Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction, and the Drama, Vol. 4: A Revised American Edition of the Reader's HandbookBrewer, Ebenezer Cobham
General
Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction, and the Drama, Vol. 4: A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook
Brewer, Ebenezer Cobham
Allusions; Fiction -- Dictionaries; Literature -- Dictionaries
=Tramtrist= (_Sir_), the name assumed by Sir Tristram, when he went to
Ireland to be cured of his wounds after his combat with Sir Marhaus.
Here La Belle Isold (or Isold “the Fair”) was his leech, and the young
knight fell in love with her. When the queen discovered that Sir
Tramtrist was Sir Tristram, who had killed her brother, Sir Marhaus,
in combat, she plotted to take his life, and he was obliged to leave
the island. La Belle Isold subsequently married King Mark of Cornwall,
but her heart was ever fixed on her brave young patient.--Sir T.
Malory, _History of Prince Arthur_, ii. 9-12 (1470).
=Tranchera=, Agricane’s sword which afterwards belonged to
Brandimart.--Ariosto, _Orlando Furioso_ (1516).
=Tra´nio=, one of the servants of Lucentio, the gentleman who marries
Bianca (the sister of Kathari´na, “the Paduan shrew”).--Shakespeare,
_Taming of the Shrew_ (1594).
=Transfer=, a usurer, who is willing to advance Sir George Wealthy a
sum of money on these easy terms: (1) 5 per cent. interest; (2) 10 per
cent. premium; (3) 5 per cent. for insuring the young man’s life; (4)
a handsome present to himself as broker; (5) the borrower to pay all
expenses; and (6) the loan not to be in cash but goods, which are to
be taken at a valuation and sold at auction at the borrower’s sole
hazard. These terms are accepted, and Sir George promises besides a
handsome _douceur_ to Loader for having found a usurer so
promptly.--Foote, _The Minor_ (1760).
=Transformations.= In the art of transformation, one of the most
important things was a ready wit to adopt in an instant some form
which would give you an advantage over your adversary; thus, if your
adversary appeared as a mouse, you must change into an owl, then your
adversary would become an arrow to shoot the owl, and you would assume
the form of fire to burn the arrow, whereupon your adversary would
become water to quench the fire; and he who could outwit the other
would come off victorious. The two best examples I know of this sort
of contest are to be found, one in the _Arabian Nights_, and the other
in the _Mabinogion_.
The former is the contest between the Queen of Beauty and the son of
the daughter of Eblis. He appeared as a scorpion, she in a moment
became a serpent; whereupon he changed into an eagle, she into a more
powerful black eagle; he became a cat, she a wolf; she instantly
changed into a worm and crept into a pomegranite, which in time burst,
whereupon he assumed the form of a cock to devour the seed, but it
became a fish; the cock then became a pike, but the princess became a
blazing fire, and consumed her adversary before he had time to
change.--“The Second Calendar.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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