He was teacher of mathematics and history to the grand-duke (Peter II.), and was also his licensed buffoon.

Tarleton, (Richard), the famous clown, and jester in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, but not attached either to the court or to any nobleman (1530-1588).

Thom, one of the court jesters of James I. Contemporary with Derrie.

Triboulet, court jester to Louis XII. and François I. (1487-1536). Licinio, the rival of Titian, took his likeness, which is still extant.

Wallett (W.F.), court jester to Queen Victoria. He styles himself “the queen’s jester,” but doubtless has no warrant for the title from the Lord Chamberlain.

Walter, jester to Queen Elizabeth.

Will, “my lord of Leicester’s jesting player;” but who this “Will” was is not known. It might be Will Johnson, Will Sly, Will Kimpe, or even Will Shakespeare.

Yorick, jester in the court of Denmark. Referred to by Shakespeare in his Hamlet, act v. sc. 1.

(Dr. Doran published The History of Court Fools, in 1858).

Fools’ Paradise, unlawful pleasure; illicit love; vain hopes; the limbus fatuorum or paradise of fools.

If ye should lead her into a fool’s paradise, it were a gross ... behavior.—Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, act ii. sc. 4 (1597).

Foot-breadth, the sword of Thoralf Skolinson “the Strong” of Norway.

Quern-biter of Hakon the Good,
Wherewith at a stroke he hewed
The millstone thro’ and thro’;
And foot-breadth of Thoralf “the Strong!”
Were not so broad, nor yet so long.
Nor was their edge so true.
Longfellow.

Fopling Flutter (Sir), “the man of mode,” and chief character of a comedy by Sir George Etherege, entitled The Man of Mode or Sir Fopling Flutter (1676).

Foppery. Vespasian the Roman emperor had a contempt for foppery. When certain young noblemen came to him smelling of perfumes, he said to them, “You would have pleased me more if you had smelt of garlic.”

Charlemagne had a similar contempt of foppery. One day, when he was hunting, the rain poured down in torrents, and the fine furs and silks of his suite were utterly spoilt. The king took this occasion to rebuke the court beaux for their vanity in dress and advised them in future to adopt garments more simple and more serviceable.

Foppington (Lord),an empty-headed coxcomb, intent only on dress and fashion. His favorite oaths, which he brings out with a drawl, are: “Strike me dumb!” “Split my windpipe!” and so on. When he loses his mistress, he consoles himself with this reflection: “Now, for my part, I think the wisest thing a man can do with an aching heart is to put on a serene countenance; for a philosphical air is the most becoming thing in the world to the face of a person of quality.”—Sir John Vanbrugh, The Relapse (1697).

The shoemaker in The Relapse tells Lord Foppington that his lordship is mistaken in supposing that his shoe pinches.—Macaulay.

Foppington (Lord), a young married man about town, most intent upon dress and fashion, whose whole life is consumed in the follies of play and seduction. His favorite oaths are: “Sun, burn me!” “Curse, catch me!” “Stop my breath!” “Let me blood!” “Run me through!” “Strike me stupid!” “Knock me down!” He is reckoned the king of all court fops.—Colley Cibber, The Careless Husband (1704).

Foppington (Lord), elder brother of Tom Fashion. A selfish coxcomb, engaged to be married to Miss Hoyden, daughter of Sir Tunbelly Clumsy, to whom he is personally unknown. His brother Tom, to whom he did not behave well, resolved to outwit him; and passing himself off as Lord Foppington, got introduced to the family, and married the heiress. When his lordship appeared, he was treated as an impostor, till Tom explained his ruse; and Sir Tunbelly, being snubbed by the coxcomb, was soon brought to acquiesce in the change, and gave his hand to his new son-in-law with cordiality. The favorite oaths of Lord Foppington are: “Strike me dumb!” “Strike me ugly!” “Stap my vitals!” “Split my windpipe!” “Rat me!”, etc.; and, in speaking, his affectation is to change the vowel “o” into a, as rat, naw, resalve, waurld, ardered, manth, paund, maunth, lang, philasapher, tarture, and so on.—Sheridan, A Trip to Scarborough (1777).

⁂ This comedy is The Relapse, slightly altered and curtailed.

Forbes (Paul), A travelled man who thinks himself blasé, but finds, to his surprise, new sensations in America. The leading excitement (and surprise) is his falling in love with a rich and beautiful girl and a poor and pretty one at the same time. Miriam, the rich beauty, divines the truth and her plan for freeing him is thus described by Edward Jasper, whom she married out of hand one evening.

“She was not happy—she resolved to throw herself into the abyss. I am the abyss.”

Forbes replies: “Since at this hour yesterday I had the honor to consider myself engaged to Miss Reese, who is now your wife, the most graceful act on my part is apparently, to efface myself. Accordingly, I efface myself.”—Ellen Olney Kirk, Sons and Daughters (1887)(1887).

Ford, a gentleman of fortune living at Windsor. He assumes the name of Brook, and being introduced to Sir John Falstaff, the knight informs him “of his whole course of wooing,” and how at one time he eluded Mrs. Ford’s jealous husband by being carried out before his eyes in a buck-basket of dirty linen.—Act iii. sc. 5.

Mrs. Ford, wife of Mr. Ford. Sir John Falstaff pays court to her, and she pretends to accept his protestationsprotestations of love, in order to expose and punish him. Her husband assumes for the nonce the name of Brook, and Sir John tells him from time to time the progress of his suit, and how he succeeds in duping her fool of a husband.—Shakespeare, Merry Wives of Windsor (1596).

Forde´lis (3 syl.), wife of Bran´dimart (Orlando’s intimate friend). When Brandimart was slain, Fordelis dwelt for a time in his sepulchre in Sicily, and died broken-hearted. (See Fourdelis.)—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1615).

Fore´sight (2 syl.), a mad superstitious old man, who “consulted the stars, and believed in omens, portents, and predictions.” He referred “man’s goatish disposition to the charge of a star,” and says he himself was “born when the Crab was ascending, so that all his affairs in life have gone backwards.”

I know the signs, and the planets, and their houses; can judge of motions, direct and retrograde, of sextiles, quadrates, trines, and oppositions, fiery trigons and aquatic trigons. Know whether life shall be long or short, happy or unhappy; whether diseases are curable or incurable; if journeys shall be prosperous, undertakings successful, or stolen goods recovered.—H. Congreve, Love for Love, ii. (1695).

Forester (Sir Philip), a libertine knight. He goes in disguise to Lady Bothwell’s ball on his return from the Continent, but being recognized, decamps.

Lady Jemima Forester, wife of Sir Philip, who goes with her sister Lady Bothwell to consult “the enchanted mirror,” in which they discover the clandestine marriage and infidelity of Sir Philip.—Sir W. Scott, Aunt Margaret’s Mirror (time, William III).

Forgeries (Literary).

Bertram (C. Julius), professor of English at Copenhagen, professed to have discovered, in 1747, the De Situ Britanniæ of Richardus Corinensis, in the library of that city; and in 1757 he published it with two other treatises, calling the whole The Three Writers on the Ancient History of the British Nations (better known as Scriptores Tres). His forgery was exposed by J.E. Mayor, in his preface to Ricardi de Cirencestria Speculum Historiale.

Chatterton (Thomas), in 1777, published certain poems, which he affirmed were written in the fifteenth century by Thomas Rowley, a monk. The poets Gray and Mason detected the forgery.

His other literary forgeries were: (1) The Pedigree of Burgum (a Bristol pewterer), professed to have been discovered in the muniment-room of St. Mary’s Church, Redcliffe. He accordingly printed a history of the “De Bergham” family, with a poem called The Romaunt of the Cnyghte, by John de Bergham (fourteenth century). (2) A forged account of the opening of the old bridge, signed “Dunhelmus Bristoliensis,” and professing to have been copied from an old MS. (3) An Account of Bristol, by Turgotus, “translated out of Saxon into English, by T. Rowley.” This forgery was made for the use of Mr. Catcott, who was writing a history of Bristol.

Ireland (S. W. H.) published, in folio, 1796, Miscellaneous Papers and Instruments, under the hand and seal of William Shakespeare, including the tragedy of King Lear and a small fragment of Hamlet, from the original, price £4 4s. He actually produced MSS. which he had forged, and which he pretended were original.

On April 2, 1796, the play of Vortigern and Rowena, “from the pen of Shakespeare,” was announced for representation. It drew a most crowded house; but the fraud was detected, and Ireland made a public declaration of his impositions, from beginning to end.

Mentz, who lived in the ninth century, published fifty-nine decretals, which he asserted were by Isidore of Seville, who lived three centuries previously. The object of these forged letters was to exalt the papacy and to corroborate certain dogmas.

At Bremen, in 1837, were printed nine books of Sanchoni´athon, and it was said that the MSS. had been discovered in the convent of St. Maria de Merinhâo by a Colonel Pereira in the Portuguese army; but it was ascertained that there was no such convent, nor any such colonel, and that the paper of this “ancient” MS. bore the water-mark of Osnabrück paper-mills.

Forgive, Blest Shade ... This celebrated epitaph in Brading Churchyard, Isle of Wight, is an altered version, by the Rev. John Gill (curate of Newchurch), of one originally composed by Mrs. Anne Steele, daughter of a Baptist minister at Bristol.

Fornar´ina (La), so called because she was the daughter of a baker (Fornajo), is the name under which Raphael’s mistress is known. Her name is said to have been Margherita. Raphael painted several portraits of this woman, the most famous being in the Uffizi Gallery at Florence, and her face appears to have suggested many of his most beautiful faces in other works.

Forrest (George), Esq., M.A., the nom de plume of the Rev. J. G. Wood, author of Every Boy’s Book (1855), etc.

Forsythe (Dick), Man of the world who comes to spend a few weeks in a country town with his invalid mother, astonishes and fascinates the natives of Ashwist, and falls in love with Lois Howe, the rector’s daughter. She has the bad taste to prefer a plainer man.—Margaret Deland, John Ward, Preacher (1888).

Fortescue (Ellen). Orphan niece adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton, shy, gentle, timid, and affectionate. Upon her death-bed Ellen’s mother has charged the child to shield her brother from blame everywhere and always. Performance of her promise to do this bring upon the sister a weight of suspicion that humbles her to the dust and nearly breaks her heart. She is cleared by her brother’s confession of his own wrong doing.—Grace Aguilar, Home Influence (1850).

For´tinbras, prince of Norway.—Shakespeare, Hamlet (1596).

Fortuna´tus, a man on the brink of starvation, on whom Fortune offers to bestow either wisdom, strength, riches, health, beauty, or long life. He chooses riches, and she gives him an inexhaustible purse. Subsequently, the sultan gives him a wishing-cap, which as soon as he puts on his head, will transport him to any spot he likes. These gifts prove the ruin of Fortunatus and his sons.

⁂This is one of the Italian tales called Nights, by Straparo´la. There is a German version, and a French one, as far back as 1535. The story was dramatized in 1553 by Hans Sachs; and in 1600 by Thomas Dekker, under the title of The Pleasant Comedie of old Fortunatus. Ludwig Tieck also had a drama upon the same subject.

The purse of Fortunatus could not supply you.—Holcroft, The Road to Ruin, i. 3.

Fortunatus’s Purse, a purse which was inexhaustible. It was given to Fortunatus by Fortune herself.

Fortunatus’s Wishing-cap, a cap given by the sultan to Fortunatus. He had only to put it on his head and wish, when he would find himself transported to any spot he liked.

Fortune (Emerson). Sharp spinster aunt of Ellen Montgomery in Susan Warner’s Wide, Wide World. She rules her house, her mother and niece with a hand of iron until she marries her farmer, phlegmatic Van Brunt.

Fortune’s Frolic, a farce by Allingham. Lord Lackwit died suddenly, and the heir of his title and estates was Robin Roughhead, a poor laborer, engaged to Dolly, a cottager’s daughter. The object of the farce is to show the pleasure of doing good, and the blessings which a little liberality can dispense. Robin was not spoilt by his good fortune, but married Dolly, and became the good genius of the cottage tenantry.

Fortunes of Nigel, a novel by Sir. W. Scott (1822). This story gives an excellent picture of the times of James I., and the account of Alsatia is wholly unrivalled. The character of King James, poor, proud and pedantic, is a masterly historic sketch.

Fortunio, one of the three daughters of an old lord, who at the age of four-score was called out to join the army levied against the emperor of Matapa´. Fortunio put on military costume, and went in place of her father. On her way, a fairy gave her a horse named Comrade, not only of incredible swiftness, but all-knowing and endowed with human speech; she also gave her an inexhaustible Turkey-leather trunk, full of money, jewels and fine clothes. By the advice of Comrade she hired seven gifted servants, named Strongback, Lightfoot, Marksman, Fine-ear, Boisterer, Trinquet, and Grugeon. After performing several marvelous feats by the aid of her horse and servants, Fortunio married Alfurite (3 syl.), the king of her country. Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales (1682).

⁂ This tale is reproduced in Grimm’s Goblins.

Fortunio’s Horse, Comrade, which not only possessed incredible speed, but knew all things, and was gifted with human speech.

Fortunio’s Attendants.

Trinquet drank up the lakes and ponds, and thus caught for his master [sic] most delicate fish. Lightfoot hunted down venison, and caught hares by the ears. As for Marksman, he gave neither partridge or pheasant any quarter, and whatever amount of game Marksman shot, Strongback would carry without inconvenience.—Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales (“Fortunio,” 1682).

Fortunio’s Sisters. Whatever gifts Fortunio sent her sisters their touch rendered them immediately worthless. Thus the coffers of jewels and gold “became only cut glass and false pistoles” the moment the jealous sisters touched them.

Fortunio’s Turkey-leather Trunk, full of suits of all sorts, swords, jewels, and gold. The fairy told Fortunio “she needed but to stamp with her foot, and call for the Turkey-leather trunk, and it would always come to her, full of money and jewels, fine linen and laces.”—Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales, (1682).

Forty Thieves, also called the tale of “Ali Baba.” These thieves lived in a vast cave, the door of which opened and shut at the words, “Open, Sesamê!” “Shut, Sesamê!” One day, Ali Baba, a wood-monger, accidentally discovered the secret, and made himself rich by carrying off gold from the stolen hoards. The captain tried several schemes to discover the thief, but was always outwitted by Morgia´na, the wood-cutter’s female slave, who, with boiling oil, killed the whole band, and at length stabbed the captain himself with his own dagger.—Arabian Nights (“Ali Baba or the Forty Thieves”).

Forwards (Marshal). Blucher is so called for his dash and readiness to attack in the campaign of 1813 (1742-1819).

Fosca´ri (Francis), doge of Venice for thirty-five years. He saw three of his sons die, and the fourth, named Jac´opo, was banished by the Council of Ten for taking bribes from his country’s enemies. The old doge also was deposed at the age of 84. As he was descending the “Giant Staircase” to take leave of his son, he heard the bell announce the election of his successor, and he dropped down dead.

Jac´opo Foscari, the fourth and only surviving son of Francis Foscari, the doge of Venice. He was banished for taking bribes of foreign princes. Jacopo had been several times tortured, and died soon after his banishment to Candia.—Byron, The Two Foscari (1820).

Fosco (Count), the airy, witty, unconscionable villain of Wilkie Collins’ Woman in White. Gallant, audacious and fat.

Foss (Corporal), a disabled soldier, who served many years under Lieutenant Worthington, and remained his ordinary when the lieutenant retired from the service. Corporal Foss loved his master and Miss Emily, the lieutenant’s daughter, and he gloried in his profession. Though brusque in manner, he was tender-hearted as a child.—G. Colman, The Poor Gentleman (1812).

⁂ Corporal Foss is modelled from “Corporal Trim,” in Sterne’s Tristram Shandy (1759).

Foster (Captain), on guard at Tully Veolan ruin.—Sir W. Scott, Waverley (time, George II.).

Foster, the English champion.—Sir W. Scott, The Laird’s Jock (time, Elizabeth).

Foster (Anthony) or “Tony-fire-the-Faggot,” agent of the earl of Leicester at Cumnor Place.—Sir W. Scott, Kenilworth (time, Elizabeth).

Foster (Sir John), the English warden.—Sir W. Scott, The Monastery (time Elizabeth).

Foster (Dr. James), a dissenting minister, who preached on Sunday evenings for above twenty years, from 1728-1748, in Old Jewry (died 1753).

Let modest Foster, if he will, excel
Ten metropolitans in preaching well.
Pope.

Foster (Silas), the bucolic master of the house that shelters the reformers of The Blithedale Romance. He gulps his tea, helps himself to dip-toast with the flat of his own knife, and perpetrates terrible enormities with the butter-plate, “behaving less like a sensible Christian than the worst kind of an ogre.”—Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Blithedale Romance (1852).

Foul-weather Jack, Commodore Byron (1723-1786.)

Foundling (The), Harriet, Harriet Raymond, whose mother died in childbirth, was committed to the charge of a gouvernante, who announced to her father (Sir Charles Raymond) that the child was dead. This, however, was not true, for the gouvernante changed the child’s name to Fidelia, and sold her at the age of 12 to one Villiard. One night, Charles Belmont, passing Villiard’s house, heard the cries of a girl for help; he rescued her and took her to his own home, where he gave her in charge to his sister Rosetta. The two girls became companions and friends, and Charles fell in love with the “foundling.” The gouvernante, on her death-bed, revealed the secret to Sir Charles Raymond, the mystery was cleared up, and Fidelia became the wife of Charles Belmont. Rosetta gave her hand to Fidelia’s brother, Colonel Raymond.—Edward Moore, The Foundling (1748).

Fountain, Bellamore, and Hare´brain, suitors to Lady Hartwell, a widow. They are the chums of Valentine the gallant, who would not be persuaded to keep his estate.—Beaumont and Fletcher, Wit without Money (1639).

Fountain of Life, Alexander Hales, “the Irrefragible Doctor” (*-1245).

Fountain of Oblivion. The student, Hieronymous, is told to seek out a certain fountain and cast a scroll into it, “and he shall find peace.” He obeys, and sees mirrored there his own life, and himself as boy and man, and beside him a maiden whose face is like that of the woman he loves.

“And the name was no longer Hermione, but was changed to Mary; and the student, Hieronymous, is lying at your feet!”—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Hyperion (1839).

Fountain of Youth, a marvellous fountain in the island of Bim´ini (one of the Baha´ma group). It had the virtue of restoring the aged to youth again. In the middle ages it was really believed to exist, and Juan Ponce de Leon, among other Spanish navigators, went in serious quest of this fountain.

