H. B., the initials adopted by Mr. Doyle, father of Richard Doyle, in his Reform Caricatures (1830).
H. H., Pen-name of Helen Hunt Jackson, authoress of Ramona, A Century of Dishonor, etc.
Hackburn (Simon of), a friend of Hobbie Elliott, farmer at the Heugh-foot.—Sir W. Scott, The Black Dwarf (time, Anne).
Hackum (Captain), a thick-headed bully of Alsatia, once a sergeant in Flanders. He deserted his colors, fled to England, took refuge in Alsatia, and assumed the title of captain.—Shadwell, Squire of Alsatia (1688).
Hadad, one of the six Wise Men of the East led by the guiding star to Jesus. He left his beloved consort, fairest of the daughters of Bethu´rim. At his decease she shed no tear, yet was her love exceeding that of mortals.—Klopstock, The Messiah, v. (1771).
Had´away (Jack), a former neighbor of Nanty Ewart, the smuggler-captain.—Sir W. Scott, Redgauntlet (time, George III.).
Ha´des (2 syl.), the god of the unseen world; also applied to the grave, or the abode of departed spirits.
⁂ In the Apostles’ Creed, the phrase “descended into hell” is equivalent to “descended into hadês.”
Hadgi (Abdallah el), the soldan’s envoy.—Sir W. Scott, The Talisman (time, Richard I.).
Hadoway (Mrs.), Lovel’s landlady at Fairport.—Sir W. Scott, The Antiquary (time, George III.).
Hafed, a gheber or fire-worshipper, in love with Hinda, the emir’s daughter. He was the leader of a band sworn to free their country or die in the attempt. His rendezvous was betrayed, but when the Moslem came to arrest him, he threw himself into the sacred fire, and was burnt to death.—T. Moore, Lalla Rookh (“The Fire-Worshippers,” 1817).
Haf´edal, the protector of travellers, one of the four gods of the Adites (2 syl.).
Hafiz, the nom de plume of Mr. Stott in the Morning Press. Byron calls him “grovelling Stott,” and adds, “What would be the sentiment of the Persian Anacreon ... if he could behold his name assumed by one Stott of Dromore, the most impudent and execrable of literary poachers?”—English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809).
Hafod. As big a fool as Jack Hafod. Jack Hafod was a retainer of Mr. Bartlett, of Castlemore, Worcestershire, and the ultimus scurrarum of Great Britain. He died at the close of the eighteenth century.
Hagan, son of a mortal and a sea-goblin, the Achillês of German romance. He stabbed Siegfried while drinking from a brook, and laid the body at the door of Kriemhild, that she might suppose he had been killed by assassins. Hagan, having killed Siegfried, then seizedseized the “Nibelung hoard,” and buried it in the Rhine, intending to appropriate it. Kriemhild, after her marriage with Etzel, king of the Huns, invited him to the court of her husband, and cut off his head. He is described as “well grown, strongly built, with long sinewy legs, deep broad chest, hair slightly gray, of terrible visage, and of lordly gait” (stanza 1789).—The Nibelungen Lied (1210).
Ha´garenes (3 syl.), the descendants of Hagar. The Arabs and the Spanish Moors are so called.
Often he [St. James] hath been seen conquering and destroying the Hagarenes.—Cervantes, Don Quixote, II. iv. 6 (1615).
Hagenbach (Sir Archibald von), governor of La Frette.—Sir W. Scott, Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).
Hahlreiner (Fraulein). The Münich landlady who accompanies H.H. as maid in her travels through Germany. During the jaunt she learns so much of other landlord’s ways and manners that “I fear me from this time henceforth, the lodgers in my dear Fraulein’s house will not find it such a marvel of cheap comfort as we did.”—Helen Hunt Jackson, Bits of Travel (1872).
Haiatal´nefous (5 syl.), daughter and only child of Ar´manys, king of the “Isle of Ebony.” She and Badoura were the two wives of Prince Camaral´zaman, and gave birth at the same time to two princes. Badoura called her son Amgiad (“the most glorious”), and Haiatalnefous called her’s Assad (“the most happy”).—Arabian Nights (“Camaralzaman and Badoura”).
