Sunk were his eyes, his voice was harsh and loud,
  Sure signs he neither choleric was, nor proud;
  His long chin proved his wit; his saint-like grace,
  A Church vermilion, and a Moses’ face;
  His memory miraculously great
  Could plots, exceeding man’s belief, repeat.

  Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel, i. (1631).

CORBAC’CIO (Signior), the dupe of Mosca the knavish confederate of Vol’pone (2 syl.).  He is an old man, with seeing and hearing faint, and understanding dulled to childishness, yet he wishes to live on, and

  Feels not his gout nor palsy; feigns himself
  Younger by scores of years; flatters his age
  With confident belying it; hopes he may
  With charms, like Aeson, have his youth restored.

  Ben Jonson, Volpone or the Fox (1605).

Benjamin Johnson [1665-1742] ... seemed to be proud to wear the poet’s double name, and was particularly great in all that author’s plays that were usually performed, viz “Wasp,” in Bartholomew Fair; “Corbaccio;” “Morose,” in The Silent Woman; and “Ananias,” in The Alchemist.—­Chetwood.

C. Dibdin says none who ever saw W. Parsons (1736-1795) in “Corbaccio” could forget his effective mode of exclaiming “Has he made his will?  What has he given me!” but Parsons himself says:  “Ah! to see ‘Corbaccio’ acted to perfection, you should have seen Shuter.  The public are pleased to think that I act that part well, but his acting was as far superior to mine as Mount Vesuvius is to a rushlight.”

COR’BANT, the rook, in the beast-epic of Reynard the Fox (1498).  (French, corbeau, “a rook.”)

CORCE’CA (3 syl.), mother of Abessa.  The word means “blindness of heart,” or Romanism.  Una sought shelter under her hut, but Corceca shut the door against her; whereupon the lion which accompanied Una broke down the door.  The “lion” means England, “Corceca” popery, “Una” protestantism, and “breaking down the door” the Reformation.—­Spenser, Faery Queen, i. 3 (1590).

CORDAY (Marie Anne Charlotte), descendant of the poet Corneille.  Born in Normandy 1768.  She killed the bloody Marat in the bath and was guillotined for the deed, July, 1793.

CORDE’LIA, youngest daughter of King Lear.  She was disinherited by her royal father, because her protestations of love were less violent than those of her sisters.  Cordelia married the king of France, and when her two elder sisters refused to entertain the old king with his suite, she brought an army over to dethrone them.  She was, however, taken captive, thrown into prison, and died there.

  Her voice was ever soft,
  Gentle, and low; an excellent thing in woman.

  Shakespeare, King Lear, act v. sc. 3 (1605).

CORFLAM’BO, the personification of sensuality, a giant killed by Arthur.  Corflambo had a daughter named Paea’na, who married Placidas, and proved a good wife to him.—­Spenser, Faery Queen, iv. 8 (1596).