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Dictionary of Phrase and Fable

E. Cobham Brewer From The Edition Of 1894

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is the twentieth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Tâw was the last letter of the Western Semitic and Hebrew alphabets, and probably represented a cross. The sound value of Semitic Taw, Greek alphabet T (Tau), Old Italic and Latin T has remained fairly constant, representing IPA /t/ in each of these; and it has also kept its original basic shape in all of these alphabets.

T in music, stands for Tutti (all), meaning all the instruments or voices are to join. It is the opposite of S for Solo.

—t— inserted with a double hyphen between a verb ending with a vowel and the pronouns elle, il, or on, is called “t ephelcystic,” as, aime—t—il, dire—t—on. (See N, Marks In Grammar.)

Marked with a T. Criminals convicted of felony, and admitted to the benefit of clergy, were branded on the brawn of the thumb with the letter T (thief). The law was abolished by 7 and 8 George IV., c. 27.

It fits to a T. Exactly. The allusion is to work that mechanics square with a T—rule, especially useful in making right angles, and in obtaining perpendiculars on paper or wood.

The saintly T's. Sin Tander, Sin Tantony, Sin Tawdry, Sin Tausin, Sin Tedmund, and Sin Telders; otherwise St. Andrew, St. Anthony, St. Audry, St. Austin [Augustine], St. Edmund, and St. Ethelred. Tooley is St. Olaf.

T.Y.C.

in the language of horseracing, means the Two—Year—Old Course scurries. Under six furlongs.

T—Rule

(A). A ruler shaped like a Greek T. (See above.)

Tab

An old Tab. An old maid; an old tabby or cat. So called because old maids usually make a cat their companion.

Tabard

The Tabard, in Southwark, is where Chaucer supposes his pilgrims to have assembled. The tabard was a jacket without sleeves, whole before, open on both sides, with a square collar, winged at the shoulder

like a cape, and worn by military nobles over their armour. It was generally emblazoned with heraldic devices. Heralds still wear a tabard.

“Item ... a chascun ung grand tabart

De cordelier, jusques aux pieds.”

Le Petit Testament de Maistre Franpois Villon.

Tabardar

A sizar of Queen's College, Oxford. So called because his gown has tabard sleeves— that is, loose sleeves, terminating a little below the elbow in a point.

Tabarin

He's a Tabarin — a merry Andrew. Tabarin was the fellow of Mondor, a famous vendor of quack medicines in the reign of Charles IX. By his antics and coarse wit he collected great crowds, and both he and his master grew rich. Tabarin bought a handsome château in Dauphiné, but the aristocracy out of jealousy murdered him.

Tabby

a cat, so called because the brindlings of the tabby were thought to resemble the waterings of the silk of the name. (French, tabis; Italian, etc., tabi; Persian, retabi, a rich figured silk.)

“Demurest of the tabby kind,

The pensive Selima reclined.” Gay.

Tabla Rasa

(Latin). A clean slate on which anything can be written.

“When a girl has been taught to keep her mind a tabla rasa till she comes to years of discretion, she will be more free to act on her own natural impulses.”— W. S. R.

Table

Apelles' table. A pictured table, representing the excellency of sobriety on one side, and the deformity of intemperance on the other.

Tables of Cebes. Cebes was a Theban philosopher, a disciple of Socrates, and one of the interlocutors of Plato's Phædo. His Tables or Tableau supposes him to be placed before a tableau or panorama representing the life of man, which the philosopher describes with great accuracy of judgment and splendour of sentiment. This tableau is sometimes appended to Epictetus.

Table of Pythagoras. The common multiplication table, carried up to ten. The table is parcelled off into a hundred little squares or cells. (See Tabulae.)

Knights of the Round Table. A military order instituted by Arthur, the “first king of the Britons,” A.D. 516. Some say they were twenty—four in number, some make the number as high as 150, and others reduce the number to twelve. They were all seated at a round table, that no one might claim a post of honour.

The Twelve Tables. The tables of the Roman laws engraved on brass, brought from Athens to Rome by the decemvirs.

Turning the tables. Rebutting a charge by bringing forth a counter—charge. Thus, if a husband accuses his wife of extravagance in dress, she “turns the tables upon him” by accusing him of extravagance in his, club. The Romans prided themselves on their tables made of citron wood from Mauritania, inlaid with ivory, and sold at a most extravagant price— some equal to a senator's income. When the gentlemen accused the ladies of extravagance, the ladies retorted by reminding the gentlemen of what they spent in tables. Pliny calls this taste of the Romans mensarum insania.

It is also used for “audi alteram partem,” and the allusion is then slightly modified— “We have considered the wife's extravagance; let us now look to the husband's.”

“We will now turn the tables, and show the hexameters in all their vigour.”— The Times.

Table d'Hote

[the host's table ]. An ordinary. In the Middle Ages, and even down to the reign of Louis XIV., the landlord's table was the only public dining—place known in Germany and France. The first restaurant was opened in Paris during the reign of the Grand Monarque, and was a great success.

Table Money

Money appropriated to the purposes of hospitality.

Table—Turning

The presumed art of turning tables without the application of mechanical force. Said by some to be the work of departed spirits, and by others to be due to a force akin to mesmerism. Jackson Davis (the Seer of Poughkeepsie), a cobbler, professed, in 1848, to hear “spirit voices in the air.” (See Spiritualism. )

Tableaux Vivants

(French, living pictures). Representations of statuary groups by living persons, invented by Madame Genlis while she had charge of the children of the Duc d'Orléans.

Tabooed

Devoted, Forbidden. This is a Polynesian term, and means consecrated or set apart. Like the Greek anathema, the Latin sacer, the French sacre, etc., the word has a double meaning— one to consecrate, and one to incur the penalty of violating the consecration. (See Tapu. )

Taborites

(3 syl.). A sect of Hussites in Bohemia. So called from the fortress Tabor, about fifty miles from Prague, from which Nicholas von Hussineez, one of the founders, expelled the Imperial army. They are now incorporated with the Bohemian Brethren.

Tabouret

The right of sitting in the presence of the queen. In the ancient French court certain ladies had the droit de tabouret (right of sitting on a tabouret in the presence of the queen). At first it was limited to princesses: but subsequently it was extended to all the chief ladies of the queen's household; and later still the wives of ambassadors, dukes, lord chancellor, and keeper of the seals, enjoyed the privilege. Gentlemen similarly privileged had the droit de fauteuil.

“Qui me resisterait

La marqurse a le tabouret.”

Beranger: Le Marquis de Carabas.

Tabulae Toletanae

The astronomical tables composed by order of Alphonso X. of Castile, in the middle of the thirteenth century, were so called because they were adapted to the city of Toledo.

“His Tables Tolletanes forth he brought,

Ful wel corrected, ne ther lakked nought.”

Chaucer: Canterbury Tales, 11,585.

Tace

(2 syl.). Latin for candle. Silence is most discreet. Tace is Latin for “be silent,” and candle is symbolical of light. The phrase means “keep it dark,” do not throw light upon it. Fielding, in his Amelia (chap. x.), says,

“Tace, madam, is Latin for candle.” There is an historical allusion worth remembering. It was customary at one time to express disapprobation of a play or actor by throwing a candle on the stage, and when this was done the curtain was immediately drawn down. Oultor (vol. i. p. 6), in his History of the Theatres of London, gives us an instance of this which occurred January 25th, 1772, at Covent Garden theatre, when the piece before the public was An Hour Before Marriage. Someone threw a candle on the stage, and the curtain was dropped at once.

“There are some auld stories that cannot be ripped up again with entire safety to all concerned. Tace is Latin for candle.”— Sir W. Scott: Redgauntlet, chap. xi. (Sir Walter is rather fond of the phrase.)

“Mum, William, mum. Tace is Latin for candle.”— W.B. Yeats: Fairy Tales of the Irish Peasantry, p. 250.

N.B. We have several of these old phrases; one of the best is, “Brandy is Latin for goose” (q.v.).

Tachebrune

(2 syl.). The horse of Ogier le Dane. The word means “brown—spot.” (See Horse .)

Taenia Rationis

Show of argument. Argument which seems prima facie plausible and specious, but has no real depth or value.

“Mr. Spencer is again afflicted with his old complaint toe rationis, and takes big words for real things.”— Era Olla: Mr. Spencer's First Principles.

Tae'pings

Chinese rebels. The word means Universal Peace, and arose thus: Hung—sew—tseuen, a man of humble birth, and an unsuccessful candidate for a government office, was induced by some missionary tracts to renounce idolatry, and found the society of Taë—ping, which came into collision with the imperial authorities in 1850. Hung now gave out that he was the chosen instrument in God's hands to uproot idolatry and establish the dynasty of Universal Peace; he assumed the title of Taë—ping—wang (Prince of Universal Peace), and called his five chief officers princes. Nankin was made their capital in 1860, but Colonel Gordon (called Chinese Gordon) in 1864 quelled the insurrection, and overthrew the armies of Hung.

Taffata

or Taffety. A fabric made of silk; at one time it was watered; hence Taylor says, “No taffaty more changeable than they.” “Notre mot taffeta est formé, par onomatopée, du bruit que fait cette étoffe. “

(Francisque—Michel.)

The fabric has often changed its character. At one time it was silk and linen, at another silk and wool. In the eighteenth century it was lustrous silk, sometimes striped with gold.

Taffata phrases. Smooth sleek phrases, euphemisms. We also use the words fustian, stuff, silken, shoddy, buckram, velvet, satin, lutestring, etc., etc., to qualify phrases and literary compositions spoken or written.

“Taffata phrases, silken terms precise,

Three—piled hyperboles.”

Shakespeare: Love's Labour's Lost, v. 2.

Taffy

A Welshman. So called from David, a very common Welsh name. David, familiarly Davy, becomes in Welsh Taffid, Taffy.

Tag Rag, and Bobtail

The vulgus ignobilë. A “tag” is a doe in the second year of her age; a “rag,” a herd of deer at rutting time; “bobtail,” a fawn just weaned.

According to Halliwell, a sheep of the first year is called a tag. Tag is sometimes written shag.

“It will swallow us all up, ships and men, shag, rag, and bobtail.”— Rabelais: Pantagruel, iv. 33.

Taghairm

(2 syl.). A means employed by the Scotch in inquiring into futurity. A person wrapped up in the hide of a fresh—slain bullock was placed beside a waterfall, or at the foot of a precipice, and there left to meditate on the question propounded. Whatever his fancy suggested to him in this wild situation passed for the inspiration of his disembodied spirit.

“Last evening—tide

Brian an augury hath tried,

Of that kind which must not be

Unless in dread extremity,

The Taghairm called.”

Sir Walter Scott: Lady of the Lake, iv. 4.

Taherites

(3 syl.). A dynasty of five kings who reigned in Khorassan for fifty—two years (820—872). So called from the founder, Taher, general of the Calif's army.

Tail

Lion's tail. Lions, according to legend, wipe out their footsteps with their tail, that they may not be tracked.

Twisting the lion's tail. (See Twisting.) He has no more tail than a Manx cat. There is a breed of cats in the Isle of Man without tails.

Tails

The men of Kent are born with tails, as a punishment for the murder of Thomas á Becket. (Lambert: Peramb.) (See the Spectator, 173.)

“For Becket's sake, Kent always shall have tails.”

Andrew Marvel.

Tails. It is said that the Ghilane race, which number between 30,000 and 40,000, and dwell “far beyond the Sennaar,” have tails three or four inches long. Colonel du Corret tells us he carefully examined one of this race named Bellal, the slave of an emir in Mecca, whose house he frequented. (World of Wonders, p. 206.)

The Niam—niams of Africa are tailed, so we are told.

Tails

The Chinese men were made to shave their heads and wear a queue or tail by the Manchu Tartars, who, in the seventeenth century, subdued the country, and compelled the men to adopt the Manchu dress. The women were allowed to compress their feet as before, although the custom is not adopted by the Tartars.

“Anglicus a lergo caudam gerit” probably refers to the pigtails once worn.

Tailors

The three tailors of Tooley Street. Canning says that three tailors of Tooley Street, Southwark, addressed a petition of grievances to the House of Commons, beginning— “We, the people of England.” (See Vaughan .)

Nine tailors make a man. The present scope of this expression is that a tailor is so much more feeble than another man that it would take nine of them to make a man of average stature and strength. There is a tradition that an orphan lad, in 1742, applied to a fashionable London tailor for alms. There were nine journeymen in the establishment, each of whom contributed something to set the little orphan up with a fruit barrow. The little merchant in time became rich, and adopted for his motto, “Nine tailors made me a man,” or “Nine tailors make a man.” This certainly is not the origin of the expression, inasmuch as we find a similar one used by Taylor a century before that date, and referred to as of old standing, even then.