Haidée, “the beauty of the Cycladês,” was the daughter of Lambro, a Greek pirate, living in one of the Cycladês. Her mother was a Moorish maiden of Fez, who died when Haidee was a mere child. Being brought up in utter loneliness, she was wholly Nature’s child. One day, Don Juan was cast on the shore, the only one saved from a shipwrecked crew, tossed about for many days in the long-boat. Haidée lighted on the lad, and, having nursed him in a cave, fell in love with him. A report being heard that Lambro was dead, Don Juan gave a banquet, but in the midst of the revelry, the old pirate returned, and ordered Don Juan to be seized and sold as a slave. Haidée broke a blood-vessel from grief and fright, and, refusing to take any nourishment, died.—Byron, Don Juan, ii. 118; iii., iv. (1819, 1821).
Haimon (The Four Sons of), the title of a minnesong in the degeneracy of that poetic school, which rose in Germany with the house of Hohenstaufen, and went out in the middle of the thirteenth century.
Hair. Every three days, when Cor´sina combed the hair of Fairstar and her two brothers, “a great many valuable jewels were combed out, which she sold at the nearest town.”—Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales (“Princess Fairstar,” 1682).
“I suspected,” said Corsina, “that Cherry is not the brother of Fairstar, for he has neither a star nor collar of gold as Fairstar and her brothers have.” “That’s true,” rejoined her husband; “but jewels fall out of his hair, as well as out of the others.”—Princess Fairstar.
Hair. Mrs. Astley, an actress of the last century, wife of “Old Astley,” could stand up and cover her feet with her flaxen hair.
She had such luxuriant hair that she could stand upright and it covered her to her feet like a veil. She was very proud of these flaxen locks; and a slight accident by fire having befallen them, she resolved ever after to play in a wig. She used, therefore, to wind this immense quantity of hair round her head, and put over it a capacious caxon, the consequence of which was that her head bore about the same proportion to the rest of her figure that a whale’s skull does to its body.—Philip Astley (1742-1814).
Hair. Mdlle. Bois de Chêne, exhibited in London in 1852-3, had a most profuse head of hair, and also a strong black beard, large whiskers, and thick hair on her arms and legs.
Charles XII. had in his army a woman whose beard was a yard and a half long. She was taken prisoner at the battle of Pultowa, and presented to the Czar in 1724.
Johann Mayo, the German painter, had a beard which touched the ground when he stood up.
Master George Killingworthe, in the court of Ivan “the Terrible” of Russia, had a beard five feet two inches long. It was thick, broad, and of a yellowish hue.—Hakluyt (1589).
Hair Cut Off. It was said by the Greeks and Romans that life would not quit the body of a devoted victim till a lock of hair had first been cut from the head of the victim and given to Proserpine. Thus, when Alcestis was about to die as a voluntary sacrifice for the life of her husband, Than´atos first cut off a lock of her hair for the queen of the infernals. When Dido immolated herself, she could not die till Iris had cut off one of her yellow locks for the same purpose.—Virgil, Æneid, iv. 693-705.
Iris cut the yellow hair of unhappy Dido, and broke the charm.—O. W. Holmes, Autocrat of the Breakfast Table.
Hair, Sign of Rank.
The Parthians and ancient Persians of high rank wore long flowing hair.
Homer speaks of “the long-haired Greeks” by way of honorable distinction. Subsequently the Athenian cavalry wore long hair, and all Lacedæmonian soldiers did the same.
The Gauls considered long hair a notable honor, for which reason Julius Cæsar obliged them to cut off their hair in token of submission.
The Franks and ancient Germans considered long hair a mark of noble birth. Hence Clodion, the Frank, was called “The Long-Haired,” and his successors are spoken of as les rois chevelures.
The Goths looked on long hair as a mark of honor, and short hair as a mark of thraldom.
For many centuries long hair was in France the distinctive mark of kings and nobles.
Haïz´um (3 syl.), the horse on which the archangel Gabriel rode when he led a squadron of 3000 angels against the Koreishites (3 syl.) in the famous battle of Bedr.
Hakem´ or Hakeem, chief of the Druses, who resides at Deir-el-Kamar. The first hakem was the third Fatimite caliph, called B’amr-ellah, who professed to be incarnate deity, and the last prophet who had personal communication between God and man. He was slain on Mount Mokattam, near Cairo (Egypt).