Four Kings (The) of a pack of cards are Charlemagne (the Franco-German king), David (the Jewish king), Alexander (the Macedonian king), and Cæsar (the Roman king). These four kings are representatives of the four great monarchies.

Four Masters (The). (1) Michael O’Clerighe, (2) Cucoirighe O’Clerighe; (3) Maurice Conry; (4) Fearfeafa Conry. These four masters were the authors of the Annals of Donegal.

⁂ O’Clerighe is sometimes Anglicized into Clerkson, and Cucoirighe into Peregrine.

Fourberies de Scapin (Les), by Molière (1671). Scapin is the valet of Lèandre, son of seignior Gèronte (2 syl.), who falls in love with Zerbinette, supposed to be a gypsy, but in reality the daughter of seignior Argante (2 syl.), stolen by the gypsies in early childhood. Her brother Octave (2 syl.) falls in love with Hyacinthe, whom he supposes to be Hyacinthe Pandolphe of Tarentum, but who turns out to be Hyacinthe Gèronte, the sister of Lèandre. Now, the gypsies demand £1500 as the ransom of Zerbinette, and Octave requires £80 for his marriage with Hyacinthe. Scapin obtains both these sums from the fathers under false pretences, and at the end of the comedy is brought in on a litter, with his head bound as if on the point of death. He begs forgiveness, which he readily obtains; whereupon the “sick man” jumps from the litter to join the banqueters. (See Scapin.)

Fourde´lis, personification of France, called the true love of Burbon (Henri IV.), but enticed away from him by Grantorto (rebellion). Talus (power or might) rescues her, but when Burbon catches her by her “ragged weeds,” she starts back in disdain. However, the knight lifts her on his steed, and rides off with her,—Spenser, Faëry Queen, v. 2 (1596).

Fou´rierism, a communistic system; so called from François Charles Fourier of Besançon (1772-1837).

Fourolle (2 syl.), a Will-o’-the-wisp, supposed to have the power of charming sinful human beings into the same form. The charm lasted for a term of years only, unless it chanced that some good Catholic, wishing to extinguish the wandering flame, made to it the sign of the cross, in which case the sinful creature became a fourolle every night, by way of penance.

Fourteen, the name of a young man who could do the work of fourteen men, but had also the appetite of fourteen men. Like Christoph´erus, he carried our Lord across a stream, for which service the Saviour gave him a sack, saying, “Whatever you wish for will come into this sack, if you only say ‘Artchila murtchila!’” (i.e. “come (or go) into my sack”). Fourteen’s last achievement was this: He went to paradise, and being refused admission, poked his sack through the keyhole of the door; then crying out “Artchila murtchila!” (“get into the sack”), he found himself on the other side of the door, and, of course, in paradise.—Rev. W. Webster, Basque Legends, 195 (1877).

Fourteen. This number plays a very conspicuous part in French history, especially in the reigns of Henri IV. and Louis XIV. For example:

14th May, 1029, the first Henri was consecrated, and 14th May, 1610, the last Henri was assassinated.

14 letters compose the name of Henri de Bourbon, the 14th king of France and Navarre.

14th December, 1553 (14 centuries, 14 decades, and 14 years from the birth of Christ), Henri IV. was born, and 1553 added together = 14.

14th May, 1554, Henri II. ordered the enlargement of the Rue de la Ferronnerie. This order was carried out, and 4 times 14 years later Henri IV. was assassinated there.

14th May, 1552, was the birth of Margaret de Valois, first wife of Henri IV.

14th May, 1588, the Parisians revolted against Henri III., under the leadership of Henri de Guise.

14th March, 1590, Henri IV. gained the battle of Ivry.

14th May, 1590, Henri IV. was repulsed from the faubourgs of Paris.

14th November, 1590, “The Sixteen” took oath to die rather than serve the Huguenot king Henri IV.

14th November, 1592, the Paris parlement registered the papal bull which excluded Henry IV. from reigning.

14th December, 1599, the Duke of Savoy was reconciled to Henri IV.

14th September, 1606, the dauphin (Louis XIII.), son of Henri IV., was baptized.

14th May, 1610, Ravaillac murdered Henri IV. in the Rue de la Ferronnerie. Henri IV. lived 4 times 14 years, 14 weeks, and 4 times 14 days, i.e. 56 years and 5 months.

14 May, 1643, died Louis XIII., son of Henri IV. (the same day and month as his father). And 1643 added together=14; just as 1553 (the birth of Henri IV.)=14.

Louis XIV. mounted the throne 1643, which added together=14.

Louis XIV. died 1715, which added together=14.

Louis XIV. lived 77 years, which added together=14.

Louis XV. mounted the throne 1715, which added together=14.

Louis XV. died 1774 (the two extremes are 14, and the two means 77=14.)77=14.)

Louis XVI. published the edict for the convocation of the states-general in the 14th year of his reign (September 27, 1788).

Louis XVIII. was restored to the throne, Napoleon abdicated, the “Peace of Paris” was signed, and the “Congress of Vienna” met in 1814; and these figures added together=14.

In 1832=14, was the death of the Duc de Reichstadt (only son of Napoleon I.).

In 1841=14, the law was passed for the fortification of Paris.

In 1850=14, Louis Phillippe died.

Fox (That), Herod Antipas (B.C. 4 to A.D. 39).

Go ye, and tell that fox, Behold, I cast out devils.—Luke xiii. 32.

Fox (The Old), Marshal Soult (1769-1851).

Foxley (Squire Matthew), a magistrate who examines Darsie Latimer [i.e. Sir Arthur Darsie Redgauntlet], after he had been attacked by the rioters.—Sir W. Scott, Redgauntlet (time, George III.).

Fracasse (Capitaine), the French Bombastes Furioso.—Theophile Gautier.

Fra Diavolo, the sobriquet of Michel Pozza, a Calabrian insurgent and brigand chief. In 1799 Cardinal Ruffo made him a colonel in the Neapolitan army, but in 1806 he was captured by the French, and hanged at Naples. Auber has a comic opera so entitled, the libretto of which was written by Scribe, but nothing of the true character of the brigand chief appears in the opera.

Fradu´bio [i.e. Brother Doubt]. In his youth he loved Frælissa, but riding with her one day they encountered a knight accompanied by Duessa (false faith), and fought to decide which lady was the fairer. The stranger knight fell, and both ladies being saddled on the victor, Duessa changed her rival into a tree. One day Fradubio saw Duessa bathing, and was so shocked at her deformity that he determined to abandon her, but the witch anointed him during sleep with herbs to produce insensibility, and then planted him as a tree beside Frælissa. The Red Cross Knight plucked a bough from this tree, and seeing with horror that blood dripped from the rift, was told this tale of the metamorphosis.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, i. 2 (1590).

Frail (Mrs.), a demirep. Scandal says she is a mixture of “pride, folly, affectation, wantonness, inconstancy, covetousness, dissimulation, malice and ignorance, but a celebrated beauty” (act i.). She is entrapped into marriage with Tattle.—W. Congreve, Love for Love (1695).

Frampton (Major), the great man of the little village of Hillsborough, and a connoisseur in peach-brandy. Losing money, horses, wagons, and all his negroes except his body-servant, at cards, he blows out his brains in a convenient pine thicket.—Joel Chandler Harris, Georgian Sketches (1888).

Francatelli, a chef de cuisine at Windsor Castle, Crockford’s, and at the Freemasons’ Tavern. He succeeded Ude at Crockford’s.

Frances, daughter of Vandunke (2 syl.), burgomaster of Bruges.—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Beggars’ Bush (1622).

France (Everidge), the unworldly daughter of a worldly mother.—A. D. T. Whitney’s story, Odd or Even? (1880).

Francesea, daughter of Guido da Polenta (lord of Ravenna). She was given by her father in marriage to Lanciotto, son of Malatesta, lord of Rimini, who was deformed. His brother Paolo, who was a handsome man, won the affections of Francesca; but being caught in adultery, both of them were put to death by Lanciotto. Francesca told Dantê that the tale of Lancelot and Guinever caused her fall. The tale forms the close of Dantê’s Hell, v., and is alluded to by Petrarch in his Triumph of Love, iii.

⁂ Leigh Hunt has a poem on the subject, and Silvio Pellico has made it the subject of a tragedy.

George H. Boker’s play under the same title is also founded upon Dante’s story. Lawrence Barrett as Lanciotto, Louis James as Pepe and Marie Wainwright as Francesca will long be recollected by American theatre-goers.

Francesca, a Venetian maiden, daughter of old Minotti, governor of Corinth. Alp, the Venetian commander of the Turkish army in the siegesiege of Corinth, loved her; but she refused to marry a renegade. Alp was shot in the siege, and Francesca died of a broken heart.—Byron, Siege of Corinth (1816).

Medora, Neuha, Leila, Francesca, and Theresa, it has been alleged, are but children of one family, with differences resulting from climate and circumstances.—Finden, Byron Beauties.

⁂ “Medora” in The Corsair; “Neuha” in The Island; “Leila” in The Giaour; and “Theresa,” in Mazeppa.

Francesco, the “Iago” of Massinger’s Duke of Milan; the Duke Sforza “the More” being Othello; and the cause of hatred being that Sforza had seduced “Eugenia” Francesco’s sister. As Iago was Othello’s favorite and ancient, so Francesco was Sforza’s favorite and chief minister. During Sforza’s absence with the camp, Francesco tried to corrupt the duke’s beautiful young bride Marcelia, and being repulsed, accused her to the duke of wishing to play the wanton with him. The duke believed his favorite minister, and in his mad jealously ran upon Marcelia and slew her. He was then poisoned by Eugenia, whom he had seduced.—Massinger, The Duke of Milan (1622). (See Francisco.)

Francis, the faithful, devoted servant of “the stranger.” Quite impenetrable to all idle curiosity.—Benj. Thompson, The Stranger (1797).

Francis (Ayrault), a visionary who living in the dream-world he has evoked, neglects his nearest of kin, and lets opportunities of happiness, usefulness and patriotic service go by unimproved.—Thomas Wentworth Higginson, The Monarch of Dreams (1887).

Francis (Father), a Dominican monk, the confessor of Simon Glover.—Sir W. Scott, Fair Maid of Perth (time, Henry IV.).

Francis (Le Baron). Young French nobleman who renounces king and country. Is shipwrecked in New England, marries Molly Wilder and settles in Plymouth as a physician. He is the father of Lazarus le Baron.—“Round Robin Series,” A Nameless Nobleman.

Francis (Father), a monk of the convent at Namur.—Sir W. Scott, Quentin Durward (time, Edward IV.).

Franciscans. So called from St. Francis, of Assisi, their founder, in 1208. Called “Min´orites” (or Inferiors), from their professed humility; “Gray Friars,” from the color of their coarse clothing; “Mendicants,” because they obtained their daily food by begging; “Observants,” because they observed the rule of poverty. Those who lived in convents were called “Conventual Friars.”

Franciscan Sisters were called “Clares,” “Poor Clares,” “Minoresses,” “Mendicants,” and “Urbanites” (3 syl.)

Francis´co, the son of Valentine. Both father and son are in love with Cellide (2 syl.), but the lady naturally prefers the son.—Beaumont and Fletcher, Mons. Thomas (1619).

Francis´co, a musician, Antonio’s boy in The Chances, a comedy by Beaumont and Fletcher (1620).

Francisco, younger brother of Valentine (the gentleman who will not be persuaded to keep his estate). (See Francesco.)—Beaumont and Fletcher, Wit Without Money (1639).

Frank, sister to Frederick; passionately in love with Captain Jac´omo the woman-hater.—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Captain (1613).

Frankenstein (3 syl.), a student, who constructed, out of the fragments of bodies picked from churchyards and dissecting-rooms, a human form without a soul. The monster had muscular strength, animal passions, and active life, but “no breath of divinity.” It longed for animal love and animal sympathy, but was shunned by all. It was most powerful for evil, and being fully conscious of its own defects and deformities, sought with persistency to inflict retribution on the young student who had called it into being,—Mrs. Shelley, Frankenstein (1817).

In the summer of 1816, Lord Byron and Mr. and Mrs. Shelley resided on the banks of the lake of Geneva ... and the Shelleys often passed their evenings with Byron, at his house at Diodati. During a week of rain, having amused themselves with reading German ghost stories, they agreed to write something in imitation of them. “You and I,” said Lord Byron to Mrs. Shelley. “will publish ours together.” He then began his tale of the Vampire ... but the most memorable part of this story-telling compact was Mrs. Shelley’s wild and powerful romance of Frankenstein.—T. Moore, Life of Byron.

Frankford (Mr. and Mrs.). Mrs. Frankford proved unfaithful to her marriage vow, and Mr. Frankford sent her to reside on one of his estates. She died of grief; but on her death-bed her husband went to see her, and forgave her.—John Heywood, A Woman Killed by Kindness (1576-1645).

Frankland (Harry), Englishman saved from death, when buried in the ruins of Lisbon, by the exertions of the woman he has wronged and deserted.—Edwin Lasseter Bynner, Agnes Surriage (1886).

Franklin (Lady), the half-sister of Sir John Vesey, and a young widow. Lady Franklin had an angelic temper, which nothing disturbed, and she really believed that “whatever is is best.” She could bear with unruffled feathers even the failure of a new cap or the disappointment of a new gown. This paragon of women loved and married Mr. Graves, a dolorous widower, for ever sighing over the superlative excellences of his “sainted Maria,” his first wife.—Lord E. Bulwer Lytton, Money (1840).

Frank´lin (The Polish), Thaddeus Czacki (1765-1813).

Franklin’s Tale (The), in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, is that of “Dorigen and Arvir´agus.” Dorigen, a lady of rank, married Arviragus, out of pity for his love and meekness. One Aurelius tried to corrupt her, but she said she would never listen to his suit till “on these coasts there n’is no stone y-seen.” Aurelius contrived by magic to clear the coast of stones, and Arviragus insisted that Dorigen should keep troth with him. When Aurelius heard thereof, and saw the deep grief of the lady, he said he would rather die than injure so true a wife and so noble a gentleman.

⁂ This tale is taken from The Decameron, x. 5. (See Dianora.) There is also a similar one in Boccaccio’s Filocopo.

Frankly (Charles), a lighted-hearted, joyous, enthusiastic young man, in love with Clarinda, whom he marries.—Dr. Hoadley, The Suspicious Husband (1747).

Frank (Warrington), a young teacher who goes out into the world to seek her fortune as a governess. She wins the affections of the eldest son of her employers, and, although preferring at heart an earlier lover, marries the gay handsome heir secretly. When the truth is revealed, the bridegroom is killed in a duel by the brother of a woman to whom he had been betrothed. Frank Warrington, humbler and wiser, returns to her country home, and eventually marries her first love.—Mirian Coles Harris, Frank Warrington (1863).

Franval (Madame), born of a noble family, is proud as the proudest of the old French noblesse. Captain St. Alme, the son of a merchant, loves her daughter; but the haughty aristocrat looks with disdain on such an alliance. However, her daughter Marianne is of another way of thinking, and loves the merchant’s son. Her brother intercedes in her behalf, and madame makes a virtue of necessity, with as much grace as possible.—Th. Holcroft, The Deaf and Dumb (1785).

Fra´teret´to, a fiend, who told Edgar that Nero was an angler in the Lake of Darkness.—Shakespeare, King Lear (1605).

Fraud, seen by Dantê between the sixth and seventh circles of the Inferno.

His face the semblance of a just man’s wore
(So kind and gracious was its outward cheer).
The rest was serpent all.
Dantê, Hell, xvii. (1300).

Fred or Frederick Lewis, prince of Wales, father of George III. It was of this prince that the following epitaph was written:

Here lies Fred,
Who was alive, and is dead.
Had it been his father,
I had much rather;
Had it been his brother,
Still better than another;
Had it been his sister,
No one would have missed her;
Had it been the whole generation,
Still better for the nation;
But, since ’tis only Fred
Who was alive, and is dead,
There’s no more to be said!

Frederick, the usurping duke, father of Celia and uncle of Rosalind. He was about to make war upon his banished brother, when a hermit encountered him, and so completely changed him that he not only restored his brother to his dukedom, but retired to a religious house, and passed the rest of his life in penitence and acts of devotion.—Shakespeare, As You Like It (1598).

Frederick, the unnatural and licentious brother of Alphonso, king of Naples, whose kingdom he usurped. He tried to seduce Evanthé (3 syl.), the chaste wife of Valerio, but not succeeding in his infamous design, he offered her as a concubine for one month to any one who, at the end of that period, would yield his head to the block. As no one would accept the terms, Evanthê was restored to her husband.—Beaumont and Fletcher, A Wife for a Month (1624).

Frederick (Don), a Portuguese merchant, the friend of Don Felix.—Mrs. Centlivre, The Wonder (1714).

Frederick the Great in Flight. In 1741 was the battle of Molwitz, in which the Prussians carried the day, and the Austrians fled; but Frederick, who commanded the cavalry, was put to flight early in the action, and thinking that all was lost, fled with his staff many miles from the scene of action.

Frederick the Great from Molwitz deigned to run.
Byron, Don Juan, viii. 22 (1824.)

Frederick (Olyphant). Young man who has incurred the enmity of one of the Brotherhood of the Sea. In consequence, he is abducted upon the threshold of a friend’s house, and put on board a vessel with directions to the Brotherhood never to allow him to land. He gains his liberty through the accidental drowning of his jailor, and returns to New York, where his absence had excited the wildest alarm among his friends and the most fanciful speculations among acquaintances.—Brander Matthews, The Last Meeting.

Frederick (Owen). Rector and friend of the Major’s family, in Constance Fenimore Woolson’s novel, For the Major.

Freeborn John, John Lilburne, the republican (1613-1657).

Freedom (Wheeler). Hard-headed Yankee whose determination that one of his children shall bear his name is thwarted by circumstances until he gives up and “lets the Lord have His way.”—Rose Terry Cooke, Freedom Wheeler’s Controversy (1881).

Freehold, a grumpy, rusty, but soft-hearted old gentleman farmer, who hates all new-fangled notions, and detests “men of fashion.” He lives in his farm-house with his niece and daughter.

Aura Freehold, daughter of Freehold. A pretty, courageous, high-spirited lass, who wins the heart of Modely, a man of the world and a libertine.—John Philip Kemble, The Farm-house.

