SCHOOLBOYS' BLUNDERS.
THE blunders of the examined
form a fruitful source of
amusement for us all, and many
comical instances have been published.
The mistakes which are constantly
occurring must naturally be innumerable, but
only a few of them rise to the dignity of
a blunder. If it be difficult to define a
blunder, probably the best illustration of
what it is will be found in the answers of
the boys under examination. All classes
of blunders may be found among these.
There are those which show confusion of
knowledge, and those which exhibit an
insight into the heart of the matter while
blundering in the form. Two very good
examples occur to one's mind, but it is to
be feared that they owe their origin to
some keen spirit of mature years. ``What
<p 158>is Faith?--The quality by which we are
enabled to believe that which we know is
untrue.'' Surely this must have
emanated from a wit! Again, the whole
Homeric question is condensed into the
following answer: ``Some people say that
the Homeric poems were not written by
Homer, but by another man of the same
name.'' If this is a blunder, who would
not wish to blunder so?
A large class of schoolboys' blunders
consist in a confusion of words somewhat
alike in sound, a confusion that is apt to
follow some of us through life. ``Matins''
has been mixed up with ``pattens,'' and
described as something to wear on the
feet. Nonconformists are said to be
persons who cannot form anything, and
a tartan is assumed to be an inhabitant
of Tartary. The gods are believed by
one boy to live on nectarines, and by
another to imbibe ammonia. The same
desire to make an unintelligible word
express a meaning which has caused the
recognised but absurd spelling of _sovereign_
(more wisely spelt _sovran_ by Milton)
shows itself in the form ``Tea-trarck''
<p 159>explained as the title of Herod given to
him because he invented or was fond of
tea.[13] A still finer confusion of ideas is to
be found in an answer reported by Miss
Graham in the _University Correspondent_:
``Esau was a man who wrote fables, and
who sold the copyright to a publisher for
a bottle of potash.''
[13] _Cornhill Magazine_, June 1888, pp. 619-28.
The following etymological guesses are
not so good, but they are worthy of
registration. One boy described a blackguard
as ``one who has been a shoeblack,'' while
another thought he was ``a man dressed
in black.'' ``Polite'' is said to be derived
from ``Pole,'' owing to the affability of the
Polish race. ``Heathen'' means ``covered
with heath''; but this explanation is
commonplace when compared with the
brilliant guess--``Heathen, from Latin
`h<ae>thum,' faith, and `en,' not.''
The boy who explained the meaning of
the words _fort_ and _fortress_ must have had
rather vague ideas as to masculine and
feminine nouns. He wrote: ``A fort is
a place to put men in, and a fortress a
place to put women in.''
<p 160>
The little book entitled _English as she
is Taught_, which contains a considerable
number of genuine answers to examination
questions given in American schools, with
a Commentary by Mark Twain, is full of
amusing matter. A large proportion of
these answers are of a similar character
to those just enumerated, blunders which
have arisen from a confusion caused by
similarity of sound in the various words,
thus, ``In Austria the principal occupation
is gathering Austrich feathers.'' The
boy who propounded this evidently had
much of the stock in trade required
for the popular etymologist. ``Ireland is
called the Emigrant Isle because it is
so beautiful and green.'' ``Gorilla warfare
was where men rode on gorillas.'' ``The
Puritans found an insane asylum in the
wilds of America.''
Some of the answers are so funny that
it is almost impossible to guess at the
train of thought which elicited them, as,
``Climate lasts all the time, and weather
only a few days.'' ``Sanscrit is not used
so much as it used to be, as it went out
of use 1500 B.C.'' The boy who affirmed
<p 161>that ``The imports of a country are the
things that are paid for; the exports are
the things that are not,'' did not put the
Theory of Exchange in very clear form.
The knowledge of physiology and of
medical subjects exhibited by some of the
examined is very amusing. One boy
discovered a new organ of the body called
a chrone: ``He had a chronic disease--
something the matter with the chrone.''
Another had a strange notion of how to
spell _craniology_, for he wrote ``Chonology
is the science of the brane.'' But best
of all is the knowledge of the origin of
Bright's disease, shown by the boy who
affirms that ``John Bright is noted for an
incurable disease.''
Much of the blundering of the
examined must be traced to the absurd
questions of the examiners--questions
which, as Mark Twain says, ``would
oversize nearly anybody's knowledge.''
And the wish which every examinee
has to bring in some subject which he
supposes himself to know is perceptible
in many answers. The date 1492 seems
to be impressed upon every American
<p 162>child's memory, and he cannot rest until
he has associated it with some fact, so
we learn that George Washington was
born in 1492, that St. Bartholomew
was massacred in that year, that ``the
Brittains were the Saxons who entered
England in 1492 under Julius C<ae>sar,''
and, to cap all, that the earth is 1492
miles in circumference.
Many of the best-known examination
jokes are associated with Scriptural
characters. One of the best of these, if also
one of the best known, is that of the man
who, paraphrasing the parable of the Good
Samaritan, and quoting his words to the
innkeeper, ``When I come again I will
repay you,'' added, ``This he said knowing
that he should see his face again no more.''
A School Board boy, competing for one
of the Peek prizes, carried this confusion
of widely different events even farther.
He had to write a short biography of
Jonah, and he produced the following:
``He was the father of Lot, and had two
wives. One was called Ishmale and the
other Hagher; he kept one at home, and
he turned the other into the dessert, when
<p 163>she became a pillow of salt in the daytime
and a pillow of fire at night.'' The sketch
of Moses is equally unhistoric: ``Mosses
was an Egyptian. He lived in an ark
made of bullrushes, and he kept a golden
calf and worshipped braizen snakes, and
et nothing but kwales and manna for forty
years. He was caught by the hair of his
head, while riding under the bough of a
tree, and he was killed by his son Absalom
as he was hanging from the bough.'' But
the ignorance of the schoolboy was quite
equalled by the undergraduate who was
asked ``Who was the first king of Israel?''
and was so fortunate as to stumble on
the name of Saul. Finding by the face
of the examiner that he had hit upon
the right answer, he added confidentially,
``Saul, also called Paul.''
The American child, however, managed
to cover a larger space of time in his
confusion when he said, ``Elijah was a good
man, who went up to heaven without
dying, and threw his cloak down for
Queen Elizabeth to step over.''
A boy was asked in an examination,
``What did Moses do with the tabernacle?''
<p 164>and he promptly answered, ``He chucked
it out of the camp.'' The scandalised
examiner asked the boy what he meant,
and was told that it was so stated in the
Bible. On being challenged for the verse,
the boy at once repeated ``And Moses
took the tabernacle and _pitched_ it without
the camp'' (Exod. xxxiii. 7).
The book might be filled with
extraordinary instances of school translation,
but room must be found for one beautiful
specimen quoted by Moore in his
_Diary_. A boy having to translate
``they ascended by ladders'' into Latin,
turned out this, ``ascendebant per
adolescentiores'' (the comparative degree of
lad, _i.e_., ladder).
The late Mr. Barrett, Musical Examiner
to the Society of Arts, gave some curious
instances of blundering in his report on
the Examinations of 1887, which is printed
in the _Programme of the Society's
Examinations for_ 1888:--
``There were occasional indications that
the terms were misunderstood. `Presto'
signifies `turn over,' `Lento' `with style.'
`Staccato' was said to mean `stick on
<p 165>the notes,' or `notes struck and at once
raised.'
``The names of composers in order of
time were generally correctly done, but
the particulars concerning the musicians
were rather startling. Thus Purcell was
said to have written, among other things,
an opera called _Ebdon and Eneas_; one
stated that he was born 1543 and died
1595, probably confusing him with Tallis,
that he wrote masses and reformed the
church music; another that he was the
organist of King's College Chapel, and
wrote madrigals. One stated that he was
born 1568 and died 1695; another, not
knowing that he had so long passed the
allotted period of man's existence, gave
his dates 1693, 1685, thus giving him no
limit of existence at all. One said he
was a German, born somewhere in the
nineteenth century, which statement
another confirmed by giving his dates as
1817-1846; and, further, credited him
with the composition of _The Woman of
Samaria_, and as having transposed plain-
song from tenor to bass. Bach is said to
have been the founder of the `Thames
<p 166>School Lipsic,' the composer of the
_Seasons_, the celebrated writer of opera
comique, born 16--, and having gone
through an operation for one of his fingers,
turned his attention to composition, wrote
operas, and, lastly, that he was born in
1756, and died 1880, and that his fame
rests on his passions.
