know not where,” and was coined by Carlyle (_Sartor Resartus_, 1833).
Sir W. Scott has a similar Scotch compound, “Kennaquhair” (“I know not
where”). Cervantes has the “island of Trapoban” (_i.e._, of
“dish-clouts,” from _trapos_, the Spanish for “a dish-clout”). Sir
Thomas More has “Utopia” (Greek, _ou topos_, “no place”). We might add
the “island of Medăma” (Greek, “nowhere”), “the peninsular of
Udamogês” (Greek, “nowhere on earth”), the country of “Kennahtwhar,”
etc., and place them in the great “Nullibian” ocean (“nowhere”), in
any degree beyond 180º long. and 90º lat.
=Wel´ford=, one of the suitors of “the Scornful Lady” (no name is
given to the lady).--Beaumont and Fletcher, _The Scornful Lady_
(1616).
=Well.= Three of the most prominent Bible characters met their wives
for the first time by wells of water, viz., Isaac, Jacob, and Moses.
Eliezer met Rebekah by a well, and arranged with Bethuel for her to
become Isaac’s wife.--_Gen._ xxiv.
Jacob met Rachel by the well of Haran.--_Gen._ xxix.
When Moses fled from Egypt into the land of Midian, he “sat down by a
well,” and the seven daughters of Jethro came there to draw water, one
of whom, named Zipporah, became his wife.--_Exod._ ii. 15-21.
The Princess Nausicăa, daughter of Alcinŏos, king of the Phæacians,
was with her maidens washing the household linen on the seashore when
she first encountered Ulysses.--Homer, _Odyssey_, vi.
=Well of English Undefiled.= So Spenser calls Chaucer.
Dan Chaucer, well of English undefiled,
On Fame’s eternal bead-roll worthy to be filed.
Spenser, _Faëry Queen_, iv. 2 (1596).
=Well-Beloved= (_The_), Charles IV. of France, Le Bien-Aimé (1368,
1380-1422).
Louis XV. of France, _Le Bien-Aimé_ (1710, 1715-1774).
=Well-Founded Doctor= (_The_), Ægidius de Colonna; also called “The
Most Profound Doctor” (Doctor _Fundatissimus et Theologorum
Princeps_); sometimes surnamed “Romānus,” because he was born in the
Campagna di Roma, but more generally “Colonna,” from a town in the
Campagna (1247-1316).
=Wellborn= (_Francis_, usually called _Frank_), nephew of Sir Giles
Overreach, and son of Sir John Wellborn, who “bore the whole sway” of
Northamptonshire, kept a large estate, and was highly honored. Frank
squandered away the property, and got greatly into debt, but induced
Lady Allworth to give him her countenance out of gratitude and respect
to his father. Sir Giles fancies that the rich dowager is about to
marry his nephew, and, in order to bring about this desirable
consummation, not only pays all his debts, but supplies him liberally
with ready money. Being thus freed from debt, and having sown his wild
oats, young Wellborn reforms, and Lord Lovell gives him a
“company.”--Massinger, _A New Way to Pay Old Debts_ (1625).
=Weller= (_Samuel_), boots at the White Hart, and afterwards servant
to Mr. Pickwick, to whom he becomes devotedly attached. Rather than
leave his master when he is sent to the Fleet, Sam Weller gets his
father to arrest him for debt. His fun, his shrewdness, his
comparisons, his archness, and his cunning on behalf of his master are
unparalleled.
_Tony Weller_, father of Sam; a coachman of the old school, who drives
a coach between London and Dorking. Naturally portly in size, he
becomes far more so in his great-coat of many capes. Tony wears
top-boots, and his hat has a low crown and broad brim. On the
stage-box he is a king, elsewhere he is a mere greenhorn. He marries a
widow, landlady of the “Marquis of Granby inn,” and his constant
advice to his son is, “Sam, beware of the vidders.”--C. Dickens, _The
Pickwick Papers_ (1836).
=Wellington of Gamblers= (_The_). Lord Rivers was called in Paris _Le
Wellington des Joueurs_.
=Wellington’s Horse=, Copenhagen. It died at the age of 27.
=Wellon= (_Mr._), rector of English church at Conception Bay, and Mrs.