Freelove (Lady), aunt to Harriot [Russet]. A woman of the world, “as mischievous as a monkey, and as cunning too” (act i. 1).—George Colman, The Jealous Wife (1761).

Freeman (Charles), the friend of Lovel, whom he assists in exposing the extravagance of his servants.—Rev. J. Townley, High Life Below Stairs (1763).

Freeman (Sir Charles), brother of Mrs. Sullen and friend of Aimwell.—George Farquhar, The Beaux’ Stratagem (1705).

Freeman (Mrs.), a name assumed by the duchess of Marlborough in her correspondence with Queen Anne, who called herself “Mrs. Morley.”

Freemason (The lady), the Hon. Miss Elizabeth St. Leger (afterwards Mrs. Aldworth), daughter of Arthur, lord of Doneraile. In order to witness the proceedings of a lodge held in her father’s house, she hid herself in an empty clock-case; but, on being discovered, she was compelled to become a member of the craft.

Free Joe, negro manumitted by his master, the latter committing suicide immediately afterward. Joe has an easy time until his wife’s master refuses to let a “free nigger” hang about his place. He consorts with “poor white folks” in order to see “Lucinda,” meeting her secretly. At length she does not come for a month to the trysting-place, and he consults a fortune-teller who shows him that her master has taken her out of the county. Still he awaits her at the appointed rendezvous many days and nights, always sure that she will come, and laughing when others doubt it. One morning his friends, the poor whites, find him there dead.—Joel Chandler Harris, Free Joe (1888).

Free´port (Sir Andrew), a London merchant, industrious, generous, and of sound good sense. He was one of the members of the hypothetical club under whose auspices the Spectator was enterprised.

Freiherr von Guttingen, having collected the poor of his neighborhood in a great barn, burnt them to death, and mocked their cries of agony. Being invaded by a swarm of mice, he shut himself up in his castle of Güttingen, in the lake of Constance; but the vermin pursued him, and devoured him alive. The castle then sank in the lake, and may still be seen there. (See Hatto.)

Freischütz (Der), a legendary German archer, in league with the devil. The devil gave him seven balls, six of which were to hit with certainty any mark he aimed at; but the seventh was to be directed according to the will of the giver.—Weber, Der Freischütz (an opera, 1822).

⁂ The libretto is by F. Kind, taken from Apel’s Gespensterbuch (or ghost book). A translation of Apel’s story may be found in De Quincey’s works.

Freron (Jean), the person bitten by a mad dog, referred to by Goldsmith in the lines:

The man recovered of the bite
The dog it was that died.
Elegy on a Mad Dog.
Un serpent mordit Jean Freron, eh bien?
Le serpent en mourut.
Gibbon, Decline and Fall, etc., vii. 4 (Milman’s
notes).

Freston, an enchanter, introduced in the romance of Don Belia´nis of Greece.

Freston, the enchanter, who bore Don Quixote especial ill-will. When the knight’s library was destroyed, he was told that some enchanter had carried off the books and the cupboard which contained them. The niece thought the enchanter’s name was Munaton; but the don corrected her, and said, “You mean Freston.” “Yes, yes,” said the niece, “I know the name ended in ton.”

“That Freston,” said the knight, “is doing me all the mischief his malevolence can invent; but I regard him not.”—Ch. 7.

“That cursed Freston,” said the knight, “who stole my closet and books, has transformed the giants into windmills” (ch. 8).—Cervantes, Don Quixote. I. i. (1605).

Friars. The four great religious orders were Dominicans, Franciscans, Augustines, and Car´melites (3 syl.). Dominicans are called black friars, Franciscans grey friars, and the other two white friars. A fifth order was the Trinitarians or Crutched friars, a later foundation. The Dominicans were furthermore called Frates Majores, and the Franciscans Frates Minores.

(For friars famed in fable or story, see under each respective name or pseudonym.)

Friar (Lawrence). Ecclesiastic, who performs the marriage ceremony between Romeo and Juliet in Shakespeare’s play of that name.

Friar’s Tale (The), by Chaucer, in The Canterbury Tales (1388). An archdeacon employed a sumpnor as his secret spy to find out offenders, with the view of exacting fines from them. In order to accomplish this more effectually, the sumpnor entered into a compact with the devil, disguised as a yeoman. Those who imprecated the devil were to be dealt with by the yeoman-devil, and those who imprecated God were to be the sumpnor’s share. They came in time to an old woman “of whom they knew no wrong,” and demanded twelve pence “for cursing.” She pleaded poverty, when the sumpnor exclaimed, “The foul fiend fetch me if I excuse thee!” and immediately the foul fiend at his side did seize him, and made off with him, too.

Fribble, a contemptible molly-coddle, troubled with weak nerves. He “speaks like a lady for all the world, and never swears.... He wears nice white gloves, and tells his lady-love what ribbons become her complexion, where to stick her patches, who is the best milliner, where they sell the best tea, what is the best wash for the face, and the best paste for the hands. He is always playing with his lady’s fan, and showing his teeth.” He says when he is married:

“All the domestic business will be taken from my wife’s hands. I shall make the tea, comb the dogs, and dress the children myself.”—D. Garrick, Miss in Her Teens, ii. (1753).

Friday (My man), a young Indian, whom Robinson Crusoe saved from death on a Friday, and kept as his servant and companion on the desert island.—Defoe, Robinson Crusoe (1709).

Friend (The Poor Man’s), Nell Gwynne (1642-1691).

Friend of Man (The), the Marquis de ÈMirabeau; so called from one of his books, entitled L’Ami des Hommes (1715-1789).

Friends.

Frenchmen: Montaigne and Etienne de la Boëtie.

Germans: Goethe and Schiller.

Greeks: Achillês and Patroc´les; Diomēdês and Sthen´alos; Epaminondas and Pelop´idas; Harmo´dius and Aristogi´ton; Herculês and Iola´os; Idomeneus (4 syl.) and Merĭon; Pyl´adês and Ores´tês; Septim´ios and Alcander; Theseus (2 syl.) and Pirith´oös.

Jews: David and Jonathan.

Syracusans: Damon and Pythias; Sacharissa and Amŏret.

Trojans: Nisus and Euryalus.

Of Feudal History: Amys and Amylion.

Friendly (Sir Thomas), a gouty baronet living at Friendly Hall.

Lady Friendly, wife of Sir Thomas.

Frank Friendly, son of Sir Thomas and fellow-collegian with Ned Blushington.

Dinah Friendly, daughter of Sir Thomas. She marries Edward Blushington, “the bashful man.”—W. T. Moncrieff, The Bashful Man.

Frithiof [Frit.yof], a hero of Icelandic story. He married Ingëborg [In.ge.boy´e] daughter of a petty Norwegian king, and the widow of Hring. His adventures are recorded in an ancient Icelandic saga of the thirteenth century.

⁂ Bishop Tegnor has made this story the groundwork for his poem entitled Frithiof’s Saga.

Frithiof’s Sword, Angurva´del.

⁂ Frithiof means “peace-maker,” and Angurvadel means “stream of anguish.”

Fritz (Old), Frederick II. “the Great,” king of Prussia (1712, 1740-1786).

Fritz, a gardener, passionately fond of flowers, the only subject he can talk about.—E. Stirling, The Prisoner of State (1847).

Frog (Nic.), the linen-draper. The Dutch are so called in Arbuthnot’s History of John Bull.

Nic. Frog was a cunning, sly rogue, quite reverse of John [Bull] in many particulars; covetous, frugal; minded domestic affairs; would pinch his belly to save his pocket; never lost a farthing by careless servants or bad debts. He did not care much for any sort of diversions, except tricks of high German artists and legerdemain; no man exceeded Nic. in these. Yet it must be owned that Nic. was a fair dealer, and in that way acquired immense riches.—Dr. Arbuthnot, History of John Bull, v. (1712).

Frollo (Claude), an archdeacon, absorbed in a search after the philosopher’s stone. He has a great reputation for sanctity, but entertains a base passion for Esmeralda, the beautiful gypsy girl. Quasimodo flings him into the air from the top of Notre Dame, and dashes him to death.—Victor Hugo, Notre Dame de Paris (1831).

Fronde War (The), a political squabble during the ministry of Maz´arin in the minority of Louis XIV. (1648-1653).

Frondeur, a “Mrs. Candor,” a backbiter, a railer, a scandal-monger; any one who flings stones at another. (French, frondeur, “a slinger,” fronde, “a sling.”)

“And what about Diebitsch?” began another frondeur.—Véra, 200.

Frondeurs, the malcontents in the Fronde war.

Front de Bœuf (Sir Reginald), a follower of Prince John of Anjou, and one of the knight’s challengers.—Sir W. Scott, Ivanhoe (time, Richard I.).

Frontaletto, the name of Sa´cripant’s horse. The word means “Little head.”—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Fronti´no, the horse of Bradaman´tê (4 syl.). Roge´ro’s horse bore the same name. The word means “Little head.”—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

The renowned Frontino, which Bradamantê purchased at so high a price, could never be thought thy equal [i.e. Rosinantês equal].—Cervantes, Don Quixote (1605).

Frost (Jack), Frost personified.

Jack Frost looked forth one still, clear night,
And he said, “Now I shall be out of sight,
So over the valley and over the height
In silence I’ll take my way.”
Hannah F. Gould.

Froth (Master), a foolish gentleman. Too shallow for great crime and too light for virtue.—Shakespeare, Measure for Measure (1603).

Froth (Lord), a good boon companion; but he vows that “he laughs at nobody’s jests but his own or a lady’s.” He says, “Nothing is more unbecoming a man of quality than a laugh; ’tis such a vulgar expression of the passion; every one can laugh.” To Lady Froth he is most gallant and obsequious, though her fidelity to her liege lord is by no means immaculate.

Lady Froth, a lady of letters, who writes songs, elegies, satires, lampoons, plays, and so on. She thinks her lord the most polished of all men, and his bow the pattern of grace and elegance. She writes an heroic poem called The Syllabub, the subject of which is Lord Froth’s love for herself. In this poem she calls her lord “Spumoso” (Froth), and herself “Biddy” (her own name). Her conduct with Mr. Brisk is most blamable.—W. Congreve, The Double Dealer (1700).

Frothal, king of Sora, and son of Annir. Being driven by tempest to Sarno, one of the Orkney Islands, he was hospitably entertained by the king, and fell in love with Coma´la, daughter of Starno, king of Inistore or the Orkneys. He would have carried her off by violence, but her brother Cathulla interfered, bound Frothal, and, after keeping him in bonds for three days, sent him out of the island. When Starno was gathered to his fathers, Frothal returned and laid siege to the palace of Cathulla; but Fingal, happening to arrive at the island, met Frothal in single combat, overthrew him, and would have slain him, if Utha, his betrothed (disguised in armor), had not interposed. When Fingal knew that Utha was Frothal’s sweetheart, he not only spared the foe, but invited both to the palace, where they passed the night in banquet and song.—Ossian, Carric-Thura.

Fudge Family (The), a family supposed by T. Moore to be visiting Paris after the peace. It consists of Phil Fudge, Esq., his son Robert, his daughter Biddy, and a poor relation named Phelim Connor (an ardent Bonapartist and Irish patriot), acting as bear-leader to Bob. These four write letters to their friends in England. The skit is meant to satirize the parvenu English abroad.

Phil Fudge, Esq., father of Bob and Biddy Fudge; a hack writer devoted to legitimacy and the Bourbons. He is a secret agent of Lord Castlereagh [Kar.´sl.ray], to whom he addresses letters ii. and ix. and points out to his lordship that Robert Fudge will be very glad to receive a snug Government appointment, and hopes that his lordship will not fail to bear him in mind. Letter vi. he addresses to his brother, showing how the Fudge family is prospering, and ending thus:

Should we but still enjoy the sway
Of Sidmouth and of Castlereagh,
I hope ere long to see the day
When England’s wisest statesmen, judges,
Lawyers, peers, will all be—Fudges.

Miss Biddy Fudge, a sentimental girl of 18, in love with “romances, high bonnets, and Mde. le Roy.” She writes letters i., v., x., and xi., describing to her friend Dolly or Dorothy the sights of Paris, and especially how she becomes acquainted with a gentleman whom she believes to be the king of Prussia in disguise, but afterwards she discovers that her disguised king calls himself “Colonel Calicot.” Going with her brother to buy some handkerchiefs, her visions of glory are sadly dashed when “the hero she fondly had fancied a king” turns out to be a common linen-draper. “There stood the vile treacherous thing, with the yard-measure in his hand.” “One tear of compassion for your poor heart-broken friend. P.S.—You will be delighted to know we are going to hear Brunel to-night, and have obtained the governor’s box; we shall all enjoy a hearty good laugh, I am sure.”

Bob or Robert Fudge, son of Phil Fudge, Esq., a young exquisite of the first water, writes letters iii. and viii. to his friend Richard. These letters describe how French dandies dress, eat, and kill time.—T. Moore (1818).

⁂ A sequel, called The Fudge Family in England, was published.

Fulgentio, a kinsman of Roberto (king of the two Sicilies). He was the most rising and most insolent man in the court. Cami´ola calls him “a suit-broker,” and says he had the worse report among all good men for bribery and extortion. This canker obtained the king’s leave for his marriage with Camiŏla, and he pleaded his suit as a right, not a favor; but the lady rejected him with scorn, and Adoni killed the arrogant “sprig of nobility” in a duel.—Massinger, The Maid of Honor (1637).

Fulkerson, Western man who removes to New York, and sets up a magazine founded upon “the greatest idea that has been struck since—the creation of man. I don’t want to claim too much, and I draw the line at the creation of man. But if you want to ring the morning stars into the prospectus, all right!”

He makes a success of it, as he has a habit of making of everything; marries a Southern girl, and goes to live over “the office.” “In New York you may do anything.” He violates all sorts of conventionalities, talks slang and loudly, yet is everybody’s friend and most people’s favorite.—W.D. Howells, A Hazard of New Fortunes (1889).

Fulmer, a man with many shifts, none of which succeed. He says:

“I have beat through every quarter of the compass ... I have blustered for prerogative; I have bellowed for freedom; I have offered to serve my country; I have engaged to betray it ... I have talked treason, writ treason ... And here I set up as a bookseller, but men leave off reading; and if I were to turn butcher, I believe ... they’d leave off eating.”

Patty Fulmer, an unprincipled, flashy woman, living with Fulmer, with the brevet rank of wife. She is a swindler, a scandal-monger, anything, in short, to turn a penny by; but her villainy brings her to grief.—Cumberland, The West Indian (1771).

Fum, George IV. The Chinese fum is a mixture of goose, stag, and snake, with the beak of a cock; a combination of folly, cowardice, malice, and conceit.

And where is Fum the Fourth, our royal bird?
Byron, Don Juan, xi. 78 (1824).

Fum-Hoam, the mandarin who restored Malek-al-Salem, king of Georgia, to his throne, and related to the king’s daughter Gulchenraz [Gundogdi] his numerous metamorphoses; he was first Piurash, who murdered Siamek the usurper; then a flea; then a little dog; then an Indian maiden named Massouma; then a bee; then a cricket; then a mouse; then Abzenderoud the imaum´; then the daughter of a rich Indian merchant, the Jezdad of Iolcos, the greatest beauty of Greece; then a foundling found by a dyer in a box; then Dugmê, queen of Persia; then a young woman named Hengu; then an ape; then a midwife’s daughter of Tartary; then the only son of the sultan of Agra; then an Arabian physician; then a wild man named Kolao; then a slave; then the son of a cadi of Erzerûm; then a dervise; then an Indian prince; and lastly Fum-Hoam.—T.S. Gueulette, Chinese Tales (1723).

Fum-Hoam, first president of the ceremonial academy of Pekin.—Goldsmith, Citizen of the World (1764).

Funk (Peter), auctioneer whose business is to cheat the unwary. Having been branded by a placard placed before his door, “Beware of Mock Auctions!” he concerts a scheme for labeling other places of business and general resort, including newspaper offices and churches.—Charles Frederick Briggs, The Knickerbocker Magazine (1846).

Fungo´so, a character in Ben Jonson’s drama, Every Man in His Humour (1598).

Unlucky as Fungoso in the play.
Pope, Essay on Criticism, 328 (1711).

Furor (intemperate anger), a mad man of great strength, the son of Occasion. Sir Guyon, the “Knight of Temperance,” overcomes both Furor and his mother, and rescues Phaon from their clutches.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, ii. 4 (1590).

Fusber´ta, the sword of Rinaldo.—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Fus´bos, minister of state to Artaxam´is, king of Uto´pia. When the king cuts down the boots which Bombastês has hung defiantly on a tree, the general engages the king in single combat, and slays him. Fusbos then coming up, kills Bombastês, “who conquered all but Fusbos, Fusbos him.” At the close of the farce, the slain ones rise one after the other and join the dance, promising “to die again tomorrow,” if the audience desires it.—W.B. Rhodes, Bombastês Furioso.

Fusbos, a nom de plume of Henry Plunkett, one of the first contributors to Punch.

Fy´rapel (Sir), the leopard, the nearest kinsman of King Lion, in the beast epic of Reynard the Fox (1498).

Gabble Rechet, a cry like that of hounds, heard at night, foreboding trouble. Said to be the souls of unbaptized children wandering through the air till the day of judgment.—Charles Reade, Put Yourself in His Place.

Gabor, a Hungarian who aided Ulric in saving Count Stral´enheim from the Oder, and was unjustly suspected of being his murderer.—Bryon, Werner (1822).

Ga´briel (2 or 3 syl.), according to Milton is called “chief of the angelic guards” (Paradise Lost, iv. 549); but in bk. vi. 44, etc., Michael is said to be “of celestial armies prince,” and Gabriel “in military prowess next.”

Go, Michael of celestial armies prince;
And thou in military prowess next,
Gabriel; lead forth to battle these my sons
Invincible.
Milton, Paradise Lost, vi. 44, etc, (1665).

⁂ Gabriel is so called “The Messenger of the Messiah,” because he was sent by the Messiah to execute his orders on the earth. He is referred to in Daniel viii. 16, ix. 21; and in Luke i. 19, 26.

Gabriel (according to the Korân and Sale’s notes):

1. It is from this angel that Mahomet professes to have received the Korân; and he acts the part of the Holy Ghost in causing believers to receive the divine revelation.—Ch. ii.

