BACCHAN’TES (3 syl.), priestesses of Bacchus.

  Round about him Bacchus fair Bacchantes,
  Bearing cymbals, flutes, and thyrses,
  Wild from Naxian groves, or Zante’s
  Vineyards, sing delirious verses. 
  Longfellow, Drinking Song.

BACCHUS, in the Lusiad, an epic poem by Camoens (1569), is the personification of the evil principle which acts in opposition to Jupiter, the lord of Destiny.  Mars is made by the poet the guardian power of Christianity, and Bacchus of Mohammedanism.

BACKBITE (Sir Benjamin), nephew of Crabtree, very conceited, and very censorious.  His friends called him a great poet and wit, but he never published anything, because “’twas very vulgar to print;” besides, as he said, his little productions circulated more “by giving copies in confidence to friends.”—­Sheridan, School for Scandal (1777).

When I first saw Miss Pope she was performing “Mrs. Candour,” to Miss Farren’s “lady Teazle,” King as “sir Peter,” Parsons “Crab-tree,” Dodd “Backbite,” Baddeley “Moses,” Smith “Charles,” and John Palmer “Joseph” [Surface].—­James Smith, Memoirs, etc.

BACTRIAN SAGE (The), Zoroas’ter or Zerdusht, a native of Bactria, now Balkh (B.C. 589-513).

BADE’BEC (2 syl.), wife of Gargantua and mother of Pantag’ruel.  She died in giving him birth, or rather in giving birth at the same time to nine dromedaries laden with ham and smoked tongues, 7 camels laden with eels, and 25 wagons full of leeks, garlic, onions, and shallots.—­Rabelais, Pantagruel, ii. 2 (1533).

BADGER (Will), sir Hugh Robsart’s favorite domestic.—­Sir W. Scott, Kenilworth (time, Elizabeth).

Bad’ger (Mr. Bayham), medical practitioner at Chelsea, under whom Richard Carstone pursues his studies.  Mr. Badger is a crisp-looking gentleman, with “surprised eyes;” very proud of being Mrs. Badger’s “third,” and always referring to her former two husbands, captain Swosser and professor Dingo.—­C.  Dickens, Bleak House (1853).

BADINGUET [Bad.en.gay] one of the many nicknames of Napoleon III.  It was the name of the mason in whose clothes he escaped from the fortress of Ham (1808, 1851-1873).

BADOURA, daughter of Gaiour (2 syl.), king of China, the “most beautiful woman ever seen upon earth.”  The emperor Gaiour wished her to marry, but she expressed an aversion to wedlock.  However, one night by fairy influence she was shown prince Camaralzaman asleep, fell in love with him, and exchanged rings.  Next day she inquired for the prince, but her inquiry was thought so absurd that she was confined as a madwoman.  At length her foster-brother solved the difficulty thus:  The emperor having proclaimed that whoever cured the princess of her [supposed] madness should have her for his wife, he sent Camaralzaman to play the magician, and imparted the secret to the princess by sending her the ring she had left with the sleeping prince.  The cure was instantly effected, and the marriage solemnized with due pomp.  When the emperor was informed that his son-in-law was a prince, whose father was sultan of the “Island of the Children of Khaledan, some twenty days’ sail from the coast of Persia,” he was delighted with the alliance.—­Arabian Nights ("Camaralzaman and Badoura").