Barre’s (Debrée’s) firm friend. He performs the service over her
husband’s grave.--Robert Lowell, _The New Priest of Conception Bay_
(1858).
=Wemmick=, clerk of Mr. Jaggers, the lawyer. He lived at Walworth.
Wemmick was a dry man, rather short in stature, with square, wooden
face. “There were some marks in the face which might have been dimples
if the material had been softer.” His linen was frayed; he wore four
mourning rings, and a brooch representing a lady, a weeping willow and
a cinerary urn. His eyes were small and glittering; his lips small,
thin and mottled; his age was between 40 and 50 years. Mr. Wemmick
wore his hat on the back of his head, and looked straight before him,
as if nothing was worth looking at. Mr. Wemmick at home and Mr.
Wemmick in his office were two distinct beings. At home he was his
“own engineer, his own carpenter, his own plumber, his own gardener,
his own Jack-of-all-trades,” and had fortified his little wooden house
like Commodore Trunnion (_q.v._) His father lived with him, and he
called him “The Aged.” The old man was very deaf, but heated the poker
with delight to fire off the nine o’clock signal, and chuckled with
joy because he could hear the bang. The house had a “real flag-staff,”
and a plank which crossed the ditch some four feet wide and two feet
deep was the drawbridge. At nine o’clock P.M., Greenwich time, the gun
(called “The Stinger”) was fired.
The piece of ordnance was mounted in a separate fortress, constructed
of lattice-work. It was protected from the weather by an ingenious
little tarpaulin contrivance in the nature of an umbrella.--C.
Dickens, _Great Expectations_, xxv. (1860).
=Wenlock= (_Wild Wenlock_), kinsman of Sir Hugo de Lacy, constable of
Chester. His head is cut off by the insurgents.--Sir W. Scott, _The
Betrothed_ (time Henry II).
=Weno´nah=, mother of Hiawatha and daughter of Noko´mis. Nokomis was
swinging in the moon, when some of her companions, out of jealousy,
cut the ropes, and she fell to the earth “like a falling star.” That
night was born her first child, a daughter, whom she named Wenonah. In
due time, this lovely daughter was wooed and won by Mudjekee´wis (the
west wind), and became the mother of Hiawatha. The false West Wind
deserted her, and the young mother died.
Fair Nokomis bore a daughter,
And she called her name Wenonah.
Longfellow, _Hiawatha_, iii. (1855).
=Wentworth= (_Eva_), the beau-ideal of female purity. She was educated
in strict seclusion. De Courcy fell in love with her, but deceived
her; whereupon she died calmly and tranquilly, elevated by religious
hope. (See ZAIRA).--Rev. C. R. Maturin, _Women_ (a romance, 1822).
=Werburg= (_St._), born a princess. By her prayer, she drove the wild
geese from Weedon.
She falleth in her way with Weedon, where, ’tis said,
St. Werburg, princely born--a most religious maid--
From those peculiar fields, by prayer the wild geese drove.
Drayton, _Polyolbion_, xxiii. (1622).
=Were-wolf= (2 _syl._), a man-wolf, a man transformed into a wolf
temporarily or otherwise.
Oft through the forest dark,
Followed the weir-wolf’s bark.
Longfellow, _The Skeleton in Armor_.
=Werner=, the boy said to have been crucified at Bacharach, on the
Rhine, by the Jews. (See HUGH OF LINCOLN.)
The innocent boy who, some years back,
Was taken and crucified by the Jews
In that ancient town of Bacharach.
Longfellow, _The Golden Legend_ (1851).
=Werner= or =Kruitzner= (_Count of Siegendorf_), father of Ulric.
Being driven from the dominions of his father, he wandered about for
twelve years as a beggar, hunted from place to place by Count
Stral´enheim. At length, Stralenheim, travelling through Silesia, was
rescued from the Oder by Gabor (_alias_ Ulric), and was lodged in an
old tumble-down palace, where Werner had been lodging for some few
days. Here Werner robbed the count of a rouleau of gold, the next day
the count was murdered by Ulric (without the connivance or even
knowledge of Werner). When Werner succeeded to the rank and wealth of
Count Siegendorf, he became aware that his son, Ulric, was the
murderer, and denounced him. Ulric departed, and Werner said, “The
race of Siegendorf is past.”--Byron, _Werner_ (1821).