Hakim (Adonbec el), Saladin in the disguise of a physicianphysician. He visited Richard Cœur de Lion in sickness; gave him a medicine in which the “talisman” had been dipped, and the sick king recovered from his fever.—Sir W. Scott, The Talisman (time, Richard I.).
Halcro (Claud), the old bard of Magnus Troil, the udaller of Zetland.—Sir W. Scott, The Pirate (time, William III.).
⁂ A udallar is one who holds his land by allodial tenure.
Halden or Halfdene (2 syl.), a Danish king, who with Basrig or Bagsecg, another Scandinavian king, made (in 871) a descent upon Wessex, and in that one year nine pitched battles were fought with the islanders. The first was Englefield, in Berkshire, in which the Danes were beaten; the second was Reading, in which the Danes were victorious; the third was the famous battle of Æscesdun or Ashdune, in which the Danes were defeated with great loss, and King Bagsecg was slain. In 909, Halfdene was slain in the battle of Wodnesfield (Staffordshire).
Hal´dimund (Sir Ewes), a friend of Lord Dalgarno.—Sir W. Scott, Fortunes of Nigel (time, James I.).
Hales (John), called “The Ever-Memorable” (1584-1656).
The works of John Hales were published after his death, in 1659, under the title of The Golden Remains of the Ever-Memorable Mr. John Hales of Eton College (three vols.).
Halifax (John), noble character, rising from poverty to affluence and honor by his own exertions, and winning for himself the name written by his mother in his Bible, “John Halifax, Gentleman.”—Dinah Maria Muloch, Mrs. Craik.
Halkit (Mr.), a young lawyer in the introduction of Sir W. Scott’s Heart of Midlothian (1818).
Hall (Sir Christopher), an officer in the army of Montrose.—Sir W. Scott, Legend of Montrose (time, Charles I.).
Hall (Ruth), vivacious woman, who is happily married, then widowed, reduced to poverty, and wins fortune and fame by her pen. Supposed to be the author’s own life under a thin veil of fiction.—Sarah Payson Willis (Fanny Fern), Ruth Hall (184-).
Haller (Mrs.). At the age of 16, Adelaid [Mrs. Haller] married the Count Waldbourg, from whom she eloped. The count then led a roving life, and was known as “the stranger.” The countess, repenting of her folly, assumed (for three years) the name of Mrs. Haller, and took service under the countess of Wintersen, whose affection she won by her amiability and sweetness of temper. Baron Steinfort fell in love with her, but hearing her tale, interested himself in bringing about a reconciliationreconciliation between Mrs. Haller and “the stranger,” who happened, at the time, to be living in the same neighborhood. They met and bade adieu, but when their children were brought forth, they relented, and rushed into each other’s arms.—Benj. Thompson, The Stranger (1797). Adapted from Kotzebue.
Halliday (Tom), a private in the royal army.—Sir W. Scott, Old Mortality (time Charles II.).
Hamarti´a, Sin personified, offspring of the red dragon and Eve. “A foul deformed” monster, “more foul deformed the sun yet never saw.” “A woman seemed she in the upper part,” but “the rest was in serpent form,” though out of sight. Fully described in canto xii. of The Purple Island (1633), by Phineas Fletcher. (Greek hamartia, “sin.”)
Hamet, son of Mandānê and Zamti (a Chinese mandarin). When the infant prince, Zaphimri, called “the orphan of China,” was committed to the care of Zamti, Hamet was sent to Corea, and placed under the charge of Morat; but when grown to manhood, he led a band of insurgents against Ti´murkan´ the Tartar, who had usurped the throne of China. He was seized and condemned to death, under the conviction that he was Zaphimri, the prince. Etan (who was the real Zaphimri) now came forward to acknowledge his rank, and Timurkan, unable to ascertain which was the true prince, ordered them both to execution. At this juncture a party of insurgents arrived, Hamet and Zaphimri were set at liberty, Timurkan was slain, and ZaphimriZaphimri was raised to the throne of his forefathers.—Murphy, The Orphan of China.
Hamet, one of the black slaves of Sir Brian de Bois Guilbert, preceptor of the Knights Templars.—Sir W. Scott, Ivanhoe (time, Richard I.).
Hamet, (the Cid) or The Cid Hamet Benengel´i, the hypothetical Moorish chronicler who is fabled by Cervantês to have written the adventures of “Don Quixote.”
