Chapter Deerslayer to Demetia of D by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Deerslayer to Demetia

Deerslayer (The), the title of a novel by J. F. Cooper, and the nickname of its hero (Natty Bumppo), a model uncivilized man, honourable, truthful, and brave, pure of heart and without reproach. He is introduced in five of Cooper’s novels: The Deerslayer, The Pathfinder, The Last of the Mohicans, The Pioneers, and The Prairie. He is called “Hawk-eye” in The Last of the Mohicans; “Leather-stocking” in The Pioneers; and “The Trapper” in The Prairie, in which he dies.

The Delawares call me “Deerslayer;” but it is not so much because I am pretty fatal with the venison, as because that, while I kill so many bucks and does, I have never yet taken the life of a fellow-creature (chap. ii.).

N.B.—Deerslayer was first called “Straight-tongue,” for his truthfulness; then “Pigeon,” for his kindness of heart; then “Lap-ear,” for his hound-like sagacity; then “Deerslayer,” for his skill in tracking and slaying deer (chap. iv.). “Hawk-eye,” so called by a dying red man or Mingo (chap. vii.).

Defarge (Mons.), keeper of a wineshop in the Faubourge St. Antoine, in Paris. He is a bull-necked, good-humoured, but implacable-looking man.

Mde. Defarge, his wife. A dangerous woman, with great force of character; everlastingly knitting.

Mde. Defarge had a watchful eye, that seldom seemed to look at anything.—C. Dickens: A Tale of Two Cities, i. 5 (1859).

Defender of the Faith, the title first given to Henry VIII. by pope Leo X., for a volume against Luther, in defence of pardons, the papacy, and the seven sacraments. The original volume is in the Vatican, and contains this inscription in the king’s handwriting: Anglorum rex Henricus, Leoni X. mittit hoc opus et fidei testem et amicitiœ; whereupon the pope (in the twelfth year of his reign) conferred upon Henry, by bull, the title “Fidei Defensor,” and commanded all Christians so to address him. The original bull was preserved by sir Robert Cotton, and is signed by the pope, four bishop-cardinals, fifteen priest-cardinals, and eight deacon-cardinals. A complete copy of the bull, with its seals and signatures, may be seen in Selden’s Titles of Honour, v. 53–57 (1672)

Defensætas, Devonshire.

Defoe writes The History of the Plague of London as if he had been a personal spectator, but he was only three years old at the time (1663–1731).

Deformed Transformed (The), a drama in two parts by lord Byron (1824).

Deggial, antichrist. The Mohammedan writers say he has but one eye and one eyebrow, and on his forehead is written CAFER (“infidel”).

Chilled with terror, we concluded that the Deggial, with his exterminating angels, had sent forth their plagues on the earth.—Beckford: Vathek (1784).

Deheubarth, South Wales.—Spenser: Faërie Queene, iii. 2 (1590).

Dei Franchi, the brothers in Boucicault’s drama, The Corsican Brothers (1848). One brother is a peaceful, amorous resident in a city; and the other is a stern, warlike huntsman of the mountains.

Deirdri, an ancient Irish story similar to the Dar-Thula of Ossian. Conor king of Ulster puts to death by treachery the three sons of Usnach. This leads to a desolating war against Ulster, which terminates in the total destruction of Eman. This is one of the three tragic stories of the Irish, which are: (1) The death of the children of Touran (regarding Tuatha de Danans); (2) the death of the children of Lear or Lir, turned into swans by Aoife; (3) the death of the children of Usnach (a “Milesian” story).