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Bean

.

Every bean has its black. Nemo sine vitiis nasʹcitur, “everyone has his faults.” The bean has a black eye. (Ogni grano ha la sua semola.)

He has found the bean in the cake, he has got a prize in the lottery, has come to some unexpected good fortune. The allusion is to twelfth cakes in which a bean is buried. When the cake is cut up and distributed, he who gets the bean is the twelfth-night king.

 

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.

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Bayonets
Bead (Anglo-Saxon, bed, a prayer)
Bead-house
Bead-roll
Beadle
Beadsman or Bedesman
Beak
Beaker
Beam
Beam (of a stag)
Bean
Beans
Bean Feast
Bean Goose (The)
Bean-king (The)
Bear (A)
Bear (The)
Bear (To)
Bear of Bradwardine (The)
Bear Account (A)
Bear Garden