``The facts about Handel are pretty
correct; but we find that Weber wrote
_Parsifal, The Flying Dutchman, Der Ring
der Nibulengon_. His dates are 1813-1883.
Mendelssohn was born 1770, died 1827
(Beethoven's dates), studied under Hadyn
(_sic_), and that he composed many operas.
Gounod is said to be `a rather modern
musician'; he wrote _Othello, Three Holy
Children_, besides _Faust_ and other works.
Among the names given as the composer
of _Nozze di Figaro_ are Donizetti, William
Sterndale Bennett, Gunod, and Sir Mickall
Costa. The particulars concerning the
real composer are equally interesting.
(1) His name is spelt Mozzart, Mosarde,
etc. (2) He was a well-known Italian, wrote
_Medea_, and others. (3) His first opera
was _Idumea, or Idomeo_. (4) He composed
<p 167>_Lieder ohne worte, Don Pasquale, Don
Govianna_, the _Zauberfloat, Feuges_, and
his _Requiem_ is the crowning glory of his
`marvellious carere.' (5) He was a
German, `born 1756, at a very early age.'
If the dates given by another writer be
true (born 1795, died 1659), it is certain
that he must have died before he was
born.''
Mr. Barrett again reported in 1889
some of the strange opinions of those
who came to him to be examined:--
``The answers to the question `Who was
Rossini? What influence did he exercise
over the art of music in his time?' brought
to light much curious and interesting
intelligence. His nationality was various.
He was `a German by birth, but was born
at Pesaro in Italy'; `he was born in
1670 and died 1826'; he was a `Frenchman,'
`a noted writer of the French,'
the place of nativity was `Pizzarro in
Genoa'; he was `an Italian, and made
people feel drunk with the sparke and
richness of his melody'; he composed
_Oberon, Don Giovanni; Der Fri<e:>schutz_,
and _Stabet Matar_. He was `an accom<p 168>plished
writer of violin music and produced
some of the prettiest melodies';
it is `to him we owe the extension of
chords struck together in ar peggio'; he
was `the founder of some institution or
another'; `the great aim of his life was
to make the music he wrote an interpretation
of the words it was set to'; he
`broke many of the laws of music'; he
`considerable altered the stage'; he
`was noted for using many instruments
not invented before'; in his `composition
he used the chromatic scale very
much, and goes very deep in harmony';
he `was the first taking up the style, and
therefore to make a great change in
music'; he was `the cause of much censure
and bickering through his writings';
he `promoted a less strict mode of writing
and other beneficial things'; and, finally,
`Giachono Rossini was born at Pezarro
in 1792. In the year 1774 there was war
raging in Paris between the Gluckists and
Piccinists. Gluck wanted to do away with
the old restraint of the Italian aria, and
improve opera from a dramatic point of
view. Piccini remained true to the old
<p 169>Italian style, and Rossini helped him to
carry it on still further by his operas,
_Tancredi, William Tell_, and _Dorma del
Lago_.' ''
The child who gave the following brilliant
answer to the question, ``What was
the character of Queen Mary?'' must
have suffered herself from the troubles
supposed to be connected with the
possession of a stepmother: ``She was wilful
as a girl and cruel as a woman, but'' (adds
the pupil) ``what can you expect from any
one who had had five stepmothers?''
The greatest confusion among the
examined is usually to be found in the
answers to historical and geographical
questions. All that one boy knew about
Nelson was that he ``was buried in
St. Paul's Cathedral amid the groans of
a dying nation.'' The student who mixed
up Oliver Cromwell with Thomas Cromwell's
master Wolsey produced this strange
answer: ``Oliver Cromwell is said to have
exclaimed, as he lay a-dying, If I had
served my God as I served my king, He
would not have left me to mine enemies.''
Miss Graham relates in the _University
<p 170>Correspondent_ an answer which contains
the same confusion with a further one
added: ``Wolsey was a famous general
who fought in the Crimean War, and who,
after being decapitated several times, said
to Cromwell, Ah! if I had only served
you as you have served me, I would
not have been deserted in my old age.''
``The Spanish Armada,'' wrote a young
man of seventeen, ``took place in the
reign of Queen Anne; she married Philip
of Spain, who was a very cruel man.
The Spanish and the English fought very
bravely against each other. The English
wanted to conquer Spain. Several battles
were fought, in which hundreds of the
English and Spanish were defeated. They
lost some very large ships, and were at a
great loss on both sides.''
The following description of the Nile
by a schoolboy is very fine: ``The Nile is
the only remarkable river in the world.
It was discovered by Dr. Livingstone, and
it rises in Mungo Park.'' Constantinople
is described thus: ``It is on the Golden
Horn; a strong fortress; has a University,
and is the residence of Peter the Great.
<p 171>Its chief building is the Sublime Port.''
Amongst the additions to our geographical
knowledge may be mentioned that Gibraltar
is ``an island built on a rock,'' and
that Portugal can only be reached through
the St. Bernard's Pass ``by means of
sledges drawn by reindeer and dogs.''
``Turin is the capital of China,'' and
``Cuba is a town in Africa very difficult
of access.''
One of the finest answers ever given in
an examination was that of the boy who
was asked to repeat all he knew of Sir
Walter Raleigh. This was it: ``He introduced
tobacco into England, and while
he was smoking he exclaimed, `Master
Ridley, we have this day lighted such a
fire in England as shall never be put
out.' '' Can that, with any sort of justice,
be styled a blunder?
The rule that ``the King can do no
wrong'' was carried to an extreme length
when a schoolboy blunder of Louis XIV.
was allowed to change the gender of
a French noun. The King said ``un
carosse,'' and that is what it is now.
In Cotgrave's _Dictionary carosse_ appears
<p 172>as feminine, but M<e'>nage notes it as
having been changed from feminine to
masculine.
It has already been pointed out that
some of the blunders of the examined
are due to the absurdity of the questions
of the examiner. The following excellent
anecdote from the late Archdeacon Sinclair's
_Sketches of Old Times and Distant
Places_ (1875) shows that even when the
question is sound a difficulty may arise
by the manner of presenting it:--
``I was one day conversing with Dr.
Williams about schools and school
examinations. He said: `Let me give you
a curious example of an examination at
which I was present in Aberdeen. An
English clergyman and a Lowland Scotsman
visited one of the best parish schools
in that city. They were strangers, but the
master received them civilly, and inquired:
``Would you prefer that I should _speer_
these boys, or that you should _speer_ them
yourselves?'' The English clergyman
having ascertained that to _speer_ meant to
question, desired the master to proceed.
He did so with great success, and the
<p 173>boys answered numerous interrogatories
as to the Exodus from Egypt. The
clergyman then said he would be glad
in his turn to _speer_ the boys, and began:
``How did Pharaoh die?'' There was
a dead silence. In this dilemma the
Lowland gentleman interposed. ``I think,
sir, the boys are not accustomed to your
English accent,'' and inquired in broad
Scotch, ``Hoo did Phawraoh dee?'' Again
there was a dead silence, till the master
said: ``I think, gentlemen, you can't _speer_
these boys; I'll show you how.'' And he
proceeded: ``Fat cam to Phawraoh at his
hinder end?'' _i.e_., in his latter days. The
boys with one voice answered, ``He was
drooned''; and a smart little fellow added,
``Ony lassie could hae told you that.''
The master then explained that in the
Aberdeen dialect ``to dee'' means to die
a natural death, or to die in bed: hence
the perplexity of the boys, who knew that
Pharaoh's end was very different.' ''
The author is able to add to this chapter
a thoroughly original series of answers to
certain questions relating to acoustics,
light and heat, which Professor Oliver
<p 174>Lodge, F.R.S., has been so kind as to
communicate for this work, and which
cannot fail to be appreciated by his readers.