“Some foolish knave, I thinke, at first began

The slander that three taylers are one man.”

Taylor: Workes, iii. 73'(1630).

Another suggestion is this: At the death of a man the tolling bell is rung thrice three tolls; at the death of a woman it is rung only three—two tolls. Hence nine tolls indicate the death of a man. Halliwell gives telled = told, and a tolling—bell is a teller. In regard to “make,” it is the French faire, as On le faisait mort, i.e. some one gave out or made it known that he was dead.

“The fourme of the Trinitie was founded in manne. ... Adam our forefather, ... and Eve of Adam the secunde personne, and of them both was the third persone. At the death of a manne three bells schulde be ronge as his knyll, in worscheppe of the Trinitie— for a womanne, who is the secunde personne of the Trinitie, two belles schulde be rungen.”— An old English Homily for Trinity Sunday. (See Strutt: Manners and Customs, vol. iii. p. 176.)

Tailor's Sword

(A), or A Tailor's Dagger. A needle.

“The tailors cross—legged on their boards,

Needle—armed, hand—extended, prepared

To stab the black cloth with their swords [to make up mourning] The instant that death is declared.”

Peter Pindar: Great Cry and Little Wool, Epist. i.

Take a Back Seat

(To). To be set aside; to be deferred for the present. A parliamentary phrase.

“When there seemed to be a tendency ... to make the Irish question, in the cant of the day, `take a back seat,' Unionist indignation knew no bounds.”— The Daily Graphic, February 9th, 1893.

Take a Hair of the Dog that Bit You

After a debauch, take a little wine the next day. Take a cool draught of ale in the morning, after a night's excess. The advice was given literally in ancient times, “If a dog bites you, put a hair of the dog into the wound,” on the homoeopathic principle of “Similia similibus curantur” (like cures like).

Take in Tow

(To). Take under guidance. A man who takes a lad in tow acts as his guide and director. To tow a ship or barge is to guide and draw it along by tow—lines.

“Too proud for bards to take in tow my name.”

Peter Pindar: Future Laureate, Part ii.

Take Mourning

(To). Attending church the Sunday after a funeral. It is the custom, especially in the northern counties, for all the mourners, and sometimes the bearers also, to sit in a specific pew all together the Sunday after a funeral. It matters not what place of worship they usually attend— all unite in the “taking mourning.”

Take Tea with Him

(I), i.e. I floor my adversary by winning every rubber. If he beats me in billiards, he “has me on toast.” (Indian slang.)

Takin' the Beuk

A Scotch phrase for family worship.

Taking On

Said of a woman in hysterics; to fret; to grieve passionately, as, “Come, don't take on so!”

“Lance, who ... took upon himself the whole burden of Dame Debbitch's ... `taking on,' as such fits of passio hysterica are usually termed.”— Sir W. Scott: Peveril of the Peak, chap. xxvi.

Taking a Sight Putting the right thumb to the nose and spreading the fingers out. This is done as much as to say, “Do you see any green in my eye?” “Tell that to the marines;” “Credat Judaeus, non ego.” Captain Marryat tells us that some “of the old coins of Denmark represent Thor with his thumb to his nose, and his four fingers extended in the air;” and Panurge (says Rabelais, Pantagruel, book ii. 19) “suddenly lifted his right hand, put his thumb to his nose, and spread his fingers straight out” to express incredulity.

“The sacristan he says no word that indicates a doubt,

But puts his thumb unto his nose, and spreads his fingers out.” Ingoldsby: Nell Cook.

Taking Time by the Forelock

Seize the present moment; “Carpe diem.” Time personified is represented with a lock of hair on his forehead but none on the rest of his head, to signify that time past cannot be used, but time present may be seized by the forelock.

Talbotype

(3 syl.). A photographic process invented in 1839 by Fox Talbot, who called it “the Calotype Process.” (See Daguerrotype .)

Tale

(1 syl.). A tally; a reckoning. In Exod. v. we have tale of bricks. A measure by number, not by weight.

An old wife's tale. Any maryellous legendary story. To tell tales out of school. To utter abroad affairs not meant for the public ear.

Tale of a Tub

(The). A ridiculous narrative or tale of fiction. The reference is to Dean Swift's tale so called.

Talent

meaning cleverness or “gift” of intelligence, is a word borrowed from Matt. xxv. 14—30.

Tales

(2 syl.). Persons in the court from whom the sheriff or his clerk makes selections to supply the place of jurors who have been empanelled, but are not in attendance. It is the first word of the Latin sentence which provides for this contingency. (Tales de circumstantibus.)

“To serve for jurymen or tales.”

Butler: Hudibras, part iii. 8.

To pray a tales. To pray that the number of jurymen may be completed. It sometimes happens that jurymen are challenged, or that less than twelve are in the court. When this is the case the jury can request that their complement be made up from persons in the court. Those who supplement the jury are called talesmen, and their names are set down in a book called a talesbook.

Talgol

(in Hudibras), famous for killing flies, was Jackson, `butcher of Newgate Street, who got his captain's commission at Naseby.

Talisman

A figure cut or engraved on metal or stone, under the influence of certain planets. In order to free any place of vermin, the figure of the obnoxious animal is made in wax or consecrated metal, in a planetary hour, and this is called the talisman. (Warburton.)

“He swore that you had robbed his house,

And stole his talismanic louse.”

S. Butler; Hudibras. part iii. 1.

Talisman. The Abraxas Stone is a most noted talisman. (See Abraxas.) In Arabia a talisman is still used, consisting of a piece of paper, on which are written the names of the Seven Sleepers and their dog, to protect a house from ghosts and demons. The talisman is supposed to be sympathetic, and to receive an influence from the planets, which it communicates to the wearer.

Talk

To talk over. To discuss, to debate, also to gain over by argument.

Talk Shop

(See Shop. )

Talkee Talkee

(A reduplication of talk with termination ee, borrowed in ridicule from some attempt of dark races to speak English.) A copius effusion of talk with no valuable result.

Talking Bird

A bird that spoke with a human voice, and could call all other birds to sing in concert. (The Sisters who Envied their Younger Sister; Arabian Nights.) (See Green Bird. )

Tall Men

Champions (a Welsh phrase), brave men

“You were good soldiers, and tall fellows.”— Shakespeare: Merry Wives of Windsor, ii. 2.

“The undaunted resolution and stubborn ferocity of Gwenwyn. had long made him beloved among the `Tall Men,' or champions of Wales.”— Sir W. Scott: The Betrothed, chap. i.

Talleyrand

anciently written Tailleran, is the sobriquet derived from the words “tailler les rangs,” “cut through the ranks.”

Tally

(A). The price paid for picking a bushel of hops. It varies (1891) from 1 1/2d. to 2 1/2d.

Tally

To correspond. The tally used in the Exchequer was a rod of wood, marked on one face with notches corresponding to the sum for which it was an acknowledgment. Two other sides contained the date, the name of the payer, and so on. The rod was then cleft in such a manner that each half contained one written side and half of every notch. One part was kept in the Exchequer, and the other was circulated. When payment was required the two parts were compared, and if they “tallied,” or made a tally, all was right, if not, there was some fraud, and payment was refused. Tallies were not finally abandoned in the Exchequer till 1834. (French, tailler, to cut.)

In 1834 orders were issued to destroy the tallies. There were two cartloads of them, which were set fire to at six o'clock in the morning, and the conflagration set on fire the Houses of Parliament, with their offices, and part of the Palace of Westminster.

To break one's tally (in Latin, “Confringere tesseram”). When public houses were unknown, a guest entertained for a night at a private house had a tally given him, the corresponding part being kept by the host. It was expected that the guest would return the favour if required to do so, and if he refused he “violated the rites of hospitality,” or confregisse tesseram. The “white stone” spoken of in the Book of the Revelation is a tessera which Christ gives to His disciples.

To live tally is to live unwed as man and wife. A tally—woman is a concubine, and a tally—man is the man who keeps a mistress. These expressions are quite common in Cheshire, Yorkshire, and Lancashire. In mines a tin label is attached to each tub of coals, bearing the name of the man who sent it to the bank, that the weighman may credit it to the right person As the tallies of the miner and weighman agree, so the persons who agree to live together tally with each other's taste.

Tally—ho!

is the Norman hunting cry Taillis au! (To the coppice). The tally—ho was used when the stag was viewed in full career making for the coppice. We now cry “Tally—ho!” when the fox breaks cover. The French cry is “Taiaut!”

Tallyman

(A). A travelling draper who calls at private houses to sell wares on the tally system— that is, part payment on account, and other parts when the man calls again

Talmud (The). About 120 years after the destruction of the Temple, the rabbi Judah began to take down in writing the Jewish traditions; his book, called the Mishna, contains six parts (1) Agriculture and seed—sowing,

(2) Festivals, (3) Marriage; (4) Civil affairs, (5) Sacrifices; and (6) what is clean and what unclean. The book caused immense disputation, and two Babylonish rabbis replied to it, and wrote a commentary in sixty parts, called the Babyloman Talmud Gemára, (imperfect). This compilation has been greatly abridged by the omission of Nos. 5 and 6.

Talpot

or Talipot Tree. A gigantic palm. When the sheath of the flower bursts it makes a report like that of a cannon.

“They burst, like Zeilan's giant palm,

Whose buds fly open with a sound

That shakes the pigmy forest round.”

Moore. Fire Worshippers.

Zeilau is Portuguese for Ceylon.

Talus

Sir Artegal's iron man. Spenser, in his Faërie Queene, makes Talus run continually round the island of Crete to chastise offenders with an iron flail. He represents executive power— “swift as a swallow, and as lion strong.” In Greek mythology, Talos was a man of brass, the work of Hephaestos (Vulcan), who went round the island of Crete thrice a day. Whenever he saw a stranger draw near the island he made himself red—hot, and embraced the stranger to death.

Tam—o'—Shanter's Mare

Remember Tam—o'—Shanter's mare. You may pay too dear for your whistle, as Meg lost her tail, pulled off by Nannie of the “Cutty—sark.”

“Think, ye may buy the joys owre dear—

Remember Tam—o'—Shanter's mare”

Burns.

Tamarisk

from a Hebrew word meaning to cleanse, so called from its abstersive qualities. The Romans wreathed the brows of criminals with tamarisk. The Arabs make cakes called manna of the hardened juice extracted from this tree.

Tame Cat

(A). A harmless dangler after a married woman; a cavalier servant; a cicisbeo.

“He soon installed himself as a taine cat in the MacMungo mansion.”— Truth (Queer Story), October, 1885.

Tamerlane

(3 syl.). A corruption of Timour Lengh (Timour the Lame), one of the greatest warrior—kings that ever lived. Under him Persia became a province of Tartary. He modestly called himself Ameer (chief), instead of sultan or shah. (1380—1405.)

Taming of the Shrew

The plot was borrowed from a drama of the same title, published by S. Leacroft, of Charing Cross, under the title of Six Old Plays on which Shakespeare Founded his Comedies. The induction was borrowed from Heuterus' Rerum Burgumdarum (lib. iv.), a translation of which was published in 1607 by

E. Grimstone, and called Admirable and Memorable Histories. Dr. Percy thinks that the ballad of The Frolicksome Duke, or the Tinker's Good Fortune, published in the Pepys Collection, may have suggested the induction. (See Sly. )

Tammany

(St.). Tammany was of the Delaware nation in the seventeenth century, and became a chief, whose rule was wise and pacific. He was chosen by the American democrats as their tutelary saint. His day is May

1st. Cooper calls him Tammenund, but the correct word is Tamanend.

Tammany Ring

A cabal or powerful organisation of unprincipled officials, who enriched themselves by plundering the people. So called from Tammany Hall, the head—quarters of the high officials of the U.S., whose nefarious practices were exposed in 1871

Tammuz

(See Thammuz. )

Tancred

(in Jerusalem Delivered) shows a generous contempt of danger. Son of Eudes and Emma (sister of Robert Guiscard), Boemond or Bohemond was his cousin. Tancred was the greatest of all the Christian warriors except Rinaldo. His one fault was “woman's love,” and that woman Clorinda, a Pagan (bk. i.). He brought 800 horse from Tuscany and Campania to the allied Christian army. He slew Clorinda (not knowing her) in a night combat, and lamented her death with great lamentation (bk. xii.). Being wounded, he was nursed by Erminia, who was in love with him (bk. xix.).

