Macrones, a people on the confines of Colchis, and I should suppose, though Flaccus does not mention it, and I have no leisure to turn to Herodotus, remarkable for their partiality to dress, since the word is clearly an abbreviated pronunciation of Macaronies.
Celsus. This philosopher composed a treatise against the Christians, which having a good sale, one of the Christians, in a merry mood, said, he sells us, and from that moment he bore his present name.
L. Mummius, a Roman consul, who acquired his cognomen of mummius, or mummy us, from being sent against the Achæans, whom he beat most unmercifully.
Boreas. This wind was long without a name, until the people feeling its northern blasts exceedingly troublesome, would be continually crying, "how they bore us!" which in time gave rise to the word boreas, or as it was originally pronounced bore us. Here we presently come at the etymology of the verb to bore, which has hitherto baffled all research and made futile every conjecture. It cannot be questioned that the Persian Boreus, and Borus the son of Perieres, had their names from some such obnoxious qualities as are attributed to the wind, though we are at a loss to guess what they were, and are by no means willing to venture an hypothesis that may lead to indecency. It is worthy of remark, as an astonishing fact, that these gentlemen are mentioned by Polyænus and Apollodorus, but without a word in the Stratagems of the one, or in the Bibliotheca of the other, that throws any light on the matter.
Philostratus. A famous sophist, and very liberal and expensive in his entertainments, from which circumstance his friends very properly gave him the cognomen of fill us, treat us. The penultimate of Philostratus is short in its derived state, but this is a liberty perfectly excusable in these cases, and coming assuredly under the description of parcè detorta.
Mannus. It is imagined that this divinity obtained his name from having once undertaken to furnish some fleet with men; but from being a German God, and for other reasons, I confess that I have no great faith in this etymology.
Æsymnus. This anxious politician's consulting Apollo, according to Pausanias, on the subject of legislation, made the witlings of his time call the God his nurse, and then in ridicule exclaim ease him nurse, which speaks for itself.
Bacchus, or Back us; and admirably so called, because he is found to be the second best in the world, inspiring courage even in a coward.
Confucius. About the etymology of the title of this famous Chinese philosopher, we are much in the dark; but it seems in the greatest degree probable that he obtained it from being a philosopher of the modern description, who put every thing into confusion.
Damon. This poet received his name from a circumstance that attended his banishment from Athens. When the sentence was brought to him, he began d—ning and swearing most bitterly, on which the officer, a rough fellow, said, "Oh, you may Damn on as long as you like, it does not signify, you must go." And go he did, but still swearing; and the people, who are tickled with a feather, hearing the officer's observations repeated, nicknamed him Damon, or as it was formerly written and spoken, Dammon.