Chapter Fitzborn to Flecknoe of F by Brewer's Readers Handbook

him paying court to Miss Biddy Bellaw, he commanded the blustering coward to “deliver up his sword,” and added—

“Leave this house, change the colour of your clothes and fierceness of your looks; appear from top to toe the wretch, the very wretch thou art!”—Garrick: Miss in Her Teens (1753).

Henry Woodward [1717–1777] was the best “Copper Captain,” “captain Flash,” and “Bobadil” of his day.—Leslie: Life of Reynolds.

(“Copper Captain,” in Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, by Fletcher; “Bobadil,” in Every Man in His Humour, by Ben Jonson.)

Flatterer. The Romans called a flatterer “a Vitellius,” from Vi tellius president of Syria, who worshipped Jehovah in Jerusalem, and Caligula in Rome. Tacitus says of him, “Exemplar apud posteros adulatorii habetur” (Annals, vi. 32).

Idem [Vitellius] miri in adulando ingenii; primus C-Cæsarem adorari ut deum instituit.—Suetonius : Vitel., ii.

Flavius, the faithful, honest steward of Timon the man-hater.—Shakespeare: Timon of Athens (1600).

Fleance, son of Banquo. After the assassination of his father, he escaped to Wales, where he married the daughter of the reigning prince, and had a son named Walter. This Walter afterwards became lord high steward of Scotland, and called himself Walter the Steward. From him proceeded in a direct line the Stuarts of Scotland, a royal line which gave James VI. of Scotland and I. of England.—Shakespeare: Macbeth (1606).

(Of course, this must not be looked on as history. Historically, there was no such person as Banquo, and therefore this descent from Fleance is mere fable.)

Flecknoe (Richard), poet-laureate to Charles II., author of dramas, poems, and other works. As a poet, his name stands on a level with Bavius and Mævius. Dryden says of him—

… he reigned without dispute
Thro’all the realms of nonsense absolute.
   —Dryden: M‘Flecnoe (1682).

(It was not Flecknoe but Shadwell that Dryden wished to castigate in this satire. The offence was that Dryden was removed from the post of laureate, and Shadwell appointed in his place. The angry ex- laureate says, with more point than truth, that “Shadwell never deviates into sense.”)