Tandem

At length. A pun applied to two horses driven one before the other. This Latin is of a similar character to plenum sed (full butt).

Tandem D.O.M

Tandem Deo optimo maximo (Now at the end ascribe we praise to God, the best and greatest).

Tangie

The water sprite of the Orkneys; from Danish tang (sea—weed), with which it is covered. The tangie sometimes appears in a human form, and sometimes as a little apple—green horse.

Tanist

(A). One who held lands in Ireland under the Celtic law of tanistry. The chief of a sept. (Irish, tanaiste, heir apparent to a chief.)

“Whoever stood highest in the estimation of the class was nominated `Tanist,' or successor.”—

E. Lawless: Story of Ireland, chap. iii. p. 27.

Tanist Stone

A monolith erected by the Celts at a coronation. We read in the Book of Judges (ix. 6) of Abimelech, that a “pillar was erected in Shechem” when he was made king; and (2 Kings xi. 14) it is said that a pillar was raised when Joash was made king, “as the manner was.” the Lia Fail of Ireland was erected in Icolmkil for the coronation of Fergus Eric. This stone was removed to Scone, and became the coronation chair of Scotland. It was taken to Westminster by Edward I., and is the coronation chair of our sovereigns. (Celtic, Tanist, the heir—apparent.)

Tankard of October

(A). A tankard of the best and strongest ale brewed in October.

“He was in high favour with Sir Geoffrey, not merely on account of his sound orthodoxy and deep learning, but [also for] his excellent skill in playing at bowls, and his facetious conversation over a pipe and tankard of October.”— Sir W. Scott: Peveril of the Peak, chap. iv

Tanner

Sixpence. (The Italian danaro, small change; Gipsy, tawno, little one. Similarly a thaler is called a dollar. )

Tanner. A proper name. (See Brewer.)

Tanner of Tamworth

Edward IV. was hunting in Drayton Basset when a tanner met him. The king asked him several questions, and the tanner, taking him for a highway robber, was very chary. At last they swopped horses, the tanner gave the king his gentle mare Brocke, which cost 4s., and the king gave the tanner his hunter, which soon threw him. Upon this the tanner paid dearly for changing back again. Edward now blew

his horn, and when his courtiers came up in obedience to the summons, the tanner, in great alarm, cried out, “I hope I shall be hanged tomorrow” (i.e. I expect), but the king gave him the manor of Plumpton Park, with 300 marks a year. (Percy Reliques, etc.)

Tannhauser

(3 syl.). A legendary hero of Germany, who wins the affections of Lisaura; but Lisaura, hearing that Sir Tannhäuser has set out for Venusberg to kiss the queen of love and beauty, destroys herself. After living some time in the cave—palace, Sir Tannhäuser obtains leave to visit the upper world, and goes to Pope Urban for absolution. “No,” said his holiness, “you can no more hope for mercy than this dry staff can be expected to bud again.” On this the knight returned to Venusberg. In a few days the papal staff actually did bud, and Urban sent for Sir Tannhauser, but the knight was nowhere to be found.

Tansy

A corruption of the Greek word athanasia, immortality, as thansa, tansy. So called because it is “a sort of everlasting flower.” (Hortus Anglicus, vol. ii. p. 366.)

Tantalise

To excite a hope and disappoint it. (See next article.)

Tantalos

(Latin, Tantalus), according to fable, is punished in the infernal regions by intolerable thirst. To make his punishment the more severe, he is plunged up to his chin in a river, but whenever he bends forward to slake his thirst the water flows from him.

“So bends tormented Tantalus to drink,

While from his lips the refluent waters shrink, Again the rising stream his bosom laves.

And thirst consumes him mid circumfluent waves.” Darwin: Loves of the Plants, 11 419.

Tantalus. Emblematical of a covetous man, who the more he has the more he craves. (See Covetous.) Tantalus. A parallel story exists among the Chipouyans, who inhabit the deserts which divide Canada from the United States. At death, they say, the soul is placed in a stone ferry—boat, till judgment has been passed on it. If the judgment is averse, the boat sinks in the stream, leaving the victim chin—deep in water, where he suffers endless thirst, and makes fruitless attempts to escape to the Islands of the Blessed. (Alexander Mackenzie Voyages in the Interior of America.) (1789, 1792, 1793.)

Tanthony

(St. Anthony). In Norwich are the churches called Sin Telder's (St. Ethelred's), Sin Tedmund's (St. Edmund's), Sin Tander's (St. Andrew's), and Sin Tausin's (St. Austin's ). (See Tawdry. )

Tantum Ergo

The most popular of the Eucharistic hymns sung in the Roman Catholic churches at Benediction with the Holy Sacrament. So called from the first two words of the last stanza but one of the hymn Pange Lingua.

Taou

The sect of Reason, founded in China by Laou—Tsze, a contemporary of Confucius. He was taken to heaven on a black buffalo. (B.C. 523.)

Tap the Admiral To suck liquor from a cask by a straw Hotten says it was first done with the rum—cask in which the body of Admiral Lord Nelson was brought to England, and when the cask arrived the admiral was found “high and dry.”

Tap the Till

(To). To pilfer from a till

Tap—up Sunday

The Sunday preceding the fair held on the 2nd October, on St. Catherine's Hill, near Guildford, and so called because any person, with or without a licence, may open a “tap,” or sell beer on the hill for that one day.

Tapis

On the tapis. On the carpet; under consideration, now being ventilated. An English—French phrase, referring to the tapis or cloth with which the table of the council—chamber is covered, and on which are laid the motions before the House.

“My business comes now upon the tapis.”— Farquhar The Beaux Stratagem, iii. 3.

Tapisserie

Faire tapisserie. To play gooseberry—picker, to be mere chaperon for the sake of “propriety.” “Se dit des personnes qui assertent á un bal ou á quelque autre grande réunion sansy prendre part.”

“You accepted out of pure kindness faire tapisserie: Mrs. Arbuthnot, you are too amiable.”— Mrs. Edwardes: A Girton Girl, chap. xxvi.

Tappit—hen

(A). A huge pewter measuring—pot, containing at least three English quarts. Readers of Waverley will remember (in chap. xi.) the Baron Bradwardine's tappit—hen of claret from Bordeaux. To have a

tappit—hen under the belt is to have swallowed three quarts of claret. A hen and chickens means large and small drinking mugs or pewter pots. A tappit was served from the tap. (See Jeroboam. )

“Weel she loed a Hawick gill,

And leugh to see a tappit—hen.”

Tapster

says E. Adams (English Language), properly means a bar—maid; ”—ster” is the Anglo—Saxon feminine suffix —estre, which remains in spin—ster (a female spinner).

This is only a half—truth. After the thirteenth century, the suffix—ster was used for an agent of either sex. We have barrister, gamester, punster, etc., and Wickliffe uses songster for a male singer (See Dr. Morris Historic Outlines, p. 89.)

Tapu

among the South Sea Islanders, means “devoted” in a religious sense. Thus, a temple is tapu, and he who violates a temple is tapu. Not only so, but everyone and everything connected with what is tapu becomes tapu also. Thus, Captain Cook was tapu because some of his sailors took rails from a “temple” of the Hawaiians to supply themselves with fuel, and, being devoted, he was slain Our taboo is the same word.

Tarabolus

or Tantrabolus. We shall live till we die, like Tarabolus [or Tantrabolus ]. Tarabolus, Ali Pacha, was grand vizier in 1693, and was strangled in 1695 by order of Mustapha II.

We shall live till we die, like Tantrabolus, is said to be a Cornish proverb. There is a cognate saying, “Like Tantrabolus, who lived till he died.”

Tantarabobs means the devil. Noisily playful children are called Tantrabols.

Tarakee

the Brahmin, was the model of austere devotion. He lived 1,100 years, and spent each century in some astounding mortification.

1st century. He held up his arms and one foot towards heaven, fixing his eyes on the sun the whole time. 2nd century. He stood on tiptoe the whole time.

8th century. He stood on his head, with his feet towards the sky. 9th century. He rested wholly on the palm of one hand.

11th century. He hung from a tree with his head downwards.

“One century he lived wholly on water, another wholly on air, another steeped to the neck in earth, and for another century he was always enveloped in fire I don't know that the world has been benefited by such devotion.”— Maurice, History of Hindostan

Tarantism

The dancing mania, extremely contagious. It broke out in Germany in 1374, and in France in the Great Revolution, when it was called the Carmagnole. Clergymen, judges, men and women, even the aged, joined the mad dance in the open streets till they fell from exhaustion.

Tarantula

This word is derived from Taranto the city, or from Thara the river in Apulia, in the vicinity of which the venomous hairy spiders abound. (Kircher: De Arte Mag.)

Tarentella

or Tarantella. Tunes and dances in triplets, supposed to cure the dancing mania.

Tariff

A list in alphabetical order of the duties, drawbacks, bounties, etc., charged or allowed on exports and imports. The word is derived from Tarifa, a seaport of Spain about twenty miles from Gibraltar, where the Moors, during the supremacy in Spain, levied contributions according to a certain scale on vessels entering the Mediterranean Sea. (French, tarif; Spanish, tarifa.)

Tarpaulins

or Tars. Sailors, more frequently called Jack Tars. Tarpaulins are tarred cloths used commonly on board ship to keep articles from the sea—spray, etc.

The more correct spelling is tar—palling, from pall, Latin pallium, a cloak or cloth.

Tarpeian Rock

So called from Tarpeia, a vestal virgin, the daughter of Spurius Tarpeius, governor of the citadel on the Capitoline Hill. Tarpeia agreed to open the gates to the Sabines if they would give her “what they wore on their arms” (meaning their bracelets). The Sabines, “keeping their promise to the ear,” crushed her to death with their shields, and she was buried in that part of the hill called the Tarpeian Rock. Subsequently, traitors were cast down this rock and so killed.

“Bear him to the rock Tarpeian, and from thence Into destruction cast him.”
Shakespeare: Coriolanus, iii.1

Tarred

All tarred with the same brush. All alike to blame, all sheep of the same flock. The allusion is to the custom of distinguishing the sheep of any given flock by a common mark with a brush dipped in tar.

Tarring and Feathering

The first record of this punishment is in 1189 (1 Rich. I.). A statute was made that any robber voyaging with the crusaders “shall be first shaved, then boiling pitch shall be poured upon his head, and a cushion of feathers shook over it.” The wretch was then to be put on shore at the very first place the ship came to. (Rymer Faedera, i 65.)

Tarrinzeau Field

The bowling—green of Southwark. So called because it belonged to the Barons Hastings, who were Barons Tarrinzeau and Mauchline.

Tartan Plaid

A plaid is a long shawl or scarf— some twelve yards of narrow cloth wrapped round the waist, or over the chest and one shoulder, and reaching to the knees. It may be chequered or not, but the English use of the word in such a compound a Scotch—plaids, meaning chequered cloth, is a blunder for Scotch tartans. The tartan is the chequered pattern, every clan having its own tartan. A tartanplaid is a Scotch scarf of a tartan or checked pattern.

Tartar

the deposit of wine, means “infernal stuff,” being derived from the word Tartaros (q.v.). Paracelsus says, “It is so called because it produces oil, water, tincture, and salt, which burn the patient as the fires of Tartarus burn.”

Tartaros

(Greek), Tartarus (Latin). That part of the infernal regions where the wicked are punished. (Classic mythology.)

The word “Hell” occurs seventeen times in the English version of the New Testament. In seven of these the original Greek is “Gehenna,” in nine “Hades,” and in one instance it is “Tartaros” (2 Peter ii. 4) It is a very great pity that the three words are translated alike, especially as Gehenna and Hades are not synonymous, nor should either be confounded with Tartarus. The Anglo—Saxon verb hél—an means to cover, hence hell = the grave or Hades.

Tartuffe

(2 syl.). The principal character of Moliére's comedy so called. The original was the Abbé de Roquette, a parasite of the Prince de Condé. It is said that the name is from the Italian tartuffoli (truffles), and was suggested to Moliére on seeing the sudden animation which lighted up the faces of certain monks when they heard that a seller of truffles awaited their orders. Bickerstaff's play, The Hypocrite, is an English version of Tartuffe.

Tassel—Gentle

The tiercel is the male of the goshawk. So called because it is a tierce or third less than the female. This is true of all birds of prey. The tiercel—gentle was the class of hawk appropriate to princes. (See Hawk. )

“O for a falconer's voice

To lure this tassel—gentle back again”

Shakespeare Romeo and Juliet, ii 2.

