Asses. Its proper power to hurt, each creature feels;
Bulls aim their horns, and asses lift their heels.
POPE Imitations of Horace.

Theseus. I wonder if the lion be to speak. Demetrius. No wonder, my lord; one lion may, when many asses do.

SHAKESPEARE, Midsummer-Night's Dream, v, I

Satire I, Book ii, lines 85, 86

Assurance.

I'll make assurance doubly sure, And take a bond of fate.-SHAKESPEARE, Macbeth, iv, 1 Assyrian.— The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold. BYRON, Destruction of Sennacherib, st. 1

Astronomer.- An undevout astronomer is mad.
YOUNG, Night Thoughts, IX, line 773

Atheism. A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion. Atheism is rather in the lip than in the heart of man. BACON, Essay XVI: Of Atheism Atheist. By night an atheist half believes a god. YOUNG, Night Thoughts, V, line 176

Atlantis. The lost Atlantis of our youth!
LONGFELLOW, Ultima Thule, Dedication, st. 2

Attempt. Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt;
Nothing's so hard, but search will find it out.
HERRICK, Seek and Find

Attractive. Here's metal more attractive. SHAKESPEARE, Hamlet, iii, Auld Lang Syne.-Should auld acquaintance be forgot,

And never brought to min'?

We'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

BURNS, Auld Lang Syne

Austrian. An Austrian army, awfully arrayed,
Boldly by battery besieged Belgrade.

ANONYMOUS, Siege of Belgrade Authors. Authors, like coins, grow dear as they grow old; It is the rust we value, not the gold.

POPE, Imitations of Horace, Epistle I, Book ii, lines 35, 36

Avarice.

So, for a good old gentlemanly vice,
I think I must take up with avarice.
BYRON, Don Juan, Canto i, st. 216

Avenged.—'T is an old tale and often told;
But did my fate and wish agree,
Ne'er had been read in story old
Of maiden true betrayed for gold

That loved or was avenged like me!
SCOTT, Marmion, ii, st. 27

O God! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be avenged on my misdeeds,
Yet execute thy wrath in [on] me alone;
Oh, spare my guiltless wife and my poor children!
SHAKESPEARE, King Richard III, i, 4

Avenging.

So wills the fierce avenging Sprite,
Till blood for blood atones!
Ay, though he's buried in a cave,
And trodden down with stones,
And years have rotted off his flesh,-
The world shall see his bones!

HOOD, The Dream of Eugene Aram

Awake. Awake, arise, or be for ever fallen!
MILTON, Paradise Lost, I, line 33

Aweary.

Cassius is aweary of the world;
Hated by one he loves; braved by his brother;
Checked like a bondman; all his faults observed,
Set in a note-book, learned, and conned by rote,
To cast into my teeth.

SHAKESPEARE, Julius Cæsar, iv, 3

Axe. When I see a merchant over-polite to his customers, begging them to taste a little brandy, and throwing half his goods on the counter, thinks I, that man has an axe to grind. C. MINOR, Who'll Turn Grindstones? Axis. The axis of the earth sticks out visibly through the centre of each and every town or city.

HOLMES, Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table, vi

Baby. Who can tell what a baby thinks?
Who can follow the gossamer links

By which the mannikin feels his way
Out from the shore of the great unknown,
Blind, and wailing, and alone,

Into the light of day?

J. G. HOLLAND, Bitter Sweet: First Movement - The Question Stated

"Where did you come from, baby dear?"
"Out of the everywhere into the here.'
G. MACDONALD, The Baby, st. I

""

Oh, hush thee, my baby, thy sire was a knight,
Thy mother a lady both lovely and bright.
SCOTT, Lullaby of an Infant Chief, st. x

Bacchus. Bacchus, ever fair and young,
Drinking joys did first ordain;
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure:
Rich the treasure,

Sweet the pleasure,

Sweet is pleasure after pain.

DRYDEN, Alexander's Feast, lines 54-60

Bachelor.

When I said I would die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I were married.

SHAKESPEARE, Much Ado about Nothing, ii, 3

Bachelor's Hall.- Bachelor's Hall, what a quare-lookin' place

it is!

