Character Sketches of Romance Volume I Part 78

CLUB-BEARER _(The)_, Periphe'tes, the robber of Ar'golis, who murdered his victims with an iron club.--_Greek Fable_.

CLUMSEY _(Sir Tunbelly_), father of Miss Hoyden. A mean, ill-mannered squire and justice of the peace, living near Scarborough. Most cringing to the aristocracy, whom he toadies and courts. Sir Tunbelly promises to give his daughter in marriage to Lord Foppington, but Tom Fashion, his lordship's younger brother, pretends to be Lord Foppington, gains admission to the family and marries her. When the real Lord Foppington arrives he is treated as an imposter, but Tom confesses the ruse. His lordship treats the knight with such ineffable contempt, that Sir Tunbelly's temper is aroused, and Tom is received into high favor.--Sheridan, _A Trip to Scarborough_ (1777).

[Ill.u.s.tration] This character appears in Vanbrugh's _Relapse_, of which comedy the _Trip to Scarborough_ is an abridgment and adaptation.

CLU'RICAUNE (3 _syl_.), an Irish elf of evil disposition, especially noted for his knowledge of hidden treasure. He generally a.s.sumes the appearance of a wrinkled old man.

CLUTTERBUCK (_Captain_), the hypothetical editor of some of Sir Walter Scott's novels, as _The Monastery_ and _The Fortunes of Nigel_.

Captain Clutterbuck is a retired officer, who employs himself in antiquarian researches and literary idleness. _The Abbot_ is dedicated by the "author of _Waverley_" to "Captain Clutterbuck," late of his majesty's--infantry regiment.

CLYM OF THE CLOUGH ("_Clement of the Cliff_"), noted outlaw, a.s.sociated with Adam Bell and William of Cloudesley, in Englewood Forest, near Carlisle. When William was taken prisoner at Carlisle, and was about to be hanged, Adam and Clym shot the magistrates, and rescued their companion. The mayor with his _posse_ went out against them, but they shot the mayor, as they had done the sheriff, and fought their way out of the town. They then hastened to London to beg pardon of the king, which was granted them at the queen's intercession. The king, wishing to see a specimen of their shooting, was so delighted at their skill that he made William a "gentleman of fe," and the other two "yemen of his chambre."--Percy, _Reliques_ ("Adam Bell," etc., I. ii. 1).

CLY'TIE, a water-nymph in love with Apollo. Meeting with no return, she was changed into a sunflower, or rather a _tournesol_, which still turns to the sun, following him through his daily course.

The sunflower does not turn to the sun. On the same stem may be seen flowers in every direction, and not one of them shifts the direction in which it has first opened. T. Moore (1814) says:

The sunflower turns on her G.o.d when he sets, The same look which she turned when he rose.

This may do in poetry, but it is not correct. The sunflower is so called simply because the flower resembles a pictured sun.

Lord Thurlow (1821) adopted Tom Moore's error, and enlarged it:

Behold, my dear, this lofty flower, That now the golden sun receives; No other deity has power, But only Phoebus, on her leaves; As he in radiant glory burns, From east to west her visage turns.

_The Sunflower_.

CLYTUS, an old officer in the army of Philip of Macedon, and subsequently in that of Alexander. At a banquet, when both were heated with wine, Clytus said to Alexander, "Philip fought men, but Alexander women," and after some other insults, Alexander in his rage stabbed the old soldier; but instantly repented and said:

What has my vengeance done?

Who is it thou hast slain? Clytus? What was he The faithfullest subject, worthiest counsellor, The bravest soldier. He who saved my life Fighting bare-headed at the river Granic.

For a rash word, spoke in the heat of wine, The poor, the honest Clytus thou hast slain,-- Clytus, thy friend, thy guardian, thy preserver!

N. Lee, _Alexander the Great_, iv. 2 (1678).

CNE'US, the Roman officer in command of the guard set to watch the tomb of Jesus, lest the disciples should steal the body, and then declare that it had risen from the dead.--Klopstock, _The Messiah_, xiii. (1771). CO'AN (_The_), Hippocrates, the "Father of Medicine"

(B.C. 460-357).

... the great Coan, him whom Nature made To serve the costliest creature of her tribe [_man_].

Dante, _Purgatory_, xxix. (1308).

CO'ANOCOT'ZIN (_5 syl_.), King of the Az'tecas. Slain in battle by Madoc.--Southey, _Madoc_ (1805).

CO'ATEL, daughter of Acul'hua, a priest of the Az'tecas, and wife of Lincoya. Lincoya, being doomed for sacrifice, fled for refuge to Madoc, the Welsh Prince, who had recently landed on the North American coast, and was kindly treated by him. This gave Coatel a sympathetic interest in the White strangers, and she was not backward in showing it. Then, when young Hoel was kidnapped, and confined in a cavern to starve to death, Coatel visited him and took him food. Again, when Prince Madoc was entrapped, she contrived to release him, and a.s.sisted the prince to carry off young Hoel. After the defeat of the Az'tecas by the White strangers, the chief priest declared that some one had proved a traitor, and resolved to discover who it was by handing round a cup, which he said would be harmless to the innocent, but death to the guilty. When it was handed to Coatel, she was so frightened that she dropped down dead. Her father stabbed himself, and "fell upon his child," and when Lincoya heard thereof, he flung himself down from a steep precipice on to the rocks below.--Southey, _Madoc_ (1805).

COBB (_Ephraim_), in Cromwell's troop.--Sir W. Scott, _Woodstock_ (time, Commonwealth).

