=Tereus= [_Te´.ruse_], king of Daulis, and the husband of Procnê. Wishing afterwards to marry Philomēla, her sister, he told her that Procnê was dead. He lived with his new wife for a time, and then cut out her tongue, lest she should expose his falsehood to Procnê; but it was of no use, for Philomela made known her story in the embroidery of a peplus. Tereus rushed after Procnê with an axe, but the whole party were metamorphosed into birds. Tereus was changed into a hoopoo (some say a lapwing, and others an owl), Procnê into a swallow, and Philomela into a nightingale. And the mute Silence hist along, ’Less Philomel will deign a song In her sweetest saddest plight, Smoothing the rugged brow of night. * * * * * * * * Sweet bird that shunn’st the noise of folly Most musical, most melancholy. Milton, _Il Penseroso_. In _Titus Andronĭcus_ the sons of Tamŏra, after defiling Lavinia, cut off her tongue and hands, but she wrote her tale in the sand with a staff held in her mouth and guided by her arms. Fair Philomela, she but lost her tongue, And in a tedious sampler sewed her mind. But, lovely niece, that mean is cut from thee; A craftier Tereus, cousin, hast thou met, And he hath cut those pretty fingers off, That could have better sewed than Philomel. Act ii. sc. 4 (1593). =Ter´il= (_Sir Walter_). The king exacts an oath from Sir Walter to send his bride, Cælestina, to court on her wedding night. Her father, to save her honor, gives her a mixture supposed to be poison, but in reality only a sleeping draught, from which she awakes in due time, to the amusement of the king and delight of her husband.--Thomas Dekker, _Satiromastix_ (1602). =Termagant=, an imaginary being, supposed by the crusaders to be a Mohammedan deity. In the _Old Moralities_ the degree of rant was the measure of the wickedness of the character portrayed; so Pontius Pilate, Herod, Judas Iscariot, Termagant, the tyrant, Sin, and so on, were all ranting parts. I would have such a fellow whipped for o’er-doing Termagant; it out-Herods Herod, pray you, avoid it.--Shakespeare, _Hamlet_, act iii. sc. 2 (1596). _Termagant_, the maid of Harriet Quidnunc. She uses most wonderful words, as _paradropsical_ for “rhapsodical,” _perjured_ for “assured,” _phisology_ for “philology,” _curacy_ for “accuracy,” _fignification_ for “signification,” importation for “import,” _anecdote_ for “antidote,” _infirmaries_ for “infirmities,” _intimidate_ for “intimate.”--Murphy, _The Upholsterer_ (1758). =Ter´meros=, a robber of Peloponnesos, who killed his victims by cracking their skulls against his own. =Termosi´ris=, a priest of Apollo, in Egypt; wise, prudent, cheerful, and courteous.--Fénelon, _Télémaque_, ii. (1700).