R. I will do so to-morrow, if you desire it; you have heard enough for to-day.
Here the conversation ended for the time. Raymond’s story, which he entitled the School of Misfortune, I shall give to my readers in the next chapter.
Origin of Words and Phrases.
“He’s cut a Dido.” It is told in history, that Dido, a queen of Tyre, about eight hundred and seventy years before Christ, fled from that place upon the murder of her husband, and with a colony settled upon the northern coast of Africa, where she built Carthage. Being in want of land, she bargained with the natives for as much as she could surround with a bull’s hide. Having made the agreement, she cut a bull’s hide into fine strings, and tying them together, claimed as much land as she could surround with the long line she had thus made. The natives allowed the cunning queen to have her way, but when anybody played off a sharp trick, they said he has “cut a Dido;”—and the phrase has come down to our day.
“He’s caught a Tartar.” In some battle between the Russians and the Tartars, who are a wild sort of people in the north of Asia, a private soldier called out, “Captain, halloa there! I’ve caught a Tartar!” “Fetch him along, then!” said the captain. “Ay, but he won’t let me!” said the man; and the fact was, the Tartar had caught him. So when a man thinks to take another in, and gets bit himself, they say—“He’s caught a Tartar!”
“Carrying the war into Africa.” In one of the famous wars between Carthage and Rome, about two thousand five hundred years ago, Hannibal, a Carthaginian leader, and one of the most wonderful men of antiquity, led his army into Italy, and for several years continued to threaten the city and lay waste the surrounding country. Scipio, a Roman general, saw the necessity of getting rid of Hannibal and his forces; so he determined to lead an army into Africa, and threaten Carthage, and thus make it necessary for Hannibal to return home for its defence. This scheme had its intended effect; and in all after time, this retaliating upon an enemy, by adopting his own tactics, is called carrying the war into Africa.
“He drives like Jehu.” “And the watchman told, saying, he came even unto them, and cometh not again: and the driving is like the driving of Jehu the son of Nimshi; for he driveth furiously.” 2 Kings ix. 20.
The term “Yankee,” is supposed to have originated with the Indians, who called the English, Yongees, which came at length to be Yankees.
“Hoosiers.” The people of Indiana are called Hoosiers, and it is said to be an abbreviation of “Who’s here?”—a question which used to be shouted aloud by the traveller in that quarter, when, amid the tall grass of the prairies, he heard voices, or saw the smoke of a log cabin, but could see nobody.
“Suckers,” is the designation of the people of Illinois; because, as is said, the Galena miners used to appear in spring about the time the suckers, a large fish of the West, ascended the rivers.