It must be understood that all these answers
are genuine, although they are not
given _verbatim et literatim_, and in some
instances one answer is made to contain
several blunders. Professor Lodge
expresses the opinion that the questions
might in some instances have been worded
better, so as to exclude several of the
misapprehensions, and therefore that the
answers may be of some service to future
setters of questions. He adds that of late
the South Kensington papers have become
more drearily correct and monotonous,
because the style of instruction now
available affords less play to exuberant
fancy untrammelled by any information
regarding the subject in hand.
1880.--ACOUSTICS, LIGHT AND HEAT
PAPER.
_Science and Art Department_.
The following are specimens of answers
given by candidates at recent examinations
in Acoustics, Light and Heat, held in
<p 175>connection with the Science and Art
Department, South Kensington. The
answers have not of course all been
selected from the same paper, neither
have they all been chosen for the same
reason.
_Question_ I.--State the relations existing
between the pressure, temperature, and
density of a given gas. How is it proved
that when a gas expands its temperature
is diminished?
_Answer_.--Now the answer to the first
part of this question is, that the square
root of the pressure increases, the square
root of the density decreases, and the
absolute temperature remains about the
same; but as to the last part of the
question about a gas expanding when its
temperature is diminished, I expect I am
intended to say I don't believe a word
of it, for a bladder in front of a fire
expands, but its temperature is not at all
diminished.
_Question_ 2.--If you walk on a dry path
between two walls a few feet apart, you
hear a musical note or ``ring'' at each
footstep. Whence comes this?
<p 176>
_Answer_.--This is similar to
phosphorescent paint. Once any sound gets
between two parallel reflectors or walls,
it bounds from one to the other and
never stops for a long time. Hence it is
persistent, and when you walk between
the walls you hear the sounds made by
those who walked there before you. By
following a muffin man down the passage
within a short time you can hear most
distinctly a musical note, or, as it is more
properly termed in the question, a ``ring''
at every (other) step.
_Question_ 3.--What is the reason that
the hammers which strike the strings of
a pianoforte are made not to strike the
middle of the strings? Why are the bass
strings loaded with coils of wire?
_Answer_.--Because the tint of the clang
would be bad. Because to jockey them
heavily.
_Question_ 4.--Explain how to determine
the time of vibration of a given tuning-
fork, and state what apparatus you would
require for the purpose.
_Answer_.--For this determination I
should require an accurate watch beating
<p 177>seconds, and a sensitive ear. I mount the
fork on a suitable stand, and then, as
the second hand of my watch passes the
figure 60 on the dial, I draw the bow
neatly across one of its prongs. I wait.
I listen intently. The throbbing air
particles are receiving the pulsations; the
beating prongs are giving up their original
force; and slowly yet surely the sound
dies away. Still I can hear it, but faintly
and with close attention; and now only
by pressing the bones of my head against
its prongs. Finally the last trace
disappears. I look at the time and leave
the room, having determined the time of
vibration of the common ``pitch'' fork.
This process deteriorates the fork
considerably, hence a different operation must
be performed on a fork which is only _lent_.
_Question_ 6.--What is the difference
between a ``real'' and a ``virtual'' image?
Give a drawing showing the formation of
one of each kind.
_Answer_.--You see a real image every
morning when you shave. You do not
see virtual images at all. The only people
who see virtual images are those people
<p 178>who are not quite right, like Mrs. A.
Virtual images are things which don't
exist. I can't give you a reliable drawing
of a virtual image, because I never saw
one.
_Question_ 8.--How would you disprove,
experimentally, the assertion that white
light passing through a piece of coloured
glass acquires colour from the glass? What
is it that really happens?
_Answer_.--To disprove the assertion (so
repeatedly made) that ``white light passing
through a piece of coloured glass acquires
colour from the glass,'' I would ask the
gentleman to observe that the glass has
just as much colour after the light has
gone through it as it had before. That is
what would really happen.
_Question_ 11.--Explain why, in order to
cook food by boiling, at the top of a high
mountain, you must employ a different
method from that used at the sea level.
_Answer_.--It is easy to cook food at the
sea level by boiling it, but once you get
above the sea level the only plan is to fry
it in its own fat. It is, in fact, impossible
to boil water above the sea level by any
<p 179>amount of heat. A different method,
therefore, would have to be employed to
boil food at the top of a high mountain,
but what that method is has not yet been
discovered. The future may reveal it to
a daring experimentalist.
_Question_ 12.--State what are the
conditions favourable for the formation of dew.
Describe an instrument for determining the
dew point, and the method of using it.
_Answer_.--This is easily proved from
question 1. A body of gas as it ascends
expands, cools, and deposits moisture; so
if you walk up a hill the body of gas inside
you expands, gives its heat to you, and
deposits its moisture in the form of dew
or common sweat. Hence these are the
favourable conditions; and moreover it
explains why you get warm by ascending
a hill, in opposition to the well-known
law of the Conservation of Energy.
_Question_ 13.--On freezing water in a
glass tube, the tube sometimes breaks.
Why is this? An iceberg floats with
1,000,000 tons of ice above the water
line. About how many tons are below
the water line?
<p 180>
_Answer_.--The water breaks the tube
because of capallarity. The iceberg
floats on the top because it is lighter,
hence no tons are below the water line.
Another reason is that an iceberg cannot
exceed 1,000,000 tons in weight: hence
if this much is above water, none is
below. Ice is exceptional to all other
bodies except bismuth. All other bodies
have 1090 feet below the surface and
2 feet extra for every degree centigrade.
If it were not for this, all fish would die,
and the earth be held in an iron grip.
P.S.--When I say 1090 feet, I mean
1090 feet per second.
_Question_ 14.--If you were to pour a
pound of molten lead and a pound of
molten iron, each at the temperature of
its melting point, upon two blocks of ice,
which would melt the most ice, and why?
_Answer_.--This question relates to
diathermancy. Iron is said to be a
diathermanous body (from _dia_, through, and
_thermo_, I heat), meaning that it gets heated
through and through, and accordingly
contains a large quantity of real heat.
Lead is said to be an athermanous body
<p 181>(from _a_, privative, and _thermo_, I heat),
meaning that it gets heated secretly or in
a latent manner. Hence the answer to
this question depends on which will get
the best of it, the real heat of the iron or
the latent heat of the lead. Probably the
iron will smite furthest into the ice, as
molten iron is white and glowing, while
melted lead is dull.
_Question_ 21.--A hollow indiarubber ball
full of air is suspended on one arm of a
balance and weighed in air. The whole
is then covered by the receiver of an air
pump. Explain what will happen as the
air in the receiver is exhausted.
_Answer_.--The ball would expand and
entirely fill the vessell, driving out all before
it. The balance being of greater density
than the rest would be the last to go, but
in the end its inertia would be overcome
and all would be expelled, and there would
be a perfect vacuum. The ball would
then burst, but you would not be aware of
the fact on account of the loudness of a
sound varying with the density of the place
in which it is generated, and not on that
in which it is heard.
<p 182>
_Question_ 27.--Account for the delicate
shades of colour sometimes seen on the
inside of an oyster shell. State and
explain the appearance presented when a
beam of light falls upon a sheet of glass
on which very fine equi-distant parallel
lines have been scratched very close to
one another.
_Answer_.--The delicate shades are due
to putrefaction; the colours always show
best when the oyster has been a bad one.
Hence they are considered a defect and
are called chromatic aberration.
The scratches on the glass will arrange
themselves in rings round the light, as any
one may see at night in a tram car.
_Question_ 29.--Show how the hypothenuse
face of a right-angled prism may be
used as a reflector. What connection is
there between the refractive index of a
medium and the angle at which an emergent
ray is totally reflected?
_Answer_.--Any face of any prism may
be used as a reflector. The connexion
between the refractive index of
a medium and the angle at which an
emergent ray does not emerge but is
<p 183>totally reflected is remarkable and not
generally known.
_Question_ 32.--Why do the inhabitants
of cold climates eat fat? How would you
find experimentally the relative quantities
of heat given off when equal weights of
sulphur, phosphorus, and carbon are
thoroughly burned?
