Chapter Albania to Alcibiades' Tables of A by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Iphigenia at Aulis by Euripidês, and Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac, somewhat resemble the same legends.

Alceste , the hero of Molière’s comedy Le Misanthrope (1666), not unlike Timon of Athens, by Shakespeare. Alceste is, in fact, a pure and noble mind soured by perfidy and disgusted with society. Courtesy seems to him the vice of fops,—and the usages of civilized life no better than hypocrisy. Alceste pays his addresses to Célimène, a coquette.

Alceste is an upright, manly character, but rude and impatient, even of the ordinary civilities of life.—Sir W. Scott.

Longfellow, in The Golden Legend, has a somewhat similar story: Henry of Hoheneck was like to die, and was told he would recover if he could find a maiden willing to lay down her life for him. Elsie, the daughter of Gottlieb (a tenant farmer of the prince), vowed to do so, and followed the prince to Salerno, to surrender herself to Lucifer; but the prince rescued her, and made her his wife. The excitement and exercise cured the indolent young prince. This tale is from Hartmann von der Aur, the Minne-singer.

Alchemist (The), the last of the three great comedies of Ben Jonson (1610). The other two are Volpone , (1605), and The Silent Woman (1609). The object of The Alchemist is to ridicule the belief in the philosopher’s stone and the elixir of life. The alchemist is “Subtle,” a mere quack; and “sir Epicure Mammon” is the chief dupe, who supplies money, etc., for the “transmutation of metal.” “Abel Drugger” a tobacconist, and “Dapper” a lawyer’s clerk, are two other dupes. “Captain Face,” alias “Jeremy,” the house-servant of “Lovewit,” and “Dol Common” are his allies. The whole thing is blown up by the unexpected return of “Lovewit.”

Alcibiades , the Athenian general. Being banished by the senate, he marches against the city, and the senate, being unable to offer resistance, open the gates to him (B.C. 450–404). This incident is introduced by Shakespeare in Timon of Athens.

Alfred (lord) Tennyson assumed this as a pseudonym in Punch (February, 1846), a reply to Lord Lytton’s New Timon.

Alcibiades of Germany, Albert margrave of Baireuth (1522–1555).

Alcibiades’ Tables represented a god or goddess ou twardly, and a Silenus, or deformed piper, within. Erasmus has a curious dissertation on these tables (Adage, 667, edited R. Stephens); hence emblematic of falsehood and dissimulation.

Whose wants virtue is compared to these
False tables wrought by Alcibiades;
Which noted well of all were found t’ve bin
Most fair without, but most deformed within.
   —W. Browne: Britannia’s Pastorals, i. (1613).