(This drama is borrowed from “Kruitzner, or The German’s Tale,” in
Miss H. Lee’s _Canterbury Tales_, 1797-1805).
=Werner.= (See TRUMPETER OF SACKINGEN.)
=Werther=, a young German student, of poetic fancy and very sensitive
disposition, who falls in love with Lotte (2 _syl._), the betrothed
and afterwards the wife of Albert. Werther becomes acquainted with
Lotte’s husband, who invites him to stay with him as a guest. In this
visit his love blazes out into a terrible passion, and after vainly
striving to fight it down, he puts an end to his misery by shooting
himself.--Goethe, _The Sorrows of Young Werther_ (1774).
⁂ Goethe represents himself, or rather one of the moods of his mind,
in the character of Werther. The catastrophe, however, is borrowed
from the fate of a schoolfellow of his named Jerusalem, who shot
himself on account of a hopeless passion for a married woman. “Albert”
and “Lotte” were sketched from his friends Albert and Charlotte
Kestner, a young couple with whom he had relations not unlike those of
Werther in the early part of the story with the fictitious characters.
=Werther of Politics.= The marquis of Londonderry is so called by Lord
Byron. Werther, the personification of maudlin sentimentality, is the
hero of Goethe’s romance entitled _The Sorrows of Young Werther_
(1774).
It is the first time since the Normans that England has been insulted
by a _minister_ who could not speak English, and that parliament
permitted itself to be dictated to in the language of Mrs.
Malaprop.... Let us hear no more of this man, and let Ireland remove
the ashes of her Grattan from the sanctuary of Westminster. Shall the
Patriot of Humanity repose by the Werther of Politics?--Byron, _Don
Juan_ (preface to canto vi., etc., 1824).
=Wessel= (_Peder_), a tailor’s apprentice, who rose to the rank of
vice-admiral of Denmark, in the reign of Christian V. He was called
Tor´denskiold (3 _syl._), corrupted into Tordenskiol (the “Thunder
Shield”), and was killed in a duel.
North Sea! a glimpse of Wessel rent
Thy murky sky ...
From Denmark thunders Tordenskiol;
Let each to heaven commend his soul,
And fly.
Longfellow, _King Christian_ [_V._].
=West Indian= (_The_), a comedy by R. Cumberland (1771). Mr. Belcour,
the adopted son of a wealthy Jamaica merchant, on the death of his
adopted father came to London, to the house of Mr. Stockwell, once the
clerk of Mr. Belcour, senior. This clerk had secretly married
Belcour’s daughter, and when her boy was born it was “laid as a
foundling at her father’s door.” Old Belcour brought the child up as
his own son, and at death “bequeathed to him his whole estate.” The
young man then came to London as the guest of Mr. Stockwell, the rich
merchant, and accidentally encountered in the street Miss Louisa
Dudley, with whom he fell in love. Louisa, with her father, Captain
Dudley, and her brother, Charles, all in the greatest poverty, were
lodging with a Mr. Fulmer, a small bookseller. Belcour gets
introduced, and, after the usual mistakes and hairbreadth escapes,
makes her his wife.
=Western= (_Squire_), a jovial, fox-hunting country gentleman,
supremely ignorant of book-learning, very prejudiced, selfish,
irascible and countrified; but shrewd, good-natured, and very fond of
his daughter, Sophia.
Philip, earl of Pembroke and Montgomery, was in character a Squire
Western, choleric, boisterous, illiterate, selfish, absurd and
cowardly.--Osborne, _Secret History_, i. 218.
Squire Western stands alone; imitated from no prototype, and in
himself an inimitable picture of ignorance, prejudice, irascibility
and rusticity, united with natural shrewdness, constitutional good
humor, and an instinctive affection for his daughter.--_Encyc. Brit._,
Art. “Fielding.”
_Sophia Western_, daughter of Squire Western. She becomes engaged to
Tom Jones, the foundling.--Fielding, _Tom Jones_ (1749).
There now are no Squire Westerns, as of old;
And our Sophias are not so emphatic,
But fair as them or fairer to behold.
