Chapter Rodogune to Roland of R by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Roger Bontemps, the personation of contentment with his station in life, and of the buoyancy of good hope. “There’s a good time coming, John.”

Vous pauvres, pleins d’enviè;
Vous rich, desireux;
Vous dont le char dévie
Après un cours heureux;
Vous qui perdrez peut-être
Des titres éclatans;
Eh! gai! prenez pour maître
Le gros Roger Bontemps.
   —Béranger (1780–1856).

Ye poor, with envy goaded;
Ye rich, for more who long;
Ye who by fortune loaded
Find all things going wrong;
Ye who by some disaster
See all your cables break;
From henceforth for your master
Should Roger Bontemps take.
   —E. C. B.

Roger de Coverley (Sir), an hypothetical baronet of Coverley or Cowley, near Oxford.—Addison: The Spectator (1711, 1712, 1714).

(The prototype of this famous character was sir John Pakington, seventh baronet of the line.)

ROGERO, brother of Marphisa; brought up by At lantês a magician. He married Bradamant, the niece of Charlemagne. Rogero was converted to Christianity, and baptized. His marriage with Bradamant and his election to the crown of Bulgaria, conclude the poem.—Ariosto: Orlando Furioso (1516).

Who more brave than Rodomont? who more courteous than Rogero?—Cervantes: Don Quixote, I. i. (1605).

Rogero, son of Roberto Guiscardo the Norman. Slain by Tisaphernês.—Tasso: Jerusalem Delivered, xx. (1575).

Rogero, a gentleman of Sicilia.—Shakespeare: The Winter’s Tale (1604).

This is one of those characters which appear in the dramatis personæ, but are never introduced in the play. Rogero not only does not utter a word, he does not even enter the stage all through the drama. In the Globe edition his name is omitted. See Violenta.)

Rogero, in The Rovers, a tragedy contributed by Canning to the Anti-jacobin Review (1798–1821). It is in ridicule of the German sentimental drama. Rogero sings the famous song of the “University of Gottingen.” When he matriculated, he says—

There first for thee my passion grew,
Sweet, sweet Matilda Pottengen;
Thou wast the daughter of my tutor,
law professor of the University
of Gottingen.

Roget, the pastoral name of George Wither in the four “eglogues” called The Shepheard’s Hunting (1615). The first and last “eglogues” are dialogues between Roget and Willy his young friend; in the second pastoral Cuddy is introduced, and in the third Alexis makes a fourth character. The subject of the first three is the reason of Roget’s imprisonment, which, he says, is a hunt that gave great offence. This hunt is in reality a satire called Abuses Stript and Whipt. The fourth pastoral has for its subject Roget’s love of poetry.

(“Willy” is his friend William Browne of the Inner Temple (two years his junior), author of Britannia’s Pastorals.)

Roha, the camphor tree. “The juice of the camphor is made to run out from a wound at the top of the tree, and, being received in a vessel, is allowed to harden in the sun.—Arabian Nights (“Sinbad’s Second Voyage”).

Roi Panade [“king of slops”], Louis XVIII. (1755, 1814–1824).

Roister Doister (Ralph), a vain, thoughtless, blustering fellow, in pursuit of Custance a rich widow, but baffled in his endeavour.—Udall: Ralph Roister Doister (the first English comedy, 1534).