Chapter White Lady of Avenel to Wicket Gate of W by Brewer's Readers Handbook

White Lady of Avenel to Wicket Gate

White Lady of Avenel, a tutelary spirit.—Sir W. Scott: The Monastery (time, Elizabeth).

Aping in fantastic fashion
Every change of human passion.

White Lady of Ireland (The), the benshee or domestic spirit of a family, who takes an interest in its condition, and intimates approaching death by wailings or shrieks.

White Man’s Grave (The), Sierra. Leonê, in Africa.

White Merle (The). Among the old Basque legends is one of a “white merle,” which, by its singing, restores sight to the blind.—Rev. W. Webster: Basque Legends, 182 (1877).

The French have a similar story, called Le Merle Blanc.

White Moon (Knight of the), Samson Carrasco. He assumed this cognizance when he went as a knight- errant to encounter don Quixote. His object was to overthrow the don in combat, and then impose on him the condition of returning home, and abandoning the profession of chivalry for twelve months. By this means he hoped to cure the don of his craze. It all happened as the barber expected: the don was overthrown, and returned to his home, but soon died.—Cervantes: Don Quixote, II. iv. 12, etc. (1615).

White Mount in London (The), the Tower, which the Welsh bards insist was built by the Celts. Others ascribe “the Towers of Julius” to the Romans; but without doubt they are Norman.

Take my head and bear it unto the White Mount, in London, and bury it there, with the face towards France.—The Mabinogion (“Branwen,” etc., twelfth century).

White Queen (The), Mary queen of Scots (La Reine Blanche). So called by the French, because she dressed in white in mourning for her husband.

White Rose (The), the house of York, whose badge it was. That of the house of Lancaster was the Red Rose.

(Richard de la Pole is often called “The White Rose.”)

White Rose of England (The). Perkin Warbeck was so called by Margaret of Burgundy sister of Edward IV. (*-1499).

White Rose of Raby (The), Cecily, wife of Richard duke of York, and mother of Edward IV. and Richard III. She was the youngest of twenty-one children.

(A novel entitled The White Rose of Raby was published in 1794.)

White Rose of Scotland (The), lady Katherine Gordon, the [? fifth] daughter of George second earl of Huntly by his second wife [princess Annabella Stuart, youngest daughter of James I. of Scotland]. She married Richard of England, styled “duke of York,” but better known as “Perkin Warbeck.” She had three husbands after the death of “Richard of England.” Probably lady Katherine was called the “White Rose” from the badge assumed by her first husband “the White Rose of York,” and “Scotland” was added from the country of her birth. Margaret of Burgundy always addressed Perkin Warbeck as “The White Rose of England.”

White Rose of York (The), Edward Courtney earl of Devon, son of the marquis of Exeter. He died at Padua, in queen Mary’s reign (1553).