possession of a casket of gold belonging to the miser,
and hidden in the garden. When Harpagon discovers his loss he raves
like a madman, and Cleante gives him the choice of Mariane or the
casket. The miser chooses the casket, and leaves the young lady to his
son. The second plot is connected with Elise (2 _syl._), the miser's
daughter, promised in marriage by the father to his friend Anselme (2
_syl._); but Elise is herself in love with Valere, who, however, turns
out to be the son of Anselme. As soon as Anselme discovers that Valere
is his son, who he thought had been lost at sea, he resigns to him
Elise, and so in both instances the young folks marry together, and
the old ones give up their unnatural rivalry.--Moliere, _L'Avare_
(1667).

AVENEL (2 _syl._), _Julian_, the usurper of Avenel Castle.

_Lady Alice_, widow of sir Walter.

_Mary_, daughter of Lady Alice. She marries Halbert Glendinning.--Sir
W. Scott, _The Monastery_ (date 1559).

_Avenel_ (_Sir Halbert Glendinning, knight of_), same as the
bridegroom in _The Monastery_.

_The lady Mary of Avenel_, same as the bride in _The Monastery_.--Sir
W. Scott, _The Abbot_ (time, Elizabeth).

_The White Lady of Avenel_, a spirit mysteriously connected with the
Avenel family, as the Irish banshee is with true Milesian families.
She announces good or ill fortune, and manifests a general interest
in the family to which she is attached, but to others she acts with
considerable caprice; thus she shows unmitigated malignity to the
sacristan and the robber. Any truly virtuous mortal has commanding
power over her.

Noon gleams on the lake,
Noon glows on the fell;
Awake thee, awake,
White maid of Avenel!

Sir W. Scott, _The Monastery_ (time, Elizabeth).

AVENGER OF BLOOD, the man who had the birthright, according to the
Jewish, polity, of taking vengeance on him who had killed one of his
relatives.

... the Christless code
That must have life for a blow.

Tennyson, _Maud_, II. i. 1.

AVERY (_Parson_), a missionary "to the souls of fishers starving on
the rocks of Marblehead." He is wrecked with his crew, one wintry
midnight, and dies praying aloud.--J.G. Whittier, _The Swan Song of
Parson Avery_ (1850).

AVICEN or _Abou-ibn-Sina_, an Arabian physician and philosopher, born
at Shiraz, in Persia (980-1037). He composed a treatise on logic, and
another on metaphysics. Avicen is called both the Hippocrates and the
Aristotle of the Arabs.

Of