Byron, _Don Juan_, xiii. 110 (1824).
=Westlock= (_John_), a quondam pupil of Mr. Pecksniff (“architect and
land surveyor”). John Westlock marries Ruth, the sister of Tom
Pinch.--C. Dickens, _Martin Chuzzlewit_ (1843).
=Westmoreland=, according to fable, is West-Mar-land. Mar or Marius,
son of Arvirăgus, was king of the British, and overthrew Rodric, the
Scythian, in the north-west of England, where he set up a stone with
an inscription of this victory, “both of which remain to this
day.”--Geoffrey, _British History_, iv. 17 (1142).
=Westward Hoe=, a comedy by Thomas Dekker (1607). The Rev. Charles
Kingsley published a novel in 1854, entitled _Westward Ho!_ or _The
Voyages and Adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh in the Reign of Queen
Elizabeth_. (See EASTWARD HOE.)
=Wetheral= (_Stephen_), surnamed “Stephen Steelheart,” in the troop of
Lord Waldemar Fitzurse (a baron following Prince John).--Sir W. Scott,
_Ivanhoe_ (time, Richard I.).
=Wetherell= (_Elizabeth_), Miss Susan Warner, authoress of _The Wide,
Wide World_ (1852), _Queechy_ (1853), etc.
=Wetzweiler= (_Tid_), or _Le Glorieux_, the court jester of Charles,
“The Bold,” duke of Burgundy.--Sir W. Scott, _Quentin Durward_ (time,
Edward IV.).
=Whachum=, journeyman to Sidrophel. He was Richard Green, who
published a pamphlet of base ribaldry, called _Hudibras in a Snare_
(1667).
A paltry wretch he had, half-starved,
That him in place of zany served,
Hight Whachum.
S. Butler, _Hudibras_, ii. 3 (1664).
=Whang=, an avaricious Chinese miller, who, by great thrift, was
pretty well off, but, one day, being told that a neighbor had found a
pot of money which he had dreamt of, began to be dissatisfied with his
slow gains, and longed for a dream also. At length the dream came. He
dreamt there was a huge pot of gold concealed under his mill, and set
to work to find it. The first omen of success was a broken mug, then a
house-tile, and at length, after much digging, he came to a stone so
large that he could not lift it. He ran to tell his luck to his wife,
and the two tugged at the stone, but, as they removed it, down fell
the mill in utter ruins.--Goldsmith, _A Citizen of the World_, lxx.
(1759).
=Wharton= (_Eliza_), heroine of one of the first novels published in
the United States, under the title of _The Coquette_, or _The History
of Eliza Wharton_, by Hannah Webster Foster (1797).
=Whartons= (_The_). _Henry Wharton_, young royalist captain, arrested
as a spy while visiting his father’s house, which is within the
American lines. He is assisted to escape by Harvey Birch.
_Sarah Wharton_, the elder daughter, has royalist proclivities;
_Frances_ is loyal to the colonial cause, and betrothed to Major
Dunwoodie.
_Mr. Wharton_ (_père_), fine specimen of the old English
gentleman.--James Fenimore Cooper, _The Spy_ (1821).
=What Next?= A farce by T. Dibdin. Colonel Clifford meets at Brighton
two cousins, Sophia and Clarissa Touchwood, and falls in love with the
latter, who is the sister of Major Touchwood, but thinks her Christian
name is Sophia, and so is accepted by Sophia’s father, who is Colonel
Touchwood. Now, it so happens that Major Touchwood is in love with his
cousin, Sophia, and looks on Colonel Clifford as his rival. The major
tries to outwit his supposed rival, but finds they are both in error,
that it is Clarissa whom the colonel wishes to marry, and that Sophia
is quite free to follow the bent of her own and the major’s choice.
=Wheel of Fortune= (_The_), a comedy by R. Cumberland (1779).
⁂ For the plot and tale, see PENRUDDOCK.
=Whetstone Cut by a Razor.= Accius Navius, the augur, cut a whetstone
with a razor in the presence of Tarquin, the elder.
In short, ’twas his fate, unemployed or in place, sir,
To eat mutton cold, and cut blocks with a razor.
Goldsmith, _Retaliation_ (“Burke” is referred to, 1774).