_Answer_.--An inhabitant of cold climates
(called Frigid Zoans) eats fat principally
because he can't get no lean, also because
he wants to rise is temperature. But if
equal weights of sulphur phosphorus and
carbon are burned in his neighbourhood
he will give off eating quite so much. The
relative quantities of eat given off will
depend upon how much sulphur etc. is
burnt and how near it is burned to him.
If I knew these facts it would be an easy
sum to find the answer.
1881.
_Question_ 1.--Sound is said to travel
about four times as fast in water as in air.
How has this been proved? State your
reasons for thinking whether sound travels
faster or slower in oil than in water.
<p 184>
_Answer_(_a_).--Mr. Colladon, a gentleman
who happened to have a boat, wrote to a
friend called Mr. Sturm to borrow another
boat and row out on the other side of the
lake, first providing himself with a large
ear-trumpet. Mr. Colladon took a large
bell weighing some tons which he put
under water and hit furiously. Every time
he hit the bell he lit a fusee, and Mr.
Sturm looked at his watch. In this way
it was found out as in the question.
It was also done by Mr. Byott who sang
at one end of the water pipes of Paris,
and a friend at the other end (on whom he
could rely) heard the song as if it were a
chorus, part coming through the water and
part through the air.
(_b_) This is done by one person going into
a hall (? a well) and making a noise, and
another person stays outside and listens
where the sound comes from. When Miss
Beckwith saves life from drowning, her
brother makes a noise under water, and
she hearing the sound some time after can
calculate where he is and dives for him;
and what Miss Beckwith can do under
water, of course a mathematician can do
<p 185>on dry land. Hence this is how it is
done.
If oil is poured on the water it checks
the sound-waves and puts you out.
_Question_ 2.--What would happen if
two sound-waves exactly alike were to
meet one another in the open air, moving
in opposite directions?
_Answer_.--If the sound-waves which
meet in the open air had not come from
the same source they would not recognise
each others existence, but if they had they
would embrace and mutually hold fast, in
other words, interfere with and destroy
each other.
_Question_ 9.--Describe any way in
which the velocity of light has been
measured.
_Answer_ (_a_).--A distinguished but
Heathen philosopher, Homer, was the first
to discover this. He was standing one day
at one side of the earth looking at Jupiter
when he conjectured that he would take
16 minutes to get to the other side.
This conjecture he then verified by careful
experiment. Now the whole way across
the earth is 3,072,000 miles, and dividing
<p 186>this by 16 we get the velocity 192,000
miles a second. This is so great that it
would take an express train 40 years to
do it, and the bullet from a canon over
5000 years.
P.S.--I think the gentlemans name was
Romer not Homer, but anyway he was
20% wrong and Mr. Fahrenheit and Mr.
Celsius afterwards made more careful
determinations.
(_b_) An Atheistic Scientist (falsely so
called) tried experiments on the Satellites
of Jupiter. He found that he could
delay the eclipse 16 minutes by going to
the other side of the earths orbit; in fact
he found he could make the eclipse
happen when he liked by simply shifting
his position. Finding that credit was
given him for determining the velocity
of light by this means he repeated it
so often that the calendar began to
get seriously wrong and there were
riots, and Pope Gregory had to set things
right.
_Question_ 10.--Explain why water pipes
burst in cold weather.
_Answer_.--People who have not studied
<p 187>Acoustics think that Thor bursts the pipes,
but we know that it is nothing of the kind
for Professor Tyndall has burst the
mythologies and has taught us that it is the
natural behaviour of water (and bismuth)
without which all fish would die and the
earth be held in an iron grip,
CHAPTER VIII.
FOREIGNERS' ENGLISH.
IT is not surprising that foreigners
should make mistakes when
writing in English, and Englishmen,
who know their own deficiencies in
this respect, are not likely to be
censorious when foreigners fall into these
blunders. But when information is printed
for the use of Englishmen, one would
think that the only wise plan was to have
the composition revised by one who is
thoroughly acquainted with the language.
That this natural precaution is not always
taken we have ample evidence. Thus, at
Havre, a polyglot announcement of certain
local regulations was posted in the harbour,
and the notice stood as follows in French:
``Un arrangement peut se faire avec le
pilote pour de promenades <a!> rames.'' The
following very strange translation into
<p 189>English appeared below the French:
``One arrangement can make himself
with the pilot for the walking with roars.''
The papers distributed at international
exhibitions are often very oddly worded.
Thus, an agent in the French court of
one of these, who described himself as
an ``Ancient Commercial Dealer,'' stated
on a handbill that ``being appointed by
Tenants of the Exhibition to sell Show
Cases, Frames, &c., which this Court
incloses, I have the honour to inform
Museum Collectors, Librarians, Builders,
Shopkeepers, and business persons in
general, that the fixed prices will hardly be
the real value of the Glasses which adorn
them.''
In 1864 was published in Paris a
pretentious work, consisting of notices of
the various literary and scientific societies
of the world, which positively swarms with
blunders in the portion devoted to England.
The new forms into which well-known
names are transmogrified must be seen to
be believed. Wadham College is printed
_Washam_, Warwick as _Worwick_; and one
of our metropolitan parks is said to be
<p 190>dedicated to a saint whose name does
not occur in any calendar, viz., _St. Jam's
Park_. There is the old confusion respecting
English titles which foreigners
find so difficult to understand; and
monsieur and esquire usually appear
respectively before and after the names of
the same persons. The Christian names
of knights and baronets are omitted, so
that we obtain such impossible forms as
``Sir Brown.''
The book is arranged geographically,
and in all cases the English word ``shire''
is omitted, with the result that we come
upon such an extremely curious monster
as ``le Comt<e'> de Shrop.''
On the very first page is made the
extraordinary blunder of turning the Cambrian
Arch<ae>ological Association into a _Cambridge_
Society; while the Parker Society,
whose publications were printed at the
University Press, is entered under
_Canterbury_. It is possible that the Latin name
_Cantabrigia_ has originated this mistake.
The Roxburgh Society, although its
foundation after the sale of the magnificent
library of the Duke of Roxburgh is cor<p 191>rectly
described, is here placed under the
county of Roxburgh. The most amusing
blunder, however, in the whole book is
contained in the following charmingly
na<i:>ve piece of etymology _<a!> propos_ of the
Geological and Polytechnic Society of the
West Riding of Yorkshire: ``On sait qu'en
Anglais le mot _Ride_ se traduit par
voyage <a!> cheval ou en voiture; on pourrait
peut-<e^>tre penser, d<e!>s le d<e'>but, qu'il s'agit
d'une Soci<e'>t<e'> hippique. II n'en est rien;
<a!> l'exemple de l'Association Britannique,
dont elle,'' etc. This pairs off well with
the translation of _Walker, London_, given
on a previous page.
The Germans find the same difficulty
with English titles that the French do,
and confuse the Sir at the commencement
of our letters with Herr or Monsieur.
Thus, they frequently address Englishmen
as _Sir_, instead of mister or esquire. We
have an instance of this in a publication
of no less a learned body than the Royal
Academy of Sciences of Munich, who
issued in 1860 a ``Rede auf Sir Thomas
Babington Macaulay.''
An hotel-keeper at Bale translated
<p 192>``limonade gazeuse'' as ``gauze lemonads";
and the following delightful entry
is from the Travellers' Book of the Drei
Mohren Hotel at Augsburg, under date
Jan. 28th, 1815: ``His Grace Arthur
Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, &c., &c.,
&c. Great honour arrived at the beginning
of this year to the three Moors. This
illustrious warrior, whose glorious
atchievements which cradled in Asia have filled
Europe with his renown, descended in it.''
It may be thought that, as this is not
printed, but only written, it is scarcely fair
to preserve it here; but it really is too
good to leave out.
The keepers of hotels are great sinners
in respect to the manner in which they
murder the English language. The following
are a few samples of this form of
literature, and most readers will recall
others that they have come across in their
travels.
The first is from Salzburg:--
``George Nelb<o:>ck begs leave to recommand
his hotel to the Three Allied, situated
_vis-<a!>-vis_ of the birth house of Mozart, which
offers all comforts to the meanest charges.
<p 193>
The next notice comes from Rastadt:--
``ADVICE OF AN HOTEL.
