Dutch Auction. An "auction " in which the bidders decrease their bids till they come to the minimum price. Dutch gold is no gold at all; Dutch courage is no real courage; Dutch concert is no music at all, but mere hubbub; and Dutch auction is no auction, or increase of bids but quite the contrary.

Dutch Comfort. 'Tis a comfort it was no worse. The comfort derivable from the consideration that how bad soever the evil which has befallen you, a worse evil is at least conceivable.

Dutch Concert. A great noise and uproar, like that made by a party of Dutchmen in sundry stages of intoxication, some singing, others quarreling, speechifying, wrangling, and so on.

Dutch Courage. The courage excited by drink; pot valor.

Dutch Republic, Rise of the. See under

Duval, Claude. A highwayman, famed in legend and ballad. He was hanged at Tyburn in 1670 and provided with an epitaph beginning:

"Here lies Du Vall: Reader, if male thou art Look to thy purse, if female, to thy heart. Duval, Madame. In Fanny Burney's novel Evelina (q.v.), the heroine's vulgar old grandmother.

Duvarney, Alixe. The heroine of Gilbert Parker's Seats of the Mighty (q.v.). Dwarf. Dwarfs have figured in the legends and mythology of nearly every race, and Pliny gives particulars of whole races of them, possibly following travelers' reports of African pigmies. Among the Teutonic and Scandinavian peoples dwarfs held an important place in mythology. They generally dwelt in rocks, caves, and recesses of the earth, were the guardians of its mineral wealth and precious stones, and were very skilful in the working of these. They had their own king, as a rule were not inimical to man, but could, on occasion, be intensely vindictive and mischievous. They play an important rôle in the Nibelungen Ring (q.v.).

In England diminutive persons dwarfs were popular down to the 18th century as court favorites or household pets; and in later times they have frequently been exhibited as curiosities at circuses, etc.

The Black Dwarf. A gnome of the most malignant character, once held by the dalesmen of the border as the author of all the mischief that befell their flocks and herds. Scott has a novel so called (1816), in which the name is given to Sir Edward Mauley, alias Elshander, the recluse, Cannie Elshie, and the Wise Wight of Mucklestane Moor.

See also Alberich, Tom Thumb. Dwight, Timothy. American poet of the Revolutionary period, known for his Conquest of Canaan (q.v.).

Dymphna, St. See under Saint.

Dynasts, The. A dramatic poem of epic scope by Thomas Hardy (published 1903-1908) dealing with the Napoleonic Wars.

Dysmas. See Dismas.

E.G., e.g. (Lat. exempli gra'tia). By way of example; for instance.

E Pluribus Unum (Lat.). One unity composed of many parts. The motto of the United States of America; taken from Moretum (line 103), a Latin poem attributed to Virgil.

Eagle. Thy youth is renewed like the eagle's (Ps. ciii. 5). This refers to the ancient superstition that every ten years the eagle soars into the "fiery region," and plunges thence into the sea, where, moulting its feathers, it acquires new life. Cp. Phanix.

She saw where he upstarted brave
Out of the well

As eagle fresh out of the ocean wave,

Where he hath lefte his plumes all hory gray,
And decks himself with fethers youthly gay.
Spenser: Faerie Queene, I, xi. 34.

The American Eagle. A widely used national symbol. See Spread Eagle.

The Golden Eagle and the Spread Eagle are commemorative of the crusades; they were the devices of the emperors of the East, and formerly figured as the ensigns of the ancient kings of Babylon and Persia, of the Ptolemies and Seleu'cides. The Romans adopted the eagle in conjunction with other devices, but Ma'rius made it the ensign of the legion, and confined the other devices to the cohorts. The French under the Empire assumed the same device.

In Christian art, the eagle is emblematic of St. John the Evangelist, because, like that bird, he looked on "the sun of glory."

St. Augustine, St. Gregory the Great, and St. Prisca are also often shown with an eagle. In heraldry, it signifies fortitude.

The Eagle. Gaudenzio Ferrari (1481– 1549), the Milanese painter.

The Eagle of the doctors of France. Pierre d'Ailly (1350-1420), French cardinal and astrologer, who calculated the horoscope of our Lord, and maintained that the stars foretold the deluge.

The Eagle of Brittany. Bertrand Duguesclin (1320-1380), Constable of France.

The Eagle of Divines. St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274).

The Eagle of Meaux. Jacques Bénigne Bossuet (1627-1704), Bishop of Meaux, the grandest and most sublime of the pulpit orators of France.

The Eagle of the North. Count Axel

E

Oxenstierna (1583-1654), the Swedish statesman, was so called.

