Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama Part 9

=Melea'ger=, son of Althaea, who was doomed to live while a certain log remained unconsumed. Althaea kept the log for several years, but being one day angry with her son, she cast it on the fire, where it was consumed. Her son died at the same moment.--Ovid, _Metam._, viii. 4.

Sir John Davies uses this to ill.u.s.trate the immortality of the soul. He says that the life of the soul does not depend on the body as Meleager's life depended on the fatal brand.

Again, if by the body's prop she stand-- If on the body's life her life depend, As Meleager's on the fatal brand; The body's good she only would intend.

_Reason_, iii. (1622).

=Melesig'enes= (5 _syl._). Homer is so called from the river Meles (2 _syl._), in Asia Minor, on the banks of which some say he was born.

... various measured verse, aeolian charms and Dorian lyric odes, And his who gave them breath, but higher sung, Blind Melesigenes, thence Homer called, Whose poem Phbus challenged for his own.

Milton, _Paradise Regained_ (1671).

=Melema= (_t.i.to_). Beautiful accomplished Greek adventurer who marries and is unfaithful to Romola. He dies by the hand of an old man who had been the benefactor of his infancy and youth, and whom he had basely deserted and ignored.--George Eliot, _Romola_.

=Me'li= (_Giovanni_), a Sicilian, born at Palermo; immortalized by his eclogues and idylls. Meli is called "The Sicilian Theocritus"

(1740-1815).

Much it pleased him to peruse The songs of the Sicilian Muse-- Bucolic songs by Meli sung.

Longfellow, _The Wayside Inn_ (prelude, 1863).

=Meliadus=, father of Sir Tristan; prince of Lyonnesse, and one of the heroes of Arthurian romance.--_Tristan de Leonois_ (1489).

? Tristan, in the _History of Prince Arthur_, compiled by Sir T. Malory (1470), is called "Tristram;" but the old minnesingers of Germany (twelfth century) called the name "Tristan."

=Mel'ibe= (3 _syl._), a rich young man married to Prudens. One day, when Melibe was in the fields, some enemies broke into his house, beat his wife, and wounded his daughter Sophie in her feet, hands, ears, nose and mouth. Melibe was furious and vowed vengeance, but Prudens persuaded him "to forgive his enemies, and to do good to those who despitefully used him." So he called together his enemies, and forgave them, to the end that "G.o.d of His endeles mercie wole at the tyme of oure deyinge forgive us oure giltes that we have trespased to Him in this wreeched world."--Chaucer, _Canterbury Tales_ (1388).

? This prose tale is a liberal translation of a French story.--See _MS.

Reg._, xix. 7; and _MS. Reg._, xix. 11, British Museum.

=Melibee=, a shepherd, and the reputed father of Pastorella. Pastorella married Sir Calidore.--Spenser, _Faery Queen_, vi. 9 (1596).

"Melibee" is Sir Francis Walsingham. In the _Ruins of Time_, Spenser calls him "Melib." Sir Philip Sidney (the "Sir Calidore" of the _Faery Queen_) married his daughter Frances. Sir Francis Walsingham died in 1590, so poor that he did not leave enough to defray his funeral expenses.

=Melibus=, one of the shepherds in _Eclogue_ i. of Virgil.

Spenser, in the _Ruins of Time_ (1591), calls Sir Francis Walsingham "the good Melib;" and in the last book of the _Faery Queen_ he calls him "Melibee."

=Melin'da=, cousin of Sylvia. She loves Worthy, whom she pretends to dislike, and coquets with him for twelve months. Having driven her modest lover to the verge of distraction, she relents, and consents to marry him.--G. Farquhar, _The Recruiting Officer_ (1705).

=Mel'ior=, a lovely fairy, who carried off, in her magic bark, Parthen'opex, of Blois, to her secret island.--_Parthenopex de Blois_ (a French romance, twelfth century).

=Melisen'dra= (_The princess_), natural daughter of Marsilio, and the "supposed daughter of Charlemagne." She eloped with Don Gayferos. The king, Marsilio, sent his troops in pursuit of the fugitive. Having made Melisendra his wife, Don Gayferos delivered her up captive to the Moors at Saragossa. This was the story of the puppet-show of Master Peter, exhibited to Don Quixote and his squire at "the inn beyond the hermitage."--Cervantes, _Don Quixote_, II. ii. 7 (1615).