=Whims= (_Queen_), the monarch of Whimdom, or country of whims,
fancies, and literary speculations. Her subjects were alchemists,
astrologers, fortune-tellers, rhymers, projectors, schoolmen, and so
forth. The best way of reaching this empire is “to trust to the
whirlwind and the current.” When Pantagruel’s ship ran aground, it was
towed off by 7,000,000 drums quite easily. These drums are the vain
imaginings of whimsyists. Whenever a person is perplexed at any knotty
point of science or doctrine, some drum will serve for a nostrum to
pull him through.--Rabelais, _Pantagruel_, v. 18, etc. (1545).
=Whim´sey=, a whimsical, kind-hearted old man, father to Charlotte and
“young” Whimsey.
As suspicious of everybody above him, as if he had been bred a rogue
himself.--Act i. 1.
_Charlotte Whimsey_, the pretty daughter of old Whimsey; in love with
Monford.--James Cobb, _The First Floor_.
=Whip with Six Lashes=, the “Six Articles” of Henry VIII. (1539).
=Whipping Boy.= A boy kept to be whipped when a prince deserved
chastisement.
BARNABY FITZPATRICK stood for Edward VI.
D’OSSAT and DUPERRON, afterwards cardinals, were whipped by Clement
VIII. for Henry IV. of France.--Fuller, _Church History_, ii. 342
(1655).
MUNGO MURRAY stood for Charles I.
RAPHAEL was flogged for the son of the marquis de Leganez, but, not
seeing the justice of this arrangement, he ran away.--Lesage, _Gil
Blas_, v. 1 (1724).
=Whisker=, the pony of Mr. Garland, Abel Cottage, Finchley.
/# There approached towards him a little, clattering, jingling,
four-wheeled chaise, drawn by a little obstinate-looking, rough-coated
pony, and driven by a little, fat, placid-faced old gentleman. Beside
the little old gentleman sat a little old lady, plump and placid like
himself, and the pony was coming along at his own pace, and doing
exactly as he pleased with the whole concern. If the old gentleman
remonstrated by shaking the reins, the pony replied by shaking his
head. It was plain that the utmost the pony would consent to do was to
go in his own way ... after his own fashion, or not at all.--C.
Dickens, _The Old Curiosity Shop_, xiv. (1840).
=Whiskerandos= (_Don Fero´lo_), the sentimental lover of
Tilburina.--Sheridan, _The Critic_, ii. 1 (1779).
=Whist= (_Father of the game of_), Edmond Hoyle (1672-1769).
=Whistle= (_The_). In the train of Anne of Denmark, when she went to
Scotland with James VI., was a gigantic Dane of matchless drinking
capacity. He had an ebony whistle, which, at the beginning of a
drinking bout, he would lay on the table, and whoever was last able to
blow it, was to be considered the “Champion of the Whistle.” In
Scotland the Dane was defeated by Sir Robert Laurie, of Maxwelton,
who, after three days’ and three nights’ hard drinking, left the Dane
under the table, and “blew on the whistle his requiem shrill.” The
whistle remained in the family several years, when it was won by Sir
Walter Laurie, son of Sir Robert; and then by Walter Riddel, of
Glenriddel, brother-in-law of Sir Walter Laurie. The last person who
carried it off was Alexander Ferguson of Craigdarroch, son of “Annie
Laurie” so well known.
⁂ Burns has a ballad on the subject, called _The Whistle_.
_Whistle._ The blackbird, says Drayton, is the only bird that
whistles.
Upon his dulcet pipe the merle doth only play.
_Polyolbion_, xiii. (1613).
=Whistler= (_The_), a young thief, natural son of Sir G. Staunton,
whom he shot after his marriage with Effie Deans.--Sir W. Scott,
_Heart of Midlothian_ (time, George II.).
=Whistling.= Mr. Townley, of Hull, says, in _Notes and Queries_,
August 2, 1879, that a Roman Catholic checked his wife, who was
whistling for a dog: “If you please, ma’am, don’t whistle. Every time
a woman whistles, the heart of the blessed Virgin bleeds.”
Une poule qui chante, le coq et une fille qui siffle, portent malheur
dans la maison.
La poule ne doit point chanter devant le coq.