The shrewd Cid Hamet, addressing himself to his pen, says, “And now my slender quill, whether skillfully cut or otherwise, here from this rack, suspended by a wire, shalt thou peacefully live to distant times, unless the hand of some rash historian disturb thy repose by taking thee down and profaning thee.”—Cervantes, Don Quixote (last chap., 1615).
Hamilton (Lady Emily), sister of Lord Evandale.—Sir W. Scott, Old Mortality (time, Charles II.).
Hamilton (Mrs.), model Christian mother, whose character and modes of government are delineated in Home Influence and The Mother’s Recompense.—Grace Aquilar (185-).
Hamiltrude (3 syl.), a poor Frenchwoman, the first of Charlemagne’s nine wives. She bore him several children.
Her neck was tinged with a delicate rose.... Her locks were bound about her temples with gold and purple bands. Her dress was looped up with ruby clasps. Her coronet and her purple robes gave her an air of surpassing majesty.—L’Epine, Croquemitaine, iii.
Hamlet, prince of Denmark, a man of mind, but not of action; nephew of Claudius, the reigning king, who had married the widowed queen. Hamlet loved Ophelia, daughter of Polo´nius, the lord chamberlain; but feeling it to be his duty to revenge his father’s murder, he abandoned the idea of marriage and treated Ophelia so strangely that she went mad, and, gathering flowers from a brook, fell into the water and was drowned. While wasting his energy in speculation, Hamlet accepted a challenge from Laertês of a friendly contest with foils; but Laertês used a poisoned rapier, with which he stabbed the young prince. A scuffle ensued, in which the combatants changed weapons, and Laertês being stabbed, both died.—Shakespeare, Hamlet (1596).
“The whole play,” says Schlegel, “is intended to show that calculating consideration which exhausts ... the power of action.” Goethe is of the same opinion, and says that “Hamlet is a noble nature, without the strength of nerve which forms a hero. He sinks beneath a burden which he cannot bear, and cannot [make up his mind to] cast aside.”
⁂ In the History of Hamblet, Hamlet’s father is called “Horvendille.”
Hammer (The ),Judas Asamonæus, surnamed Maccabæus, “the hammer” (B.C. 166-136).
Charles Martel (689-741).(689-741).
On prétend qu’on lui donna le surnom de Martel parcequ’il avait écrasé comme avec un marteau les Sarrasins qui, sous la conduite d’Abdérame, avaient envahi la France.—Bouillet.
Hammer and Scourge of England, Sir William Wallace (1270-1305).
Hammer of Heretics.
1. Pierre D’Ailly, president of the council which condemned John Huss (1350-1425).
2. St. Augustine, “the pillar of truth and hammer of heresies” (395-430).—Hakewell.
3. John Faber. So called from the title of one of his works, Malleus Hereticorum (1470-1541).
Hammer of Scotland, Edward I. His son inscribed on his tomb: “Edwardus Longus Scotorum Malleus hic est” (1239, 1272-1307).
Hammerlein (Claus), the smith, one of the insurgents at Liège.—Sir W. Scott, Quentin Durward (time, Edward IV.).
Hamond, captain of the guard of Rollo (“the bloody brother” of Otto, and duke of Normandy). He stabs the duke, and Rollo stabs the captain; so that they kill each other.—Beaumont and Fletcher, The Bloody Brother (1639).
Hamor (Everett), artist to whom Gwenn consents to sit as a model, and who reciprocates the favor by stealing her heart, his own fancy being enthralled, while he knows that he cannot marry her.
While she dances—a breathing poem, her clear eyes seeking Hamor’s with a kind of proud pleading—“Your smile, too, O my master,” they pleaded; “your smile to crown my joy,”—he is talking of art to a young Danish woman, also an artist, and not seeing Gwenn.—Blanche Willis Howard, Gwenn (1883).
Hampden (John), was born in London, but after his marriage lived as a country squire. He was imprisoned in the gatehouse for refusing to pay a tax called ship-money, imposed without the authority of parliament. The case was tried in the Exchequer Chamber, in 1638, and given against him. He threw himself heart and soul into the business of the Long Parliament, and commanded a troop in the parliamentary army. In 1643 he fell in an encounter with Prince Rupert; but he has ever been honored as a patriot, and the defender of the rights of the people (1597-1643).