2. It was the angel Gabriel that won the battle of Bedr. Mahomet’s forces were 319, and the enemy’s a thousand; but Gabriel (1) told Mahomet to throw a handful of dust in the air, and so doing the eyes of the enemy were “confounded;” (2) he caused the army of Mahomet to appear twice as many as the army opposed to it; (3) he brought from heaven 3000 angels, and, mounted on his horse Haïzûm, led them against the foe.—Ch. iii.

3. Gabriel appeared twice to Mahomet in his angelic form: first “in the highest part of the horizon,” and next “by the lote tree,” on the right hand of the throne of God.—Ch. liv.

5. Gabriel’s horse is called Haïzûm, and when the golden calf was made, a little of the dust from under this horse’s feet being thrown into its mouth, the calf began to low, and received life.—Ch. ii.

Gabriel (according to other legends):

The Persians call Gabriel “the angel of revelations,” because he is so frequently employed by God to carry His messages to man.

The Jews call Gabriel their enemy and the messenger of wrath; but Michael they call their friend, and the messenger of all good tidings.

In mediæval romance, Gabriel is the second of the seven spirits which stand before the throne of God, and he is frequently employed to carry the prayers of man to heaven, or bring the messages of God to man.

Longfellow, in the Golden Legend, makes Gabriel “the angel of the moon,” and says that he “brings to man the gift of hope.”

Gabriel Lajeunesse, son of Basil the blacksmith of Grand Pré, in Acadia (now Nova Scotia). He was legally plighted to Evangeline, daughter of Benedict Bellefontaine (the richest farmer of the village); but next day all the inhabitants were exiled by order of George II., and their property confiscated. Gabriel was parted from his troth-plight wife, and Evangeline spent her whole life in trying to find him. After many wanderings, she went to Philadelphia, and became a sister of mercy. The plague visited this city, and in the almshouse the sister saw an old man stricken down by the pestilence. It was Gabriel. He tried to whisper her name, but died in the attempt. He was buried, and Evangeline lies beside him in the grave.—Longfellow, Evangeline (1849).

Gabrielle (Charmante), or La Belle Gabrielle, daughter of Antoine d’Estrèes (grand-master of artillery and governor of the Ile de France). Henri IV. (1590) happened to stay for the night at the chateau de Cœuvres, and fell in love with Gabrielle, then 19 years old. To throw a veil over his intrigue, he gave her in marriage to Damerval de Liancourt, created her duchess of Beaufort, and took her to live with him at court.

The song beginning “Charmante Gabrielle ...” is ascribed to Henri VI.

Gabrielle (von Dohna). Brought up by her widowed father in singleness of heart and happiness until when she is over twenty he is again betrothed, and his fiancée persuades him to send his daughter to visit a relative, the Countess von Kronfels. She is a selfish old woman who adores her dog, and slights her invalid son. Gabrielle is dutiful to the old countess, and an angel of mercy to her son, although for awhile she dislikes and fears him. Finally, she tells the crippled man:

“You are a greater hero in my eyes than if you were leading men to battle. You may send me away if you will, but you will break my heart.”

He loves her too well to let her go.—Blanche Willis Howard, The Open Door (1889).

Gabri´na, wife of Arge´o, baron of Servia, tried to seduce Philandre, a Dutch knight; but Philandre fled from the house, where he was a guest. She then accused him to her husband of a wanton insult, and Argeo, having apprehended him, confined him in a dungeon. One day, Gabrina visited him there, and implored him to save her from a knight who sought to dishonor her. Philandre willingly espoused her cause, and slew the knight, who proved to be her husband. Gabrina then told her champion that if he refused to marry her, she would accuse him of murder to the magistrates. On this threat he married her, but ere long was killed by poison. Gabrina now wandered about the country as an old hag, and being fastened on Odori´co, was hung by him to the branch of an elm.—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

Gabriolet´ta, governess of Brittany, rescued by Am´adis de Gaul from the hands of Balan (“the bravest and strongest of all giants”).—Vasco de Lobeira, Amadis de Gaul, iv. 129 (fourteenth century.)

Gadshill, a companion of Sir John Falstaff. This thief receives his name from a place called Gadshill, on the Kentish road, notorious for the many robberies committed there.—Shakespeare, 1 Henry IV. act ii. sc. 4 (1597).

Ga´heris (Sir), son of Lot (king of Orkney) and Morgause (King Arthur’s sister). Being taken captive by Sir Turquine, he was liberated by Sir Launcelot du Lac. One night, Sir Gaheris caught his mother in adultery with Sir Lamorake, and, holding her by the hair, struck off her head.

Gaiour [Djow.´r], emperor of China, and father, of Badour´a (the “most beautiful woman ever seen upon earth”). Badoura married Camaral´zaman, the most beautiful of men.—Arabian Nights (“Camaralzaman and Badoura”). (See Giaour).

Gal´ahad (Sir), the chaste son of Sir Launcelot and the fair Elaine (King Pelles’s daughter, pt. iii. 2), and thus was fulfilled a prophecy that she should become the mother of the noblest knight that was ever born. Queen Guenevere says that Sir Launcelot “came of the eighth degree from our Saviour, and Sir Galahad is of the ninth ... and, therefore, be they the greatest gentlemen of all the world” (pt. iii. 35). His sword was that which Sir Balin released from the maiden’s scabbard (see Balin), and his shield belonged to King Euelake [Evelake], who received it from Joseph of Arimathy. It was a snow-white shield, on which Joseph had made a cross with his blood (pt. iii. 39). After divers adventures, Sir Galahad came to Sarras, where he was made king, was shown the sangraal by Joseph of Arimathy, and “took“took the Lord’s body between his hands,” and died. Then suddenly “a great multitude of angels bear his soul up to heaven,” and “sithence was never no man that could say he had seen the sangraal” (pt. iii. 103).

Sir Galahad was the only knight who could sit in the “Siege Perilous,” a seat in the Round Table reserved for the knight destined to achieve the quest of the holy graal, and no other person could sit in it without peril of his life (pt. iii. 32). He also drew from the iron and marble rock the sword which no other knight could release (pt. iii. 33). His great achievement was that of the Holy Graal.

Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres
I find a magic bark;
I leap on board: no helmsman steers
I float till all is dark.
A gentle sound, an awful light!
Three angels bear the holy Grail
With folded feet, in stoles of white
On sleeping wings they sail.
Ah, blessed vision! blood of God!
My spirit beats her mortal bars,
As down dark tides the glory slides
And star-like mingles with the stars.
Tennyson, Sir Galahad.

Then the bishop took a wafer, which was made in the likeness of bread, and at the lifting up [the elevation of the host] there came a figure in the likeness of a child, and the visage was as red and as bright as fire; and he smote himself into that bread; so they saw that the bread was formed of a fleshly man, and then he put it into the holy vessel again ... then he took the holy vessel and came to Sir Galahad as he kneeled down, and there he received his Saviour ... then went he and kissed Sir Bors ... and kneeled at the table and made his prayers; and suddenly his soul departed ... and a great multitude of angels bear his soul to heaven.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur, iii. 101-103 (1470).

⁂ Sir Galahalt, the son of Sir Brewnor, must not be confounded with Sir Galahad, the son of Sir Launcelot.

Galahalt (Sir), called “The Haut Prince,” son of Sir Brewnor. He was one of the knights of the Round Table.

Gal´antyse (3 syl.), the steed given to Graunde Armoure by King Melyzyus.

And I myselfe shall give you a worthy stede,
Called Galantyse, to helpe you in your nede.
Stephen Hawes, The Passe-tyme of Plesure, xxviii. (1515).

Ga´laor (Don), brother of Am´adis de Gaul. A desultor amoris, who, as Don Quixote says, “made love to every pretty girl he met.” His adventures form a strong contrast to those of his more serious brother.—Amadis de Gaul (fourteenth century).

A barber in the village insisted that none equalled “The Knight of the Sun” [i.e. Amadis], except Don Galaor his brother.—Cervantes, Don Quixote, I. 1 (1605).

Gal´apas, a giant of “marvellous height” in the army of Lucius, king of Rome. He was slain by King Arthur.

[King Arthur] slew a great giant named Galapas ... He shortened him by smiting off both his legs at the knees, saying, “Now art thou better of a size to deal with than thou wert.” And after, he smote off his head.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur, I. 115 (1470).

Gal´aphron or Gallaphrone (3 syl.), a king of Cathay, father of Angelica.—Bojardo, Orlando Innamorato (1495); Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (1516).

When Agrican ... besieged Albracca ...
The city of Gallaphrone, whence to win
The fairest of her sex, Angelica.
Milton, Paradise Regained, iii. (1671).

Galasp, or rather George Gillespie, mentioned by Milton in Sonnet, x., was a Scottish writer against the independents, and one of the “Assembly of Divines” (1583-1648). See Colkitto.

Galatea. Lovely statue, made by Pygmalion, and endued with life by Venus at the prayer of the sculptor-lover.

Galate´a, a sea-nymph, beloved by Polypheme (3 syl.) She herself had a heartache for Acis. The jealous giant crushed his rival under a huge rock, and Galatēa, inconsolable at the loss of her lover, was changed into a fountain. The word Galatea is used poetically for any rustic maiden.

⁂ Handel has an opera called Acis and Galatea (1710).

Galatea, a wise and modest lady attending on the princess in the drama of Philaster or Love Lies a-bleeding, by Beaumont and Fletcher (1608).

Gala´tine (3 syl.), the sword of Sir Gaw´ain, King Arthur’s nephew.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur, i. 93 (1470).

Galbraith (Miss Lucy), a young lady who finds herself en tête-a-tête with her çi-devant lover in a parlor-car. Conversation ensues and a quarrel. Upon attempting to leave the car, she discovers that it is uncoupled and solitary upon the track. In the fright of the alarm caused by what she assumes to be peril, she falls into her lover’s arms entreating forgiveness. The reconciliation is complete by the time they arrive safely at Schenectady.—W. D. Howells, The Parlor Car, A Farce (1876).

Galbraith (Major Duncan), of Garschattachin, a militia officer.—Sir W. Scott, Rob Roy (time, George I.).

Ga´len, an apothecary, a medical man (in disparagement). Galen was the most celebrated physician of ancient Greece, and had a greater influence on medical science than any other man before or since (A. D. 130-200).

Unawed, young Galen bears the hostile brunt,
Pills in his rear, and Cullen in his front.
Wm. Falconer, The Midshipman.

Dr.Dr. William Cullen, of Hamilton, Lanarkshire, author of Nosology, (1712-1790).

Gal´enist, a herb doctor.

The Galĕnist and Paracelsian
S. Butler, Hudibras, iii. 3 (1678).

Galeotti Martivalle, (Martius), astrologerastrologer of Louis XI. Being asked by the superstitious king if he knew the day of his own death, the crafty astrologer replied that he could not name the exact day, but he had learnt thus much by his art—that it would occur just twenty-four hours before the decease of his majesty (ch. xxix.).—Sir W. Scott, Quentin Durward (time, Edward IV.).

⁂ Thrasullus the soothsayer made precisely the same answer to Tibe´rius, emperor of Rome.

Galera´na is called by Ariosto the wife of Charlemagne; but the nine wives of that emperor are usually given as Hamiltrude (3 syl.), Desidera´ta, Hil´degarde (3 syl.), Fastrade (2 syl.), Luitgarde, Maltegarde, Gersuinde, Regi´na, and Adalin´da.—Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, xxi. (1516).

Galère (2 syl.). Que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère? Scapin wants to get from Géronte (a miserly old hunks) £1500, to help Leandre, the old man’s son, out of a money difficulty. So Scapin vamps up a cock-and-bull story about Leandre being invited by a Turk on board his galley, where he was treated to a most sumptuous repast; but when the young man was about to quit the galley, the Turk told him he was a prisoner, and demanded £1500 for his ransom within two hours’ time. When GéronteGéronte hears this, he exclaims, “Que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère?” and he swears he will arrest the Turk for extortion. Being shown the impossibility of so doing, he again exclaims, “Que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère?” and it flashes into his mind that Scapin should give himself up as surety for the payment of the ransom. This of course Scapin objects to. The old man again exclaims, “Que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère?” and commands Scapin to go and tell the Turk that £1500 is not to be picked off a hedge. Scapin says the Turk does not care a straw about that, and insists on the ransom. “Mais, que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère?” cries the old hunks; and tells Scapin to go and pawn certain goods. Scapin replies there is no time, the two hours are nearly exhausted. “Que diable,” cries the old man again, “allait-il faire dans cette galère?” and when at last he gives the money, he repeats the same words, “Mais, que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère?”—Molière, Les Fourberies de Scapin. ii. 11 (1671).

Gal´gacus, chief of the Caledonians, who resisted Agricŏla with great valor. In A. D. 84 he was defeated, and died on the field. Tacĭtus puts into his mouth a noble speech, made to his army before the battle.

Galgacus, their guide,
Amongst his murthered troops there resolutely died.
Drayton, Polyolbion, viii. (1612).

Galia´na, a Moorish princess, daughter of Gadalfe, king of Tolēdo. Her father built for her a palace on the Tagus, so splendid that “a palace of Galiana” has become a proverb in Spain.

Galien Restored, a mediæval romance of chivalry. Galien was the son of Jaqueline (daughter of Hugh, king of Constantinople). His father was Count Oliver of Vienne. Two fairies interested themselves in Jaqueline’s infant son; one, named Galienne, had the child named after her, Galien; and the other insisted that he should be called “Restored,” for that the boy would restore the chivalry of Charlemagne.—Author unknown.

Galile´o [Galilei], born at Pisa, but lived chiefly in Florence. In 1633 he published his work on the Copernican system, showing that “the earth moved and the sun stood still.” For this he was denounced by the Inquisition of Rome, and accused of contradicting the Bible. At the age of 70 he was obliged to abjure his system, in order to gain his liberty. After pronouncing his abjuration, he said, in a stage whisper, E pur si muove (“It does move, though”). This is said to be a romance (1564-1642).

Galinthia, daughter of Prœtus, king of Argos. She was changed by the Fates into a cat, and in that shape was made by Hecate her high priestess.—Antonius Liberalis, Metam, xxix.

Gallegher, audacious errand-boy in the office of a daily newspaper. He outwits police and sporting-men, and shows detective genius unequalled by a “professional,” becoming the means of arresting a noted murderer, and driving into town after midnight with the news of this event and of a big prize-fight, sinking exhausted on the office floor with the exclamation, “I beat the town!”—Richard Harding Davis, Gallegher (1890).

Gallegos [Gal´.le.goze], the people of Galacia (once a province of Spain).

Gallice´næ, priestesses of Gallic mythology, who had power over the winds and waves. There were nine of them, all virgins.

Galligan´tus, the giant who lived with Hocus-Pocus, the conjuror. When Jack the Giant-killer blew the magic horn, both the giant and conjuror were overthrown.—Jack the Giant-killer.

Gallo-ma´nia, a furor for everything French. Generally applied to that vile imitation of French literature and customs which prevailed in Germany in the time of Frederick II. of Prussia. It is very conspicuous in the writings of Wieland (1733-1813).

Galloping Dick, Richard Ferguson, the highwayman, executed in 1800.

Galloway (The Fair Maid of), Margaret, only daughter of Archibald, fifth earl of Douglas. She married her cousin William, to whom the earldom passed in 1443. After the death of her first husband, she married his brother James (the last earl of Douglas).

Gallowglasses, heavy-armed foot-soldiers of Ireland and the western isles; the light-armed troops were called kernes.

—— the merciless Macdonwald
—— from the western isles
Of kernes and gallowglasses is supplied.
Shakespeare’s Macbeth, act i. sc. 2.

Gallura’s Bird, the cock, the emblem of Gallura in Sardinia, ruled by Nino di Gallura de’Visconti. Dante meets Nino in purgatory, who sends a message to his daughter, but reproaches the mother with her marriage after his death, to Galeazzo de’Visconti of Milan, whose emblem was a viper.

For her so fair a burial will not make
The viper which calls Milan to the field,
As had been made by shrill Gallura’s bird.
Dante, Purgatorio, viii.

Gal´way Jury, an independent jury, neither to be brow-beaten nor led by the nose. In 1635, certain trials were held in Ireland, respecting the right of the Crown to the counties of Ireland. Leitrim, Roscommon, Sligo, and Mayo gave judgment for the Crown, but Galway stood out, whereupon each of the jury was fined £4000.

Ga´ma (Vasco da), the hero of Camoëns’s Lusiad. Sagacious, intrepid, tender-hearted, pious, and patriotic. He was the first European navigator who doubled the Cape of Good Hope (1497).

Gama, captain of the venturous band,
Of bold emprise, and born for high command,
Whose martial fires, with prudence close allied,
Ensured the smiles of fortune on his side.
Camoens, Lusiad, i. (1569).

⁂ Gama is also the hero of Meyerbeer’s posthumous opera called L’Africaine (1865).

Gam´elyn (3 syl.), youngest of the three sons of Sir Johan di Boundys, who, on his death-bed, left “five plowes of land” to each of his two elder sons, and the residue of his property to the youngest. The eldest son took charge of Gamelyn, but treated him shamefully. On one occasion he said to him, “Stand still, gadelyng, and hold thy peace.” To which the proud boy retorted, “I am no gadelyng, but the lawful son of a lady and true knight.” On this, the elder brother sent his servants to chastise him, but he drove them off “with a pestel.” At a wrestling match young Gamelyn threw the champion, and carried off the prize ram; but on reaching home found the door closed against him. He at once kicked the door down, and threw the porter into a well. The elder brother now bound the young madcap to a tree, and left him two days without food; but Adam the spencer, unloosed him; and Gamelyn fell upon a party of ecclesiastics, who had come to dine with his brother, and “sprinkled holy water on them with a stout oaken cudgel.” The sheriff sent to apprehend the young spitfire, but he fled with Adam into the woods, and came upon a party of foresters sitting at meat. The captain gave him welcome, and Gamelyn in time became “king of the outlaws.” His brother being sheriff, would have put him to death, but Gamelyn hanged his brother on a forest tree. After this the king appointed him chief ranger, and he married.—The Coke’s Tale of Gamelyn, formerly attributed to Chaucer.

⁂ Lodge has made this tale the basis of his romance entitled Rosalynd or Eupheus’ Golden Legacye (1590); and from Lodge’s novel Shakespeare has borrowed the plot, with some of the character and dialogue, of As You Like It.

Gamelyn de Guar´dover (Sir), an ancestor of Sir Arthur Wardour.—Sir W. Scott, Antiquary (time, George III.).

