Alithea Moody, sister of John. She jilts Sparkish, a conceited fop, and marries Harcourt.—The Country Girl (time, Garrick, altered from Wycherly).
Mooma, youngest sister of Yerūti. Their father and mother were the only persons of the whole Guarāni race who escaped a small-pox plague which ravished that part of Paraguay. They left the fatal spot and lived in the Mondai woods, where both their children were born. Before the birth of Mooma, her father was eaten by a jagŭar, and the three survivors lived in the woods alone. When grown to a youthful age, a Jesuit priest persuaded them to come and live at St. Joăchin (3 syl.); so they left the wild woods for a city life. Here the mother soon flagged and died. Mooma lost her spirits, was haunted with thick-coming fancies of good and bad angels, and died. Yerūti begged to be baptized, received the rite, cried, “Ye are come for me! I am ready;” and died also.—Southey, A Tale of Paraguay (1814).
Moon (Man in the), said to be Cain, with a bundle of thorns.
Now doth Cain with fork of thorns confine
On either hemisphere, touching the wave
Beneath the towers of Seville. Yesternight
The moon was round.
Dantê, Hell, xx. (1300).
Moon (Minions of the), thieves or highwaymen. (See [Moon’s Men].)
Moon and Mahomet. Mahomet made the moon perform seven circuits round Caaba or the holy shrine of Mecca, then enter the right sleeve of his mantle and go out at the left. At its exit, it split into two pieces, which re-united in the centre of the firmament. This miracle was performed for the conversion of Hahab, the Wise.
Moon-Calf, an inanimate, shapeless human mass, said by Pliny to be engendered of woman only.—Nat. Hist., x. 64.
Moon’s Men, thieves or highwaymen, who ply their vocation by night.
The fortune of us that are but moon’s men doth ebb and flow like the sea.—Shakespeare, 1 Henry IV. act i. sc. 2 (1597).
Moonshine (Saunders), a smuggler.—Sir W. Scott, Bride of Lammermoor (time, William III.).