Character Sketches of Romance Volume Iii Part 137

=Sancho= (_Don_), a rich old beau, uncle to Victoria. "He affects the misdemeanors of a youth, hides his baldness with amber locks, and complains of toothache, to make people believe that his teeth are not false ones." Don Sancho "loves in the style of Roderigo I."--Mrs.

Cowley, _A Bold Stroke for a Husband_ (1782).

=Sancho Panza=, the squire of Don Quixote. A short, pot-bellied peasant, with plenty of shrewdness and good common sense. He rode upon an a.s.s which he dearly loved, and was noted for his proverbs.

_Sancho Panza's a.s.s_, Dapple.

_Sancho Panza's Island-City_, Barataria, where he was for a time governor.

_Sancho Panza's Wife_, Teresa [Cascajo] (pt. II. i. 5); Maria or Mary [Gutierez] (pt. II. iv. 7); Dame Juana [Gutierez] (pt. I. i. 7); and Joan (pt. I. iv. 21).--Cervantes, _Don Quixote_ (1605-15).

? The model painting of Sancho Panza is by Leslie; it is called "Sancho and the d.u.c.h.ess."

=Sanchoni'athon= or SANCHONIATHO. Nine books ascribed to this author are published at Bremen in 1838. The original was said to have been discovered in the convent of St. Maria de Merinhao, by Colonel Pereira, a Portuguese; but it was soon ascertained that no such convent existed, that there was no colonel of the name Pereira in the Portuguese service, and that the paper bore the water-mark of the Osnabruck paper-mills.

(See IMPOSTORS, LITERARY.)

=Sanct-Cyr= (_Hugh de_), the seneschal of King Rene, at Aix.--Sir W.

Scott, _Anne of Geierstein_ (time, Edward IV.).

=Sancy Diamond= (_The_) weighs 53-1/2 carats, and belonged to Charles "the Bold" of Burgundy. It was bought, in 1495, by Emmanuel of Portugal, and was sold, in 1580, by Don Antonio to the Sieur de Sancy, in whose family it remained for a century. The sieur deposited it with Henri IV.

as a security for a loan of money. The servant entrusted with it, being attacked by robbers, swallowed it, and being murdered, the diamond was recovered by Nicholas de Harlay. We next hear of it in the possession of James II. of England, who carried it with him in his flight, in 1688.

Louis XIV. bought it of him for 25,000. It was sold in the Revolution; Napoleon I. rebought it; in 1825 it was sold to Paul Demidoff for 80,000. The prince sold it, in 1830, to M. Levrat, administrator of the Mining Society; but as Levrat failed in his engagement, the diamond became, in 1832, the subject of a lawsuit, which was given in favor of the prince. We next hear of it in Bombay; in 1867 it was transmitted to England by the firm of Forbes and Co.; in 1873 it formed part of "the crown necklace," worn by Mary of Sachsen Altenburg, on her marriage with Albert of Prussia; 1876, in the invest.i.ture of the Star of India by the Prince of Wales, in Calcutta, Dr. W. H. Russel tells us it was worn as a pendant by the maharajah of Puttiala.

? Streeter, in his book of _Precious Stones and Gems_, 120 (1877), tells us it belongs to the Czar of Russia, but if Dr. Russel is correct, it must have been sold to the maharajah.

=Sand= (_George_). Her birth name was Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, afterwards Dudevant (1803-1877).

=San'dabar=, an Arabian writer, about a century before the Christian era, famous for his _parables_.

It was rumored he could say The _parables_ of Sandabar.

Longfellow, _The Wayside Inn_ (prelude 1863).

=Sanford= (_Marion_). Truth-loving, sincere, and simple-hearted woman, loyal in deed and thought to her traduced lover until time establishes his innocence.

A marked woman in general society; a woman who reigned, queen-like, over every heart, but among the circle of her relatives ... she was held to be little less than the angels.--Charles King, _Marion's Faith_ (1886).

=Sandford= (_Harry_), the companion of Tommy Merton.--Thomas Day, _History of Sandford and Merton_ (1783-9).

=Sandpiper= (_The_).

"Comrade, where wilt thou be to-night?

When the loosed storm breaks furiously?

My driftwood fire will burn so bright!

To what warm shelter can'st thou fly?

I do not fear for thee, 'though wroth The tempest rushes through the sky.

For are we not G.o.d'S children both, Thou little sandpiper and I?"

