Chapter Siguna to Silver Wedding of S by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Siguna to Silver Wedding

Sigun'a Wife of Loki. She nurses him in his cavern, but sometimes, as she carries off the poison which the serpents gorge, a portion drops on the god, and his writhings cause earthquakes. (Scandinavian mythology.)

Sigurd The Norse Siegfried (q.v.). He falls in love with Brynhild, but, under the influence of a love- potion, marries Gudrun, a union which brings about a volume of mischief.
   Sigurd the Horny. A German romance based on a legend in the Sagas. An analysis of this legend is published by Weber in his Illustrations of Northern Antiquities. (See Siegfried, Horny.)

Sikes (Bill). A ruffian housebreaker of the lowest grade in Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens.

Sikh (Hindu sikh, disciple.) The Sikhs were originally a religious body like the Mahometans, but in 1764 they formally assumed national independence. Since 1849 the Sikhs have been ruled by the English.

Silbury near Marlborough. An artificial mound, 130 feet high, and covering seven acres of ground. Some say it is where “King Sel” was buried; others, that it is a corruption of Solis-bury (mound of the sun); others, that it is Sel-barrow (great tumulus), in honour of some ancient prince of Britain. The Rev. A. C. Smith is of opinion that it was erected by the Celts about B.C. 1600. There is a natural hill in the same vicinity, called St. Martin's Sell or Sill, in which case sill or sell means seat or throne. These etymologies of Silbury must rest on the authority of those who have suggested them.

Silchester (Berks) is Silicis castrum (flint camp), a Saxon-Latin form of the Roman Calleva or Galleva. Galleva is the Roman form of the British Gwal Vawr (great wall), so called from its wall, the ruins of which are still striking. Leland says, “On that wall grow some oaks of ten cart-load the piece.” According to tradition King Arthur was crowned here; and Ninnius asserts that the city was built by Constantius, father of Constantine the Great.

Silence gives Consent Latin, “Qui tacet consentire vidétur;” Greek, “Auto de to sigan homologountos esti sou” (Euripides); French, “Assez consent qui ne dit mot;” Italian, “Chi tace confessa.”

`But that you shall not say I yield, being silent,
I would not speak.”
Shakespeare: Cymbeline, ii. 3.

Silent (The). William I., Prince of Orange (1533-1584).

Silenus The foster-father of Bacchus, fond of music, and a prophet, but indomitably lazy, wanton, and given to debauch. He is described as a jovial old man, with bald head, pug nose, and face like Bardolph's.

Silhouette (3 syl.). A black profile, so called from Etienne de Silhouette, Contrôleur des Finances, 1757, who made great savings in the public expenditure of France. Some say the black portraits were called Silhouettes in ridicule; others assert that Silhouette devised this way of taking likenesses to save expense.

Silk Received silk, applied to a barrister, means that he has obtained licence to wear a silk gown in the law courts, having obtained the degree or title of sergeant.

Silk Gown A queen's counsel. So called because his canonical robe is a black silk gown. That of an ordinary barrister is made of stuff or prunello.

Silk Purse You cannot make a silk purse of a sow's ear. “You cannot make a horn of a pig's tail.” A sow's ear may somewhat resemble a purse, and a curled pig's tail may somewhat resemble a twisted horn, but a sow's ear cannot be made into a silk purse, nor a pig's tail into a cow's horn.

“You cannot make, my lord, I fear,
A velvet purse of a sow's ear.”
Peter Pindar: Lord B. and His Motions.

Silken Thread In the kingdom of Lilliput, the three great prizes of honour are “fine silk threads six inches long, one blue, another red, and a third green.” The emperor holds a stick in his hands, and the candidates “jump over it or creep under it, backwards or forwards, as the stick indicates,” and he who does so with the greatest agility is rewarded with the blue ribbon, the second best with the red cordon, and the third