Chapter Feed of Corn to Fern of F by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Feed of Corn to Fern

Feed of Corn A quartern of oats, the quantity given a horse on a journey when the ostler is told to give him a feed.

Feet How are your poor feet? This was the popular street mot in the year of the Great Exhibition of London in 1862. The immense labour of walking over the exhibition broke down all but the strongest athletes.

Fehm-gericht or Vehmgericht (3 syl.). The secret tribunals of Westphalia, for the preservation of public peace, suppression of crime, and maintenance of the "Catholic" religion. The judges were enveloped in profound mystery; they had their secret spies through all Germany; their judgments were certain, but no one could discover the executioner. These tribunals rose in the twelfth century, and disappeared in the sixteenth. Sir Walter Scott, in Anne of Gierstein, has given an account of the Westphalian Fehmgericht. (Old German, fehmen, to condemn; Gericht, a tribunal.)

"This Vigilance Committee [of Denver city] is a modern reproduction of the famous Vehmgerict - The Times.

Felician (Father). The priest and schoolmaster of Grand Pré, who accompanied Evangeline in her wanderings to find Gabriel, her affianced husband. (Longfellow: Evangeline.)

Felix a monk who listens to the singing of a milk-white bird for a thousand years, which seemed to him "but a single hour," so enchanted was he by the song. (Longfellow: The Golden Legend.)

Felixmarte (4 syl.). The hero of a Spanish romance of chivalry by Melchior de Orteza, Caballero de Ubeda (1566). The curate in Don Quixote condemned this work to the flames.

Fell (Dr.). (See Doctor Fell .)

Fellow Commoner A wealthy or married undergraduate of Cambridge, who pays extra to "common" (i.e. dine) at the fellows' table. In Oxford, these demi-dons are termed Gentlemen Commoners.
   Fellow commoner or gentleman commoner. An empty bottle; so called because these sort of students are, as a class, empty-headed.

Felo de Se The act of a suicide when he commits self-murder. Murder is felony, and a man who murders himself commits this felony - felo de se.

"A felo-de-se, therefore, is he that deliberately puts an end to his own existence." - Blackstone: Commentaries, book iv. chap. xiv. p. 189.

Feme-covert A married woman. This does not mean a woman coverte by her husband, but a woman whose head is covered, not usual with maidens or unmarried women. In Rome unmarried women wore on their heads only a corolla (i.e. a wreath of flowers). In Greece they wore an anadema, or fillet. The Hungarian spinster is called hajadon (bare-headed). Married women, as a general rule, have always covered their head with a cap, turban, or something of the same sort, the head being covered as a badge of subjection. Hence Rebekah (Gen. xxiv. 65), being told that the man she saw was her espoused husband, took a veil and covered her head. Servants wear caps, and private soldiers in the presence of their officers cover their heads for the same reason. (See Eph. v. 22, 23.)
    Women do not, like men, uncover their heads even in saluting, but bend their knee, in token of subjection. (See Salutations.)

Feme-sole A single woman. Feme-sole merchant. A woman who carries on a trade on her own account.

Femme de Chambre (French.) A chambermaid.

Femynye (3 syl.). A mediæval name for the kingdom of the Amazons. Gower terms Penthesile'a "queen of Feminee."

"He [Thessus] conquered al the regne of Femynye." Chaucer: Canterbury Tales. 868.

Fen Nightingale A frog, which sings at night in the fens, as nightingales sing in the groves. (See Arcadian Nightingale.)