Chapter Mareotic Luxury to Marines of M by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Margarine Substitute (A). A mere imitation. Just as margarine is an imitation and substitute of butter.

“Between a real etching and that margarine substitute a pen-and-ink drawing ... the difference is this: the margarine substitute is essentially flat ... but true etching is in sensible relief.”- Nineteenth Century, May 1891, p. 780.

Margate (Kent), is the sea-gate or opening. (Latin, mare; Anglo-Saxon, mære, etc.)

Margherit'a di Valois married Henri the Béarnais, afterwards Henri IV. of France. During the wedding solemnities, Catherine de Medicis devised the massacre of the French Protestants, and Margherita was at a ball during the dreadful enactment of this device. (Meyerbeer: Gli Ugonotti, an opera.)

Margin In all our ancient English books, the commentary is printed in the margin. Hence Shakespeare:

“His face's own margent did quote such amazes.”
Love's Labour's Lost, ii. 1.

“I knew you must be edified by the margent.”- Hamlet, v. 2.

“She ... could pick no meaning ...
Writ in the glassy margents of such books.”
Shakespeare: Rape of Lucrece, stanza 15.

Margites The first dunce whose name has been transmitted to fame. His rivals are Codrus and Flecknoe.

“Margites was the name ... whom Antiquity recordeth to have been dunce the first.”- Pope: Dunciad (Martinus Scriblerus).

Marguerite des Marguerites [the pearl of pearls ]. So Francois called his sister (Marguerite de Valois), authoress of the Heptameron. She married twice: first, the Duc d'Alencon, and then Henri d'Albret, king of Navarre, and was the mother of Henry IV. of France. Henri [IV.] married a Marguerite, but this Marguerite was the daughter of Henri II. and Catherine de Medicis. The former befriended the Huguenots, the latter was a rigid Catholic, like her mother.

Margutte (3 syl.). A giant ten feet high, who died of laughter on seeing a monkey pulling on his boots. (Pulci: Morgante Maggiore.) (See Death From Strange Causes.)

Mari'a Heroine of Donizetti's opera La Figlia del Reggimento. She first appears as a vivandière or French sutler-girl, for Sulpizio (the sergeant of the 11th regiment of Napoleon's Grand Army) had found her after a battle, and the regiment adopted her as their daughter. Tonio, a Tyrolese, saved her life and fell in love with her, and the regiment agreed to his marriage provided he joined the regiment. Just at this juncture the marchioness of Berkenfield claims Maria as her daughter; the claim is allowed, and the vivandiere is obliged to leave the regiment for the castle of the marchioness. After a time the French regiment takes possession of Berkenfield Castle, and Tonio has risen to the rank of field officer. He claims Maria as his bride, but is told that her mother has promised her hand to the son of a duchess. Maria promises to obey her mother, the marchioness relents, and Tonio becomes the accepted suitor.
   Maria. A fair, quick-witted, amiable maiden, whose banns were forbidden by the curate who published them; in consequence of which she lost her reason, and used to sit by the roadside near Moulines, playing vesper hymns to the Virgin all day long. She led by a ribbon a little dog named Silvio, of which she was very jealous, for she had first made a goat her favourite, but the goat had forsaken her. (Sterne: Sentimental Journey.)

Maria Theresa Wife of Sancho Panza. She is sometimes called Maria, sometimes Teresa Panza. (Don Quixote.)

Mariamites (4 syl.). Worshippers of Mary, the mother of Jesus. They said the Trinity consisted of God the Father, God the Son, and Mary the mother of God.