Chapter Chibiabos to Children of C by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Chibiabos to Children

Chibiabos, the Harmony of Nature personified; a musician, the friend of Hiawatha, and ruler in the land of spirits. When he played on his pipe, the “brooks ceased to murmur, the wood-birds to sing, the squirrel to chatter, and the rabbit sat upright to look and listen.” He was drowned in lake Superior by the breaking of the ice.

Most beloved by Hiawatha
Was the gentle Chibiabos;
He the best of all musicians,
He the sweetest of all singers.
   —Longfellow: Hiawatha, vi. and xv.

Chicaneau [She’-ka-no], a litigious tradesman, in Les Plaideurs, by Racine (1668)

Chichi-Vache, a monster that fed only on good women. The word means the “sorry cow.” It was all skin and bone, because its food was so extremely scarce. (See Bycorn, p. 163.)

O noble wyvês, full of heigh prudence,
Let noon humilitie your tongês nayle…
Lest Chichi-Vache you swolive in her entraile.

Chaucer: Canterbury Tales (“Merchant’s Tale,” 1388).

Chick (Mr.), brother-in-law of Mr. Dombey; a stout gentleman, with a tendency to whistle and hum airs at inopportune moments. Mr. Chick is somewhat hen-pecked; but in the matrimonial squalls, though apparently beaten, he not unfrequently rises up the superior, and gets his own way.

Louisa Chick, Mr. Dombey’s married sister. She is of a snappish temper, but dresses in the most juvenile style; and is persuaded that anything can be accomplished if persons will only “make an effort.”—Dickens: Dombey and Son (1846).

Chicken (The), Michael Angelo Taylor, barrister. So called because in his maiden speech, 1785, he said, “I deliver this opinion with great deference, being but a chicken in the profession of the law.”

Chicken (The Game), a low fellow, to be heard of at the bar of the Black Badger. Mr. Toots selects this man as his instructor in fencing, betting, and self-defence. The Chicken has short hair, a low forehead, a broken nose, and “a considerable tract of bare and sterile country behind each ear.”—Dickens: Dombey and Son (1846).

Chickens and the Augurs. When the augurs told Publius Claudius Pulcher, the Roman consul, who was about to engage the Carthaginian fleet, that the sacred chickens would not eat, he replied, “Then toss them into the sea, that they may drink.”

Chickenstalker (Mrs.), a stout, bonny, kind-hearted woman, who keeps a general shop. Toby Veck, in his dream, imagines her married to Tugby, the porter of sir Joseph Bowley.—Dickens: The Chimes (1844).

Chickweed (Conkey, i.e. Nosey), the man who robbed himself. He was a licensed victualler on the point of failing, and gave out that he had been robbed of 327 guineas “by a tall man with a black patch over his eye.” He was much pitied, and numerous subscriptions were made on his behalf. A detective was sent to examine into the “robbery,” and Chickweed would cry out, “There he is!” and run after the “hypothetical thief” for a considerable distance, and then lose sight of him. This occurred over and over again, and at last the detective said to him, “I’ve found out who done this here robbery.” “Have you?” said Chickweed. “Yes,’ says Spyers, “you done it yourself.” And so he had.—Dickens: Oliver Twist, xxxi. (1837).

Chiffinch (Master Thomas), alias Will Smith, a friend of R ichard Gaulesse. The private emissary of Charles II. He was employed by the duke of Buckingham to carry off Alice Bridgenorth to Whitehall, but the captive escaped and married Julian Peveril.

Kate Chiffinch, mistress of Thomas Chiffinch.—Sir W. Scott: Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).