For The Sake Of
Explanation I Shall Here Subjoin A Few Examples.
Tegeingl is the
name of a province in North Wales, over which David, son of Owen,
had dominion, and which had once been in the possession of his
brother.
The same word also was the name of a certain woman with
whom, it was said, each brother had an intrigue, from which
circumstance arose this term of reproach, "To have Tegeingl, after
Tegeingl had been in possession of his brother."
At another time, when Rhys, son of Gruffydd, prince of South Wales,
accompanied by a multitude of his people, devoutly entered the
church of St. David's, previous to an intended journey, the
oblations having been made, and mass solemnised, a young man came
to him in the church, and publicly declared himself to be his son,
threw himself at his feet, and with tears humbly requested that the
truth of this assertion might be ascertained by the trial of the
burning iron. Intelligence of this circumstance being conveyed to
his family and his two sons, who had just gone out of the church, a
youth who was present made this remark: "This is not wonderful;
some have brought gold, and others silver, as offerings; but this
man, who had neither, brought what he had, namely, iron;" thus
taunting him with his poverty. On mentioning a certain house that
was strongly built and almost impregnable, one of the company said,
"This house indeed is strong, for if it should contain food it
could never be got at," thus alluding both to the food and to the
house. In like manner, a person, wishing to hint at the avaricious
disposition of the mistress of a house, said, "I only find fault
with our hostess for putting too little butter to her salt,"
whereas the accessory should be put to the principal; thus, by a
subtle transposition of the words, converting the accessory into
the principal, by making it appear to abound in quantity. Many
similar sayings of great men and philosophers are recorded in the
Saturnalia of Macrobius. When Cicero saw his son-in-law, Lentulus,
a man of small stature, with a long sword by his side: "Who," says
he, "has girded my son-in-law to that sword?" thus changing the
accessary into the principal. The same person, on seeing the half-
length portrait of his brother Quintus Cicero, drawn with very
large features and an immense shield, exclaimed, "Half of my
brother is greater than the whole!" When the sister of Faustus had
an intrigue with a fuller, "Is it strange," says he, "that my
sister has a spot, when she is connected with a fuller?" When
Antiochus showed Hannibal his army, and the great warlike
preparations he had made against the Romans, and asked him,
"Thinkest thou, O Hannibal, that these are sufficient for the
Romans?" Hannibal, ridiculing the unmilitary appearance of the
soldiers, wittily and severely replied, "I certainly think them
sufficient for the Romans, however greedy;" Antiochus asking his
opinion about the military preparations, and Hannibal alluding to
them as becoming a prey to the Romans.
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