Gamester (The), a tragedy by Ed. Moore (1753). The name of the gamester is Beverley, who in despair commits suicide; and the object of the play is to show the great evils of gambling.

Gamester (The), by Mrs. Centlivre (1705). The hero is Valere, to whom Angelica gives a picture, which she enjoins him not to lose on pain of forfeiting her hand. Valere loses it in play, and Angelica, in disguise, is the winner. After much tribulation, Valere is cured of his vice, the picture is restored, and the two are happily united in marriage.

Gammer Gurton’s Needle, by Mr. S., Master of Arts. It was in existence, says Warton, in 1551 (English Poetry, iv. 32). Sir Walter Scott says; “It was the supposed composition of John Still, M.A., afterwards bishop of Bath and Wells;” but in 1551 John Still was a boy not nine years old. The fun of this comedy turns on the loss and recovery of a needle, with which Gammer Gurton was repairing the breeches of her man Hodge. The comedy contains the famous drinking song, “I cannot eat but little Meat.”

Gamp (Sarah), a monthly nurse, residing in Kingsgate Street, High Holborn. Sarah was noted for her gouty umbrella, and for her perpetual reference to an hypothetical Mrs. Harris, whose opinions were a confirmation of her own. She was fond of strong tea and strong stimulants. “Don’t ask me,” she said, “whether I won’t take none, or whether I will, but leave the bottle on the chimley piece, and let me put my lips to it when I am so dispoged.” When Mrs. Prig “her pardner,” stretched out her hand to the teapot [filled with gin], Mrs. Gamp stopped the hand and said with great feeling, “No, Betsy! drink fair, wotever you do.” (See Harris.)—C. Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit, xlix. (1843).

⁂ A big, pawky umbrella is called a Mrs. Gamp, and in France, un Robinson, from Robinson Crusoe’s umbrella.

⁂ Mrs. Gamp and Mrs. Harris have Parisian sisters in Mde. Pochet and Mde. Gibou, creations of Henri Monnier.

Gan. (See Ganelon.)

Gan´dalin, earl of the Firm Island, and ’squire of Am´adis de Gaul.

Gandalin, though an earl, never spoke to his master but cap in hand, his head bowing all the time, and his body bent after the Turkish manner.—Cervantes, Don Quixote, I. iii. 6 (1605).

Gan´elon (2 syl.), count of Mayence, the “Judas” of Charlemagne’s paladins. His castle was built on the Blocksberg, the loftiest peak of the Hartz Mountains. Charlemagne was always trusting this base knight, and was as often betrayed by him. Although the very business of the paladins was the upholding of Christianity, Sir Ganelon was constantly intriguing for its overthrow. No doubt jealousy of Sir Roland made him a traitor, and he basely planned with Marsillus (the Moorish king), the attack of Roncesvallês. The character of Sir Ganelon was marked with spite, dissimulation, and intrigue, but he was patient, obstinate and enduring. He was six feet and a half in height, had large glaring eyes and fiery red hair. He loved solitude, was very taciturn, disbelieved in the existence of moral good, and has become a by-word for a false and faithless friend. Dantê has placed him in his “Inferno.” (Sometimes called Gan.)

The most faithless spy since the days of Ganelon.—Sir W. Scott, The Abbot, xxiv. (1820).

Ganem, “The Slave of Love.” The hero and title of one of the Arabian Nights tales. Ganem was the son of a rich merchant of Damascus, named Abou Aibou. On the death of his father he went to Bagdad, to dispose of the merchandise left, and accidentally saw three slaves secretly burying a chest in the earth. Curiosity induced him to disinter the chest, when lo! it contained a beautiful woman, sleeping from the effects of a narcotic drug. He took her to the lodgings, and discovered that the victim was Fetnab, the caliph’s favorite, who had been buried alive by order of the sultana, out of jealousy. When the caliph heard thereof, he was extremely jealous of the young merchant, and ordered him to be put to death, but he made good his escape in the guise of a waiter, and lay concealed till the angry fit of the caliph had subsided. When Haroun-al-Raschid (the caliph) came to himself, and heard the unvarnished facts of the case, he pardoned Ganem, gave to him Fetnab for a wife, and appointed him to a lucrative post about the court.

Gan´esa, goddess of wisdom, in Hindû mythology.

Then Camdeo [Love] bright and Ganesa sublime
Shall bless with joy their own propitious clime.
Campbell, Pleasures of Hope, i. (1799).

Ganlesse (Richard), alias Simon Canter, alias Edward Christian, one of the conspirators.—Sir W. Scott, Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).

Ganna, the Celtic prophetess, who succeeded Velle´da. She went to Rome, and was received by Domitian with great honor.—Tacitus, Annals, 55.

Ganor, Gano´ra, Geneura, Ginevra, Genievre, Guinevere, Guenever, are different ways of spelling the name of Arthur’s wife; called by Geoffrey of Monmouth, Guanhuma´ra or Guan´humar; but Tennyson has made Guenevere the popular English form.

Gants Jaunes (Des), dandies, men of fashion.

Gan´ymede (3 syl.), a beautiful Phrygian boy, who was carried up to Olympos on the back of an eagle, to become cup-bearer to the gods instead of Hebê. At the time of his capture he was playing a flute while tending his father’s sheep.

There fell a flute when Ganymede went up—
The flute that he was wont to play upon.
Jean Ingelow, Honours, ii.

(Jupiter compensated the boy’s father for the loss of his son, by a pair of horses.)

Tennyson, speaking of a great reverse of fortune from the highest glory to the lowest shame, says:

They mounted Ganymedes,
To tumble Vulcans on the second morn.
The Princess, iii.

The Birds of Ganymede, eagles. Ganymede is represented as sitting on an eagle, or attended by that bird.

To see upon her shores her foul and conies feed,
And wantonly to hatch the birds of Ganymede.
Drayton, Polyolbion, iv. (1612).

⁂ Ganymede is the constellation Aquarius.

Garagan´tua, a giant, who swallowed five pilgrims with their staves in a salad.—Rabelais, The History of Garagantua (1533).

“You must borrow me Garagantua’s mouth first: ’tis a word too great for any mouth of this age’s size.”—Shakespeare, As You Like It, act iii. sc. 2.

Gar´cias. The soul of Peter Garcias, money. Two scholars, journeying to Salamanca, came to a fountain, which bore this inscription; “Here is buried the soul of the licentiate Peter Garcias.” One scholar went away laughing at the notion of a buried soul, but the other, cutting with his knife, loosened a stone, and found a purse containing 100 ducats.—Lesage, Gil Blas (to the reader, 1715).

Garcilas´o, surnamed “the Inca,” descended on the mother’s side from the royal family of Peru (1530-1568). He was the son of Sebastian Garcilaso, a lieutenant of Alvarado and Pizarro. Author of Commentaries on the Origin of the Incas, their Laws and Government.

Garcilaso [de la Vega], called “The Petrarch of Spain”Spain”, born at Toledo (1503-1536). His poems are eclogues, odes, and elegies of great naïveté, grace, and harmony.

Sometimes he turned to gaze upon his book,
Boscan or Garcilasso [sic].
Byron, Don Juan i. 95 (1819).

Garda (Thorne). Beautiful, untaught and utterly unreasonable girl, whom everybody pets and who always gets her own way. She fascinates men and outwits women, defies all authority, and never loses her temper. In a lazy way she falls in love with one man after another, and is most constant to the least worthy. The best and kindest woman among her friends suffers in reputation from her escapades, and Garda accepts the sacrifice as a matter of course. The incarnation of sensuous selfishness.—Constance Fennimore Woolson, East Angels (1886).

Gardening (Father of Landscape), Lenotre (1613-1700).

Gar´diner (Richard), porter to Miss Seraphine Arthuret and her sister Angelica.—Sir W. Scott, Redgauntlet (time, George III.).

Gardiner (Colonel), colonel of Waverley’s Regiment.—Sir W. Scott, Waverley (time, George II.).

Gareth (Sir), according to Ancient romance, was the youngest son of Lot, king of Orkney and Morgawse, Arthur’s [half] sister. His mother, to deter him from entering Arthur’s court, said, jestingly, she would consent to his so doing if he concealed his name and went as a scullion for twelve months. To this he agreed, and Sir Kay, the king’s steward, nicknamed him “Beaumains,” because his hands were unusually large. At the end of the year he was knighted, and obtained the quest of Linet, who craved the aid of some knight to liberate her sister Lionês, who was held prisoner by Sir Ironside in Castle Perilous. Linet treated Sir Gareth with great contumely, calling him a washer of dishes and a kitchen knave; but he overthrew the five knights and liberated the lady, whom he married. The knights were—first, the Black Knight of the Black Lands or Sir Pere´ard (2 syl.), the Green Knight or Sir Pertolope, the Red Knight or Sir Perimo´nês, the Blue Knight or Sir Persaunt of India (four brothers), and lastly, the Red Knight of the Red Lands or Sir Ironside.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur, i. 120-153 (1470).

⁂ According to Tennyson, Sir Gareth was “the last and tallest son of Lot, king of Orkney, and of Bellicent his wife.” He served as kitchen knave in King Arthur’s hall a twelvemonth and a day, and was nicknamed “Fair-hands” (Beaumains). At the end of twelve months he was knighted, and obtained leave to accompany Lynette to the liberation of her sister Lyonors, who was held captive in Castle Perilous by a knight called Death or Mors. The passages to the castle were kept by four brothers, called by Tennyson, Morning Star or Phos´phorus, Noonday Sun or Meridies, Evening Star or Hespĕrus, and Night or Nox, all of whom he overthrew. At length Death leapt from the cleft skull of Night, and prayed the knight not to kill him, seeing that what he did his brothers had made him do. At starting, Lynette treated Gareth with great contumely, but softened to him more and more after each victory, and at last married him.

He that told the tale in olden times
Says that Sir Gareth wedded Lyonors;
But he that told it later says Lynette.
Tennyson, Idylls of the King (“Gareth and Lynette”).

Gareth and Linet´ is in reality an allegory, a sort of Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, describing the warfare of a Christian from birth to his entrance into glory. The “Bride” lived in Castle Perilous, and was named Lionês; Linet´ represents the “carnal world,” which, like the inhabitants of the City of Destruction, jest and jeer at everything the Christian does. Sir Gareth fought with four knights, keepers of the roads “to Zion” or Castle Perilous, viz., Night, Dawn, Midday, and Evening, meaning the temptations of the four ages of man. Having conquered in all these, he had to encounter the last enemy, which is Death, and then the bride was won—the bride who lived in Castle Perilous or Mount Zion.

⁂ Tennyson, in his version of this beautiful allegory, has fallen into several grave errors, the worst of which is his making Gareth marry Linet instead of the true bride. This is like landing his Pilgrim in the City of Destruction, after having finished his journey and passed the flood. Gareth’s brother was wedded to the world (i.e. Linet), but Gareth himself was married to the “true Bride,” who dwelt in Castle Perilous. Another grave error is making Death crave of Gareth not to kill him, as what he did he was compelled to do by his elder brothers. I must confess that this to me is quite past understanding.—See Notes and Queries, January 19, February 16, March 16, 1878.

Gar´gamelle (3 syl.), wife of Grangousier and daughter of the Parpaillons. On the day that she gave birth to Gargantua, she ate 16 qrs. 2 bush. 3 pecks and a pipkin of dirt, the mere remains left in the tripe which she had for supper, although the tripe had been cleaned with the utmost care.—Rabelais, Gargantua, i. 4 (1533).

⁂ Gargamelle is an allegorical skit on the extravagance of queens, and the dirt is their pin-money.

Gargan´tua, son of Grangousier and Gargamelle. It needed 17,913 cows to supply the babe with milk. Like Garagantua (q.v.), he ate in his salad lettuces as big as walnut trees, in which were lurking six pilgrims from Sebastian. He founded and endowed the abbey of Theleme (2 syl.), in remembrance of his victory over Picrochole (3 syl.).—Rabelais, Gargantua, i. 7 (1533).

⁂ Of course, Gargantua is an allegorical skit on the allowance accorded to princes for their maintenance.

Gargantua’s Mare. This mare was as big as six elephants, and had feet with fingers. On one occasion, going to school, the “boy” hung the bells of Notre Dame de Paris on his mare’s neck, as jingles; but when the Parisians promised to feed his beast for nothing, he restored the peal. This mare had a terrible tail “every whit as big as the steeple of St. Mark’s,” and on one occasion being annoyed by wasps, she switched it about so vigorously that she knocked down all the trees in the vicinity. Gargantua roared with laughter, and cried, “Je trouve beau ce!” where upon the locality was called “Beauce.”—Rabelais, Gargantua, i. 16 (1533).

⁂ Of course this “mare” is an allegorical skit on the extravagance of court mistresses, and the “tail” is the suite in attendance on them.

Gargan´tuan Curriculum, a course of studies including all languages, all sciences, all the fine arts, with all athletic sports and calisthenic exercises.—Grangousier wrote to his son, saying:

“There should not be a river in the world, no matter how small, thou dost not know the name of, with the nature and habits of all fishes, all fowls of the air, all shrubs and trees, all metals, minerals, gems and precious stones. I would, furthermore, have thee study the Talmudists and Cabalists, and get a perfect knowledge of man, together with every language, ancient and modern, living or dead.”—Rabelais, Pantag´ruel´ ii. 8 (1533).

Gar´gery (Mrs. Joe), Pip’s sister. A virago, who kept her husband and Pip in constant awe.

Joe Gargery, a blacksmith, married to Pip’s sister. A noble-hearted simple-minded man who loved Pip sincerely. Though uncouth in manners and ungainly in appearance, Joe Gargery was one of nature’s gentlemen.—C. Dickens, Great Expectations (1860).

Gargouille (2 syl.), the great dragon that lived in the Seine, ravaged Rouen, and was slain by St. Roma´nus in the seventh century.

Garlic. The purveyor of the sultan of Casgar says he knew a man who lost his thumbs and great toes from eating garlic. The facts were these: A young man was married to the favorite of Zobeidê, and partook of a dish containing garlic; when he went to his bride, she ordered him to be bound, and cut off his two thumbs and two great toes, for presuming to appear before her without having purified his fingers. Ever after this he always washed his hands 120 times with alkali and soap after partaking of garlic in a ragout.—Arabian Nights (“The Purveyor’s Story”).

Gar´rat (The mayor of). Garrat is a village between Wandsworth and Tooling. In 1780 the inhabitants associated themselves together to resist any further encroachments on their common, and the chairman was called the Mayor. The first “mayor” happened to be chosen on a general election, and so it was decreed that a new mayor should be appointed at each general election. This made excellent capital for electioneering squibs, and some of the greatest wits of the day have ventilated political grievances, gibbeted political characters, and sprinkled holy water with good stout oaken cudgels under the mask of “addresses by the mayors of Garrat.”

The Mayor of Garrat, a farce by S. Foote (1762).

Garrick. Cool-headed, cool-hearted Federal agent who runs all sorts of dangers to bear into camp dispatches found upon a dead comrade, and marries a woman many degrees too noble for one whose ideals of morality are lower than becomes a man so brave in other matters.—Rebecca Harding Davis, Waiting for the Verdict (1866).

Garter. According to legend, Joan, countess of Salisbury, accidentally dropped her garter at a court ball. It was picked up by her royal partner, Edward III., who gallantly diverted the attention of the guests from the lady by binding the blue band round his own knee, saying, as he did so,“Honi soit qui mal y pense.”

The earl’s greatest of all grandmothers
Was grander daughter still to that fair dame
Whose garter slipped down at the famous ball.
Robert Browning, A Blot on the ’Scutcheon, i., 3.

Gartha, sister of Prince Oswald of Vero´na. When Oswald was slain in single combat by Gondibert (a combat provoked by his own treachery), Gartha used all her efforts to stir up civil war; but Hermegild, a man of great prudence, who loved her, was the author of wiser counsel, and diverted the anger of the camp by a funeral pageant of unusual splendor. As the tale is not finished, the ultimate lot of Gartha is unknown.—Sir William Davenant, Gondibert (died 1668).

Garth (Sip), woman of the people, who “puts” everything “honest” to people. Shrewd, deep of heart and almost fierce of will, girding at her limitations, yet profoundly in sympathy with her fellow-sufferers, she becomes a valuable ally to her high-bred friend, Perley Kelso, in her efforts to bring comfort and beauty into the dwellings of the poor.—Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, The Silent Partner (1871).

Garth (Caleb), surveyor and land-agent. Excellent man, but better at lending than keeping money.

Mary Garth, his daughter; sensible and true woman, with few graces of person and no affectations.—George Eliot, Middlemarch.

Gas´abal, the ’squire of Don Galaor.

Gasabal was a man of such silence that the author names him only once in the course of his voluminous history.—Don Quixote, I. iii. 6 (1605).

Gascoigne (Sir William). Shakespeare says that Prince Henry “struck the chief justice in the open court;” but it does not appear from history that any blow was given. The fact is this:

One of the gay companions of the prince being committed for felony, the prince demanded his release, but Sir William told him the only way of obtaining a release would be to get from the king a free pardon. Prince Henry now tried to rescue the prisoner by force, when the judge ordered him out of court. In a towering fury, the prince flew to the judgment seat, and all thought he was about to slay the judge; but Sir William said very firmly and quietly. “Syr, remember yourselfe. I kepe here the place of the kynge, your sovereigne lorde and father, to whom you owe double obedience; wherefore I charge you in his name to desyste of your wylfulnes.... And nowe for your contempte goo you to the pryson of the Kynges Benche, whereunto I commytte you, and remayne ye there prisoner untyll the pleasure of the kynge be further known.” With which words the prince being abashed, the noble prisoner departed and went to the King’s Bench.—Sir Thomas Elyot, The Governour (1531).

Gashford, secretary to Lord George Gordon. A detestable, cruel sneak, who dupes his half-mad master, and leads him to imagine he is upholding a noble cause in plotting against the English Catholics. To wreak vengeance on Geoffrey Haredale, he incites the rioters to burn “The Warren,” where Haredale resided. Gashford commits suicide.—C. Dickens, Barnaby Rudge (1841).

Gaspar or Casper (“the white one”), one of the three Magi or kings of Cologne. His offering to the infant Jesus was frankincense, in token of divinity.

⁂ The other two were Melchior (“king of light”), who offered gold, symbolical of royalty; and Balthazar (“lord of treasures”), who offered myrrh, to denote that Christ would die. Klopstock, in his Messiah, makes the number of the Magi six, not one of which names agrees with those of Cologne Cathedral.

