Memory (The Bard of), Samuel Rogers, author of the Pleasures of Memory (1762-1855).
Men of Prester John’s Country. Prester John, in his letter to Manuel Comnēnus, says his land is the home of men with horns; of one-eyed men (the eye being in some cases before the head, and in some cases behind it); of giants, forty ells in height (i.e. 120 feet); of the phœnix, etc.; and of ghouls who feed on premature children. He gives the names of fifteen different tributary states, amongst which are those of Gog and Magog (now shut in behind lofty mountains); but at the end of the world these fifteen states will overrun the whole earth.
Menalcas, any shepherd or rustic. The name occurs in the Idylls of Theoc´ritos, the Eclogues of Virgil, and the Shepheardes Calendar of Spenser.
Men´cia of Mosquera (Donna) married Don Alvaro de Mello. A few days after the marriage, Alvaro happened to quarrel with Don An´drea de Baesa and kill him. He was obliged to flee from Spain, leaving his bride behind, and his property was confiscated. For seven years she received no intelligence of his whereabouts (for he was a slave most of the time), but when seven years had elapsed the report of his death in Fez reached her. The young widow now married the marquis of Guardia, who lived in a grand castle near Burgos, but walking in the grounds one morning she was struck with the earnestness with which one of the under-gardeners looked at her. This man proved to be her first husband, Don Alvaro, with whom she now fled from the castle; but on the road a gang of robbers fell upon them. Alvaro was killed, and the lady taken to the robbers’ cave, where Gil Blas saw her and heard her sad tale. The lady was soon released, and sent to the castle of the marquis of Guardia. She found the marquis dying from grief, and indeed he died the day following, and Mencia retired to a convent.—Lesage, Gil Blas, i. 11-14 (1715).
Mendo´za, a Jew prize-fighter, who held the belt at the close of the last century, and in 1791 opened the Lyceum in the Strand, to teach “the noble art of self-defence.”
I would have dealt the fellow that abused you such a recompense in the fifth button, that my friend Mendoza could not have placed it better.—R. Cumberland, Shiva, the Jew, iv. 2 (1776).
There is a print often seen in old picture shops, of Humphreys and Mendoza sparring, and a queer angular exhibition it is. What that is to the modern art of boxing, Quick’s style of acting was to Dowton’s.—Records of a Stage Veteran.
Mendoza (Isaac), a rich Jew, who thinks himself monstrously wise, but is duped by every one. (See under Isaac.)—Sheridan, The Duenna (1775).
Menech´mians, persons exactly like each other, as the brothers Dromio. So called from the Mencœchmi of Plautus.
Menec´rates (4 syl.), a physician of Syracuse, of unbounded vanity and arrogance. He assumed to himself the title of Jupiter, and in a letter to Philip, king of Macedon, began thus: “Menecratês Jupiter to King Philip, greeting.” Being asked by Philip to a banquet, the physician was served only with frankincense, like the gods; but Menecratês was greatly offended, and hurried home.