Chapter Boots to Bos of B by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Border States (The ). The five “slave” states (Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri) which lay next to the “free states” were so called in the Civil War, 1861-1865.

Bordlands Lands kept by lords in Saxon times for the supply of their own board or table. (Anglo-Saxon, bord, a table.)

Bordlode Service paid for the land.

Bore (A ). A person who bestows his tediousness on you; one who wearies you with his prate, his company, or his solicitations. Verb bear, bore, borne, to endure. A bore is someone we bore with or endured.

“At this instant
He bores me with some trick.”
Shakespeare: Henry VIII., i. 1.

Bore A tidal wave.
   The most celebrated bores are those of the Brahmaputra, Ganges, Hooghly, Indus, and Tsintang (in China). Bores occur regularly in the Bristol Channel and Solway Frith; occasionally (in high tides), in the Clyde, Dee (Cheshire), Dornoch Frith, Lune, Severn, Trent (eygre ), and Wye. The bore of the Bay of Fundy is caused by the collision of the tides. (Icelandic bára, a wave or billow.)

Bore (in pugilistic language) is one who bears or presses on a man so as to force him to the ropes of the ring by his physical weight; figuratively, one who bears or presses on you by his pertinacity.

“All beggars are liable to rebuffs, with the certainty besides of being considered bores.”- Prince Albert, 1859.

Boreal Northern.

“In radiant streams,
Bright over Europe, bursts the Boreal morn.”
Thomson Autumn, 98.

Boreas The north wind. According to mythology, he was the son of Astræus, a Titan, and Eos, the morning, and lived in a cave of Mount Hæmus, in Thrace. (Greek, boros, voracious; Boreas, the north wind; Russian, boria, storm.)

“Cease, rude Boreas! blustering railer.”
Geo. Alex. Stevens.

“Omnia pontus haurit saxa vorax,” Lucan.

Borghese (Bor-ga'-zy ). The Princess Borghese pulled down a church contiguous to her palace, because the incense turned her sick and the organ made her head uneasy.

Borgia (See Lucrezia. )

Born Not born yesterday. Not to be taken in; worldly wise.

Born Days In all my born days. Ever since I was born.

Born in the Purple (a translation of porphyrogenitus ). The infant of royal parents in opposition to born in the gutter, or child of beggars. This has nothing to do with the purple robes of royalty. It refers to the chamber lined with porphyry by one of the Byzantine empresses for her accouchement. (See Nineteenth Century, March, 1894, p. 510.)

“Zoe, the fourth wife of Leo VI., gave birth to the future Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus in the purple chamber of the imperial palace.”- Finlay: History of the Byzantine and Greek Empires, vol. i.

Born with a Silver Spoon or Born with a silver spoon in one's mouth. Born to good luck; born with hereditary wealth. The reference is to the usual gift of a silver spoon by the godfather or godmother of