The two-headed eagle. The German eagle has its head turned to our left hand, and the Roman eagle to our right hand. When Charlemagne was made Kaiser of the Holy Roman Empire," he joined. the two heads together, one looking east and the other west; consequently, the late Austrian Empire, as the direct successor of the Holy Roman Empire, included the Double-headed Eagle in its coat of arms.

In Russia it was Ivan Vasilievitch who first assumed the two-headed eagle, when, in 1472, he married Sophia, daughter of Thomas Palæologus, and niece of Constantine XIV, the last Emperor of Byzantium. The two heads symbolize the Eastern or Byzantine Empire and the Western or Roman Empire.

Earnshaw, Catherine. The heroine of Emily Bronté's Wuthering Heights (q.v.). Ears to Ears Bible. See Bible, Specially named.

Earthly Paradise, The. In medieval times it was a popular belief that paradise, a landor island where everything was beautiful and restful, and where death and decay were unknown, still existed somewhere on earth and was to be found for the searching. It was usually located far away to the east; Cosmas (7th century) placed it beyond the ocean east of China, in 9th century maps it is shown in China itself, and the fictitious letter of Prester John to the Emperor Emmanuel Comnenus states that it was within three days' journey of his own territory a fact" that is corroborated by Mandeville. The Hereford map (13th century) shows it as a circular island near India, from which it is separated not only by the sea, but also by a battlemented wall. Cp. Brandan, St.

66

The Prologue to William Morris' collection of narrative poems with this title (1868-1871) tells how a party of adventurers left a Scandinavian port during a pestilence to search for the Earthly Paradise. After many misadventures

the remnant of the band discovered it, were hospitably received, and regaled their hosts each month with versified renderings of old world stories from classical and Scandinavian legend.

Easiest Way, The. A drama by Eugene Walter (Am. 1908). The heroine, Laura

East. The Far East. China, Japan and neighboring sections of the Orient.

The Middle East. A term used somewhat loosely to designate the region between the Near and Far East.

The Near East. The countries that were comprised in the Turkish empire before the World War.

Down East. In New England.

'Way Down East. Name of a popular American play of rural life.

East and West Poems. A volume by Bret Harte (Am. 1871). See Pike.

East Lynne. A novel by Mrs. Henry Wood (1861) (1861) which was immensely popular, particularly in a dramatic version. Its heroine, Lady Isabel Vane, after running off with another man, returns to her remarried husband, completely disguised as a nurse hired to care for her own children, and successfully keeps up the pretence over a considerable period of time. In the end she and her husband are reconciled.

East Side, The. The slums; the Eastside tenement districts of New York City, inhabited almost entirely by foreigners.

Easter. The name was adopted for the Christian Paschal festival from A.S. eastre, a heathen festival held at the vernal equinox in honor of the Teutonic goddess of dawn, called by Bede Eostre (cognate with Lat. aurora and Sanskrit ushas, dawn). On the introduction of Christianity it was natural for the name of the heathen festival to be transferred to the Christian, the two falling about the same time.

Easter Sunday is the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon, i.e. the full moon that occurs on the day of the vernal equinox (March 21st) or on any of the next 28 days. Consequently, Easter Sunday cannot be earlier than March 22nd, or later than April 25th. This was fixed by the Council of Nice, A. D. 325.

It was formerly a common belief that the sun danced on Easter Day.

But oh, she dances such a way,

No sun upon an Easter day

Is half so fine a sight.

Sir John Suckling: Ballad upon a Wedding.

Eatanswill Gazette. A journal of some importance in Dickens' Pickwick Papers (q.v.), the persistent opponent of the Eatanswill Independent.

Eben Holden. A novel by Irving Bacheller (Am. 1900). The chief interest of the book lies in the character and quaint sayings of Eben Holden, the sturdy and loyal" hired man." There is a love affair in which the orphaned William and Hope Brower, the daughter of the kindly couple who have given Eben Holden and William a home, are the principals.

Eb'lis. A jinn of Arabian mythology, the ruler of the evil genii, or fallen angels. Before his fall he was called Azaz'el (q.v.) When Adam was created, God commanded all the angels to worship him; but Eblis replied, "Me thou hast created of smokeless fire, and shall I reverence a creature made of dust? God was very angry at this insolent answer, and turned the disobedient angel into a Sheytân (devil), and he became the father of devils.

Another Mohammedan tradition has it that before life was breathed into Adam all the angels came to look at the shape of clay, among them Eblis, who, knowing that God intended man to be his superior, vowed never to acknowledge him as such and kicked the figure till it rang.

When he said unto the angels, "Worship Adam," all worshipped him except Eblis. Koran, ii.

