Chapter Parson Balwhidder to Passe-Lourdaud of P by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Parviz (“victorious”), surname of Khosrou II. of Persia. He kept 15,000 female musicians, 6000 household officers, 20,500 saddle-mules, 960 elephants, 200 slaves to scatter perfumes when he went abroad, and 1000 sekabers to water the roads before him. His horse, Shibdiz, was called “the Persian Bucephalus.”

The reigns of Khosrou I. and II. were the golden period of Persian history.

Parzival, the hero of a metrical romance, by Wolfram von Eschenbach (twelfth century). Parzival was brought up by a widowed mother in solitude, but when grown to manhood, two wandering knights persuaded him to go to the court of king Arthur. His mother, hoping to deter him, consented to his going if he would wear the dress of a common jester. This he did, but soon achieved such noble deeds that Arthur made him a knight of the Round Table. Sir Parzival went in quest of the holy graal, which was kept in a magnificent castle called Graalburg, in Spain, built by the royal priest Titurel. He reached the castle, but, having neglected certain conditions, was shut out, and, on his return to court, the priestess of Graal-burg insisted on his being expelled the court and degraded from knighthood. Parzival then led a new life of abstinence and self-abnegation, and a wise hermit became his instructor. At length he reached such a state of purity and sanctity that the priestess of Graal-burg declared him worthy to become lord of the castle, having been “made perfect by suffering” (Rev. vii. 14; Heb. ii. 10).

This, of course, is an allegory of a Christian giving up everything in order to be admitted a priest and king in the city of God, and becoming a fool in order to learn true wisdom (see 1 Cor. iii. 18).

Pascal. Frederick von Hardenberg (“Novalis”) (1770–1801) is so called by Carlyle.

Pasquin, a Roman cobbler in the latter half of the fifteenth century, whose shop stood in the neighbourhood of the Braschi palace near the Piazza Navoni. He was noted for his caustic remarks and bitter sayings. After his death, a mutilated statue near the shop was called by his name, and made the repository of all the bitter epigrams and satirical verses of the city; hence called pasquinades .

Sir Archy MSarcasm—the common Pasquin of the town.—Macklin: Love à-la-Mode, i. I (1779).

Passamonte (Gines de), the galleyslave set free by don Quixote. He returned the favour by stealing Sancho’s wallet and ass. Subsequently he reappeared as a puppet-showman.—Cervantes: Don Quixote (1605-15).

Passatore (Il), a title assumed by Belli’no, an Italian bandit chief, who died 1851.

Passebrewell, the name of sir Tristram’s horse.—History of Prince Arthur, ii. 68.

Passe-Lourdaud , a great rock near Poitiers, where there is a very narrow hole on the edge of a precipice, through which the university freshmen are made to pass to “matriculate” them. (Passe-Lourdaud means “lubber-pass.”)

The same is done at Mantua, where the freshmen are made to pass under the arch of St. Long—inus.