Chapter of War of H by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

of War

Homeric Verse Hexameter verse; so called because Homer adopted it in his two great epics. (See Hexameter Verse.)

Homoeopathy (5 syl.). The plan of curing a disease by very minute doses of a medicine which would in healthy persons produce the very same disease. The principle of vaccination is a sort of homoeopathy, only it is producing in a healthy person a mitigated form of the disease guarded against. You impart a mild form of small-pox to prevent the patient from taking the virulent disease. (Greek, homoios pathos, like disease.) (See Hahnemann.)

"Tut, man! one fire burns out another's burning!
One pain is lessened by another's anguish ...
Take thou some new infection to the eye,
And the rank poison of the old will die."
Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet, i.2.

Honest (h silent). Honest Jack Bannister. An actor in London for thirty-six years. (1760-1836.)

"After his retirement he was once accosted by Sir George Rose, when Honest Jack, being on the other side of the street, cried out, `Stop a moment. Sir George, and I will come over to you.' `No, no, replied his friend,' `I never yet made you cross, and will not begin now." - Grinsted: Relics of Genius.

Honest George General Monk (1608-1670).

Honest Lawyer (An). The oldest allusion to this strange expression is the epigram on St. Ives (1251- 1303), of whom Dom Lobineau says: "Il distribuait avec une sainte profusion aux pauvres les revenus de son bénéfice et ceux de son patrimonie, qui etaient dé £60 de rente, alors une somme très notable, particulièrement en Basse Bretagne. " (Lives of the Saints of Great Britain.)

"Sanctus Yvo erat Brito,
Advocatus, et non latro.
Res miranda populo."

   St. Ives was of the land of beef,
An advocate, and not a thief;
A stretch on popular belief. E.C.B.
   The phrase was facetiously applied by some wag to Sir John Strange, Master of the Rolls, who died, at the age of fifty-eight, in 1754.

"Here lies an honest lawyer, that is Strange."

    Of course this line forms no part of the inscription in Leyton churchyard, Essex, where Sir John was buried.

Honey Madness There is a rhododendron about Trebizond, the flowers of which the bees are fond of, but if anyone eats the honey he becomes mad. (Tourneford.)

Honey Soap contains no portion of honey. Some is made from the finest yellow soap; and some is a mixture of palm-oil soap, olive-soap, and curdsoap. It is scented with oil of verbena, rose-geranium, ginger-grass, bergamot, etc.

Honey better than Vinegar "On prend plus de mouches avec du miel, qu'avec du vinaigre." "Plus fait douceur que violence." "It faut avoir mauvaise bête par douceur."
   It is better to be preserved in vinegar than to rot in honey. It is better to suffer affliction if thereby the heart is brought to God, than to lose body and soul by worldly indulgences.

Honeycomb The hexagonal shape of the bees' cells is generally ascribed to the instinctive skill of the bee, but is simply the ordinary result of mechanical laws. Solitary bees always make circular cells; and without doubt those of hive bees are made cylindrical, but acquire their hexagonal form by mechanical pressure. Dr. Wollaston says all cylinders made of soft pliable materials become hexagonal under such circumstances. The cells of trees are circular towards the extremity, but hexagonal in the centre of the substance; and the cellular membranes of all vegetables are hexagonal also. (See Ant.)
   Will Honeycomb. A fine gentleman. One of the members of the imaginary club from which the Spectator issued.

Honeydew A sweet substance found on lime-trees and some other plants. Bees and ants are fond of it. It is a curious misnomer, as it is the excretion of the aphis or vine-fretter. The way it is excreted is this: the ant beats with its antennae the abdomen of the aphis, which lifts up the part beaten, and excretes a limpid drop of sweet juice called honeydew.