ne who had gone to ruin
(_abreothan_). _Bordel_, on the contrary, is a place, literally a
small hut or shelter, especially for fornication, Med. Lat.
_bordellum_, diminutive of the Late Lat. _borda_, board. The words
were early confused, and brothel-house, bordel-house, bordel or
brothel, are all used for a disorderly house, while bordel was
similarly misused, and, like brothel in its proper meaning, was
applied to a disorderly person.

DISPATCH, or DESPATCH, to send off immediately, or by express;
particularly in the case of the sending of official messages, or of the
immediate sending of troops to their destination, or the like. The word
is thus used as a substantive of written official reports of events,
battles and the like, sent by ambassadors, generals, &c., by means of a
special messenger, or of express correspondence generally. From the
primary meaning of the prompt sending of a message, &c., the word is
used of the quick disposal of business, or of the disposal of a person
by violence; hence the word means to execute or murder. The etymology of
the word has been obscured by the connexion with the Fr. _depecher_, and
_depeche_, which are in meaning the equivalents of the Eng. verb and
substantive. The Fr. word is made up of the prefix _de-_, Lat. _dis-_,
and the root which appears in _empecher_, to embarrass, and means
literally to disentangle. The Lat. origin of _depecher_ and _empecher_
is a Low Lat. _pedicare_, _pedica_, a fetter. The Fr. word came into
Eng. as _depeach_, which was in use from the 15th century until
"despatch" was introduced. This word is certainly direct from the Ital.
_dispacciare_, or Span, _despachar_, which must be derived from the Lat.
root appearing in _pactus_, fixed, fastened, from _pangere_. The _New
English Dictionary_ finds the earliest instance of "dispatch" in a
letter to Henry VIII. from Bishop Tunstall, commissioner to Spain in
1516-1517.

DISPENSATION, a term with two main applications, (1) to the action of
administering, arranging or dealing out, and (2) to the action of
allowing certain things, rules, &c., to be done away with, relaxed. Of
these two meanings the first is to be derived from the classical Latin
use of _dispensare_, literally, to weigh out, hence to distribute,
especially of the orderly arrangement of a household by a steward; thus
_dispensatio_ was, in theology, the word chosen to translate the Greek
[Greek: oikonomia