Gaspard, the steward of Count De Valmont, in whose service he had been for twenty years, and to whom he was most devotedly attached.—W. Dimond, The Foundling of the Forest.

Gas´pero, secretary of state, in the drama called The Laws of Candy, by Beaumont and Fletcher (1647).

Gathe´ral (Old), steward to the duke of Buckingham.—Sir W. Scott, Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).

Gath´erill (Old), bailiff to Sir Geoffrey Peveril of the Peak.—Sir W. Scott, Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).

Gauden´tio di Lucca, the hero and title of a romance by Simon Berington. He makes a journey to Mezzoramia, an imaginary country in the interior of Africa.

Gau´difer, a champion in the romance of Alexander.

Gaudio´sa (Lady), wife of Pelayo; a wise and faithful counsellor, high-minded, brave in danger, and a real helpmate.—Southey, Roderick, Last of the Goths (1814).

Gaudissart, the droll French bagman.

Gaul, son of Morni of Strumon. He was betrothed to Oith´ona, daughter of Nuäth, but before the day of marriage he was called away by Fingal to attend him on an expedition against the Britons. At the same time Nuäth was at war, and sent for his son Lathmon; so Oithona was left unprotected in her home. Donrommath, lord of Uthal (or Cuthal) seized this opportunity to carry her off, and concealed her in a cave in the desert island of Trom´athon. When Gaul returned to claim his betrothed, he found she was gone, and was told by a vision in the night where she was hidden. Next day, with three followers, Gaul went to Tromathon, and the ravisher coming up, he slew him and cut off his head. Oithona, armed as a combatant, mingled with the fighters and was wounded. Gaul saw what he thought a youth dying, and went to offer assistance, but found it was Oithona, who forthwith expired. Disconsolate, he returns to Dunlathmon, and thence to Morven. Ossian, Oithona.

Gaunt´grim, the wolf, in Lord Lytton’s Pilgrims of the Rhine (1834).

Bruin is always in the sulks, and Gauntgrim always in a passion.—Ch. xii.

Gavar´ni, the pseudonym of Sulpice Paul Chevalier, the great caricaturist of the French Charivari (1803-1896).

Gavroche (2 syl.), type of the Parisian street arab.—Victor Hugo, Les Misèrables (1862).

Gawain [Gaw´’n], son of King Lot and Morguase (Arthur’s sister). His brothers were Agravain, Ga´heris, and Ga´reth. The traitor Mordred was his half-brother, being the adulterous offspring of Morgause and Prince Arthur. Lot was king of Orkney. Gawain was the second of the fifty knights created by King Arthur; Tor was the first, and was dubbed the same day (pt. i. 48). When the adulterous passion of Sir Launcelot for Queen Guenever came to the knowledge of the king, Sir Gawain insisted that the king’s honor should be upheld. Accordingly, King Arthur went in battle array to Benwicke (Brittany), the “realm of Sir Launcelot,” and proclaimed war. Here Sir Gawain fell, according to the prophecy of Merlin, “With this sword shall Launcelot slay the man that in this world he loved the best” (pt. i. 44). In this same battle the king was told that his bastard son Mordred had usurped his throne, so he hastened back with all speed, and in the great battle of the West received his mortal wound (pt. iii. 160-167).—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur (1470).

Of Arthurian knights, Gawain is called the “Courteous,” Sir Kay the “Rude and Boastful,” Mordred the “Treacherous,” Launcelot the “Chivalrous,” Galahad the “Chaste,” Mark the “Dastard,” Sir Palomides (3 syl.) the “Saracen,” i.e. unbaptized, etc.

Gawky (Lord), Richard Grenville (1711-1770).

Gaw´rey, a flying woman, whose wings served the double purpose of flying and dress.—R. Pultock, Peter Wilkins (1750).

Gay (Walter), in the firm of Dombey and Son; an honest, frank, and ingenuous youth, who loved Florence Dombey, and comforted her in her early troubles. Walter Gay was sent in the merchantman called The Son and Heir, as junior partner, to Barbadoes, and survived a shipwreck. After his return from Barbadoes, he married Florence.—C. Dickens, Dombey and Son (1846).

Gayless (Charles), the penniless suitor of Melissa. His valet is Sharp.—Garrick, The Lying Valet (1741).

Gaylords (The). Village family in good circumstances.

Squire Gaylord, shrewd lawyer, with one tender place in his heart—his love for his only child.

Mrs. Gaylord, a calvinistic invalid, in awe of her imperious lord.

Marcia Gaylord, headstrong village beauty, who elopes with Bartley Hubbard, a newspaper man; goes with him to Boston; shares his capricious fortunes; adores and is madly jealous of him and goes home to nurse her sick mother, without her husband’s consent. He sues for a divorce, prevented by her father’s arrival prepared to give the other side of the question.—W. D. Howells, A Modern Instance.

Gay´ville (Lord), the affianced husband of Miss Alscrip “the heiress,” whom he detests; but he ardently loves Miss Alton, her companion. The former is conceited, overbearing, and vulgar, but very rich; the latter is modest, retiring, and lady-like, but very poor. It turns out that £2000 a year of “the heiress’s” property was entailed on Sir William Charleton’s heirs, and therefore descended to Mr. Clifford in right of his mother. This money Mr. Clifford settles on his sister, Miss Alton (whose real name is Clifford). Sir Clement Flint tears the conveyance, whereby Clifford retains the £2000 a year, and Sir Clement settles the same amount on Lord Gayville, who marries Miss Alton, alias Miss Clifford.

Lady Emily Gayville, sister of Lord Gayville. A bright, vivacious, and witty lady, who loves Mr. Clifford. Clifford also greatly loves Lady Emily, but is deterred from proposing to her because he is poor and unequal to her in a social position. It turns out that he comes into £2000 a year in right of his mother, Lady Charlton; and is thus enabled to offer himself to the lady, by whom he is accepted.—General Burgoyne, The Heiress (1781).

Gayworthys’ (The), New England household.

Dr. Gayworthy. Excellent man and physician. His heart is bound up in his step-grandson in whose favor he makes a will.

Johanna and Rebecca Gayworthy; one round, laughing and fair; the other, slight, brown, delicate, serious-eyed. Each has a lover and each her disappointment and victory.

Mrs. Vorse or “Sister Prue,” step-daughter, a widow with one son—Gershom, who is wild for sea-life, and gets it.

Mrs. Gair, née Gayworthy; the town-sister, diplomatic and suave. She secretes the doctor’s will and manœuvres Gershom off to sea.

Sadie, or Say Gair; upright little girl, who grows into a sound-hearted woman, and brings crooked things straight after many days and much striving, by marrying Gershom.—A.D.T. Whitney, The Gayworthys (1865).

Gaz´ban, the black slave of the old fire-worshipper, employed to sacrifice the Mussulmans to be offered on the “mountain of fire.”—Arabian Nights (“Amgiad and Assad”).

Gazette (Sir Gregory), a man who delights in news, without having the slightest comprehension of politics.—Samuel Foote, The Knights.

Ge´ber, an Arabian alchemist, born at Thous, in Persia (eighth century). He wrote several treatises on the “art of making gold,” in the usual mystical jargon of the period; and hence our word gibberish (“senseless jargon”).

This art the Arabian Geber taught ...
The Elixir of Perpetual Youth.
Longfellow, The Golden Legend.

Geddes (Joshua), the quaker.

Rachael Geddes, sister of Joshua.

Philip Geddes, grandfather of Joshua and Rachael Geddes.—Sir W. Scott, Redgauntlet (time, George III.).

Geierstein [Gi´.er.stine], Arnold, count of.

Count Albert of Geierstein, brother of Arnold Biederman, disguised (1) as the black priest of St. Paul’s; (2) as president of the secret tribunal; (3) as monk at Mont St. Victoire.

Anne of Geierstein, called “The Maiden of the Mist,” daughter of Count Albert, and baroness of Arnheim.

Count Heinrich of Geierstein, grandfather of Count Arnold.

Count Williewald of Geierstein, father of Count Arnold.—Sir W. Scott, Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).

Geislaer (Peterkin), one of the insurgents at Liège [Le.aje].—Sir W. Scott, Quentin Durward (time, Edward IV.).

Geith (George), a model of untiring industry, perseverance, and moral courage. Undaunted by difficulties, he pursued his onward way, and worked as long as breath was left him.—Mrs. Trafford [Riddell], George Geith.

Gelert, Llewellyn’s favorite hound. One day, Llewellyn returned from hunting, when Gêlert met him smeared with gore. The chieftain felt alarmed, and instantly went to look for his baby son. He found the cradle overturned, and all around was sprinkled with gore and blood. He called his child, but no voice replied, and thinking the hound had eaten it, he stabbed the animal to the heart. The tumult awoke the baby boy, and on searching more carefully, a huge wolf was found under the bed, quite dead. Gêlert had slain the wolf and saved the child.

And now a gallant tomb they raise,
With costly sculpture decked;
And marbles, storied with his praise.
Poor Gêlert’s bones protect.
Hon. W.R. Spencer, Beth Gêlerts (“Gêlerts Grave”).

⁂ This tale, with a slight difference, is common to all parts of the world. It is told in the Gesta Romanorum of Follicŭlus, a knight, but the wolf is a “serpent,” and Folliculus, in repentance, makes a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. In the sanskrit version, given in the Pantschatantra (A.D. 540), the tale is told of the brahmin Devasaman, an “ichneumon” and “black snake” taking the places of the dog and the wolf. In the Arabic version by Nasr-Allah (twelfth century), a “weasel” is substituted for the dog; in the Mongolian Uligerun a “polecat;” in the Persian Sindibadnâmeh, a “cat;” and in the Hitopadesa (iv. 3), an “otter.” In the Chinese Forest of Pearls from the Garden of the Law, the dog is an “ichneumon,” as in the Indian version (A.D. 668). In Sandabar, and also in the Hebrew version, the tale is told of a dog. A similar tale is told of Czar Piras of Russia; and another occurs in the Seven Wise Masters.

Gel´latly (Davie) idiot servant of the baron of Bradwardine (3 syl.).

Old Janet Gellatly, the idiot’s mother.—Sir W. Scott, Waverley (time, George II.).

⁂ In some editions the word is spelt “Gellatley.”

Geloi´os. Silly laughter personified. Geloios is slain by Encra´tês (temperance) in the battle of Mansoul. (Greek, gĕloios, “facetious”).

Gem of Normandy, Emma, daughter of Richard “the Fearless,” duke of Normandy. She first married Ethelred II. of England, and then Canute, but survived both, and died in 1052.

Gems emblems of the Twelve Apostles.

Andrew, the bright blue sapphire, emblematic of his heavenly faith.

Bartholomew, the red carnelian, emblematic of his martyrdom.

James, the white chalcedony, emblematic of his purity.

James the Less, the topaz, emblematic of delicacy.

John, the emerald, emblematic of his youth and gentleness.

Matthew, the amethyst, emblematic of sobriety. Matthew was once a “publican,” but was “sobered” by the leaven of Christianity.

Matthias, the chrysolite, pure as sunshine.

Peter, the jasper, hard and solid as the rock of the Church.

Philip, the friendly sardonyx.

Simeon of Cana, the pink hyacinth, emblematic of sweet temper.

Thaddeus, the chrysoprase, emblematic of serenity and trustfulness.

Thomas, the beryl, indefinite in lustre, emblematic of his doubting faith.

Gems symbolic of the Months.

January, the jacinth or hyacinth, symbolizing constancy and fidelity.

February, the amethyst, symbolizing peace of mind and sobriety.

March, the blood-stone or jasper, symbolizing courage and success in dangerous enterprise.

April, the sapphire and diamond, symbolizing repentance and innocence.

May, the emerald, symbolizing success in love.

June, the agate, symbolizing long life and health.

July, the carnelian, symbolizing cure of evils resulting from forgetfulness.

August, the sardonyx or onyx, symbolizing conjugal felicity.

September, the chrysolite, symbolizing preservation from folly, or its cure.

October, the aqua-marine, opal, or beryl, symbolizing hope.

November, the topaz, symbolizing fidelity and friendship.

December, the turquoise or ruby, symbolizing brilliant success.

⁂ Some doubt exists between May and June, July and August. Thus some give the agate to May, and the emerald to June; the carnelian to August, and the onyx to July.

Gem´ini (“the twins”). Castor and Pollux are the two principal stars of this constellation; the former has a bluish tinge, and the latter a damask red.

As heaven’s high twins, whereof in Tyrian blue
The one revolveth; through his course immense
Might love his fellow of the damask hue.
Jean Ingelow, Honours, i.

Gemini. Mrs. Browning makes Eve view in the constellation Gemini a symbol of the increase of the human race, and she loved to gaze on it.—E. B. Browning, A Drama of Exile (1850).

Geneu´ra. (See Gineura).

⁂ Queen Guinever or Guenever is sometimes called “Geneura,” or “Genevra.”

Gene´va Bull (The), Stephen Marshall, a Calvinistic preacher.

Geneviève (St.) the patron saint of Paris, born at Nanterre. She was a shepherdess, but went to Paris when her parents died, and was there during Attila’s invasion (A.D. 451). She told the citizens that God would spare the city, and “her prediction came true.” At another time, she procured food for the Parisians suffering from famine. At her request, Clovis built the church of St. Pierre et St. Paul, afterwards called Ste. Geneviève. Her day is January 3. Her relics are deposited in the Panthèon now called by her name (419-512).

Genii or Ginu, an intermediate race between angels and men. They ruled on earth before the creation of Adam—D’Herbelot, Bibliothèque Orientale, 357 (1697). Also spelt Djinn and Jinn.

⁂ Solomon is supposed to preside over the whole race of genii. This seems to have arisen from a mere confusion of words of somewhat similar sound. The chief of the genii was called a suleyman, which got corrupted into a proper name.

Genius and Common Sense, T. Moore says that Common Sense and Genius once went out together on a ramble by moonlight. Common Sense went prosing on his way, arrived home in good time, and went to bed; but Genius, while gazing at the stars, stumbled into a river, and died.

⁂ This story is told of Thalês, the philosopher, by Plato. Chaucer has also an allusion thereto in his Miller’s Tales.

So ferde another clerk with ’stronomye:
He walkêd in the feeldês for to prye
Upon the sterrês, what ther shuld befall,
Til he was in a marlê pit i-fall,
Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, (1388).

Genna´ro the natural son of Lucrezia di Borgia (daughter of Pope Alexander VI.) before her marriage with Alfonso, duke of Ferra´ra. He was brought up by a Neapolitan fisherman. In early manhood he went to Venice, heard of the scandalous cruelty of Lucrezia, and with the heedless petulance of youth, mutilated the duke’s escutcheon by striking out the B, thus converting Borgia into Orgia (orgies). Lucrezia demanded vengeance, and Gennaro was condemned to death by poison. When Lucrezia discovered that the offender was her own son, she gave him an antidote to the poison, and set him free. Not long after this, at a banquet given by Negro´ni Lucrezia revealed herself to Gennaro as his mother, and both expired of poison in the banquet hall.—Donizetti, Lucrezia di Borgia (1834).

Gennil (Ralph), a veteran in the troop of Sir Hugo de Lacy.—Sir W. Scott, The Betrothed (time, Henry II.).

Genove´va, wife of Siegfried, count palatine of Brabant. Being suspected of infidelity, she was driven into the forest of Ardennes, where she gave birth to a son, who was suckled by a white doe. After a time Siegfried discovered his error, and both mother and child were restored to their proper home.—German Popular Stories.

Tieck and Müller have popularized the tradition, and Raupach has made it the subject of a drama.

Gentle Shepherd (The), George Grenville. In one of his speeches he exclaimed in the House, “Tell me where!” when Pitt hummed the line of a popular song, “Gentle Shepherd, tell me where!” and the House was convulsed with laughter (1712-1770).

Gentle Shepherd (The), the title and chief character of Allan Ramsay’s pastoral (1725).

Gentleman of Europe (The First), George IV. (1762, 1820-1830).

It was the “first gentleman in Europe” in whose high presence Mrs. Rawdon passed her examination, and took her degree in reputation; so it must be flat disloyalty to doubt her virtue. What a noble appreciation of character must there not have been in Vanity Fair when that august sovereign was invested with the title of Premier Gentilhomme of all Europe!—Thackeray, Vanity Fair (1843).

Gentleman of Europe (First), Louis d’Artois.

Gentleman Smith, William Smith, actor, noted for his gentlemanly deportment on the stage (1730-1790).

Geoffrey, archbishop of York.—Sir W. Scott, The Talisman (time, Richard I.).

Geoffrey, the old ostler of John Mengs (inn-keeper at Kirchhoff).—Sir W. Scott, Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).

Geoffrey Crayon, the hypothetical name of the author of the Sketch-Book by Washington Irving (1818-1820).

George (Honest). General Monk, George, duke of Albemarle, was so called by the votaries of Cromwell (1608-1670).

George (Mr.), a stalwart, handsome, simple-hearted fellow, son of Mrs. Rouncewell, the housekeeper at Chesney Wold. He was very wild as a lad, and ran away from his mother to enlist as a soldier; but on his return to England he opened a shooting-gallery in Leicester Square, London. When Sir Leicester Dedlock, in his old age, fell into trouble, George became his faithful attendant.—C. Dickens, Bleak House (1853).

George (St.), the patron saint of England. He was born at Lydda, but brought up in Cappadocia, and suffered martyrdom in the reign of Diocletian, April, 23, A.D. 303. Mr. Hogg tells us of a Greek inscription at Ezra, in Syria, dated 346, in which the martyrdom of St. George is referred to. At this date was living George, bishop of Alexandria, with whom Gibbon, in his Decline and Fall, has confounded the patron saint of England; but the bishop died in 362, or fifty-nine years after the prince of Cappadocia. (See Red Cross Knight.)

⁂ Mussulmans revere St. George under the name of “Gherghis.”

St. George’s Bones were taken to the church in the City of Constantine.

St. George’s Head. One of his heads was preserved at Rome. Long forgotten, it was rediscovered in 751, and was given in 1600 to the church of Ferrara. Another of his heads was preserved in the church of Mares-Moutier, in Picardy.

St. George’s Limbs. One of his arms fell from heaven upon the altar of Pantaleon, at Cologne. Another was preserved in a religious house of Barala, and was transferred thence in the ninth century to Cambray. Part of an arm was presented by Robert of Flanders to the City of Toulouse; another part was given to the abbey of Auchin, and another to the Countess Matilda.

