Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama Part 56

Tusser has a poem of twelve lines, in rhyme, every word of which begins with _t_. The subject is on _Thriftiness_ (died 1580).

=P's= (_The Five_), William Oxberry, printer, poet, publisher, publican and player (1784-1824).

=Pache= (_J. Nicolas_), a Swiss by birth. He was minister of war in 1792, and maire de Paris 1793. Pache hated the Girondists, and at the fall of Danton, was imprisoned. After his liberation, he retired to Thym-le-Moutiers (in the Ardennes), and died in obscurity (1740-1823).

Swiss Pache sits sleek-headed, frugal, the wonder of his own ally for humility of mind.... Sit there, Tartuffe, till wanted.--Carlyle.

=Pacific= (_The_), Amadeus VIII., count of Savoy (1383, 1391-1439, abdicated, and died 1451).

Frederick III., emperor of Germany (1415, 1440-1493).

Olaus III. of Norway (*, 1030-1093).

=Pac'olet=, a dwarf, "full of great sense and subtle ingenuity." He had an enchanted horse, made of wood, with which he carried off Valentine, Orson and Clerimond from the dungeon of Ferragus. This horse is often alluded to. "To ride Pacolet's horse" is a phrase for _going very fast_.--_Valentine and Orson_, [TN-58]fifteenth century).

_Pacolet_, a familiar spirit.--Steele, _The Tatler_ (1709).

_Pacolet_, or NICK STRUMPFER, the dwarf servant of Norna "of the Fitful Head."--Sir W. Scott, _The Pirate_ (time William III.).

=Pacomo= (_St._), an Egyptian, who lived in the fourth century. It is said that he could walk among serpents unhurt; and when he had occasion to cross the Nile, he was carried on the back of a crocodile.

The hermit fell on his knees before an image of St. Pacomo, which was glued to the wall.--Lesage, _Gil Blas_, iv. 9 (1724).

=Paddington= (_Harry_), one of Macheath's gang of thieves. Peachum describes him as a "poor, petty-larceny rascal, without the least genius. That fellow," he says, "though he were to live for six months, would never come to the gallows with credit" (act i. 1).--Gay, _The Beggar's Opera_ (1727).

=Paddy=, an Irishman. A corruption of _Padhrig_, Irish for Patrick.

=Padlock= (_The_), a comic opera by Bickerstaff. Don Diego (2 _syl._), a wealthy lord of 60, saw a country maiden named Leonora, to whom he took a fancy, and arranged with the parents to take her home with him and place her under the charge of a duenna for three months, to see if her temper was as sweet as her face was pretty; and then either "to return her to them spotless, or make her his lawful wife." At the expiration of the time, the don went to arrange with the parents for the wedding, and locked up his house, giving the keys to Ursula, the duenna. To make a.s.surance doubly sure, he put a padlock on the outer door, and took the key with him. Leander, a young student, smitten with the damsel, laughed at locksmiths and duennas, and, having gained admission into the house, was detected by Don Diego, who returned unexpectedly. The old don, being a man of sense, perceived that Leander was a more suitable bridegroom than himself, so he not only sanctioned the alliance, but gave Leonora a handsome wedding dowry (1768).

=Paean=, the physician of the immortals.

=Paea'na=, daughter of Corflambo, "fair as ever yet saw living eye," but "too loose of life and eke too light." Paeana fell in love with Amias, a captive in her father's dungeon; but Amias had no heart to give away.

When Placidae was brought captive before Paeana, she mistook him for Amias, and married him. The poet adds, that she thenceforth so reformed her ways "that all men much admired the change, and spake her praise."--Spenser, _Faery Queen_, iv. 9 (1596).

=Pagan=, a fay who loved the Princess Imis; but Imis rejected his suit, as she loved her cousin, Philax. Pagan, out of revenge, shut them up in a superb crystal palace, which contained every delight except that of leaving it. In the course of a few years, Imis and Philax longed as much for a separation as, at one time, they wished to be united.--Comtesse D'Aunoy, _Fairy Tales_ ("Palace of Revenge," 1682).

