Chapter Tear Handkerchief to Temper of T by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Teian Muse (The). Anacreon, a native of Teion, in Paphlagonia. (B.C. 563-478.)

Teinds Tithes.

“Taking down from the window-seat that amusing folio (The Scottish Coke upon Littleton). he opened it, as if instinctively, at the tenth title of Book Second, `of Teinds or Tythes.' ”- Sir W. Scott: The Antiquary, chap. xxxv.

   N.B. Those entitled to tithes were called in Scotland “teind-masters.”

Telamones Supporters. (Greek, Telamon.) Generally applied to figures of men used for supporters in architure (See Atlantes. )

Telegram Milking a telegram. A telegram is said to be “milked” when the message sent to a specific party is surreptitiously made use of by others.

“They receive their telegrams in cipher to avoid the risk of their being `milked' by rival journals,”- The Times, August 14th, 1869.

Telemachos The only son of Ulysses and Penelope. After the fall of Troy he went, under the guidance of Mentor, in quest of his father. He is the hero of Fénelon's prose epic called Télémaque.

Tell (William). The boldest of the Swiss mountaineers. The daughter of Leuthold having been insulted by an emissary of Albrecht Gessler, the enraged father killed the ruffian and fled. William Tell carried the assassin across the lake, and greatly incensed the tyrannical governor. The people rising in rebellion, Gessler put to death Melchtal, the patriarch of the district, and, placing the ducal cap of Austria on a pole, commanded the people to bow down before it in reverence. Tell refused to do so, whereupon Gessler imposed on him the task of shooting an apple from his little boy's head. Tell succeeded in this perilous trial of skill, but, letting fall a concealed arrow, was asked with what object he had secreted it. “To kill thee, O tyrant,” he replied, “if I had failed in the task imposed on me.” Gessler now ordered the bold mountaineer to be put in chains and carried across the lake to Küssnacht Castle “to be devoured alive by reptiles,” but, being rescued by the peasantry, he shot Gessler and liberated his country. (Rossini: Guglielmo Tell, an opera.)
    Kissling's monument at Altorf (1892) has four reliefs on the pedestal: (1) Tell shooting the apple; (2) Tell's leap from the boat; (3) Gessler's death; and (4) Tell's death at Schachenbach.
   William Tell. The story of William Tell is told of several other persons:
   (1) Egil, the brother of Wayland Smith. One day King Nidung commanded him to shoot an apple off the head of his son. Egil took two arrows from his quiver, the straightest and sharpest he could find. When asked by the king why he took two arrows, the god-archer replied, as the Swiss peasant to Gessler, “To shoot thee, tyrant, with the second if the first one fails.”
   (2) Saxo Grammaticus tells nearly the same story respecting Toki, who killed Harald.
   (3) Reginald Scot says, “Puncher shot a pennie on his son's head, and made ready another arrow to have slain the Duke Remgrave, who commanded it.” (1584.)
   (4) Similar tales are told of Adam Bell, Clym of the Clough, William of Cloudeslie and Henry IV., Olaf and Eindridi, etc.

Tellers of the Exchequer A corruption of talliers - i.e. tally-men, whose duty it was to compare the tallies, receive money payable into the Exchequer, give receipts, and pay what was due according to the tallies. Abolished in the reign of William IV. The functionary of a bank who receives and pays bills, orders, and so on, is still called a “teller.”

Temora One of the principal poems of Ossian, in eight books, so called from the royal residence of the kings of Connaught. Cairbar had usurped the throne, having killed Cormac, a distant relative of Fingal; and Fingal raised an army to dethrone the usurper. The poem begins from this point with an invitation from Cairbar to Oscar, son of Ossian, to a banguet. Oscar accepted the invitation, but during the feast a quarrel was vamped up, in which Cairbar and Oscar fell by each other's spears. When Fingal arrived a battle ensued, in which Fillan, son of Fingal, the Achilles of the Caledonian army, and Cathmor, brother of Cairbar, the bravest of the Irish army, were both slain. Victory crowned the army of Fingal, and Ferad-Artho, the rightful heir, was restored to the throne of Connaught.