Tasselled Gentleman

A fop, a man dressed in fine clothes. A corruption of Tercel—gentle by a double blunder: (1) Tercel, erroneously supposed to be tassel, and to refer to the tags and tassels worn by men on their dress; and (2) gentle corrupted into gentlemen, according to the Irish exposition of the verse, “The gentle shall inherit the earth.”

Tatianists The disciples of Tatian, who, after the death of Justin Martyr, “formed a new scheme of religion; for he advanced the notion of certain invisible aeons, branded marriage with the name of fornication, and denied the salvation of Adam.” (Irenaeus. Adv. Hereses (ed. Grabe), pp. 105, 106, 262.)

Two Tatians are almost always confounded as one person in Church history, although there was at least a century between them. The older Tatian was a Platonic philosopher, born in Syria, and converted to Christianity by Justin the Martyr. He was the author of a Discourse to the Greeks, became a Gnostic, and founded the sect of the Tatianists. The other Tatian was a native of Mesopotamia, lived in the fourth century, and wrote in very bad Greek a book called Diatessaron, supposed to be based on four Gospels, but what four is quite conjectural.

Tatterdemalion

A ragamuffin.

Tattoo

A beat on the drum at night to recall the soldiers to their barracks. It sounded at nine in summer and eight in winter. (French, tapoter or tapotez tous.)

The devil's tattoo. Drumming with one's finger on the furniture, or with one's toe on the ground— a monotonous sound, which gives the listener the “blue devils.”

Tattoo

(To). To mark the skin, especially the face, with indelible pigments rubbed into small punctures. (Tahitan, tatu, from ta, mark.)

Tau

Marked with a tau, i.e. with a cross. Tertullian says, “Haee est litera Græcorum, nostra autem T, species crucis.” And Cyprian tells us that the sign of the cross on the forehead is the mark of salvation.

“This reward (Ezek. ix. 4) is for those whose foreheads are marked with Tau.”— Bp Andrews Sermons (Luke xvii. 32).

Taurus

[the Bull ] indicates to the Egyptians the time for ploughing the earth, which is done with oxen.

Mount Taurus, in Asia. In Judges xv. 3—19 we have an account of Samson and the jawbone, but probably Chamor (translated an ass) was the name of a hill or series of hills like Taurus, and should not have been translated. Similarly, Lehi (translated a jawbone) is probably a proper name also, and refers to a part of Chamor. If so, the meaning is, When he (Samson) came to Lehi, the summit of Mount Chamor, seeing a moist boulder, he broke it off and rolled it on his foes. Down it bounded, crushing “heaps upon heaps” of the Philistines. Where the boulder was broken off a spring of water jetted out, and with this water Samson quenched his thirst.

What is now called the Mountain of St. Patrick was previously called “Mount Eagle”— in Irish, Cruachan Aichle.

Tawdry

Showy, worthless finery; a corruption of St. Audrey. At the annual fair of St. Audrey, in the isle of Ely, showy lace called St. Audrey's lace was sold, and gave foundation to our word tawdry, which means anything gaudy, in bad taste, and of little value. (See Tanthony. )

“Tawdry. `Astrigmenta, timbriae, sen fasciolae, emptae nundinis S. Ethelredae.' ”— Henshawe.

“Come, you promised me a tawdry lace and a pair of sweet gloves.”— Winter's Tale, iv. 4.

Tawny

(The). Alexandre Bonvicino the historian, called Il Moretto. (1514—1564.)

Taylor

called The Water—Poet, who confesses he never learnt so much as the accidence. He wrote fourscore books, and afterwards opened an alehouse in Long Acre. (1580—1654.)

“Taylor, their better Charon, lends an oar,

Once swan of Thames, though now he sings no more.” Dunciad, iii.

Taylor's Institute

The Fitzwilliam Museum of Oxford. So called from Sir Robert Taylor, who made large bequests towards its erection. (1714—1788.)

Tchin

The military system adopted in the municipal and momestic regimen of Russia.

“Peter the Great established what is here [in Russia] the `tchin,' that is to say, he applied the military system to the general administration of the empire.”— De Custine: Russia, chap. vii.

Tchow Dynasty

The third imperial dynasty of China, which gave thirty—four kings, and lasted 866 years (B.C. 1122—256). It was so called from the seat of government.

Te Deum, etc.

is usually ascribed to St. Ambrose, but is probably of a much later date. It is said that St. Ambrose improvised this hymn while baptising St. Augustine. In allusion to this tradition, it is sometimes called “the Ambrosian Hymn.”

Te Deum (of ecclesiastical architecture) is a “theological series” of carved figures in niches: (1) of angels,

(2) of patriarchs and prophets, (3) of apostles and evangelists, (4) of saints and martyrs, (5) of founders. In the restored west front of Salisbury cathedral there is a “Te Deum,” but the whole 123 original figures have been reduced in number.

Te Igitur

One of the service—books of the Roman Catholic Church, used by bishops and other dignitaries. So called from the first words of the canon, “Te igitur, clementissime Pater.”

Oaths upon the Te Igitur. Oaths sworn on the Te Igitur service—book, regarded as especially solemn.

Teague

(A). An Irishman, about equal to Pat or Paddy. Sometimes we find the word Teague—lander. Teague is an Irish servant in Farquhar's Twin Rivals; in act iii. 2 we find the phrase “a downright Teague,” meaning a regular Irish character— blundering, witty, fond of whisky, and lazy. The name is also introduced in Shadwell's play, The Lancashire Witches, and Teague O'Divelly, the Irish Priest (1688).

“Was't Carwell, brother James, or Teague,

That made thee break the Triple League?”

Rochester: History of Insipids.

Teakettle Broth

consists of hot water, bread, and a small lump of butter, with pepper and salt. The French soup maigre.

Tean

or Teian Poet. Anacreon, who was born at Teos, in Ionia. (B.C. 563—478.)

Teanlay Night

The vigil of All Souls, or last evening of October, when bonfires were lighted and revels held for succouring souls in purgatory.

Tear

(to rhyme with “snare"). To tear Christ's body. To use imprecations. The common oaths of mediaeval times were by different parts of the Lord's body, hence the preachers used to talk of “tearing God's body by imprecations.”

“Her othes been so greet and so dammpnable

That it is grisly for to hiere hëm swere.

Our blisful Lordës body thay to—tere.”

Chaucer: Canterbury Tales, 13,889.

Tear

(to rhyme with “fear"). Tear and larme. (Anglo — Saxon, taeher; Gothic, tagr; Greek, dakru; Latin, lacrim—a; French, lar'm.)

Tears of Eos. The dew—drops of the morning were so called by the Greeks. Eos was the mother of Memnon (q.v.), and wept for him every morning.

St. Lawrence's tears. Falling stars. St. Lawrence was roasted to death on a gridiron, and wept that others had not the same spirit to suffer for truth's sake as he had. (See Lawrence.)

Tear Handkerchief

(The). A handkerchief blessed by the priest and given, in the Tyrol, to a bride, to dry her tears. At death, this handkerchief is laid in her coffin over the face of the deceased.

Teaspoon

(A). 5,000. (See Spoon. )

Teazle

(Lady). A lively, innocent country maiden, married to Sir Peter, who is old enough to be her father. Planted in the hotbed of London gaiety, she formed a liaison with Joseph Surface, but, being saved from disgrace, repented and reformed. (Sheridan: School for Scandal.) (See Townly. )

Teazle

(Sir Peter). A man who had remained a bachelor till he had become old, when he married a girl from the country, who proved extravagant, fond of pleasure, selfish, and vain. Sir Peter was always gibing his wife for her inferior rank, teasing her about her manner of life, and yet secretly liking what she did, and feeling proud of her. (Sheridan: School for Scandal.)

Teck

(A). A detective. Every suspicious man is a “teck” in the eyes of a thief. Of course, the word is a contraction of [de]tec[tive].

Teeth

From the teeth outwards. Merely talk; without real significance.

“Much of the ... talk about General Gordon lately was only from the teeth outwards.”— The Daily News, 1886.

To set one's teeth on edge. (See Edge.) He has cut his eye—teeth. He is “up to snuff;” he has “his weather—eye open.” The eye—teeth are cut late— Months.

First set — 5 to 8, the four central inoisors. 7 ” 10 ” lateral incisors.

12 ” 16 ” anterior molars.

14 ” 20 ” the eye—teeth.

Years.

Second set — 5 to 6, the anterior molars. 7 ” 8 ” incisors.

9 ” 10 ” bicuspids.

11 ” 12 ” eye—teeth.

In spite of his teeth. In opposition to his settled purpose or resolution. Holinshed tells us of a Bristol Jew, who suffered a tooth to be drawn daily for seven days before he would submit to the extortion of King John. (See Jew's Eye.)

“In despite of the teeth of all the rhyme and reason.”—Shakespeare: Merry Wives of Windsor, v. 4.

To cast into one's teeth. To utter reproaches.

“All his faults observed,

Set in a note—book, learned, and conned by rote, To cast into my teeth.”

Shakespeare: Julius Caesar, iv. 3.

The skin of his teeth. (See Skin.)

Teeth. The people of Ceylon and Malabar used to worship the teeth of elephants and monkeys. The Siamese once offered to a Portuguese 700,000 ducats to redeem a monkey's tooth.

Wolf's tooth. An amulet worn by children to charm away fear.

Teeth are Drawn

(His). His power of doing mischief is taken from him. The phrase comes from the fable of The Lion in Love, who consented to have his teeth drawn and claws cut, in order that a fair damsel might marry him. When the teeth were drawn and claws cut off, the father of the maid fell on the lion and slew him.

Teeth of the Wind

(In the). With the wind dead against us, with the wind blowing in or against our teeth.

“To strive with all the tempest in my teeth.”

Pope.

Teetotal

Those who sign the abstinence pledge are entered with O. P. (old pledge) after their name. Those who pledge themselves to abstain wholly from alcoholic drinks have a T (total) after their name. Hence, T = total abstainer.

The tale about Dick Turner, a plasterer or fish—hawker at Preston, in Lancashire, who stammered forth, “Ill have nowt to do with the moderation botheration pledge; I'll be reet down t— total, that or nowt,” is not to be relied on.

It is said that Turner's tombstone contains this inscription: “Beneath this stone are deposited the remains of Richard Turner, author of the word Teetotal as applied to abstinence from all intoxicating liquors, who departed this life on the 27th day of October, 1846, aged 56 years.”

Teetotum

(A). A working—man's club in which all intoxicants are prohibited.

“You can generally depend upon getting your money's worth if you go to a teetotum.”— Stephen Remarx, chap. v.

Teian Muse

(The). Anacreon, a native of Teion, in Paphlagonia. (B.C. 563—478.)

Teinds

Tithes.

“Taking down from the window—seat that amusing folio (The Scottish Coke upon Littleton). he opened it, as if instinctively, at the tenth title of Book Second, `of Teinds or Tythes.' ”— Sir

W. Scott: The Antiquary, chap. xxxv.

N.B. Those entitled to tithes were called in Scotland “teind—masters.”

Telamones

Supporters. (Greek, Telamon.) Generally applied to figures of men used for supporters in architure (See Atlantes. )

Telegram Milking a telegram. A telegram is said to be “milked” when the message sent to a specific party is surreptitiously made use of by others.

“They receive their telegrams in cipher to avoid the risk of their being `milked' by rival journals,”— The Times, August 14th, 1869.

Telemachos

The only son of Ulysses and Penelope. After the fall of Troy he went, under the guidance of Mentor, in quest of his father. He is the hero of Fénelon's prose epic called Télémaque.

Tell

(William). The boldest of the Swiss mountaineers. The daughter of Leuthold having been insulted by an emissary of Albrecht Gessler, the enraged father killed the ruffian and fled. William Tell carried the assassin across the lake, and greatly incensed the tyrannical governor. The people rising in rebellion, Gessler put to death Melchtal, the patriarch of the district, and, placing the ducal cap of Austria on a pole, commanded the people to bow down before it in reverence. Tell refused to do so, whereupon Gessler imposed on him the task of shooting an apple from his little boy's head. Tell succeeded in this perilous trial of skill, but, letting fall a concealed arrow, was asked with what object he had secreted it. “To kill thee, O tyrant,” he replied, “if I had failed in the task imposed on me.” Gessler now ordered the bold mountaineer to be put in chains and carried across the lake to Küssnacht Castle “to be devoured alive by reptiles,” but, being rescued by the peasantry, he shot Gessler and liberated his country. (Rossini: Guglielmo Tell, an opera.)