``The underwritten has the honour of
informing the publick that he has made
the acquisition of the hotel to the Savage,
well situated in the middle of this city.
He shall endeavour to do all duties which
gentlemen travellers can justly expect;
and invites them to please to convince
themselves of it by their kind lodgings at
his house.
``BASIL
``JA. SINGESEM.
``Before the tenant of the Hotel to
the Stork in this city.''
Whatever may be the ambition of mine
host at Pompeii, it can scarcely be the
fame of an English scholar:--
``Restorative Hotel Fine Hok,
Kept by Frank Prosperi,
Facing the military quarter
at Pompei.
That hotel open since a very few days is
renowned for the cheapness of the Apart<p 194>ments
and linen, for the exactness of the
service, and for the excellence of the true
French cookery. Being situated at proximity
of that regeneration, it will be propitious
to receive families, whatever, which
will desire to reside alternatively into that
town to visit the monuments now found
and to breathe thither the salubrity of the
air. That establishment will avoid to all
travellers, visitors of that sepult city and
to the artists (willing draw the antiquities)
a great disorder occasioned by tardy and
expensive contour of the iron whay people
will find equally thither a complete sortment
of stranger wines and of the kingdom,
hot and cold baths, stables, coach houses,
the whole at very moderated prices. Now
all the applications and endeavours of the
Hoste will tend always to correspond to
the tastes and desires of their customers
which will require without doubt to him
into that town the reputation whome, he
is ambitious.''
On the occasion of the Universal
Exhibition of Barcelona in 1888 the _Moniteur
de l'Exposition_ printed a description of
Barcelona in French, German, Spanish,
<p 195>and English. The latter is so good that
it is worthy of being printed in full:--
``Then there will be in the same Barcelona
the first universal Exposition of
Spain. It was not possible to choose a
more favorable place, for the capital-
town of Catalonia is a first-rate city open
to civilization.
``It is quite out of possibility to deny it
to be the industrial and commercial capital
of the peninsula and a universal Exposition
could not possibly meet in any other
place a more lively splendour than in this
magnificent town.
``Indeed what may want Barcelona to
deserve to be called great and handsome?
Are here not to be found archeological
and architectural riches, whose specimens
are inexhaustible?
``What are then those churches whose
style it is impossible to find elsewhere,
containing altars embellished with truly
spanish magnificence, and so large and
imposing cloisters, that there feels any
man himself exceedingly small and little?
What those shaded promenades, where
the sun cannot almost get through with
<p 196>the golden tinge of its rays? what this
Rambla where every good citizen of
Barcelona must take his walk at least
once every day, in order to accomplish the
civic pilgrimage of a true Catalanian?
``And that Paseo Colon, so picturesque
with its palmtrees and electric light,
which makes it like, in the evening, a
theatrical decoration, and whose ornament
has been very happily just finished?
``And that statue of Christopher
Colomb, whose installation will be
accomplished in a very short time, whose price
may be 500,000 francs?
``Are not there still a number of proud
buildings, richly ornamented, and splendid
theaters? one of them, perhaps the
most beautiful, surely the largest (it
contains 5000 places) the Liceo, is truly
a master-pi<e!>ce, where the spectators are
lost in admiration of the riches, the
ornaments, the pictures and feel a true
regret to turn their eyes from them to
look at the stage.
``You will see coffee houses, where have
been spent hundreds of thousands to
change their large rooms in enchanted
<p 197>halls with which it would be difficult to
contest even for the palaces of east.
``And still in those little streets, now
very few, so narrow that the inhabitants
of their opposite houses can shake hands
together, do you not know that doors
may be found which open to yards and
staircases worthy of palaces?
``Do you not know there are plenty of
sculptures, every one of them masterpieces,
and that, especially the town
and deputation house contain some halls
which would make meditate all our great
masters?
``If we walk through the Catalonia-
square to reach the Ensanche, our
astonishment becomes still greater.
``In this Ensanche, a newly-born, but
already a great town, there are no streets:
there are but promenades with trees on
both sides, which not only moderate the
rays of the sun through their follage, but
purify the surrounding atmosphere and
seem to say to those who are walking
beneath their shade: You are breathing
here the purest air!
``There display the houses plenty of
<p 198>the rarest sorts of marble. Out and
indoors rules marble, the ceilings of the
halls, the staircases, the yards command
and force admiration to the spectator,
who thought to see only houses and finds
monumental buildings.
``Join to that a Paseo de Gracia with
immense perspective; the promenade of
Cortes, 10 kil. long; some free squares
by day- and night-time, in which the rarest
plants and the sweetest flowers enchant
the passengers eyes and enbalm his
smell.
``Join lastly the neighbourhoods, but a
short way from the town and put on all
sides in communication with it by means
of tramways-lines and steam-tramways
too; those places show a very charming
scenery for every one who likes natural
beauties mingled with those which are
created by the genius of man.
``After that all there is Monjuich, whose
proud fortress seems to say: I protect
Barcelona: half-way the slope of the
mountain, there are Miramar, Vista
Alegre, which afford one of the grandest
panorama in the world: on the left side,
<p 199>the horizon skirting, some hills which
form a girdle, whose indented tops detach
them selves from an ever-blue sky; at
the foot of those mountains, the suburbs
we have already mentioned, created for
the rest and enjoyment of man after his
accomplished duty and finished work;
on the lowest skirt Barcelona in a flame
with its great buildings, steeples, towers,
houses ornamented with flat terraces, and
more than all that, its haven, which had
been, to say so, conquered over the
Mediterranean and harbors daily in itself
a large number of ships.
``All this ideal Whole is concentrated
beneath an enchanting sky, almost as
beautiful as the sky of Italy. The climate
of Barcelona is very much like Nice, the
pretty.
``Winter is here unknown; in its place
there rules a spring, which allows every
plant to bud, every most delicate flower
to blossom, orangetrees and roses, throughout
the whole year.
``In one word, Barcelona is a magnificent
town, which is about to offer to the
world a splendid, universal Exposition,
<p 200>whose success is quite out of doubt
determined.''
At the Paris Exhibition of 1889 a
_Practical Guide_ was produced for the
benefit of the English visitor, which is
written throughout in the most astonishing
jargon, as may be seen from the
opening sentences of the ``Note of the
Editor,'' which run as follows: ``The
Universal Exhibition, for whom who comes
there for the first time, is a true chaos
in which it is impossible to direct and
recognize one's self without a guide.
What wants the stranger, the visitor who
comes to the Exhibition, it is a means
which permits him to see all without
losing uselessly his time in the most part
vain researches.''
This is the account of the first
conception of the Exhibition: ``Who was
giving the idea of the Exhibition? The
first idea of an Exhibition of the
Centenary belongs in reality not to anybody.
It was in the air since several years, when
divers newspapers, in 1883, bethought
them to consecrate several articles to it,
and so it became a serious matter. The
<p 201>period of incubation (brooding) lasted
since 1883 till the month of March 1884;
when they considered the question they
preoccupied them but about a National
Exhibition. Afterwards the ambition
increased. The ministery, then presided
by Mr. Jules Ferry, thought that if they
would give to this commercial and industrial
manifestation an international character
they would impose the peace not
only to France, but to the whole world.''
The Eiffel Tower gives occasion for
some particularly fine writing: ``In order
to attire the stranger, to create a great
attraction which assured the success of
the Exhibition, it wanted something
exceptional, unrivalled, extraordinary. An
engineer presented him, Mr. Eiffel, already
known by his considerable and keen
works. He proposed to M. Locroy to
erect a tower in iron which, reaching the
height of three hundred metres, would
represent, at the industrial sight, the
resultant of the modern progresses. M.
Locroy reflected and accepted. Hardly
twenty years ago, this project would have
appeared fantastic and impossible. The
<p 202>state of the science of the iron
constructions was not advanced enough, the
security given by the calculations was not
yet assured; to-day, they know where
they are going, they are able to count the
force of the wind. The resistance which
the iron opposes to it. Mr. Eiffel came
at the proper time, and nevertheless how
many people have prophetized that the
tower would never been constructed.
How many critics have fallen upon this
audacious project! It was erected,
however, and one perceives it from all Paris;
it astonishes and lets in extasy the
strangers who come to contemplate it.''
