Chapter Talismans to Tammany of T by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Talvi, a pseudonym of Mrs. Robinson. It is simply the initials of her maiden name, Therese Albertine Louise von Iakob.

Tam O’Shanter, a tale by Burns, which he considered his best. Founded on a legend that no sort of bogie could pass the middle of a running stream. Tam saw a hellish legion dancing in Alloway Kirk (near Ayr), and being excited cried out, “Weel done, Cutty Sark!” Immediately the lights were extinguished, and Tam rode for his life to reach the river Doon. He had himself passed the mid-stream, but his horse’s tail had not reached it, so Cutty Sark caught hold of it and pulled it off (1791),

Tam o’Todshaw, a huntsman, near Charlie’s Hope farm.—Sir W. Scott: Guy Mannering (time, George II.).

Tam o’the Cowgate, the sobriquet of sir Thomas Hamilton, a Scotch lawyer, who lived in the Cowgate, at Edinburgh (*–1563).

Tamburlaine the Great, the Tartar conqueror (1336–1405). In history called Tamerlane (q.v.).

(The hero and title of a tragedy by C. Marlow (1587). Shakespeare (2 Henry IV. act ii. sc. 4) makes Pistol quote a part of this turgid play.

Holla, ye pampered jades of Asia.
What! can ye draw but twenty miles a day,
And have so proud a chariot at your heels,
And such a coachman as great Tamburlaine!

In the stage direction—

Enter Tamburlaine, drawn in his chariot by Trebizon and Soria, with bits in their mouths, reins in his left hand, in his right a whip with which he scourgeth them.

(See Tamerlane.)

Tame , a river which rises in the vale of Aylesbury, at the foot of the Chiltern, and hence called by Drayton “Chiltern’s son.” Chiltern’s son” marries Isis (Cotswold’s heiress), whose son and heir is Thames. This allegory forms the subject of song xv. of the Polyolbion, and is the most poetical of them all.

Tamer Tamed (The), a kind of sequel to Shakespeare’s comedy The Taming of the Shrew. In the Tamer Tamed, Petruchio is supposed to marry a second wife, by whom he is hen-pecked.—Fletcher (1647).

Tamerlane, emperor of Tartary, in Rowe’s tragedy so called, is a noble, generous, high-minded prince, the very glass and fashion of all conquerors, in his forgiveness of wrongs, and from whose example Christians may be taught their moral code. Tamerlane treats Bajazet, his captive, with truly godlike clemency, till the fierce sultan plots his assassination. Then longer forbearance would have been folly, and the Tartar had his untamed captive chained in a cage, like a wild beast.—Rowe: Tamerlane (1702).

(It is said that Louis XIV. was Rowe’s “Bajazet,” and William III. his “Tamerlane.”)

Tamerlane is a corruption of Timour Lengh (“Timour the Lame”). He was one-handed and lame also. His name was used by the Persians in terrorem. (See Tamburlaine the Great.)

Taming of the Shrew (The), a comedy by Shak espeare (1594). The “shrew” is Katharina, elder daughter of Baptista of Padua. She is tamed by the stronger mind of Petruchio into a most obedient and submissive wife.

(This drama is founded on A pleasaunt conceited Historie, called The Taming of a Shrew. As it hath beene sundry times acted by the right honourable the Earle of Pembrooke his servants, 1607.)