A little learning is proverbially dangerous, and often lures vague people into unsuspected perils. One of the most charming ladies of my acquaintance, remonstrating with her mother for letting the fire go out on a rather chilly day, exclaimed, "O dear mamma, how could you be so careless? If you had been a Vestal Virgin you would have been bricked up." When the London County Council first came into existence, it used to assemble in the Guildhall, and the following dialogue took place between a highly cultured councillor and one of his commercial colleagues.
Cultured Councillor. "The acoustics of this place seem very bad."
Commercial Councillor (sniffing). "Indeed, sir? I haven't perceived anything unpleasant."
A well-known lady had lived for some years in a house in Harley Street which contained some fine ornamentation by Angelica Kauffmann, and, on moving to another quarter of the town, she loudly lamented the loss of her former drawing-room, "for it was so beautifully painted by Fra Angelico."
Mistakes of idiom are the prolific parents of error, or, as Mrs. Lirriper said, with an admirable confusion of metaphors, breed fruitful hot water for all parties concerned. "The wines of this hotel leave one nothing to hope for," was the alluring advertisement of a Swiss innkeeper who thought that his vintages left nothing to be desired. Lady Dufferin, in her Reminiscences of Viceregal Life, has some excellent instances of the same sort. "Your Enormity" is a delightful variant on "Your Excellency;" and there is something really pathetic in the Baboo's benediction, "You have been very good to us, and may Almighty God give you tit for tat." But to deride these errors of idiom scarcely lies in the mouth of an Englishman. A friend of mine, wishing to express his opinion that a Frenchman was an idiot, told him that he was a "cretonne." Lord R----, preaching at the French Exhibition, implored his hearers to come and drink of the "eau de vie;" and a good-natured Cockney, complaining of the incivility of French drivers, said, "It is so uncalled for, because I always try to make things pleasant by beginning with 'Bon jour, Cochon.'" Even in our own tongue Englishmen sometimes come to grief over an idiomatic proverb. In a debate in Convocation at Oxford, Dr. Liddon, referring to a concession made by the opposite side, said, "It is proverbially ungracious to look a gift horse in the face." And, though the undergraduates in the gallery roared "Mouth, sir; mouth!" till they were hoarse, the Angelic Doctor never perceived the unmeaningness of his proverb.
Some years ago a complaint of inefficiency was preferred against a workhouse-chaplain, and, when the Board of Guardians came to consider the case, one of the Guardians, defending the chaplain, observed that "Mr. P---- was only fifty-two, and had a mother running about." Commenting on this line of defence, a newspaper, which took the view hostile to the chaplain, caustically remarked:—"On this principle, the more athletic or restless were a clergyman's relatives, the more valuable an acquisition would he himself be to the Church. Supposing that some Embertide a bishop were fortunate enough to secure among his candidates for ordination a man who, in addition to 'a mother running about,' had a brother who gained prizes at Lillie Bridge, and a cousin who pulled in the 'Varsity Eight, and a nephew who was in the School Eleven, to say nothing of a grandmother who had St. Vitus's Dance, and an aunt in the country whose mind wandered, then surely Dr. Liddon himself would have to look out for his laurels."
The "Things one would rather have expressed differently" for which reporters are responsible are of course legion. I forbear to enlarge on such familiar instances as "the shattered libertine of debate," applied to Mr. Bernal Osborne, and "the roaring loom of the Times" when Mr. Lowell had spoken of the "roaring loom of time." I content myself with two which occurred in my own immediate circle. A clerical uncle of mine took the Pledge in his old age, and at a public meeting stated that his reason for so doing was that for thirty years he had been trying to cure drunkards by making them drink in moderation, but had never once succeeded. He was thus reported:—"The rev. gentleman stated that his reason for taking the Pledge was that for thirty years he had been trying to drink in moderation, but had never once succeeded." Another near relation of mine, protesting on a public platform against some misrepresentation by opponents, said:—"The worst enemy that any cause can have to fight is a double lie in the shape of half a truth." The newspaper which reported the proceedings gave the sentiment thus:—"The worst enemy that any cause can have to fight is a double eye in the shape of half a tooth." And, when an indignant remonstrance was addressed to the editor, he blandly said that he certainly had not understood the phrase, but imagined it must be "a quotation from an old writer."
But if journalistic reporting, on which some care and thought are bestowed, sometimes proves misleading, common rumour is far more prolific of things which would have been better expressed differently. It is now (thank goodness!) a good many years since "spelling-bees" were a favourite amusement in London drawing-rooms. The late Lady Combermere, an octogenarian dame who retained a sempiternal taste for les petits jeux innocents kindly invited a young curate whom she had been asked to befriend to take part in a "spelling-bee." He got on splendidly for a while, and then broke down among the repeated "n's" in "drunkenness." Returning crestfallen to his suburban parish, he was soon gratified by hearing the rumour that he had been turned out of a lady's house at the West End for drunkenness.
Shy people are constantly getting into conversational scrapes, their tongues carrying them whither they know not, like the shy young man who was arguing with a charming and intellectual young lady.
Charming Young Lady. "The worst of me is that I am so apt to be run away with by an inference."