The figures attached to the fountain
under the tower are comically described
as follows:--
``Europe under the lines of a woman,
leaned upon a printing press to print and
a book, seems deeped in reflections.
``America is young woman, energetic and
virginal however, characterising the youth
and the audacies of the American people.
``Asia, the cradle of the human kind,
represents the volupty and the sensualism.
Her posture, the expression of her figure,
<p 203>render well the abandonment of the passion
with the oriental people.
``Africa represented by a figure of a
woman in a timid attitude, is well the
symbol of the savage people enslaved by
the civilisation.
``Australia finally is figured by a woman
buttressed on herself, like an animal not
yet tamed, ready to throw itself on its
prey, without waiting to be attacked. . . .
``Above Asia and Africa, the Love and
the Sleep, in the shade of a floating
drapery. Finally, between Europe and
America, a young girl symbolises the
History.''
The author commences the account
of his first walk as follows: ``Thus we
begin, at present as we have let him see
these two wonderworks which fly at the
eyes, the Tower and the fountain, to return
on his steps to retake with order this walk
of recognition which will permit him,
thanks to our watchfulness, to see all in
a short time.''
``The History of the human dwelling''
is introduced thus: ``It is the moment
or never to walk among the surprising
<p 204>restitution, of which M. Garnier the
eminent architect of the Opera has made
him the promoter. On our left going
along the flower-beds from the Tower till
here, the constructions of the History of
the human Dwelling is unfolded to our
eyes. The human Dwelling in all countries
and in all times, there is certainly
an excellent subject of study. Without
doubt the great works do not fail, where
conscientious plates enable us to know
exactly in which condition where living
our ancestors, how their dwellings where
disposed in the interior. But nothing
approaches the demonstration by the
materiality of the fact, and it is struck
with this truth that the organisators of
the Exhibition resolved to erect an
improvisated town, including houses of all
countries and all latitudes.''
The author finishes up his little work
in the same self-satisfied manner, which
shows how unconscious he was that he
was writing rubbish:--
``There is finished our common walk,
and in a happy way, after six days which
we dare believe it did not seem to you
<p 205>long, and tiresome, your curiosity finding
a constant aliment at every step which we
made you do, in this exhibition without
rivalry, where the beauties succeed to
the beauties, where one leaves not one
pleasure but for a new one. As for us,
our task of cicerone is too agreeable
to us, that we shall do our best to
retain you still near us, in efforcing us
to discover still other spectacles, and to
present you them after all those you
know already.''
If it be absurd to give information to
Englishmen in a queer jargon which it is
difficult for him to understand, what must
be said of those who attempt to teach a
language of which they are profoundly
ignorant? Most of us can call to mind
instances of exceedingly unidiomatic
sentences which have been presented to
our notice in foreign conversation books;
but certainly the most extraordinary of
this class of blunders are to be found in
the _New Guide of the Conversation in
Portuguese and English_, by J. de Fonseca
and P. Carolino, which created some
stir in the English press a few years
<p 206>ago.[14] The authors do not appear to
have had even the most distant acquaintance
with either the spoken or written
language, so that many of the sentences
are positively unintelligible, although
the origin of many of them may be
found in a literal translation of certain
French sentences. One chapter of this
wonderful book is devoted to _Idiotisms_,
which is a singularly appropriate title
for such odd English proverbs as the
following:--
[14] A selection from this book was printed by
Messrs. Field & Tuer under the title of _English
as she is spoke_.
``The necessity don't know the low.''
``To build castles in Espaguish.''
``So many go the jar to spring, than at
last rest there.''
(A little further on we find another
version of this well-known proverb: ``So
much go the jar to spring that at last it
break there.'')
``The stone as roll not heap up not
foam.''
``He is beggar as a church rat.''
``To come back at their muttons.''
<p 207>
``Tell me whom thou frequent, I will
tell you which you are.''
The apparently incomprehensible sentence
``He sin in trouble water'' is explained
by the fact that the translator
confused the two French words _p<e'>cher_,
to sin, and _p<e^>cher_, to fish.
The classification adopted by the
authors cannot be considered as very
scientific. The only colours catalogued
are _white, cray, gridelin, musk_ and _red_;
the only ``music's instruments''--_a
flagelet, a dreum_, and a _hurdy-gurdy_.
``Common stones'' appear to be _loadstones,
brick, white lead_, and _gumstone_.
But probably the list of ``Chastisements''
is one of the funniest things in this Guide
to Conversation. The list contains _a fine,
honourable fine, to break upon, to tear off
the flesh, to draw to four horses_.
The anecdotes chosen for the instruction
of the unfortunate Portuguese youth are
almost more unintelligible than the rest
of the book, and probably the following
two anecdotes could not be matched in
any other printed book:--
``The Commander Forbin of Janson,
<p 208>being at a repast with a celebrated
Boileau, had undertaken to pun upon
her name:--`What name, told him, carry
you thither? Boileau: I would wish
better to call me Drink wine.' The poet
was answered him in the same tune:--
`And you, sir, what name have you choice?
Janson: I should prefer to be named
John-meal. The meal don't is valuable
better than the furfur.'''
The next is as good:--
``Plato walking one's self a day to the
field with some of their friends. They
were to see him Diogenes who was in
water untill the chin. The superficies
of the water was snowed, for the rescue
of the hole that Diogenes was made.
Don't look it more told them Plato, and
he shall get out soon.''
A large volume entitled _Polugl<o^>ssos_ was
published in Belgium in 1841, which is
even more misleading and unintelligible
than the Portuguese School Book. The
English vocabulary contains some amazing
words, such as _agridulce, ales of troops,
ancientness sign, bivacq fire, breast's pellicule,
chimney black money, infatuated compass,
<p 209>iug_ (vocal), _window, umbrella_, etc. At
the end of this vocabulary are these
notes:--
``Look the abridged introduction
exeptless for the english editions, foregoing
the french postcript, next after the title
page. Just as the numbers, the names
of cities, states, seas, mountains and
rivers, the christian names of men and
woman, and several synonimous, who
enter into the composition of many
english words, suppressed in the former
vocabulary, are explained by the respective
categorys and appointed at the general
index, look also by these, what is not
found here above.''
``_Version alternative_. See for the shorter
introduction exeptless for the english
editions, foregoing the french postscript
next after the title page. Just as the
numbers &c. . . . their expletives are
be given by the respective categorys, and
appointed at the general index, to wich
is sent back!''
We are frequently told that foreigners
are much better educated than we are,
and that the trade of the world is slipping
<p 210>through our fingers because we are not
taught languages as the foreigners are.
This may be so, but one cannot help
believing that the dullest of English
clerks would be able to hold his own
in competition with the ingenious youths
who are taught foreign languages on the
system adopted by Senhors Fonseca
and Carolino, and by the compiler of
_Polugl<o^>ssos_.
Guides to a foreign town or country
written in English by a foreigner are
often very misleading; in fact, sometimes
quite incomprehensible. A contributor
to the _Notes and Queries_ sent to that
periodical some amusing extracts from a
Guide to Amsterdam. The following few
lines from a description of the Assize
Court give a fair idea of the language:--
``The forefront has a noble and sublime
aspect, and is particularly characteristical
to what it ought to represent. It
is built in a division of three fronts in
the corinthic order, each of them consists
of four raising columns, resting upon a
general basement from the one end of
the forefront to the other, and supporting
<p 211>a cornish, equalling running all over the
face.''[15]
[15] _Notes and Queries_, First Series, iii 347.
When it was known that Louis XVIII.
was to be restored to the throne of France,
a report was circulated that the Duke of
Clarence (afterwards William IV.) would
take the command of the vessel which was
to convey the king to Calais. The people
of that town were in a fever of expectation,
and having decided to sing _God save
the King_ in honour of their English visitor,
they thought that it would be an additional
compliment if they supplemented it with
an entirely new verse, which ran as
follows:--
``God save noble Clar<e'>nce,
Who brings our King to France,
God save Clar<e'>nce;
He maintains the glor<y'>
Of the British nav<y'>,
Oh God, make him happ<y'>,
God save Clar<e'>nce.''[16]
[16] _Ibid_., iv. 131.