Hamzu-ben-Ahmud, who, on the death of Hakeem. B’amr-ellah (called the incarnate deity and last prophet), was the most zealous propagator of the new faith, out of which the semi-Mohammedan sect, called Druses, subsequently arose.
N.B.—They were not called “Druses” till the eleventh century, when one of their “apostles,” called Durzi, led them from Egypt to Syria, and the sect was called by his name.
Handel’s Monument, in Westminster Abbey, is by Roubillac. It was the last work executed by this sculptor.
Han (Sons of), the Chinese, so called from Hân, the village in which Lieou-pang was chief. Lieou-pang conquered all who opposed him, seized the supreme power, assumed the name of Kao-hoâng-tee and the dynasty, which lasted 422 years, was “the fifth imperial dynasty, or that of Hân.” It gave thirty emperors, and the seat of government was Yn. With this dynasty the modern history of China begins (B.C. 202 to A.D. 220).
Handsome Englishman (The). The French used to call John Churchill, duke of Marlborough, Le Bel Anglais (1650-1722).
Handsome Swordsman (The). Joachim Murat was popularly called Le Beau Sabreur (1767-1815).
Handy Andy, (See Andy).
Handy (Sir Abel), a great contriver of inventions which would not work, and of retrograde improvements. Thus “his infallible axletree” gave way when it was used, and the carriage was “smashed to pieces.” His substitute for gunpowder exploded, endangered his life, and set fire to the castle. His “extinguishing powder” might have reduced the flames, but it was not mixed, nor were his patent fire-engines in workable order. He said to Farmer Ashfield:
“I have obtained patents for tweezers, toothpicks, and tinder-boxes ... and have now on hand two inventions, ... one for converting saw-dust into deal boards, and the other for cleaning rooms by steam-engines.”
Lady Nelly Handy (his wife), formerly a servant in the house of Farmer Ashfield. She was full of affectations, overbearing, and dogmatical. Lady Nelly tried to “forget the dunghill whence she grew, and thought herself the Lord knows who.” Her extravagance was so great that Sir Abel said his “best coal-pit would not find her in white muslin, nor his India bonds in shawls and otto of roses.” It turned out that her first husband, Gerald, who had been absent twenty years, reappeared and claimed her. Sir Abel willingly resigned his claim, and gave Gerald £5000 to take her off his hands.
Robert Handy (always called Bob), son of Sir Abel by his first wife. He fancied he could do everything better than any one else. He taught the post boy to drive, but broke the horse’s knees. He taught Farmer Ashfield how to box, but got knocked down by him at the first blow. He told Dame Ashfield he had learned lace-making at Mechlin, and that she did not make it in the right way; but he spoilt her cushion in showing her how to do it. He told Lady Handy (his father’s bride) she did not know how to use the fan, and showed her; he told her she did not know how to curtsey, and showed her. Being pestered by this popinjay beyond endurance, she implored her husband to protect her from further insults. Though light-hearted, Bob was “warm, steady, and sincere.” He married Susan, the daughter of Farmer Ashfield.—Th. Morton, Speed the Plough (1798).
Hanging Judge (The), Sir Francis Page (1718-1741).
The earl of Norbury, who was chief justice of the Common Pleas in Ireland from 1820 to 1827, was also stigmatized with the same unenviable title.
Hannah. The friend of the Quaker widow in the garden after her husband’s funeral—“the single heart that comes at need.”—Bayard Taylor, The Quaker Widow.
Hannah, housekeeper to Mr. Fairford, the lawyer.—Sir W. Scott, Redgauntlet (time, George III.).
Hannah Thurston. A country girl, a Quaker by birth and breeding, whose Madonna face and nobility of character win the regard of a wealthy citizen of the world, a travelled man who yet does not sympathize with Hannah’s “progressive” ideas on the subject of woman’s suffrage, etc. He marries her and converts her.—Bayard Taylor, Hannah Thurston, (1868.)
Hans, a simple-minded boy of five and twenty, in love with Esther, but too shy to ask her in marriage. He is a “Modus” in a lower social grade; and Esther is a “cousin Helen,” who laughs at him, loves him, and teaches him how to make love to her and win her.—S. Knowles, The Maid of Mariendorpt (1838).
Hans, the pious ferryman on the banks of the Rhine.—Sir W. Scott, Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).
Hans (Adrian), a Dutch merchant killed at Boston.—Sir W. Scott, Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).
