Chapter Doomstead to Douay Bible of D by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Doomstead to Douay Bible

Doomstead The horse of the Scandinavian Nornes or Fates. (See Horse .)

Door (Greek, thura; Anglo-Saxon, dora.)
   The door must be either shut or open. It must be one way or the other. This is from a French comedy called Le Grondeur, where the master scolds his servant for leaving the door open. The servant says that he was scolded the last time for shutting it, and adds: "Do you wish it shut?" - "No." - "Do you wish it open?" - "No." - "Why," says the man, "it must be either shut or open."
   He laid the charge at my door. He accused me of doing it.
   Next door to it. As, if not so, it was next door to it, i.e. very like it, next-door neighbour to it.
   Sin lieth at the door (Gen. iv. 7). The blame of sin lies at the door of the wrong-doer, and he must take the consequences.

Door Nail (See Dead .) Scrooge's partner is "dead as a door-nail." (Dickens. Christmas Carol, chap. i.)

Door-opener (The). So Crates, the Theban, was called, because every morning he used to go round Athens and rebuke the people for their late rising.

Door-tree (A) The wooden bar of a door to secure it at night from intruders. Also a door-post.

Doors [house ]. As, come indoors, go indoors. So Virgil: "Tum foribus divæ ... [Dido]... resedit. " (Then Dido seated herself in the house or temple of the goddess.) (Æneid, i. 505.)
   Out of doors. Outside the house; in the open air.

Doorm An earl called "the Bull," who tried to make Enid his handmaid; but, when she would neither eat, drink, nor array herself in bravery at his bidding, "he smote her on the cheek;" whereupon her lord and husband, Count Geraint, starting up, slew the "russet-bearded earl" in his own hall. (Tennyson: Idylls of the King; Enid.)

Dora The first wife of David Copperfield; she was a child-wife, but no help-meet. She could do nothing of practical use, but looked on her husband with idolatrous love. Tennyson has a poem entitled Dora.

Dorado (El). (See El Dorado .)

Dorax A Portuguese renegade, in Dryden's Don Sebastian - by far the best of all his characters.

Dorcas Society A society for supplying the poor with clothing. So called from Dorcas, mentioned in Acts ix. 39.

Dorchester As big as a Dorchester butt. Very corpulent, like the butts of Dorchester. Of Toby Filpot it is said:

"His breath-doors of life on a sudden were shut,
And he died full as big as a Dorchester butt."
O'Keefe: Poor Soldier.

Doric The oldest, strongest, and simplest of the Grecian orders of architecture. So called from Doris, in Greece, or the Dorians who employed it. The Greek Doric is simpler than the Roman imitation. The former stands on the pavement without fillet or other ornament and the flutes are not scalloped. The Roman column is placed on a plinth, has fillets, and the flutings, both top and bottom, are scalloped.

Doric Dialect The dialect spoken by the natives of Doris, in Greece. It was broad and hard. Hence, any broad dialect.

Doric Land Greece, Doris being a part of Greece.

"Through all the bounds
Of Doric land."
Milton: Paradise Lost, book 1. 510.

Doric Reed Pastoral poetry. Everything Doric was very plain, but cheerful, chaste, and solid. The Dorians were the pastoral people