[Doeg], a herdsman of Saul (1 Sam. xxi. 7); a name applied by Dryden to Elkanah Settle in "Absalom and Achitophel."
[Dogberry], a self-satisfied night constable in "Much Ado about Nothing."
[Dog-days], 20 days before and 20 after the rising of the dog-star Sirius, at present from 3rd July to 11th August.
[Doge], the name of the chief magistrate of Venice and Genoa, elected at first annually and then for life in Venice, with, in course of time, powers more and more limited, and at length little more than a figure-head; the office ceased with the fall of the republic in 1797, as it did in Genoa in 1804.
[Dogger Bank], a sandbank in the North Sea; a great fishing-field, extending between Jutland in Denmark and Yorkshire in England, though distant from both shores, 170 m. long, over 60 m. broad, and from 8 to 10 fathoms deep.
[Dogs, Isle of], a low-lying projection of a square mile in extent from the left bank of the Thames, opposite Greenwich, and 3½ m. E. of St. Paul's.
[Dog-Star], [Sirius] (q. v.).
[Dolabella], son-in-law of Cicero, a profligate man, joined Cæsar, and was raised by him to the consulship; joined Cæsar's murderers after his death; was declared from his profligacy a public enemy; driven to bay by a force sent against him, ordered one of his soldiers to kill him.
[Dolci, Carlo], a Florentine painter, came of a race of artists; produced many fine works, the subjects of them chiefly madonnas, saints. &c. (1616-1686).
[Dolcino], a heresiarch and martyr of the 14th century, of the Apostolic Brethren, a sect which rose in Piedmont who made themselves obnoxious to the Church; was driven to bay by his persecutors, and at last caught and tortured and burnt to death; a similar fate overtook others of the sect, to its extermination.