In continuation of the story, it may be
said that the Duke did not go to Calais,
<p 212>and that therefore the anthem was not
sung.
The composer of this strange verse
succeeded in making pretty fair English,
even if his rhymes were somewhat deficient
in correctness. This was not the case
with a rather famous inscription made by
a Frenchman. Monsieur Girardin, who
inscribed a stone at Ermenonville in
memory of our once famous poet Shenstone,
was not stupid, but rather preternaturally
clever. This inscription is
above all praise for the remarkable manner
in which the rhymes appeal to the eye
instead of the ear; and moreover it shows
how world-famous was that charming
garden at Leasowes, near Halesowen,
which is now only remembered by the
few:--
``This plain stone
To William Shenstone.
In his writings he display's
A mind natural.
At Leasowes he laid
Arcadian greens rural.''
Dr. Moore, having on a certain occasion
excused himself to a Frenchman for using
<p 213>an expression which he feared was not
French, received the reply, ``Bon monsieur,
mais il m<e'>rite bien de l'<e^>tre.'' Of these
lines it is impossible to paraphrase this
polite answer, for we cannot say that they
deserve to be English.
INDEX.
Adder _for_ nadder, 7.
Afghan _for_ Anglican, 148.
Agassiz, _Zoological Biography_, blunder in, 64.
Alison's (Sir Archibald) blunder, 34.
Ampulle (Sainte), 35
Amsterdam, Guide to, 210.
Anderson (Andrew), his disgraceful printing of the Bible, 141.
Apostrophe, importance of an, 121.
Apron _for_ napron, 7.
_Arabian Nights_, translations of, 45.
Arden (Pepper), 60.
Arlington (Lord), his title taken from the village of Harlington, 8.
Artaxerxes, 54.
Ash's Dictionary, 9, 10.
Averrhoes, 54.
Babington's (Bishop) _Exposition of the Lord's Prayer_, 92.
_Bachaumont, M<e'>moires de_, 33.
Baly's (Dr.) translation of M<u:>ller's _Physiology_, 51.
<p 216>
Barcelona Exhibition (1883), 194
Barker (Robert) and Martin Lucas fined for
leaving _not_ out of the Seventh Commandment, 136.
Bellarmin, misprints in his works, 79.
Benserade's joke, 97.
Bible, blunders in the printing of the, 135.
----incorrect translations of passages in, 58.
----the ``Wicked'' Bible, 136.
_Bibliographical Blunders_ 63 - 77
Bismarck's (Prince) endeavours to keep on good
terms with all the Powers, 145.
Blades's (W.) _Shakspere and Typography_, 104.
Blunder, knowledge necessary to make a, 2.
Blunders, amusing mistakes, 1.
_Blunders in General_, 1-30.
----_of Authors_, 31 -46.
----_of Translators_, 47-62.
----(_Bibliographical_), 63-77.
----(_Schoolboys_'), 157-187.
Boehm's tract on the Boots of Isaiah, 71.
Boyle (Robert) becomes Le Boy, 72.
Brandenburg (Elector of) and Father Wolff, 20.
Brathwaite's (R.) _Strappado for the Divell_, 94.
Breton's (Nicholas) tracts, 81.
----_Wit of Wit_, 93.
_Bride (La) de Lammermuir_, 49.
Brigham le jeune _for_ Brigham Young, 67.
Britton's _Tunbridge Wells_, 37.
Broch (J. K.), an imaginary author, 64.
Buckingham's (J. Silk) anecdote of a wilful
misprint, 140.
<p 217>
Bulls, a sub-class of blunders, 24.
----made by others than Irishmen, 25.
----(Negro), 26.
Burton (Hill) on bulls, 29.
Butler's (S.) allusion to corrupted texts, 135.
----misprints in his lines, 127.
Byron's _Childe Harold_, persistent misprint in, 134.
C<ae>soris (Mr. C. J.), 73.
Calamities _for_ Calamites, 116
Calpensis (Flora) not an authoress, 68.
Campbell's (Lord) supposed criticism of _Romeo and Juliet_, 46.
_Campion, Death and Martyrdom of_, 81.
Camus, an imaginary author, 65.
Canons _for_ chanoines, 48.
Capo Basso, 48.
Cardan's treatise _De Subtilitate_ without a misprint, 97
Careme, _Le Patissier Pittoresque_, 74.
Cartwright (Major), 60.
Castlemaine's (Lord) _English Globe_, 87.
Chaucer's works, misprints in, 153.
Chelsea porcelain, 43.
Chernac's _Mathematical Tables_, 144.
Cicero's (Mr. Tul.) _Epistles_, 72.
----_Offices_, 51.
Cinderella and the glass slipper, 57.
Classification, blunders in, 73.
Clement XIV. (Pope), 26.
Clerk (P. K.) _for_ Rev. Patrick Keith, 69.
Cockeram's _English Dictionarie_, 11.
<p 218>
Collier (John Payne), blunder made in a
newspaper account of his burial, 127.
Contractions, ignorant misreading of, 124.
Coquilles, specimens of, 147.
Correspondence, etymology of, 9.
Cow cut into _calves_, 129.
Cowley's allusion to corrupted texts, 135,
Cromwells, confusion of the two, 169.
Cross readings, 24.
Cruikshank's (George) real name supposed to be
Simon Pure, 70.
Curmudgeon, etymology of, 10.
_Damn<e'> et Calive_, 49.
Darius, 54
Dekker's _Satiro-Mastix_, errata to, 80.
Deleted _for_ delited in Shakespeare, 115.
De Morgan, on authors correcting their own
proofs, 89.
D'Israeli's _Curiosities of Literature_, 68, 69.
Do part _for_ depart, 8.
Donis (Nicholas), an imaginary author, 66.
Dorus Basilicus, an imaginary author, 65.
Dotet in trouble, 55.
Drayton, misreading of, 6.
Edgeworth's _Essay on Irish Bulls_, 28.
Emendations of editors, 23.
_English as she is Spoke_, 206.
_English as she is Taught_, 160.
Enrichi de Deux Listes (Mons.), 68.
Erekmann-Chatrian's _Conscript_, 56.
<p 219>
_Errata (lists of_), 78-99.
Estienne's (Henri) joke over a misprint, 152.
Etymologies (absurd), 9.
Ewing's (Bishop) _Argyllshire Seaweeds_, 74.
Examined, blunders of the, 157.
Faith, definition of, 158
Faraday (_Sir_ Michael), 41.
Featley's (Dr. Daniel) _Romish Fisher Caught in
his own Net_, 96.
Field the printer's blunders, 139.
_Finis Coronat opus_, 61.
Fitzgerald (Fighting), 32.
Fletcher's _The Nice Valour_, 96.
Fonseca and Carolino, _Guide of the Conversation_, 205.
_Foreigners' English_, 188-213.
Foulis's edition of Horace, 98.
French kings, anointing of the, 35.
Galt's _Lives of the Players_, 45
Garnett's _Florilegium Amantis_, 75.
Gascoigne's (George) _Droomme of Doomes Day_, 91.
Ghost words, 2.
Girardin's epitaph on Shenstone at Ermenonville, 212.
Gladstone's (Mr.) _Gleanings of Past Years_, 38.
Glanvill's (Joseph) _Essays_, 86.
``God save the King,'' new verse by a Frenchman, 211.
Goldsmith's blunders, 31,
<p 220>
Goldsmith's _Deserted Village_, translation of a line in, 56.
Gordon (J. E. H.) and B. A. Cantab, 69.
Greatrakes (Valentine), blunder in his name, 118.
Greeley's (Horace) bad writing, 126.
Grolier not a binder, 19.
Haggard 's (Rider) _King Solomon's Mines_, 74.
Hales's (Prof.) observations on misprints, 131.
Hall's (John) _Hor<ae> Vaciv<ae>_, 117.
Halliwell-Phillipps' _Dictionary of Misprints_, 80, 101.
Harrison's (Peter) bull, 29.
Henri II. not a potter, 19.
Herodote et aussi Jazon, 49.
Heywood's (Thomas) _Apology for Actors_, 83.
