BRECK (Alison), an old fishwife, friend of the Mucklebackits.—­Sir W. Scott, The Antiquary (time, Greorge III.).

Breck (Angus), a follower of Rob Roy M’Gregor, the outlaw.—­Sir W. Scott, Rob Roy (time, Greorge I.).

BREITMAN (Hans), the giver of the entertainment celebrated in Charles Godfrey Leland’s dialect verses, Hans Breitman gave a Party.  A favorite with parlor and platform “readers.” (1871.)

BRENDA [TROIL], daughter of Magnus Troil and sister of Minna.—­Sir W. Scott, The Pirate (time, William III.).

BRENGWAIN, the confidante of Isolde (2 syl.) wife of sir Mark king of Cornwall.  Isolde was criminally attached to her nephew sir Tristram, and Brengwain assisted the queen in her intrigues.

Brengwain, wife of Gwenwyn prince of Powys-land.—­Sir W. Scott, The Betrothed (time, Henry II.).

BRENNETT (Maurice), a man whom “life had always cast for the leading business” and who “bears himself in a manner befitting the title role.”  In pursuance of this destiny he becomes a mining speculator, betrays his confiding partner and everybody else who will trust, and when success seems within his grasp is thwarted by the discovery of a man he had supposed to be dead.  The woman he would have married to secure her fortune, around which he had woven the fine web of his schemes, breaks out impetuously: 

“If you will prove his complicity ...  I will pursue him to the ends of the earth.”

At that moment through the window she sees the head-light of the train that is bearing Maurice Brennett away into the darkness.  The thorough search made for him afterward is futile.—­Charles Egbert Craddock, Where the Battle was Fought (1885).

BRENTANO (A), one of inconceivable folly.  The Brentanos, Clemens and his sister Bettina, are remarkable in German literary annals for the wild and extravagant character of their genius.  Bettina’s work, Goethe’s Correspondence with a Child (1835), is a pure fabrication of her own.

  At the point where the folly of others ceases,
  that of the Brentanos begins.—­German Proverb.

BRENTFORD (The two kings of).  In the duke of Buckingham’s farce called The Rehearsal (1671), the two kings of Brentford enter hand-in-hand, dance together, sing together, walk arm-in-arm, and to heighten the absurdity the actors represent them as smelling at the same nosegay (act ii. 2).

BRETWALDA, the over-king of the Saxon rulers, established in England during the heptarchy.  In Germany the over-king was called emperor.  The bretwalda had no power in the civil affairs of the under-kings, but in times of war or danger formed an important centre.

BREWER OF GHENT (The), James van Artevelde, a great patriot.  His son Philip fell in the battle of Rosbecq (fourteenth century).