holas_ (_Brother_), a monk at St. Mary's Convent.--Sir W. Scott,
_The Monastery_ (time, Elizabeth).

_Nicholas_ (_St._), patron saint of boys, parish clerks, sailors,
thieves, and of Aberdeen, Russia, etc.

_Nicholas_ (_St._). The legend is, that an angel told him a father was
so poor he was about to raise money by the prostitution of his three
daughters. On hearing this St. Nicholas threw in at the cottage window
three bags of money, sufficient to portion each of the three damsels.

The gift
Of Nicholas, which on the maidens he
Bounteous bestowed, to save their youthful prime
Unblemished.

Dant[^e], _Purgatory_, xx. (1308).

=Nicholas of the Tower= (_The_), the duke of Exeter, constable of the
Tower.

=Nicholas's Clerks=, highwaymen; so called by a pun on the phrase _Old
Nick_ and _St. Nicholas_ who presided over scholars.

_St. Nicholas's Clerks_, scholars; so called because St. Nicholas was
the patron of scholars. The statutes of Paul's School require the
scholars to attend divine service on St. Nicholas's Day.--Knight, _Life
of Dean Colet_, 362 (1726).

=Nicholas Minturn=, hero of novel of that name, by Josiah Gilbert Holland
(1876).

=Nickleby= (_Nicholas_), the chief character and title of a novel by C.
Dickens (1838). He is the son of a poor country gentleman, and has to
make his own way in the world. He first goes as usher to Mr. Squeers,
schoolmaster at Dotheboys Hall, in Yorkshire; but leaves in disgust with
the tyranny of Squeers and his wife, especially to a poor boy named
Smike. Smike runs away from the school to follow Nicholas, and remains
his humble follower till death. At Portsmouth, Nicholas joins the
theatrical company of Mr. Crummles, but leaves the profession for other
adventures. He falls in with the brothers Cheeryble, who make him their
clerk; and in this post he rises to become a merchant, and ultimately
marries Madeline Bray.

_Mrs. Nickleby_, mother of Nicholas, and a widow. She is an enormous
talker, fond of telling long stories with no connection. Mrs. Nickleby
is a weak, vain woman, who imagines an idiot neighbor is in love with
her because he tosses cabbages and other articles over the garden wall.
In conversation, Mrs. Nickleby rides off from the main point at every
word suggestive of some new idea. As a specimen of her sequence of
ideas, take the following example: "The name began with 'B' and ended
with 'g,' I am sure. Perhap