=Page= (_Mr._), a gentleman living at Windsor. When Sir John Falstaff made love to Mrs. Page, Page himself a.s.sumed the name of Brooke, to outwit the knight. Sir John told the supposed Brooke his whole "course of wooing," and how nicely he was bamboozling the husband. On one occasion, he says, "I was carried out in a buck-basket of dirty linen before the very eyes of Page, and the deluded husband did not know it." Of course, Sir John is thoroughly outwitted and played upon, being made the b.u.t.t of the whole village.

_Mrs. Page_, wife of Mr. Page of Windsor. When Sir John Falstaff made love to her, she joined with Mrs. Ford to dupe him and punish him.

_Anne Page_, daughter of the above, in love with Fenton. Slender calls her "the sweet Anne Page."

_William Page_, Anne's brother, a schoolboy.--Shakespeare, _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (1595).

_Page_ (_Sir Francis_), called "The Hanging Judge" (1661-1741).

Slander and poison dread from Delia's rage; Hard words or hanging if your judge be Page.

Pope.

_Page_ (_Ruth_). A dainty little miss, bright, happy and imaginative, called sometimes "Teenty-Taunty." Her head is full of fairy-lore, and when she tumbles into the water one day, she dreams in her swoon of Fairy-Land and the wonders thereof, of a bunch of forget-me-nots she was to keep alive if she would have her mother live, and so many other marvellous things, that her distressed father opines that "the poor child would be rational enough, if she had not read so many fairy-books."--John Neal, _Goody Gracious and the Forget-me-not_ (183-).

=Paget= (_The Lady_), one of the ladies of the bedchamber in Queen Elizabeth's court.--Sir W. Scott, _Kenilworth_ (time, Elizabeth).

_Paine_[TN-59] (_Squire_). "Hard-headed, hard fe'tured Yankee," whose conversion to humanity and Christianity is effected by Roxanna Keep.

She "drilled the hole, an' put in the powder of the Word, an'

tamped it down with some pretty stiff facts ... but _the Lord fired the blast Himself_."--Rose Terry Cooke, _Somebody's Neighbors_ (1881).

=Painter of Nature.= Remi Belleau, one of the Pleiad poets, is so called (1528-1577).

_The Shepheardes Calendar_, by Spenser, is largely borrowed from Belleau's _Song of April_.

=Painter of the Graces.= Andrea Appiani (1754-1817).

=Painters.=

_A Bee._ Quentin Matsys, the Dutch painter, painted a bee so well that the artist Mandyn thought it a real bee, and proceeded to brush it away with his handkerchief (1450-1529).

_A Cow._ Myro carved a cow so true to nature that bulls mistook it for a living animal (B.C. 431).

_A Curtain._ Parrhasios painted a curtain so admirably that even Zeuxis, the artist, mistook it for real drapery (B.C. 400).

_A Fly._ George Alexander Stevens says, in his _Lectures on Heads_:

I have heard of a connoisseur who was one day in an auction-room where there was an inimitable piece of painting of fruits and flowers. The connoisseur would not give his opinion of the picture till he had first examined the catalogue; and, finding it was done by an Englishman, he pulled out his eye-gla.s.s. "Oh, sir," says he, "those English fellows have no more idea of genius than a Dutch skipper has of dancing a cotillion. The dog has spoiled a fine piece of canvas; he is worse than a Harp Alley signpost dauber.

There's no keeping, no perspective, no foreground. Why, there now, the fellow has actually attempted to paint a fly upon that rosebud.

Why, it is no more like a fly than I am like--;" but, as he approached his finger to the picture, the fly flew away (1772)[TN-60]

_Grapes._ Zeuxis (2 _syl._) a Grecian painter, painted some grapes so well that birds came and pecked at them, thinking them real grapes (B.C.

400).

_A Horse._ Apelles painted Alexander's horse Bucephalos so true to life that some mares came up to the canvas neighing, under the supposition that it was a real animal (about B.C. 334).