Celia Thaxter, _Drift-weed_ (1878).

=San'glamore= (3 _syl._), the sword of Braggadochio.--Spenser, _Faery Queen_, iii. (1590).

=Sanglier= (_Sir_), a knight who insisted on changing wives with a squire, and when the lady objected, he cut off her head, and rode off with the squire's wife. Being brought before Sir Artegal, Sir Sanglier insisted that the living lady was his wife, and that the dead woman was the squire's wife. Sir Artegal commanded that the living and dead women should both be cut in twain, and half of each be given to the two litigants. To this Sir Sanglier gladly a.s.sented; but the squire objected, declaring it would be far better to give the lady to the knight than that she should suffer death. On this, Sir Artegal p.r.o.nounced the living woman to be the squire's wife, and the dead one to be the knight's.--Spenser, _Faery Queen_, v. 1 (1596).

("Sir Sanglier" is meant for Shan O'Neil, leader of the Irish insurgents in 1567. Of course this judgment is borrowed from that of Solomon, 1 _Kings_ iii. 16-27.)

=Sanglier des Ardennes=, Guillaume de la Marck (1446-1485).

=Sangraal=, =Sancgreal=, etc., generally said to be the holy plate from which Christ ate at the Last Supper, brought to England by Joseph of Arimathy. Whatever it was, it appeared to King Arthur and his 150 knights of the Round Table, but suddenly vanished, and all the knights vowed they would go in quest thereof. Only three, Sir Bors, Sir Percivale and Sir Galahad, found it, and only Sir Galahad had touched it, but he soon died, and was borne by angels up into heaven. The Sangraal of Arthurian romance is "the dish" containing Christ transubstantiated by the sacrament of the Ma.s.s, and made visible to the bodily eye of man. This will appear quite obvious to the reader by the following extracts:--

Then anon they heard cracking and crying of thunder.... In the midst of the blast entered a sunbeam more clear by seven times than the day, and all they were alighted of the grace of the Holy Ghost.... Then there entered into the hall the Holy Grale covered with white samite, but there was none that could see it, nor who bare it, but the whole hall was full filled with good odors, and every knight had such meat and drink as he best loved in the world, and when the Holy Grale had been borne through the hall, then the holy vessel departed suddenly, and they wist not where it became.--Ch. 35.

Then looked they and saw a man come out of the holy vessel, that had all the signs of the pa.s.sion of Christ, and he said ... "This is the holy dish wherein I ate the lamb on Sher-Thursday, and now hast thou seen it ... yet hast thou not seen it so openly as thou shalt see it in the city of Sarras ... therefore thou must go hence and bear with thee this holy vessel, for this night it shall depart from the realm of Logris ... and take with thee ... Sir Percivale and Sir Bors."--Ch. 101.

So departed Sir Galahad, and Sir Percivale and Sir Bors with him.

And so they rode three days, and came to a river, and found a ship ... and when on board, they found in the midst the table of silver and the Sancgreall covered with red samite.... Then Sir Galahad laid him down and slept ... and when he woke ... he saw the city of Sarras (ch. 103).... At the year's end ... he saw before him the holy vessel, and a man kneeling upon his knees in the likeness of the bishop, which had about him a great fellowship of angels, as it had been Christ Himself ... and when he came to the sakering of the Ma.s.s, and had done, anon he called Sir Galahad, and said unto him, "Come forth ... and thou shalt see that which thou hast much desired to see" ... and he beheld spiritual things ... (ch.

104).--Sir T. Malory, _History of Prince Arthur_, iii. 35, 101, 104 (1470).

The earliest story of the Holy Graal was in verse (A.D. 1100), author unknown.

Chretien de Troyes has a romance in eight-syllable verse on the same subject (1170).

Guiot's tale of _t.i.turel_, founder of Graalburg, and _Parzival_, prince thereof, belongs to the twelfth century.

Wolfram von Eschenbach, a minnesinger, took Guiot's tale as the foundation of his poem (thirteenth century).

In _t.i.turel the Younger_ the subject is very fully treated.

Sir T. Malory (in pt. iii. of the _History of Prince Arthur_, translated in 1470 from the French) treats the subject in prose very fully.

R. S. Hawker has a poem on the _Sangraal_, but it was never completed.

Tennyson has an idyll called _The Holy Grail_ (1858).

Boisseree published, in 1834, at Munich, a work _On the Description of the Temple of the Holy Graal_.