BRAGMAR´DO (_Jano´tus de_), the sophister sent by the Parisians to Gargantua, to remonstrate with him for carrying off the bells of Notre-Dame to suspend round the neck of his mare for jingles.--Rabelais, _Gargantua and Pantag´ruel´_, ii. (1533). BRAHMIN CASTE OF NEW ENGLAND, term used by Oliver Wendell Holmes in _Elsie Venner_ to describe an intellectual aristocracy: "Our scholars come chiefly from a privileged order just as our best fruits come from well-known grafts."--_Elsie Venner_ (1863). BRAIN'WORM, the servant of Knowell, a man of infinite shifts, and a regular Proteus in his metamorphoses. He appears first as Brainworm; after as Fitz-Sword; then as a reformed soldier whom Knowell takes into his service; then as justice Clement's man; and lastly as valet to the courts of law, by which devices he plays upon the same clique of some half-dozen men of average intelligence.--Ben Jonson, _Every Man in His Humour_ (1598). BRAKEL (_Adrian_), the gipsy mountebank, formerly master of Fenella, the deaf and dumb girl.--Sir W. Scott, _Peveril of the Peak_ (time, Charles II.). BRAMBLE (_Matthew_), an "odd kind of humorist," "always on the fret," dyspeptic, and afflicted with gout, but benevolent, generous, and kind-hearted. _Miss Tabitha Bramble_, an old maiden sister of Matthew Bramble, of some forty-five years of age, noted for her bad spelling. She is starched, vain, prim, and ridiculous; soured in temper, proud, imperious, prying, mean, malicious, and uncharitable. She contrives at last to marry captain Lismaha'go, who is content to take "the maiden" for the sake of her £4000. _Bramble (Sir Robert_), a baronet living at Blackberry Hall, Kent. Blunt and testy, but kind-hearted; "charitable as a Christian, and rich as a Jew;" fond of argument and contradiction, but detesting flattery; very proud, but most considerate to his poorer neighbors. In his first interview with lieutenant Worthington, "the poor gentleman," the lieutenant mistook him for a bailiff come to arrest him, but sir Roflert nobly paid the bill for £500 when it was presented to him for signature as sheriff of the county. _Frederick Bramble_, nephew of sir Robert, and son of Joseph Bramble, a Russian merchant. His father having failed in business, Frederick is adopted by his rich uncle. He is full of life and noble instincts, but thoughtless and impulsive. Frederick falls in love with Emily Worthington, whom he marries.--G. Colman, _The Poor Gentleman_ (1802). BRA´MINE (_2 syl._) AND BRA´MIN (_The_), Mrs. Elizabeth Draper and Laurence Sterne. Sterne being a clergyman, and Mrs. Draper having been born in India, suggested the names. Ten of Sterne's letters to Mrs. Draper are published, and called _Letters to Eliza_. BRAN, the dog of Lamderg the lover of Gelchossa (daughter of Tuathal).--Ossian, _Fingal_, v. [Illustration] Fingal king of Morven had a dog of the same name, and another named Luäth.