BOISTERER, one of the seven attendants of Fortunio.  His gift was that he could overturn a windmill with his breath, and even wreck a man-of-war.

Fortunio asked him what he was doing.  “I am blowing a little, sir,” answered he, “to set those mills at work.”  “But,” said the knight, “you seem too far off.”  “On the contrary,” replied the blower, “I am too near, for if I did not restrain my breath I should blow the mills over, and perhaps the hill too on which they stand.”—­Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales ("Fortunio,” 1682).

BOLD BEAUCHAMP [Beech-am], a proverbial phrase similar to “an Achilles,” “a Hector,” etc.  The reference is to Thomas de Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, who, with one squire and six archers, overthrew a hundred armed men at Hogges, in Normandy, in 1346.

So had we still of ours, in France that famous were, Warwick, of England then high-constable that was, ...So hardy, great, and strong, That after of that name it to an adage grew, If any man himself adventurous happed to shew, “Bold Beauchamp” men him termed, if none so bold as he.

  Drayton, Polyolbion, xviii. (1613).

BOLD STROKE FOR A HUSBAND, a comedy by Mrs. Cowley.  There are two plots:  one a bold stroke to get the man of one’s choice for a husband, and the other a bold stroke to keep a husband.  Olivia de Zuniga fixed her heart on Julio de Messina, and refused or disgusted all suitors till he came forward.  Donna Victoria, in order to keep a husband, disguised herself in man’s apparel, assumed the name of Florio, and made love as a man to her husband’s mistress.  She contrived by an artifice to get back an estate which don Carlos had made over to his mistress, and thus saved her husband from ruin (1782).

BOLD STROKE FOR A WIFE.  Old Lovely at death left his daughter Anne L30,000, but with this proviso, that she was to forfeit the money if she married without the consent of her guardians.  Now her guardians were four in number, and their characters so widely different that “they never agreed on any one thing.”  They were sir Philip Modelove, an old beau; Mr. Periwinkle, a silly virtuoso; Mr. Tradelove, a broker on ’Change; and Mr. Obadiah Prim, a hypocritical quaker.  Colonel Feignwell contrived to flatter all the guardians to the top of their bent, and won the heiress.—­Mrs. Centlivre (1717).

BOLDWOOD (Farmer), one of the wooers of Bathsheba Everdene.  He serves for her seven years and loses her at last, after killing her husband to free her from his tyranny.  He is sentenced to penal servitude “during Her Majesty’s pleasure.”—­Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd (1874).

BOLSTER, a famous Wrath, who compelled St. Agnes to gather up the boulders which infested his territory.  She carried three apronfuls to the top of a hill, hence called St. Agnes’ Beacon. (See WRATH’S HOLE.)

BOL’TON (Stawarth), an English officer in The Monastery, a novel by sir W. Scott (time, Elizabeth).