Wherein our Devonshire now and fartherest Cornwal are,
  The old Danmonii [sic] dwelt. 
  Drayton, Polyolbion, xvi. (1613).

DAMARIS WAINRIGHT.  A woman richly endowed by Nature and fortune, whose mother and brother have died insane.  She comes to maidenly maturity under the impression which strengthens into belief that madness is her heritage.  After long struggles she accepts the hand of one who has striven steadily to combat what he considers a morbid conviction, and makes ready for her marriage.  When dressed for the ceremony she sits down to await her bridegroom, and the image of herself in a tarnished mirror suggests a train of melancholy musing that result in dementia.

“With a mad impulse to flee she sprang to her feet just as Lincoln knocked....  For an instant her failing reason struggled to consciousness as a drowning swimmer writhes a last time to the surface, and gasps a breath only to give it up in futile bubbles that mark the spot where he sank.  With a supreme effort her vanquished will for a moment re-asserted itself.  She knew her lover was at the door, and she knew also that the feet of doom had been swifter than those of the bridegroom....  She sprang forward and threw open the door.”

  “‘I am mad!’ she shrieked, in a voice which
  pierced to every corner of the old mansion.”

Arlo Bates, The Wheel of Fire, (1885).

DAM’OCLES (3 syl.), a sycophant, in the court of Dionys’ius the Elder, of Syracuse.  After extolling the felicity of princes, Dionysius told him he would give him experimental proof thereof.  Accordingly he had the courtier arrayed in royal robes and seated at a sumptuous banquet, but overhead was a sword suspended by a single horsehair, and Damocles was afraid to stir, lest the hair should break and the sword fall on him.  Dionysius thus intimated that the lives of kings are threatened every hour of the day.—­Cicero.

Let us who have not our names in the Red Book console ourselves by thinking comfortably how miserable our betters may be, and that Damocles, who sits on satin cushions, and is served on gold plate, has an awful sword hanging over his head, in the shape of a bailiff, or hereditary disease, or family secret.—­Thackeray, Vanity Fair, xlvii. (1848).

DAMOE’TAS, a herdsman.  Theocritos and Virgil use the name in their pastorals.

  And old Damoetas loved to hear our song. 
  Milton, Lycidas (1638).

DA’MON, a goat-herd in Virgil’s third Eclogue.  Walsh introduces the same name in his Eclogues also.  Any rustic, swain, or herdsman.

DAMON AND DELIA.  Damon asks Delia why she looks so coldly on him.  She replies because of his attention to Belvidera.  He says he paid these attentions at her own request, “to hide the secret of their mutual love.”  Delia confesses that his prudence is commendable, but his acting is too earnest.  To this he rejoins that she alone holds his heart; and Delia replies: