Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama Part 122

The gentle name that shows Her love, her loveliness, and bloom (Her only epitaph a rose) Is growing on her tomb!

John James Piatt, _Poems of House and Home_ (1879).

=Rose of Aragon= (_The_), a drama by S. Knowles (1842). Olivia, daughter of Ruphi'no (a peasant), was married to Prince Alonzo of Aragon. The king would not recognize the match, but sent his son to the army, and made the cortez pa.s.s an act of divorce. A revolt having been organized, the king was dethroned, and Almagro was made regent. Almagro tried to marry Olivia, and to murder her father and brother, but the prince returning with the army made himself master of the city, Almagro died of poison, the marriage of the prince and peasant was recognized, the revolt was broken up, and order was restored.

=Rose of Har'pocrate= (3 _syl._). Cupid gave Harpocrate a rose, to bribe him not to divulge the amours of his mother, Venus.

Red as a rose of Harpocrate.

E. B. Browning, _Isobel's Child_, iii.

=Rose of Paradise.= The roses which grew in paradise had no thorns.

"Thorns and thistles" were unknown on earth till after the Fall (_Gen._ iii. 18). Both St. Ambrose and St. Basil note that the roses in Eden had no thorns, and Milton says, in Eden bloomed "Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the rose."--_Paradise Lost_, iv. 256 (1665).

=Rose of Raby=, the mother of Richard III. This was Cicely, daughter of Ralph de Nevill of Raby, earl of Westmoreland.

=Rose Vaughan.= Lover of "Yone" Willoughby, in _The Amber G.o.ds_. He has super-refined and poetical tastes; delights and revels in beauty, and until he met Yone had admired her gentle sister. The siren, Yone, sets herself to win him and succeeds. Marriage disenchants him and the knowledge of this maddens her into something akin to hatred. Yet she dies begging him to kiss her. "I am your Yone! I forgot a little while,--but I love you, Rose, Rose!"--Harriet Prescott Spofford, _The Amber G.o.ds_ (1863).

=Rose of York=, the heir and head of the York faction.

When Warwick perished, Edmund de la Pole became the Rose of York, and if this foolish prince should be removed by death ... his young and clever brother [_Richard_] would be raised to the rank of Rose of York.--W. H. Dixon, _Two Queens_.

=Roses= (_War of the_). The origin of this expression is thus given by Shakepeare:[TN-136]

_Plant._ Let him that is a true-born gentleman ...

If he supposes that I have pleaded truth, From off this briar pluck a white rose with me.

_Somerset._ Let him that is no coward, nor no flatterer, But dare maintain the party of the truth, Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me.

Whereupon Warwick plucked a white rose and joined the Yorkists, while Suffolk plucked a red one and joined the Lancastrians.--Shakespeare, 1 _Henry VI._ act ii. sc. 4 (1589).

=Rosemond=, daughter of Cunimond, king of the Gepidae. She was compelled to marry Alboin, king of the Lombards, who put her father to death A.D.

567. Alboin compelled her to drink from the skull of her own father, and Rosemond induced Peride'us (the secretary of Helmichild, her lover), to murder the wretch (573). She then married Helmichild, fled Ravenna, and sought to poison her second husband, that she might marry Longin, the exarch; but Helmichild, apprised of her intention, forced her to drink the mixture she had prepared for him. This lady is the heroine of Alfieri's tragedy called _Rosemonde_ (1749-1803). (See ROSAMOND.)

=Ro'sencrantz=, a courtier in the court of Denmark, willing to sell or betray his friend and schoolfellow, Prince Hamlet, to please a king.--Shakespeare, _Hamlet_ (1596).

=Rosetta=, the wicked sister of Brunetta and Blon'dina, the mothers of Cherry and Fairstar. She abetted the queen-mother in her wicked designs against the offspring of her two sisters, but, being found out, was imprisoned for life.--Comtesse D'Aunoy, _Fairy Tales_ ("Princess Fairstar," 1682).

_Rosetta_, a bright, laughing little coquette, who runs away from home because her father wants her to marry young Meadows, whom she has never seen. She enters the service of Justice Woodc.o.c.k. Now, it so happens that Sir William Meadows wishes his son to marry Rosetta, whom he has never seen, and he also runs away from home, and under the name of Thomas becomes gardener to Justice Woodc.o.c.k. Rosetta and young Meadows here fall in love with each other, and the wishes of the two fathers are accomplished.--Isaac Bickerstaff, _Love in a Village_ (1763).

In 1786 Mrs. Billington made her _debut_ in "Rosetta," at once dazzling the town with the brilliancy of her vocalization and the flush of her beauty.--C. R. Leslie.

=Rosetta [Belmont]=, daughter of Sir Robert Belmont. Rosetta is high-spirited, witty, confident, and of good spirits. "If you told her a merry story, she would sigh; if a mournful one, she would laugh. For _yes_ she would say 'no,' and for _no_, 'yes.'" She is in love with Colonel Raymond, but shows her love by teasing him, and Colonel Raymond is afraid of the capricious beauty.--Edward Moore, _The Foundling_ (1748).

=Rosiclear and Donzel del Phebo=, the heroine and hero of the _Mirror of Knighthood_, a mediaeval romance.

=Rosinan'te= (4 _syl._), the steed of Don Quixote. The name implies "that the horse had risen from a mean condition to the highest honor a steed could achieve, for it was once a cart-horse, and was elevated into the charger of a knight-errant."--Cervantes, _Don Quixote_, I. ii. 1 (1605).

Rosinante was admirably drawn, so lean, lank, meagre, drooping, sharp-backed, and raw-boned, as to excite much curiosity and mirth.--Pt. I. ii. 1.

=Rosiphele= (3 _syl._), princess of Armenia; of surpa.s.sing beauty, but insensible to love. She is made to submit to the yoke of Cupid, by a vision which befalls her on a May-day ramble.--Gower, _Confessio Amantis_ (1393).

=Rosmonda=, a tragedy in Italian, by John R. Ruccellai (1525). This is one of the first regular tragedies of modern times. _Sophonisba_, by Trissino, preceded it, being produced in 1514, and performed in 1515.

=Rosny= (_Sabina_), the young wife of Lord Sensitive. "Of n.o.ble parents, who perished under the axe in France." The young orphan, "as much to be admired for her virtues, as to be pitied for her misfortunes," fled to Padua, where she met Lord Sensitive.--c.u.mberland, _First Love_ (1796).

=Ross= (_Lord_), an officer in the king's army, under the duke of Monmouth.--Sir W. Scott, _Old Mortality_ (time, Charles II.).

_Ross_ (_The Man of_), John Kyrle, of Whitehouse, in Gloucesters.h.i.+re. So called because he resided in the village of Ross, Herefords.h.i.+re. Kyrle was a man of unbounded benevolence, and beloved by all who knew him.

? Pope celebrates him in his _Moral Essays_, iii. (1709).

=Rosse= (2 _syl._), the sword which the dwarf Elberich gave to Otwit, king of Lombardy. It was so keen that it left no gap where it cut.

Balmung, the sword forged by Wieland, and given to Siegfried, was so keen that it clove Amilias in two without his knowing it, but when he attempted to move he fell asunder.

This sword to thee I give; it is all bright of hue, Whatever it may cleave, no gap will there ensue.

From Almari I brought it, and Rosse is its name.

_The Heldenbuch._

=Rostocostojambedanesse= (_M. N._), author of _After Beef, Mustard_.--Rabelais, Pantagruel, ii. 7 (1533).

=Rothmar=, chief of Tromlo. He attacked the va.s.sal kingdom of Croma, while the under-king, Crothar, was blind with age, resolving to annex it to his own dominion. Crothar's son, Fovar-Gormo, attacked the invader, but was defeated and slain. Not many days after, Ossian (one of the sons of Fingal) arrived with succors, renewed the battle, defeated the victorious army, and slew the invader.--Ossian, _Croma_.

=Rothsay= (_The duke of_) prince Robert, eldest son of Robert III. of Scotland.