Chapter Fiona to Fitz-Boodle of F by Brewer's Readers Handbook

(1) Polycratês, being too fortunate, was advised to cast away something he most highly prized, and threw into the sea an engraved gem of great value. A few days afterwards a fish came to his table, and in it was this very gem.—Herodotus, iii. 40.

(2) A certain queen, having formed an illicit attachment to a soldier, gave him a ring which had been the present of her husband. The king, being apprized thereof, got possession of the ring while the soldier was asleep, threw it into the sea, and then asked his queen to bring it him. In great alarm, she went to St. Kentigern and told him everything. The saint went to the Clyde, caught a salmon with the ring in its mouth, and gave it to the queen, who thus saved her character and her husband. This legend is told about the Glasgow arms.

(3) The arms of dame Rebecca Berry, wife of sir Thomas Elton, Stratford-le-Bow, to be seen at St. Dunstan’s Church, Stepney. The tale is that a knight, hearing the cries of a woman in labour, knew that the infant was destined to become his wife. He tried to elude his destiny, and, when the infant had grown to woman- hood, threw a ring into the sea, commanding the damsel never to see his face again till she could produce the ring which he had cast away. In a few days a cod-fish was caught, and the ring was found in its mouth. The young woman producing the ring, the marriage was duly consummated.—Romance of London.

(4) Solomon’s signet-ring. (See Sakhar.)

Fisher (Ralph), assistant of Roland Græme, at Avenel Castle.—Sir W. Scott: The Abbot (time, Elizabeth).

Fitz-Boodle (George), a name assumed by Thackeray in a series of articles called “Fitz-Boodle Papers,” contributed to Fraser’s Magazine (1842).