=Melissa=, a prophetess who lived in Merlin's cave. Bradamant gave her the enchanted ring to take to Roge'ro; so, under the form of Atlantes, she went to Alcina's isle, delivered Rogero, and disenchanted all the captives in the island.

In bk. xix. Melissa, under the form of Rodomont, persuaded Agramant to break the league which was to settle the contest by single combat, and a general battle ensued.--Ariosto, _Orlando Furioso_ (1516).

? This incident of bk. xix. is similar to that in Homer's _Iliad_, iii.

iv., where Paris and Menelaos agree to settle the contest by single combat; but Minerva persuades Pandaros to break the truce, and a general battle ensues.

=Me'lita= (now _Malta_). The point to which the vessel that carried St.

Paul was driven was the "Porto de San Paolo," and according to tradition, the cathedral of Citta Vecchia stands on the site of the house of Publius, the Roman governor. St. Paul's grotto, a cave in the vicinity, is so named in honor of this great apostle.

=Meli'tus=, a gentleman of Cyprus, in the drama called _The Laws of Candy_, by Beaumont and Fletcher (1647).

=Melizyus=, king of Thessaly, in the golden era of Saturn. He was the first to tame horses for the use of man.

_Melizyus_ (_King_) held his court in the Tower of Chivalry, and there knighted Graunde Amoure, after giving him the following advice:

And first _Good Hope_ his legge harneyes should be; His habergion, of _Perfect Ryhteousnes_, Gird first with the girdle of _Chast.i.tie_; His rich placarde should be good busines, Brodred with _Alms_ ...

The helmet _Mekenes_, and the shelde _Good Fayeth_, His swerde _G.o.d's Word_, as St. Paule sayeth.

Stephen Hawes, _The Pa.s.se-tyme of Plesure_, xxviii. (1515).

=Mell= (_Mr._), the poor, down-trodden second master at Salem House, the school of Mr. Creakles. Mr. Mell played the flute. His mother lived in an almshouse, and Steerforth used to taunt Mell with this "degradation,"

and indeed caused him to be discharged. Mell emigrated to Australia, and succeeded well in the new country.--C. d.i.c.kens, _David Copperfield_ (1849).

=Melle'font= (2 _syl._), in love with Cynthia, daughter of Sir Paul Pliant. His aunt, Lady Touchwood, had a criminal fondness for him, and, because he repelled her advances, she vowed his ruin. After pa.s.sing several hair-breadth escapes from the "double dealing" of his aunt and his "friend," Maskwell, he succeeded in winning and marrying the lady of his attachment.--W. Congreve, _The Double Dealer_ (1700).

=Mellifluous Doctor= (_The_), St. Bernard, whose writings were called "a river of paradise" (1091-1153).

=Melnotte= (_Claude_), a gardener's son, in love with Pauline, "the Beauty of Lyons," but treated by her with contempt. Beauseant and Glavis, two other rejected suitors, conspired with him to humble the proud fair one.

To this end, Claude a.s.sumed to be the prince of Como, and Pauline married him, but was indignant when she discovered how she had been duped. Claude left her to join the French army, and, under the name of Morier, rose in two years and a half to the rank of colonel. He then returned to Lyons, and found his father-in-law on the eve of bankruptcy, and Pauline about to be sold to Beauseant to pay the creditors. Claude paid the money required, and claimed Pauline as his loving and truthful wife.--Lord L. B. Lytton, _Lady of Lyons_ (1838).

=Melo= (_Juan de_), born at Castile in the fifteenth century. A dispute having arisen at Esalo'na upon the question whether Achilles or Hector were the braver warrior, the Marquis de Ville'na called out, "Let us see if the advocates of Achilles can fight as well as prate." At the word, there appeared in the a.s.sembly a gigantic fire-breathing monster, which repeated the same challenge. Every one shrank back except Juan de Melo, who drew his sword and placed himself before King Juan II. to protect him, "tide life, tide death." The king appointed him alcayde of Alcala la Real, in Grana'da, for his loyalty.--_Chronica de Don Alvaro de Luna._

=Melrose= (_Violet_), an heiress, who marries Charles Middlewick. This was against the consent of his father, because Violet had the bad taste to snub the retired tradesman, and considered vulgarity as the "unpardonable sin."