Milton, Paradise Lost, i. 306 (1665).

BUS’NE (2 syl.).  So the gipsies call all who do not belong to their race.

The gold of the Busne; give me her gold.  Longfellow, The Spanish Student.

BUSQUEUE (Lord), plaintiff in the great Pantagruelian lawsuit known as “lord Busqueue v. lord Suckfist,” in which the parties concerned pleaded for themselves.  Lord Busqueue stated his grievance and spoke so learnedly and at such length, that no one understood one word about the matter; then lord Suckfist replied, and the bench declared “We have not understood one iota of the defence.”  Pantag’ruel, however, gave judgment, and as both plaintiff and defendant considered he had got the verdict, both were fully satisfied, “a thing without parallel in all the annals of the court.”—­Rabelais, Pantagruel, ii. (1533).

BUSY BODY (The), a comedy by Mrs. Centlivre (1709).  Sir Francis Gripe (guardian of Miranda, an heiress, and father of Charles), a man sixty-five years old, wishes to marry his ward for the sake of her money, but Miranda loves and is beloved by sir George Airy, a man of twenty-four.  She pretends to love “Gardy,” and dupes him into yielding up her money, and giving his consent to her marriage with “the man of her choice,” believing himself to be the person.  Charles is in love with Isabinda, daughter of sir Jealous Traffick, who has made up his mind that she shall marry a Spaniard named don Diego Babinetto, expected to arrive forthwith.  Charles dresses in a Spanish costume, passes himself off as the expected don, and is married to the lady of his choice; so both the old men are duped, and all the young people wed according to their wishes.

BUTCHER (The), Achmet pasha, who struck off the heads of seven of his wives at once.  He defended Acre against Napoleon I.

John ninth lord Clifford, called “The Black Clifford” (died 1461).

Oliver de Clisson, constable of France (1320-1407).

Butcher (The Bloody), the duke of Cumberland, second son of Gleorge II.; so called for his great barbarities in suppressing the rebellion of Charles Edward, the young pretender (1726-1765).

BUTCHER OF ENGLAND, John Tiptoft, earl of Worcester, a man of great learning and a patron of learning (died 1470).

On one occasion in the reign of Edward IV. he ordered Clapham (a squire to lord Warwick) and nineteen others, all gentlemen, to be impaled.—­Stow, Warkworth Chronicle ("Cont.  Croyl.”)

Yet so barbarous was the age, that this same learned man impaled forty Lancastrian prisoners at Southampton, put to death the infant children of the Irish chief Desmond, and acquired the nickname of “The Butcher of England.”—­Old and New London, ii. 21.

BUTLER (Reuben), a presbyterian minister, married to Jeanie Deans.

Benjamin Butler, father of Reuben.