Eblis had five sons, viz. (1) Tir, author of fatal accidents; (2) Awar, the demon of lubricity; (3) Dasim, author of discord; (4) Sut, father of lies; and (5) Zalambur, author of mercantile dishonesty.

Ecce

Ecce homo (Lat., Behold the man). The name given to many paintings of our Lord crowned with thorns and bound with ropes, as He was shown to the people by Pilate, who said to them, homo!" (John xix. 5), especially those by Correggio, Titian, Guido, Van Dyck, Rembrandt, Poussin, and Albert Durer. In 1865 Sir John Seeley published a survey of the life and work of Christ with the title Ecce Homo.

Eccles, Robert. A character in Meredith's Rhoda Fleming, weak and dissipated but likable.

Ecclesias'tes. One of the books in the Old Testament, formerly ascribed to Solomon, because it says (verse 1), "The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem," but now generally assigned to an unnamed author of the 3rd century B. C. The Hebrew name is Koheleth, which means "the Preacher."

The refrain of the book is " Vanity of vanities, all is vanity."

Ecclesias'ticus. One of the books of the Old Testament Apocrypha, traditionally (and probably correctly) ascribed to a Palestinian sage named Ben Sirah, or Jesus, the Son of Sirach.

Echegaray, José (1833-1916). Spanish dramatist. His best-known play is The Great Galeoto (q.v.). Echegaray was a recipient of the Nobel prize.

Echidna. A monster of classical mythology, half woman, half serpent. She was mother of the Chimæra, the manyheaded dog Orthos, the hundred-headed dragon of the Hesperides, the Col'chian dragon, the Sphinx, Cer'berus, Scylla, the Gorgons, the Lernæan hydra, the vulture that gnawed away the liver of Prome'theus, and the Nem'ean lion.

Spenser makes her the mother of the Blatant Beast (q.v.).

Echidna is a Monster direfull dred,

Whom Gods doe hate, and heavens abhor to see; So hideous is her shape, so huge her hed,

That even the hellish fiends affrighted boe At sight thereof, and from her presence flee: Yet did her face and former parts professe A faire young Mayden full of comely glee; But all her hinder parts did plaine expresse A monstrous Dragon, full of fearfull uglinesse. Faerie Queene, VI, vi. 10.

Echo. The Romans say that Echo was a nymph in love with Narcissus, (q.v.), but because her love was not returned, she pined away till only her voice remained.

Sweet Echo, sweetest nymph, that liv'st unseen
Within thy airy shell,

By slow Meander's margent green.
Canst thou not tell me of a gentle pair
That likest thy Narcissus are?

Milton: Comus, 230.

Eclec'tics. The name given to those who do not attach themselves to any special school (especially philosophers and painters), but pick and choose from various systems, selecting and harmonizing those doctrines, methods, etc., which suit them (Gr. ek-legein, to choose, select).

École des Femmes, L'. (The School for Wives). A comedy by Molière. For the plot, see Agnes.

Ecstatic Doctor. See under Doctor.

Ector, Sir. In Arthurian romance, the foster-father of King Arthur, and father

of Sir Kay. Tennyson gives this rôle to Sir Anton instead.

The child was delivered unto Merlin, and he bare it forth unto Sir Ector, and made a holy man to christen him, and named him Arthur; and so Sir Ector's wife nourished him with her own pap. Malory: Le Morte d'Arthur, I, iii.

Edda. This name

-

which may be

from Edda, the great-grandmother in the Old Norse poem Rigsthul, or from the old Norse odhr, poetry is given to two separate works or collections, viz. The Elder or Poetic Edda, and The Younger Edda, or Prose Edda of Snorri. The firstnamed was discovered in 1643 by an Icelandic bishop, and consists of mythological poems dating from the 9th century and supposed to have been collected in the 13th century. They are of unknown authorship, but were erroneously attributed to Sæmund Sigfusson (d. 1133), and this has hence sometimes been called Sæmund's Edda. The Younger Edda is a work in prose and verse by Snorri Sturluson (d. 1242), and forms a guide to poets and poetry. It consists of the Gylfaginning (an epitome of Scandinavian mythology), the Bragaraeour or sayings of Bragi, the Skaldskaparmal (a glossary of poetical expressions, etc.), the Hattatal (a list of meters, with examples of all known forms of verse), with a preface, history of the origin of poetry, lists of poets, etc.

Eden. Paradise, the country and garden in which Adam and Eve were placed by God (Gen. ii. 15). The word means delight, pleasure. It is often used to describe a place of charming scenery. In Dickens' Martin Chuzzlewit Eden was a dismal swamp somewhere in the United States, the climate of which generally proved fatal to the poor dupes who were induced to settle there through the swindling transactions of General Scadder and General Choke. So dismal and dangerous was the place, that even Mark Tapley was satisfied to have found at last a place where he could come out jolly with credit."

