Chapter Sibyl's Books to Siegfried of S by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Sibyl's Books to Siegfried

Sibyl’s Books (The). We are told that the sibyl of Cumæ (in Æolis) offered Tarquin nine volumes of predictions for a certain sum of money, but the king, deeming the price exorbitant, refused to purchase them; whereupon she burnt three of the volumes, and next year offered Tarquin the remaining six at the same price. Again he refused, and the sibyl burnt three more. The following year she again returned, and asked the original price for the three which remained. At the advice of the augurs, the king purchased the books, and they were preserved with great care under guardians specially appointed for the purpose.

Her remaining chances, like the sibyl’s books, became more precious in an increasing ratio as the preceding ones were destroyed.—Fitzgerald: The Parvenu Family, i. 7.

Sic Vos non Vobis. (See VOS NON VOBIS.)

Sicilian Bull (The), the brazen bu invented by Pe rillos for the tyrant Phalaris, as an engine of torture. Perillos himself was the first victim enclosed in the bull.

As the Sicilian bull that rightfully
His cries echoed who had shaped the mould,
Did so rebellow with the voice of him
Tormented, that the brazen monster seemed
Pierced through with pain.
   —Dante: Hell, xxvii. (1300).

Sicilian Vespers (The), the massacre of the French in Sicily, which began at Palermo, March 30, 1282, at the hour of vespers, on Easter Monday. This wholesale slaughter was provoked by the brutal conduct of Charles d’Anjou (the governor) and his soldiers towards the islanders. (See SHIBBOLETH, p. 998.)

A similar massacre of the Danes was made in England on St. Bryce’s Day (November 13), 1002.

Another similar slaughter took place at Bruges, March 24, 1302.

(The Bartholomew Massacre (August 24, 1572) was a religious not a political movement.)

Sicilien (Le) or L’AMOUR PEINTRE, a comedy by Molière ( 1667). The Sicilian is don Pèdre, who has a Greek slave named Isidore. This slave is loved by Adraste , a French gentleman, and the plot of the comedy turns on the way that the Frenchman allures the Greek slave away from her master. (See ADRASTE, p. 10.)

Sicily of Spain (The). Alemtejo, in Portugal, at one time “the granary of Portugal.”

Sick Man of the East (The), the Turkish empire. It was Nicholas of Russia who gave this name to the moribund empire.

We have on our hands a sick man, a very sick man. It would be a great misfortune if one of these days he should happen to die before the necessary arrangements are made…The man is certainly dying, and we must not allow such an event to take us by surprise. —Nicholas of Russia, to sir George Seymour, British chargé d’ affaires (January II, 1844).

The sick man of Orange, don John, governor-general of the Netherlands, writing in 1577 to Philip II. of Spain, called the prince of Orange “the sick man,” because he was in the way, “and wanted him finished.” He said to Philip, “Money is the gruel with which we must cure this sick man,” spies and assassins being expensive articles.—Motley: The Dutch Republic, v. 2. Again he says, “There is no remedy, sire, for the body but by cutting off the diseased part.”

Siddartha, born at Gaya, in India, and known in Indian history as Buddha (i. e. “The Wise”).

Sidney, the tutor and friend of Charles Egerton McSycophant. He loves Constantia, but conceals his passion for fear of paining Egerton, her accepted lover.—Macklin: The Man of the World (1764).