George and the Dragon (St.). St. George, son of Lord Albert of Coventry, was stolen in infancy by “the weird lady of the woods,” who brought the lad up to deeds of arms. His body had three marks; a dragon on the breast, a garter round one of the legs, and a blood-red cross on the right arm. When he grew to manhood, he fought against the Saracens. In Libya he heard of a huge dragon, to which a damsel was daily given for food, and it so happened that when he arrived the victim was Sabra, the king’s daughter. She was already tied to the stake when St. George came up. On came the dragon; but the knight, thrusting his lance into the monster’s mouth, killed it on the spot. Sabra, being brought to England, became the wife of her deliverer, and they lived happily in Coventry till death.—Percy, Reliques III. iii. 2.

St. George and the Dragon, on old guinea-pieces, was the design of Pistrucci. It was an adaptation of a didrachm of Tarentum, B.C. 250.

⁂ The encounter between George and the dragon took place at Berytus (Beyrut).

The tale of St. George and the dragon is told in the Golden Legends of Jacques de Voragine.—See S. Baring-Gould, Curious Myths of The Middle Ages.

George I. and the duchess of Kendal (1719). The duchess was a German, whose name was Erangard Melrose de Schulemberg. She was created duchess of Munster, in Ireland, baroness Glastonbury, Countess of Feversham, and duchess of Kendal (died 1743).

George II. His favorite was Mary Howard, duchess of Suffolk.

George II., when angry, vented his displeasure by kicking his hat about the room. We are told that Xerxes vented his displeasure at the loss of his bridges by ordering the Hellespont to be fettered, lashed with 300 stripes, and insulted.

George III., and the Fair Quakeress. When George III. was about 20 years of age he fell in love with Hannah Lightfoot, daughter of a linen-draper in Market Street, St. James’s. He married her in Kew Church, 1759, but of course the marriage was not recognized. (See Lovers.)

⁂ The following year (September, 1760), he married the Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. Hannah Lightfoot married a Mr. Axford, and passed out of public notice.

George IV. and Mrs. Mary Robinson, generally called Perdita. Mary Darby, at the age of 15, married Mr. Robinson, who lived a few months on credit, and was then imprisoned for debt. Mrs. Robinson sought a livelihood on the stage, and George IV., then Prince of Wales and a mere lad, saw her as “Perdita,” fell in love with her, corresponded with her under the assumed name of “Florizel,” and gave her a bond for £20,000, subsequently cancelled for an annuity of £500 (1758-1800).

⁂ George IV. was born 1762, and was only 16 in 1778, when he fell in love with Mrs. Robinson. The young prince suddenly abandoned her, and after two other love affairs, privately married, at Carleton House (in 1785), Mrs. Fitzherbert, a lady of good family, and a widow, seven years his senior. The marriage being contrary to the law, he married the Princess Caroline of Brunswick, in 1795; but still retained his connection with Mrs. Fitzherbert, and added a new favorite, the Countess of Jersey.

George [de Laval], a friend of Horace de Brienne (2 syl.). Having committed forgery, Carlos (alias Marquis d’Antas), being cognizant of it, had him in his power; but Ogarita (alias Martha) obtained the document, and returned it to George.—E. Stirling, Orphan of the Frozen Sea (1856).

George-a-Green, the pinner or pound-keeper of Wakefield, one of the chosen favorites of Robin Hood.

Veni Wakefield peramænum,
Ubi quærens Georgium Greenum,
Non inveni, sed in lignum,
Fixim reperi Georgii signum,
Ubi allam bibi feram,
Donec Georgio fortior eram.
Drunken Barnaby (1640).

Once in Wakefield town, so pleasant,
Sought I George-a-Green, the peasant;
Found him not, but spied instead, sir,
On a sign, “The George’s Head,” sir:
Valiant grown with ale like nectar.
What cared I for George or Hector?

⁂ Robert Green has a drama entitled George-a-Green, the Pinner of Wakefield (1589).

Georgian Women (The) Allah, wishing to stock his celestial harem, commissioned an imaum to select for him forty of the loveliest women he could find. The imaum journeyed into Frankistan, and from the country of the Ingliz carried off the king’s daughter. From Germany he selected other maidens; but when he arrived at Gori (north-west of Tiflis) he fell in love with one of the beauties, and tarried there. Allah punished him by death, but the maidens remained in Gori, and became the mothers of the most beautiful race of mortals in the whole earth.—A Legend.

Georgina [Vesey], daughter of Sir John Vesey. Pretty, but vain and frivolous. She loved, as much as her heart was susceptible of such a passion, Sir Frederick Blount, but wavered between her liking and the policy of marrying Alfred Evelyn, a man of great wealth. When she thought the property of Evelyn was insecure, she at once gave her hand to Sir Frederick.—Lord E. Bulwer Lytton, Money (1840).(1840).

Geraint´ (Sir) of Devon, one of the knights of the Round Table. He was married to E´nid, only child of Yn´iol. Fearing lest Enid should be tainted by the queen, Sir Geraint left the court, and retired to Devon. Half sleeping and half waking, he overheard part of Enid’s words, and fancying her to be unfaithful to him, treated her for a time with great harshness; but Enid nursed him when he was wounded with such wifely tenderness that he could no longer doubt her fealty, and a complete understanding being established, “they crowned a happy life with a fair death.”—Tennyson, Idylls of the King (“Geraint and Enid”).

Ger´aldin (Lord), son of the earl of Glenallen. He appears first as William Lovell, and afterwards as Major Neville. He marries Isabella Wardour (daughter of Sir Arthur Wardour).

Sir Aymer de Geraldin, an ancestor of Lord Geraldin.—Sir W. Scott, the Antiquary (time, George III.)

Ger´aldine (3 syl.), a young man who comes home from his travels to find his playfellow (who should have been his wife) married to old Wincott, who receives him hospitably as a friend of his father’s, takes delight in hearing tales of his travels, and treats him most kindly. Geraldine and the wife mutually agree not in any wise to wrong so noble and confiding an old gentleman.—John Heywood, The English Traveller (1576-1645).

Geraldine (Lady), an orphan, the ward of her uncle Count de Valmont, and the betrothed of Florian (“the foundling of the forest,” and the adopted son of the count). This foundling turns out to be his real son, who had been rescued by his mother and carried into the forest to save him from the hands of Longueville, a desperate villain.—W. Dimond, The Foundling of the Forest.

Geraldine (The Fair), the lady whose praises are sung by Henry Howard, earl of Surrey. Supposed to be Elizabeth Fitzgerald, daughter of Gerald FitzgeraldFitzgerald, ninth earl of Kildare. She married the earl of Lincoln.

Gerard (John), an English botanist (1545-1607), who compiled the Catalogus Arborum, Fruticum, et Plantorum, tam Indigenarum quam Exoticarum, in Horto Johanis Gerardi. Also author of the Herbal or General History of Plants (1597).

Of these most helpful herbs yet tell we but a few,
To those unnumbered sorts of simples here that grew...
Not skillful Gerard yet shall ever find them all.
Drayton, Polyolbion xiii. (1613).

Gerard, attendant of Sir Patrick Charteris (provost of Perth).—Sir W. Scott, Fair Maid of Perth (time, Henry IV.).

Gerhard the Good, a merchant of Cologne, who exchanges his rich freight for a cargo of Christian slaves, that he may give them their liberty. He retains only one, who is the wife of William, king of England. She is about to marry the merchant’s son, when the king suddenly appears, disguised as a pilgrim. Gerhard restores the wife, ships both off to England, refuses all recompense, and remains a merchant as before.—Rudolf of Ems (a minnesinger), Gerhard the Good (thirteenth century).

Ger´ion. So William Browne, in his Britannia’s Pastorals (fifth song), calls Philip of Spain. The allusion is to Geryon of Gadês (Cadiz), a monster with three bodies (or, in other words, a king over three kingdoms) slain by Herculês.

⁂ The three kingdoms over which Philip reigned were Spain, Germany and the Netherlands.

Gerlinda or Girlint, the mother of Hartmuth, king of Norway. When Hartmuth carried off Gudrun the daughter of Hettel (Attila), who refused to marry him, Gerlinda put her to the most menial work, such as washing the dirty linen. But her lover, Herwig, king of Heligoland, invaded Norway, and having gained a complete victory, put Gerlinda to death.—An Anglo-Saxon Poem (thirteenth century).

German Literature (Father of), Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781).

Germany, formerly called Tongres. The name was changed (according to fable) in compliment to Ger´mana, sister of Julius Cæsar, and wife of Salvius Brabon, duke of Brabant.—Jehan de Maire, Illustrations de Gaule, iii. 20-23.

Geoffrey of Monmouth says that Ebraucus, one of the descendants of Brute, king of Britain, had twenty sons, all of whom, except the eldest, settled in Tongres which was then called Germany, because it was the land of the germans or brothers.

These germans did subdue all Germany,
Of whom it hight.
Spenser, Faëry Queen, ii. 10 (1590).

Geron´imo, the friend of Sganarelle (3 syl.). SganarelleSganarelle asks him if he would advise his marrying. “How old are you?” asks Geronimo; and being told that he is 63, and the girl under 20, says, “No.” Sganarelle, greatly displeased at his advice, declares he is hale and strong, that he loves the girl, and has promised to marry her. “Then do as you like,” says Geronimo.—Molière, Le Mariage Force (1664).

⁂ This joke is borrowed from Rabelais. Panurge asks Pantagruel whether he advises him to marry. “Yes,” says the prince; whereupon Panurge states several objections. “Then don’t,” says the prince. “But I wish to marry,” says Panurge. “Then do it by all means,” says the prince. Every time the prince advises him to marry, Panurge objects; and every time the prince advises the contrary, the advice is equally unacceptable.—Pantagruel, iii. 9 (1545).

Géronte´ (2 syl.), father of Léandre and Hyacinthe; a miserly old hunks. He has to pay Scapin £1500 for the “ransom” of Léandre, and after having exhausted every evasion, draws out his purse to pay the money, saying, “The Turk is a villain!” “Yes,” says Scapin. “A rascal!” “Yes,” says Scapin. “A thief!” “Yes,” says Scapin. “He would wring from me £1500! would he?” “Yes,” says Scapin. “Oh, if I catch him, won’t I pay him out?” “Yes,” says Scapin. Then putting his purse back into his pocket, Géronte´ walks off, saying, “Pay the ransom, and bring back the boy.” “But the money; where’s the money?” says Scapin. “Oh, didn’t I give it you?” “No,” says Scapin. “I forgot,” says Géronte, and he pays the money (act ii. 11).—Molière, Les Fourberies de Scapin (1671).

In the English, version called The Cheats of Scapin, by Otway, Géronte is called “Gripe” Hyacinthe is called “Clara,” Léandre is Anglicized into “Leander,” and the sum of money borrowed is £200.

Geronte (2 syl.), the father of Lucinde (2 syl.). He wanted his daughter to marry Horace, but as she loved Léandre, in order to avoid a marriage she detested she pretended to have lost the power of articulate speech, and only answered, “Han, hi, hon!” “Han, hi, hon, han!” Sganarelle, “le médecin malgré lui,” seeing that this jargon was put on, and ascertaining that Léandre was her lover, introduced him as an apothecary, and the young man soon effected a perfect cure with “pills matrimoniac.”—Molière, Le Médecin Malgré Lui (1666).

Ger´rard, king of the beggars, disguised under the name of Clause. He is the father of Florez, the rich merchant of Bruges.—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Beggars’ Bush (1622).

Ger´trude (2 syl.), Hamlet’s mother. On the death of her husband, who was king of Denmark, she married Claudius, the late king’s brother. Gertrude was accessory to the murder of her first husband, and Claudius was principal. Claudius prepared poisoned wine, which he intended for Hamlet; but the queen not knowing it was poisoned drank it and died; Hamlet, seeing his mother fall dead, rushed on the king and killed him.—Shakespeare, Hamlet (1596).

⁂ In the Historie of Hamblett, Gertrude is called “Geruth.”

Gertrude, daughter of Albert, patriarch of Wy´oming. One day an Indian brought to Albert a lad (nine years old) named Henry Waldegrave (2 syl.), and told the patriarch he had promised the boy’s mother, at her death, to place her son under his care. The lad remained at Wyoming for three years, and was then sent to his friends. When grown to manhood, Henry Waldegrave returned to Wyoming, and married Gertrude; but three months afterwards Brandt, at the head of a mixed army of British and Indians attacked the settlement, and both Albert and Gertrude were shot. Henry Waldegrave then joined the army of Washington, which was fighting for American independence.—Campbell, Gertrude of Wyoming (1809).

Gertrude. Brave heroine of Maria S. Cummins’s Lamplighter. She raises herself by sheer force of energy and talent from the lowly station in which she was born to a position of highest respectability and influence (1853).

Gerun´dio (Fray), i.e. Friar Gerund, the hero and title of a Spanish romance, by the Jesuit De l’Isla. It is a satire on the absurdities and bad taste of the popular preachers of the time (1758).

Ge´ryon’s Sons, the Spaniards; so called from Geryon, an ancient king of Spain, whose oxen were driven off by Her´culês. This task was one of the hero’s “twelve labors.” Milton uses the expression in Paradise Lost, xi. 410 (1665).

Geryon´eo, a human monster with three bodies. He was of the race of giants, being the son of Geryon, the tyrant who gave all strangers “as food to his kine, the fairest and the fiercest kine alive.” Geryoneo promised to take the young widow Belgê (2 syl.) under his protection; but it was like the wolf protecting the lamb, for “he gave her children to a dreadful monster to devour.” In her despair she applied to King Arthur for help, and the British king, espousing her cause, soon sent Geryoneo “down to the house of dole.”—Spenser, Faëry Queen, v. 10, 11 (1596).

⁂ “Geryoneo” is the house of Austria, and Philip of Spain in particular. “King Arthur” is England, and the earl of Leicester in particular. The “Widow Belgê” is the Netherlands; and the monster that devoured her children the inquisition, introduced by the duke of Alva. “Geryoneo” had three bodies, for Philip ruled over three kingdoms—Spain, Germany and the Netherlands. The earl of Leicester, sent in 1585 to the aid of the Netherlands, broke off the yoke of Philip.

Ges´mas, the impenitent thief crucified with our Lord. In the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, he is called Gestas. The penitent thief was Dismas, Dysmas, Demas, or Dumacus.

Three bodies on three crosses hang supine;
Dismas and Gesmas and the power Divine.
Dismas seeks heaven, Gesmas his own damnation.
The Mid-one seeks our ransom and salvation.
Translation of a Latin Charm.

Gessler (Albrecht), the brutal and tyrannical governor of Switzerland, appointed by Austria over the three forest cantons. When the people rose in rebellion, Gessler insulted them by hoisting his cap on a pole, and threatening death to any one who refused to bow down to it in reverence. William Tell refused to do so, and was compelled to shoot at an apple placed on the head of his own son. Having dropped an arrow by accident, Gessler demanded why he had brought a second. “To shoot you,” said the intrepid mountaineer, “if I fail in my task.” Gessler then ordered him to be cast into Kusnacht Castle, “a prey to the reptiles that lodged there.” Gessler went in the boat to see the order executed, and as the boat neared land, Tell leapt on shore, pushed back the boat, shot Gessler, and freed his country from Austrian domination.—Rossini, Guglielmo Tell (1829).

Geta, according to Sir Walter Scott, the representative of a stock slave and rogue in the new comedy of Greece and Rome (? Getês).

The principal character, upon whose devices and ingenuity the whole plot usually turns, is the Geta of the piece—a witty, roguish, insinuating, and malignant slave, the confidant of a wild and extravagant son, whom he aids in his pious endeavors to cheat a suspicious, severe, and griping father.—Sir Walter Scott, The Drama.

Ghengis Khan, a title assumed by Tamerlane or Timour the Tartar (1336-1405).

Giaffir [Djaf.fir], pacha of Aby´dos, and father of Zuleika [Zu.lee´.kah]. He tells his daughter he intends her to marry the governor of Magne´sia, but Zuleika has given her plight to her cousin Selim. The lovers take to flight; Giaffir pursues and shoots Selim; Zuleika dies of grief; and the father lives on, a broken-hearted old man, calling to the winds, “Where is my daughter?” and echo answers, “Where?”—Byron, Bride of Abydos (1813).

Giam´schid [Jam.shid], suleyman of the Peris. Having reigned seven hundred years, he thought himself immortal; but God, in punishment, gave him a human form, and sent him to live on earth, where he became a great conqueror, and ruled over both the East and West. The bulwark of the Peris’ abode was composed of green chrysolite, the reflection of which gives to the sky its deep blue-green hue.

Soul beamed forth in every spark
That darted from beneath the lid,
Bright as the jewel of Giamschid,
ByronByron, The Giaour (1813).

She only wished the amorous monarch had shown more ardor for the carbuncle of Giamschid.—W. Beckford, Vathek (1786).

Giants of Mythology and Fable. Strabo makes mention of the skeleton of a giant 60 cubits in height. Pliny tells us of another 46 cubits. Boccaccio describes the body of a giant from bones discovered in a cave near Trapani, in Sicily, 200 cubits in length. One tooth of this “giant” weighed 200 ounces; but Kircher says the tooth and bones were those of a mastodon.

Ac´amas, one of the Cyclops.—Greek Fable.

Adamastor, the giant Spirit of the Cape. His lips were black, teeth blue, eyes shot with livid fire, and voice louder than thunder.—Camoëns, Lusiad, v.

Ægæon, the hundred-handed giant. One of the Titans.—Greek Fable.

Ag´rois, one of the giants called Titans. He was killed by the Parcæ.—Greek Fable.

Alcyoneus [Al´.sĭ.ŏ.nuce] or Al´cion, brother of Porphyrĭon. He stole some of the Sun’s oxen, and Jupiter sent Herculês against him, but he was unable to prevail, for immediately the giant touched the earth he received fresh vigor. Pallas, seizing him, carried him beyond the moon, and he died. His seven daughters were turned into halcyonshalcyons, or kingfishers.—Apollonios of Rhodes, Argonautic Expedition, i. 6.

Al´gebar´. The giant Orīon is so called by the Arabs.

Alifanfaron or Alipharnon, emperor of Trapoban.—Don Quixote.

Aloe´os, (4 syl.), son of Titan and Terra.—Greek Fable.