Hirudo _for_ hirundo, 48.
_Hit or Miss_, 53.
Holy Gruel _for_ Holy Grail, 149.
Homeric poems, author of the, 158.
Hood's lines on misprints, 151.
Hood (Thomas), _Geometricall Instrument called a Sector_, 82.
Hook's (Dean) bad writing, 123.
Hooker's _Ecclesiastical Polity_, corrections by the author, 93.
Hopton's (Arthur) _Baculum Geod<oe>ticum Viaticum_, 83.
Horse-shoeing husbandry _for_ horse hoeing, 149.
Hotel-keepers' English, 192.
Howell's (J.) _Deudrologia_, 75.
Huet, ``ancient'' Bishop of Avranch, 51.
<p 221>
Hugo's (Victor) translation, 50.
Hunt's (Leigh) specimens of misprints, 148.
Hyett s{sic} _Flowers from the South_, 74.
Ibn Roshd = Averrhoes, 54
Immoral _for_ immortal, 120.
_Independent Whig_, 53.
``Indifferent justice,'' 42.
Insurrection _for_ resurrection, 133.
Jefferies (Judge) said to have presided at the trial
of Charles I., 37.
Job's wish that his adversary had written a book, 58.
Jonson's (Ben) _Every Man in his Humour_, 95.
Juvenal, edition of, with the first printed errata, 78.
Lamartine's _Girondins_, translation of, 54.
Lamb's _Tales from Shakespeare_, 45.
Lane's (E. W.) good writing, 123.
La Rochefoucauld _as_ Ruchfucove, 53.
Layamon's Brat _for_ Brut, 149.
Le Berceau, an imaginary author, 67
Leigh's (Edward) table of errata, 79.
Leviticus supposed to be a man, 17.
Leycester's (Sir Peter) _Historical Antiquities_, 97.
Littleton's Latin Dictionary, 10.
Lodge's (Prof. Oliver) series of examination papers 174
Logotypes, 113.
<p 222>
London (William) not a bishop, 67.
Louis XIV., blunder of, 171.
----_Secret Memoirs of the Court of_, blunder in 55
_Louis XVIII., M<e'>moires de_, blundes in, 33.
_Love's Last Shift_, 52.
Macaulay's blunder as to the _Faerie Queene_, 39.
----opinion of Goldsmith's blunders, 31.
Malherbe's epitaph on Rosette, 145.
Mantissa, an imaginary author, 67.
Marmontel's _Moral Tales_, 51.
Maroni's (P. V.) _The Opera_, 73.
Marriage Service, misprint in, 8.
Marvell's _Rehearsal Transprosed_, 122.
_Men of the Time_, misFrint in, 155.
M<e'>nage on bad writirlg, 122.
Mephistopheles, 151.
Milton said to have written the _Inferno_, 42
_Misprints_, 100-156.
----(intentional), 155.
Mispronunciations, 22.
Misquotations, 21.
_Miss<ae> ac Misselis Anatomia_, 1561, book with
fifteen pages of errata, 79.
_Mistakes, A New Booke of_, 1637, 24.
Monosyllabic titles, 40.
Morgan's (Silvanus) _Horologiographia Optica_, 85.
Morton's _Natural History of Northamptonshire_, 89.
_Mourning Bride_, 52.
Murray's (Dr.) ghost words, 6.
<p 223>
Murrell's _Cookery_, 1632, 112.
Musical Examinations, blunders in, 164
Napier's bones, 38.
Napoleon III. said to be Consul in 1853, 35
Nash's _Lenten Stuffe_, 93.
Nicholson (Dr. Brinsley) on authors correcting
their own proofs, go, 95.
Nicolai a man not a place, 65.
Nova Scotia _for_ New Caledonia, 51.
Oxford Music Hall supposed to be at Oxford, 17.
Paine (Tom) confused with Thomas Payne, 67.
Paris Exhibition 1889, English guide to, 200.
Passagio (G.) not an author, 68.
Peacham's (Henry) _The Mastive_, 95.
Pickle (Sir Peregrine), 34.
Picus of Mirandula, edition of his works has the
longest list of errata on record, 78.
Playford's John) _Vade Mecum_, 87.
Poluglossos, 208.
Pope's lines, misprint in, 125.
Porcelain, etymology of, 9.
Porson's _Catechism of the Swinish Multitude_, 130.
Printers' upper and lower cases, 110, 111.
Proofs corrected by authors in the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, 89.
Prynne's _Brevia Parliamentaria_, 60.
Pythagoras as Peter Gower, {no page #}
Rabelais' blunder, 146.
<p 224>
Raleigh (Sir Walter), 171.
Ray's (John) _Remains_, 118.
Render, a bad translator; 47.
Richardson's (S.) etymology of correspondence, 9
Ridings of Yorkshire, 7, 191.
Robertson's _Scotland_, translation of, 49.
Robinson (Otis H.), on ``Titles of Books,'' 75.
Roche's (Sir Boyle) bull of the bird that was in
two places at once, 29.
Rogue Croix _for_ Rouge Croix, 130.
Ruskin's _Notes on Sheepfolds_, 73.
Saints (Imaginary), 13.
Sala's (Mr.) opinion on misprints, 128.
San Francisco, Florence, mistaken _for_ San
Francisco, California, 18.
Saroom (Jean), 66.
_Schoolboys' Blunders_, 157-187,
Scot's _Hop-Garden_, 90.
Scott (Sir Walter), ghost word. 5.
----his real name said to be William, 71.
Scylla and Charybdis, 43.
Shakespeare's text improved by attention to the
technicalities of printing, 105, 113.
Sharp's (William) misprint, 120.
Shelley's _Prometheus Unbound_, a copy in whole calf, 72.
Shenstone, epitaph on, by a Frenchman, 212.
Shirley's lines, misprints in, 125.
Sinclair's (Archdeacon) anecdote of an examination, 172.
<p 225>
Sixtus V. (Pope), misprints in his edition of the
Vulgate, 135.
Skeat's (Prof.) ghost words, 2.
----On misprints in Chaucer's works, 153.
Skimpole (Harold), 34.
Smith's (Sydney) ghost word, 4.
Souza's edition of Camoens, 98.
Stanyhurst's translation of Virgil (1582), 59, 91.
Stevens (Henry) on the ``Wicked'' Bible, 136.
Susannah called a maiden, 41.
Swinburne's _Under the Microscope_, 73.
Tellurium, supposed magnetic qualities of, 52.
``Thisms'' _for_ this MS., 119.
Tongs, strife of, 150.
Topography _for_ typography, 121.
Translations, humorous, 61.
Translators said to be traitors, 47
Tressan (Comte de), 47.
Trinity (Master of), 60.
Twain (Mark) on schoolboys' blunders, 160.
Unite _for_ untie, 149.
Ussher (Archbishop), 141.
Vagabond (Mr.) _for_ Mr. Rambler, 60.
Vedast (St.), _alias_ Foster, 13.
Venus _for_ Venns, 130.
Viar (S.), 16.
Vieta's _Canon Mathematicus_, 144.
Virtuous Rocks _for_ Vitreous Rocks, 150.
Viscontian snakes, 48.
<p 226>
Vitus (Saint), 16.
Wade's (Marshal) roads, 26.
_Walker, London_, 53.
Walpole's (Horace) specimen of a bull, 29.
W<a:>lsch _for_ Welsh, 51.
Warburton's (Bishop) blunder in quoting _Cinthio_ 34.
Watt's _Bibliotheca Britannica_, blunder in, 63.
Welsh rabbit, 52.
Wigorn (Bishop), 66.
William IV. when Duke of Clarence, 211.
Winton (George), 66.
Witt's (Richard) _Arithmetical Questions_, 90.
Words that never existed, 3.
Writing (bad) of authors, 122.
Xerxes, 54.
Xinoris (Saint), 13.
Ye _for_ the, 6.
Yonge's _Dynevor Terrace_, misprint in, 120.
_Yvery, History of the House of_, 19.
Zoile (Mons.) et Mdlle. Lycoris, 59.
Zollverein, 40.
End of Project Gutenberg's Literary Blunders, by Henry Benjamin Wheatley