Kape me from such all the days of my life!
Sure but I think what a burnin' disgrace it is,
Niver at all to be gettin' a wife.

Pots, dishes, pans, an' such grasy commodities,
Ashes and praty-skins, kiver the floor;
His cupboard's a storehouse of comical oddities,
Things that had niver been neighbours before.
JOHN FINLEY, Bachelor's Hall, st. 1, 2
Bad.-Tis no shame to be bad, because 't is so common.
CYRIL TOURNEUR, The Revenger's Tragedy, ii, 1

Bairns. Oh, bairnies, cuddle doon!
ALEXANDER ANDERSON, Cuddle Doon

They say barnes are blessings. SHAKESPEARE, All's Well That Ends Well, i, 3 Bait.- Bait the hook well; this fish will bite. SHAKESPEARE, Much Ado about Nothing, ii, 3 Balance. I called the New World into existence to redress the balance of the Old. CANNING, The King's Message

Ballads. I knew a very wise man that believed that if a man were permitted to make all the ballads he need not care who should make the laws of a nation.

ANDREW FLETCHER OF SALTOUN, Letter to the

Marquis of Montrose

Balm.-"Is there is there balm in Gilead? - tell me me, I implore!"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore!"
POE, The Raven, st. 15

Bank. I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows.

Banishment. The bitter bread of banishment. SHAKESPEARE, King Richard II, iii, 1

tell

SHAKESPEARE, Midsummer-Night's Dream, ii, 1

Banner. For ever float that standard sheet!

Where breathes the foe but falls before us,
With Freedom's soil beneath our feet,

And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us?
DRAKE, The American Flag, st. 5

Oh, say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleam-
ing?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,

O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming;

And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
F. S. KEY, The Star-Spangled Banner, st. 1
Our glorious Semper Eadem, the banner of our pride.
MACAULAY, The Armada, line 30

Banquet-hall. I feel like one

Who treads alone
Some banquet-hall deserted,
Whose lights are fled,
Whose garlands dead,
And all but he departed.

Banners.

Hang out our banners on the outward walls;
The cry is still "They come!" our castle's strength
Will laugh a siege to scorn.-SHAKESPEARE, Macbeth, v, 5

Bar.- Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!

↑. MOORE, Oft in the Stilly Night, st. 2

And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea.1

1 Raise ye no cry, and let no moan

Be made when I depart.-FELICIA HEMANS, The Cid's Deathbed, st. 9

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

Too full for sound and foam,1

When that which drew from out the boundless deep2
Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark.
TENNYSON, Crossing the Bar

Barbarism.

There is a moral of all human tales;
'T is but the same rehearsal of the past,
First freedom, and then glory when that fails,
Wealth, vice, corruption,- barbarism at last.

BYRON, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto iv, st. 108

Barbered. Being barbered ten times o'er.
SHAKESPEARE, Antony and Cleopatra, ii, 2
Bard. A bard here dwelt, more fat than bard beseems.
JAMES THOMSON, The Castle of Indolence, Canto i,

st. 68 Bargain. So clap hands and a bargain. SHAKESPEARE, King Henry V, v, 2

Bark.

That fatal and perfidious bark,
Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark.
MILTON, Lycidas, lines 100, 101

Barleycorn.- John Barleycorn was a hero bold,

Of noble enterprise,

For if you do but taste his blood,
'T will make your courage rise.

BURNS, John Barleycorn, st. 13

1 How still the plains of the water be! The tide is in his ecstasy.

The tide is at his highest height:

And it is night.-LANIER, The Marshes of Glynn, st. 10

And last in kindly curves, with gentlest fall,
By quiet fields, a slowly-dying power,
To that last deep where we and thou are still.

TENNYSON, De Profundis, i

Out of the deep, Spirit, out of the deep,
With this ninth moon, that sends the hidden sun
Down yon dark sea, thou comest, darling boy.
TENNYSON, De Profundis, ii, st. 1

Where is he who knows? From the great deep to the great deep he goes. TENNYSON, Coming of Arthur, lines 409, 410