Aloi´des (4 syl.), sons of Alēĕus (4 syl.), named Otos and Ephialtês (q.v.).

Am´erant, a cruel giant slain by Guy of Warwick.—Percy, Reliques.

Angoulaffre, the Saracen giant. He was 12 cubits high, his face measured 3 feet in breadth, his nose was 9 inches long, his arms and legs 6 feet. He had the strength of thirty men, and his mace was the solid trunk of an oak tree, 300 years old. The tower of Pisa lost its perpendicularity by the weight of this giant leaning against it to rest himself. He was slain in single combat by Roland, at Fronsac.—L’Epine, Croquemitaine.

Antæos, 60 cubits (85 feet) in height.—Plutarch.

Arges (2 syl.), one of the Cyclops.—Greek Fable.

Aschapart, a giant 30 feet high, and with 12 inches between his eyes. Slain by Sir Bevis of Southampton.—British Fable.

Atlas, the giant of the Atlas Mountains, who carries the world on his back. A book of maps is called an “atlas” from this giant.—Greek Fable.

Balan, “bravest and strongest of the giant race.”—Amădis of Gaul.

Belle, famous for his three leaps, which gave names to the places called Wanlip, Burstall, and Bellegrave.—British Fable.

Belle´rus, the giant from whom Cornwall derived its name “Bellerium.”—British Fable. Milton: Lycidas.

Blunderbore (3 syl.), the giant who was drowned because Jack scuttled his boat.—Jack the Giant-killer.

Briare´os (4 syl.), a giant with a hundred hands. One of the Titans.—Greek Fable.

Brobdingnag, a country of giants, to whom an ordinary-sized man was “not half so big as a round little worm pricked from the lazy finger of a maid.”—Swift, Gulliver’s Travels.

Brontes (2 syl.), one of the Cyclops.—Greek Fable.

Burlong, a giant mentioned in the romance of Sir Tryamour.

Cacus, of Mount Aventine, who dragged the oxen of Hereculês into his cave tail foremost.—Greek Fable.

Calig´orant, the Egyptian giant, who entrapped travellers with an invisible net.—Ariosto.

Caraculiambo, the giant that Don Quixote intended should kneel at the foot of Dulcin´ea.—Cervantes, Don Quixote.

Ceus or Cœus, son of Heaven and Earth. He married Phœbê, and was the father of Latōna.—Greek Fable.

Chalbroth, the stem of all the giant race.—Rabelais, Pantagruel.

Christopherus, or St. Christopher, the giant who carried Christ across a ford, and was well-nigh borne down with the “child’s” ever-increasing weight.—Christian Legend.

Clytious, one of the giants who made war upon the gods. Vulcan killed him with a red-hot iron mace.—Greek Fable.

Colbrand, the Danish giant slain by Guy of Warwick.—British Fable.

Corflambo, a giant who was always attended by a dwarf.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, iv. 8.

Cormoran´, the Cornish giant who fell into a pit twenty feet deep, dug by Jack and filmed over with a thin layer of grass and gravel.—Jack the Giant-killer.

Cormorant, a giant discomfited by Sir Brian.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, vi. 4.

Coulin, the British giant pursued by Debon, and killed by falling into a deep chasm.—British Fable.

Cyclops, giants with only one eye, and that in the middle of the forhead. They lived in Sicily, and were blacksmiths.—Greek Fable.

Despair, of Doubting Castle, who found Christian and Hopeful asleep on his grounds, and thrust them into a dungeon. He evilly entreated them, but they made their escape by the key “Promise.”—Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress, i.

Dondasch, a giant contemporary with Seth. “There were giants in the earth in those days.”—Oriental Fable.

Encel´ados, “most powerful of the giant race.” Overwhelmed under Mount Etna.—Greek Fable.

Ephialtes (4 syl.), a giant who grew nine inches every month.—Greek Fable.

Erix, son of Goliah [si.] and grandson of Atlas. He invented legerdemain.—Duchat, [Oe]uvres de Rabelais (1711).

Eu´rytos, one of the giants that made war with the gods. Bacchus killed him with his thyrsus.—Greek Fable.

Ferracute, a giant 36 feet in height, with the strength of forty men.—Turpin’s Chronicle.

Ferragus, a Portuguese giant.—Valentine and Orson.

Fierabras, of Alexandria, “the greatest giant that ever walked the earth.”—Mediæval Romance.

Fion, son of Comnal, an enormous giant, who could place his feet on two mountains, and then stoop and drink from a stream in the valley between.—Gaelic Legend.

Fiorgwyn, the gigantic father of Frigga.—Scandinavian Mythology.

Fracassus, father of Ferrăgus, and son of Morgantê.

Primus erat quidam Fracassus prole gigantis,
Cujus stirps olim Morganto venit ab illo.
Qui bacchioconem campanæ ferre solebat,
Cum quo mille hominum colpos fracasset in uno Merlin Cocaius [i.e. Théophile Folengo],
Histoire Macaronique (1606).

Gabbara, the father of Goliah [sic] of Secondille, and inventor of the custom of drinking healths.—Duchat, [Oe]uvres de Rabelais (1711).

Galapas, the giant slain by King Arthur.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur.

Galligantus, the giant who lived with Hocus-Pocus the conjuror.—Jack the Giant-killer.

Garagantua, same as Gargantua (q.v.).

Gargantua, a giant so large that it required 900 ells of linen for the body of his shirt, and 200 more for the gussets; 406 ells of velvet for his shoes, and 1100 cow-hides for their soles. His toothpick was an elephant’s tusk, and 17,913 cows were required to give him milk. This was the giant who swallowed five pilgrims, with their staves, in a salad.—Rabelais, Gargantua.

Gemmagog, son of the giant Oromedon, and inventor of Poulan shoes, i.e. shoes with a spur behind, and turned-up toes fastened to the knees. These shoes were forbidden by Charles V. of France, in 1365, but the fashion revived again.—Duchat, [Oe]uvres de Rabelais (1711).

Geryon´eo, a giant with three bodies [Philip II. of Spain].—Spenser, Faëry Queen, v. 11.

Giralda, the giantess. A statue of victory on the top of an old Moorish tower in Seville.

Godmer, son of Albion, a British giant slain by Canu´tus, one of the companions of Brute.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, ii. 10.

Goem´agot, the Cornish giant who wrestled with Cori´neus (3 syl.), and was hurled over a rock into the sea. The place where he fell was called “Lam Goëmagot.”—Geoffrey, British History.

Gogmagog, king of the giant race of Albion when Brute colonized the island. He was slain by Cori´neus. The two statues of Guildhall represent Gogmagog and Corineus. The giant carries a pole-axe and spiked balls. This is the same as Goëmagot.

Grangousia, the giant king of Utopia.—Rabelais, Pantagruel.

Grantorto, the giant who withheld the inheritance of Ire´na.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, v.

Grim, the giant slain by Greatheart, because he tried to stop pilgrims on their way to the Celestial City.—Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress, ii.

Grum´bo, the giant up whose sleeve Tom Thumb crept. The giant, thinking some insect had crawled up his sleeve, gave it a shake, and Tom fell into the sea, when a fish swallowed him.—Tom Thumb.

Gyges, who had fifty heads and a hundred hands. He was one of the Titans.—Greek Fable.

Hapmouche, the giant “fly-catcher.” He invented the drying and smoking of neats’ tongues.—Duchat, Œuvres de Rabelais (1711).

Hippol´ytos, one of the giants who made war with the gods. He was killed by Hermês.—Greek Fable.

Hrasvelg, the giant who keeps watch over the Tree of Life, and devours the dead.—Scandinavian Mythology.

Hurtali, a giant in the time of the Flood. He was too large of stature to get into the ark, and therefore rode straddle-legs on the roof. He perpetuated the giant race. Atlas was his grandson.

Indracittran, a famous giant of Indian mythology.

Jotun, the giant of Jötunheim or Giant-land, in Scandinavian story.

Juliance, a giant of Arthurian romance.

Kifri, the giant of atheism and infidelity.

Kottos, a giant with a hundred hands. One of the Titans.—Greek Fable.

Malambru´no, the giant who shut up Antonoma´sia and her husband in the tomb of the deceased queen of Candaya.—Cervantes, Don Quixote, II. iii. 45.

Margutte (3 syl.), a giant 10 feet high, who died of laughter when he saw a monkey pulling on his boots.—Pulci, Morgante Maggiore.

Maugys, the giant warder with whom Sir Lybius does battle.—Libeaux.

Maul, the giant of sophistry, killed by Greatheart, who pierced him under the fifth rib.—Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress, ii.

Mont-Rognon, one of Charlemagne’s paladins.

Morgante (3 syl.), a ferocious giant, who died by the bite of a crab.—Pulci, Morgante Maggiore.

Mugillo, a giant famous for his mace with six balls.

Offerus, the pagan name of St. Christopher, whose body was 12 ells in height.—Christian Legend.

Ogias, an antediluvain giant, mentioned in the apocrypha condemned by Pope Gelasius I. (492-496).

Orgoglio, a giant thrice the height of an ordinary man. He takes captive the Red Cross Knight, but is slain by King Arthur.—Spenser, Faëry Queen, i.

Ori´on, a giant hunter, noted for his beauty. He was slain by Diana, and made a constellation.—Greek Fable.

Otos, a giant, brother of Ephialtês. They both grew nine inches every month. According to Pliny, he was 46 cubits (66 feet) in height.—Greek Fable.

Pallas, one of the giants called Titans. Minerva flayed him, and used his skin for armor; hence she was called Pallas Minerva.—Greek Fable.

Pantag´ruel, son of Gargantua, and last of the race of giants.

Polybo´tes (4 syl.), one of the giants who fought against the gods. The sea-god pursued him to the island of Cos, and, tearing away a part of the island, threw it on him and buried him beneath the mass.—Greek Fable.

Polyphe´mos, king of the Cyclops. His skeleton was found at Trapa´ni, in Sicily, in the fourteenth century, by which it is calculated that his height was 300 feet.—Greek Fable.

Porphyr´ion, one of the giants who made war with the gods. He hurled the island of Delos against Zeus; but Zeus, with the aid of Herculês, overcame him.—Greek Fable.

Pyrac´mon, one of the Cyclops.—Greek Fable.

Ritho, the giant who commanded King Arthur to send his beard to complete the lining of a robe.—Arthurian Romance.

Slay-good, a giant slain by Greatheart. Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress, ii.

Ster´opes (3 syl.), one of the Cyclops.—Greek Fable.

Tartaro, the Cyclops of Basque legendary lore.

Teutoboch´us, a king, whose remains were discovered in 1613, near the river Rhone. His tomb was 30 feet long.—Mazurier, Histoire Véritable du Géant Teutobochus (1618).

Thaon, one of the giants who made war with the gods. He was killed by the Parcæ.—Hesiod, Theogony.

Titans, a race of giants.—Greek Fable.

Tit´yos, a giant whose body covered nine acres of land. He tried to defile Latōna, but Apollo cast him into Tartarus, where a vulture fed on his liver, which grew again as fast as it was devoured.—Greek Fable.

Typhœus, a giant with a hundred heads, fearful eyes, and most terrible voice. He was the father of the Harpies. Zeus [Jupiter] killed him with a thunderbolt, and he lies buried under Mount Etna.—Hesiod, Theogony.

Typhon, son of Typhœus, a giant with a hundred heads. He was so tall that he touched heaven with his head. His offspring were Gorgon, Geryon, Cerberos, and the hydra of Lernê. He lies buried under Mount Etna.—Homer, Hymns.

Widenostrils, a huge giant, who lived on windmills, andand died from eating a lump of fresh butter.—Rabelais, Pantagruel iv. 17.

Yohak, the giant guardian of the caves of Babylon.—Southey, Talaba, v.

⁂ Those who wish to pursue this subject further, should consult the notes of Duchat, bk. ii. 1 of his Œuvres de Rabelais.

Giants in Real Life.

Anak, father of the Anakim. The Hebrew spies said they themselves were mere grasshoppers in comparison to these giants.—Josh. xv. 14; Judges i. 20; Numb. xiii. 33.

Anak, 7 feet 8 inches at the age of 26. Exhibited in London, 1862-5. Born at Ramonchamp, in the Vosges (1 syl.), 1840. His real name was Joseph Brice.

Andron´icus II., 10 feet. Grandson of Alexius Comnēnus. Nicetas asserts that he had seen him.

Bamford (Edward), 7 feet 4 inches. Died in 1768, and was buried in St. Dunstan’s Churchyard.

Bates (Captain), 7 feet 11 inches; of Kentucky. Exhibited in London, 1871.

Blacker (Henry), 7 feet 4 inches, and most symmetrical. Born at Cuckfield, Sussex, in 1724. Generally called “The British Giant.”

Bradley, 7 feet 8 inches at death. Born at Market Weighton, in Yorkshire. His right hand is preserved in the museum of the College of Surgeons (1798-1820).

Brice (Joseph), 7 feet 8 inches. His hand could span 15½ inches.

Busby (John), 7 feet 9 inches; of Darfield. His brother was about the same height.

Chang-Woo-Goo, 7 feet 6 inches; of Fychou. The Chinese giant. Exhibited in London, 1865-6.

Charlemagne, 8 feet nearly. He could squeeze together three horse-shoes at once with his hands.

Cotter (Patrick), 8 feet 7½ inches. The Irish giant. A cast of his hand is preserved in the museum of the College of Surgeons (died 1802).

Elea´zer, 7 cubits (10 feet 6 inches). The Jewish giant mentioned by Josephus. He lived in the reign of Vitellius.

Eleizegue (Joachim), 7 feet 10 inches. The Spanish giant. Exhibited in London.

Evans (William), 8 feet at death. Porter to Charles I. (died 1632).

Frank (Big), 7 feet 8 inches; weight 22 stone; girth round the chest, 58 inches. He was an Irishman, whose name was Francis Sheridan (died 1870).

Frenz (Louis), 7 feet 4 inches. The French giant.

Gabara, 9 feet 9 inches. An Arabian giant. Pliny says he was the tallest man seen in the days of Claudius.

Gilly, 8 feet. A Swede; exhibited as a show in the early part of the nineteenth century.

Goli´ath, 6 cubits and a span (? 9 feet 4 inches).—1 Sam. xvii. 4, etc. His “brother” was also a giant.—2 Sam. xxi. 19; 1 Chron. xx. 5.

Gordon (Alice), 7 feet. An Essex giantess (died 1737).

Hale (Robert), 7 feet 6 inches; born at Somerton. Generally called “The Norfolk Giant” (1820-1862).

Har´drada (Harold), “5 ells of Norway in height” (nearly 8 feet). The Norway giant.

La Pierre, 7 feet 1 inch; of Stratgard, in Denmark.

Louis, 7 feet 4 inches. The French giant. His left hand is preserved in the museum of the College of Surgeons.

Loushkin, 8 feet 5 inches. The Russian giant, and drum-major of the Imperial Guards.

M’Donald (James), 7 feet 6 inches; of Cork (died 1760).

M’Donald (Samuel), 6 feet 10 inches. A Scotchman; usually called “Big Sam” (died 1802).

Magrath (Cornelius), 7 feet 8 inches. He was an orphan, reared by Bishop Berkley, and died at the age of 20 (1740-1760).

Maximi´nus, 8 feet 6 inches. The Roman emperor (235-238).

Mellon (Edmund), 7 feet 6 inches. Born at Port Leicester, Ireland (1665-1684).

Middleton (John), 9 feet 3 inches. “His hand was 17 inches long, and 8½ inches broad.” He was born at Hale, in Lancashire, in the reign of James I.—Dr. Plott, History of Staffordshire.

Miller (Maximilian Christopher), 8 feet. His hand measured 12 inches, and his fore-finger 9 inches long. The Saxon giant. Died in London (1674-1734).

Murphy, 8 feet 10 inches. An Irish giant, contemporary with O’Brien. Died at Marseilles.

O’Brien or Charles Byrne, 8 feet 4 inches. The Irish giant. His skeleton is preserved in the museum of the College of Surgeons (1761-1783).

Og, king of Bashan. “His bed was 9 cubits by 4 cubits” (? 13½ feet by 6 feet).—Deut. iii. 11.

⁂ The Great Bed of Ware is 12 feet by 12 feet.

Osen (Heinrich), 7 feet 6 inches; weight, 300 lbs. or 37-1/4 stone. Born in Norway.

Porus, an Indian king who fought against Alexander near the river Hydaspês (B.C. 327). He was a giant “5 cubits in height” [7½ feet], with strength in proportion.—Quintus Curtius, De rebus gestis Alexandri Magni.

Riechart (J. H.), 8 feet 3 inches, of Friedberg. His father and mother were both giants.

Salmeron (Martin), 7 feet 4 inches. A Mexican.

Sam (Big), 6 feet 10 inches. (See “M’Donald.”)

Sheridan (Francis), 7 feet 8 inches. (See “Frank.”)

Swan (Miss Anne Hanen), 7 feet 11 inches; of Nova Scotia.

⁂ In 1682, a giant 7 feet 7 inches was exhibited in Dublin. A Swede 8 feet 6 inches was in the body-guard of a king of Prussia. A human skeleton 8 feet 6 inches is preserved in the museum of Trinity College, Dublin.

Becanus says he had seen a man nearly 10 feet high, and a woman fully 10 feet. Gasper Bauhin speaks of a Swiss 8 feet in height. Del Rio says he saw a Piedmontes in 1572 more than 9 feet in stature. C.S.F. Warren, M.A., says (in Notes and Queries, August 14, 1875) that his father knew a lady 9 feet high; “her head touched the ceiling of a good-sized room.” Vanderbrook says he saw a black man, at Congo, 9 feet high.

Giant of Literature, Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1783).

Giant’s Leap (Lam Goëmagot) or “Goëmagot’s Leap.” Now called Haw, near Plymouth. The legend is that Cori´neus (3 syl.) wrestled with Goëmagot, king of the Albion giants, heaved the monster on his shoulder, carried him to the top of a high rock, and cast him into the sea.

At the beginning of the encounter, Corineus and the giant, standing front to front, held each other strongly in their arms, and panted aloud for breath; but Goëmagot presently grasping CroineusCroineus with all his might, broke three of his ribs, two on the right side and one on his left. Corineus, highly enraged, roused up his whole strength, snatched up the giant, ran with him on his shoulders to the neighboring cliff, and heaved him into the sea.... The place where he fell is called Lam Goëmagot to this day.—Geoffrey, British History, i. 16 (1142).