Hans of Iceland, a novel by Victor Hugo (1824). Hans is a stern, savage, Northern monster, ghastly and fascinating.
Hans von Rippach [Rip.pak], i.e. Jack of Rippach. Rippach is a village near Leipsic. This Hans von Rippach is is a “Mons. Nong-tong-pas,” that is, a person asked for, who does not exist. The “joke” is to ring a house up at some unseasonable hour, and ask for Herr Hans von Rippach or Mons. Nongtongpas.
Hanson (Neil), a soldier in the castle of Garde Doloureuse.—Sir W. Scott, The Betrothed (time, Henry II.).
Hanswurst, the “Jack Pudding” of old German comedy, but almost annihilated by Gottsched, in the middle of the eighteenth century. He was clumsy, huge in person, an immense gourmand, and fond of vulgar practical jokes.
⁂ The French “Jean Potage,” the Italian “Macaroni,” and the Dutch “Pickel Herringe,” were similar characters.
Hapmouche (2 syl.), i.e. “fly-catcher,” the giant who first hit upon the plan of smoking pork and neats’ tongues.—Rabelais, Pantagruel, ii. 1.
Happer or Hob. the miller who supplies St. Mary’s Convent.
Mysie Happer, the miller’s daughter. Afterwards, in disguise, she acts as the page of Sir Piercie Shafton, whom she marries.—Sir W. Scott, The Monastery (time, Elizabeth).
Happuck, a magician, brother of Ulin, the enchantress. He was the instigator of rebellion, and intended to kill the Sultan Misnar at a review, but Misnar had given orders to a body of archers to shoot the man who was left standing when the rest of the soldiers fell prostrate in adoration. Misnar went to the review, and commanded the army to give thanks to Allah for their victory, when all fell prostrate except Happuck, who was thus detected, and instantly despatched.—Sir C. Morell [James Ridley], Tales of the Genii (“The Enchanter’s Tale,” vi., 1751).
Have we prevailed against Ulin and Happuck, Ollomand and Tasnar, Ahaback and Desra; and shall we fear the contrivance of a poor vizier?—Tales of the Genii, vii. (1751).
Har´apha, a descendant of Anak, the giant of Gath. He went to mock Samson in prison, but durst not venture within his reach.—Milton, Samson Agonistes (1632).
Harbor (In).
Har´bothel (Master Fabian), the squire of Sir Aymer de Valence.—Sir W. Scott, Castle Dangerous (time, Henry I.).
Hard Times, a novel by C. Dickens (1854), dramatized in 1867 under the titlef of Under the Earth or The Sons of Toil. Bounderby, a street Arab, raised himself to banker and cotton prince. When 55 years of age, he proposed marriage to Louisa, daughter of Thomas Gradgrind, Esq., J.P., and was accepted. One night the bank was robbed of £150, and Bounderby believed Stephen Blackpool to be the thief, because he had dismissed him, being obnoxious to the mill hands; but the culprit was Tom Gradgrind, the banker’s brother-in-law, who lay perdu for a while, and then escaped out of the country. In the dramatized version, the bank was not robbed at all, but Tom merely removed the money to another drawer for safe custody.
Hardcastle (Squire), a jovial, prosy, but hospitable country gentleman of the old school. He loves to tell his long-winded stories about Prince Eugene and the duke of Marlborough. He says, “I love everything that’s old—old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine,” and he might have added, “old stories.”
Mrs. Hardcastle, a very “genteel” lady indeed. Mr. Hardcastle is her second husband, and Tony Lumpkin her son by her former husband. She is fond of “genteel” society, and the last fashions. Mrs. Hardcastle says, “There’s nothing in the world I love to talk of so much as London and the fashions, though I was never there myself.” She, foolishly mistaking her husband for a highwayman, and imploring him on her knees to take their watches, money, all they have got, but to spare their lives: “Here, good gentleman, whet your rage upon me, take my money, my life, but spare my child!” is infinitely comic.
The princess, like Mrs. Hardcastle, was jolted to a jelly.—Lord W.P. Lennox, Celebrities, i. 1.
Miss Hardcastle, the pretty, bright-eyed, lively daughter of Squire Hardcastle. She is in love with young Marlow, and “stoops” to a pardonable deceit “to conquer” his bashfulness and win him.—Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer (1773).