Kissling's monument at Altorf (1892) has four reliefs on the pedestal: (1) Tell shooting the apple; (2) Tell's leap from the boat; (3) Gessler's death; and (4) Tell's death at Schachenbach.

William Tell. The story of William Tell is told of several other persons: (1) Egil, the brother of Wayland Smith. One day King Nidung commanded him to shoot an apple off the head of his son. Egil took two arrows from his quiver, the straightest and sharpest he could find. When asked by the king why he took two arrows, the god—archer replied, as the Swiss peasant to Gessler, “To shoot thee, tyrant, with the second if the first one fails.”

(2) Saxo Grammaticus tells nearly the same story respecting Toki, who killed Harald.

(3) Reginald Scot says, “Puncher shot a pennie on his son's head, and made ready another arrow to have slain the Duke Remgrave, who commanded it.” (1584.)

(4) Similar tales are told of Adam Bell, Clym of the Clough, William of Cloudeslie and Henry IV., Olaf and Eindridi, etc.

Tellers of the Exchequer

A corruption of talliers — i.e. tally—men, whose duty it was to compare the tallies, receive money payable into the Exchequer, give receipts, and pay what was due according to the tallies. Abolished in the reign of William IV. The functionary of a bank who receives and pays bills, orders, and so on, is still called a “teller.”

Temora

One of the principal poems of Ossian, in eight books, so called from the royal residence of the kings of Connaught. Cairbar had usurped the throne, having killed Cormac, a distant relative of Fingal; and Fingal raised an army to dethrone the usurper. The poem begins from this point with an invitation from Cairbar to Oscar, son of Ossian, to a banguet. Oscar accepted the invitation, but during the feast a quarrel was vamped up, in which Cairbar and Oscar fell by each other's spears. When Fingal arrived a battle ensued, in which Fillan, son of Fingal, the Achilles of the Caledonian army, and Cathmor, brother of Cairbar, the bravest of the Irish army, were both slain. Victory crowned the army of Fingal, and Ferad—Artho, the rightful heir, was restored to the throne of Connaught.

Temper

To make trim. The Italians say, temperare la lira, to tune the lyre: temperare una penna, to mend a pen; temperáre l'oriuôlo, to wind up the clock. In Latin, temperare calamum is “to mend a pen.” Metal well tempered is metal made trim or meet for its use, and if not so it is called ill—tempered. When Otway says,

“Woman, nature made thee to temper man,” he means to make him trim, to soften his nature, to mend him.

Templars or Knights Templars. Nine French knights bound themselves, at the beginning of the twelfth century, to protect pilgrims on their way to the Holy Land, and received the name of Templars, because their arms were kept in a building given to them for the purpose by the abbot of the convent called the Temple of Jerusalem. They used to call themselves the “Poor Soldiers of the Holy City.” Their habit was a long white mantle, to which subsequently was added a red cross on the left shoulder. Their famous war—cry was

“Bauseant,” from their banner, which was striped black and white, and charged with a red cross; the word Bauseant is old French for a black and white horse.

Seal of the Knights Templars (two knights riding on one horse). The first Master of the Order and his friend were so poor that they had but one horse between them, a circumstance commemorated by the seal of the order. The order afterwards became wealthy and powerful.

Temple

(London) was once the seat of the Knights Templars. (See above.)

Temple

The place under inspection, from the Latin verb tueor, to behold, to look at. It was the space marked out by the Roman augurs as the field of observation. When augurs made their observations they marked out a space within which the sign was to occur. Rather remarkable is it that the Greek theos and Latin deus are nouns from the verbs theaomai and tueor, meaning the “presence” in this space marked out by the augurs.

Temple

(A). A kind of stretcher, used by weavers for keeping Scotch carpeting at its proper breadth during weaving. The weaver's temple is a sort of wooden rule with teeth of a pothook form.

Temple Bar

called “the City Golgotha,” because the heads of traitors, etc., were exposed there. (Removed 1878.)

Temple of Solomon

Timbs, in his Notabilia, p. 192, tells us that the treasure provided by David for this building exceeded 900 millions sterling (!). The building was only about 150 feet long and 105 wide. Taking the whole revenue of the British empire at 100 millions sterling annually, the sum stated by Timbs would exhaust nine years of the whole British revenue. The kingdom of David was not larger than Wales, and by no means populous.

Temples

(Pagan) in many respects resembled Roman Catholic churches. There was first the vestibule, in which were the piscina with lustral water to sprinkle those who entered the edifice; then the nave (or naos), common to all comers; then the chancel (or adytum ) from which the general public was excluded. In some of the temples there was also an apsis, like our apse; and in some others there was a portico, which not unfrequently was entered by steps or “degrees”; and, like churches, the Greek and Roman temples were consecrated by the pontiff.

The most noted temples were that of Vulcan, in Egypt; of Jupiter Olympus, and of Apollo, in Delphos; of Diana, in Ephesus; the Capitol and the Pantheon of Rome; the Jewish temple built by Solomon, and that of Herod the Great.

Tempora Mutantur (See Mutantur. )

Ten

Gothic, tai—hun (two hands); Old German, ze—hen, whence zehn, zen.

Ten Commandments

(The). The following rhyme was written under the two tables of the commandments:—

“PRSVR Y PRFCT MN

VR KP THS PRCPTS TN.

The vowel E

Supplies the key.”

Ten Commandments

(The). Scratching the face with the ten fingers of an angry woman; or a blow with the two fists of an angry man, in which the “ten commandments are summarised into two.”

“Could I come near your beauty with my nails,

I'd set my ten commandments in your face.”

Shakespeare: 2 Henry VI., i. 3.

“ `I daur you to touch him,' spreading abroad her long and muscular fingers, garnished with claws, which a vulture might have envied. `Ill set my ten commandments on the face of the first loop that lays a finger on him.”— Sir W. Scott: Waverley, chap. xxx.

Tench

is from the Latin tinc—a, so called, says Aulus Gellius, because it is tincta (tinted).

Tend in the Eyes

Dutch, “Iemand naar de oogen te zien. ” The English equivalent is, “to wait on his nod” or beck.

“Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides,

So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes.”

Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra, ii. 2.

Tendon

(See Achilles. )

Tenglio

A river in Lapland on whose banks roses grow.

“I was surprised to see upon the banks of this river roses of as lovely a red as any that are in our own gardens.”— M. de Maupertuis.

Teniers

Malplaquet, in France, famous for the victory of the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene over the French under Marshal Villars on September 11, 1709.

“Her courage tried

On Teniers' dreadful field.”

Thomson: Autumn.

The Scottish Teniers. Sir David Wilkie (1785—1841).

Tenner

(A). A ten—pound note. A “fiver” is a five—pound note.

Tennis Ball of Fortune

Pertinax, the Roman emperor, was so called. He was first a seller of charcoal, then a schoolmaster, then a soldier, and lastly an emperor, but in three months he was dethroned and murdered.

Tennyson (Alfred). Bard of Arthurian Romance. His poems on the legends of King Arthur are— (1) The Coming of Arthur; (2) Geraint and Enid; (3) Merlin and Vivien; (4) Lancelot and Elaine; (5) The Holy Grail;

(6) Pelleas and Ettare; (7) Guinevere; (8) The Passing of Arthur. Also The Morte d' Arthur, Sir Galahad, The Lady of Shallott. (1810—1892.)

Tenpenny Nails

Very large nails, 1,000 of which would weigh 10 lbs. Four—penny nails are those which are much smaller, as 1,000 of them would weigh only 4 lbs.; two—penny nails, being half the size, 1,000 of them would weigh only 2 lbs. Then we come to the ounce nails, 1,000 weighing only 8, 12, or 16 ounces, the standard unit being always 1,000 nails. Penny is a corruption of pounder, pouner, puner, penny, as two—penny nails, four—penny nails, ten—penny nails, etc., according to the weight of 1,000 of them.

Tenson

A subdivision of the chanzos or poems of love and gallantry by the Troubadours. When the public jousts were over, the lady of the castle opened her “court of love,” in which the combatants contended with harp and song.

Tent

Father of such as dwell in tents. Jabal. (Genesis iv. 20.)

Tent

(Skidbladnir's) would cover a whole army, and yet fold up into a parcel not too big for the pocket. (Arabian Nights.)

Tenterden

Tenterden steeple was the cause of Goodwin Sands. The reason alleged is not obvious; an apparent non—sequitur. Mr. More, being sent with a commission into Kent to ascertain the cause of the Goodwin Sands, called together the oldest inhabitants to ask their opinion. A very old man said, “I believe Tenterden steeple is the cause.” This reason seemed ridiculous enough, but the fact is, the Bishop of Rochester applied the revenues for keeping clear the Sandwich haven to the building of Tenterden steeple. (See Goodwin Sands. )

Some say the stone collected for strengthening the wall was used for building the church tower.

Tenterhooks

I am on tenterhooks, or on tenterhooks of great expectation. My curiosity is on the full stretch, I am most curious or anxious to hear the issue. Cloth, after being woven, is stretched or “tentered” on hooks passed through the selvages. (Latin, tentus, stretched, hence “tent,” canvas stretched.)

“He was not kept an instant on the tenterhooks of impatience longer than the appointed moment.”— Sir W. Scott: Redgauntlet, chap. xvi.

Tenth Legion

(The), or the Submerged Tenth. The lowest of the proletariat class. A phrase much popularised in the last quarter of the nineteenth century by “General” Booth's book, In Darkest England. (See Submerged.)

Tenth Wave

It is said that every tenth wave is the biggest. (See Wave. )

“At length, tumbling from the Gallic coast, the victorious tenth wave shall ride, like the boar, over all the rest.”— Burke.

Tercel

The male hawk. So called because it is one—third smaller than the female. (French, tiers.)

Terence

The Terence of England, the mender of hearts, is the exquisite compliment which Goldsmith, in his Retaliation, pays to Richard Cumberland, author of The Jew, The West Indian, The Wheel of Fortune, etc. (1732—1811.)

Teresa (St.). The reformer of the Carmelites, canonised by Gregory XV. in 1621. (1515—1582.) (See Sancho Panza. )

Term Time

called, since 1873, LAW SESSIONS.

Michaelmas Sessions begin November 2nd, and end December 21st. Hilary Sessions begin January 11th, and end the Wednesday before Easter. Easter Sessions begin the Tuesday after Easter—week, and end the Friday before Whit Sunday. Trinity Sessions begin the Tuesday after Whit—sun—week, and end August 8th.

Term Time of our Universities

There are three terms at Cambridge in a year, and four at Oxford, but the two middle Oxford terms are two only in name, as they run on without a break. The three Cambridge terms are Lent, Easter, and Michaelmas. The four Oxford terms are Lent, Easter + Trinitv, and Michaelmas.

LENT—

Cambridge, begins January 13th, and ends on the Friday before Palm Sunday. Oxford, begins January 14th, and ends on the Saturday before Palm Sunday.

EASTER—

Cambridge, begins on the Friday of Easter—week, and ends Friday nearest June 20th. Oxford, begins on the Wednesday of Easter—week, and ends Friday before Whit—Sunday. The continuation, called “Trinity term,” runs on till the second Saturday of July.

MICHAELMAS—

Cambridge, begins October 1st, and ends December 16th. Oxford, begins October 10th, and ends December 17th.

Termagant

The author of Junnus says this was a Saxon idol, and derives the word from tyr magan (very mighty); but perhaps it is the Persian tir—magian (Magian lord or deity). The early Crusaders, not very nice in their distinctions, called all Pagans Saracens, and muddled together Magianism and Mahometanism in wonderful confusion, so that Termagant was called the god of the Saracens, or the co—partner of Mahound. Hence Ariosto makes Ferrau “blaspheme his Mahound and Termagant” (Orlando Furioso, xii. 59); and in the legend of Syr Guy the Soudan or Sultan is made to say—

“So helpë me, Mahòune, of might,

And Termagaunt, my God so bright.”

Termagant was at one time applied to men. Thus Massinger, in The Picture, says, “A hundred thousand Turks assailed him, every one a Termagant [Pagan].” At present the word is applied to a boisterous, brawling woman. Thus Arbuthnot says, “The eldest daughter was a termagant, an imperious profligate wretch.” The change of sex arose from the custom of representing Termagant on the stage in Eastern robes, like those worn in Europe by females.

“ `Twas time to counterfeit, or that hot termagant Scot [Douglas] bad paid me scot and lot too.”— Shakespeare: 1 Henry IV., v. 4.

