Chapter Ordinary to Orlando of O by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Ordinary to Orlando

Ordinary (An). A public dinner where each guest pays his quota; a table d'hôte.

“ `Tis almost dinner; I know they stay for you at the ordinary.”- Beaumont and Fletcher: Scornful Lady. iv. l.

Oread (plural, Oreads [3 syl.] or Oreades [4 syl.]). Nymphs of the mountains. (Greek, oros a mountain.)

Oreilles Sir W. Scott (Waverley, x.) speaks of vinum primæ notæ thus:- “C'est des deux oreilles,” that is, it is strong and induces sleep. It makes one “Dormir sur les deux oreilles.” Littré, however, says, “Though wine d'une oreille is excellent, that of deux oreilles is execrable.”

“Vin d'une oreille, le bon vin; vin de deux oreilles le mauvais. On appelle, ainsi le bon vin, parce que le bon vin fait pencher la tête de celui qui le goute d'un côte seulement: et le mauvais vin, parce qu'on secoue la tête, et par consequent le deux oreilles.”

Orelio The steed of Don Roderick, the last of the Goths, noted for its speed and symmetry. (See Horse. )

Orellana The river Amazon in America: so called from Orellana, lieutenant of Pizarro.

Orfeo and Heurodis The tale of Orpheus and Eurydice, with the Gothic machinery of elves or fairies.

Orgies (2 syl.). Drunken revels, riotous feasts; so called from the nocturnal festivals in honour of Bacchus. (Greek, orge, violent emotion.)

Orgoglio (pron. Or-gole'-yo). The word is Italian, and means “Arrogant Pride,” or The Man of Sin. A hideous giant as tall as three men; he was son of Earth and Wind. Finding the Red Cross Knight at the fountain of Idleness, he beats him with a club and makes him his slave. Una, hearing of these mischances, tells King Arthur, and Arthur liberates the knight and slays the giant. Moral: The Man of Sin had power given him to “make war with the saints and to overcome them” for “forty and two months” (Rev. xiii. 5, 7), then the “Ancient of Days came,” and overcame him (Dan. vii. 21, 22). (Spenser: Faërie Queene, book i.)
    Arthur first cut off Orgoglio's left arm- i.e. Bohemia was first cut off from the Church of Rome. He then cut off the giant's right leg- i.e. England; and, this being cut off, the giant fell to the earth, and was afterwards dispatched.

Orgon Brother-in-law of Tartuffe. His credulity is proverbial: he almost disbelieved his senses, and saw everyone and everything through the couleur de rose of his own honest heart. (Molière: Tartuffe.)

Oriana The beloved of Amadis of Gaul, who called himself Beltenebros when he retired to the Poor Rock. (Amadis de Gaul, ii. 6.)
   Queen Elizabeth is sometimes called the “peerless Oriana,” especially in the madrigals entitled the Triumphs of Oriana (1601).
   Oriana. The nurseling of a lioness, with whom Esplandian, son of Oriana and Amadis of Gaul, fell in love, and for whom he underwent all his perils and exploits. She is represented as the fairest, gentlest, and most faithful of womankind.

O'riande [O'-re-ond ]. A fay who lived at Rosefleur, and brought up Maugis d'Aygremont (q.v.). When her protégé grew up she loved him “dun si grand amour, qu'elle doute fort qu'il ne se départe d'avecques elle.” (Romance de Maugis d'Aygremont et de Vivian son Frére.)

O'riel A fairy whose empire lay along the banks of the Thames, when King Oberon held his court in Kensington Gardens. (Tickell: Kensington Gardens.)

Orientation The placing of the east window of a church due east, that is, so that the rising sun may at noon shine on the altar. Anciently, churches were built with their axes pointing to the rising sun on the saint's day; so that a church dedicated to St. John was not parallel to one dedicated to St. Peter. The same practice prevailed both in Egypt and ancient Greece.
   Modern churches are built as nearly due east and west as circumstances will allow, quite regardless of the saint's day.