Edgar. The hero of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (q.v.), the master of Ravenswood, son of Allan of Ravenswood, a shabby Scotch nobleman. The story

also forms the substance of Donizetti's opera, Lucia di Lammermoor. In the novel Edgar perishes in the quicksands. at Kelpies Flow, but in the opera he stabs himself.

Edgar Huntley. A once-famous detective story by Charles Brockden Brown (Am. 1801).

Edgeworth, Maria (1767-1849). English

novelist, author of Castle Rackrent (q.v.). Edmund. In Shakespeare's King Lear (q.v.), the natural son of the Earl of Gloucester. Both Goneril and Regan, daughters of King Lear, were in love with him. Regan, on the death of her husband, designed to marry Edmund, but Goneril, out of jealousy, poisoned her.

Edmund Bertram. In Jane Austen's Mansfield Park (q.v.).

Edricson, Alleyne. Hero of A. Conan Doyle's White Company (q.v.).

Ed'yrn. Son of Nudd; called the "Sparrowhawk," in Tennyson's Marriage of Geraint (Idylls of the King), which was founded on the story of Geraint, Son of Erbin, in Lady Charlotte Guest's translation of the Mabinogion. He ousted Yn'iol from his earldom, and tried to win E'nid, the earl's daughter, but was overthrown by Geraint and sent to the court of King Arthur, where his whole nature was completely changed, and "subdued to that gentleness which, when it weds with manhood, makes a man."

Edward II. King of England (12841327). Christopher Marlowe's historical drama of this title (1594) is generally considered his masterpiece.

Edward IV. King of England (14421483). He is introduced into Shakespeare's historical dramas, 2 and 3 Henry VI and Richard III and appears in Scott's Anne of Geierstein.

Edward VI. King of England (15371553). As Prince of Wales he is the "prince" in Mark Twain's burlesque, The Prince and the Pauper (q.v.).

Edwin and Angeli'na. The hero and heroine of a famous ballad by Oliver Goldsmith (1767), called The Hermit. Angelina was the daughter of a wealthy lord "beside the Tyne." Her hand was sought in marriage by many suitors, amongst whom was Edwin, "who had neither wealth nor power, but he had both wisdom and worth." Angelina loved him, but "trifled with him," and Edwin, in despair, left her, and retired from the world. One day, Angelina, in boy's clothes, asked hospitality at a hermit's cell; she was kindly entertained, told her tale, and the hermit proved to be Edwin. From that hour they never parted

Two familiar lines are from this ballad:
Man wants but little here below,
Nor wants that little long.

Effen'di. A Turkish title, about equal to the English "Mr." or Esq." but always following the name. It is given to emirs, men of learning, the high priests of mosques, etc.

Ege'ria. In Roman legend, the nymph who instructed Numa in his wise legislation; hence, a counsellor, adviser.

Ege'us. Father of Her'mia in Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream (q.v.). Eggleston, Edward (1837-1902). American novelist, author of The Hoosier Schoolmaster (q.v.).

Egil. Brother of Wieland or Volund the Vulcan of Northern mythology. Egil was a great archer, and in the Saga of Thidrik there is a tale told of him the exact counterpart of the famous story about William Tell and the apple. See Tell.

Eg'lamour. In Shakespeare's Two Gentlemen of Verona, the person who aids Silvia, daughter of the Duke of Milan, in her escape.

Eglantine, Madame. The name of the Prioress (q.v.) in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

Egmont. A historical tragedy by Goethe (Ger. 1788). The hero is the Count of Egmont (1522-1568), a Flemish general and patriot who was executed for his opposition to Philip II. Goethe has departed from history by making him fall in love with the beautiful but lowborn Clärchen.

Egoist, The. A novel by George Meredith (Eng. 1879). The Willoughby Patterne of Patterne Hall, egoist is Sir possessed of good looks, wealth and all the virtues except humility and a sense of humor. He invites his fiancée, Clara Middleton, and her father, a clergyman who loves good food and wine, to spend a month at the Hall where he is the idol of his two old aunts. Clara, 66 a rogue in porcelain as Mrs. Mountstuart Jenkinson, the clever widow who regulates the social life of the countryside, pronounces her, is soon longing to extricate herself from the attentions of her self-centered lover. She is thankful for the diversion of Patterne's gay Irish guest, De Craye, who makes violent love to her, but gives her confidence to Vernon Whitford, Patterne's cousin and secretary, tutor to the lazy and impish young Crossjay. Patterne, who has had a sad experience previously, is in mortal dread of being jilted by Clara and to preserve his dignity proposes to his