Outdoing Termagant (Hamlet, iii. 2). In the old play the degree of rant was the measure of villainy. Termagant and Herod, being considered the beau—ideal of all that is bad, were represented as settling everything with club law, and bawling so as to split the ears of the groundlings. Bully Bottom, having ranted to his heart's content, says, “That is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein.” (See Herod.)

Terpsichore

(properly Terp—sik'—o—re, but often pronounced Terp'—si—core). The goddess of dancing. Terpsichorean, relating to dancing. Dancers are called “the votaries of Terpsichore.”

Terra Firma

Dry land, in opposition to water; the continents as distinguished from islands. The Venetians so called the mainland of Italy under their sway; as, the Duchy of Venice, Venetian Lombardy, the March of Treviso, the Duchy of Friuli, and Istria. The continental parts of America belonging to Spain were also called by the same term.

Terrestrial Sun

(That). Gold, which in alchemy was the metal corresponding to the sun, as silver did to the moon. (Sir Thomas Browne: Religio Medici, p. 149, 3.)

Terrible

(The). Ivan IV. [or II.] of Russia. (1529, 1533—1584.)

Terrier

is a dog that “takes the earth,” or unearths his prey. Dog Tray is merely an abbreviation of the same word. Terrier is also applied to the hole which foxes, badgers, rabbits, and so on, dig under ground to save

themselves from the hunters. The dog called a terrier creeps into these holes like a ferret to rout out the victim. (Latin, terra, the earth.) Also a land—roll or description of estates.

There are short—and long—haired terriers. (1) Short—haired: the black—and—tan, the schipperke, the bull—terrier, and the fox—terrier. (2) Long—haired: the Bedlington, the Dandy Dinmont, and the Irish, Scotch, and Yorkshire terrier.

Terry Alts

Insurgents of Clare, who appeared after the Union, and committed numerous outrages. These rebels were similar to “the Thrashers” of Connaught, “the Carders,” the followers of “Captain Rock" in 1822, and the Fenians (1869).

Tertium Quid

A third party which shall be nameless. The expression originated with Pythagoras, who, defining bipeds, said—

“Sunt bipes homo, et avis, et tertium quid.

“A man is a biped, so is a bird, and a third thing (which shall be nameless).”

Iamblichus says this third thing was Pythagoras himself. (Vita Pyth., cxxvii.) In chemistry, when two substances chemically unite, the new substance is called a tertium quid, as a neutral salt produced by the mixture of an acid and alkali.

Terza Rima

A poem in triplets, in which the second or middle line rhymes with the first and third lines of the succeeding triplets. In the beginning of the poem lines 1 and 3 rhyme independently, and the poem must end with the first line of a new triplet. Dante's Divine Comedy is in this metre, and Byron has adopted it in The Prophecy of Dante. The scheme is as follows.—

—1a

x2a feel (a new rhyme for 1b and 3b).

—3a

1b heal

x2b cries (a new rhyme for 1c and 4c).

3b steal

1c skies

2c place — (a new rhyme for 1d and 3d)

3c arise

1d race

x2d ( a new rhyme for 1e and 3e)

3d space

etc etc.

Tesserarian Art

The art of gambling. (Latin, tessera, a die.)

Tester

A sixpence. Called testone (teste, a head) because it was stamped on one side with the head of the reigning sovereign. Similarly, the head canopy of a bed is called its tester (Italian, testa; French, teste, tête). Copstick in Dutch means the same thing. Worth 12d. in the reign of Henry VIII., but 6d. in the reign of Elizabeth.

“Hold, there's a tester for thee.”— Shakespeare: 2 Henry IV., iii. 2.

Testers are gone to Oxford, to study at Brazenose. When Henry VIII, debased the silver testers, the alloy broke out in red pimples through the silver, giving the royal likeness in the coin a blotchy appearance; hence the punning proverb.

Tete—a—tete A confidential conversation.

Tete Bottee

[Booted Head ]. The nickname of Philippe des Comines.

“You, Sir Philip des comines, were at a hunting—match with the duke your master; and when he alighted after the chase, he required your services in drawing off his boots. Reading in your looks some natural resentment, he ordered you to sit down in turn, and rendered you the same office. ... but ... no sooner had he plucked one of your boots off than he brutally beat it about your head ... and his privileged fool Le Glorieux gave you the name of Tito Bottée.”— Sir W. Scott: Quentin Durward. chap. xxx.

Tete du Pont

The barbiean or watch—tower placed on the head of a drawbridge.

Tether

He has come to the end of his tether. He has outrun his fortune; he has exhausted all his resources. The reference is to a cable run out to the bitter end (see Bitter End ), or to the lines upon lines in whale fishing. If the whale runs out all the lines it gets away and is lost.

Horace calls the end of life “ultima linca rerum, ” the end of the goal, referring to the white chalk mark at the end of a racecourse.

Tethys

The sea, properly the wife of Oceanos.

“The golden sun above the watery bed

Of hoary Tethys raised his beamy head.”

Hoole's Ariosto, bk. viii.

Tetragrammaton

The four letters, meaning the four which compose the name of Deity. The ancient Jews never pronounced the word Jehovah composed of the four sacred letters JHVH. The word means “I am,” or “I

exist” (Exod. iii. 14); but Rabbi Bechai says the letters include the three times— past, present, and future. Pythagoras called Deity a Tetrad or Tetractys, meaning the “four sacred letters.”

The words in different languages: —

Arabic, ALLA.

Assyrian, ADAD.

Brahmins, JOSS.

Danish, GODH.

Dutch, GODT.

East Indian, ZEUL and ESAI.

Egyptian, ZEUT, AUMN, AMON.

French, DIEU.

German, GOTT.

Greek, ZEUS.

Hebrew, JHVH, ADON.

Irish, DICH.

Italian, IDIO.

Japanese, ZAIN.

Latin, DEUS.

Malayan, EESF.

Persian, SORU, SYRA.

Peruvian, LLAN.

Scandinarian, ODIN.

Spanish, DIOS.

Sredish, OODD, GOTH.

Syriac, ADAD.

Tahitan, ATUA.

Tartarian, TYAN.

Turkish, ADDI.

Vaudois, DIOU.

Wallachian, SEUE.

“Such was the sacred Tetragrammaton.

Things worthy silence must not be revealed.”

Dryden: Britannia Rediviva.

[We have the Egyptian , like the Greek .]

Tetrapla

The Bible, disposed by Origen under four columns, each of which contained a different Greek version. The versions were those of Aquila, Symmachus, Theodosian, and the Septaugint.

Teucer

Brother of Ajax the Greater, who went with the allied Greeks to the siege of Troy. On his return home, his father banished him the kingdom for not avenging on Ulysses the death of his brother. (Homer: Iliad.)

Teutons

Thuath—duiné (north men). Our word Dutch and the German Deutsch are variations of the same word, originally written Theodisk.

Teutonic Knights

An order which the Crusades gave birth to. Originally only Germans of noble birth were admissible to the order. (Abolished by Napoleon in 1800.)

Th

theta. The sign given in the verdict of the Areopagus of condemnation to death .

“Et potis es vitio nigrum praeflgere theta.”— Persius.

T meant absolution, and A = non liquet. In the Roman courts C meant condemnation, A absolution, and N L (non liquet) remanded.

Thais

(2 syl.). An Athenian courtesan who induced Alexander, when excited with wine, to set fire to the palace of the Persian kings at Persepolis.

“The king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;

Tha is led the way to light him to his prey,

And, like another Helen, flred another Troy.”

Dryden: Alexander's Feast.

Thalaba

The Destroyer, son of Hodeirah and Zeinab (Zenobia); hero of a poem by Southey, in twelve books.

Thales

The Seven Sages (of Greece) (c. 620 BCE–550 BCE) was primarily the title given by Greek tradition to seven men of note considered to be wise. The major questions are, who considered them to be wise, on what basis, and why the number seven.

Thalestris

Queen of the Amazons, who went with 300 women to meet Alexander the Great, under the hope of raising a race of Alexanders.

“This was no Thalestris from the fields, but a quiet domestic character from the fireside.”— C. Brontë's Shirley, chap. xxviii.

Thali'a

One of the muses, generally regarded as the patroness of comedy. She was supposed by some, also, to preside over husbandry and planting, and is represented leaning on a column holding a mask in her right hand, etc.

Thames

(1 syl.). The Latin Thamesis (the broad Isis, where isis is a mere variation of esk, ouse, uisg, etc., meaning water). The river Churn unites with the Thames at Cricklade, in Wiltshire, where it was at one time indifferently called the Thames, Isis, or Thamesis. Thus, in the Saxon Chronicle we are told the East Anglians

“overran all the land of Mercia till they came to Cricklade, where they forded the Thames.” In Camden's Britannia mention is made of Summerford, in Wiltshire, on the east bank of the “Isis” (cujus vocabulum Temis juxta vadum, qui appellatur Summerford). Canute also forded the Thames in 1016 in Wiltshire. Hence Thames is not a compound of the two rivers Thame and Isis at their junction, but of Thamesis. Tham is a variety of the Latin amnis, seen in such words as North—ampton, South—ampton, Tam—worth, etc. Pope perpetuates the notion that Thames = Thame and Isis in the lines—

“Around his throne the sea—born brothers stood;

Who swell with tributary urns his flood:—

First the famed authors of his ancient name,

The winding Isis and the fruitful Thame!

The Kennet swift, for silver eels renowned;

The Loddon slow, with verdant alders crowned; Cole, whose dark streams his flowery islands lave; And chalky Wey that rolls a milky wave;

The blue transparent Vaudalis appears;

The gulphy Lee his sedgy tresses rears;

And sullen Mole that hides his diving flood;

And silent Darent stained with Danish blood.” Pope: Windsor Forest.

He'll never set the Thames on fire. Hell never make any figure in the world; never plant his footsteps on the sands of time. The popular explanation is that the word Thames is a pun on the word temse, a coru—sieve; and that the parallel French locution He will never set the Seine on fire is a pun on seine, a drag—net; but these solutions are not tenable. There is a Latin saw, “Tiberim accendere nequaquam potest, ” which is probably the fons et origo of other parallel sayings. Then, long before our proverb, we had “To set the Rhine on fire” (Den Rhein anzünden), 1630, and Er hat den Rhein und das Meer angezündet, 1580.

“There are numerous similar phrases: as “He will never set the Liffey on fire;” to “set the Trent on fire;” to “set the Humber on fire;” etc. Of course it is possible to set water on fire, but the scope of the proverb lies the other way, and it may take its place beside such sayings as “If the sky falls we may catch larks.”

Thammuz

The Syrian and Phoenician name of Adonis. His death happened on the banks of the river Adonis, and in summer—time the waters always become reddened with the hunter's blood. (See Ezekiel viii. 14.)

“Thammuz came next behind,

Whose annual wound on Lebanon allured

The Syrian damsels to lament his fate

In amorous ditties all a summer's day,

While smooth Adonis from his native rock

Ran purple to the sea, supposed with blood

Of Thammuz yearly wounded.”

Milton: Paradise Lost, bk, iii. 446—452.

Thamyris

A Thracian bard mentioned by Homer (Iliad, ii. 595). He challenged the Muses to a trial of skill, and, being overcome in the contest, was deprived by them of his sight and power of song. He is represented with a broken lyre in his hand.

“Blind Thamyris and blind Maeonides [Eomer],

And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old.”

Milton: Paradise Lost, iii. 35—36.

“Tiresias” pronounce Ti'—re—sas, “Phineus” pronounce Finuce.

That

Seven “thats” may follow each other, and make sense.

“For be it known that we may safely write

Or say that `that that' that that man wrote was right; Nay, e'en that that that, that `that THAT' has followed, Through six repeats, the grammar's rule has hallowed; And that that that that that `that THAT' began Repeated seven times is right, deny't who can.”

“My lords, with humble submission that that I say is this: That that that `that that' that that gentleman has advanced is not that that he should have proved to your lordships.”— Spectator, No. 86.

That's the Ticket

That's the right thing to do; generally supposed to be a corruption of “That's the etiquette,” or proper mode of procedure, according to the programme; but the expanded phrase “That's the ticket for

soup” seems to allude to the custom of showing a ticket in order to obtain a basin of soup given in charity.

Thatch

A straw hat. A hat being called a tile, and the word being mistaken for a roof—tile, gave rise to several synonyms, such as roof, roofing, thatch, etc.

Thaumaturgus

A miracle—worker; applied to saints and others who are reputed to have performed miracles. (Greek, thauma ergon.)

Prince Alexander of IIohenlohe, whose power was looked upon as miraculous. Apollonius of Tyana, Cappadocia (A.D. 3—98). (See his Life, by Philostratus.) St. Bernard of Clairvaux, called “the Thaumaturgus of the West.” (1091—1153.) St. Francis d'Assisi, founder of the Franciscan order. (1182—1226.)

