Chapter Middlemarch to Milesian Fables of M by Brewer's Readers Handbook

marry the husband selected for her by her father, she might be put to de ath. Egeus , an Athenian, promised to give his daughter Hermia in marriage to Demetrius; but, as the lady loved Lysander, she refused to marry the man selected by her father, and fled from Athens with her lover. Demetrius went in pursuit of her, followed b y Helena, who doted on him. All four came to a forest, and fell asleep. In their dreams a vision of fairies passed before them, and on awaking, Demetrius resolved to forego Hermia who disliked him, and to take to wife Helena who sincerely loved him. When Egeus was informed thereof, he readily agreed to give his daughter to Lysander, and the force of the law was not called into action (1592).

Several of the incidents of this comedy are borrowed from the Diana of Montemayor, a Spaniard (sixteenth century).

Midwife of Men’s Thoughts. So Socrâtês termed himself (B.C. 468–399).

No other man ever struck out of others so many sparks to set light to original thought.—Grote: History of Greece (1846–56).

Miggs (Miss), the handmaiden and “comforter” of Mrs. Varden. A tall, gaunt young woman, addicted to pattens; slender and shrewish, of a sharp and acid visage. She held the male sex in utter contempt, but had a secret exception in favour of Sim Tappertit, who irreverently called her “scraggy.” Miss Miggs always sided with madam against master, and made out that she was a suffering martyr, and he an inhuman Nero. She called ma’am “mim;” said her sister lived at “twenty-sivin;” Simon she called “Simmun.” She said Mrs. Varden was “the mildest, amiablest, forgivingest-sperited, longest-sufferingest female in existence.” Baffled in all her matrimonial hopes, she was at last appointed female turnkey to a county Bridewell, which office she held for thirty years, when she died.—Dickens: Barnaby Rudge (1841).

Miss Miggs, baffled in all her schemes…and cast upon a thankless, undeserving world, turned very sharp and sour…but the justices of the peace for Middlesex…selected her from 124 competitors to the office of turnkey for a county Bridewell, which she held till her decease, more than thirty years afterwards, remaining single all that time.—Last chapter.

Mignon, a beautiful, dwarfish, fairy-like Italian girl, in love with Wilhelm her protector. She glides before us in the mazy dance, or whirls her tambourine like an Ariel. Full of fervour, full of love, full of rapture, she is overwhelmed with the torrent of despair at finding her love is not returned, becomes insane, and dies.—Goethe: Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship (1794–6).

Sir W. Scott drew his “Fenella,” in Peveril of the Peak, from this character; and Victor Hugo has reproduced her in his Notre Dame, under the name of “Esmeralda.”

Migonnet, a fairy king, who wished to marry the princess brought up by Violenta the fairy mother.

Of all dwarfs he was the smallest. His feet were like an eagle’s and close to the knees, for legs he had none. His royal robes were not above half a yard long, and trailed one-third part upon the ground. His head was as big as a peck, and his nose long enough for twelve birds to perch on. His beard was bushy enough for a canary’s nest, and his ears reached a foot above his head.—Comtesse D’Aulnoy: Fairy Tales (“The White Cat,” 1682).

Mikado of Japan, the spiritual supreme or chief pontiff. The temporal supreme is called the koubo, segoon, or tycoon.

But thou, Micado, thou hast spoken
The word at which all locks are broken.
   —St. Paul’s (January, 1873).

Milan (The duke of), an Italian prince, an ally of the Lancastrians.—Sir

W. Scott: Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).

(Massinger has an excellent tragedy called The Duke of Millaine (1623). The duke is Sforza (fifteenth century). His speech before the emperor is admirable.)