ustrians (the
"Pragmatic army"), 42,000 men under the command of George II. of
England, routed the numerically superior French forces under the duc de
Noailles. It was in memory of this victory that Handel composed his
_Dettingen Te Deum_.

DEUCALION, in Greek legend, son of Prometheus, king of Phthia in
Thessaly, husband of Pyrrha, and father of Hellen, the mythical ancestor
of the Hellenic race. When Zeus had resolved to destroy all mankind by a
flood, Deucalion constructed a boat or ark, in which, after drifting
nine days and nights, he landed on Mount Parnassus (according to others,
Othrys, Aetna or Athos) with his wife. Having offered sacrifice and
inquired how to renew the human race, they were ordered to cast behind
them the "bones of the great mother," that is, the stones from the
hillside. The stones thrown by Deucalion became men, those thrown by
Pyrrha, women.

See Apollodorus i. 7, 2; Ovid, _Metam._ i. 243-415; Apollonius Rhodius
iii. 1085 ff.; H. Usener, _Die Sintflutsagen_ (1899).

DEUCE (a corruption of the Fr. _deux_, two), a term applied to the "two"
of any suit of cards, or of dice. It is also a term used in tennis when
both sides have each scored three points in a game, or five games in a
set; to win the game or set two points or games must then be won
consecutively. The earliest instances in English of the use of the slang
expression "the deuce," in exclamations and the like, date from the
middle of the 17th century. The meaning was similar to that of "plague"
or "mischief" in such phrases as "plague on you," "mischief take you"
and the like. The use of the word as an euphemism for "the devil" is
later. According to the _New English Dictionary_ the most probable
derivation is from a Low German _das daus_, i.e. the "deuce" in dice,
the lowest and therefore the most unlucky throw. The personification,
with a consequent change of gender, to _der daus_, came later. The word
has also been identified with the name of a giant or goblin in Teutonic
mythology.

DEUS, JOAO DE (1830-1896), the greatest Portuguese poet of his
generation, was born at San Bartholomeu de Messines in the province of
Algarve on the 8th of March 1830. Matriculating in the faculty of law at
the university of Coimbra, he did not proceed to his degree but settled
in the city, dedicating himself wholly to the composition of verses,
which circulated among professors and undergraduates in manuscript
copies. In the volume of h