J. Joseph Gassner, of Bratz, in the Tyrol, who, looking on disease as a possession, exorcised the sick, and his cures were considered miraculous. (1727—1779.)

Gregory, Bishop of Neo—Casare'a, in Cappadocia, called emphatically “the Thaumaturgus,” from the numerous miracles he is reported to have performed. (212—270.)

St. Isidorus. (See his Life, by Damascius.) Jannes and Jambres, the magicians of Pharaoh who withstood Moses. Blaise Pascal. (1623—1662.)

Plotinus, and several other Alexandrine philosophers. (205—270.) (See the Life of Plotinus, by Porphyry.) Proclus. (412—415.) (See his Life, by Marinus.)

Simon Magus, of Samaria, called “the Great Power of God.” (Acts viii. 10.) Several of the Sophists. (See Lives of the Philosophers, by Eunapius.)

Sospitra possessed the omniscient power of seeing all that was done in every part of the globe. (Eunapius: OEdeseus.

Vincent de Paul, founder of the “Sisters of Charity.” (1576—1660.) Peter Schott has published a treatise on natural magic called Thaumaturgus Physicus. (See below.)

Thaumaturgus. Filumea is called Thaumaturga, a saint unknown till 1802, when a grave was discovered with this inscription on tiles: “LUMENA PAXTE CYMFI, which, being rearranged, makes Pax tecum Filumena. Filumena was at once accepted as a saint, and so many wonders were worked by “her” that she has been called La Thaumaturge de Dixneuvième Siècle.

Theagenes and Chariclea

The hero and heroine of an erotic romance in Greek by Heliodorus, Bishop of Trikka (fourth century).

Theban Bard

or Eagle. Pindar, born at Thebes. (B.C. 518—439.)

Theban Legion

The legion raised in the Thebaïs of Egypt, and composed of Christian soldiers, led by St. Maurice. This legion is sometimes called “the Thundering Legion” (q.v.).

Thebes (1 syl.), called The Hundred—Gated, was not Thebes of Boeotia, but of Thebaïs of Egypt, which extended over twenty—three miles of land. Homer says out of each gate the Thebans could send forth 200 war — chariots. (Egyptian, Taape or Taouab, city of the sun.)

“The world's great empress on the Egyptian plain,

That spreads her conquests o'er a thousand states, And pours her heroes through a hundred gates, Two hundred horsemen and two hundred cars From each wide portal issuing to the wars.”

Pope: Iliad, 1.

Thecla

(St.), styled in Greek martyrologies the proto—martyress, as St. Stephen is the proto—martyr. All that is known of her is from a book called the Periods, or Acts of Paul and Theela, pronounced apocryphal by Pope Gelasius, and unhappily lost. According to the legend, Thecla was born of a noble family in Iconium, and was converted by the preaching of St. Paul.

Theist, Deist, Atheist, Agnostic

A theist believes there is a God who made and governs all creation; but does not believe in the doctrine of the Trinity, nor in a divine revelation.

A deist believes there is a God who created all things, but does not believe in His superintendence and government. He thinks the Creator implanted in all things certain immutable laws, called the Laws of Nature, which act per se, as a watch acts without the supervision of its maker. Like the theist, he does not believe in the doctrine of the Trinity, nor in a divine revelation.

The atheist disbelieves even the existence of a God. He thinks matter is eternal, and what we call “creation” is the result of natural laws.

The agnostic believes only what is knowable. He rejects revelation and the doctrine of the Trinity as “past human understanding.” He is neither theist, deist, nor atheist, as all these are past understanding.

Thelusson Act

The 39th and 40th George III., cap. 98. An Act to prevent testators from leaving their property to accumulate for more than twenty—one years. So called because it was passed in reference to the last will and testament of the late Mr. Thelusson, in which he desired his property to be invested till it had accumulated to some nineteen millions sterling.

Thenot

An old shepherd who relates to Cuddy the fable of The Oak and the Briar, with the view of curing him of his vanity. (Spenser: Shepherd's Calendar.)

Theocritus

The Scottish Theocritus. Allan Ramsay, author of The Gentle Shepherd. (1685—1758.)

Theodomas

A famous trumpeter at the siege of Thebes.

“At every court ther cam loud menstralcye

That never trompëd Joab for to heere,

Ne he Theodomas yit half so cleere

At Thebës, when the citë was in doute.”

Chaucer: Canterbury Tales, 9,592.

Theodora

(in Orlando Furioso), sister of Constantine, the Greek Emperor. Greatly enraged against Rogero, who slew her son, she vowed vengeance. Rogero, captured during sleep, being committed to her hands, she cast him into a foul dungeon, and fed him on the bread of affliction till Prince Leon released him.

Theodorick

One of the heroes of the Nibelung, a legend of the Sagas. This king of the Goths was also selected as the centre of a set of champions by the German minnesängers (minstrels), but he is called by these romancers Diderick of Bern (Verona).

Theon's Tooth

The bite of an illnatured or carping critic. “Dente Theonino circumrodi, ” to be nastily aspersed. (Horace: Epistles, i. 18, 82.) Theon was a carping grammarian of Rome.

Theosophy

(the society was founded in November, 1875). It means divine wisdom, the “wisdom religion,” the “hidden wisdom.” It is borrowed from Ammonius Saccas of the third century A.D. Theosophists tell us there has ever been a body of knowledge, touching the universe, known to certain sages, and communicated by them in doles, as the world was able to bear the secrets. Certainly Esdras supports this hypothesis. Of the two hundred books Jehovah said:—

“The first that thou hast written publish openly, that the worthy [esoterics] and the unworthy [exoterics] may read it; but keep the seventy last that thou mayst deliver them only to such as be wise among the people, for in them is wisdom and the stream of knowledge.”— 2 Esdras xiv. 45—47.

“At my first approach to the `Wisdom Religion.' I rather resented the necessity of having to master the profusion of technical terms which Madame Blavatsky very freely sprinkles about her Key to Theosophy, such as DAVACHAN, BUDDI, ATMA, MANAS, SAMADHI, etc.”— F. J. Gould.

Therapeu'tæ

The Therapeutæ of Philo were a branch of the Essenes. The word Essenes is Greek, and means “doctors” (essaioi), and Therapeutæ is merely a synonym of the same word.

Theresa

Daughter of the Count Palatine of Padolia, beloved by Mazeppa. The count, her father, was very indignant that a mere page should presume to fall in love with his daughter, and had Mazeppa bound to a wild horse and set adrift. As for Theresa, Mazeppa never knew her future history. Theresa was historically not the daughter, but the young wife, of the fiery count. (Byron: Mazeppa.)

Thermidorians

Those who took part in the coup d'état which effected the fall of Robespierre, with the desire of restoring the legitimate monarchy. So called because the Reign of Terror was brought to an end on the ninth Thermidor of the second Republican year (July 27th, 1794). Thermidor or “Hot Month” was from July 19th to August 18th. (Duval: Souvenirs Thermidoriens.)

Thersites

A deformed, scurrilous officer in the Greek army which went to the siege of Troy. He was always railing at the chiefs, and one day Achilles felled him to the earth with his first and killed him. (Homer: Iliad.)

“He squinted, halted, gibbous was behind,

And pinched before, and on his tapering head

Grew patches only of the flimsiest down.

... Him Greece had sent to Troy,

The miscreant, who shamed his country most.” Cowper's Translation, book ii.

A Thersites. A dastardly, malevolent, impudent railer against the powers that be. (See above.

Theseus

(2 syl.). Lord and governor of Athens, called by Chaucer Duke Theseus. He married Hippolita, and as he returned home with his bride, and Emily her sister, was accosted by a crowd of female suppliants, who complained of Creon, King of Thebes. The Duke forthwith set out for Thebes, slew Creon, and took the city by assault. Many captives fell into his hands, amongst whom were the two knights named Palamon and Arcite (q.v.). (Chaucer The Knight's Tale.)

The Christian Theseus. Roland the Paladin.

Thespians

Actors. (See below.)

Thespis, Thespian

Dramatic. Thespis was the father of Greek tragedy.

“The race of learned men,

... oft they snatch the pen,

As if inspired, and in a Thespian rage;

Then write.”

Thomson: Castle of Indolence, c. i. 52.

“Thespis, the first professor of our art,

At country wakes sang ballads from a cart.”

Dryden: Prologue to Sophonisba.

Thessalian Deceitful, fraudulent; hence = fraud or deceit. = double dealing, referring to the double—dealing of the Thessalians with their confederates, a notable instance of which occurred in the Peloponnesian War where, in the very midst of the battle, they turned sides, deserting the Athenians and going over to the Lacedæmonians. The Loerians had a similar bad repute, whence but of all people, the Spartans were most noted for treachery.

Thestylis

Any rustic maiden. In the Idylls of Theocritos, Thestylis is a young female slave.

“And then in baste her bower she leaves,

With Thestylis to bind the sheaves.”

Milton: L'Allegro.

Thick

Through thick and thin (Dryden). Through evil and through good report; through stoggy mud and stones only thinly covered with dust.

“Through perils both of wind and limb

She followed him through thick and thin.”

Butler: Hudibras.

“Thick and thin blocks” are pulley—blocks with two sheaves of different thickness, to accommodate different sizes of ropes.

Thick—skinned

Not sensitive; not irritated by rebukes and slanders. Thin—skinned, on the contrary, means impatient of reproof or censure; their skin is so thin it annoys them to be touched.

Thief

(See Autolycus, Cacus, etc.)

Thieves' Latin

Slang; dog, or dog's Latin; gibberish.

“What did actually reach his ears was disguised so completely by the use of cant words and the thieves' Latin, called slang, that he ... could make no sense of the conversation.”— Sir W. Scott: Redyauntlet, chap. xiii.

“He can vent Greek and Hebrew as fast as I can thieves' Latin.”— Sir W. Scott: Kenilworth, chap. xxix.

Thieves on the Cross

called Gesmas (the impenitent) and Desmas (afterwards “St. Desmas,” the penitent thief) in the ancient mysteries. Hence the following charm to scare away thieves:

“Impartibas meritis pendent tria corpora ramis:

Desmas et Gesmas, media est divina potestas; Alta petit Desmas, infelix, inflma, Gesmas:

Nos et res nostras conservet samma potestas,

Hos versus dicas, ne tu furto tua perdas.”

Thimble

Scotch, Thummle, originally “Thumb—bell,” because it was worn on the thumb, as sailors still wear their thimbles. It is a Dutch invention, introduced into England in 1695 by John Lofting, who opened a thimble manufactory at Islington.

Thimble—rig

A cheat. The cheating game so called is played thus: A pea is put on a table, and the conjurer places three or four thimbles over it in succession, and then sets the thimbles on the table. You are asked to

say under which thimble the pea is, but are sure to guess wrong, as the pea has been concealed under the man's nail.

Thin—skinned

(See above, Thick—Skinned. )

Thin Red Line

(The). The old 93rd Highlanders were so described at the battle of Balaclava by Dr. W. H. Russell, because they did not take the trouble to form into square. “Balaclava” is one of the honour names on their colours, and their regimental magazine is named The Thin Red Line.

Thin as a Whipping—post

As a lath; as a wafer. (See Similes. )

“I assure you that, for many weeks afterwards, I was as thin as a whipping—post.”— Kingston The Three Admirals, chap. vi.

“ `I wish we had something to eat,' said Tom. `I shall grow as thin as a whipping—post ... I suspect.' ”— Kingston: The Three Admirals, chap. xi.

Think about It

(I'll). A courteous refusal. When the sovereign declines to accept a bill, the words employed are Le roi (or la reine) s'avisera.

Thirteen Unlucky

The Turks so dislike the number that the word is almost expunged from their vocabulary. The Italians never use it in making up the numbers of their lotteries. In Paris no house bears the number, and persons, called Quartorziennes (q.v.), are reserved to make a fourteenth at dinner parties.

“Jamais on ne devrait

Se Mettre a table treize,

Mais douze c'est parfait.”

La Mascotte (an opera), i. 5.

Sitting down thirteen at dinner, in old Norse mythology, was deemed unlucky, because at a banquet in the Valhalla, Loki once intruded, making thirteen guests, and Baldur was slain.

In Christian countries the superstition was confirmed by the Last Supper of Christ and His twelve apostles, but the superstition itself is much anterior to Christianity.