COBBLER-POET (_The_), Hans Sachs, of Nuremberg. (See TWELVE WISE MASTERS).

COBHAM (_Eleanor_), wife of Humphrey, duke of Gloucester, and aunt of King Henry VI., compelled to do penance barefoot in a sheet in London, and after that to live in the Isle of Man in banishment, for "sorcery." In _2 Henry VI_., Shakespeare makes Queen Margaret "box her ears," but this could not be, as Eleanor was banished three years before Margaret came to England.

Stand forth, dame Eleanor Cobham, Gloster's wife ...

You, madam ... despoiled of your honor ...

Shall, after three days' open penance done, Live in your country, here in banishment, With Sir John Stanley, in the Isle of Man.

Shakespeare, _2 Henry VI_. act ii. sc. 3 (1591).

c.o.c.k OF WESTMINSTER (_The_). Castell, a shoemaker, was so called from his very early hours. He was one of the benefactors of Christ's Hospital (London).

c.o.c.kER (_Edward_), published a useful treatise on arithmetic, in the reign of Charles II., which had a prodigious success, and has given rise to the proverb, "According to c.o.c.ker" (1632-1675).

c.o.c.kLE (_Sir John_), the miller of Mansfield, and keeper of Sherwood Forest. Hearing a gun fired one night, he went into the forest, expecting to find poachers, and seized the king (Henry VIII.), who had been hunting and had got separated from his courtiers. When the miller discovered that his captor was not a poacher, he offered him a night's lodging. Next day the courtiers were brought to c.o.c.kle's house by under-keepers, to be examined as poachers, and it was then discovered that the miller's guest was the king. The "merry monarch" knighted the miller, and settled on him 1000 marks a year.--R. Dodsley, _The King and the Miller of Mansfield_ (1737).

c.o.c.kney (_Nicholas_), a rich city grocer, brother of Barnacle.

Priscilla Tomboy, of the West Indies, is placed under his charge for her education.

_Walter c.o.c.kney_, son of the grocer, in the shop. A conceited young prig, not yet out of the quarrelsome age. He makes boy-love to Priscilla Tomboy and Miss La Blond; but says he will "tell papa" if they cross him.

_Penelope c.o.c.kney_, sister of Walter.--_The Romp_ (altered from Bickerstaff's _Love in the City_).

Coelebs' Wife, a bachelor's ideal of a model wife. Coelebs is the hero of a novel, by Mrs. Hannah Moore, ent.i.tled _Coelebs in Search of a Wife_ (1809).

In short, she was a walking calculation, Miss Edgworth's novels stepping from their covers, Or Mrs. Trimmer's books on education.

Or "Coelebs' wife" set out in quest of lovers.

Byron, _Don Juan_, i. 16 (1819).

COEUR DE LION, Surname of Richard of England (1157-1199.) Also conferred upon Louis VIII. of France.

COFFIN (_Long Tom_), the best sailor character ever drawn. He is introduced in _The Pilot_, a novel by J. Fenimore Cooper. Cooper's novel has been dramatized by E. Fitzball, under the same name, and Long Tom Coffin preserves in the burletta his reckless daring, his unswerving fidelity, his simple-minded affection, and his love for the sea.

COGIA HOUSSAIN, the captain of forty thieves, outwitted by Morgiana, the slave. When, in the guise of a merchant, he was entertained by Ali Baba, and refused to eat any salt, the suspicions of Morgiana was aroused, and she soon detected him to be the captain of the forty thieves. After supper she amused her master and his guest with dancing; then playing with Cogia's dagger for a time, she plunged it suddenly into his heart and killed him.--_Arabian Nights_ ("Ali Baba or the Forty Thieves").

COL'AX. Flattery personified in _The Purple Island_ (1633), by Phineas Fletcher. Colax "all his words with sugar spices ... lets his tongue to sin, and takes rent of shame ... His art [_was_] to hide and not to heal a sore." Fully described in canto viii. (Greek, _kolax_, "a flatterer or fawner.")

COLBRAND or COLEBROND (_2 syl_.), the Danish giant, slain in the presence of King Athelstan, by Sir Guy of Warwick, just returned from a pilgrimage, still "in homely russet clad," and in his hand a "hermit's staff." The combat is described at length by Drayton, in his _Polyolbion_, xii.

One could scarcely bear his axe ...

Whose squares were laid with plates, and riveted with steel, And armed down along with pikes, whose hardened points ... had power to tear the joints Of cuira.s.s or of mail.

Drayton, _Polyolbion_, xii. (1613).

COLDSTREAM (_Sir Charles_), the chief character in Charles Mathew's play called _Used up_. He is wholly _ennuye_, sees nothing to admire in anything; but is a living personification of mental inanity and physical imbecility.

COLE (_1 syl._), a legendary British king, described as "a merry old soul," fond of his pipe, fond of his gla.s.s, and fond of his "fiddlers three." There were two kings so called--Cole (or Col I.) was the predecessor of Porrex; but Col II. was succeeded by Lucius, "the first British king who embraced the Christian religion." Which of these two mythical kings the song refers to is not evident.

_Cole (Mrs.)_. This character is designed for Mother Douglas, who kept a "gentlemen's magazine of frail beauties" in a superbly furnished house at the north-east corner of Covent Garden. She died 1761.--S.

Foote, _The Minor_ (1760).

COLEIN (_2 syl._), the great dragon slain by Sir Bevis of Southampton.--Drayton, _Polyolbion_, ii. (1612).