A Contest in the King’s English.
There is a young darky downtown, at a livery stable, who has been priding himself on his ability, as he expressed it, “ter fling English.” But he takes no pride in it any more. Old Wash cured him, and it happened this way:
“Wheneber I goes down dar arter yo’ mare,” the old darky said, “dis heah young niggah gins ter fling his English ’roun’ scan’lus. I tell you, boss, I’m gittin’ tired ob dat, an’ I’m gwi’ teach ’im how ter talk English sho’ nuff some day. I sw’ar to you, sah,” said the old man, as he mopped his face with his red handkerchief, “It’s so hot I’ve mighty nigh multerplied, an’ I’ve got de commissary rumertism, ter boot; but jes you watch out fur me de naixt time dat nigger ’gins ter fling his jaw-bone ’roun’ whar I’m standin’—jes you watch me riddle ’im wid sintax an’ orfrography an’ sich! Jes you watch!”
For several days after that I noticed the old man studying an old Davies Geometry and an obsolete work on synonyms, which I had sent to the attic long ago—looking, as he expressed it, for “some good cuss-words to fit de ’casion.” But I had forgotten all about it until one evening I drove into the stable with him. A sprightly young darky ran out, took the mare by the bit, and patronizingly remarked:
“Gentermen, condescen’ to disintergrate frum de vehicle, an’ de quadruped shall hab my unqualified solicertashun, wid abundance ob nutrititious ellerments.” And he smirked at the old man as much as to say: “Don’t dat parlyze you, old man?”
“Hold on dar,” exclaimed Old Wash, and his eyes flashed as he rose quickly to the occasion: “Sonny,” he began witheringly, “it is transparent to de interlactual apprehension ob eny disinterested individual dat de gravertashun of special conceits described on de hypotonuse of your simeon-headed eclipse, am entirely too cumbershum fur de horizontal vinculum dat circumscribes de radius ob yo’ cocoanut-shaped trapezium, sah!”
“Wha—wha—what dat you say, Unker Wash?” gasped the young darky as his jaw began to drop.
“I merely riz ter interjec’ de mental reservashun,” remarked the old man indifferently, “dat de interlectual hemmerage of verbosity procedin’ from de vacuum produced by de metermorphosis ob de origonal superstructure of de san’-stones ob yo’ cranium, am entirely incumpatabul wid de consterpastion of ideas generated by de paralysis ob yo’ interlectual acumen, sah!”
“Gord, what is he sayin’?” remarked the young negro sheepishly to the crowd that had gathered to enjoy his discomfiture.
“In udder words,” shot out the old man again, “ter make hit entirely incomprehensibul to de conglommerated hypothesis ob yo’ trapezoidal interlec’, I simply remarked dat de corporeal superfluerty ob yo’ physical insigniferkance am entirely too cumbersome fur de belly-band ob yo’ mental confermashun, sah!”
Here the crowd shouted, the young darky’s eyes looked like moons, his legs shook, and he gasped out: “Wha—wha—what dat old man talkin’ ’bout, man?”
“How long since this nigger wus cotch in the jungles of Africa,” asked Old Wash quietly of the proprietor of the stable, “dat he can’t understan’ de simples’ remark in de plaines’ of English?”
And then the old man tried again. He rolled up his sleeves, and with the air of one who was trying to make himself exceedingly plain he began laying it off on his fingers and palm:
“Sonny, de equilateral altertude of de comprehenserbility ob my former observations wus to de effect dat, if in de course of a cummercial transacshun, I shu’d onexpectedly negotiate fur yo’ habeas-corporosity at its intrinsic invalidity an’ quickly dispose of it at de exaggerated hifolutiness of yo’ own colossal conceitability an’ hipnartic expectashun I’d have sufficient commercial collateral to transpose my present habitation to de perennial localization of de avenue called Easy.”
By this time the young darky was fairly groveling in the dust.
“Do yo’ comprehen’ dat,” yelled the old man, “yo’ po’ benighted parallelergram, distended from de apex of a truncated coon (cone), yo’ bow-legged son of a parallelopipedon—”
But the old man got no further with his geometrical swearing, for amid the shouts of the spectators his opponent had vanished, and as he went up the street to have the old man arrested for swearing in public, he remarked to the policeman as he told his tale: “I didn’t keer, Cap’n, ’bout ’im outgineralin’ me er flingin’ English, an’ outcussin’ me in mo’ kinder newfangled cuss words den eber cum out ob Turkey, but when he ’flected on my mother by callin’ me de bow-legged-son-ob-a-parrot-an-er-pigeon-roost, de nigger don’t lib dat I gwi’ take dat frum!”
It was a week later before Old Wash and I had occasion to drive into the stable again. We were met by the same darky, who took the mare by the bit and meekly remarked: “Light, gentlemen; I’ll take de mair.”
And the old man said: “I am so excruciatinly rejoiced, sonny, to recognize de rejuvernated resurrection ob de exhileratin’ perception dat an infinertesermal ray ob common sense has penertrated de comatose condition ob yo’ fibrous misunderstanding’. In other words,” he winked, “I’se saved an ebononic interlec frum er new-bohn grave.”