Twelve at a dinner table, supposing one sits at the head of the table and one at the bottom, gives a party to these two, provided a couple is divided; but thirteen, like any other odd number, is a unicorn.

Thirteens

Throwing the thirteens about. A thirteen is an Irish shilling, which, prior to 1825, was worth 13 pence, and many years after that date, although reduced to the English standard, went by the name of

“thirteens.” When Members of Parliament were chaired after their election, it was by no means unusual to carry a bag or two of “thirteens,” and scatter the money amongst the crowd.

Thirteenpence—halfpenny

A hangman. So called because thirteenpence—halfpenny was at one time his wages for hanging a man. (See Hangman. )

Thirty

A man at thirty must be either a fool or a physician. (Tiberius.)

Thirty Tyrants

The thirty magistrates appointed by Sparta over Athens, at the termination of the Peloponnesian war. This “reign of terror,” after one year's continuance, was overthrown by Thrasybulos (B.C. 403).

The Thirty Tyrants of the Roman empire. So those military usurpers are called who endeavoured, in the reigns of Valerian and Gallienus (253—268), to make themselves independent princes. The number thirty must be taken with great latitude, as only nineteen are given, and their resemblance to the thirty tyrants of Athens is extremely fanciful. They were—

In the East. Illyricum.

(1) Cyriades. (11) Ingenuus.

(2) Macrianus. (12) Regillianus.

(3) Balista. (13) Aureolus.

(4) Odenathus. Promiscuous.

(5) Zenobia.

(14) Saturninus in

Pontus.

In the West.

(6) Posthumus.

(15)Trebellianus in

Isauria.

(7) Lollianus. (16) Piso in Thessaly.

(8) Victorinus and his mother Victoria. (17) Valens in

Achaia.

(9) Marius.

(18) AEmilianus in

Egypt.

(10) Tetricus. (19) Celsus in Africa.

Thirty Years' War A series of wars between the Catholics and Protestants of Germany in the seventeenth century. It began in Bohemia in 1618, and ended in 1648 with the “peace of Westphalia.”

Thisbe

A Babylonish maiden beloved by Piramus. They lived in contiguous houses, and as their parents would not let them marry, they contrived to converse together through a hole in the garden wall. On one occasion they agreed to meet at Ninus' tomb, and Thisbe, who was first at the spot, hearing a lion roar, ran away in a fright, dropping her garment on the way. The lion seized the garment and tore it. When Piramus arrived and saw the garment, he concluded that a lion had eaten Thisbe, and he stabbed himself. Thisbe returning to the tomb, saw Piramus dead, and killed herself also. This story is travestied in the Midsummer Night's Dream, by Shakespeare.

Thistle

(The). The species called Silybum Marianum, we are told, owes the white markings on its leaves to the milk of the Virgin Mary, some of which fell thereon and left a white mark behind. (See Christian Traditions. )

Thistles are said to be a cure for stitch in the side, especially the species called “Our Lady's Thistle.” According to the Doctrine of Signatures, Nature has labelled every plant, and the prickles of the thistle tell us the plant is efficacious for prickles or stitches in the side. (See Turmeric.)

Thistle Beds

Withoos, a Dutch artist, is famous for his homely pictures where thistle—beds abound.

Thistle of Scotland

The Danes thought it cowardly to attack an enemy by night, but on one occasion deviated from their rule. On they crept, barefooted, noiselessly, and unobserved, when one of the men set his foot on a thistle, which made him cry out. The alarm was given, the Scotch fell upon the night—party, and defeated them with terrible slaughter. Ever since the thistle has been adopted as the insignia of Scotland, with the motto “Nemo me impune lacessit. ” This tradition reminds us of Brennus and the geese (See also Stars And Stripes. )

Thistle. The device of the Scotch monarchs was adopted by Queen Anne, hence the riddle in Pope's pastoral proposed by Daphnis to Strephon:

“Tell me, in what more happy fields

The thistle springs, to which the lily yields”

Pope: Spring

In the reign of Anne the Duke of Marlborough made the “lily” of France yield to the thistle of Queen Anne. The lines are a parody of Virgil's Eclogue, iii. 104—108.

Thomas

(St.). Patron saint of architects. The tradition is that Gondoforus, king of the Indies, gave him a large sum of money to build a palace. St. Thomas spent it on the poor, “thus erecting a superb palace in heaven.”

The symbol of St. Thomas is a builder's square, because he was the patron of masons and architects. Christians of St. Thomas. In the southern parts of Malabar there were some 200,000 persons who called themselves “Christians of St. Thomas” when Gama discovered India. They had been 1,300 years under the jurisdiction of the patriarch of Babylon, who appointed their materene (archbishop). When Gama arrived the head of the Malabar Christians was Jacob, who styled himself “Metropolitan of India and China.” In 1625 a stone was found near Siganfu with a cross on it, and containing a list of the materenes of India and China.

Sir Thomas. The dogmatical prating squire in Crabbe's Borough (letter x.).

Thomas—a—Kempis

Thomas Hammerlein of Kempen, an Augustinian, in the diocese of Cologne. (1380—1471.)

Thomas the Rhymer

Thomas Learmont, of Ercildoune, a Scotchman, in the reign of Alexander III., and contemporary with Wallace. He is also called Thomas of Ercildoune. Sir Walter Scott calls him the “Merlin of Scotland.” He was magician, prophet, and poet, and is to return again to earth at some future time when

Shrove Tuesday and Good Friday change places.

Care must be taken not to confound “Thomas the Rhymer” with Thomas Rymer, the historiographer and compiler of the Foedera.

Thomasing

In some rural districts the custom still prevails of “Thomasing”— that is, of collecting small sums of money or obtaining drink from the employers of labour on the 21st of December— “St. Thomas's Day.” December 21st is still noted in London as that day when every one of the Common Council has to be either elected or re—elected, and the electors are wholly without restriction except as to age and sex. The aldermen and their officers are not elected on St. Thomas's Day.

Thomists

Followers of Thomas Aquinas, who denied the doctrine of the immaculate conception maintained by Duns Scotus.

“Scotists and Thomists now in peace remain.” Pope: Essay on Criticism, 444.

Thomson

(James), author of The Seasons and Castle of Indolence, in 1729 brought out the tragedy of Sophonisba, in which occurs the silly line: “O Sophonisba, Sophonisba, O!” which a wag in the pit parodied into “O Jemmy Thomson, Jemmy Thomson, O!” (1700—1748.)

Thone

(1 syl.) or Thonis. Governor of a province of Egypt. His wife was Polydamnia. It is said by

post—Homeric poets that Paris took Helen to this province, and that Polydamnia gave her a drug named nepenthes to make her forget her sorrows, and fill her with joy.

“Not that nepenthes which the wife of Thone

In Egypt gave to love—lorn Helena

Is of such power to stir up joy as this. Milton: Comus, 695—697.

Thopas

(Sir). Native of Poperyng in Flanders; a capital sportsman, archer, wrestler, and runner. He resolved to marry no one but an “elf queen,” and set out for fairy—land. On his way he met the three—headed giant Olifaunt, who challenged him to single combat. Sir Thopas got permission to go back for his armour, and promised to meet him next day. Here mine host interrupts the narrative as “intolerable nonsense,” and the “rime” is left unfinished.

“An elf queen wo! I have, I wis,

For in this world no woman is

Worthy to be my mate.” Chaucer: Rime of Sir Thopas.

Thor

Son of Odin, and god of war.

His attendant was THIALFI, the swift runner. His belt was MEGINGJARDIR or MEGINJARD, which doubled his strength whenever he put it on. His goats were CRACK, GRIND, CRASH, and CHASE.

His hammer or mace was MJOLNIR.

His palace was BILSKIRNIR (Bright Space), where he received the warriors who had fallen in battle. His realm was THRUDVANG.

His wife was SIF (Love).

He is addressed as Asa Thor or Ring Thor (Winged Thor, i.e. Lightning). (Scandinavian mythology.) The word enters into many names of places, etc., as Thorsby in Cumberland, Thunderhill in Surrey, Thurso in Caithness, Toishorwald (i.e. “Hill of Thorin—the—wood") in Dumfriesshire, Thursday, etc.

Thorn

The Conference of Thorn met October, 1645, at Thorn, in Prussia, to remove the difficulties which separate Christians into sects. It was convoked by Ladislas IV. of Poland, but no good result followed the

conference.

Thorn in the Flesh

(A). Something to mortify; a skeleton in the cupboard. The allusion is to a custom `common amongst the ancient Pharisees, one class of which used to insert thorns in the borders of their gaberdines to prick their legs in walking and make them bleed. (See Pharisees .)

Thorns

Calvin (Admonitio de Reliquiis) gives a long list of places claiming to possess one or more of the thorns which composed the Saviour's crown. To his list may be added Glastonbury Abbey, where was also the spear of Longius or Longinus, and some of the Virgin's milk.

The thorns of Dauphiné will never prick unless they prick the first day. This proverb is applied to natural talent. If talent does not show itself early, it will never do so— the truth of which application is very doubtful indeed.

“Si l'espine non picque quand nai,

A pene que picque jamai.”

Proverb in Dauphine.

Thorps—men

Villagers. This very pretty Anglo—Saxon word is worth restoring. (Thorpe, Anglo—Saxon, a village.)

Thoth

The Hermes of Egyptian mythology. He is represented with the head of an ibis on a human body. He is the inventor of the arts and sciences, music and astronomy, speech and letters. The name means “Logos” or “the Word.”

Though Lost to Sight, to Memory Dear

A writer in Harper's Magazine tells us that the author of this line was Ruthven Jenkyns, and that the poem, which consists of two stanzas each of eight lines, begins each stanza with “Sweetheart, good—bye,” and ends with the line, “Though lost to sight, to memory dear.” The poem was published in the Greenwich Magazine for Marines in 1701 or 1702.

Thousand

Everyone knows that a dozen may be either twelve or thirteen, a score either twenty or twenty—one, a hundred either one hundred or one hundred and twenty, and a thousand either one thousand or one thousand two hundred. The higher numbers are the old Teutonic computations. Hickes tells us that the Norwegians and Icelandic people have two sorts of decad, the lesser and the greater called “Tolfræd.” The lesser thousand = 10 x 100, but the greater thousand = 12 x 100. The word tolf, equal to tolv, is our twelve.

(Institutiones Grammaticæ, p. 43.)

“Five score of men, money, or pins,

Six score of all other things.” Old Saw.

Thousand Years as One Day

(A). (1 Peter iii. 8.) Precisely the same is said of Brahma. “A day of Brahma is as a thousand revolutions of the Yoogs, and his might extendeth also to a thousand more.” (Kreeshna: Bhagavat Geeta.)

Thrall

A slave; bondage; wittily derived from drill, in allusion to the custom of drilling the ear of a slave in token of servitude, a custom common to the Jews. (Deut. xv. 17.) Our Saxon forefathers used to pierce at the

church—door the ears of their bond—slaves. (Anglo—Saxon, thrael, slave or bondman.)

Thread

The thread of destiny— i.e. that on which destiny depends. The Greeks and Romans imagined that a grave maiden called Clotho spun from her distaff the destiny of man, and as she spun one of her sisters worked out the events which were in store, and Atropos cut the thread at the point when death was to occur.

A St. Thomas's thread. The tale is that St. Thomas planted Christianity in China, and then returned to Malabar. Here he saw a huge beam of timber floating on the sea near the coast, and the king endeavouring, by the force of men and elephants, to haul it ashore, but it would not stir. St. Thomas desired leave to build a church with it, and, his request being granted, he dragged it easily ashore with a piece of packthread. (Faria y Sousa.)

Chief of the Triple Thread. Chief Brahmin. Osorius tells us that the Brahmins wore a symbolical Tessera of three threads, reaching from the right shoulder to the left. Faria says that the religion of the Brahmins proceeded from fishermen, who left the charge of the temples to their successors on the condition of their wearing some threads of their nets in remembrance of their vocation; but Osorius maintains that the triple thread symbolises the Trinity.

“Terna fila ab humero dextero in latus sinistrum gerunt, ut designent trinam in natura divina rationem.”

Threadneedle Street

A corruption of Thryddanen or Thryddenal Street, meaning third street from

“Chepesyde” to the great thoroughfare from London Bridge to “Bushop Gate” (consisting of New Fyshe Streate, Gracious Streate, and Bushop Gate Streate). (Anglo—Saxon, thrydda or thrydde, third.)

Another etymology is Thrig—needle (three—needle street), from the three needles which the Needlemaker's Company bore in their arms. It begins from the Mansion House, and therefore the Bank stands in it.

The Old Lady in Threadneedle S