Hardie (Mr.), a young lawyer, in the introduction of Sir W. Scott’s Heart of Midlothian (1818).
Hardie (Alfred), lover of Julia Dodd, in Charles Reade’s Very Hard Cash. His father, Richard Hardie, wealthy and fraudulent banker, cheats David Dodd, Julia’s father, of £14,000, and hinders his son’s marriage to the daughter of his victim by every means in his power, going so far as to shut him up in an insane asylum on what was to have been his wedding-day.—Charles Reade, Very Hard Cash.
Hardouin (2 syl.). Jean Hardouin, the jesuit, was librarian to Louis XIV. He doubted the truth of all received history; denied that the Æne´id was the work of Virgil, or the Odes of Horace the production of that poet; placed no credence in medals and coins; regarded all councils before that of Trent as chimerical; and looked on all Jansenists as infidels (1646-1729).
Hardy (Mr.), father of Letitia. A worthy little fellow enough, but with the unfortunate gift of “foreseeing” everything (act v. 4).
Letitia Hardy, his daughter, the fiancée of Dor´icourt. A girl of great spirit and ingenuity, beautiful and clever. Doricourt dislikes her without knowing her, simply because he has been betrothed to her by his parents; but she wins him by stratagem. She first assumes the airs and manners of a raw country hoyden, and disgusts the fastidious man of fashion. She then appears at a masquerade, and wins him by her many attractions. The marriage is performed at midnight, and, till the ceremony is over, Doricourt has no suspicion that the fair masquerader is his affianced, Miss Hardy.—Mrs. Cowley, The Belle’s Stratagem (1780).
Harding (Mr.), gentle warden of Barchester almshouse; precentor and rector of St. Cuthbert’s. Harried nearly out of his sober wits by newspaper persecution.—Anthony Trollope, The Warden and Barchester Towers.
Haredale (Geoffrey), brother of Reuben, the uncle of Emma Haredale. He was a papist, and incurred the malignant hatred of Gashford (Lord George Gordon’s secretary) by exposing him in Westminster Hall. Geoffrey Haredale killed Sir John Chester in a duel, but made good his escape, and ended his days in a monastery.
Reuben Haredale, (2 syl.), brother of Geoffrey, and father of Emma Haredale. He was murdered.
Emma Haredale, daughter of Reuben, and niece of Geoffrey, with whom she lived at “The Warren.” Edward Chester entertained a tendresse for Emma Haredale.—C. Dickens, Barnaby Rudge (1841).
Harefoot (Harold). So Harold I. was called because he was swift of foot as a hare (1035-1040).
Hargrave, a man of fashion. The hero and title of a novel by Mrs. Trollope (1843).
Harley, “the man of feeling.” A man of the finest sensibilities and unbounded benevolence, but bashful as a maiden.—Mackenzie, The Man of Feeling (1771).
The principal object of Mackenzie is ... to reach and sustain a tone of moral pathos by representing the effect of incidents ... upon the human mind, ... especially those which are just, honorable, and intelligent.—Sir W. Scott.
Harlot (The Infamous Northern), Elizabeth Petrowna, empress of Russia (1709-1761).
Har´lowe (Clarissa), a young lady, who, to avoid a marriage to which her heart cannot consent, but to which she is urged by her parents, casts herself on the protection of a lover, who most scandalously abuses the confidence reposed in him. He afterwards proposes marriage; but she rejects his proposal, and retires to a solitary dwelling, where she pines to death with grief and shame.—S. Richardson, The History of Clarissa Harlowe (1749).
The dignity of Clarissa under her disgrace ... reminds us of the saying of the ancient poet, that a good man struggling with the tide of adversity, and surmounting it, is a sight upon which the immortal gods might look down with pleasure.—Sir W. Scott.
The moral elevation of this heroine, the saintly purity which she preserves amidst scenes of the deepest depravity and the most seductive gaiety, and the never-failing sweetness and benevolence of her temper, render Clarissa one of the brightest triumphs of the whole range of imaginative literature.—Chambers, English Literature, ii. 161.
Harmon (John), alias John Rokesmith, Mr. Boffin’s secretary. He lodged with the Wilfers, and ultimately married Bella Wilfer. He is described as “a dark gentleman, 30 at the utmost, with an expressive, one might say, a handsome face.”—C. Dickens, Our Mutual Friend (1864).