A whistling woman and a crowing hen
Are neither good for God or men.
=Whitaker= (_Richard_), the old steward of Sir Geoffrey Peveril.--Sir
W. Scott, _Peveril of the Peak_ (time, Charles II.).
=Whitchurch=, in Middlesex (or Little Stanmore), is the parish, and
William Powell was the blacksmith, made celebrated by Händel’s
_Harmonious Blacksmith_. Powell died in 1780.
=White Cat= (_The_). A certain queen, desirous of obtaining some fairy
fruit, was told she might gather as much as she would if she would
give to them the child about to be born. The queen agreed, and the
new-born child was carried to the fairies. When of marriageable age,
the fairies wanted her to marry Migonnet, a fairy-dwarf, and, as she
refused to do so, changed her into a white cat. Now comes the second
part. An old king had three sons, and promised to resign the kingdom
to that son who brought him the smallest dog. The youngest son
wandered to a palace, where he saw a white cat endowed with human
speech, who gave him a dog so tiny that the prince carried it in an
acorn shell. The father then said he would resign his crown to that
son who brought him home a web, 400 yards long, which would pass
through the eye of a needle. The White Cat gave the prince a web 400
yards long packed in the shale of a millet grain. The king then told
his sons he would resign his throne to that son who brought home the
handsomest bride. The White Cat told the prince to cut off its head
and tail. On doing so, the creature resumed her human form, and was
acknowledged to be the most beautiful woman on earth.
Her eyes committed theft upon all hearts, and her sweetness kept them
captive. Her shape was majestic, her air noble and modest, her wit
flowing, her manners engaging. In a word, she was beyond everything
that was lovely.--Comtesse D’Aunoy, _Fairy Tales_ (“The White Cat,”
1682).
=White Clergy= (_The_), the parish priests, in contradistinction to
_The Black Clergy_ or monks, in Russia.
=White Cross Knights=, the Knights Hospitallers. The Knights Templar
wore a _red_ cross.
The White Cross Knights of the adjacent isle.
Robert Browning, _The Return of the Druses_, i.
=White Devil of Wallachia.= George Castriota, known as “Scanderbeg,”
was called by the Turks “The White Devil of Wallachia” (1404-1467).
=White Elephant= (_King of the_) a title of the kings of Ava and Siam.
=White Friars= (_The_), the Carmelites, who dress in white.
⁂ There is a novel by Miss Robinson called _White Friars_.
=White Heron.= Maurice Thompson thus describes the shooting of a white
heron:
“Like twenty serpents bound together,
Hissed the flying arrow’s feather.
A thud, a puff, a feathery ring,
A quick collapse, a quivering--
A whirl, a headlong downward dash,
A heavy fall, a sullen plash,
And, like white foam, or giant flake
Of snow, he lay upon the lake!”
Maurice Thompson, _The Death of the White Heron, Songs of
Fair Weather_ (1883).
=White Hoods= (or _Chaperons Blancs_); the insurgents of Ghent, led by
Jean Lyons, noted for their fight at Minnewater to prevent the digging
of a canal which they fancied would be injurious to trade.
Saw the fight at Minnewater, saw the “White Hoods” moving west.
Longfellow, _The Belfry of Bruges_.
=White Horse= (_Lords of The_), the old Saxon chiefs, whose standard
was a white horse.
And tampered with the lords of the White Horse.
Tennyson, _Guinevere_.
=White Horse of the Peppers=, a sprat to catch a mackerel. After the
battle of the Boyne, the estates of many of the Jacobites were
confiscated, and given to the adherents of William III. Amongst
others, the estate of the Peppers was forfeited, and the Orangeman to
whom it was awarded went to take possession. “Where was it, and what
was its extent?” These were all-important questions; and the Orangeman
was led up and down, hither and thither, for several days, under
pretence of showing him the land. He had to join the army by a certain
day, but was led so far afield that he agreed to forego his claim if
supplied with means of reaching his regiment within the given time.
Accordingly, the “white horse,” the pride of the family, and the
fastest animal in the land, was placed at his disposal, the king’s
grant was revoked, and the estate remained in the possession of the
original owner.--S. Lover, _Stories and Legends of Ireland_ (1832-34).