Chapter Drunkenness to Dudgeon of D by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

of the trees. (Greek, drus, any forest tree.) They were supposed to live in the trees and die when the trees died. Eurydice, the wife of Orpheus (2 syl.) the poet, was a dryad.

Dryasdust (Rev. Dr.). A heavy, plodding author, very prosy, very dull, and very learned; an antiquary. Sir Walter Scott employs the name to bring out the prefatory matter of some of his novels.

"The Prussian Dryasdust . . . excels all other `Dryasdusts' yet known." - Carlyle.

Dualism A system of philosophy which refers all things that exist to two ultimate principles. It is eminently a Persian doctrine. The Orphic poets made the ultimate principles of all things to be Water and Night, or Time and Necessity. In theology the Manichean doctrine is dualistic. In modern philosophy it is opposed to monism (q.v.), and insists that the creator and creation, mind and body, are distinct entities. That creation is not deity, and that mind is not an offspring of matter. (See Monism.)
Dub To make a knight by giving him a blow. Dr. Tusler says, "The ancient method or knighting was by a box on the ear, implying that it would be the last he would receive, as he would henceforth be free to maintain his own honour." The present ceremony is to tap the shoulder with a sword. (Anglo-Saxon, dubban, to strike with a blow.)

Dub Up! Pay down the money. A dub is an Anglo-Indian coin, hence "down with your dubs," money down. A "doubloon" is a double pistole.

Dublin (the Irish dubh-linn, the "black pool"). The chief part of the city stands on land reclaimed from the river Liffey or the sea.
   True as the Deil is in Dublin city. (Burns: Death and Dr. Hornbook.) Probably Burns refers to the Scandinavian name Divelin, which suggested first Divel and then Devil or Deil.

Dubs in "marbles" is a contraction of double or doublets. Thus, if a player knocks two marbles out of the ring, he cries dubs, before the adversary cries "no dubs," and claims them both.

Ducat A piece of money; so called from the legend on the early Sicilian pieces: Sit tibi, Christe, datus, quem tu regis, istë ducatus (May this duchy [ducat-us ] which you rule be devoted to you, O Christ).

Duchesne (2 syl.). Le père Duchésne. Jacques Réné Hébert, chief of the Cordelier Club in the French Revolution, the members of which were called Hébertists. He was called "Father Duchésne," from the name of his vile journal. (1755-1794.)

Duchess The wife or widow of a duke; but an old woman is often jocosely termed an old duchess or a regular old duchess. The longevity of the peers and peeresses is certainly very striking.

Duck A lame duck. A stock-jobber who will not, or cannot, pay his losses. He has to "waddle out of the alley like a lame duck."
   Like a dying duck in a thunderstorm. Quite chop-fallen.
   To get a duck. A contraction of duck's egg or 0, in cricket. A player who gets no run off his bat is marked down 0.

Duck Lane A row for old and second-hand books which stood formerly near Smithfield, but has given way to city improvements. It might be called the Holywell Street of Queen Anne's reign.

"Scotists and Thomists now in peace remain
Amidst their kindred cobwebs in Duck Lane."
Pope: Essay on Criticism.

Duck's Egg Broke his duck's egg. Took his first school prize. In cricket a "duck's egg" or 0 in a score is broken by a run.

"What a proud and happy day it was to Lucy when little Herbert, in public-school parlance, `broke his duck's egg - otherwise, took his first prize." - A Fellow of Trinity, chap.i.

Duck's-foot Lane [City.] A corruption of Duke's Foot Lane; so called from the Dukes of Suffolk, whose manor-house was there.

Ducks and Drakes The ricocheting or rebounding of a stone thrown from the hand to skim along the surface of a pond or river.
   To make ducks and drakes of one's money. To throw it away as stones with