⁂ For explanation of the mystery see vol. I. ii. 13.
Harmo´nia’s Necklace, an unlucky possession, something which brings evil to its possessor. Harmonia was the daughter of Mars and Venus. On the day of her marriage with King Cadmus, she received a necklace made by Vulcan for Venus. This unlucky ornament afterwards passed to Sem´elê, then to Jocasta, then Eriphy´lê, but it was equally fatal in every case. (See Luck.)—Ovid, Metaph., iv. 5; Statius, Thebaid, ii.
Harmonious Blacksmith. It is said that the sound of hammers on an anvil suggested to Handel the “theme” of the musical composition to which he has given this name.—See Schoelcher, Life of Handel, 65.
A similar tale is told of Pythagoras.
Harmony (Mr.), a general peace-maker. When he found persons at variance, he went to them separately, and told them how highly the other spoke and thought of him or her. If it were man and wife, he would tell the wife how highly her husband esteemed her, and would apply the “oiled feather” in a similar way to the husband. “We all have our faults,” he would say, “and So-and-so-knows it, and grieves at his infirmity of temper; but though he contends with you, he praised you to me this morning in the highest terms.” By this means he succeeded in smoothing many a ruffled mind.—Inchbald, Every One has His Fault (1794).
Harold “the Dauntless,” son of Witikind, the Dane. “He was rocked on a buckler, and fed from a blade.” Harold married Eivir, a Danish maid, who had waited on him as a page.—Sir W. Scott, Harold the Dauntless (1817).
Harold (Childe), a man of good birth, lofty bearing, and peerless intellect, who has exhausted by dissipation the pleasures of youth, and travels. Sir Walter Scott calls him “Lord Byron in a fancy dress.” In canto i. the childe visits Portugal and Spain (1809); in canto ii., Turkey in Europe (1810); in canto iii., BelgiumBelgium and Switzerland (1816); in canto iv., Venice, Rome, and Florence (1817).
⁂ Lord Byron was only 21 when he began Childe Harold, and 28 when he finished it.
Haroun-al-Raschid, caliph, of the Abbasside race, contemporary with Charlemagne, and, like him, a patron of literature and the arts. The court of this caliph was most splendid, and under him the caliphate attained its greatest degree of prosperity (765-809).
⁂ Many of the tales in the Arabian Nights are placed in the caliphate of Haroun-al-Raschid, as the histories of “Am´inê,” “Sindbad the Sailor,” “Aboul-hasson and Shemselnihar,” “Noureddin,” “Codadad and his Brothers,” “Sleeper Awakened,” and “Cogia Hassan.” In the the third of these the caliph is a principal actor.
Har´pagon, the miser, father of Cléante (2 syl.) and Elise (2 syl.). Both Harpagon and his son desire to marry Mariane (3 syl.); but the father, having lost a casket of money, is asked which he prefers—his casket or Mariane, and as the miser prefers the money, Cléante marries the lady. Harpagon imagines that every one is going to rob him, and when he loses his casket, seizes his own arm in the frenzy of passion. He proposes to give his daughter in marriage to an old man named Anselme, because no “dot” will be required; and when Valère (who is Elise’s lover) urges reason after reason against the unnatural alliance, the miser makes but one reply, “sans dot.” “Ah,” says Valère, “il est vrai cela ferme la bouche à tout, sans dot.” Harpagon, at another time, solicits Jacques (1 syl.) to tell him what folks say of him: and when Jacques replies he cannot do so, as it would make him angry, the miser answers, “Point de tout, au contraire, c’est me faire plaisir.” But when told that he is called a miser and a skinflint, he towers with rage, and beats Jacques in his uncontrolled passion.
“Le seigneur Harpagon est de tous les humains l’humain le moins humain, le mortel de tous les mortels le plus dur et le plus serré” (ii. 5). Jacques says to him, “Jamais on ne parle de vous que sous les noms d’avare, de ladre, de vilain, et de fesse-Matthiæ” (iii. 5).—Molière, L’Avare (1667).
Harpax, centurion of the “Immortal Guard.”—Sir W. Scott, Count Robert of Paris (time, Rufus).
Harpê (2 syl.), the cutlass with which Mercury killed Argus, and with which Perseus (2 syl.) subsequently cut off the head of Medusa.
Harper, a familiar spirit of mediæval demonology.