Chapter Osiris to Overie of O by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Osprey. When fish see the osprey, the legend says, they are so fascinated that they “swoon,” and, turning on their backs, yield themselves an easy prey to the bird. Rattlesnakes exercise the same fascination over birds.

The osprey… the fish no sooner do espy,
But… turning their bellies up, as tho’ their death they saw,
They at his pleasure lie, to stuff his gluttonous maw.
   —Drayton: Polyolbion, xxv. (1622).

Osrick, a court fop, contemptible for his affectation and finical dandyism. He is made umpire by king Claudius, when Laertês and Hamlet “play” with rapiers in “friendly” combat.—Shakespeare. Hamlet (1596).

Osseo, son of the Evening Star, whose wife was O’weenee. In the Northland there were once ten sisters of surpassing beauty; nine married beautiful young husbands, but the youngest, named Oweenee, fixed her affections on Osseo, who was “old, poor, and ugly,” but “most beautiful within.” All being invited to a feast, the nine set upon their youngest sister, taunting her for having married Osseo; but forthwith Osseo leaped into a fallen oak, and was transformed to a most handsome young man, his wife to a very old woman, “wrinkled and ugly,” but his love changed not. Soon another change occurred: Oweenee resumed her former beauty, and all the sisters and their husbands were changed to birds, who were kept in cages about Osseo’s wigwam. In due time a son was born, and one day he shot an arrow at one of the caged birds, and forthwith the nine, with their husbands, were changed to pygmies.

From the story of Osseo
Let [us]learn the fate of jesters.
   —Longfellow: Hiawatha, xii. (1855).

Ossian, the warrior-bard. He was son of Fingal (king of Morven) and his first wife Ros-crana (daughter of Cormac king of Ireland).

His wife was Evir-Allen, daughter of Branno (a native of Ireland); and his son was Oscar.

Ostrich (The) is said, in fable, not to brood over her eggs, but to hatch them by gazing on them intently. Both birds are employed, for if the gaze is suspended for only one moment, the eggs are addled.—Vanslebe. (This is an emblem of the ever-watchful eye of Providence.)

Such a look…
The mother ostrich fixes on her egg,
Till that intense affection
Kindles its light of life.
   —Southey: Thalaba the Destroyer, iii. 24 (1797).

Ostrich Egg. Captain F. Burnaby saw an ostrich egg hung by a silver chain from the ceiling of the principal mosque of Sivas, and was told it was a warning to evil-doers.

The ostrich always looks at the eggs she lays, and breaks those that are bad. So God will break evil- doers as the ostrich her worthless eggs.—Burnaby: On Horseback through Asia Minor, xxix. (1877).

Oswald, steward to Goneril daughter of king Lear.—Shakespeare: King Lear (1605).

Oswald, the cup-bearer to Cedric the Saxon, of Rotherwood.—Sir W. Scott: Ivanhoe (time, Richard I.).

Oswald (Prince), being jealous of Gondibert, his rival for the love of Rhodalind (the heiress of Aribert king of Lombardy), headed a faction against him. A battle was imminent, but it was determined to decide the quarrel by four combatants on each side. In this combat, Oswald was slain by Gondibert.—Davenant: Gondibert, i.(died 1668).

Othello, the Moor, commander of the Venetian army. Iago was his ensign or ancient. Desdemona, the daughter of Brabantio the senator, fell in love with the Moor, and he married her; but Iago, by his artful villainy, insinuated to him such a tissue of circumstantial evidence of Desdemona’s love for Cassio, that, Othello’s jealousy being aroused, he smothered her with a pillow, and then killed himself.—Shakespeare: Othello (1611).