Part 120 (2/2)

=Rom'uald= (_St_).[TN-135] The Catalans had a great reverence for a hermit so called, and hearing that he was about to quit their country, called together a parish meeting, to consult how they might best retain him amongst them, ”For,” said they, ”he will certainly be consecrated, and his relics will bring a fortune to us.” So they agreed to strangle him; but their intention being told to the hermit, he secretly made his escape.--St. Foix, _Essais Historiques sur Paris_, v. 163.

? Southey has a ballad on the subject.

=Romulus= (_The Second and Third_), Camillus and Marius. Also called ”The Second and Third Founders of Rome.”

=Romulus and Remus=, the twin sons of Silvia, a vestal virgin, and the G.o.d Mars. The infants were exposed in a cradle, and the floods carried the cradle to the foot of the Palatine. Here a wolf suckled them, till one Faustulus, the king's shepherd, took them to his wife, who brought them up. When grown to manhood, they slew Amulius, who had caused them to be exposed.

The Greek legend of Tyro is in many respects similar. This Tyro had an amour with Poseidon (as Silvia had with Mars), and two sons were born in both cases. Tyro's mother-in-law confined her in a dungeon, and exposed the two infants (Pelias and Neleus) in a boat on the river Enipeus (3 _syl._). Here they were discovered and brought up by a herdsman (Romulus and Remus were brought up by a shepherd), and when grown to manhood, they put to death their mother-in-law, who had caused them to be exposed (as Romulus and Remus put to death their great-uncle, Amulius).

=Ron=, the ebony spear of Prince Arthur.

The temper of his sword, the tried Excalibor, The bigness and the length of Rone his n.o.ble spear, With Pridwin his great s.h.i.+eld.

Drayton, _Polyolbion_, iv. (1612).

=Ronald= (_Lord_), in love with Lady Clare, to whom he gave a lily-white doe. The day before the wedding nurse Alice told Lady Clare she was not ”Lady Clare” at all, but her own child. On hearing this, she dressed herself as a peasant girl, and went to Lord Ronald to release him from his engagement. Lord Ronald replied, ”If you are not the heiress born, we will be married to-morrow, and you shall still be Lady Clare.”--Tennyson, _Lady Clare_.

=Ronaldson= (_Neil_), the old ranzelman of Jarlshof (ch. vii.).--Sir W.

Scott, _The Pirate_ (time William III.).

=Rondib'ilis=, the physician consulted by Panurge, on the knotty question, ”whether he ought to marry, or let it alone.”--Rabelais, _Pantagruel_ (1545).

? This question, which Panurge was perpetually asking every one, of course refers to the celibacy of the clergy.

=Rondo= (_The Father of the_), Jean Baptiste Davaux.

=Rope of Ocnus= (_A_), profitless labor. Ocnus was always twisting a rope with unwearied diligence, but an a.s.s ate it as fast as it was twisted.

? This allegory means that Ocnus worked hard to earn money, which his wife squandered by her extravagance.

The work of Penelope's web was ”never ending, still beginning,” because Penelope pulled out at night all that she had spun during the day. Her object was to defer doing what she abhorred but knew not how to avoid.

=Roper= (_Margaret_), was buried with the head of her father, Sir Thomas More, between her hands.

Her who clasped in her last trance Her murdered father's head.

Tennyson.

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